Qualla: Relief of Montgomery Castle

Relief of Montgomery Castle: Introduction

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data, CC BY-SA 3.0. Sir William Fairfax lay on the field for sixteen hours before he died. His Yorkshire infantry had been repulsed three times by Royalist pikemen on a Powys hillside on 18 September 1644. On the fourth charge he led them in himself and took up to fifteen wounds. He stayed conscious long enough to deliver a final message: tell Parliament he accounted his life well spent in their service, and ask Sir William Brereton to look after his widow and children. He died sometime that night near the village of Montgomery, in what would turn out to be the largest battle ever fought on Welsh soil and one of the decisive turning points of the First English Civil War.

Image: Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data | CC BY-SA 3.0

Relief of Montgomery Castle: The Castle and the Earl

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data, CC BY-SA 3.0. Montgomery Castle in mid-Wales had passed to the Herbert family in the early 17th century and was the home of Edward Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury, philosopher, diplomat, and elder brother of the metaphysical poet George Herbert. By 1644 Edward was elderly, ill, and unwi...

Image: Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data | CC BY-SA 3.0

Relief of Montgomery Castle: The Siege Reversed

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data, CC BY-SA 3.0. Mytton pulled five hundred infantry back into the castle and prepared for a long defence. Myddelton rode out with the cavalry to bring help. The Royalists, joined by Lord Byron and possibly some of the Northern Horse under Sir Marmaduke Langdale, dug in around the castle with 2,8...

Image: Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data | CC BY-SA 3.0

Relief of Montgomery Castle: Eighteen September

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data, CC BY-SA 3.0. Byron formed up on a hill northwest of the castle, leaving a detachment to guard his siege works. There was no action on 17 September. Both armies sat in the cold autumn air looking at each other. On the morning of 18 September, when about a third of the Parliamentarian cavalry r...

Image: Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data | CC BY-SA 3.0

Relief of Montgomery Castle: What the Battle Cost

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data, CC BY-SA 3.0. Many of Byron's defeated men were already survivors of Marston Moor in July. Six of his regiments had come back from Ireland after the king's negotiated armistice with the Confederate Catholics and had been chewed up twice in three months. The remnants of five infantry regiments ...

Image: Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data | CC BY-SA 3.0