“There hath beene yn tyme of mynd sum Partes of the Castel stonding now sum ruines of the Botoms of Waulles appere. Now it is caullid Holme Hylle. George Duke of Clarence, Brother to King Edward, had thought to have brought Avon aboute the Towne and to have enlarged the Town.” [a/][149d]
[149d] Lel. Itinerary, vol. vi. fo. 96 [84].
[150a] The elevated ground above mentioned, which includes the place called “Margaret’s Camp,” seems to be the same which (although it has no very great pretensions to be called a hill) is alluded to by Holinshed, when he states that the Lancastrian forces were driven up towards the hill from whence they descended.
[150b] The winding or circuitous state of the old road, seems in some degree to corroborate the statement of Holinshed, as to the Lancastrian camp being defended with “cumbersome lanes, deep ditches,” &c. &c.; indeed it is remarkable, that even now, there are ditches of very awkward size and depth, on the north and west sides of the garden at Gupshill Farm.
[150c] It is called from that circumstance by the country people “the Island.”
[151] It seems strange, that Mr. Dyde, in his History of Tewkesbury, suggests, that Margaret’s encampment was at a place adjoining the town and abbey, called the Vineyard. Little as we may truly think of the Duke of Somerset’s talents as a military commander, he could scarcely have made so ridiculous a mistake, as to have fixed upon so low and insecure a spot, as the Vineyard, commanded by the high ground of Holme Hill, and with the little river the Swilgate not in his front, but in his rear. What Mr. Dyde has mistaken for intrenchments, are nothing more than some trifling inequalities in a spot of ground close to the abbey, which in all probability, was formerly used as a garden or vineyard, as its name implies.
[152] There are two hamlets in the parish of Tewkesbury, viz., one called the Mythe, and the other Southwick and the Park, situated on the westward of the town, and on the road leading towards Cheltenham; and it is in the latter portion of the parish that Margaret’s Camp is situated.
[153a] The ball is almost a perfect globe, except at one spot, where it is rather defective, and may perhaps have been eaten into by rust.
[153b] Holinshed.
[153c] Hall’s Chronicles, fo. 31.