Village Horror Story
The Brutal Folklore of Civil War Bagnall
In a peaceful, rural corner of North Staffordshire famed for its Well Dressings and idyllic atmosphere, two distinct memories of true human horror have found themselves handed down through the years in local folklore. But far from being a product of gruesome embellishment, it could well prove to be the case that these stories of massacre and revenge are completely, horrifically true.
A Beautiful Neighbourhood
As hidden histories go, there is one quaint and quiet spot on the edge of the Staffordshire Moorlands that appears to have more feathers in its cap than most. It is a place where the events of both the English Civil War and those of the Jacobite rebellion 100 years later, seem to have seeped into the DNA of local history to leave traces of some extraordinarily savage folk tales.
Centred on the village of Bagnall, one such tale tells of how, when Parliamentarian troops were billeted in the village, a skirmish took place nearby that was so ferocious that the area would henceforth be named after the sheer volume of severed body parts that were left strewn across the site in the wake of the encounter. Another, perhaps even darker tale, tells of how a young drummer boy was murdered in an act of retaliation against his military masters, before having his skin flayed and tanned in order to be used as a drum covering.
However strange the stories, and no matter how transient local beliefs in these events might be, time and time again, it is local knowledge that comes up trumps when researching such topics. As such, folk tales like these found around this region of the Staffordshire borders, made up by the villages of Bagnall, Endon and Stanley, should not easily be dismissed. In fact, research may well suggest quite the opposite. It is with an open mind that we begin our journey back, in hope of understanding more about these curious, if disturbing stories, from an area that may yet prove to be the custodian of a unique, if brutal, local history.
Just a couple of miles away from that key North Staffordshire thoroughfare of the A53 between Leek and the city of Stoke-On-Trent, the scattered collection of villages around Bagnall provide a picturesque rural lilt to the post-industrial reach of the nearby urban centre of Stoke. This is a garden world of meandering lanes, country pubs and village greens that can offer the history lover a tangible opportunity to consider what life was like in the area long before the pot bank boom of the 1800s. The last time I visited, I had to wait to cross a brook as a family of geese trotted across rather nonchalantly without a care in the world. Less than fifteen minutes later, I was in the heart of the city, sat amongst the gridlocked afternoon traffic waiting to access the A500.
Local activity around the villages extends back to at least the later Anglo-Saxon period of the tenth century. But most importantly, in relation to the stories that have been left with us from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, we know that there were a number of important buildings and institutions already established in the local vicinity by the time in which the events recounted in local lore are believed to have taken place. The churches, farms, manor houses and pubs, many of which survive to this day, act as our anchors as we attempt to grasp the local past. Keystone in the chain being Bagnall Hall itself, built in 1603 and to which the tales of both the massacre and the flayed boy are intrinsically bound.
Tightrope of the Times
Established houses such as Bagnall Hall often found themselves treading a thin line during the Civil War. Their loyalties were naturally divided between the Crown and Parliament, which meant that during the ebb and flow of the conflict they were variously seen as both safe houses and legitimate targets for each side, depending on which had the upper hand locally at any particular time. As such, when we consider the folklore associated with the massacre at the nearby spot now known rather fittingly as ‘Armshead’, Bagnall Hall's place in the tale is a natural fit.
At the outbreak of hostilities, there was no instant sense of polarisation for many parts of England. Rather, such divisions of loyalties would be more steadily developed over the following year, with many landowners initially seeking to simply stay out of the way; the memories of similar conflicts in the centuries gone by, and the damage to local economies that came hand in hand with them, still present in memory.
As the country began to tear itself apart in a conflict that would eventually come to be remembered as - per head of the population - the most devastating in England's history, staying out of the way became increasingly difficult. Such was the fractious nature of the conflict at its outset, that prominent Catholic families who would be in favour of the King often found themselves living, sometimes literally, next door to those supporting Parliament.
Come 1642, Bagnall Hall was in the possession of William Adams, the younger son of John Adams, a powerful local landowner who had died in 1641, leaving William properties in Bagnall, Sneyd Green, and Tunstall. We don’t know for certain if the Adams family were on the side of the Crown at the outset of the conflict, but an inscription on the fireplace from the rectory house of nearby St Chad's Church, uncovered during nineteenth century renovations, reads, quite explicitly, ‘Fear God, Honour Your King’.
