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In 1639 trouble was
brewing between King and Parliament. Charles I visited Hull to
inspect the town's defences, and arsenal - at that time England's
largest. He was warmly welcomed and entertained, possibly in what is
Wilberforce House today. In 1640 Sir John Hotham was made town
Governor and given a strong military detachment to help him. By 1642
the dispute between King and Parliament reached breaking point. With
conflict inevitable, Charles tried to change the Governor. He wanted
the Earl of Newcastle to take over, but Parliament re-affirmed
Hotham as Governor. The King moved his Court to York to be nearer to
Hull. The two towns counter-balanced each other - York for the King,
Hull for Parliament. On 22nd April the King sent his young son, the
Duke of York (later James 11) to Hull. He was entertained by the
mayor (Henry Barnard) and Hotham and stayed overnight. Hotham
suspected a trap however, and when he heard that the King was also
coming he ordered the town gates to be closed and went out on the
wall near Beverley Gate to refuse the King entry. Despite the King's
alternate threats and bargains Hotham maintained his refusal, even
though the mayor was in favour of allowing the King to enter.
Charles went back as far as Beverley and the Duke of York was
allowed to follow.
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This was the first overt act of the Civil War and Hotham was declared
a traitor the next day. The town was besieged for three weeks in July.
but the defenders came out of the town twice to attack the royalists,
and in their second sally they succeeded in pushing the royalists
our of their headquarters at Anlaby. four miles from the town, and
the siege was lifted. Hotham's son, John. took a party of troops from
Hull and captured Cawood Castle near Selby, thus protecting the town
from the west.
However, the Hothams fared no better than had Sir Robert Constable
a century earlier, except they probably met a quicker death. In 1643
their enthusiasm for the parliamentary cause had diminished to the
point where they began to have talks with the royalist side. On 29th
June they were arrested, although Sir John Hotham had escaped as far
as Beverley. They were both executed by Parliament in London in 1644.
The new mayor, Thomas Raikes, five aldermen (including Henry Barnard)
and the vicar of Holy Trinity, formed a defence committee for the
own with the mayor as Acting Governor. By this time the whole of Yorkshire,
apart from the Hull area was in Royalist hands and early in June 1643
Lord Fairfax, the Parliamentary Commander for the County took refuge
in Hull. He was subsequently made Governor. |
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| The inevitable
second siege of the town was started by the Earl of Newcastle
(Charles' nominee for Governor in 1642) on 2nd September 1643, using
a large army. The defenders destroyed the Charterhouse, which was
outside the walls, and used the ruins as a gun emplacement. The
first part of the siege was marked by an artillery battle, the
royalists firing red hot shot into the town to start fires. Fairtax
cut the banks of the River Humber to flood the countryside and
impede the royalists on 14th September. Oliver Cromwell brought
Parliamentary reinforcements on 261h September, with more troops
being brought later by Sir John Meldrum. On 11th October Fairfax
took the initiative using his now strong forces to advance out of
the town, and after bitter fighting, the Parliamentary Troops
over-ran the royalists. The siege ended the next day, and for some
years 11th October was a day of thanksgiving in Hull (in later years
11th October became the official day for the start of the famous
Hull Fair, although that policy was discontinued in mid twentieth
century). |
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| Because of Hull's resistance the royalists could not take full
advantage of their success in the rest of the north, and Fairfax
used the town as a base for military operations for the rest of
1643. Hull remained politically quite happy under parliamentary
government. Andrew Marvell, one of the town's M.P's was a notable
Puritan poet. The one serious royalist plot in the town was in
1657-8, led by Sir Henry Slingsby. This attempt to subvert officers
of the garrison was denounced by the officers themselves and
Slingsby was executed. The accession of Oliver Cromwell's son,
Richard. as Lord Protector of England was well received in the town.
However, in 1659 Robert Overton was appointed Governor, a man who
had been very unpopular when he had been Deputy Governor in
164S-1655. This probably did not help the cause of the regime in
Hull. |
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| Nationally, the winter of 1659-60 saw signs that a return to the
monarchy under Charles II, son of Charles I, looked likely. Robert
Overton began to shows signs of resistance and preparations against
another royalist siege. Eventually he must have seen that defeat
would have been inevitable, and he allowed himself to be replaced as
Governor by Charles Fairfax, although some of the garrisonn were
still opposed to the restitution of the monarchy. Thus Hull began
the Civil War as the first town to resist Charles 1 and was among
the last to accept his son Charles II. However, the townspeople
themselves seemed pleased enough to have the monarchy back. On 8th
May 1660 the Royal Arms were replaced and on 11th May Charles 11 was
proclaimed in the town as King with bell ringing and jubilation. But
after 1642 no monarch would set foot in Hull for over two centuries. |
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Back in control the new monarchy set about improving Hull's
fortifications once again, and a new citadel was begun in 1681.
However, the former Duke of York became James II soon after and
gradually became less popular in Hull as his pro-Catholic policies
unfolded. The town once more took an important step towards
rebellion, this time in support of Prince Wilhelm of Orange, husband
of Princess Mary. who was a daughter of James II by his first wife,
Anne Hyde. Wilhelm and Mary were both solid Protestants. In Hull,
James II had appointed the Catholic Lord Langdale as Governor. but
the Deputy Governor, Captain Lionel Copley took action to gain the
town for Wilhelm. On the night of 3rd December 1688 Copley and other
Protestant officers and trusted troops, together with aldermen and
citizens captured the Governor and other Roman Catholic Officers,
took the Citadel and declared the town in support of Prince Wilhelm.
This effectively put an end to all resistance to the rebellion by
James II's supporters in Yorkshire. Sir John Hotham's grandson (yet
another Sir John) became Governor, having landed with Wilhelm at
Torbay in Devon. Wilhelm and Mary became joint monarchs, William III
and Mary II. The Hotham's were still fated, as the new Governor died
in 1689 and his son too in 1691. The 3rd December was declared a
public holiday in Hull and, as 'Town-taking' day, was celebrated for
over a century.
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