Civil War Church Use.
To:
Dear Mr. Harrington,
The Vicar, Rev. Simon Wright, has passed on to me your query about the use of local churches during the English Civil War, 1642-5.
Your first question is easy to answer and I expect Simon has already sent you this but I repeat it. The Townstal church guide book contains the following:
"After the Reformation years it is difficult to find reference to St. Clement's beyond the list of successive Vicars and the record of Baptisms and burials. We do know, however, that in the civil war Sir Thomas Fairfax, en route from Totnes to Cornwall with two regiments stormed and took Dartmouth, Townstal Church and Mount Boone. The church must have formed a valuable strong point commanding the only route down to Hardnesse, our present main road not then existing."
John Scott, a churchwarden for many years says that he has never seen bullet marks on the tower, but they may either never have existed or been obliterated by early 20C attempts to waterproof the building.
Your third question I can answer directly as I have seen the original burial register for St. Saviour's when it was still kept in the church in Dartmouth. However the 17 deaths it records on October 4th 1643 relate to the first seige of Dartmouth when it was captured by Prince Maurice after a month's fierce resistance in heavy rain. I have a copy of the names which I can send you if you wish. This was the last entry in the handwriting of the Vicar, Anthony Harford, who must have left the town after its capture by the Royalists as he was a supporter of Parliament, and another hand takes over during this period. His wife however gave birth to a daughter the following March. Harford's writing reappears in April 1646.
The story of Dartmouth in the Civil War has to be reconstructed from the accounts kept by the Mayor and Receiver (treasurer), which survive in the Devon Record Office. There is also a 50-page book of expenses claimed by the town's occupants AFTER the war ended in which they listed all they had spent to help fortify it, as well as all they had lost because of the war. Suspicious historians may feel some of them exaggerated their losses in the hope that Parliament would recompense them (there is no evidence that they received anything!), but the picture that emerges is still of a community uniting to keep out the enemy.
In my book "Dartmouth and its Neighbours", pub. in 1997 by Dart Books, 12 Fairfax Place, Dartmouth Devon TQ6 9AE, ISBN No. 1 901536 00 9, I have written a chapter about the lead-up to and events of the civil war, with the sources given. An earlier book published in 1950 which I recommend is by Percy Russell, "Dartmouth - A History of the Port and Town," - republished 1982 by Friends of Dartmouth Museum, no ISBN no. on my copy. He also quotes from original sources..
In my book there is a map showing where the fortifications were to defend the town, including Townstal church and St. Saviours. The first seige by Prince Maurice had to be met entirely from local resources, organised by the Mayor and town councillors, who had spent the town's money sending Thomas Newcomen (grandfather of the inventor of the steam engine) to London to buy 36 barrels of gunpowder. The accounts show that guns were mounted on top of the newly enlarged tower of St. Saviour's as well as on St. Clement's Townstal.
Henry Penny, blacksmith supplied "ironwork" to all the forts and local people brought anything which could be used to make road blocks. After the war Agnes Penny, now a widow, claimed in her expense account that her house had been burnt down, and that her husband had served 24 weeks at St. Saviour's and 18 weeks at Townstal & other forts at 3s 6p per week.
I doubt whether there would ever have been "bullet" marks on the church towers as the combatants were using big guns with cannon balls. Curiously enough, two cannon balls have been brought into the local museum this year, found in fields within gunshot range of Townstal church.
We know from the town accounts that Prince Maurice's men based themselves at Milton Farm, about % mile from Townstal church, as the Mayor records huge quantities of beer, best sack and claret being delivered to them there after the town surrendered. I do not know of any "fort" adjacent to the church, but at a pinch the garrison could have camped inside it during the fighting.
Fairfax's attack on the town to recover it for Parliament took place in January 1645/6, after the local inhabitants had been occupied by Royalists for over two years. It surrendered according to Fairfax's own account after only a few days', with the loss of only one man in his forces.
I hope this helps with your enquiries, or that you will find what you need from the two books suggested.
Yours sincerely, (Mrs) Ray Freeman