Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand.

[MonsGraupius]

I cannot fathom how you would come to that view.

Because that is what the evidence says. Cartimandua was a Roman client ruler, backed by Roman power. The Romans were not obliged to treat all native queens in the same way, and nobody would expect them to do so.

In Roman society women were lower class citizens who had few rights, and certainly could not rule over men. That is why they had so much problem with Boudica ... in her eyes she had absolutely no rights as queen.

Again, you fail to understand the Roman psychology: "women are not rulers ...and those who pretend to be ... should be treated like Boudica was".

they were the cavalry, which is what everyone maintains was with Suetonius.

Not around here they don't!

Does change anything ... they are still incapable of defending London, they do not go North to use St.Albans as their base for war ... and the Thames-Severn line is exactly the defensive line that the Romans used repeatedly in Britain.

From London the only place that is a seat for war is Calleva ... behind the defences of the Thames-Severn line.

And anyone suggesting that the friends of Romans are in the north so that is where they would head ... must answer for why Catus heads off to Gaul ... which is clearly where the friends of Rome line and where the Roman supply lines will come from.

WHERE IS YOUR CAMP? Where is even the slightest evidence of any encampments between London and the army in Wales?

Unless you believe that Paulinus flew down to London in a single day, or that his army - along with every other Roman force from the conquest until the end of Roman power in Britain, including the troops you want to have at Silchester - moved about the country without making camps anywhere, then you must accept that there are temporary marching camp sites - probably a great number of them - all over England and Wales which have left no archaeological trace.

The only Roman fortification in the area known to have been occupied in c.AD60 is the vexilation fortress at Alchester. Which is quite near Tring and St Albans.

A small fast moving detachment is capable of reaching Roman fortifications each night. A large army has to build its own camp. We know when Suetonius gets to London that he considers himself to be at risk .... and so from that point on, he would have retreated behind the defences of a camp or a barrier like the Thames.

Suetonius was safe behind the walls of Calleva

He certainly was not. The walls of Silchester were not built until the early 3rd Century.

The present stone wall is from about 200AD, the previous wooden defences would be earlier.

Of course not, they would go back and forth with the baggage train...

Extraordinary idea!

It was the way things were done when armies moved on campaign. But not through territory where they could get supplies, so it doesn't apply to this discussion and it isn't worth wasting my time on it.

In reality, Roman armies moved much faster than five miles a day

Of course they moved a lot faster because they were constantly going back and forth. But even five miles a day is a bit ambitious on campaign. More like 2-3miles a day. But they aren't on campaign, so let's drop it.

The two options from Calleva, is that Boudica crosses ... perhaps around Oxford... or that Suetonius cross the Thames above Goring and then heads toward Boudica... he would have made for some crossing point between Goring and Oxford... probably chose an obscure ford to cross the Thames, of which there are a number... there were other fords every few miles... This places him at the foot of the Chiltern hills ...

This is quite interesting, and not too crazy. However, we would have to ask what Boudica and her army were doing up around Oxford. Where were they going, and what was their objective?

I don't know. All I've really done is to move Suetonius' starting position to Calleva from London, and given him time to regroup and resupply in his "seat for war".

From let's say "Dorchester" (simply so we have a name in the likely area), the line toward Norfolk runs along a long line of hills. This places the battle in one of the valleys along the scarp of those hills with a plain in front.

Suetonius had the fourteenth legion with the veterans of the twentieth, and auxiliaries from the neighbourhood, to the number of about ten thousand armed men, when he prepared to break off delay and fight a battle. He chose a position approached by a narrow defile, closed in at the rear by a forest, having first ascertained that there was not a soldier of the enemy except in his front, where an open plain extended without any danger from ambuscades.

Based on the marching camps heading toward Mons Graupius, the Romans seem to prefer relatively open ground rather than the mountains. And they liked a hilltop camp each evening. I'm not aware of anything along this line, which given the intense farming relative to NE Scotland does not mean they were not there.

I suppose, the simplest fit to the above text, based on the Agricola campaign, is that Suetonius took his army from "Dorchester" toward Norfolk along the base of the Chilterns ... I would suggest the line is close to modern Aylesbury, Letchworth and by Cambridge the line is almost extinguished.

