The storming of Berwick on 30 March 1296 opened with English cavalry crashing through the town's flimsy palisade defences. The massacre that followed lasted several days and killed thousands of civilians; contemporary estimates range from 7,000 to 17,000 though scholarly estimates are lower. Edward I reportedly halted the killing only when clergy intervened. The systematic nature of the massacre — intended as a terror demonstration — was unprecedented in Anglo-Scottish warfare and set the tone for a generation of savage conflict.
Aubrey generates in-depth historical research for any location in Britain — drawing on Domesday records, scheduled monuments, Victorian OS maps, geological data and archaeological archives to tell the full story of a place.
Research a location near Berwickshire