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Ro-Man
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Leeds
Joined on:
27-Feb-2007 16:23:16
Posted:
67 posts
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Here’s a mystery I’ve been meaning to post for a while.
Opinion is split down the middle about whether a Civil War battle occurred in Meanwood. The rumours are that on 23rd January 1643 a battle took place at the foot of Woodhouse Ridge, in Batty’s Wood, not far from where Woodhouse Cricket Club now stands. Various local history books document the battle as taking place, whilst there are others which are more sceptical.
For example, the following is from “Meanwood” by Arthur Hopwood
"If The Battle of Meanwood' were not mentioned, many would consider the omission a mistake. They would point to the evidence of the 'Stainbeck'-the legend being that the stream ran red with blood - and to the musket balls, so many of which have been picked out of the beck at the foot of Woodhouse Ridge - or Pikeman Ridge, the suggestive name by which it was known in 1781 There may have been a Civil War skirmish hereabouts on 23 January 1643 but it can hardly have been a 'battle' - there is no documentary record of the incident. As for the circumstantial evidence, the name 'Staynbek'(i.e. Stonebeck) first appears in 1240, some four hundred years too soon, and Pikeman Ridge, or a very similar name, was used in 1561 - a hundred years before the dale in question. As for the musket balls - their localised concentration suggests target practice rather than the spread of shot to be expected after an armed encounter."
This is the other side of the story from “A history of Headingley” by Christopher Gardener
"Some historians have linked the name of the part of the boundary between Headingley and Leeds which runs from Hyde Park Corner to Woodhouse Ridge along the line of Cliff Lane and which is called Pikeman Ridge with the battle in Batty's Wood and Meanwood Valley. It is quite a coincidence, however. Pikeman Rigge was surveyed by a royal commission and reported in a document of 1612, and an earlier boundary commission in 1561 also reported the name of Pate Man Rig for the same part of the boundary between-Headingley and Woodhouse. So the name Pikeman Ridge, is far older than the Civil War and it is pure coincidence that a thousand Parliamentarian pikemen were in action only a little way from the place. The word Rig found in the earliest records, means hedge and not a ridge in the modern sense."
Then there is a large history of the battle itself which is written by Walter Gill in his book “Woodhouse in Leeds”. I’ll post it later if anyone is interested, but it takes a bit of reading. Where did all his research come from if the battle didn’t actually take place?
There must be plenty of rumours and places kicking about to do with Leeds in the Civil War. Anyone got any pics or info?
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JanCee
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16-Jun-2007 21:41:45
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201 posts
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Sgt. Washbourne
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Location:
Headingley, Leeds
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10-Jul-2007 21:32:20
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32 posts
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According to Leodis...a musket shot was apparently found in the location you're referring to, thought to be a left over from a civil war skirmish.
As it happens, I do have a few pictures of an old air raid bunker from the exact spot.
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tyke bhoy
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Born and bred Leeds where I still work
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21-Feb-2007 09:18:21
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I wouldn't say that. Escaped by swimming the river suggests they were fighting with their backs to it (or pretty close to it). Not something you would associate with a battle in Meanwood (2 miles + from the Aire). Also given it says blizzard I doubt if a battle that started in Meanwood would have ended up close to the river and if it wasn't close to the river then there would have been many other escape routes. Of course all that is just theory so it doesn't completely rule it out but at least suggests it unlikely Leeds fell due to a battle in Meanwood.
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tyke bhoy
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Born and bred Leeds where I still work
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Leodis seems to think that Royalists were on their way to attack Parliamentary forces in Leeds which suggests a different and later "battle" as the one Jancee's post describes is the Parliamentarians taking Leeds http://www.leodis.net/display.aspx?resourceIdentifier=2002815_78440494 . Other reseach also suggests battle is a rather Grandiose term as it was more a minor skirmish
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Ro-Man
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Leeds
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27-Feb-2007 16:23:16
Posted:
67 posts
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| tyke bhoy wrote: |
| Other reseach also suggests battle is a rather Grandiose term as it was more a minor skirmish |
That's the point though Tyke Bhoy. All the history books that mention any sort of skirmish / battle still have no documentary evidence to rely on. So even if it was a battle rather than a skirmish, it's still a mystery whether the thing took place at all.
As with other stories, it seems to me that people have taken rumours and what has been written in other books and taken this as fact. One account I've seen even has an artist's impression of how the battle would have looked (pretty good if true, as some of it would have been fought in my garden).
