How Sir Tord Fought For Charles Of Sweden
In the year 1450 and the succeeding period there was great disorder in
the Scandinavian kingdoms. The Calmar Union was no longer satisfactory to
the people of Sweden, who were bitterly opposed to being ruled by a
Danish king. There were wars and intrigues and plots and plans, with
plenty of murder and outrage, as there is sure to be in such troublous
times. There was king after king, none of them pleasing to the people.
King Erik behaved so badly that neither Sweden nor Denmark would have
anything to do with him, and he became a pirate, living by plunder. Then
Duke Christopher of Bavaria was elected king of Scandinavia, but he also
acted in a way that made every one glad when he died. In those days there
was a great nobleman in Sweden, named Karl Knutsson, who had a hand in
everything that was going on. One thing especially made him very popular
at that time, when a new king was to be elected. The spring had been very
dry and there was danger of a complete failure of the crops, but on the
day when Karl landed in Stockholm, May 23, 1450, there came plentiful
rains and the people rejoiced, fancying that in some way he had brought
about the change of weather. So, when the lords assembled to elect a new
king, Karl received sixty-two out of seventy votes, while the people
shouted that they would have no other king. He was then crowned king as
Charles VIII. There had been only one Charles before him, but somehow the
mistake was made of calling him Charles VIII., and in later years came
Charles IX., X., etc., the mistake never being rectified.
All this is in introduction to a tale we have to tell, that of a bold
champion of King Charles. For the new king had many troubles to contend
with. The king of Denmark in especial gave him much trouble, and the
southern province of West Gothland was in danger of seceding from his
rule. In this dilemma he chose his cousin, Sir Tord Bonde, a young but
daring and experienced warrior, as the captain of his forces in that
province. He could not have made a better choice, and the stirring career
of Sir Tord was so full of strange and exciting events that we must
devote this tale to his exploits.
Loedoese, a stronghold of Gothland, was still held by the Danes, and Sir
Tord's first adventure had to do with this place. On a dark, rainy, and
stormy night he led a party of shivering horsemen towards the town,
galloping onward at headlong speed over the muddy road and reaching the
place before day-dawn. Utterly unexpectant of such a coming, the Danes
were taken by surprise and all made prisoners, Sir Tord's men feeding
luxuriously on the enemy's meat and wine as some recompense for their wet
night's journey.
Master of the place without a blow, Sir Tord found there a bag of
letters, containing some that had to do with plots against the king.
These letters he sent to King Charles, but they put him upon a new
adventure of his own. One of the traitors was Ture Bjelke, master of
Axewalla Castle, and Sir Tord, fancying that the traitor would be as
welcome a present to the king as his letters, set out for the castle with
thirty men.
On arriving there Ture, not dreaming that his treason had been
discovered, admitted his visitor without hesitation. The troopers were
also permitted to enter, Sir Tord having told them to come in groups of
five or six only, so as not to excite suspicion by their numbers.
That night, while they sat at table, and just as the cabbage was being
carried in, Sir Tord sprang up and seized Ture firmly by the collar,
calling out that he arrested him as a traitor to the king. The knight's
men sprang up to defend him, but Sir Tord's men attacked them with sword
and fist, the matter ending in the men as well as their master being
taken prisoners, and the castle falling into Sir Tord's hands.
On receiving the letters, Charles laid them before the senate at
Stockholm, but the traitors were men of such power and note, and there
was so much envy and jealousy of Charles among the lords, that he dared
not attempt to punish the plotters as they deserved, but was obliged to
pardon them. As for Ture and his men, they managed to escape from the
place where they had been left for safe keeping, and made their way to
Denmark.
Meanwhile Sir Tord Bonde was kept busy, for King Christian of Denmark
several times invaded the land. On each occasion he was met by the
valiant defender of West Gothland and driven out with loss. On his final
retreat he built a fortress in Smaland, which he called Danaborg, or
Danes' castle, leaving in it a Danish garrison; but it was quickly
attacked by Sir Tord with his men-at-arms and a force of armed peasantry
and the castle taken by storm, the Danes suffering so severe a defeat
that the place was afterwards known as Danasorg, or Danes' sorrow.
Sir Tord, to complete his chain of defences, had built several fortresses
in Norway, then claimed by King Christian as part of his dominions. He
had with him in this work about four hundred men, so small a force that
Kolbjoern Gast, one of Christian's generals, proceeded against him with an
army three thousand strong, proposing to drive the daring invader out of
the kingdom.
Weak as he felt himself, Sir Tord determined to try conclusions with the
Danes and Norsemen, proposing to use strategy to atone for his weakness.
One hundred of his men were placed in ambush in a clump of woodland, and
with the remaining three hundred the Swedish leader marched boldly on the
enemy, who were entrenched behind a line of wagons. Finding that he could
not break through their defences, Sir Tord and his men turned in a
pretended flight and were hotly pursued by the enemy, who abandoned their
lines to follow the flying Swedes. Suddenly Sir Tord turned and led his
men in a fierce attack upon the disordered pursuers, falling upon them
with such bold fury that he had two horses killed under him. At the same
time the hundred men broke from their ambush, sounding their war-horns
loudly, and fell on the flank of the foe, though they were so badly armed
that they had no iron points on their lances.
