The Battle of Tordesillas was an armed conflict fought during the Revolt of the Comuneros, that engaged the royalist forces commanded by the Count of Haro and the comuneros garrison of the Valladolid town of Tordesillas, the headquarters of the rebels, on December 5, 1520.
At the end of November the army of the Santa Junta, led by Pedro Girón y Velasco, had advanced towards Medina de Rioseco, establishing its headquarters in the town of Villabrágima, only a league away from the royal army. This one, composed fundamentally of contingents provided and commanded by the nobility, was limited to occupy towns to avoid the advance and to cut the lines of communication.
The situation was maintained until December 2, when the rebel army left Villabrágima for Villalpando. With this movement the route to Tordesillas —headquarters of the Junta and residence of Queen Joanna the Mad— was left unprotected, so the royal army took advantage of the occasion and on December 4 headed out. The following day the army attacked the city and after a long and hard fight with the defensive garrison, it was able to seize the city.
On the political level, the occupation of Tordesillas was a major defeat for the comuneros, who lost Queen Joanna, and with her, their hopes that she would heed their claims. In addition, many of the procurators were imprisoned, and those who were not, had fled. On the military level, the angry criticism towards the General-in-chief Pedro Girón due to the movement of the troops, forced him to resign from his post and withdraw from the conflict, which in turn produced important desertions in the bulk of the comuneros troops.
The nobles, on the other hand, did not take advantage of the victory. Deeply divided, with scarce numbers, and fearing reprisals from the comuneros within their fiefdoms, they limited themselves to establishing garrisons in some strategic places, after which they discharged most of the troops and returned to their domains.
Prelude
At the end of November 1520 the Captain General of the Santa Junta, Pedro Girón y Velasco, mobilized the bulk of his army towards Villabrágima, at the same time that other smaller detachments occupied Villafrechós, to the north, Tordehumos, to the southwest and Villagarcía de Campos and Urueña, to the south. In this way the distance between the troops of the lords, grouped in Medina de Rioseco, was shortened to a league and hostilities seemed inevitable. However, the nobles commanded by the Count of Haro refused to take the initiative. They only limited themselves to impede the enemy's advance and cut their lines of communication by occupying towns such as Mota del Marqués, San Pedro de Latarce, Castromonte or Torrelobatón.
What was actually happening was that the royalist side was deeply divided over the right course of action. On the one hand, the regent Adrian and his collaborators insisted that a rapid and withering attack should be carried out against the comuneros; they were convinced that their troops were far superior to those of the rebels. The nobles, on the other hand, saw this position as very risky because the enemy was solidly entrenched in Villabrágima and because, in addition, the vineyards on the left bank of the Sequillo River were impassable terrain for the cavalry, on which their forces were mainly based, but perfect for the rebels' infantry.
However, their particular interests were also at stake in this problem. Above all, the lords feared to provoke a greater anti-seignorial reaction in their domains if they openly confronted the comuneros. Equally revealing are the declarations of Admiral Fadrique Enríquez de Velasco —since September Viceroy of Castile along with Adrian and the Constable—, who rejected the idea of fighting in his own fiefdom, on the banks and plain of the Rioseco.
As the days went by, the verbal confrontations between the two sides became particularly harsh. The Count of Benavente even went so far as to mock the intellectuals, the leaders who pretended to give lessons in strategy:
He said that if they put a dotor and a bachelor tied to each banner of those who were going to fight, he would be the one to fight the battle, and not in any other way.
— Letter from Hernando de la Vega to the Constable, dated December 1, 1520.
The rest of the nobles were equally disturbed:
Since the Lord Count de Haro came until today [December 1] there has been talk and dispute as to whether the battle should be fought or garrisons should be placed, the Lord Cardinal and some who advised him, who are among those who will not fight, have been and are in favor of there being a battle in any case, and the Cardinal spoke to the Admiral and the Count of Venavente and other captains in this matter, so that it seemed to them that they were touched something in their honor and they became angry, while the Admiral spoke a few heated words.
