The Royalists and Roundheads of the Civil War arrived on the playing fields of St John’s Academy earlier today when as a taster for the Battle of Marlborough re-enactment over the weekend of 27-28 July on The Common, the English Civil War Society came to show Year 8 students what life was like for the soldiers on both sides of the conflict.
Year 8 students had the chance for History to come alive as they have been studying the Civil War in their recent history lessons.
They were given the opportunity handle the excellent seventeenth century artefacts that the members of the ECW Society bought with them. Students tried on some of the armour and clothing from the period, they were shown how to load and fire a cannon and a musket, how to wield a sword, use a 16 foot long pike and they heard (in not too graphic detail) of some of the gruesome punishments handed out, with one or two students ending up in the stocks!
A fascinating, interesting and educative morning and some students commented that it really helped them understand the nature of warfare and how hard life was. Other students learnt about the importance of Marlborough during the siege of December 1642 and the battles that followed.
The English Civil War Society will back again in Marlborough on the 27-28 July to commemorate Marlborough’s History.
This includes a re-enactment of the Battle between the Royalists and Oliver Cromwell’s Parliamentarians on the Common.
It will include firing of muskets and cannons – ready to bombard the town!
On a somewhat softer note, there will also be a Civilian Living History Encampment in Priory Gardens to show how people of Marlborough and the locality lived in the seventeenth century.
‘Fogg’s Bogs’ formally declared open by Mayor Mervyn Hall
