After the death of the kings Osbert and Aella in the battle for York, Northumbria belonged to the Danes and pausing only to put a puppet king on the throne, the brothers Halfdan, Ivarr, and Ubbe turned their eyes southward once more. At the head of the great heathen horde they marched over three hundred kilometres back to East Anglia to do battle with the army of King Edmund.
The battle took place near Hoxne in Suffolk; the Danes fresh from their victory in the north, slaughtered Edmunds army and carried the day. King Edmund escaped but was caught and according to the writings of Abbo of Fleury“he was placed with his back against a tree, as if on a rack and used for target practice in archery until he bristled with arrows like a hedgehog. When he was eventually wrenched away from the tree trunk his back was ripped open exposing his ribcage”. After his death Edmund was elevated to the sainthood. East Anglia like Northumbria was now under the heel of the Danes.
Around about this time the great heathen army split in two. Ivarr and his men went north to join his Viking friends from Ireland in the destruction of the Fortress of Dumbarton in Strathclyde and then returned to his kingdom in Dublin. Halfdan stayed in East Anglia where Guthrum who arrived at the head the Great Summer Army joined him.Together they launched a series of assaults on Wessex, but after a season of fighting, stalemate was reached in the autumn of 871, Alfred paid Danegelt and the Danes retreated to London
In 872 the Danish army moved north to crush a rebellion in Northumbria and then in 874 turned its attention to Mercia. After capturing the city of Repton they swept through Mercia driving King Burgred into exile overseas and capturing the whole of the Kingdom. With Burgred gone they placed Ceolwulf on the throne to rule as a puppet King.
By now Halfdan had heard of the death of his brother Ivarr in Dublin the year before and the Danish force split again. Guthram and the Summer Army moved back to Cambridge to prepare for a new assault on Wessex, while Halfdan headed north with the remainder of the great heathen army. Determined to regain his brother’s kingdom, he set up camp on the Tyne and after over wintering, struck deep into Strathclyde to Dumbarton in an attempt to bring the area back into the Northumbrian fold. He also made an unsuccessful attempt to win back Dublin from the Norwegian Vikings who had gained control after the death of Ivarr.
After ten years of almost constant warfare Halfdan’s men had grown weary of battle and he was forced to return to Northumbria to divide up the land amongst his followers. It was the year 876 and in that year the majority of the warriors of Great Heathen army put away their swords and took up the plough.
Ever the warrior Halfdan tried once more to regain Dublin, but with fewer men at his command the effort failed and he was killed in a sea battle off the Irish coast in 877.
