this channel is part of the history hit Network the days and weeks after the battle at Edge Hill in October 1642 had probably provided King Charles with his best and perhaps only chance of winning the Civil War outright he had failed to take it by November the Parliamentary Army under Essex had managed to slip past the royalist forces outside London to regain the city while Charles had established his court at Oxford both sides now realized that there would be no Speedy end to the English Civil War [Music] sir Edward Sydenham a royalist soldier wrote to Ralph verney after the battle of Edge Hill for all our great Victory I have had the greatest loss by the death of your Noble father that ever any friend did he himself killed two with his own hands and broke the point of his standard at push of the pike before he fell my humble service to his sad wife God In His Infinite Mercy comfort you both shall be the prayers of your friend and servant the economic demographic and financial strength was on one side the Parliamentary side London and the surrounding counties were agriculturally the most fertile parts of England London was the source and center of financing London was the center of overseas trade and at the outset all the major ports and the Navy were all under parliamentary control in contrast the royalists were supported by the poorest areas in the country after the indecisive Edge Hill campaign both sides settled down for a fairly inactive winter the winter of 1642-43 consolidating their position and ensuring that the counters of England and Wales were firmly secured forking or Parliament and that they could begin to tap their resources [Music] the winters of the early 1640s were particularly severe with unnaturally heavy and prolonged Falls of snow [Music] with a sudden thaw the Primitive roads of 17th century England quickly turned into muddy quagmires that made movement impossible [Music] the winter therefore was a time of small but Fierce engagements between detachments and garrisons while the main field armies waited for the spring and dry roads all around the country garrisons were attacked convoys were ambushed and a pattern of constant raid and counter raid was established as the two sides sought ways to improve their positions for the coming summer campaigns of 1643 they were able to survey the situation around the country Northumberland and Durham were already held for the king and the royalists were pushing Southward into the veil of York on the other side of the pennines Cumberland and Westmoreland were also for the king but in Lancashire the position was still in some doubt [Music] royalist supporters too dominated Wales While most of East Anglia had declared for Parliament in the South Sir William Waller had captured the royalist Garrison at Winchester shortly before Christmas and was extending his influence into Devon in the west country however his old friend and future opponent sir Ralph Hopton had secured Cornwall for King Charles [Music] in the all-important areas of the Thames Valley and the Midlands there was still jockeying the position as both sides prepared for the real war that could only be fought in the spring and summer [Music] there is still some argument among Civil War historians as to whether a royalist strategy for the year 1643 had actually been formulated if this strategy existed it would have been to bring forces from the north the Midlands and the Southwest defeat the parliamentarian field armies in those areas and eventually move on London so that by the end of the year London the capital and the city government would be back in royalist hands King needed to advance they were the ways to advance the advances would naturally take him towards London whatever he did he needed more territory so that he could hem in the parliamentarians so that he could tap the resources of more of England and Wales for a longer War so it was the natural sensible thing to do whatever the truth as the campaign season of 1643 opened the king had the initiative but his army continued to be hampered by a serious shortage of arms and ammunition [Music] some regiments for instance contained many more pikemen than Musketeers a situation that meant royalist armies would have to rely on brute strength rather than Firepower in battle at the end of February Queen Henrietta who had traveled to Holland to pawn the crown jewels and to buy arms with the proceeds landed at Bridlington in Yorkshire and The Marquis of Newcastle prepared a great Convoy to transport the precious cargo to Oxford to cover the arrival of this vital arms shipment Prince Rupert moved into the Midlands on the 3rd of April to storm the defenses of Birmingham and on the 21st of April after a short Siege he captured Litchfield the royalists received a setback however when the Earl of Essex struck West and laid Siege to reading Rupert quickly returned from the Midlands to come to the aid of the town but he was powerless to prevent the Garrison's surrender on the 27th of April 1643. John Gwynn a royalist soldier wrote a cannon shell came through the guard house and knocked off the tiles from the roof one fell upon the head of Sir Arthur Aston the governor and sank him almost to the ground he faintly said my head's whole I think but spoke no more at that time he was carried away to his house in the town where during the rest of the siege he was speechless a short time after the Garrison was surrendered and they broke their conditions and plundered us with reading in parliamentary hands the two main field armies withdrew to their old positions watching each other wearily the Parliamentary Army was crippled by a typhus epidemic the first of many to sweep the