English Civil War and the Dramatic Seizure of Shrewsbury - Part 18

English Civil War -  Dramatic Seizure of Shrewsbury - Part 18 of the Story of Shropshire - The English Civil War 1642 to 1645

See Note 1 for attribution

The year of 1642 brought the horrors of the English Civil Wars, in which the Parliamentarians (led by men like Essex, Fairfax, and Cromwell) rebelled against King Charles I, whose government they considered to be arbitrary and oppressive.

Shrewsbury, like most of Shropshire apart from Wem, was strongly Royalist.

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King Charles I visited the town in 1642, and Prince Rupert arrived and stayed for a few weeks in 1644. while Charles was there he recruited men for the disastrous campaign which later led to a Royalist defeat, in the famous battle of Marston Moor.

To prepare for any Parliamentary attack, the townspeople built additional fortifications which ran across the northern end of the town. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be any evidence of those walls still existing today.

These included a fortified wall, and a ditch which reached from the Castle all the way to the western loop of the River Severn, and another wall and ditch which should have reached all the way to the eastern loop.

Unfortunately, it didn't - and the gap was filled by nothing stronger than a few feet of wooden palisade.

Learning of this weakness from their spies early in 1645, the Parliamentarians at Wem entrusted Lieutenant-Colonel William Reinking with a force of twelve hundred men and instructed him to seize Shrewsbury.

Setting out from Wem by the light of the moon, on the evening of Tuesday 21 February, Reinking and his followers are said to have reached Shrewsbury at about 4 O'clock on Wednesday morning.

The main body of some eight hundred horsemen halted to the north of Castle Foregate, while the other four hundred dismounted, and made their way across the fields towards the wooden palisade by the river.

Reinking had brought carpenters with saws and axes to cut down the palisade, but when they arrived he was afraid that the noise of breaking down these fences would wake them, and alert the garrison to their presence.

So he launched a small boat on the River Severn, loaded it up with men, and told them to row it up-river and land inside the defences. However, the current in the river that day, was apparently too strong for them.

Twice they tried and failed to by-pass the defences in this manner; and then they were seen by a royalist sentry, who gave the alarm. They realised that, at that point, it was too late to worry about making a noise. So, Reinking and five of his men rushed immediately to the palisade, and broke it down.

That allowed the infantry to rush through the gap.

One group of fifty are said to have used ladders which they had brought with them to scale over the town wall where it ran along the riverside. Once through they dashed across the town to open the northern gateway.

But, Sir Michael Earnley led a small sortie from the Castle, in an attempt to prevent them from reaching the gateway. In the melee that took place his men were swept aside, and he himself was seriously wounded.

So it was, a few minutes later, the gateway had been captured. The drawbridge was let down, and eight hundred Parliamentarian cavalry were rode into the town virtually unopposed.

Meanwhile Reinking, at the head of the other three hundred and fifty men, who had streamed through the gap in the palisade, went forward to St. Mary's Watergate. In those days a tower and sentry point was attached to the Gate.

However, the guards, both at that location, and at another fort higher up the lane (where it was crossed by the town walls), were traitors.

A pre-agreed password was given by the invaders, and the guards immediately opened the gates. This allowed the Parliamentarian infantry to stream into the town.

They reached the street between the castle and the town, just as the cavalry came up.

Reinking was given a horse once again, and led an attack upon the 'Court of the Main Guard', which stood on the site of the present market square.

This was overcome after a short struggle in which it is said that Reinking had his horse killed under him.

Most of the royalist officers were taken in their beds.

That ends the story for us here.

Miraculously, the total loss on both sides was only seven men and one captain, and the Roundheads had gained the town.

Text based upon The Story of Shrewsbury, by Richard Graves, Hardwick House, Ellesmere 1993.

Charles I image: By Sir Anthony Van Dyck (1641 - 1641) Details of artist on Google Art Project - BQHR9te2WWtyOA at Google Cultural Institute , Public Domain, Link