Paranormal History

Marston Moor, and its place in paranormal history.

As the sun ebbed away from the skies above Marston Moor on the 2nd July 1644 dark clouds rolled across the landscape, a sure sign that bad weather was brewing, a day to end with the thunderclap of a summer storm, and the fate of a nation decided.

In all honesty I could write a million words to describe why England erupted into Civil War in 1642, and there are plenty of people who would disagree or fully agree with my views. Its causes are a hundredfold, its cost high and its gains perhaps even higher. The war was effectively fought in various regions, the South West, where two friends fought one another in a series of engagements, the midlands / south midlands, where the Kings main army was based in Oxford and supported by Wales, and the North, where the Kings main supporter, William Cavendish, the Earl of Newcastle (later Marquis) fought against the double act of father and son, Lord Ferdinando Fairfax and his son Sir Thomas Fairfax. Up until early 1644 the war in the north had gone well for the King, Newcastle had beaten the Fairfax duo, most notably at Adwalton Moor close to Bradford and had besieged the Parliamentarians in Hull. If the north could be conquered it could mean Newcastle bringing his men south and turning the tide of the war elsewhere, the Parliamentarians in turn needed a saviour in the north, and they found it in the form of an alliance with the Scottish. Promises were made by the leader of Parliament, John Pym, promises of money and that the Church of England would be run along the lines of the Scottish Presbyterian model Kirk, all of this was more of Pym’s lies however as the Parliamentarians never lived up to their promise, yet in early 1644 Scottish troops advanced southwards into the North-East. The Earl of Newcastle moved quickly, he did not have the manpower to defeat the Scots and hold the Parliamentarians inside Hull and so after retreating from the city of Newcastle to Durham, Cavendish decided to hold onto the largest of the North’s cities, York.

York was besieged by the combined Scottish Army under the First Earl of Levan, Alexander Leslie, Lord Fairfax’s Parliamentarian Army and another Parliamentarian Army under the Second Earl of Manchester, Edward Montagu. Inside York were the now Marquis of Newcastle’s veteran army as well as the York Garrison commanded by Sir Thomas Glemham, John Belasyse and Sir Henry Slingsby. There were a series of assaults made on York, most notably by the Scots and Manchester’s troops but both were driven off after very heavy fighting. King Charles was not about to let the city be lost, and with it his Northern Army and the War. In truth there was little he could do to prevent it, he sent his nephew, Prince Rupert of the Rhine to relieve the siege; he was probably the best General on either side during the conflict yet suffered from being on the losing side.

The letter which King Charles wrote to Rupert, ordering him to relieve York has been the cause of much debate, it is not clear if Charles wanted Rupert to fight the Allied army; that however is how Rupert read the letter. By the 26th June he had arrived at Skipton Castle, he had advanced through Lancashire in the hope of gaining troops from the large amount of Catholic’s in the North West, on the way his men massacred the garrison of Bolton after a delegation had been fired upon, in war at this time if a town or city did not surrender they were shown no mercy, yet it was still an act of wanton depravity. From Skipton Rupert went to relieve the siege by coming from the north, using Parliamentarian built bridges to cross some rivers. Rupert never entered York; he was too busy finding out where the enemy was, yet five different commanders now all faced the same question, should a battle be fought?

It was clear York had been relieved, the Allied army, camped on Marston Moor decided to move to Tadcaster where a good road network would bring reinforcements to them and allow them to flee if disaster struck. On the 2nd July much of the Parliamentarian army was well on its way to Tadcaster when Royalist Cavalry came to investigate their old positions in the vicinity of Long Marston. Immediately the Allied Army turned around to confront the Royalists, who in turn appeared on their side of Marston Moor in dribs and drabs, a regiment at a time. The last to arrive on the battlefield were the Scots for the Allies, and the men from York for the Royalists, these men had suffered during the siege and had gorged themselves on the food left by the fleeing Allied Army.

Battles in this period were really three separate battles, the Infantry took the centre, 2/3 of all Infantry carried Matchlock Muskets, the rest carried Pikes anywhere from 8 to 12’ long (some soldiers cut them down to make them lighter, they were the ones who died when coming to an enemy out of their reach). Infantry moved slow and purposefully towards one another, with pikes outstretched and ragged volleys of musket fire killing or wounding enemy troops. It is a myth to believe that when the push of pike came that men with Muskets turned their muskets around and used them as clubs, each Musketeer also carried a short sword, a far more lethal weapon in a battle than a lump of wood. On either wing (either side of the central Infantry formations) would be the Cavalry, another myth often presented on TV is that cavalry charged full speed into the enemy, in truth they trotted towards the enemy, keeping a strict formation in lines of men and horses, at the beginning of the war Rupert had trained his men to hold their fire (they were armed with long pistols and carbines) until they were on top of the enemy, everyone else fired from a distance then wheeled their horse to the back of the formation. By Marston Moor most Cavalry fought as Rupert’s did, Cromwell’s ironsides being the best on the Parliamentarian side.

