During the Parliamentary wars, Lawrence impoverished himself by his zeal in support of King Charles; he was one of a list of thirty-two principal gentlemen of Shropshire (headed by the sheriff) who, in November 1642, entered into a mutual undertaking to raise a troop of dragoons for his Majesty’s service; a step deemed necessary in consequence of the additional strength which the Parliamentary party had acquired in the county, by Colonel Mitton’s capture of Wem, in the preceding month of August; but the cause of the Royalists sustained a far severer blow eighteen months afterwards in the loss of Shrewsbury, which borough, after having voluntarily expended nearly all its resources in aid of the king, was surprised in the night of 21st February, 1645, through the treachery of one of its inhabitants. After an ineffectual defence, the town was carried by the rebels, and among the prisoners whom they took on that occasion, was Ensign Cassey Benthall, the eldest son of Lawrence. The young officer was fortunate enough, however, to make his escape, and, pursuing his loyal course, had attained the rank of colonel, when he was killed, fighting for Charles I., at Stow-in-the-Wold, in Gloucestershire. Colonel Benthall had enlisted in his regiment many of the yeomen in the neighbourhood of his father’s estate, and among those who were killed at Stow was Thomas Penderel, a brother of the famous Richard Penderel, who was the attendant and guide of Charles II. in his wanderings after the battle of Worcester. The loyalty of Lawrence Benthall was well known to Richard Penderel, and nearly procured for the former the honour of aiding the king to escape; for the royal fugitive, having been conducted by Richard to the town of Madeley, would have crossed the Severn by the Benthall ferry, but his intention had been anticipated by the Parliamentary soldiers, who had taken possession of the boat. Charles, therefore, remained concealed at Madeley, in a barn of Mr. Woolf, a worthy loyalist, who entertained him there a night and a day; and from thence the unfortunate king retreated to Boscobel wood, where he had the well-known adventure which has made the oak-leaf sacred to his memory.
Many were the damages sustained by the houses of the gentlemen of Shropshire at this troublesome period, through wanton acts of violence; but Benthall Hall remained in tolerably perfect preservation till A.D. 1818, when it was partly destroyed by fire, from which, however, the principal rooms escaped without injury.
The exterior of the mansion, though it would be commonly denominated Elizabethan, affords an example of the domestic architecture which was antecedent to the pure Elizabethan style. The landscape view of the front presented to the reader is taken from the avenue, which has been unfortunately deprived of its most stately trees by its present noble proprietor. The building is of stone; the extent of frontage being relieved by a slight projection on the left, and by two tiers of bay-windows, which are placed at equal distances on either side of a porch. All the windows have stone compartments and lozenge-panes. The roof is gabled without finials, and the chimneys, which are tastefully placed, are lofty, with ornamented shafts and mouldings. The porch stands somewhat out of the centre of the frontage, so as agreeably to subdue the regularity of the building, and surmounted by a windowed room, harmonises with the other projections. The front entrance is a round arched door, on the left of the porch.
The rooms in the interior are lofty. The entrance-hall has unfortunately lost all its wainscoting, except some carved oak over the chimneypiece, which represents the Benthall
coat of arms with that of Cassey impaled. On the right is the ancient with-drawing-room, completely wainscoted, and containing an oak chimneypiece, which is executed in the diminutive Grecian style essential to Elizabethan architecture. The uppermost tier of columns, which have Ionic capitals, enclose the Benthall coat of arms with that of Cassey impaled, and immediately beneath it is the coat of Harries, enclosed by a tier of Roman Doric columns. This room has an elegant bay-window, and a decorated ceiling; further on the right is a spacious, but modern dining-room, built by Francis Blythe Harries, Esq. of Broseley Hall, who resided here many years. On the left of the entrance-hall is the principal staircase-lobby, forming a passage to the ancient dining-room. This room is fully and richly wainscoted, and has a handsome oak chimneypiece extending to a decorated ceiling, and exhibiting on its panels the Benthall and Cassey coats of arms. The staircase is also of oak, and elaborately worked, in the angle of which a panel tastefully, though somewhat fantastically carved, represents a leopard, the crest of Benthall.
From a drawing by F W Hulme. Day & Son. Lithʳˢ to The Queen