There are times when I really need to be paying closer attention to "impulse" reads, as while this book ostensibly concentrates on the notorious battle, it's really about the slow-motion fall of Henry VI and the House of Lancaster. That said, I'm not so saturated in medieval English history that I didn't get anything out of this work. Goodwin's main virtue is to emphasize how the walking leadership void that was Henry contributed to the ferocity of the "Wars of the Roses," arguing that only an active monarch with a certain degree of military and political skill could have had a chance of controlling the forces undermining the English state. As for the battle itself, Goodwin goes to some lengths to argue that Towton still deserves its notoriety for being the bloodiest day in English intramural combat. I wasn't convinced, but Goodwin does seem like he's providing a reasonable accounting. ( )

For the 550th commemoration of the battle of Towton which took place in northern England on March 29th in 1461, George Goodwin has written a good general introduction to the War of the Roses that led up to this battle which is usually marketed as England's bloodiest. This claim is not backed by facts. The large number of participants in this battle, far larger than in all the other battles of the War of the Roses relies either on monkish non-witness sources or on a napkin calculation of England's male population. In my guesstimate, it is unlikely that more than 30.000 men were engaged. If one counts actual fighters, the numbers would shrink even further. Given the absence of documentation, all numbers are but speculations.

Goodwin thus speaks of "England's most brutal battle", even if the true butchery happened after the battle. As in most medieval battles, the majority of casualties occurred in the aftermath of the battle, when the blocked fleeing Lancastrians were massacred. The battle is, however, only the endpoint of this book, its final tenth chapter. The first eight chapters recap the origin of the conflict between the Yorkists and Lancastrians. I found the presentation of Henry VI's schizophrenia one of the highlights of the book. The character vignettes are also well done. The military aspects and the quality problems of the Lancastrians would have merited a more extensive treatment than chapter nine's examination of the campaign and the battle of Towton in chapter ten. Those interested in the battlefield mechanics should look to Boardman's and Haigh's books about the battle. Recommended to the general reader. ( )