The Relief of Newark occurred on 21 March 1644 during the First English Civil War, when Prince Rupert of the Rhine's Royalist army lifted the Parliamentarian siege of Newark-on-Trent in Nottinghamshire. A rapid Royalist approach and cavalry attack forced the Parliamentarian force besieging the important garrison to retire to an untenable position.
Background[]
At the start of 1644, King Charles I of England hoped to form an army in North West England from regiments he was able to bring back from Ireland following his cessation of hostilities with Confederate Ireland a year earlier. However, this army was defeated and dispersed at the Battle of Nantwich in January 1644, and Charles ordered his nephew, Prince Rupert of the Rhine, to restore Royalist fortunes in the northwest. Rupert set up his headquarters at Shrewsbury on 21 February.
Meanwhile, Parliamentarian forces in the Midlands besieged the Royalist garrison of Newark-on-Trent in Nottinghamshire, which commanded the River Trent. John Meldrum's Parliamentarian force was forced to settle in for a siege after its initial attacks on Newark were unsuccessful, and, on 12 March, King Charles ordered Prince Rupert to relieve Newark. Rupert combined his regiment of horse with two Irish regiments from North Wales and marched past the Royalist-held towns of Wolverhampton, Ashby-de-la-Zouch, and Bingham, gathering troops from their garrisons as he went.
Battle[]
Prince Rupert arrived too quickly for Meldrum to withdraw, and Rupert's cavalry advanced by moonlight and attacked Meldrum's army around the ruins of St. Leonard's Hospice. The Parliamentarian right wing was broken by Prince Rupert's attack, and Rupert himself engaged in hand-to-hand fighting. The Royalist right wing was driven back by the Parliamentarian left, but the Parliamentarians were soon outflanked and withdrew in good order. Meldrum retreated across a pontoon bridge to an island on the Trent, where he was besieged. He was able to secure a conditional surrender by which his army dispersed into the surrounding Parliamentarian garrisons, and the Royalists secured 3,000 muskets, 11 guns, and 2 mortars.