— Letter from Hernando de la Vega to the Constable, dated December 1, 1520.
Armies
Although it is not possible to know the exact number of soldiers for each of the armies —we must not forget that contingents were being added all the time— it is possible to get an idea of the ratio of forces based on the letters dated in the days prior to the battle.
Royalist army
Commanded by the Count of Haro, the royalist army was made up mainly of infantrymen recruited by the nobles in noble lands, especially from Navarre, Galicia and Asturias, and part of the veterans of the Djerba expedition. Obviously, the troops of Antonio de Fonseca —licensed in August after the fire of Medina del Campo— and the urban militias could not be counted on, either because they were under the control of the rebels or because there was a certain reluctance to make the loyal cities fight with their brethren. At one point, the incorporation of three thousand German mercenary soldiers into the king's ranks was also considered, although this plan did not materialize in the end.
As for the artillery, it was obtained from Navarre and Fuenterrabía, but at the cost of leaving the French border unguarded. At the end of November it was placed under the direction of the mayor of Pamplona, Miguel de Herrera.
Comunero Army
The comunero army was made up mainly of urban militias contributed by the cities most committed to the movement: Valladolid (where all the males between eighteen and sixty years of age were mobilized), Toledo, Segovia, etc. Together with these forces (which by November had been organized and paid their salaries), there was also the other part of the Djerba veterans, who had accepted to join Pedro Girón through the emissary Carlos Arellano, as well as the peculiar battalion of Antonio de Acuña, bishop of Zamora, made up of around 300 armed priests.
As for artillery and armament in general, the rebels could easily obtain it from Medina del Campo, Castile and the Basque Country.
Battle
First troop movements
The situation continued until December 2, when the rebel army began to abandon its positions in Villabrágima and moved towards Villalpando, the locality of the Constable, which surrendered the following day without resistance. At first, the lords considered the possibility of liberating the town by moving their troops to Castroverde de Campos, but finally decided to seize Tordesillas, whose route had been liberated thanks to the movement of Girón to the west.
On the 4th the army of lords marched towards the city, occupying the villages abandoned by the comuneros almost without resistance. There were only a few skirmishes in Villagarcía, but Castromonte, Peñaflor and Torrelobatón fell without difficulty.
Fall of Tordesillas
On December 5 the first detachments reached Tordesillas at ten o'clock in the morning. Three hours later the Count of Haro appeared with the rest of the men and by means of a king of arms, two trumpets and a secretary of the admiral addressed to the city an ultimatum, which the comuneros asked for a time limit to answer. Above all, they were trying to make the royalists lose time while they awaited the arrival of reinforcements. The Count insisted with a new request but as this time the answer was negative, at half past three in the afternoon, after an intense artillery fire, he gave the order to begin the assault. The garrison of 80 lances and 400 infantrymen —some of whom were the priests of Zamora— defended themselves fiercely with Luis de Quintanilla from Medina at the head. On several occasions certain lords even suggested the idea of retreating ("alzar el combate", Spanish for "to cease the combat"), but in the end there was no need to reach this point.
After an hour of uncertain confrontation, an infantryman of Gómez de Santillán, according to some, or the artilleryman Miguel de Herrera, according to others, managed to open a gate in the wall and the attackers were able to enter the city, although the comuneros then prevented their advance by setting fire to the surrounding houses. Fire was also sighted on the other side of the Douro:
After a long time, some fires appeared on the other side of the river, and since we could not have any warning of what it was, we thought it was people from the Junta because they never ceased to repel and make explosions in the place.
— Letter from the Count of Haro to the Constable, dated December 5, 1520.
