Hopton Castle is situated in the village of the same name which lies approximately halfway between Knighton and Craven Arms, in the English county of Shropshire. Hopton Castle featured in the TV series Time Team in 2010. A ruin since the early 18th century, it was partially restored between 2006 and 2011, and was officially re-opened to the public as a visitor attraction in December 2011 by the Duke of Gloucester. [1]
The castle may have been founded in the 12th century as a motte and bailey by one of the Hoptons as a mesne lord of the Says of Clun Castle. Walter de Hopton possibly built the stone castle during the Barons' War of the 1260s. The bailey was fortified in stone and a rectangular two-storey keep was built. The last Walter Hopton died during the Wars of the Roses and the castle passed by marriage to the Corbet family of Moreton Corbet castle. From them it passed to Henry Wallop (died 1642) when he married Elizabeth Corbet, daughter of Robert Corbet. [2] He fortified it as a parliamentary stronghold at the outbreak of the English Civil War but died before he could take part in the conflict, leaving it to his son, Robert Wallop, the regicide.
During the Civil War Hopton Castle was one of the few castles to be held for the Parliament in the west. In 1644 Sir Michael Woodhouse, with a force of about 500, laid siege to the castle which was defended by about thirty Roundheads under the command of Samuel More. [3] More eventually agreed terms and surrendered.
There are varying versions of what happened next. According to More's account all those who surrendered, apart from himself, were killed and buried. [4] Other accounts vary on how the siege ended. They state that after a three-week siege, More delayed surrendering until the bailey had been taken and the entrance to the keep was on fire, at which point the garrison surrendered to Sir Michael Woodhouse, who at his discretion (his prerogative under the laws of war as they were practised at that time), decided not to grant the majority of his prisoners quarter and they were killed by their captors.
The castle was still habitable in 1700, but fell into disrepair soon afterwards. Substantial remnants of the much altered keep remain. [5]
In November 2008 the Hopton Castle Preservation Trust (founded in 2006) took ownership of the castle. The trust recently raised one million pounds, half of which was a grant from the National Lottery to fund conservation work and secure a future for the site. (See conservation and repair). [5] [6]
The castle was the subject of a Time Team excavation and episode, appearing in series 17 of the long-running archaeology television programme, as episode 6 ("The Massacre in the Cellar") of that series, and broadcast on Channel 4 on 16 May 2010.
The remaining castle keep was excavated over three days by Time Team, clarifying the shape of the castle and the history of its construction. The keep had been captured by the Royalists during the English Civil War. No evidence of a massacre was found. [4]
Time Team had previously excavated and filmed at High Ercall, another Civil War site in Shropshire.
The conservation and repair of the ruin, funded principally by The Heritage Lottery Fund and English Heritage was the culmination of many years of campaigning and fund raising on the part of the new owners, The Hopton Castle Preservation Trust. The works entailed significant structural stabilisation and rebuilding of the masonry and conservation of surviving medieval plaster. During this time a sophisticated and possibly unique garderobe chamber was revealed. As a result of evidence discovered within this chamber it is now believed that a siege breach may have taken place here.
Conisbrough Castle is a medieval fortification in Conisbrough, South Yorkshire, England. The castle was initially built in the 11th century by William de Warenne, the Earl of Surrey, after the Norman conquest of England in 1066. Hamelin Plantagenet, the illegitimate, parvenu brother of Henry II, acquired the property by marriage in the late 12th century. Hamelin and his son William rebuilt the castle in stone, including its prominent 28-metre (92 ft)-high keep. The castle remained in the family line into the 14th century, despite being seized several times by the Crown. The fortification was then given to Edmund of Langley, passing back into royal ownership in 1461.
PontefractCastle is a castle ruin in the town of Pontefract, in West Yorkshire, England. King Richard II is thought to have died there. It was the site of a series of famous sieges during the 17th-century English Civil War.
Shrewsbury Castle is a red sandstone castle in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England. It stands on a hill in the neck of the meander of the River Severn on which the town originally developed. The castle, directly above Shrewsbury railway station, is a Grade I listed building.
Caus Castle is a ruin of a hill fort and medieval castle in the civil parish of Westbury in the English county of Shropshire. It is situated up on the eastern foothills of the Long Mountain guarding the route from Shrewsbury, Shropshire to Montgomery, Powys, on the border between England and Wales. It was destroyed during the English Civil War and has been in ruins since.
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Moreton Corbet is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Moreton Corbet and Lee Brockhurst, in the Shropshire district, in the ceremonial county of Shropshire, England. The village's toponym refers to the Corbet family, the local landowners.
Moreton Corbet Castle is a ruined medieval castle and Elizabethan era manor house, located near the village of Moreton Corbet, Shropshire, England. It is a Grade I listed building and English Heritage property. Although out of use since the 18th century, it remains the property of the Corbet family. It can be visited free of charge during daylight hours.
Whittington Castle is a castle in northern Shropshire, England, owned and managed by the Whittington Castle Preservation Fund. The castle was originally a motte-and-bailey castle, but this was replaced in the 13th century by one with buildings around a courtyard whose exterior wall was the curtain wall of the inner bailey. As a castle of the Welsh Marches, it was built on the border of Wales and England very close to the historic fort of Old Oswestry.
Cornwall played a significant role in the English Civil War, being a Royalist enclave in the generally Parliamentarian south-west.
Robert Wallop was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times from 1621 to 1660. He supported the Parliamentary cause in the English Civil War and was one of the regicides of King Charles I of England.
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Berkhamsted Castle is a Norman motte-and-bailey castle in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire. The castle was built to obtain control of a key route between London and the Midlands during the Norman conquest of England in the 11th century. Robert of Mortain, William the Conqueror's half brother, was probably responsible for managing its construction, after which he became the castle's owner. The castle was surrounded by protective earthworks and a deer park for hunting. The castle became a new administrative centre of the former Anglo-Saxon settlement of Berkhamsted. Subsequent kings granted the castle to their chancellors. The castle was substantially expanded in the mid-12th century, probably by Thomas Becket.
Sir Henry Wallop of Farleigh House, Hampshire was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons variously between 1597 and 1642.
This is a timeline for the English Civil War in Shropshire.
Samuel More (1593–1662) was an English man at the centre of two historical incidents in 17th-century England. In the first, he arranged for the removal of his children to the New World aboard the Mayflower; later, during the English Civil War, a garrison under his command was massacred by besieging forces.
The Corbet family is an aristocratic English family of Anglo-Norman extraction, who were amongst the early marcher lords, holding the barony of Caus. Following the extinction of the senior line the junior line based at Moreton Corbet Castle would go on to become one of the most powerful and richest of the landed gentry in Shropshire. The family trace their ancestry to two barons found in the 1086 Domesday Book and they probably came from the Boitron and Essay region, near Sées in Normandy.
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