Our Bygone episode today takes us to Clitheroe, specifically Edisford Bridge, and a medieval battle that sources say made the River Ribble “run red with blood”.

Historian Roger Frost MBE takes us back to ‘The Anarchy’, a bloody period of some 19 years when the nation was skewered by civil war as rival claimants fought over the English throne, and Scots sought to take advantage of the disarray.

It was in this time of chaos and upheaval that a Scottish army crossed into Lancashire and for a time actually cemented the county as a vassal state.

In the midst of this was the now largely unforgotten Battle of Clitheroe, which took place on the southern Bowland fells on June 10th, 1138, and saw the Scottish commander William fitz Duncan emerge victorious over an Anglo-Norman force, in all likelihood commanded by the de Lacy family, who controlled Clitheroe Castle.

The Battle of the Standard, sometimes called the Battle of Northallerton, in which English forces repelled a Scottish army, took place on 22 August 1138 on Cowton Moor near Northallerton in Yorkshire. The English were led by Archbishop Thurstan of York, who had gathered local militia and baronial armies from Yorkshire and the north Midlands. (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

placeholder image — The Battle of the Standard, sometimes called the Battle of Northallerton, in which English forces repelled a Scottish army, took place on 22 August 1138 on Cowton Moor near Northallerton in Yorkshire. The English were led by Archbishop Thurstan of York, who had gathered local militia and baronial armies from Yorkshire and the north Midlands. (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

The exact location of the battle is still disputed by historians, but Roger believes it took place in fields around Edisford Bridge, on the banks of the River Ribble.

William, the son of King David of Scotland, was said to have plundered and rampaged around the surrounding lands following the battle, killing and enslaving local people. Indeed, chroniclers say the River Ribble ran red with blood.

Revenge of sorts came just two months later for the Anglo-Normans when David was defeated at The Battle of the Standard in North Allerton.

King David was the uncle and ally of the Empress Matilda, a central protagonist in The Anarchy who fought her cousin, King Stephen, for the English throne.

Matilda felt that she should have been the rightful heir following the death of her father, King Henry I, but when Stephen seized the crown, bitter civil war ensued until The Anarchy ended in 1154 when King Henry II succeeded Stephen on the throne.

Roger says: “The Anarchy was a civil war fought between King Stephen and his cousin Matilda. The Battle of Clitheroe should be better known than it is because it was a prelude to the even more important Battle of the Standard.

“William fitz Duncan was a landowner in England. King David and his nephew William took advantage of the civil war and invaded northern England, splitting his army into two divisions, with William taking charge of an army west of the Pennines.

“It entered the Ribblesdale Valley in Yorkshire and ultimately arrived at Clitheroe. When William arrived here he was met by the de Lacy family who occupied the castle at Clitheroe.”

Bygone Burnley: Harle Syke with historian Roger Frost MBE

Scholars say that depsite the English force, composed of knights and men-at-arms, being heavily armoured in chainmail and helmets, it was defeated by a smaller Scottish army which included “men of Galloway”.

Robert de Lacy’s younger brother was reportedly killed during looting and pillaging around the estates following the battle.

Finally, our video looks at the site of a leper hospital, located where the Edisford Bridge pub now stands. St Nicholas’ Hospital, as it was known, was founded between 1147 and 1154.

By 1350, it was reported that “no lepers” had been at Edisford for some years, and its assets were transferred to Whalley Abbey. The buildings fell into a “ruined and decayed” state by the time of the dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530s.