What s the furthest you think a Scottish army ever got into England?
I think you might be surprised If you re interested in the people
places and events in Scottish history then click the subscribe
button at the bottom right of the screen. In the meantime, let me take you on a journey.
This is Carlisle Castle. It s been besieged by Scots
from the time of William Wallace to Bonny Pince Charlie s Jacobites
and yes I know Jacobites weren t uniquely Scottish and Scots weren t all Jacobites.
Anyway the answer to the question isn t Carlisle
although the tensions that caused this Scottish army to march south did
involve a dispute over lands in this area but we have to go further south to find out.
We re now just south of Derby. This is how far Jacobites
got with Bonny Prince Charlie. In fact this memorial tells you
THIS CAIRN MARKS THE FARTHEST POINT SOUTH REACHED
BY THE JACOBITE ARMY OF PRINCE CHARLES EDWARD STUART
ON 4TH DECEMBER 1745 Erected by the
Charles Edward Stuart Society & Marstons Brewery
on the 250th anniversary I assumed they made a lot of cash from Scottish
Jacobites drinking the weak beer down here but it turns out this is now the beer
garden of a Marston s pub either way, a Scottish army
reached much further south than this and it was much earlier than 1745.
If you watched my video about How Henry II stole the north of England from Scotland in 1157,
you ll know that Henry wasn t only a killer of Canterbury Archbishops,
but a reneger on promises to Scottish kings. Not only was this the reason that Alexander II
came south with an army sixty years later it s also the reason he, a Scottish king,
was named earlier that year in England s Magna Carta.
If you get nothing else from this video, there s a pub quiz question for you to savour.
If you take anything else from the video, then it s about Alexander II and the furthest a Scottish
army got south in England It s kind of about dishonest
English kings as well. I cover some of the things
that led up to this in my video about why 1157 may be the most important date in Scottish history
I m not going to lie, there ll be some who get caught up in the whole Scottish/English thing.
Let s just remember it wasn t us. It was eight hundred years ago, so calm doon.
If your x times great grandad was involved then they probably didn t have YouTube,
so you making a fool of yourself arguing in the comments section isn t going to help anyone.
There s no point somebody will still do it.
If you want to say something in the comment section then put your guess for
how far south we re going to get oh and whilst you re in the bit
underneath the video, why not click through to the shop and buy a mug
or one of these groovy T-shirts. The point
is that a while back Henry II of England had taken Cumbria and Northumbria from Malcolm IV.
He was the grandson of David I of Scotland. He s known by the epithet Malcolm the Maiden.
After his short reign his brother became William I, or William the Lion.
See when posterity knows you as Malcolm the Maiden and your brother as William the Lion,
It makes you wonder whether you made the correct choice of toys when you were children
but that s what brings us to William the Lion s SON
Alexander II who this video is about.
He still wants those lands in the north of England back.
Of course, things had happened in England as well since Henry II reneged on that land deal.
Henry had killed an Archbishop called Thomas Becket,
faced rebellion from his own sons, and later he died.
Now the two of Henry s sons that concern US are Richard I the English lion king,
and his brother John, he was the baddie in Robin Hood.
John has problems He was fighting to
regain lands in France that didn t go well. He had a poor relationship with his English nobles
particularly the ones in the north . which was getting worse
That all led to a compromise treaty with the nobles that, along with later amendments,
we call Magna Carta.
Now I said that Alexander II was named in the Magna Carta, and he was.
Alexander had been inaugurated king of Scots at Scone on December 5th 1214.
Of course, in another sense Alexander is one of the English king s nobles.
He held English lands from the King of England. The confusion between Scots kings
holding feudal lands in England AND being kings in their own right in Scotland,
that caused upset over sovereignty for centuries.
We ve already seen what these cheeky English monarchs are like.
It s a bit like if you had a holiday cottage in France and the French President said:
Right that means you and all your lands in Scotland belong to me.
That s EXACTLY what it was like. Now THAT is going to cause comments
The point is that like many English kings before and after,
John had tried to impose himself on Scotland itself,
not just the bits of England owned by the King of Scots.
When Alexander s dad was alive, John had come up with an army and
insisted on the right of choosing who would marry off Alexander s sisters
Let s be honest, monarchs on both sides of the border had looked to
increase the lands and people under their control whenever they got the chance.
Hence the argument over Cumbria and Northumbria Now John s problems with his northern nobles gave
Alexander an opportunity. In early 1215 some English
barons with Scottish land holdings had started appearing at Scottish court
looking for Alexander to help them in their conflict with John.
But Alexander was only just in the job, and decided that caution was the best option.
Then the rebel nobles marched on London and that s when that whole Magna Carta compromise
was signed here at Runnymede on 15th June 1215
The problem was, neither side took it seriously and England drifted into civil war.
The rebel barons did two things that concern us.
Now remember John had been disputing lands in France .
The rebel barons asked the French Dauphain, Louis VIII, to come and be king of England
and the northern barons were happy to swear allegiance to Alexander.
On October 19th Alexander s army crossed the Scottish border and took
the homage of Barons of Northumbria. How far south did he come?
In January 1216 when King John moved against his barons in the north
they turned again to Alexander and reaffirmed their homage and fealty
John crossed over to Berwick and laid waste to it
poor old Berwick gets it every time. but then he continued into Lothian.
John went on an orgy of destruction through the southeast of Scotland.
Alexander launched a counter raid into Cumberland before John retreated back south.
By August Carlisle was firmly in Scottish hands again.
It was now the seat of Scottish administration over Cumberland and West Morland.
Effectively the north of what we call England was part of Scotland.
Then Alexander headed over Pennines to Durham before turning further south
Louis had landed in Kent from France to take the English crown just like
the English barons had asked him. Alexander met him at Canterbury,
and the Scottish King and French Dauphin marched south as English landowners
eighty years before the Auld Alliance between Scotland and France.
They came here and laid siege to this castle. Louis agreed that Cumberland
and Northumbria were Alexanders and Alexander gave homage for those lands.
Nearly sixty years after the lands had been lost to the Scots king, through Henry II s duplicity,
a Scottish force had come down here. The southern lands, that the English call north,
were back in Scottish hands. But John wasn t finished.
Weakened, but not defeated, John struck at Alexander s lines of communication.
Alexander hurried back north to deal with this Then John did something to scupper Alexander s
cause that was even sneakier than his father Henry II.
It was a devious strategy nobody had expected Overnight on18-19th October 1216
he died. The sneaky bastard.
Just when Alexander had got the north of England back the source
of much of the barons anger was gone. They thought: Hold on it ll be much easier
to deal with John s underage son Henry III. They reneged on the agreement with French king.
Alexander found his northern English support dwindling and once again
Scotland was denied a load of potential second string players for our international rugby team
The border didn t come south but a Scottish army had come deep into England
to besiege the castle here . AT DOVER
I ve got a video that explains the detail of that Henry II promise to David I
and it s coming up on screen now