Royalist cause. On 5 July 1643, he won a major triumph
over his old friend, Sir William Waller, at Lansdown.
The following day, he was injured by the explosion of a
wagon full of powder. A week later, at Roundway Down
on 13 July 1643, Hopton again faced Waller’s forces; the
Royalists won a smashing victory and left 1,500 Parlia-
mentarians dead on the battlefield. For this service, he
was created Baron Hopton of Stratton.
Hopton spent the winter consolidating his gains
and building his army. In March 1644, the Parliamen-
tarians moved on his forces at Cheriton (Arlesford),
Hampshire. It was there on 29 March that Waller, with
6,500 men, faced Hopton’s force of 3,500 men and
2,500 horse soldiers. Waller’s overwhelming advantage
of men and arms forced Hopton to retreat, ending the
Royalist control of southwest England. In 1646, Charles
took over the command of the entire Royalist army, but
he was not the military leader or strategist that Hopton
was. Moreover, the Royalist cause became hopeless at
this point due to growing numbers of Parliamentarian
troops. Hopton lost a decisive battle against Thomas,
Lord fairfax, at Torrington (16 February 1646), the
last major battle of the so-called First Civil War (al-
though the conflict would continue in various forms
until 1651). On 14 March 1646, Hopton surrendered
to Fairfax at Tresillian Bridge. He later accompanied
Prince Charles (later Charles II) in an attempt to pro-
long the war in the Scilly and Channel Islands, but their
efforts were fruitless. He settled in Belgium, dying in
Bruges in September 1652.
References: Firth, Charles Harding, “Hopton, Ralph,
Lord Hopton,” in The Dictionary of National Biography,
22 vols., 8 supps., edited by Sir Leslie Stephen and Sir
Sidney Lee, et al. (London: Oxford University Press,
1921–22), IX:1241–44; Edgar, Frank Terrell Rhoades,
Sir Ralph Hopton: The King’s Man in the West (1642–
1652) (Oxford, U.K.: The Clarendon Press, 1968);
Carlin, Norah, The Causes of the English Civil War (Ox-
ford, U.K.: Blackwell Publishers, 1999); Reid, Stuart,
All the King’s Armies: A Military History of the English
Civil War, 1642–1651 (Staplehurst, Kent, U.K.: Spell-
mount, 1998); Healey, Charles E. H. Chadwyck, Bellum
Civile: Hopton’s Narrative of His Campaign in the West
(1642–1644) and Other Papers (London: Harrison &
Sons, Printers, 1902); Adair, John, Cheriton 1644: The
Campaign and the Battle (Kineton, U.K.: The Round-
wood Press, 1973).
Howard, Charles, second baron Howard of
Effingham and first earl of Nottingham
(1536–1624) English general and admiral
The eldest son of William, first baron Howard and
his wife Margaret (née Gamage), Charles Howard was
born in Norfolk in 1536. His paternal grandfather was
Thomas, the second duke of Norfolk, while his mater-
nal grandfather was Sir Thomas Gamage of Coity, in
Glamorganshire. His father’s sister was the mother of
King Henry VIII’s second wife, Anne Boleyn. William
Howard served as deputy earl marshal to Anne, as well
as lord high admiral during the rebellion of Sir Thomas
Wyatt in 1554.
Because of his relation to Anne Boleyn and her
daughter, who became Queen Elizabeth I, Charles
Howard was rewarded by the Crown with various diplo-
matic missions, including being sent in 1559 to France
to congratulate Francis II on his ascension to the French
throne. He entered the English military and rose through
the ranks, becoming general of the horse under the earl
of Warwick in 1569, when he aided in putting down
a rebellion in the north of England. In 1563, he was
elected to Parliament from Surrey, sitting in that session
and in 1572. In 1573, upon his father’s death, he suc-
ceeded to the title of Baron Howard of Effingham, and
three years later he was bestowed with the knight of the
garter. He was named as one of the commissioners to
try Mary, Queen of Scots, who was an enemy of Queen
Elizabeth, in 1586; Mary was eventually found guilty
and beheaded.
In late 1587, when war with Spain appeared in-
evitable, Lord Howard was named as the “lieutenant-
general and commander-in-chief of the navy and army
prepared to the seas against Spain.” He selected the Ark
Royal as his main flagship, and, with Sir Francis drake,
sailed his fleet of some 90 ships from Plymouth. How-
ard initially proposed a massive attack on the Spanish
fleet; however, due to bad weather, he was only able to
harry Spain’s armada, which, as it transpired, proved a
highly successful tactic. His ships followed the armada
to Gravelines, near Calais. On 28 July 1588, Howard
wrote to Sir Francis Walsingham, on the evening be-
fore the battle at Gravelines, about the fleet that he
would face the following day, “Ther force is wonderfull
gret and strong And yet we ploke ther fethers by lytell
and litell... .” With the maneuverability of the British
ships and the use of fire ships sent into the Spanish
in harbor, 16 Spanish galleons were destroyed, and the howARD, chARleS