Summary. It is most likely there was a wall or vallum around the early cathedral-church of Lichfield. In 1299, Bishop Langton was given a licence to build a stone, crenellated wall around his palace and houses in the Close. It had an affinity with the moated wall around the bishop’s palace at Wells. By 1640 and the approach of a Civil War there was a formidable, unique curtain wall with bastion towers and a moat around the Close. Three sieges, during 1643-46, destroyed much of the wall, gates, palace and cathedral. The precise shape of the west gate, the structure of the southern boundary and aspects of the moat are uncertain.
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Ancient texts described a protective wall around the Cathedral Close in the 12th-century, presumably organised by Bishop Roger de Clinton, 1129-48.[2] The Close was said to be a castellum, c. 1200,[3] or small castle. A 17th-century description was, Castrum Lichesfeldense muniendo villam vallo vallendo milites; meaning, ‘The soldiers fortified the castle of Lichfield and fortified the town with a rampart’.[4] Some suggesting a castle was within the town and not around the Close.[5] Taylor described it as a rather vaguely worded document.[6] Harwood thought the whole settlement was entrenched so that, Clinton fortified the castle, to have made a rampart round the village, and to have enrolled and mustered the soldiers.[7] Was it a response to the Anarchy War, 1138-1153? It is now believed there was some kind of fortification of the Close[8] but it was probably rudimentary. The Victorian County History could only conclude the Close appeared to have been fortified.[9] So what sort of early fortification was built? It was around three sides of the Close, 300 m long and 250 m wide. The south side river or stream had been dammed and the new pool protected this side.
Suggested topography of the Close around the year 1100.[10] The enclosure could have been a ditch and embankment, but it is more likely to have used the bedrock to give a substantial vallum.
In 1299, around 30 years before completion of the cathedral, Bishop Walter de Langton obtained a licence (April 20, 1299 page 409 in Calendar of Patent Rolls Edward I, Volume 3.) to strengthen and crenellate the boundary walls. It read, Licence, in honour of the cathedral church of Lichefeld and of the saints whose bodies rest there, and for the security and quiet of the canons and ministers of the church residing there, for Walter de Langeton, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, to enclose the precinct of his and the canons’ houses within the close of the church with a stone wall, and to crenellate the wall.
This wall gave security and quiet to Langton’s palace and to
the canon’s houses in the Close. Its purpose was not military and it probably
was not impregnable. It was not to protect the cathedral. Wharton, 1691, stated
simply, he refortified the Close with a stone wall.[11] The east wall had three interval towers
with two within the bishop’s palace[12]
and one where there is now Selwyn House. This low-level fortification resembled
the curtain wall built around Langton’s palace at Eccleshall.
Maddison explained the fortifying was a response to Edward I’s
marshalling for his three campaigns of 1277, 1282 and 1294,[13] and
chimes with the building of castles. If this is true, it would be
expected troops were garrisoned in the Close, but there is no reference to this
in the fragmentary documents. The licence does not describe a formidable castle
to garrison troops.
Langton’s rise in the church was
assisted by his uncle who in 1265 became Archbishop of York and by his close
friend Robert Burnell who became Bishop of Bath and Wells. The walls, gatehouse
and moat at Wells were added after 1329, which was after Langton’s death in
1321, but around the same time as the building of the Lichfield ramparts. Since
it is known the layout of the church and the choirs at Lichfield
and Wells were similar,[14]
the hall in Langton’s palace matched the size of Bishop Burnell’s at
Wells,1292,[15]
statuary around the north door has similarities with those on Wells, and the
west fronts of the two cathedrals have similarities, it is possible the two
moated walls and tower have resemblances. It is possible the low walls, 5m high, and bastions (not towers) at
Wells meant to give security and quiet to the bishop’s palace and had the same
function as Lichfield’s wall.
Aerial
view of the bishop’s palace at Wells. The walls are only 5m high and the
corners have bastions, not high towers. This indicates the fortification gave
security from ordinary people, but would have been weak against a military
siege. Was Lichfield like this?
This low-level
fortification does not agree with narratives in the last two centuries. Harwood said,[16] the Close, was surrounded by water, and fortified by walls and
bastions, and was a place of considerable strength.[17] Victoria County
History has Langton constructed a stone perimeter wall with massive
gatehouses at the south and west entrances.[18] In a seminal work[19] on the Civil War sieges
it was claimed “Langton fortified the Close by surrounding the whole of it,
including the south side, with stone walls, built in a handsome manner and
strengthened with towers and turrets. To the west and south of these
fortifications were gates (the southern gate was a postern), each furnished
with a portcullis and a drawbridge to give access over a moat.” Two thick oak
doors, one internal and one to the outside guarded each entrance. It is clear
these are descriptions of later additions to the fortification. Probably the
walls had to be reinforced soon after the age of cannon began in the 1330s.The
twin semi-octagonal towers at the Dam Street entrance were completed after 1322
and the west gate c. 1355 with a portcullis added 1376.
