Forgotten fields of america3/14/2023 ![]() James IV’s body is thought to rest below an English golf course.James IV was married to Margaret Tudor, daughter of King Henry VII, through whose line arose the Union of the Crowns of England and Scotland.James IV of Scotland (1473-1513) was the last king to die on a battlefield in Britain.Some articles will feature pub-quiz style trivia and coincidence to evidentially demonstrate the importance of this event. That is likely to be the hook, and hence Flodden’s ‘story’. So far, there has been very little coverage, but what you are likely to read about today, to the extent that Flodden is even covered as part of the ‘news cycle’, is the ‘forgotten’ Flodden. The national Scottish focus is firmly on the Battle of Bannockburn, the 700 th anniversary of which is next year. That lack of will seems to continue into today. There were not enough men who returned to their families to share their tales and create a narrative, and of those who did, perhaps there was a lack of will to relive that barbarous day. Unlike the lengthy military campaigns in France and Belgium during the First World War, there was insufficient time for a weight of eloquently written literature to emerge documenting the valiant suffering of those who participated. Within twenty years, perhaps, the land would have shown no visible sign of what had gone before. It is hard, painful, to imagine how the sounds of battle would have smashed that silence, how the fields would have become scarred, laden and infused with the horror, the air befouled. It felt like a place where the earth and heavens meet, where the elements battle on a daily basis. The surface of the battlefield, at the time of our visit an expanse of closely cropped corn stubble, appeared to move as shadows from the clouds above swept across the ground. The site of the battle is in the middle of nowhere, the surrounding countryside rural and largely unoccupied. ![]() The feeling that overwhelmed me was one of exposure. Two weeks ago I stood on Flodden Field on a breezy yet mild autumn afternoon. On 9 September 1513, in a field in northern England, thousands of men, including King James IV of Scotland and many of his nobles, died when an English force met and defeated a raiding Scottish army. Today is the 500 th anniversary of the bloody Battle of Flodden.
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