Warwickshire: The Land of Shakespeare

by Clive Holland

Through that long Sunday morning, on October 23, 1642 (November 2, new style), the forces of Lord Essex lay and watched the enemy on the heights above them, and distant from them scarcely more than a couple of miles; showing no disposition to risk an attack upon a position which was undoubtedly so advantageous as to be worth several thousand men. At about one o’clock it was decided by the King and his officers to descend the steep face of the cliff, and make a frontal attack upon the Parliamentarians disposed in a long line passing through Battle and Thistle Farms. In Essex’s own regiment commanding a troop was Oliver Cromwell, then forty–one, who was destined to ultimately crush the Royal cause on the fields of Marston Moor and Naseby.

Prince Rupert, who, earlier in the day, had caused embarrassment by his refusal to serve under orders save those of King Charles himself, led the cavalry on the right, Lord Wilmot on the left, whilst the command of the centre was vested in Sir Jacob Astley and General Ruthven, with the King and reserves of pensioners in the rear. Although the day was fine overhead the ground was wet and miry, and proved heavy “going” for troops already fatigued by several days of rapid marching. Close upon two o’clock the muffled boom of two cannon fired by the Parliamentarians rolled across the plain and reverberated amid the cliffs of the Edge Hills. The momentous opening of the great Civil War had come.

The Royalists’ cavalry on the left swept round, and charged upon the body of Parliamentarian troops located at what is now known as Battle Farm, where Essex had placed some of his artillery. They were repulsed with considerable loss. Prince Rupert’s charge along the right wing met with more success as it drove back Sir James Ramsay and the force under his command. But unhappily for the King the Prince rushed onwards towards Kineton with characteristic heedlessness to plunder the Parliamentarian baggage train, unmindful of the fact that his help was needed, as the Royalists were losing ground on other parts of the field.

At this hour of the day, although the Parliamentary left was crumpled up and forced back, the right wing held its own, as did also the centre; and when Rupert returned from his impetuous pursuit, it was too late to retrieve his error of judgment. The enemy’s centre had not only stood firm but had advanced, forcing the Royalists to retreat. The arrival of John Hampden, with a body of troops who promptly opened fire upon the Prince’s horsemen, causing them to flee in great confusion, completed the disaster, Rupert himself having to throw away his hat and plumes lest they should offer a mark to the enemy’s musketeers.

The Royal army was now indeed, for some considerable time, in imminent danger of a disastrous and crushing defeat, owing to the severe pressure on its left front.

Both armies suffered severely, almost equally so, states a contemporary account, but inasmuch as the Parliamentarians had held their ground and the Royalists had been compelled to retire from the assault, the advantage was with some justness claimed by the former. The number of killed was very large, but contemporary estimates are so contradictory that it is almost impossible to obtain figures of any exactness. Probably Sir William Dugdale, who, present during the engagement, afterwards went over the field and estimated the number of those actually slain to have been rather more than 1100, is approximately correct.

Although the enclosures have altered the general appearance of the field of battle from that which it bore on that disastrous Sunday of October 23, 1642, the main lines can even nowadays be traced with considerable clearness and accuracy. And the “Sun Rising,” a fine, old stone house, has survived the course of the years, as has also the old Beacon Tower, at Burton Dassett, on the summit of which the first signal fire was kindled in the cresset by the Parliamentarians to send the news of the battle London–wards to the next station at Ivinghoe, some forty miles distant, and thence to Harrow–on–the–Hill.

The months immediately succeeding the first struggle at Edge Hill saw some great happenings. Warwick had held out when called upon by Sir William Dugdale to surrender in the King’s name, though Banbury yielded. But at Coventry the anti–Royalist faction was all powerful, the “rebels,” “sectaries,” and “schismatics” gathered thick within its walls, where they deemed immunity from molestation more certain than in unprotected towns. Kenilworth at the commencement of the war had been garrisoned for the King, but the defenders were soon stealthily withdrawn as the rebels in the district increased in numbers; a fight between them and a body of Parliamentarian troops from Coventry taking place at Curdworth near Coleshill, just prior to the battle of Edge Hill.

So far as Warwickshire’s part in the Civil War is concerned the most stirring and memorable event after the battle of Edge Hill was the attack upon and the destruction of a part of Birmingham by Prince Rupert on Easter Monday of the year 1643.

Although many echoes of the struggle which was fiercely waged, and with varying fortune to the contending parties, up and down the country for a further period of two and a half years, reached Warwickshire, and although several severe engagements were fought in the neighbouring counties of Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire, and Berkshire, no very considerable fighting took place in Warwickshire itself after the burning of Birmingham. It was, however, so near the field of other actions that its peace was perpetually disturbed during the succeeding years, until the final crushing of the Royalist adherents at Naseby on June 14, 1645, and the surrender of the King to the Scots in the following year at Newark. Troops passed along its peaceful lanes on many occasions, and manor–houses were raided by detached bodies of Royalists and Parliamentarians, producing a feeling of unrest and insecurity amongst the inhabitants, and imparting an element of romance to many a time–worn building.