A Wotton-under-Edge man's mission to put the last battle in Britain between private armies more firmly on the county map will see triumph this weekend when a memorial is officially unveiled to remember the grim events of 1470.

Keen historian Adam Dolling is set to lead a guided walk this Saturday (May 3) from North Nibley, near Wotton-under-Edge, to the location of the last recorded private skirmish, which took place on ancient common land in the shadow of a still-standing oak, between North Nibley and Berkeley.

The free walk, which covers just over three miles, will last up to three hours and will culminate in the unveiling of a new interpretation board back in North Nibley, the honours being carried out by John Berkeley as a direct descendant from the Berkeley side of the original battle.

As Adam told Punchline-Gloucester.com, the location for the gruesome fight was logical because the battle marked the culmination of a decades-long-fued between the Berkeley dynasty and the Talbots, who held their seat of power just up the road, in Wotton-under-Edge.

Adam said: "I was always fascinated by what happened on that fateful day and I originally wrote a piece for the Battlefield Trust's magazine. The next thing I knew, they were asking me to lead people on a step-by-step guide to what happened," said Adam, who since the Pandemic has been organising an annual pilgrimage to raise awareness of the forgotten skirmish.

The backstory to the clash, as explained on the guided tour, reveals how 19-year-old Thomas Talbot, aka Viscount Lisle, decided to challenge the older and, as was to prove, militarily wiser William (Lord) Berkeley in the culmination of the longest running legal dispute in English history.

Adam explained: "Talbot was a hothead and had recently bungled a sly attempt to sneak into Berkeley Castle, after which he challenged Berkeley to a fight in a fit of pique: he suggested they met the next day on the common, both parties knowing the chaos of the ongoing Wars of the Roses would ensure little chance of state intervention."

Talbot called on all his local supporters to assemble, a force which included subjects from his Wotton power base who'd have little choice but to obey his orders. In all, with little notice, Adam explains that he probably mustered some 300-400 men. 

Berkeley, by contrast, cast a wider net, being the county's foremost landowner. sons of the soil made up a good part of his contingent, but so, too, did artisans of war, mercenaries, seasoned longbow men, "the kind of men who knew how to fire arrows at a rate of ten a minute". With 1,000 mercenaries rising to the challenge, the odds did not look good for the Wotton contingent.

Adam's walk literally leads visitors through the known – and often chilling – details of the fateful day, not least (spoiler alert) the early demise of Thomas Talbot, who took a lethal arrow through his throat when he naively dropped his neck guard for a literal breather.

As the walk goes on to show, that moment set in train a chain of events which led to the killing field spreading back to North Nibley itself, with no mercy shown by the Berkeley side as it sought to reinforce its victory by exacting maximum economic damage on its opponent: ""The red mist would set in in such moments," Adam told Punchline, "especially when the opposition is on the run with their backs turned. Killing them spelled an irreversible advantage."

After the tour of the battlefield, the fact-packed walk culminates at North Nibley's St Martin's Church, where walkers find out more about an 1864 discovery by workmen of a mass grave of the battle's victims. The event will then see the official unveiling of the new plaque, at the nearby junction of The Street and Lower House Lane in North Nibley.

● Walkers meet for the event at 10:30am on Saturday May 3 at St. Martin's Church, North Nibley, GL11 6DJ. Taking part is free, with a suggested £5 donation to the Battlefields Trust. For more information, contact asdolling@hotmail.com or on 07968 722973.