Three Kingdoms in the Army's wake in order to break the deadlock a major victory was required that would alter the delicate balance in favor of one side or the other but this was hardly likely to emerge from the pattern of minor battles and skirmishes which characterized the opening months of 1643. foreign [Music] [Music] the first opportunity to strike a meaningful strategic blow fell to the royalists sir Ralph Hopton the royalist leader in the west Drew up his army to face the parliamentarians led by Sir William Waller who in former days had been a close friend they met at lands downhill outside the city of bath on the 5th of July the real tragedy of the Civil War can be clearly seen in the surviving letters between Hopton and Waller two old friends who found themselves on different sides of a bitter conflict Walla wrote to Hopton sir the experience I have had of your worth and the happiness I've enjoyed in your friendship are wounding considerations when I look upon this present distance between us suddenly my affections to you are so unchangeable that hostility itself cannot violate my friendship to your person but I must be true to the cause wherein I serve that great God which is the Searcher of my heart knows with What a Sad sense I go upon this service and with what a perfect hatred I detest this war without an enemy but I look upon it as Opus domini which is enough to silence all passion in me the God of Peace in his good time send us peace and in the meantime fit us to receive it we are both upon the stage I'm gonna stack those parts that are assigned Us in this tragedy let us do it in a way of honor and without personal animosities whatsoever the issue be I shall never willingly relinquish the dear title of your most affectionate friend and faithful servant William Waller lands downhill near bath and roundway down their devices have to be seen as major victories for the Royals scores in the Southwest at Lansdowne Hill the Cornish infantry fought their way up an incredibly Steep Hill in the face of hostile fire driving the parliamentarians off the hill Unfortunately they were not in any position to capitalize on this Victory although they did put the parliamentarians into a position that later on would be advantageous to the royalist cause but devises having retired on devices after Lansdowne hopton's forces pinned Walla around the town allowing royalisters to come from Oxford and in a battle which saw men plunging over the edge of a of a precipice defeat what was forced with the destruction of Waller's Army the last major field Army to disrupt the royalist advance in the Southwest is destroyed and the road is open for the royalists to roll up not only South West England but also Central Southern England and to threaten the Parliamentary heartlands in and around London foreign up by hopton's success the royalists moved swiftly a second arms Convoy arrived in Oxford two days later and leaving a scattering of garrisons behind them to distract the main roundhead Army the royalists began to march on Bristol there the city's hastily constructed Earth defenses were not strong enough to withstand a furious royalist assault on the 26th of July the storming of the defenses of the City of Bristol was to prove one of the most Savage days fighting of the entire War less casualties were high [Music] Rupert put the Cornish infantry on the south side of the town and they took his own Cavalry and fought to the north side of the town where he noticed a weakness in the defenses the Cornish assaulted on their sector and Rupert assaulted on their sector the coins took incredible casualties but that was the nature of the college footage they were quite capable of doing that Rupert managed to get him and started to feed his Cavalry into the town the the fortifications were captured and only after a fight right in the center of Bristol was the town captured one royalist Observer surveying the dead men piled high on the ramparts remarked as gallon gentleman has ever Drew sword lay upon that ground like so many rotten sheep foreign [Music] although losses were high at Bristol they gained the royalist cause was incalculable Bristol was the Second City in the Kingdom a major port with sufficient ships still to form the nucleus of a royalist fleet less spectacularly but no less importantly the city also had gun manufacturers capable of turning out hundreds of muskets a week these were greatly welcomed by the under-supplied royalists by the end of the war most royalist infantry regiments were wholly armed with bristol-made muskets with Bristol secure the king's advisors advocated turning immediately to attack London but Charles again hesitated and instead he decided to First capture Gloucester the last remaining major parliamentary stronghold in the West so confident was Charles a victory that he allocated a portion of his precious forces to undertake a simultaneous Siege of Exeter after capturing these two round head strongholds it was planned that the combined royalist armies would then Advance on London Gloucester was an important town and port in the Civil War it was a fairly flourishing Port it was the lowest bridgeable point of the river seven it was also it stood on an important Crossroads Road Crossroads so it has a strategic social economic importance in the Civil War the King couldn't exploit the rich Thames Valley because Parliament held London and that blocked that route it's possible that he could have exploited the seven Valley as an alternative artery of trade and commerce manufacturing production and thus got ongoing money raked off through excise and taxes and duties to finance his war effort he couldn't really do that though