Sir Charles Lucas, 1613 to 28 August 1648, was a professional soldier from Essex and Royalist cavalry leader in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Taken prisoner at the end of the First English Civil War in March 1646, he was released after swearing not to fight against Parliament again, an agreement he broke when the Second English Civil War began in 1648. As a result, he was executed following his capture at the Siege of Colchester in August 1648, and became a Royalist martyr after the 1660 Stuart Restoration.
Ashby de la Zouch Castle is a ruined fortification in the town of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire, England. The castle was built by William, Lord Hastings, a favourite of Edward IV, after 1473, accompanied by the creation of a 3,000-acre (1,200 ha) park. Constructed on the site of an older manor house, two large towers and various smaller buildings had been constructed by 1483, when Hastings was executed by Richard, Duke of Gloucester. The Hastings family used the castle as their seat for several generations, improving the gardens and hosting royal visitors.
Earl of Huntingdon is a title which has been created several times in the Peerage of England. The medieval title was associated with the ruling house of Scotland.
Thomas Grey, Lord Grey of Groby, was an elected Member of Parliament for Leicester during the English Long Parliament, an active member of the Parliamentary party and a regicide. He was the eldest son of Henry Grey, 1st Earl of Stamford, using his father's as his own courtesy title, and Anne Cecil, daughter of William Cecil, 2nd Earl of Exeter.
George Hastings, 4th Earl of Huntingdon was an English nobleman.
Thomas Horton was an English soldier in the Parliamentarian army during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, and Regicide. A member of the minor gentry, his family was connected to Sir Arthur Haselrig, one of the Five Members whose attempted arrest by Charles I in January 1642 sparked the First English Civil War. Horton served throughout the war, and in 1645 was given command of a regiment in the New Model Army.
Sir William Batten was a naval officer and administrator from Somerset, who began his career as a merchant seaman, served as second-in-command of the Parliamentarian navy during the First English Civil War, then defected to the Royalists when the Second English Civil War began in 1648. After the 1660 Stuart Restoration, he was elected Member of Parliament for Rochester and re-appointed Surveyor of the Navy, a position he had previously held from 1638 to 1648. In this capacity, he was a colleague of the author Samuel Pepys, who mentions him frequently in his "Diary", often to his detriment.
This is a list of people who have served as Custos Rotulorum of Leicestershire.
Sir George Lisle was a professional soldier from London who briefly served in the later stages of the Eighty and Thirty Years War, then fought for the Royalists during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Captured at Colchester in August 1648, he was condemned to death by a Parliamentarian court martial and executed by firing squad along with his colleague Charles Lucas.
Henry Bard, 1st Viscount Bellomont was a Royalist soldier and diplomat who served in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, then as envoy from Charles II of England to Safavid Iran and the Mughal Empire, where he died in 1656.
Lucy Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon, born Lucy Davies, was a seventeenth-century English poet.
Thomas Rawton was one of the highest-ranking officers to support the Levellers, and served with Parliament on both land and sea. He was the eldest son of Captain John Rawton, a naval officer who made his fortune in the Baltic trade, and inherited his father's property in the London Borough of Southwark.
Henry Hastings, 5th Earl of Huntingdon, was a prominent English nobleman and literary patron in England during the first half of the seventeenth century.
Cornwall played a significant role in the English Civil War, being a Royalist enclave in the generally Parliamentarian south-west.
Theophilus Hastings, 7th Earl of Huntingdon was a 17th-century English politician and Jacobite. One of the few non-Catholics to remain loyal to James II of England after November 1688, on the rare occasions he is mentioned by historians, he is described as a 'facile instrument of the Stuarts,' a 'turncoat' or 'outright renegade.'
Ferdinando Hastings, 6th Earl of Huntingdon, was the son of Henry Hastings, 5th Earl of Huntingdon, and Lady Elizabeth Stanley, the daughter of Ferdinando Stanley, 5th Earl of Derby, and Alice Spencer. He married Lucy, daughter of Sir John Davies, on 7 August 1623.
Elizabeth Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon, formerly Lady Elizabeth Stanley, was an English noblewoman and writer who was third in line of succession to the English throne. She was the wife of Henry Hastings, 5th Earl of Huntingdon. She was also styled Lady Hastings of Hungerford and Lady Botreaux as her husband held both of these titles in addition to the Earl of Huntingdon.
The Battle of Burton Bridge was fought between Royalist and Parliamentarian forces at Burton upon Trent on 4 July 1643 during the First English Civil War. By the time of the battle, the town, which had at various times been held by both sides, was garrisoned by a Parliamentarian unit under the command of Captain Thomas Sanders and the town's military governor, Colonel Richard Houghton. The key river crossing at Burton was desired by Queen Henrietta Maria, who was proceeding southwards from Yorkshire with a convoy of supplies destined for King Charles I at Oxford. The Royalists, led by Colonel Thomas Tyldesley, launched a cavalry charge across the bridge which succeeded in defeating the Parliamentarians and capturing most of their officers, including Sanders and Houghton. The Queen's convoy proceeded on its way south to Oxford, with Tyldesley receiving a knighthood and a promotion in recognition of his victory. Burton changed hands several more times during the course of the war, before finally coming under Parliamentarian control in 1646.
St Helen's Church is the Anglican parish church of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, in the deanery of North West Leicestershire and the Diocese of Leicester. There was a church in the town in the 11th century, but the core of the present building mainly dates from work started in 1474, when the church was rebuilt by William Hastings at the same time that he converted his neighbouring manor house into a castle. The church was refurbished in about 1670 to create more space, but the large and increasing size of the congregation led to further work in 1829, and a major rebuild in 1878–80, including the widening of the nave by the addition of two outer aisles.
The Storming of Shelford House was a confrontation of the English Civil War that took place from 1 to 3 November 1645. The Parliamentarian force of Colonel-General Sydnam Poyntz attacked the Royalist outpost of Shelford House, which was one of a group of strongholds defending the strategically important town of Newark-on-Trent. The house, owned by Philip Stanhope, 1st Earl of Chesterfield and controlled by his son Sir Philip Stanhope, and made up of mostly Catholic soldiers, was overwhelmed by the Parliamentarian force after calls for submission were turned down by Stanhope. The majority of the defenders were killed in the resulting sack by the Parliamentarians, commanded by Colonel John Hutchinson, and the house was then burned to the ground. Stanhope died soon afterwards from injuries he sustained in the attack.
