Battle Of Hastings Research Paper

The Battle of Hastings

On August 1066, William, Duke of Normandy assembled 4000 knights and 7000 foot soldiers at the mouth of the Dives River, on the coast of Normandy. However they were unable to embark because of the unfavourable winds.

Harold Godwinson who was the King of England feared an attack in the Hastings-Pevensey area, but by the 8th of September King Harold though the wind would ruin any attack by sea, so he sent away his English fleet and his army of men.

On the 27th of September the winds turned favourable, William sailed to the port of Pevensey. When he landed on the 29th of September he made a makeshift fort on top of the ruins of a Roman Stronghold. 2 days later William moved his entire army 16 kilometres to the east to a

small fishing port called Hastings, which was a much better place for an invasion. When there he made two large wooden forts.
On the 2nd of October King Harold heard William had landed and started to march a large army of poorly trained men to confront William. William was no threat to London and his seat of power but Harold knew that he was plundering his land so he had to stop him. Harold arrived outside Hastings on the 13th of October 1066 on a ridge known as Battle.
The next morning William and his army road out of Hastings at 6 am. What they found was Harold and his army already formed up in ranks 10-12 deep. They didn’t start fighting until 9:30am, when the Norman Archers started firing on the English, but the arrows where stopped by a wall of English shields. Many of the Norman archers died in their exposed position. The Norman infantry went in next but where cut down by the English 2 handed battle axes. The battle continued on for many hours. By evening William knew he had to win or surrender, because Harold would get reinforcements and he would get none. William ordered an all-out attack, this time the archers fired high in the sky, the falling arrows thinned the English ranks. The English were forced to shorten their lines so they could maintain there shield wall. At this moment the Normans turned into a killing machine they cut through the English although it took them a further 2 hours to finish them off. Harold was thought to have died by getting shot in the eye by an arrow. The remaining few Englishmen retreated to the edge of a nearby forest where they tried to make a stand, but were cut down. The road to London was now open for William.
Causes:
Edward the confessor was the last King of the old English Royal line. When he died childless on the 10th of January 1066, there was a problem with who would succeed him. Much earlier, when Edward was alive William of Normandy had been promised by Edward that he would be the next king of England. So when Edward died everyone thought that William would be the next king. However, in his death bed, King Edward changed his mind on who would succeed him, he decided that another one of his favourites, Harold Godwinson Earl of Wessex and Kent, would be crowned king. Because of King Edwards’s change of mind, William Duke of Normandy decided that he would try to take the throne of England by force. This was definitely the biggest cause for the battle of Hastings because if William had been selected to be king like he was promised than he would have no motive to invade England and try to take the throne from Harold because he was already the King.
King Harold was well aware of the threat of the William and the Normans, so he decided that is was essential to have an army in place in case of an invasion.

To get troops to fight the Normans, Harold called on his levies, which were free men who owed two months of service to the English Military each year. Harold and his army waited for the Normans in the south of England for two months, but the Normans didn’t come because the weather was too bad. The levies terms of duties were over so they left, and food reserves had become low so Harold was forced to stand down his Navy for the coming winter. Harold’s army was now very depleted. So when William and his army eventually came when the weather was better they were able to sail in without any trouble, if the weather was better two months earlier and Harold had his full force of men and the Navy then the Normans may have been confronted on the sea and not at Hastings.

My last cause of the Battle of Hastings was that after Harold had sent away the Navy and his army of men in the South an invasion of Northumbria was happening in the North of England. Harold had to march his already depleted army up to the north of England to fight up there. He defeated the invaders but his army was damaged even more, whilst he was away in the north William sailed in in the south without any

trouble.
Consequences:
The Battle of Hastings marked the beginning of a new era in British History.
There were many consequences of the Battle of Hastings, the first one and probably the biggest consequence was what William Duke of Normandy wanted in the first place, to be crowned King. After the battle, where the newly crowned king of England, Harold, was killed and defeated by William and his army of Normans, William started his march on London. When William arrived at Berkhamsted near London the city surrendered. William took hostages to ensure that the surrender was kept. William wanted to be crowned king as soon as possible. His coronation took place on Christmas Day, 1066, in Westminster Abbey by Arch Bishop Ealdred. William was the first Norman King of England, and the Anglo-Saxon era was over.
Another direct consequence of the Battle of Hastings was the end of Anglo-Saxon England and the almost total elimination of the old English aristocracy also the loss of English control over the Catholic Church in England. The Anglo-Saxon period lasted for 600 years, from 410 to 1066 when William of Normandy took the throne and started the Norman rule England. When William took over he did made many changes to England, for example, he systematically dispossessed English landowners and gave their property to his own followers, by 1086 only about 5% of land in England was owned by English hands. This tiny percentage diminished further in the decades that followed. Native English were also removed from high governmental and religious office. After 1075 all earldoms were held by Normans. A large number of English people found the Norman control unbearable and emigrated, popular destinations were Scotland and the Byzantine Empire, others settled in Scandinavia and perhaps even Russia and the coasts of the Black Sea.
My last consequence was the introduction of Anglo-Norman, a northern language similar to Old French, it became the main language of the ruling classes in England, replacing Old English. This majority was increased even further in the mid-twelfth century by an influx of followers of the Angevin dynasty, speaking a more common type of French. The English language did not regain its former dominance until the fourteenth century, while the use of French in court didn’t end until well into the fifteenth century.