It was only at dusk when the attackers entered definitively in Tordesillas; first the soldiers of the Count of Benavente, then those of the Count of Alba de Liste and later followed by those of Astorga and Haro. Even so, the resistance did not cease, since the royalists had to fight in the streets hand to hand with the defenders, amid the ringing of bells and the glow of the fires. Captain Suero del Águila, for his part, came quickly from Alaejos with 100 lances, but the enemy's army was too superior to face it effectively without Pedro Girón's forces. He was finally taken prisoner along with Colonel Gonzalo Palomino. At that time a new breach was also made in the wall to allow the entry of artillery and infantry.
Around eight o'clock at night the last pockets of resistance gave way and the soldiers surrendered to pillage, from which only the churches, convents and the residence of Queen Joanna were spared. Even the saddle of the Infanta Catherine of Austria was stolen. Of course, the nobles were disgusted by this behavior, but they claimed that they had not been able to control their men. The Count of Benavente went further and in addition to punishing some of the soldiers, he promised compensation for the residents of Tordesillas, albeit at the expense of the State.
If we base ourselves on the affirmations of the royal secretary Lope Hurtado, the royalist side suffered only fifty casualties, between dead and wounded. This figure could be revised as it is too small for the characteristics of the fight described above, especially considering that witnesses report that the combat lasted approximately six hours. It is also recorded that the Count of Benavente was hit in the arm, his son in the leg and Luis de la Cueva in the face.
On the same day of the battle, December 5, the Admiral and the Count of Benavente sent a report to Charles V, giving him a detailed account of the personalities who had participated in the battle, among them: the Counts of Haro, of Benavente, of Alba de Liste, of Luna, of Miranda, the Marquises of Astorga and those of Denia, Diego de Rojas, Juan Manrique —son of the Duke of Nájera—, Beltrán de la Cueva —first-born son of the Marquis of Aguilar—, Pedro Osorio, Pedro de Bazán, Juan de Ulloa, Francisco Enríquez, the adelantado of Castile, —brother of the admiral—, Diego Osorio, Luis de la Cueva, etc.
Matter of Girón
There is some controversy among historians when it comes to determine if with his movement from Villabrágima to Villalpando the captain of the comunero army, Pedro Girón, intended to betray the rebel cause or simply ignored the error at the time of committing it.
The chronicler Pedro de Alcocer believes that Girón did indeed betray the comuneros:
He [Girón] wrote to the Constable, his uncle, and to the Admiral that he would win pardon from the King and that he would deliver him to Tordesillas and the Queen.
— Pedro de Alcocer, Relación de algunas cosas...
Pedro Mexía also considers this theory probable but prefers not to make a categorical statement about it:
Something [Girón's betrayal] that I do not know for sure I do not dare to affirm, although there was no lack of evidence to believe it.
— Pedro Mexía, Relación de las Comunidades de Castilla.
The bishop and historian Prudencio de Sandoval, for his part, offers two explanations to the problem. The first refers that Antonio de Acuña —the famous bishop from Zamora— and Girón were having dinner together with the Admiral and the Count of Benavente in Villabrágima when these two gentlemen pretended to join the side of the Junta, thus encouraging the comunero leaders to go against the Constable and attack Villalpando. This is more than implausible, judging by the fact that it seems almost impossible that Acuña and Girón would take their naivety to such an extreme. The second hypothesis, of course, is treason. In fact, the chronicler is surprised that Acuña —who was not part of the plot— would have agreed to his colleague's military maneuver:
And Don Pedro Giron took up residence in the houses of the Constable, his uncle. All they say was by agreement and double deal, and it was good to see, because they left the enemy free, and in Villalpando there was nothing to do. From Don Pedro Giron the deal could be feared, because the great ones, his relatives, pulled him a lot, as will soon be seen. What is frightening is that the bishop of Zamora (who was not in the deal), did not give in to it, but was always so black and hard, that it cost him his life, losing it miserably tied to a stick.
— Prudencio de Sandoval, Historia de la vida y hechos del Emperador Carlos V.