while Parliament held Gloucester that blocked up the seven Valley and made a mess of those plans of the royalist to exploit the seven Valley disrupting trade Commerce movement of goods and hence there is an argument for the king making a determined effort to get Gloucester and thus fully to open up the 7s3 and the Seven Valley as an alternative to London from the Thames Valley this time King Charles determined the way in which Gloucester should be captured sickened by the losses of Bristol he would not permit the town to be stormed preferring instead to starve the Defenders into submission the governor of Gloucester Colonel Massey however confounded the king's plan by holding out and in doing so thwarted Charles's great design for 1643. [Music] problem with Gloucester is that it was well defended it had Roman and rebuilt medieval defenses quite a small defensive circuit and although its Dynamic parliamentarian Defender Massey probably only had 1500 men that was perfectly adequate to hold off a much larger rolest Army particularly a royalist army that for much of the siege lacked sufficient Heavy Artillery to blow holes in the masonry walls and thus the siege of Gloucester conducted in very bad weather which also hampered the king's operation turned out to be something of a disaster for the king he fails he moves away he wastes time at Gloucester foreign [Music] with the breathing space gained from the protracted Siege of Gloucester the Earl of Essex was able to assemble a relief Force by filling out his typhus ravaged ranks with several regiments of militia from London despite their somewhat dubious quality Essex raised the siege of Gloucester on the 4th of September it was not a moment too soon The Garrison was down to a single barrel of gunpowder Essex was to throw away his success by once again allowing the royalist Army to get between him and his base at London and the King was able to force Essex to fight his next battle on ground of his own choosing the two forces met on the 20th of September at Newbury [Music] [Applause] the outcome at the Battle of Newbury was indecisive there was terrible terrible face fighting lots of senior royalist officers were killed leading the men into the fighting but the actual result was in this is the royalists held the best position but they were they were desperately low on ammunition with very little hope of more coming so Charles decided to pull back what motivated him most was to preserve his army as a body and yet give Essex the the reward of getting back to London the outcome of the battle really wasn't much good for Charles the battle was a failure for the king and many historians if we're looking for a turning point in the Civil War many historians linking Gloucester and Newbury in summer 1643 see this as a turning point the king's failure to capture Gloucester wasting time as it turned out at Gloucester the king's failure then to advance quickly on London the king's stalemate being forced back at Newbury meant that a real opportunity was lost and this was a turning point in terms of Rawless morale if Parliament can raise almost a new Army and March it out from London can relieve Gloucester can then get between us and London can repulse us at Newbury then a chance has gone can we ever really beat them [Music] foreign [Music] struggled for control of the west of England during 1643 the war continued to rage in the North the campaigns here featured two of the Civil War's most colorful characters they were William Cavendish the Earl of Newcastle for the royalists and Sir Thomas Fairfax third Baron of Cameron the Parliamentary Commander Newcastle was a fabulously wealthy landowner who was the principal supporter of the king's cause in the North probably the wealthiest man in England at the outbreak of the war he had been appointed general of king's forces north of the Trent in 1642 a position that probably owed more to his ownership of large areas of the northern lands than to any great military skills nonetheless Newcastle served Charles well and with no little success during the early years of the war Fairfax known as black Tom for his dark hair and brooding looks was one of the outstanding Soldier politicians of the Civil War hindered by poor quality troops when war broke out he proved himself to be a fine Commander a military strategist even in defeat and it was he with his father Ferdinando who waged war against newcastle's Northern army during 1643. in the spring of 1643 Newcastle went on the offensive despite securing garrisons at Newark and Belvoir he had seen the fairfax's score victories at Leeds and Wakefield where the royalist garrisons had been overrun now aided by Lord Goring who had accompanied Queen Henrietta on her journey back from Holland Newcastle sought to secure the north for the crown [Music] in March Goring won a victory at seacroft Moore near Leeds although the victory was more moral than strategic as it left the larger parliamentary Army station nearby intact foreign Wakefield was reoccupied briefly by the royalists but it determined counter-attack by Fairfax regained The Garrison for Parliament among the 1400 prisoners taken during the fight was Lord Goring himself and his was a sad lost to Newcastle [Music] in June 1643 came a central moment in the early struggle for the North the two arm is finally met face to face at at Walton Moore where Newcastle had gathered 10 000 troops in favorable ground to the south of the village of adwalton itself fearful that Bradford was about to be attacked the fairfaxes had little option but to meet the threat although their army was filled with raw recruits the result was perhaps inevitable the Battle of Ed Walton Moore was