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Ian R P
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Beeston, Leeds
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19-May-2007 23:02:51
Posted:
57 posts
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Hi all,
Well we know there was a battle at Adwalton Moor near Drighlington, and I have read Parliamentarian forces rested on Hunslet Moor before they attacked Leeds (buoyed by Local 'Clubmen'). But there is no reason a battle couldn't have taken place at Meanwood as the royalists were chased out of Town.
Get time team in to dig for bones in your yard!
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simonm
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Republic of Armley
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19-May-2007 22:04:49
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From what I can remember, the main battle/ skirmish was down by the river along the aire around Kirkstall abbey way. The Parliamentarians approached from the west of Leeds along the river valley and met resistence near the abbey? A smallish battle ensued and the royalists were pushed back along and into the river. No more resistence was found in any great number!
It's quite possible that other skirmishes broke out elsewhere in the city as troops fleeing were being pursued!
I'll dig out my old books and get a better description later!
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Beefish
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Leeds
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15-Mar-2007 20:50:17
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24 posts
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When the last bit of wall standing on the Royal Armouries site was demolished the Sealed Knot marched through the city centre with a small cannon and fired a shot at the bit of wall. As a member of the Royal Armouries Support group (defunct now) I joined in with the march and I asked the Sealed Knot about the "battle of the Ridge" as we had always called it. The Sealed Knot described in great detail both the Battle of the Ridge and the Battle down by the river so it sounds as if there were at least 2 battles in or around Leeds. Don't know if that's any help!
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oldleedsman
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simonm
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Most likely is oldLeedsman. There are many burial mounds around the city from various ages!!
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drapesy
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Burley, Leeds
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24-Feb-2007 21:20:32
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2108 posts
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| simonm wrote: |
From what I can remember, the main battle/ skirmish was down by the river along the aire around Kirkstall abbey way. The Parliamentarians approached from the west of Leeds along the river valley and met resistence near the abbey? A smallish battle ensued and the royalists were pushed back along and into the river. No more resistence was found in any great number!
It's quite possible that other skirmishes broke out elsewhere in the city as troops fleeing were being pursued!
I'll dig out my old books and get a better description later!
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My God Simonm - you've got a heck of a long memory - You must be older than Arry Awk!!! Which side were you on??
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Scandy Bramley
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Location:
Denmark
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20-May-2007 16:44:42
Posted:
267 posts
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| drapesy wrote: |
| My God Simonm - you've got a heck of a long memory - You must be older than Arry Awk!!! Which side were you on?? |
Like most Armleyites, he sided with them that was winning at the time. 
He couldn't have sided with the roundheads, as it's an armley characteristic that you have a 50p shaped head, with protruding forehead and abnormally low eyebrows.
SimonM also has the tell-tale grazed knuckles (from continually dragging them along the gravelly streets of his location), that show him to be a real Armleyite.
In the civil war, BOTH sides avoided Armley, as they were scared of catching rabies, or the bubonic plague...
NOT from the dogs or rats, but from contact with the locals!
Stanningley Road was built to keep armleyite neanderthals out of civilised Bramley 
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simonm
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Thats gonna cost you on Fri!!!!
Drapesy, there are quite a lot of burial mounds around the city and surrounding area's. Farnley park, towton etc!
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Ro-Man
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Leeds
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27-Feb-2007 16:23:16
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There seems to be quite a bit of interest in this story, so I'll post the other account I mentioned in my first post. This is from a pamphlet by Walter Gill called "Woodhouse in Leeds". If you ask me there's way too many assumptions about what could have happened, and the theory of the name 'Pikeman Rigge' which he mentions at the end had already been disproved. Still, it's worth a read just to show how one bit of history can have so many theories.
But what about the Bradford pikemen who had dropped down the almost precipitous slope of Batty's Wood into Meanwood Valley? A persistent folk-tradition lasting right up to modern times held that a Civil War battle had been fought here too, on the northern border of Greater Woodhouse. Occasional widely scattered leaden bullets were unearthed in the Valley, and two mounds were reputed burial places of the soldiers killed in it. One was on the top of Miles Hill (know to locals as Sugarwell Hill) on the opposite side of the Valley from the Ridge and Batty's Wood (known to locals as Batty Woods). A prominent group of trees (now only bushes) marked what is still known as "Soldiers' Grave". The other tree-covered mound is half-a-mile further north by the side of Stonegate Road, near to Revolution Well.
All this, though suggestive, fell short of concrete evidence, especially in view of the absence of written accounts. Then by accident my younger brother, a friend and I, found what was lacking. Just about the time I was beginning my series of old Woodhouse sketches, we were walking along Meanwood Beck at the foot of the rocky slope of Batty's Wood when one of us picked up what looked like a small round pebble. But it was very heavy, in fact plainly a leaden bullet: I had seen several such in local museums. Curious as to whether there might be more, we began scratching the loose soil which barely covered the sandstone rocks on the right bank of the stream. We found not a few but dozens of the bullets. Eventually, after several summers' evenings' work, we had collected almost two hundred of them, all within two or three yards of the stream over a space of no more than thirty or forty yards alongside it. Many more are probably still there; three were found in an hour or two nearly forty years after our first dig.