In 1348, a licence[20] was granted to stop people using a road which ran along
the road south of the cathedral. Calander of Patent rolls,
1348-50, page 56 for April 18, 1348, stated, Certain of the town of
Lichfield claimed to have a common transit through the close leading from
Bakenstrete by the gate of the close, with bridges over the water there,
sufficient for the transit of men, carts, wains or horses. An inquisition found
it did not cause damage for this transit. However, the king confirms the
charter (1299) so that only the bishop, the dean and chapter, and the ministers
of them and the church shall have transit through the close.
This confirms Langton’s purpose for security, privacy and quiet. A map of the Close wall in 1610 shows a straight, low wall around the Close with corner towers, two gates and no moat. The wall does not appear impregnable.
This confirms Langton’s purpose to have security, privacy and quiet. Whether all this considerable fortification was completed in the 14th century, or more added in the intervening 300 years to the English Civil War is unknown.A map of the Close wall in 1610 shows a straight, low wall around the Close with corner towers, two gates and no moat. The wall does not appear impregnable.
Appearance of the fortress cathedral on a map by John Speed dated 1610, not showing a moat. [21]
Bassett’s plan for 1350, 1982, showing a simple square wall, block-shaped west gate and an absence of a moat; all confirming Speed’s map.
A journal written by the Parliamentary army General, Sir William Brereton, [22] stated at the beginning of the first siege, March 1643, the walls of the Close had been strengthened and loopholes pieced in the stonework, a deep and wide moat surrounded the Close, mounds were thrown up on the inner banks, double wooden doors, portcullises and drawbridges added to the gates and additional walls and bastions added. The west gate had two outer towers to make it a barbican and this would have strengthened the doorway, the weakest part of the fortification. It is clear the Royalists led by the Earl of Chesterfield had greatly added to the fortification before the first battle. Clarendon wrote, 1702-4, at the beginning of the Civil War “The Close in Lichfield was a place naturally strong, and defended with a moat, and a very high and thick wall; which in the infancy of the war was thought a good fortification”. On the second siege, April 1643, he added, “The cathedral church and all the clergymen’s houses was strongly fortified, and resolved against him (Prince Rupert). The wall, about which there was a broad and deep moat, was so thick and strong, that no battery the prince could raise would make any impression."
There are 3 uncertainties concerning this 1640s fortification, namely, the extent of the moat, the nature of the southern boundary and the shape of the towers.
1.
Was the moat in 1640 dry, wet, complete or partial?
The
substantial ditch which enclosed the whole complex was known to have been cut
or re-cut in c. 1130. It was dug into the underlying sandstone and presumably
acted as a convenient quarry for buildings within the Close. It was around 30
m. wide and 5 m. deep.[23] There is no evidence at the
time of construction that the ditch contained water. Lomax
said the Close was nearly surrounded
by water.[24]
Speed’s map of 1610 does not show any moat.
Gresley’s (1840)[25] plan of the Close for 1640 showing a moat on two sides, an unequal west gate and a southern wall against the pool.
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Thorpe's (1950) [26] similar plan of the Close showing a moat on sections of the east and west sides. The southeast gate has an outward extension.
Tringham’s
plan (1985)[27] of the Close from surveys in 1649 and 1660,
showing a moat on two sides of the Close. This followed the layout shown on
John Snape’s map of Lichfield drawn in 1791.
It is plausible the water course along
the east wall extended as far as the bishop’s palace, because it could then
drain waste from the palace. Likewise, it extended three-quarters along the
west wall and drained waste from the houses along Beacon Street. The north dyke
being at a higher elevation (presently, 8m higher than the pool) would not be
fed with water from the southern stream, but could have filled with rainwater
or from a spring. The bedrock of Mercian red sandstone has a relatively low
permeability and can hold water. So, was the whole Close surrounded with a moat
at the start of the Civil War, 1643?
