'The Daily Telegraph' reported the annual march in the Mall of the Royalist Army of the English Civil War Society on 30th January to commemorate the execution of King Charles I.
Posted on Tue 30 January 2024
On Sunday 14th January, the paper reported the result of a seven-year search for the 'lost' site of the Battle of Stow in Gloucestershire in the English Civil War. The battle took place on 21st March 1646. The trust had long suspected that a stone monument, put up by locals in 2002, was in the wrong place, as there was a lack of war relics at the site. The investigations by archaeologists and metal detectorists had unearthed dozens of 17th-century musket balls and powder caps from infantry and cavalry weapons in farmland half a mile from the town, proving that the wrong site had been registered.
The discovery shows that the battle took place nearly a mile from where Historic England, the heritage watchdog responsible for protecting battlefield sites, originally believed the battle to have taken place, and follows five archaeological surveys by the Battlefields Trust Charity and the re-examination of contemporary accounts.
This battle was the last fought in the first English Civil War. The Roundheads caught up with the King's last remaining army, which was trying to link up with the King at Oxford, 30 miles away. The Royalists were heavily outnumbered and retreated into Stow, where the battle continued. One street ran red with Royalist blood, according to local legend, before their commander, Jacob Astley, 1st Baron Astley of Reading, was forced to surrender in the market square.
Following this battle, Charles realised that the end was in sight and gave himself up to the Scottish army in Newark, Nottinghamshire in May 1646.
Richard Woolley, Defence Correspondent