a major royalist victory and a setback for Fairfax Father and Son the battle was fought on open rolling ground and it was a messy difficult battle on High Ground Lord Fairfax was repulsed by a royalist cavalry charge and had to fall back towards Bradford his son on Lower ground became detached from him maybe he didn't realize that his father was falling back and so he then was badly mauled and had to mount a very difficult and circuitous Retreat initially to Bradford though they couldn't stay there and they had to fall back further the fairfaxes made their way around newcastle's force with a small number of men and and got into Hull safe from newcastle's eventual assault and pushing themselves into a position where which they could capitalize on for the future but the net result of agua Yorkshire and the North East is in newcastle's hands for the king after the victory at Walton came news of trouble for the royalists in Lincolnshire the parliamentarians had inflicted defeat on their armies at the Battle of Gainsborough and had occupied the strategically important town Sir Charles Cavendish cousin of the Earl of Newcastle had been killed as he commanded the royalist horse against a man whom would later play a vital role in parliament's overall Victory Colonel Oliver Cromwell [Music] newcastle's Army arrived not only to recapture Gainsborough but nearby Lincoln too forcing Cromwell to retreat to Peterborough the earl now faced a difficult decision with 15 000 men at his disposal he could march on to join with the king's Army in the Thames Valley and make a great assault on London [Music] to do this though would leave the fairfaxes at Hull with an army large enough to make trouble for the royalists in Yorkshire and so Newcastle made his decision he would turn take his army to Hull and lay Siege to the town it would prove to be a costly error many historians criticize The Marquis of Newcastle for not marching South to join the main royalist armies in the Midlands and the South instead he halted and mounted what turned out to be a futile and unsuccessful Siege of Kingston upon Hull we can criticize him um The Siege of Hull was going to be enormously difficult because of its position because it was defended by low-lying land and water defenses because Parliament had the Navy and Hull could always be supplied relieved reinforced by water it meant that from the outset it was going to be enormously difficult for Newcastle to capture the Kingston upon Holland taken Newcastle was wisest to go to capture Hall that he failed to capture Hall is unfortunate but he was wise to try initially Hull was the second largest Armory in the country so Hull was a crucial prize for the royalist party it would have saved on uh long and expensive resupply Expeditions from from the Netherlands as opposed it would have allowed those those Munitions that were coming in from the Netherlands to come in more easily without having to negotiate the English Channel or go around north of Scotland to get to the friendly Port Bristol because of parliament's command of the Navy the potential for landing more troops in Holland making it a major base for land activity and disrupting newcastle's lines of communication had he pushed much further south into Lincolnshire and into the Parliamentary heartlands of East Anglia in the East Midlands were considerable those dangers were considerable and so his decision to Halt and try or by albeit vainly to capture Hull is I think explicable by the end of 1643 the whole of England was paying a terrible price for the continuation of an increasingly bitter Civil War although there was undoubtedly a wish on both sides to come to a negotiated peace settlement King Charles stubbornness and the political skills of the Hawks the Parliamentary Camp combined to render such a thing impossible Robert Bailey a Scottish commissioner to London wrote in a letter home in November 1643 that country is in a most pitiful condition no corner of it free from the evils of a cruel War every Shire every city many families divided in this quarrel much blood and Universal spoil made by both where they prevail this then was the once peaceful and prosperous England as it contemplated another year of conflict and bloodshed foreign by the end of 1643 there were several signs that Parliament was losing the war that the King was winning the war the Rawless had gained considerable territory during the year they'd mopped up Yorkshire they'd rolled through much of Lincolnshire they'd acquired much territory in the West Midlands and perhaps most dramatically of all out of Cornwall they'd broken out and they'd mopped up almost the whole of the Southwest and Central Southern England by the end of 1643 the Rawless controlled perhaps two-thirds of the land mass of England and Wales and with it all the resources of men money material that that implied parliamentarians were losing the war and politically that added to difficulties and uncertainties within parliament in London there was considerable Division division that in if anything grew rather than diminished as to the purpose of the conflict and the extent to which it should be pressed home and there were Generals and politicians who would have liked a settlement with the King short of Victory after all most of these generals was frightened by the idea of winning as they were by the idea of defeat and that is certainly true of figures of generals such as Essex or Manchester and the the leading commanders in other words in the early stages of the war for the Parliamentary side on the 8th of December 1643 Parliament suffered a grievous loss away from the battlefield John Pym parliament's politician Supreme died as a