The Battle of Benfleet

Over the centuries the wild coasts of Essex have been so tamed and subdued that I doubt the locals from even a hundred years ago would recognise where they were if they were to arrive here at present day. Over the centuries flood defences have turned the old Essex marshes to fields and more recently from fields to urban sprawl. It does however seem strange to think that thousands of people drive through the site of a Viking fort on their way on and off of Canvey Island every day, and whilst I'm sure most are aware of the Viking memorial placed by the side of road, I suspect few really know just how important the battle of Benfleet really was to our nation's history.

The Context For Hæstan's Invasion

The first Viking raids occurred in 836 but became an issue for the English for hundreds of years.  Comparatively, Essex saw very little of the conflicts compared with other parts of England like Wessex, Mercia and Northumbria, but even so there are still a number of significant Anglo-Danish battle sites spread around the county that have ultimately shaped the history of the country and the world.

England in the ninth century had yet to coalesce into a single kingdom and was at that point still broken up into various sub-kingdoms known generally as the heptarchy. Essex for example had for a time been an independent kingdom in its own right until absorbed into Wessex around 825. Throughout the Saxon period, Wessex along with Mercia, rose to prominence and became one of the two most dominant territories within the heptarchy, and it is Wessex whom we have to thank for King Alfred the Great, who is perhaps the biggest reason that we speak English (albeit with romantic influence) and not a form of Danish.

It was Alfred the Great's leadership in 894 which ultimately ensured the English triumph over the Danish army led by Hæstan at the battle of Benfleet, but it would not do the men of either side justice to explain only the circumstances of the battle itself, for it was only the end to a long and grueling campaign that had lasted many months occurring haphazardly all over England.

In the year 878, the whole future of England had been in jeopardy. Wessex had been invaded by the Danes and they had reached the Wessex heartlands forcing Alfred the Great to conduct a guerrilla war, retreating often and harrying the Danes in a war of attrition until eventually routing the enemy at Edington in Wiltshire on the 6th of May, forcing the remaining Danes to flee back to a locally held fortress. Alfred's men were then able to encircle the fortress at Edington forcing the Danish king Guthrum to seek terms as the besieged Danes began to run low on provisions. The result was the Treaty of Wedmore which effectively split England more or less in half diagonally from Liverpool to London, with the Danes occupying more or less the entire eastern half of the country and the city of London itself. In return the Danes were asked if they would be baptised, to which they agreed, and hostages were exchanged to seal the deal.

In 886 following a series of raids on Wessex from the Danelaw, Alfred once again assembled his men and retook London. It seems that the raids that initiated the conflict however were not a military action sanctioned by Guthrum, but merely the actions of a few badly behaved Viking opportunists. Guthrum died soon after in 890, but the Viking threat refused to die with him. Hæstan, the leader of a great army looked to England wantingly.

Hæstan's Invasion 

A great fleet of some two hundred and fifty ships landed Hæstan's army in Kent in the winter of 892, and quickly moved to occupy the fortified town of Appledore. Shortly after, a smaller force of some eighty ships landed more troops on the south bank of the Thames, capturing the town of Milton. Their plan originally seemed to be to join these two armies together in a pincer movement, capturing the city of Canterbury in order to cut off England's trade routes to the continent.

In the spring of 894, Alfred moved his army directly between these two Viking armies and once again turned to guerrilla warfare tactics to harass the larger Viking forces. The English cleverly used the topography of the area to their advantage, setting themselves near Ashford in a gap between the hills and the heavily wooded area of the Kent Downs. Communications between the two Danish armies were severed, and due to the ferocity of the English ambushes, the Danes eventually gave up on combining the two armies altogether.

The smaller army to the north left Milton and crossed the Thames estuary to Benfleet with Hæstan. Its possible that a small colony of Danes were already living there, and so could have been called upon to repair ships and assist with the army that had now come to be stationed there. Multiple longboats would have been moored up in the East Haven Creek and in a coastal channel which before the building of flood defences flowed up behind where the Helmet and Hoy pub stands today. Soon after their arrival, the Danes at Benfleet were ordered to make themselves ready to push west on a raid, a decision which ultimately would be Hæstan's downfall.

The larger contingent at Appledore also finally left their encampments after exhausting their supplies and also headed west raiding towns and villages as they went. King Alfred's son Edward, commanding a sizeable Saxon force, pursued them and intercepted them at Farnham in Surrey. The Danes were routed and fled north, crossing the Thames near Staines with Edward's men in pursuit. Hæstan, unaware of the defeat of the larger army, had left the safety of the Benfleet fort leaving only a small detachment to defend their plundered goods and Hæstan's wife and children.

Meanwhile as all this was going on, another fleet of Danish ships had embarked from Northumbria, sailed through the Strait of Dover and were well on their way to Devon and Cornwall. Its unclear whether this was part of a united campaign among the various Danish warlords or whether it was just an opportunistic excursion; but it certainly broke up the English defenders. Alfred was forced to leave the campaign in the south east and head to the West Country, leaving the ongoing campaign which so far had been going well, to his son Edward and his son-in-law Earl Ethelflæd.

