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Page 5 of 10
The Battle of Clyst Heath
The moment this news broke, 2,000 enraged Cornishmen made for Clyst Heath, some getting there before dawn to place their ordinance on the lower western slopes. Others soon arrived to position themselves around the heath where Russell and Grey lay encamped, dreading the lash-back they knew was coming. At dawn, they found themselves under fire as the Cornish guns opened up. There was no expanse of open ground where Russell could deploy his cavalry, so he opted for his favourite three-pronged approach, while the Royal Engineers cut their way through the hedges to the Topsham road for the cavalry to round the Cornish forces and attack them from behind – another of Russell’s preferred tactics.
The Battle of Clyst Heath, August 6, 1549, was the bloodiest yet in this Anglo-Cornish war. Outmanoeuvred, outgunned, outflanked and outnumbered, the Cornish fought like men possessed, burning with fury born of the previous evening’s massacre. Several times, Russell called on them to surrender but had the offer thrown back in his teeth. Lord Grey was later to comment that he had never seen the like, nor taken part in such a murderous fray. As he had led the charge against the Scots in the Battle of Musselburgh, this was a telling statement.
The battle lasted the entire day, the Cornish fighting to the last man and taking a huge number of Russell’s soldiers with them. Appalled by the carnage of his victory, Lord Russell took his troops down river to Topsham, while at Exeter those Cornishmen still encamped around the city walls finally lifted their five-week siege and marched away. Refusing to lower themselves to the depths to which the English army had sunk, they preferred to maintain honour and released all their own prisoners unharmed.
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