And based on the above, at some point Suetonius with Boudica coming to him for battle, takes a right turn up some ravine which I bet he fortifies

If we assume Suetonius gets to Dorchester before Boudica hears. And that then the two close on each other at the same speed, then Letchworth is slightly under half way ... so that would possibly be the maximum that Suetonius could advance. Also the hills are not as pronounced here, so based on overall tactics, I think further back. But Suetonius does have to commit himself by advancing in order to lure Boudica out. She's not going to mobilise an army if Suetonius can just make a quick dash back behind the Thames-Severn barrier. So, that suggests somewhere around Aylesbury to Letchworth.

Also, that line runs at a tangent to a circle around London, and at Dunstable, they start moving further away from London. Suetonius would have had an eye on a quick escape back to the fortified fords of the Thames ... and given the odds, I think he would be looking for a battle somewhere like Dunstable, where he had not enemy behind, and could, if required, run across the Thames and like Catus to Gaul. Dunstable to London is 38miles. Dunstable to Dorchester and the Thames that way is 44miles. Fresh horses could make that in one dash. I doubt he's going much beyond Dunstable.

If they just wanted to attack the Romans they could have marched west from London to the Thames and found one of those many fords you mention. The river might have held them up for two or three days while they found a viable crossing point, but not the several weeks that Paulinus would need to concentrate his army around the undefended town of Calleva. Then they would be across and into open country, with the strategic advantage over Paulinus.

Also, if Paulinus himself needed to cross the river to attack Boudica, why would the Iceni not hold the fords against him? They had a vast advantage of numbers, and could have put guards at every crossing and swarmed the Romans when they tried to get across.

From Goring North the Thames is easily crossed. And, unless there has been heavy rain, it would be almost impossible to stop her crossing, even if Suetonius attempted to defend all the fords. However, once across the Thames, there are very few routes south to Calleva. One is through what is poetically called the "Goring gap". A narrow ravine up to 700m wide, with the Thames flowing from side to side. It would be an ideal battle site for Suetonius (equivalent to that battle of the Spartans against the Persians).

The other route is over the ridgeway hills aka Berkshire or Chilton downs. Whilst at the other end, the white horse is on the same hills. More problematic for Boudica, there are defences running along the ridgeway ... e.g. 51.557545, -1.313557 Grim's ditch


There are of course some ways across, and the most obvious is the valley taken by the old Didcot-Compton railway which would locate the battle at this point: Battle Site, and the temple commemorating the battle was built here: Temple. There is also other evidence. However, there is not the key evidence needed: not a single artefact relating to a battle that I can find, so it does not seem boudica came this way.

However, if she had, she'd have had an extremely difficult time getting through these hills.

---

No, I'm saying that Suetonius arrives in London after rushing there. Which means he did not have his baggage train and I suggest that it was only Cavalry

I see.  It is not simply a matter of cavalry outpacing infantry.  Your position is that Suetonius raced down to London with his cavalry (you have used the word 'gallop' elsewhere in this thread).  Otherwise, is my summary an accurate reflection of your position?

Whenever I say "Gallop" ... I'm being intentionally dramatic ... because an army at the time of the Romans, never moved quickly ... so "moving quickly" was still slow and never a gallop (except in battle)
 
I am simply using the text: "Suetonius, however, with wonderful resolution, marched amidst a hostile population to Londinium".

I am interpreting "wonderful resolution" as "rushing" ... which as I've said the Roman army normally moves like a slug on its day off, doesn't really mean "galloping". There is a similar phrase at the battle of Mons Graupius where Tacotis writes: expedito exercitu"  ... translated by Alfred church as "he advanced with a lightly equipped force", which I would suggest means that they ditched all the supply wagons and took only  what each man could carry, thus avoiding the lengthy delay it usually took to move camp. This might allow the normal 15miles between camps (and several days moving supplies from one camp to the next), to be extended to perhaps 30miles between camps, and moving every day. But this could not be kept up for long, unless moving through areas where supplies can be guaranteed.

Bizarrely although horses could do 30-60miles in a day, they cannot sustain that. In contrast, a lightly equipped foot soldier, could probably do 30 miles a day ... until his small pack of food ran out. But, they can only do that on roads ... not across virgin ground.

But, what we know, is whatever the force that arrives in London, it is incapable of building defences against Boudica. As Romans often took material to build their camps with them, that suggests that all the tools and materials to build defences never made it to London. That is what tells us what kind of force got there and what state they were in. They simply were incapable of building the necessary fortifications in the time available to mount a defence of London. Given that the Ninth had reteated into their camp ... they clearly had not only the time, but the means to build their camp, yet Suetonius did not.