Confused and frightened by the double attack and the blare of the
trumpets, the Norsemen broke and fled, crying out that "all the might of
Sweden was in arms against them"; but they were pursued so closely that
the leader and all his men were taken by the brave four hundred.
Thus the bold and skilful Sir Tord defended the king's cause in those
quarters, winning victories by stratagem where force was lacking and
keeping off the attacks of the Danes by his watchfulness, bravery, and
sound judgment; until men came to say, that his brave cousin was the
king's chief support and that his secret enemies dared not undertake
anything against him while he had so skilful and courageous a defender.
There are two ways of disposing of a troublesome foe, one by fair and
open warfare, one by treachery. As Sir Tord could not be got rid of in
the former manner, his enemies tried the latter. Joesse Bosson, one of his
officers, though born a Dane, had proved so faithful and won his
confidence to such an extent that the valiant Swede trusted him
completely, and made him governor of the fortress of Karlborg. He did
not dream that he was nourishing a traitor and one capable of the basest
deeds.
During the warfare in Norway Sir Tord reached Karlborg one afternoon,
proposing to spend the night there. He was received with much show of joy
by Joesse, who begged him to take the repose he needed, promising to keep
strict watch in the fortress during his stay there. Without a thought of
danger Sir Tord went to the chamber provided for him. Joesse said the same
to the followers of his guest, and as they were weary they were glad to
go to their beds.
Having thus disposed of his visitors, Joesse got his boats ready, loaded
them with his most-prized effects, and then turned the key on the
followers of his trusting guest, hid their swords, and even cut their
bowstrings, so much was he afraid of the heroic soldier who had been his
best friend.
Then, axe in hand, he entered the room of Sir Tord. The sleeper, awakened
by his entrance, raised himself a little in the bed and asked what he
wanted. For answer the murderous wretch brought down his axe with so
heavy a blow that the head of Sir Tord was cleft in twain to the
shoulders. Then, taking to his boats, the assassin made his escape to the
Danes, by whom his bloody act was probably instigated.
With the death by treason and murder of the brave Sir Tord, the chief
bulkwark of the realm of King Charles, this tale should end, but the
later career of Charles VIII. is so curious a one that it will be of
interest to make some brief mention of it.
Never has king had a more diversified career. With the death of his brave
defender, enemies on all sides rose against him, his great wealth and
proud ostentation having displeased nobles and people alike. Chief among
his enemies was the archbishop of Upsala, who nailed a letter to the door
of the cathedral in which he renounced all loyalty and obedience to King
Charles, took off his episcopal robes before the shrine of St. Erik, and
vowed that he would not wear that dress again until law and right were
brought back to the land. It was a semi-civilized age and land in which
churchmen did not hesitate to appeal to the sword, and the archbishop
clad himself in armor, and with helmet on head and sword by side, set out
on a crusade of his own against the man he deemed an unworthy and
oppressive king.
He found many to sustain him, and Charles, taken utterly by surprise,
barely escaped to Stockholm, wounded, on a miserable old horse, and with
a single servant. Besieged there and unable to defend the town, he hid
part of his treasures, put the rest on board a vessel, and while going on
board himself was accosted by one of the archbishop's friends, who asked
him:
"Have you forgotten anything?"
"Nothing except to hang you and your comrades," was the bitter reply of
the fugitive king.
King Christian of Denmark was called in by the archbishop to take the
vacant throne, Charles was pronounced a traitor by his enemies, and for
some years Christian ruled over Sweden. Then his avarice and the heavy
taxes he laid on the people aroused such dissatisfaction that an
insurrection broke out, Christian's army was thoroughly defeated, and he
was forced to take ship for Denmark, while Charles was recalled to the
throne and landed in Stockholm in 1464, a second time king of Sweden.
This reign was not a long one. Christian, who had imprisoned the
archbishop because he opposed the heavy taxation of the peasants, now
sought his aid again and sent him with an army to Sweden. As a result
Charles found himself once more shut up in Stockholm and was again forced
by his enemies to resign the crown, being given instead of his kingdom
the government of Raseborg Castle in Finland. And instead of having
treasures to take with him, as before, he was now so poor that he could
not pay a debt of fifty marks he owed in Stockholm. He expressed his
state of poverty in the following verse:
"While I was Lord of Fogelwich,
I was a mighty man and rich;
But since I'm King of Swedish ground
A poorer man was never found."
But his career was not yet ended. He was again to sit on the throne.
Friends arose in his favor, the people again grew dissatisfied with
Danish rule, and the archbishop, his greatest enemy, died. Charles was
recalled and returned from Finland, a third time standing on Swedish
ground as king.
He had still a hard fight before him. A Swedish nobleman, Erik Wase,
sought to win the throne for himself, and Christian of Denmark sent a new
army to Sweden; but by the aid of a brave young knight, Sten Sture, Nils
Sture, his cousin, and some other valiant friends, all his enemies were
overcome and thus, after years of struggle and a remarkably diversified
career, he was at length firmly seated on the throne.
But the unfortunate monarch was not long to enjoy the quiet which he had
so hardly won. He fell seriously ill in May, 1470, and feeling that death
was near, he sent for Sten Sture and made him administrator of the
kingdom, with control of the castle of Stockholm. But he earnestly warned
him never to seek for the royal power, saying:
"That ambition has ruined my happiness and cost me my life."