That being said, the tale of the massacre is predicated on the village of Bagnall having provided a base for Parliamentarian troops, not Royalist. Either way, come the time of the event that has remained in legend, Bagnall was said to have been playing host to a Parliamentarian garrison that was using the rectory itself as an armoury, and from where they would venture out to join battle around three miles away; going on to leave the field thick with a mass of severed heads and body parts.
Exactly when and why this confrontation took place has long been perceived as lost to history, and when placed against a misguided historical view that there were no major encounters within ten miles of the village during the Civil War, the whole event has come to be viewed as little more than a spurious folk story. My research, however, will suggest otherwise.
At the site of the rectory, there are several blade marks to be found on the contemporary period fireplace, of the kind more commonly found in local churches from billeted troops, passing time by sharpening their weapons. In the case of Bagnall, this provides a confirmation that troops likely were indeed stationed at the village for a time. However, our quest really picks up speed when we consider the details of a little- discussed but significant event that took place near to the village in the summer of 1643.
The House at Cheddleton
March 1643, and the Civil War is raging throughout England, and in the south of Staffordshire, Parliamentarian commander Sir John Gell is making progress. On the 6th he had successfully taken Lichfield before turning his attention to the town of Stafford; a key Royalist stronghold on the route between the Crown ports of the Yorkshire coast and their new, de-facto capital at Oxford. Joined by Cheshire commander, Sir William Brereton, they convene at Hopton Heath just outside the town on the 19th and join battle with Royalist forces under command of the Earl of Northampton. Charging the Parliamentarian lines, Northampton is thrown from his horse and is killed in the melee. Yet come nightfall, the day belonged to the Royalists, with around five hundred Parliamentarian casualties on the field compared to the Royalists fifty.
Although both sides claimed victory, it would have likely been scored a draw if it were a boxing match, with the loss of Royalist commander Northampton being balanced against the greater causalities of the Parliamentarian force. Following the battle, Gell would parade Northampton's body through the streets of Derby as a trophy, but it was not the only token he had of the days events. In the confusion of the battle, he had also managed to capture a key piece of Royalist artillery; the monstrous machine of war that was the cannon known as ‘Roaring Meg’.
One of the Royalists killed alongside Northampton at Hopton Heath was John Biddulph of Biddulph Hall and we know that come February 1644, Gell's man in the north of the county, Sir William Brereton, would use Roaring Meg to assist him in the siege and subsequent destruction of Biddulph Hall. It is an event that has lived long in the memory of Biddulph. Cannonballs dating from the time of the siege are often found in the pond of the Talbot Inn, presumably as a result of Meg finding her range across the valley as she fired on the hall. Indeed, there is even a local pub named after her. But by the time of the siege at Biddulph, it is possible Meg had been in the area for several months already and likely played a part in a largely forgotten piece of local history that may relate directly to the story of the Armshead massacre and the soldiers of Bagnall; the destruction of Cheddleton House.
Included in his work Memorials of the Civil War In Cheshire and the Adjacent Counties of 1889, Thomas Melborn shares an account of how on Thursday 10th August 1643, Colonial Brereton marched his forces on the manor house at Cheddleton, which was at that time in the possession of the Jefford family, complete with ‘three great pieces of ordinance’ in his arsenal; one of which could have well been Roaring Meg. Attacking the house for the better part two days straight, the house finally surrendered around 4 pm on Friday the 11th, with word of what was found inside providing significant clues as to the missing details of the Armshead massacre.
Upon entering the house, it was recorded that Brereton took around 60 men as prisoners from the garrison, and further discovered arms for the provision of 200 soldiers. The arms would have instantly required safe lock-up, which entirely fits with the stories of an armoury being created at the rectory in Bagnall. The prisoners however, were reportedly ordered to march south following their capture, heading for the new Parliamentarian headquarters at Stafford. Their route took them directly to the spot on the Stafford road that is now known to us in legend as the scene of the massacre.