Looking Northwards on a map of the battle would see the Allied Left Wing Cavalry headed by Cromwell, the Infantry in the Centre had no overall commander; each Regiment had its own leader, the Right Wing of Allied Cavalry led by Sir Thomas Fairfax. Opposite Fairfax on the Royalist left (looking South) was Lord Byron, the centre, like the Allies, was led by individual regimental leaders. The Right was taken by Lord Goring, Prince Rupert kept a body of reserve Cavalry, his own bodyguard of troops and veterans of a dozen battles and skirmishes. Alexander Leslie did the same with contingents of Scots who had been making their own way back to the battlefield. The Royalists soon discovered (if they had not already known) that they were drastically outnumbered, 18’000 men for the King, against a combined 27’000 strong Parlo-Scottish Army.

In effect it took so long for the Parliamentarian Foot to march back to Marston Moor and for Newcastle’s troops to arrive that it was already late in the day when Prince Rupert told William Cavendish that the battle would be fought on the morning of the 3rd. The Royalists Infantry had a long ditch to their front, a defensive position which they manned with a forlorn hope of Musketeers, at the end of the ditch was some flat ground and so they placed some artillery on that spot. It is unsure whether this artillery unit began firing at the Parliamentarian horsemen opposite, but what is known is that Oliver Cromwell ordered his Cavalry to attack. As his order went out the skies darkened, men looked to the heavens as large rain drops began padding onto the dry ground, a Musket needs a lit taper (Match-Cord, much like a shoe lace soaked in saltpetre so it burns) to be able to work, for it to fire the gunpowder and so shoot the Musket Ball. Rain spoiled all of that, it was not impossible to fire during wet weather, but it was very hard. Cromwell’s Cavalry crashed into the Artillerymen and Royalist Cavalry from Byron’s Command came to help their beleaguered comrades and soon both Royalist and Parliamentarian Cavalry were firing point blank at one another, often both sides resorting to sword fighting from horseback to decide the smaller battles inside the larger conflict. As all of this was beginning the Allied foot troops advanced, easily pushing the Royalist’s and their wet Muskets back to their parent Regiments. They had trouble getting through the ditch, which may have had hedges alongside it, out on the Allied Right though things had not gone well. Lord Goring had charged his horses forward, Fairfax’s cavalry did not last long enough to engage their enemy before they turned tail and ran, it has often been pointed out that Royalist Cavalry ALWAYS ran off after their beaten foes, at Marston Moor however Goring stopped many of his men from doing so, they wheeled round and organised a charged into the flank of the Allied Foot Regiments, if the Cavalry could panic the Allied Infantry then victory would be delivered to Rupert and the King. Lord Goring’s men advanced and came to the Allied Right hand Infantry, these men were not the fallible Parliamentarians however, they were Scotsmen, and instead of running and giving victory to the King they stood their ground and gave a brave death to any of Goring’s Cavalry foolish enough to advance against them.

By now Rupert and Cavendish had discovered that a battle was going on, for as the first shots had been fired lightning had forked the sky and thunder had rumbled through the moor. Rupert led his Reserve to the right where Byron was being beaten, but not by Cromwell. Early in the engagement a fellow Parliamentarian trooper had fired his pistol close to Cromwell’s cheek and the flash of gunpowder had burned his skin, Cromwell fled back to safety to have his “wound” treated. Alexander Leslie may well have seen Rupert’s banner rush to the flank and so he too sent Cavalry to that part of the Battlefield, Scottish Lancers (not armed with Pistols but 6 to 8’ foot lances) and more regular cavalry crashed into Rupert and Byron’s men just as they were getting the upper hand, this counterstroke proved to be decisive, Rupert and Byron’s Cavalry crumpled and began to flee back towards York through Wilstrop Wood, Rupert himself had hidden in a bean-field, Parliamentarian Cavalry troopers found his belongings, then murdered his pet dog, a hunting poodle named ‘boy’, which Parliamentarian Propaganda had claimed to be the devil.

