Battle of Solway Moss - Aftermath

Aftermath

Gervase Phillips has estimated that only about 7 Englishmen and 20 Scots were killed but 1,200 Scottish prisoners were taken, including Sinclair, the Earls of Cassillis, Glencairn and Maxwell. Prisoners taken to England included Lord Gray, and Stewart of Rosyth. A number of captured Scottish earls, lords and lairds were released; they sent hostages, called "pledges" into England in their place. On 14 December 1542, Thomas Wharton's report of the battle was read to Privy Council, and they ordered that Scottish prisoners entering London should wear a red St Andrew's cross. Among the captured guns were four falconets with the cast cipher of 'JRS' for 'Jacobus Rex Scotorum' and the Scottish royal arms with an imperial crown.

Eustace Chapuys reported that the Scottish prisoners attended Henry's court on Christmas Day wearing swords and dirks. They were able to talk to the French ambassador and Henry gave them each a present of a gold chain. These hostages and prisoners were mostly well treated in England, as it was hoped that when they returned to Scotland after their ransoms were paid, they would further the English cause. Some of the high ranking prisoners taken at the battle were exchanged for their 'pledges' at Carlisle on 10 January 1543. Chapuys said the return of some prisoners was prevented at this time by the Scottish government which claimed they were traitors for losing the battle, or suspected they were now being influenced by Henry. As their families were arrested these prisoners could not provide their pledges and stayed on the border at Berwick-upon-Tweed.

However, a modern historian Marcus Merriman sees the battle and hostage-taking more as the culmination of James V's war rather than the beginning of Henry VIII's Rough Wooing. He notes that the capture of so many Scottish nobles at the time of the birth and accession of Mary, Queen of Scots did not affect Henry's policy or the Scottish lords's subsequent rejection of the Treaty of Greenwich in December 1543.