The Wars of the Roses were fought from 1455 to 1487, a total of thirty-two years, yet the actual number of combatants were small, and campaigning actually occurred only over a twelve or thirteen week period during the entire period.

As Philip A. Haigh noted in his The Military Campaigns of the Wars of the Roses, "The stakes were high,…(but) The harsh reality of combat on the battlefields of fifteenth century England was that much of it was hard and brutal, and often fought in miserable…conditions." The 'small' number of combatants managed to do an incredible amount of damage. Over 100,000 lives were lost because of the wars, over 3% of the population of England. Add to this the material destruction, misplaced families and the horrible suffering brought on by plague in besieged towns and cities, and a truer picture of this bloody, fratricidal war can be perceived.

By 1453, all but Calais had been lost to the French on the European continent. Many Englishmen were angry with their government for this failure to hold onto these possessions that had been so hard to maintain for so many centuries. The sacrifices of their noble ancestors seemed destined to be besmirched by the lack of resolve in the current monarchy. Henry V's strengths and charisma had not been passed down to Henry VI, who was described as vacillating and indecisive, suffering as well from mental illness!

For a time, the kingdom was held in the more able hands of a distant cousin of Henry's, the Duke of York, but Henry, having one of his lucid moments, dismissed York and instead placed the Duke of Somerset into Royal favor. York, not one to be dismissed so casually form his position of power, went home and rallied support, including the powerful Earl of Salisbury and his son, Warwick (the future 'Kingmaker'). With a force of 3,000 men, archers, billmen, men-at-arms and levies, they marched south. Henry, aware of the insurrection, raised a force of 2,000 men, all seasoned troops with good officers, and marched north to meet the rebels. From the beginning, the war was not one of geographic rivals, as most wars are, but of dynastic rivals.

The thirty-two years of fighting for the crown of England saw the continued use of the longbow as the missile weapon of choice, though handguns were used on occasion, primarily by mercenaries. The ratio of archers in the armies was quite high, as much as 8:1. Insofar as actual numbers went, Hastings led 3,000 archers in 1471, the Stanleys had 3,000 in 1485, the Duke of Norfolk commanded 1,000 in 1484, while Oxford had 800 at the Battle of Barnet and Robert Ogle led 600 at the first battle of St. Albans.

It was also a time of confusing names and interchangeable titles, making it sometimes difficult to determine who was on what side at what time. Most of the armies were small and there was little use of the vast numbers of shire levies, as any but the most ardent supporters of a faction feared to support a possible loser, especially as the wars grew more brutal and executions of captured prisoners increased.

One way troops were raised was by Commissions of Array, whereby the nobles had knights bound to them in exchange for the lord's influence and word in court or on the field of battle to support the knights. The knights were also bound to bring with them their retainers to fight alongside them. In this way, the armies were kept up to a size acceptable to fight a pitched battle.

By 1460, it became accepted that prisoners would not be ransomed, but would instead be executed. Lands belonging to the deceased lord would then be distributed among the victors. Though the War of the Roses was a civil war in every sense of the word, the common people were not unduly treated. There was very little outright pillage, rape or destruction of towns as most of the war took place on the battlefield. The contending factions also did not want to alienate the people they would be ruling, if they finally managed to defeat their enemies. The war was one of nobles and knights, not of peasants and commoners.

Artillery had been utilized as long as a century before, and had really shown its value at Castillon in 1453, when the French had destroyed the English forces at the final battle of the 100 Year's War. The lesson was not forgotten. In every major battle of the Wars of the Roses, artillery was used. As mentioned before, the longbow, still considered at this point in time superior to firearms, continued to rule the battlefield. Most cavalry dismounted to fight as the experiences of the 100 Year's War were vividly remembered, notably the French cavalry charges at Agincourt in 1415 that had been utterly decimated by longbow fire. As noted by Dominic Mancini in 1483, "On reaching the field of battle, the horses are abandoned, and they all fight together under the same condition so that no one should hold any hope of flight." Mounted were, however, used at Towton, Barnet and Bosworth.

The loss of life among the noble houses of England during the war would be very high. Trollope, a veteran of the 100 Year's War was knighted by the Prince of Wales after the second battle at St. Albans. He proceeded to tell the Prince, "My lord I have not deserved it, for I slew but fifteen men…." During the war, three Dukes of Somerset were killed, along with two Earls of Northumberland, two Earls of Devon, and Richard Neville (Warwick the Kingmaker) and his brother at the same battle. Between 1459 and 1461, eighteen nobles were either killed in battle or executed afterwards. Between 1469 and 1461, seventeen nobles lost their lives and between 1483 and 1487, seven nobles were killed. Very few nobles stayed out of the fighting. In fact between 1459 and 1461, of the total of 68 nobles in England, 54 of them fought on one side or the other. An incredible figure, noted by K. B. MacFarlane, lists the extinction rates of noble families in England between 1425-1491 as over 25%!

Army sizes were restricted because of the lack of support by commoners. They simply refused to fight away from their home areas. This was just the opposite for the nobles, 75% of whom particiated at the Battle of Towton in 1461. This was a huge battle by all accounts, with large numbers of commoners for a change. Numbers were estimated at a high of 50,000 or more. After Towton, the nobles were less eager than before to actively support a faction, as executions became the price if you lost.

As far as the faction went and how nobles determined which side to support, much of their support depended upon which side their rivals chose. There were many age-old feuds that continued to fester. In the north of England, there was the Percy family on one side, and the Neville's then automatically chose the other. In the west, it was the Earl of Devon against Lord Bonville. Blood ties also were important, such as the Neville's and Bourchiers supporting the Yorkists.

Since 90% of the population did not live in towns, most of the fighters in the armies were hard to muster. There was no pay per se, and the mustered forces were mostly untrained. The inability to keep an army in the field for any length of time meant a short campaign season. In fact, the longest campaign of the war was only seven and a half weeks long.

This, then is a brief background to the war. We are at present working on a scenario booklet that will include thirteen battle scenarios. Each scenario will have a short introduction, a description of the historical battle, a listing of the forces using the Medieval Warfare War of the Roses army list, and a full color map, including historical setups. The booklet will also include a short painting guide and suggestions for building your armies.

The battles during the Wars of the Roses were not all balanced, as historical battles often favored one side over the other. For these, it is best to use them for club games to teach the rules, or to vary the victory conditions so as to allow the weaker force a chance to win. Likewise, the commanders were varied in their command quality. I do not believe in building into a game an 'idiot' factor. Let each player bring his own skills to the table and not be hampered by artificial abstractions as to the quality of a commander.

We have also opted to include strategems as developed by Richard Crawley in WI issue # 56. These allow for interesting situations to give some unpredictability to certain battles.

By all means, enjoy your games. The Medieval Warfare rules are meant to be fun. The scenarios provide a quick way to get into playing the game and can also be used for period specific tournament play.

As always, if you have any questions or ideas, email me at tlgore@frontiernet.net or join our rules discussion group at GoreAMwar-subscribe@egroups.com