Goring’s Cavalry could not flee to York for fear of running into the now victorious Allied Cavalry which was chasing Rupert, Goring instead fled to the south. Whilst all of this Cavalry action had been taking place the Infantry battle in the centre had slowly gone the Allied Army’s way, men began fleeing in small numbers, then whole Regiments turned tail and fled, one Regiment or Irishmen dressed in Green coats were caught in open order by Allied Cavalry in the region of Moor Lane, the Regiment was wiped out. The Marquis of Newcastle had brought his own Foot Regiments to the battle, comprising around seven separate below-strength Regiments, these men dressed in White Coats now stood alone, defeated, exhausted after weeks of siege inside York they now formed a defensive position inside an old walled sheep pen, known as White Sykes Close. There may have been as many as 300 men inside White Sykes Close; the Catholic members of the Regiment wore a large Red Cross patch on their Coats. No one knows who commanded this body of men; they could have fled, and like many Regiments could have survived. Instead they stood their ground, 300 men against almost 27’000 men. It was a miracle any of them survived, after numerous assaults by infantry and cavalry they still stood their ground, calls were made to surrender, returned with calls of victory, or death. Only 30 men, each badly wounded and unable to stand, survived the horrors of White Sykes Close.

The battle over Cromwell sent word that god had given him victory, thus many people believed (and sadly still do) that Marston Moor was Cromwell’s victory, it is not known if he returned to action after having his cheek burned early on, without the Scottish then Parliament would have been defeated, a fact forgotten, especially by Cromwell himself.

I have visited this battlefield many times, both on my own and with interested parties of people. I usually start a walk at the Sun Inn in Long Marston and walk down Marston Lane towards Tockwith, to the right is Marston Hall where Parliamentary officers were housed the night before the battle, it is said Cromwell himself haunts this place, though of course it could be, and more than likely is, a different Parliamentarian Officer who died in the fighting. Just beyond Marston Hall is the junction of Atterwith Lane, more on this later, next comes the Junction of Moor Lane, scene of the Irish Regiment’s disaster and also a place where ghostly soldiers have been seen many times in the past. Next to this is the Monument, where in 2006 I had my own strange encounter where I heard what I can only describe as someone running on gravel, I heard the heavy breathing and wheezing, as well as the rattle of various accoutrements which a soldier may have worn during the battle, I confess I was on my own and it was around 1:30 in the morning when this happened and it took me a good ten minutes to decide to look for an explanation, though I still found none. When walking the site I walk from the monument down Marston lane, on the right hand side is a hedge and beyond that would have been the ditch which proved to be a stumbling block to the Allied Infantrymen, I then turn right up Kendal Lane, it was here the fighting between Royalist and Parliamentarian horse started the battle. There is a public footpath on the right which takes me towards Wilstrop Wood, a very spooky place in the dead of night. Walking towards Wilstrop Wood along this pathway takes a walker past the Bean Field Rupert hid in. After being defeated Royalist Cavalry fled this way, aided by a young girl who opened a gate so they could pass through Wilstrop Wood, it is unsure how she died, some say she was trampled by accident by the Royalists, some say she was murdered by Parliamentarians, either way her ghost has been seen and heard screaming in this part of the battlefield. On through Wilstrop Wood brings you eventually to Atterwith Lane, a right turn here brings me to the main road once more, it is along this lane that Goring’s Cavalry advanced and beat off Fairfax, it is also midway along here that ghosts have been seen, mostly hiding in ditches or behind hedges, as the Royalists would have done so at the battles end. All over the battlefield men have been seen dressed as if still in battle, men and horses too have been seen around Cromwell’s Plump, which is a clump of tree’s opposite the Monument. If you’ve followed these directions and are still feeling fit then you may wish to find White Sykes Close, no one is sure of the exact location but in many guidebooks it is found if you walk up Moor Lane (next to the Monument) and turn left at the end.

It is thought 4’000 Royalists died in the fighting, which lasted less than an hour, perhaps as few as 300 Parlo-Scottish men died. After Marston Moor the North was lost, in truth though the Parliamentarians spent much effort and time defeating various strongholds in the North still loyal to King Charles, who in turn could never raise another Northern Army. Eventually a much depleted Royalist Army met its end at Naseby to a large Parliamentarian Army, by then the writing was on the wall, with the first marks being made in the mud, blood and carnage of Marston Moor. Men fought and died in these fields, their blood remains, their heroism and fates are recorded, regardless of their cause they deserve to be given credit for being the brave men we remember all soldiers to be, every year on November 11th.

Thank you for your time.

CJ Linton.