Qualla: Storming of Farnham Castle

Storming of Farnham Castle: Introduction

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lewis Hulbert, CC BY-SA 3.0. Sir John Denham was a poet first and a soldier second, and in late 1642 it would have been better had he stuck to verse. He held Farnham Castle for the King with troops too inexperienced to look out from behind their own walls. When Parliament's Sir William Waller arrived on 30 November, Denham still refused to surrender. He had 300 sheep, 100 oxen, plenty of ammunition, and a barricade of piled wood behind a stone gate. What he lacked was anyone willing to fire a musket. In three hours it was over.

Image: Lewis Hulbert | CC BY-SA 3.0

Storming of Farnham Castle: A Castle Caught in the Middle

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lewis Hulbert, CC BY-SA 3.0. Farnham Castle, near the Surrey town of the same name, was a twelfth-century stronghold that had become the country seat of the Bishop of Winchester, Walter Curle. Most of the surrounding area sympathised with the King. When Charles I raised his royal standard at Nottingham in Au...

Image: Lewis Hulbert | CC BY-SA 3.0

Storming of Farnham Castle: Switching Hands

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lewis Hulbert, CC BY-SA 3.0. Wither asked repeatedly for more men and more weapons. Neither came. When the Royalist army marched on London in November after the bloodletting at Edgehill, the strategic value of Farnham Castle dropped to zero in the Earl of Essex's calculations, and Wither was ordered to aband...

Image: Lewis Hulbert | CC BY-SA 3.0

Storming of Farnham Castle: Three Hours of Reluctance

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lewis Hulbert, CC BY-SA 3.0. With the King retreating to Oxford, Essex gave Waller the task of clearing Royalist holdouts from the south-east. Most withdrew. Denham did not. His troops barricaded the castle gate with piles of wood, but the castle itself was not easily defensible, and Denham's men were not so...

Image: Lewis Hulbert | CC BY-SA 3.0

Storming of Farnham Castle: A Poet's Friendship

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lewis Hulbert, CC BY-SA 3.0. Denham and his men were marched to London, arriving 3 December. The common soldiers were soon released. Officers were held longer at Lambeth Palace, but Denham was free by March 1643 and joined the King at Oxford. There he learned that Wither - the man whose estate his troops had...

Image: Lewis Hulbert | CC BY-SA 3.0

Storming of Farnham Castle: Waller's Year

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lewis Hulbert, CC BY-SA 3.0. Waller took £40,000 worth of plunder out of Farnham Castle, along with gunpowder and shoes - the prosaic accumulation of a garrison that had eaten well and fired little. Within the next month he captured Winchester, Arundel, and Chichester, asserting Parliamentary control over Su...

Image: Lewis Hulbert | CC BY-SA 3.0