The Danes Retreat to Benfleet

Edward's forces continued to chase the remnants of the Danish army that they had defeated at Farnham, finally cornering them on an island in the river Colne near Iver in Buckinghamshire. It seemed as though the English were about to win an absolute victory, but bad timing got the better of the English besiegers. As per English law, after a period of six months military service English soldiers were given the choice to return home to their farmsteads. Given that most families were responsible for feeding themselves it was imperative for most of them that they should return home, particularly for harvest, else their family risked starvation through the winter months. During the crossover between soldiers returning home and fresh ones arriving, the Danes took their opportunity and broke the siege, fleeing east in small groups back to the stronghold at Benfleet.

Edward's army was unable to keep up with or predict the routes these multiple groups were taking independently and so regrouped back at London to plan the next engagement. Although the Danish break through at Iver and their subsequent regrouping at Benfleet was a set back for the Saxons, it was offset by the fact that the English now had a fresh fighting force that should be far more effective. Upon arriving at London, news of the largely successful campaign encouraged many Londoners to take up arms alongside Edward in the Fyrd (Old English for militia), increasing the size of his army further.

Although the English had the advantage for now, they couldn't afford to rest on their laurels. They needed a full-blown conclusion to the campaign before winter or the Danes could potentially gather more troops - and had that have happened they in all likelihood would have needed to fight the same campaign all over again the following year.

When the Danish groups who had broken free at Iver arrived at Benfleet I can't imagine they'd have been too pleased. Having received heavy casualties, they arrived at Benfleet to find only a tiny defensive garrison. Hæston was still out raiding and the fleet of ships which had been moored at Benfleet had mostly relocated to Mersea Island. All they could do was sit at the fort behind the wooden palisades and hope that help would come. But it didn't.

The Assault on the Benfleet Fort

Although the distance to Benfleet from London was only some thirty-odd miles, the landscape in the Anglo-Saxon period was remarkably different to how it looks today. Along the Thames lay thick woodlands and riverside marshes, the only main road into the Benfleet area went through the main towns of Ilford, Brentwood, Billericay and Wickford. But taking down a fortification needs an element of surprise, so its unlikely that they used main roads. Edward's army probably passed through occupied Essex unhindered, their advance held secret by locals as they edged their way closer to the Danish stronghold through the pristine Essex woodland.

The fort at Benfleet was typical of the time period, using the creeks that almost encircled South Benfleet (modern sea defences have changed the geography of the area substantially) as part of the fort's defences. A ditch and rampart was likely dug on the eastern flank which was not protected by any water, likely following where the Grosvenor road lies today, and continuing all the way down to the Hadleigh Ray. The whole fort would have then been surrounded by high wooden palisades with a keep and tower constructed where the car park exists today behind the Half Crown pub. The battle site was verified when the nearby train line was under construction during the mid-nineteenth century. Labourers found numerous skeletons and the remains of charred Viking longships embedded in the mud. Up until fairly recently there was also a visible bank behind St Mary's churchyard from the original fort perimeter, as mentioned in the local 1855 archælogical journal.

Its not clearly understood how the battle at Benfleet was conducted as the only written account we have comes from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle which was written decades after the event. What we can presume is that the Danes would not have chosen to meet the Saxons outside of their fortified position and fight on level ground. Perhaps the English forces managed to form up at the nearby hill at Thundersley and attack the unsuspecting Danes in one full on attack, but it equally could have been a stealthy midnight infiltration. Perhaps being outnumbered and worn out they surrendered without too much resistance.Whatever the case the Saxons won a flawless victory there, with the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle's account reporting:

A map of Benfleet Fort and how it
corresponds to modern Benfleet:
Red - Bank, ditch and barricade
Yellow - The inner keep
Blue - The old Benfleet creek
which no longer exists.

“The fortress at Beamfleote had ere this been constructed by Hæstan, and he was at the same time gone out to plunder and the Great Army was therein. Then they (the English) came thereto and put the Army to flight and stormed the fortress and took all that was within it as well as the women and children also, and brought the whole to London and Rochester, and they brought the wife of Hæstan and his two sons to the King."

Its a possibility that during the battle, a number of Danes fled eastward towards Shoebury at a site known as the Danish Camp to form a last stand. The fort at Shoebury on the site of The Garrison estate is actually prehistoric, but its entirely possible that the Danes also used the earth banks there later on, and perhaps not just on this one occasion. Excavations done in 1998 there however only turned up a few pieces of pottery from the time period, which proves very little. 

Following the English victory, King Alfred accepted Hæstan's family as friends, offering an olive branch to the Danes by releasing them back to her husband unharmed. It was said that Hæstan was so overwhelmed with Alfred's generosity and good will that he swore an oath never to attack England again. The defeat of the Danes at Benfleet that day created a period of relative stability for a century. In the relative stability without constant fears of Danish invasions, Alfred's grandson eventually saw the magnum opus of a unified England fulfilled.

The battle of Benfleet was included in the 2009 novel entitled The Burning Land, written by Bernard Cornwell, (a part of the The Last Kingdom series which has recently been made into a TV drama by the BBC.) The battle also has a memorial in South Benfleet with a commemorative stone and ship monument visible from the main road near the railway bridge. Whilst culturally the battle is pretty obscure, had the Saxons failed to take Benfleet when they did then there is a good possibility that the Danes could have received reinforcements and defeated the dynasty that gave rise to a unified England.

Sources

(1.) A History of Benfleet (Early Days) Written by H.E Priestley, written in 1977.
(2.) Historic England - Defended prehistoric settlement at Shoeburyness, known as the Danish Camp: https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1017206