Edgehill battlefield

The Battle of Edgehill was fought on Sunday 23 October 1642 in the open fields between Radway and Kineton, below the ridge at Edgehill in Warwickshire. It was the first pitched battle of the English Civil War. Historic England registers the site, but most of it is closed Ministry of Defence land, so a visit means looking and reading rather than walking the field.

The story of the battle

The two armies were close in size, and the day settled nothing. The Battlefields Trust gives about 13,000 Royalists under Charles I and about 12,000 Parliamentarians under the Earl of Essex. Warwickshire's historic environment record gives the Royalists about 14,000, and neither number is certain. The Royalists held the ridge and came down from it. The fighting began at around 2pm or 3pm and went on until nightfall, with sunset at about 4.30pm.

The Trust counts about 1,000 dead and 2,000 to 3,000 wounded. Essex fell back north towards Warwick and Coventry, and the road to London lay open to the King.

Who won

People still argue about the result. The Battlefields Trust calls it indecisive with a Royalist advantage, and Warwickshire's record says it is often described as a draw but was in truth a Royalist victory. The King took Oxford, which became his headquarters, but did not press on to London with any speed. Our story of the Civil War in Banburyshire follows the campaign, including the taking of Broughton Castle three days after the battle.

The ghosts

The tales of a phantom battle in the sky over Edgehill are legend. They have their own telling in our story of the haunted battlefield.

What you can see

The land looks like farmland, but much of what lay under it has gone. A major military depot was built across the field in the 1940s, and the Battlefields Trust says its rail lines and silos, and their later removal, damaged the archaeology and changed the shape of the ground in places. A survey still found evidence: Warwickshire's record notes 52 musket balls and a cannonball from a metal detector survey. Historic England first registered the battlefield in June 1995, and the Battlefields Trust's survey report calls Edgehill the largest site on the English battlefields register.

The memorial stone stands on the B4086 near Kineton. Its inscription says the battle was fought between that spot and Radway, and that many of the dead are buried about three quarters of a mile south of the stone.

Visiting the battlefield

The Battlefields Trust is clear that most of the field remains closed, and that this makes the ground hard to read. Historic England's entry says access by public footpath is limited. The Trust adds that the rights of way across the field were closed in the 1940s for the depot, so access is almost entirely by public road, and that the B4086, the only road across the field, is fast and not one to walk along. The footpaths from Edgehill down to Radway are good, if steep in places. The Trust publishes a leaflet for a trail linking Edgehill with the battlefields at Cropredy and Edgcote, but as of November 2021 it was looking into problems on the trail around the Kineton depot. Check with the Trust's Mercia group (mercia@battlefieldstrust.com) before relying on it. Keep to public rights of way and out of any fenced land.

The ridge above is the best way to understand the ground, because it is where the Royalists stood. On a clear day the whole plain is in front of you.

Getting there

By car, the memorial stone is on the B4086 at Kineton, CV35 0JP. The ridge at Edgehill is a short drive south east, on the way back to Banbury. There is no visitor centre on the field. The Battlefields Trust points instead to a small exhibition on the battle in Radway church, opened in October 2015, and to the panels it put up in 2006 in the Castle Inn's beer garden at Edgehill and in Kineton churchyard. We found no current hours for the exhibition, so check with the parish first.

Nearby

Upton House is on the ridge, and Burton Dassett Hills give another long view over the same plain. Cropredy Bridge is the next battle in the same war, two years on. Our guide to Edgehill covers the village, and The Bell Inn at Shenington is a listed pub within a short drive.