result of an internal abscess with his passing those who opposed the king had lost their greatest political Visionary and most able administrator almost his last political act however had been to provide the legislative Machinery that would turn the war in favor of Parliament he had negotiated the solemn league and Covenant with the Scots John pem in 1643 was a major blow to parliament's Ambitions and plans for the war he had been more than anybody else a driving force behind the parliamentarian command however his negotiations with the scars and the subsequent alliance with the Scots were even more so important it wasn't just the fact that the Scots were bringing an army of 20 000 men a disciplined regularly trained Army led by officers who'd got experience on the continent under Gustav Adolf but it led to the formation of a thing called the committee for both kingdoms a 25-man committee that was made up mainly of MPS but also of members from the Army and from Scotland and this in itself is a crucial link uh event in the it's the start of an identity of parliament not as a body led by one man but as a body led by the body foreign [Music] with the agreement of the solemn league and Covenant the whole complexion of the war was altered for it bound the Scots to provide an Army on the Parliamentary side the ACT also committed both countries to a common act of worship which the Scots carelessly assumed would be presbyterianism the English however added the telling phrase according to the word of God to the agreement thus making it a good deal more ambiguous the misunderstanding over the form of worship would eventually lead to the breakup of the alliance but for the time being Parliament had exactly what it needed military help from a strong outside power now these Scottish troops were incredibly important it's not just a matter of numbers the Scots were also in many senses militarily more effective than their English counterparts because a large number of Scottish troops and even more of their officers had served on the continent in the long-standing 30 Years War from 1618 to 1648 and had gained military experience as a result furthermore the Scots were willing to campaign not just up the ages of England not just to take shall we say Barrett or Newcastle but to go a long way South not just to Yorkshire in fact Scottish troops got as far south as herefordshire these pro-parliamentarian Scots have a dramatic impact on the war in 1644 the royalists in the north of England are now effectively sandwiched between English parliamentarians to the South Scottish parliamentarians to the north and they are the meat in the sandwich and in 1644 they suffer and they break on the 19th of January 1644 the blue bonneted Scots were LED across the river Tweed by Alexander Leslie the Earl of Levin the Army's able and experienced Commander suddenly the king's cause in the north was under real threat he could ill afford to lose an area so fertile for new recruits or his access to the supplies of coal that were being shipped out from the tine to pay for arms and ammunition in response to this new Danger The Earl of Newcastle raced northwards in an attempt to hold the line of the river tine against the invading Scots Army but he quickly received dire news taking advantage of newcastle's absence from Yorkshire the fairfaxes had stormed the market town of Selby and destroyed the royalist field Army left by Newcastle to protect the city of York the rightest capital of the north was in grave danger of falling into the hands of parliamentary forces abandoning all hope of halting the Scots Advance Newcastle turned and hurried southwards to save York it was now that the 64 year old Earl of Levin revealed a boldness hitherto lacking in his royalist counterparts when it might have been prudent to stay in the far north to secure his lines of Supply the Earl took a calculated risk and headed south towards York in Hot Pursuit of newcastle's army by the 22nd of April he had joined up with fairfax's army outside York and newcastle's force was promptly besieged within the city's ancient walls relief of the city was absolutely vital for the royalist cause sooner or later York would be starved into submission if it should fall it would be the end for the king in the north and perhaps the country as a whole foreign [Music] Charles the first is determined to hang on to York it's his Northern Capital it's a key Center it would be terrible in terms of resources morale for him to lose it he's determined to hold on to it if at all possible he hasn't got a northern Army that he can spare and send to the relief of York instead he has to try and get one of his Southern armies but he can't spare his main Army so he authorizes his nephew Prince Rupert to lead an army North A Long March through the West Midlands the Northwest to March up and relieve York the additional problem is that he can't spare many men from his Southern Army given campaigns there in the South and the Midlands for Rupert to take so Rupert initially has to set off with relatively modest size force and he has to try and pick up further men on route [Music] foreign [Applause] the war was going very badly indeed for the king unable to make any Headway against the two parliamentarian armies commanded by the Earl of Essex and Sir William Waller Charles made the desperate decision to concentrate the royalist forces of the loyal town of Worcester he wrote to Rupert in an attempt to recall the prince's forces for that rendezvous but the letter was couched in such ambiguous terms that it was actually to precipitate the battle that spelled the beginning of the end for Charles the letter read if York be lost I shall esteem