On the night of 21 July 1403, a 16-year-old soldier was carried into the candlelit sanctuary of Shrewsbury Abbey with a bloodied rag pressed against his face. Shortly before, he’d been evacuated from a nearby battlefield when an arrow had hit him just below his right eye.
Ordinarily, he’d have been left to die. After all, this was medieval Britain, 400 years before the advent of anaesthetics, military surgeons or combat medics. The wounded teenager, however, was no ordinary soldier. He was Prince Hal, eldest son of King Henry IV and heir to the throne of England. It wasn’t only his survival that now rested on the successful removal of the arrowhead still wedged in his skull, but the fate of a nation.
For years, the British Isles had been…
