Naseby Battlefield Trail - Cromwell Memorial - Naseby, Northamptonshire
Posted by: 
SMacB
N 52° 24.817 W 000° 59.684
30U E 636383 N 5808934
Monument and information boards at the site of the Battle of Naseby, 14th June 1645, offering views over the battlefield where Royalist forces were defeated by the Parliamentarian 'New Model Army'.
Waymark Code: WM106WN
Location: East Midlands, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 03/10/2019
Views: 1
Monument and information boards at the site of the Battle of Naseby, 14th June 1645, offering views over the battlefield where Royalist forces were defeated by the Parliamentarian 'New Model Army'.
The monument was erected c.1936 by J.A. Batch. Consisting of limestone ashlar, an octagonal ribbed shaft surmounted by a ball finial on an octagonal panelled plinth. The inscription on the front of the plinth reads:
Battle of Naseby,
14 June 1645.
From near this site
Oliver Cromwell
led the Cavalry charge
which decided the
issue of the battle
and ultimately that of
the great Civil War. On the reverse of the plinth:
This memorial
was accepted
on behalf of
the county
by the Chairman of
the County Council
18 May 1936.The info board tells us -
"The decisive battle of the English Civil War was fought in the fields of Naseby, Sulby, Sibbertoft and Clipston parishes on Saturday 14 June, 1645. The Parliamentarian New Model Army, under the command of Sir Thomas Fairfax, defeated the Royalist army, commanded by King Charles I and Prince Rupert of the Rhine.
Cavalry patrols clashed on the evening of 13 June in Naseby village. Early on 14 June Fairfax marched the New Model Army to meet at Naseby windmill, now the Obelisk. By 8.00am King Charles and Rupert had moved the royal army to a position on the ridge between East Farndon and Little Oxendon. Both sides wished to fight and Fairfax ordered his army to a position on the ridge to the south of this place. Rupert saw the movement and brought the Royalists to Dust Hill, across the valley to the north.
The Battle Commences -
This area was mostly open ground, but contained by an ancient parish boundary hedge around Sulby to the west and a rabbit warren (on today’s Lodge Hill) and boggy ground to the east. Lieutenant General of Horse Oliver Cromwell put dragoons behind Sulby Hedges. Their musket fire caused the royalist cavalry on the western flank to charge, forcing many of parliament’s horse to flee. The royalist foot attacked and almost broke through Fairfax’s line but it stubbornly resisted. Cromwell's troopers routed the horse opposing them and then fell on the left flank of the royalist foot. Despite Rupert’s Bluecoat Regiment standing like a wall of brass' on the slope just west of the road to the north, Fairfax’s counter-attacks succeeded in driving the royalists back. Part of the royalist army went on fighting, all the way they had come that moming, in a battle reaching a climax on Wadborough Hill."
An excellent account of the battle can be found here - (
visit link)