On Friday, I had feared I was going to lose my car. While this might have been good for the environment, at the moment public transport doesn’t do the job it could, so it would have been impossible for me to get to Towton Battlefield on a Sunday. Even on any other day of the week it would take about two and a half hours, when the battlefield is only ten miles from me.
Fortunately, the problem with the car turned out to be one that could be resolved and resolved without huge cost. So, the next issue was getting over a bout of sinusitis so that I could go on the walk I had so been looking forward to.
Along the route, there were information boards, kindly put up by Towton Battlefield Society. Equally, it is thanks to the landowner that the public is allowed to walk on the site (on designated paths).
The landscape is now very different from what the soldiers would have encountered in 1461. Instead of farmers fields
it used to be heath and bog, which in turn were created after ancient Britons had cleared the area of its trees. With a population of less than 3 million in the fifteen century, what is now considered prime agricultural land would not have been the necessity it might be today.
I am therefore once again saddened by both the barbarity of war (approximately 1% of the population of England were killed in the battle) and the losses our environment has incurred. If only we could marry the advantages of 1461 with those of today and keep the bad at bay.
Sinusitis is so debilitating. I hope you lose it
Much better today, thank you, Derrick