my crown little less unless supported by your sudden march to me and a miraculous Conquest in the south of all the effects of their Northern power can be found here but if York be relieved and you beat the rebel Army of both kingdoms which are before it then but otherwise not I may possibly make a shift upon the defensive to spin out time until you come to assist me but if that be either lost or have freed themselves from procedures or that for want of powder you cannot undertake that work that you immediately march with your whole strength directly to Worcester to assist me and my Army without which or you're having relieved York by beating the Scots all the successes you have afterwards must infallibly be useless to me 's letter was an object lesson in lack of clarity but the central theme was clear enough he was in serious trouble and he urgently required the assistance of Prince Rupert and his army [Music] if Rupert was able to relieve York by beating the Scots then that was well and good but come what may he must March South again as soon as possible to meet the king at Worcester Rupert received the Fateful letter five days after it was sent by which time the prospects for the royalist Garrison at York looked Bleak indeed for although they were still well stocked with food and ammunition the two besieging armies had now been joined by a third under the command of the Earl of Manchester [Music] Rupert weighed up his options if he marched South to join the king York would certainly be lost on the other hand the king's letter had hinted at a few days grace it did not take long for the prince to reach a decision or to display the single-minded determination that was so typical of him he would march to relieve York before joining his uncle at Worcester problem was of course that the parliamentarian armies at York outnumbered Rupert's own by two to one he had triumphed over such odds before but this time with so much at stake the prince knew that he would have to considerably reduce the odds before risking a pitched battle Rupert's solution was bold and imaginative Prince Rupert's plan to relieve York was based on two assumptions the first assumption would would be that he would be outnumbered by the Allied Army at least two to one and the second assumption would be that he wouldn't be able to offer battle until he'd linked up with the democracies of newcastle's army he had three options the first option was to advance from diaspora straight towards York but the Allied Army was camped at long long Marston the second option was a more indirect route via Weatherby but still he would have this problem with the the Allied Army at long Martin again third option and the one that he chose was an indirect route to borrowbridge and Thornton bridge and into York that way part of his army is fainted away to try and disrupt to dislodge the Parliamentary Army to March them in the wrong direction while the bulk of his army in a rather Security's March is able to bypass the English and Scottish parliamentary forces and thus undisruptive and without having to give battle the bulk of his army is able to swing round and enter York Rupert entered the city of York in Triumph on July the 1st 1644 to the great joy of its weary Defenders there was now a combined Army of 6 000 cavalrymen and eleven thousand infantry men inside York enough Rupert believed to take on the Allied parliamentarian armies outside however newcastle's exhausted men were far from Keen to do battle the long Siege had sapped their fighting spirit what was more Lord ithan newcastle's Scottish chief of staff made plain his discomfort at the prospect of a battle with his own countrymen fighting English parliamentarians was one thing he told Rupert but fighting Scotsman was quite another spirited parliamentarian armies soon abandoned any hope of laying further Siege to York and moved off in the direction of tadcaster the out of Newcastle and Lord ithin pleaded with Rupert to give the royalist army time to rest but the prince argued that if they could beat the Scots the threat to York would be removed for good there was also of course the matter of the king's letter urging Rupert to come to his Aid as soon as possible there was no alternative argued Rupert the royalist Army must fight and fight now reluctantly Newcastle and itin acceded to the prince's wishes thank you foreign Rupert could not know was that only three days earlier the king's forces had met and defeated the army of Sir William Waller at crop Eddie bridge in Oxfordshire [Music] against all expectations Charles was moving North away from Oxford and found himself on the opposite side of the chirwell from Sir William Wallace Army he Scouts reported that Waller had extended himself and in an action which encompassed all three Bridges the king against all all expectations was able to route and defeat Wallace Army and this really was one of the things that had bothered him this this Army that was shadowing him and in actual fact by doing this he very nearly removed the need for the action at Marston Moore Unfortunately they were not able to communicate this to Rupert and Newcastle in time foreign [Music] the course of the war had changed significantly but everything Rupert now planned and carried out had the relief of his uncle's Army at Worcester as his primary objective driven on still by the Urgent tone of the king's letter his army set off as quickly as it could in pursuit of the parliamentarian forces it was not long before he caught up with their rear guard on a Yorkshire Moor on the afternoon of the 1st of July 1644. the Battle of Marston Moore the decisive battle of the English Civil War was now only hours away [Music]