Over all those intervening years I slowly collected other pieces of tangible evidence and researched the records. Most of these details and the reasoned arguments therefrom were published in a Yorkshire Evening Post article of mine, June 27th 1974. Sufficient here now to tell the story which had unfolded of the Battle of Meanwood Valley.
There is no doubt that Sir William Savile knew both the intended date and general strategy of the expected attack. Thus early in the war many had doubts as to where their loyalties lay. This produced quite a crop of spies and informers on both sides. So the Royalists' commander anticipated a move down the Meanwood Valley and the likely point of entry. He evidently sent some companies of his dragoons (mounted musketeers) to block it. These arrived in time to select their position, probably along one of the many ancient goits thereabouts and facing the foot of the steep woodland from a hundred yards or so away, on the opposite side of the beck. Then, as the leading pikemen were crossing the stream and the rest fully committed to the descent, the Royalists fired a tremendous concentrated volley using every gun they had - hoping to create panic and suicidal attempts to climb back into the Wood. This accounts for the bullets we found.
What exactly happened then is a matter of some conjecture. But
certainly the pikemen did not lose their nerve. Their morale was high
after their two recent victories over these same troops. Moreover they now had had a month's training under professional officers known to have been provided by Sir Thomas Fairfax.
It could be that the outnumbering pikemen immediately charged the dragoons before they had had time to reload their muskets, a process which took three or four minutes. Thjs however now seems unlikely since I have heard fairly recently that from time to time bullets have been dug up in the allotments, a few hundred yards downstream, behind Woodhouse Cricket Field where the brook forms its boundary. All along this stretch the general direction of the stream is a wide arc turning inwards relative to the dragoons' position.
What probably happened was that, after the initial volley, the pikemen continued to drop swiftly down through Batty's Wood and then spread downstream, taking cover behind the opposite bank of the Beck, - and waited. The Royalists, who cannot have numbered much more than 300 men, were in no position to attack at close quarters after failing to panic their opponents and must have been contemplating remounting to get away. Meanwhile, it would seem likely that the small company of Bradford musketeers (30 had been sent to attack Leeds Bridge with the other half of the pikemen) were sent to the downstream end of the line with instructions there to fire a volley at the dragoons. Fearful of being outflanked, the latter fired a volley back - which gave the thousand pikemen their signal to rise from the Beck banks as one man. And a fearful sight they must have looked as they charged!
The battle spread across the valley as the dragoons, such as had time to remount, hastily retreated mostly round the northern flank of Miles Hill. Here, up the shallow little vale of the Stain Beck, (as testified by bullets found in the Stainbeck area) they seem to have made their last attempt at a stand. Here, too, the King's men probably suffered their worst casualties, since the ground is exactly halfway between the two burial mounds.
Eventually it seems, the remnants of the defeated companies managed to disengage themselves and ride off eastwards to Seacroft. Here they established a strongpoint which became a thorn in the side of the Leeds' victors for several months. But by the time the pikemen had broken off the chase, the battle there was already over and won without their presence.
Whichever battle the folk of Woodhouse watched (as the bolder spirits no doubt did) they had safe grandstand views from either just beyond the southern edge of the Moor for the Leeds fight, or for that of Meanwood Valley from the crown of Woodhouse Ridge. Small wonder that the latter vantage point, even a century and a half later as evidenced by maps, was still known by the name of "Pikeman Rigge". In the story of Woodhouse, 23rd January 1643 was quite a day!
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Scandy Bramley
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AWESOME tale, Ro-Man! Thanks for that mate!
This forum never ceases to amaze me, with the history you learn on here...
Truely fantastic....
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FarnleyBloke
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Farnley
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A couple of years ago Calendar or Look North did a feature where some guys were re-enacting a Civil War skirmish that supposedly happened on Boar Lane. Could this be part of the same thing? Were there possibly running battles between small groups all over leeds?
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LS13
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Leeds
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23-Mar-2007 18:01:03
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The steep grass bank on the Headingley side of Woodhouse Ridge was known as 'carboard hill' when I was a kid. It was littered with the remnants of cardboard boxes used as makeshift sledges by hundreds of little lads. Rumours circulated of would-be evel knievels tackling the steep slope on bogeys/go karts but I never believed it..this was in the days before x boxes etc obviously...