Prince
Rupert arrived in Lichfield on April 6 1643 to retake the Close from the occupying
Parliamentarian Army. His Royalist forces surrounded the Close and began to
pound the walls, but to no avail. So, he recruited men to mine tunnels under
the wall. Clayton wrote, “Before they could start undermining the walls the top moat (north
side) had to be drained of water, and this was probably done by diverting the
springs that fed the moat from the higher ground”.[28] It is presumed the
diggers were under some metal shield to prevent being shot from the ramparts.
The northwest
corner of the fortress cathedral at the time of the second siege and after
undermining the northeast tower with gunpowder. Note the shielding around the
northwest tower to protect the miners. Also, the rectangular shape of the west
gate. A reconstruction of the second siege of Lichfield; Mike Kilfoyle; 1993;
LCA 0576.
Griffiths Higgs was the dean of Lichfield and wrote a first-hand account of events in the spring of 1643 in Latin.[29] Higgs was a Royalist and wrote, “Rupert for the second siege moved his machines and catapults, providing mantlets (protective iron shields) for the siege-men. He used battering rams, hurled rocks and constructed underground mines. He fixed ladders to the walls and built a bridge across the moat. After the Close was taken by the Royalists, Richard Bagot of Stafford was declared governor and he had water brought back into the moat.” This infers a wet moat existed, particularly on the north side.
It is obvious why Rupert tried to breach the wall on the northwest corner. This has the highest elevation and presumably the lowest water level. It could also have had the lowest wall offset by the deepest ditch. Furthermore, it might have been a wall without a house behind; breaching a wall and then having to fight through a house might have been too much. If so, it adds to the notion by 1643 the whole of the Close had a complete moat.
2.
Did the south side have a wall or were
backs of houses and the pool sufficient protection?
John
Speed’s map, 1610, appears to show houses along the south boundary of the
Close. So does a hand-drawn view of the Close from the south by William
Dugdale.
Cox,[30] 1738, wrote the Close was so-called because it was enclosed with a stone wall and deep fosse (trench or dyke) on all sides except the south where it was defended by a pool of water. If the walled Close was primarily to protect the bishop’s palace, then its own high wall south of the palace was sufficient. Entry through the southeast gate would be restricted and probably only allowed the bishop’s carriage and staff to pass through. No southern wall was repeated in Mike Kilfoyle’s drawings and in Tringham’s layout for the mid-17th century. Ellis and Atherton stated the Close was protected by the Minster Pool on the south (or city side) and had a ditch on the other three sides.25 Thorpe’s plan, 1950, however, has a definite curtain wall along the Minster pool. At the Dam Street end there is a portion of a wall still existing. Was this a true wall, or a long back to a row of houses now removed?
Painting
thought to be mid-17th century by an unknown artist shows a square west gate
and no southern wall.
At the end
of the garden to No. 19 The Close is a length of walling which would have given
protection.
At both the southeast and southwest
corners a house was incorporated into the wall and had a defensive turret. It
is indicates houses were added to the defensive wall.
St Mary’s house with defensive turret.
Hewitt[31] (1874) wrote various maps and plans show the Close precincts do not extend to the pool bank, so that it may be doubted if the pool ever formed a moat barrier to the fortress. An interspace of dry land between the pool and the Close seems vulnerable to access and insecure. It appears the southside had a combination of walls and backs of houses, probably strengthened with access to their roofs, along the edge of Minster Pool and this was sufficient deterrence to any incursion by an enemy, but it is uncertain. Gresley (1840)[32] mentions earth mounds being built up in the back gardens on the south side and soldiers using them as barricades, but if they were placed between the houses/wall and the pool it would have been exposure to cannon fire and if behind the wall it would have been useless. In December 1645, ice on Minster Pool was deliberately broken several times to prevent easy crossing of the pool. An archaeological dig, 1976-7, south of College Hall found no evidence of a defensive wall.
3. What was the shape of the towers?
A drawing exists of the west gate [33]before its final demolition in 1800.[34] It shows three shields, a rampant lion with chequered square (left), the arms of the see of Lichfield (centre) and the arms of Charles I (right). This is the centre of the gate and gives no clue as to the shape of the side towers. Lomax stated over the gate was a tower,[35] but that does not accord with other castle gates.
West gate drawing before its demolition in 1800
An etching by Henry White[36]
shows a small west gate that has round towers.
Henry White etching. Lichfield Cathedral in 1640, William Salt Library.The west gate appears small, whereas the ferry gate on the south side appears large. The towers are drawn round when it is known the corner towers were octagonal.
The remains of the side tower, still visible in the left wall to the entrance to the Close, suggest a large tower block. This is reminiscent of the gatehouse to the bishop’s palace at Wells.
