The Siege of Bamborough

 

My second experience with combat was some years after my first. It was the third year of the reign of King Edward IV, and I had set aside my hand cannon and culverin to be a member of the royal artillery. Lord Warwick had requested the assistance of the King’s gun in his siege of Castle Bamburough, where Sir Ralph Grey had given refuge to Henry VI, and so we went with the King’s great iron guns, London and New-Castle, and his brass gun, Dysyson, of which I was one of the gunners, to the Northumberland. As soon as we arrived and arrayed the guns against the castle, Lord Warwick offered a chance to surrender which Sir Grey unwisely refused, and so our bombardment began.



    What a sight (and sound) it was! The three great guns fired together, and the thunderclap and billowing smoke made it seem as though a storm had fallen from the sky to settle on the ground. Whole stones were wrenched from the walls and thrown into the sea. Once, I swear I saw a shot from our gun, Dysyson, fly right through Sir Grey’s chambers in the castle tower! Again and again our gun smote the tower until it fell in a ruin. I will never forget the sight of the tower falling; it fell so slowly and ponderously. Not long after the tower fell, the castle garrison surrendered. The bombardment by all the King’s guns no doubt frightened the garrison into surrender, but I like to think that it was the felling of the tower that did it. 

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