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JanCee
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JanCee
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Jimbo5553
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Leeds
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| Ro-Man wrote: |
Here’s a mystery I’ve been meaning to post for a while.
Opinion is split down the middle about whether a Civil War battle occurred in Meanwood. The rumours are that on 23rd January 1643 a battle took place at the foot of Woodhouse Ridge, in Batty’s Wood, not far from where Woodhouse Cricket Club now stands. Various local history books document the battle as taking place, whilst there are others which are more sceptical.
For example, the following is from “Meanwood” by Arthur Hopwood
"If The Battle of Meanwood' were not mentioned, many would consider the omission a mistake. They would point to the evidence of the 'Stainbeck'-the legend being that the stream ran red with blood - and to the musket balls, so many of which have been picked out of the beck at the foot of Woodhouse Ridge - or Pikeman Ridge, the suggestive name by which it was known in 1781 There may have been a Civil War skirmish hereabouts on 23 January 1643 but it can hardly have been a 'battle' - there is no documentary record of the incident. As for the circumstantial evidence, the name 'Staynbek'(i.e. Stonebeck) first appears in 1240, some four hundred years too soon, and Pikeman Ridge, or a very similar name, was used in 1561 - a hundred years before the dale in question. As for the musket balls - their localised concentration suggests target practice rather than the spread of shot to be expected after an armed encounter."
This is the other side of the story from “A history of Headingley” by Christopher Gardener
"Some historians have linked the name of the part of the boundary between Headingley and Leeds which runs from Hyde Park Corner to Woodhouse Ridge along the line of Cliff Lane and which is called Pikeman Ridge with the battle in Batty's Wood and Meanwood Valley. It is quite a coincidence, however. Pikeman Rigge was surveyed by a royal commission and reported in a document of 1612, and an earlier boundary commission in 1561 also reported the name of Pate Man Rig for the same part of the boundary between-Headingley and Woodhouse. So the name Pikeman Ridge, is far older than the Civil War and it is pure coincidence that a thousand Parliamentarian pikemen were in action only a little way from the place. The word Rig found in the earliest records, means hedge and not a ridge in the modern sense."
Then there is a large history of the battle itself which is written by Walter Gill in his book “Woodhouse in Leeds”. I’ll post it later if anyone is interested, but it takes a bit of reading. Where did all his research come from if the battle didn’t actually take place?
There must be plenty of rumours and places kicking about to do with Leeds in the Civil War. Anyone got any pics or info?
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The 'Battle' of Meanwood more of a skirmish really, did happen on the eve of the Battle for Leeds, when General Fairfax was camped on Woodhouse Moor, a patrol found out that some Cavaliers were camped on Meanwood Road ( where the 'white houses' just to be), the Roundheads came down the ridge presumably thru the night, then used the beck (where it goes under Meanwood Road ) as their trench, a few volleys of shot and the suprised Cavaliers were chased up Stainbeck Lane, across Stonegate Road and beyond,
jimbo
ps way back in the early sixties I went to Stainbeck Boys School
( now Carr Manor I believe )
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cnosni
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Leeds
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28-Mar-2007 21:17:06
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This is a message for Ro-man.
I am very interested in your pamphlet by Walter Gill about Woodhouse.
Theres no copy in Leeds library and i was wondering how you got yours.
Part of my family lived in Woodhouse from 1730 till late 1800s andanydetails on Woodhouse at this time would be more than welcome.
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Ro-Man
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Leeds
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27-Feb-2007 16:23:16
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Sorry about the late reply, but if you still need the info-
There's loads of copies of the Gill pamphlet in the local branch public libraries, and there should be 5 copies available at the Central Library according to the catalogue (can't gurantee they haven't gone missing though).
You can find them all by doing a search here.
http://librarycatalogue.leedslearning.net/TalisPrism/
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cnosni
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Leeds
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28-Mar-2007 21:17:06
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2625 posts
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| Ro-Man wrote: |
Sorry about the late reply, but if you still need the info-
There's loads of copies of the Gill pamphlet in the local branch public libraries, and there should be 5 copies available at the Central Library according to the catalogue (can't gurantee they haven't gone missing though).
You can find them all by doing a search here.
http://librarycatalogue.leedslearning.net/TalisPrism/
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Thanks for that,they are not in the local studies section to my knowledge,will have to get down and ask next time,
cheers
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rogerb
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leeds
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11-Jan-2009 20:03:54
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2 posts
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the Gill pamphlet makes good reading and I'd like to beleive it - having searched, I can find no original evidence to support his account, whihc seems to be conjectural. no readon to suppose it ISN'T true, though ...
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