North side of the west gate. It is about 20 feet high and 20 feet wide. The south side was demolished to make way for Newton's College.
It cannot be ruled out the west gate had octagonal towers much like around the Close. It is odd there is no account of its appearance. The remains of a tower at the bishop’s palace at Eccleshall show it was octagonal.
Tower at Eccleshall castle
It seems incongruous the corner towers and possibly the southern gate towers
were octagonal and the west gate was not.
Southern Gate opposite Dam Street. Early guides state the southeast gates were of massive oak, studded with iron, and having a wicket for the passage of people on foot. The water from Minster Pool was bridged by a draw-bridge before flowing to Stowe Pool. The gateway was flanked by towers, projecting from the walls of the Close into the fosse, one of which on the east side was used as a dwelling, and called the turret house.[37]
South west gate drawing, 1840.
Corner Towers. The corner towers appear octagonal and this is apparent in the remnant of the northeast tower. Its sides are 15 feet long. The foundation of a tower in the southeast was a half- octagon with 12 feet sides, but is this the corner tower or the eastern tower of the gate? The octagonal foundation appears to be facing east, not south and thus was on a corner, so the corner tower was the turret tower attached today to a house. The southwest tower was the largest.[38]
Foundation to southeast tower showing it has octagonal sides 12 feet wide. It is
faces south and east.
Northern wall and northeast tower showing it was octagonal with 15 feet long sides, The wall was about 4 feet thick.
Northeast tower showing brickwork above stonework
Inside the tower..
There are uncertainties in the shape of the curtain wall, especially the shape of the towers alongside the gates. It is incongruous, the west-gate had tall, square side towers, whereas the south-east gate towers were octagonal. The height of the castellated wall appears to vary considerably, with the north wall being higher than the south or east wall.
Summary
After the second siege with the breaching of the northwest corner wall and takeover by the Royalists, Prince Rupert ordered the strengthening of the fortifications. It was recorded in a Parliamentary record (No. 38, 20-27 April, 1643) that the following were undertaken, [39]
- making up the breach in the wall where the mine was sprung
- making a drawbridge with chains and repairing the gate wall
- installing new gates with ironwork
- repairing the inner tower at the west gate and adding a cannon
- drawing water around the Close. So there was water around the Close by the time of the third siege.
- In 1645 ‘the ‘bulwarks were raised’
The Royalists surrendered the Close on July 10, 1646, and on the July 16th orders were given to slight the fortifications, but so little was left to remove.[40] Brereton’s army stayed on to demolish the walls. The two gateways were kept, but the doors and portcullises were removed. It is likely the moat must have been drained completely, and this was confirmed by Erdwicke[41] in 1717 when he wrote the Close had ‘a good, deep dry trench.’
Reconstructions of the walls.
[1]
A. Sargent, ‘Early medieval Lichfield. A reassessment’. Staffordshire
Archaeological and Historical Society Transactions, (2013), 1–32.
[2] H. Wharton, Anglia Sacra (1691),
434.
[3] M. W. Greenslade, 'Lichfield: The cathedral close', in A History of the
County of Stafford: Volume 14, Lichfield, (London, 1990), 57-67. British
History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/staffs/vol14/
[4] H. Wharton, Anglia
Sacra, i. 434; S.H.C.
4th ser. xi. 8.
[5] The site was reputed to be
close to the street named ‘Castle Dyke’, between Frog Lane and Wade Street.
Leland wrote, “There hathe bene a castle of auncient tyme in the southe ende of
the towne, but no parte of it standithe. The plote with the dikes is sene, and
is yet caullyd The Castle Felde; but in my coniecture the more lykely place
wher it shuld of very auntient tyme have stond is the very close of the palace.
That ground is somewhat castle like. L. Toulmin Smith, The Itinerary of John
Leland in or about the years 1535–1543. (London: 1907–10), 99.
[6] C. C. Taylor, ‘The origins
of Lichfield, Staffordshire’, South Staffordshire archaeological and historical
society transactions for 1968-9, (1969), 10, 43-52.
[7] T. Harwood, The history and antiquities
of the church and city of Lichfield. (London: 1806), 10-11, 288, 292, 295.
[8] W. Pitt, Topographical history of
Staffordshire. (1817).
[9] M.
W. Greenslade (ed.), 'Lichfield: History to c.1500', in A History of
the County of Stafford: Volume 14, Lichfield, (London, 1990), pp. 4-14,
note 46.
