Atrocities in the context of the English Civil War: a historian focuses on a massacre 375 years ago, which had hardly been noticed until now, in which 160 soldiers of the royalists as well as probably women and children were massacred after storming a fortress. His research shows that the bloody act was subsequently covered up by both conflict parties and the local population.
In 1642 there was a military escalation: The tensions between the absolutist-minded King Charles I and the House of Commons led to the English Civil War. It was held between the loyal “Cavaliers” and the supporters of Parliament – the “Roundheads”. In addition to the political power struggle, the differences between the various religious groups that had previously arisen in England, Scotland and Ireland also played a role in the conflict. One stumbling block in this context was that Charles I had made a Catholic queen. The war eventually ended with the defeat of the royalists and the execution of the king in 1649.
On the trail of a strangely unknown event
The historian David Appleby from the University of Nottingham has been researching events in the context of the English Civil War for many years. He reports that he repeatedly encountered references in historical documents to a military conflict that seemed strangely little known to him: the bloody storming of Shelford Manor in 1645. “I felt compelled to study this event in detail since the The name Shelford appeared again and again in some documents, which, however, only referred to indirectly. I wondered why I had never heard of it and why it was not mentioned in the two major works on the atrocities of the Civil War in England, ”says Appleby. So he dedicated himself to the task of reconstructing the event using all available archives and historical writings, as well as clarifying why it remained so unknown.
As available from the information available, Shelford Manor was a fortified property east of Nottingham owned by Philip Stanhope, the loyal Earl of Chesterfield. In the summer of 1645, after the royalists were defeated at Naseby, some soldiers from the battered army were billeted at Shelford Manor. Explosive: It was the queen’s regiment, which consisted mainly of foreign Catholics. On November 1, 1645, Shelford Manor was then surrounded by parliamentary troops. After Stanhope had refused to surrender, the fortress was finally stormed. Documents in the Nottinghamshire archives revealed that the attackers fell into a brutal frenzy. Accordingly, Stanhope and the approximately 160 soldiers of the royalists were brutally massacred, apparently together with several women and children. Presumably their mutilated bodies were then buried in a pit on the site.
Everyone wanted to forget
According to Appleby, the event illustrates the escalations in brutality that the English Civil War also led to. “After I had reconstructed the event using all available archives and historical documents, the explanation for why both the royalists and the parliamentarians apparently covered up the massacre became apparent,” says the historian. It seems plausible that the supporters of parliament perceived the brutal massacre by their troops as a disgrace that was better kept a secret. But one might think that the royalists would have had an interest in making the bloody deed known to their followers.
According to Appleby, the fact that they too remained silent is probably due to the fact that it was a Catholic unit that was massacred. Because, as he explains, these troops of Charles I had a particularly bad reputation and there was a dispute in the ranks of the royalists over the recruitment of foreigners and Catholics. Apparently they did not want to raise this issue in public in connection with the massacre. “The silence about the Shelford story is perhaps a reflection of the shame on both sides at the bloodshed and unpopular developments in the supposedly ‘civil’ civil war,” said Appleby.
Another clue about the background of the “social amnesia” in connection with the massacre comes from today’s village of Shelford, reports Appleby. “It is strange that even long-established families there apparently have no recognizable popular memory of the most important event in the history of the village and there are also no tales or commemorative place names, as they are usually common,” says the historian.
As he reports in this connection, according to his research, the intention was to set up a garrison at Shelford Manor after the massacre. But then the building was set on fire – the villagers had been blamed for that. Perhaps they no longer wanted a military presence in their place and perhaps also wiped the whole story from the communal memory. “The question now arises to me: What cases of forgotten and hushed up episodes of violence during the civil war could there have been?” The historian concludes.
Source: University of Nottingham, Article: Historical Research, doi: 10.1093 / hisres / htaa011