[10] T. R. Slater, ‘The topography and planning
of Medieval Lichfield. A critique. South Staffordshire archaeological and
historical society transactions for 1984-1985. (1986), 26, 11-35.
[11] See note 2, Wharton, 1691, volume 1, 442.
[12] For a plan of the palace see N. Tringham,
'Palace of Walter Langton in Lichfield Close', Medieval Archaeology and
Architecture at Lichfield, ed. J. Maddison (1993), 88.
[13] J. Maddison, ‘Building at Lichfield
Cathedral during the episcopate of Walter Langton, 1296–1321.’ In Medieval
archaeology and architecture at Lichfield, XIII, British Archaeological
Association (1993), 66.
[14] R. Willis, ‘On
foundations of early buildings recently discovered in Lichfield Cathedral’. The
Archaeological Journal, (1861), 18, 1–24. Willis visited the
Cathedral in 1849 to examine window tracery. In 1854 he was invited to forward
a drawing for the restoration of the choir area. Before publication Willis gave
a lecture reported in The Gentleman’s Magazine, March 1861, Vol. 210, 296‑300.
[15] D. Lepine, ‘‘Glorious confessor’: the cult
of S Chad at Lichfield Cathedral during the later Middle Ages’, Staffordshire
Archaeological and Historical Society-Transactions, (2021), 33.
[16] See Harwood note 7. Harwood (1806), 10.
[17] Ibid 20.
[18] Ibid 11, note 404.
[19] H. Clayton, Loyal and Ancient City.
Lichfield in the Civil Wars. (Lichfield: 1987).
[20] Calendar of Patent Rolls 1348–50, 56, April 18 1348.
[21] First published in 1611-12 by J. Sudbury and G. Humble.
[22] J. McKenna, A Journal of the English Civil War. The Letter Book of Sir William Brereton. (North Carolina and London: 2012), 59, 99. . J. W. W. Bund, The Civil War in Worcestershire, 1642-1646 and the Scotch invasion of 1651. (Birmingham: 1905), 30, confirmed the Close was fortified by the Royalists before the first siege, 1643.
[23] T. R. Slater, (1986), 15. See note 10.
Current cathedral ditch has been measured to be 42 m (139 feet) wide, around 6
m (20 feet) deep and with a bank around 2 m high.
[24] T. Lomax, A short account
of the City and Close of Lichfield. (Lichfield: 1819).
[25]
W. Gresley, The siege of Lichfield: A tale illustrative of the Great
Rebellion. (London: 1840), 274.
[26] H. Thorpe,
‘Lichfield: a study of its growth and function.’ Collections for a history
of Staffordshire, 1950-51, (1954) 137-211
[27] N. J. Tringham, ‘Two seventeenth-century
surveys of Lichfield Cathedral Close, South Staffordshire Archaeological and
Historical Society transactions for 1983-84. (1985), 25, 35-49.
[28] H. Clayton, ‘Loyal and Ancient City. The
Civil War in Lichfield’. (Lichfield, self-published: 1987), 43.
[29] N. Ellis and I. Atherton, ‘Griffith Higgs's
Account of the Sieges of and Iconoclasm at Lichfield Cathedral in 1643, Midland
History, (2009) 34:2, 233-245.
[30]
T, Cox, Magna Britannia, (London: 1738), 234.
[31]
J. Hewitt, ‘Lichfield Cathedral Close and its sieges’. Archaeological J. (1874),
31, 1, 327–336.
[32]
W. Gresley, (1840) 67, see note 25, wrote, The Royalists, on their side, had
not been backward in making preparation for defence. Mounds had been thrown up
in the gardens between the Cathedral and the pool; the old houses had been
pierced with loop-holes and embrasures; and the bastions of the south gate, and
the battlements of the Lady Chapel, had been lined with musketeers and
marksmen, who were protected partly by the battlements, partly by woolsacks
carried up to the roofs of the buildings for that purpose.
[33] It is thought Langton’s
master mason was Henry de Ellerton, active as the master of the King’s Works
1304-22. He took over the building of Caernarfon Castle in 1323. The King’s
Gate might have a resemblance to Lichfield’s west-gate.
[34] A pen and ink drawing by C. E. Skinner in
March 1800 prior to the demolition of the gate.
[35] T. Lomax, (1819), 206. See note 24.
[36] T. Harwood (1806), 307. See note 7.
[37] T. Lomax, (1819), 210. See note 24.
[41] S. Erdwicke, Survey of Staffordshire. Containing William Dugdale’s transcript. (London: 1717), 100.