There is a conclusion presenting itself here in which there was indeed a Parliamentarian force stationed at Bagnall, as both local lore and evidence suggest; the village likely being seen as a secure location in a tempestuous and dangerous landscape. In the aftermath of the fall of Cheddleton House, it could well be that Brereton decided to dispatch his captives rather than continue south, and there is a perfect match of numbers, location, motive, and means for such an event to have taken place. It is the single set of circumstances during the conflict that would fit with the legend, and fit precisely at that. We know for a fact that Brereton didn't himself travel to Stafford following the attack at Cheddleton, as records attest to his presence in Nantwich in the days after. I would therefore suggest that in Melborn's account we have stumbled upon the very events that have been remembered to history in local lore as the massacre at Armshead.
Rebels in the Moorlands
The second piece of the lore connected to the region's wartime events comes in the legend of a drummer boy. Again, it is a piece that has held strong in local storytelling over the years, but one which has received little by way of research, despite there being a comparative wealth of recorded evidence. In some instances, the tale is told against the setting of the Civil War, but all viable historical accounts point with absolute clarity to the matter taking place 102 years later, during the Jacobite rebellion. Either way, it is a grisly tale not for the faint-hearted, the young boy being flayed in vengeance for sufferings previously imposed upon a local figure of authority by the drummer boys accompanying military masters.
As referenced earlier in this collection, Bonnie Prince Charlie had entered England from Scotland in September of 1745 intent on marching to London in an attempt to regain the crown for the House of Stuart, which had been bereft of the throne since William of Orange had been awarded it in 1688; in a move designed to ensure the continued protestant rule of England, now known to history as the ‘Glorious Revolution’.
By the time Charles Stuart reached the Staffordshire Moorlands that November, his army had swollen to over 7000 troops. Both on their passage toward London, which would ultimately be stopped at Derby, and their subsequent retreat back towards Scotland, Stuart's rebel forces spent considerable time in and around the Moorlands, leaving a large number of tales in their wake. Some of which, particularly on their return trip when they were not so concerned with encouraging local support, were reported to have involved looting, rape, and murder. Safe to say, the locals didn't take the actions of the Scotch rebels lightly, and there are numerous accounts across the region of local men taking vengeance against the them in any way they could.
It is against the backdrop of this partisan fever that the events that lead to the drummer boy legend take place. There is little doubt that elements of the Jacobite force quartered themselves in the village of Bagnall during their campaign. In a letter written by Mr James Middleton at the time, a friend of Lord Gower and local MP from Hanley, who had asked Middleton to make observations on the rebels upon their entering the town of Leek, he points to the very actions that would find their return in the brutal treatment of the young boy in our legend. Amongst various fascinating points of observation, he notes how;
About thirty of their horse came to Bagnall and kept Justice Murhall for three days. It is said he gave them three hundred pounds to be released.
Justice William Murhall was a key figure of authority in the Moorlands at the time, a county magistrate living at Bagnall Hall who had served as High Sheriff of Staffordshire just three years earlier in 1742. Being held prisoner in his own home and having to pay a ransom to be released, was not something that he was ever going to forgive.
War Drum
When the rebels passed back through the Moorlands in December, Murhall was intent on revenge, with various sources being left to us that detail the shape that revenge ultimately took. John Ward's work The Borough of Stoke on Trent from 1843 is a real gem when it comes to accounts of events that took place locally in the 1700s and has consistently proven its value to me in researching local history.
One section of the book recounts a conversation that took place in 1810 at the Turks Head pub in Burslem, where 82-year-old Ralph Leigh and his friend, the 70-year-old John Telwright, discuss various memories from Leigh's youth; one of which is a recollection of the time that the rebels came through the area;
Leigh: Remember when them Scotch rebels come as far as Bagnall and
went to old Justice Murhalls? I remember it well but I was only about 5 or 6 years old
Telwright: The justice didn’t like them I’ve heard.
Leigh: I think not. The young Pretender and his officers stayed and breakfasted
at the Squires, and afterwards the Scotch soldiers robbed his arms and money, an made him shew them the road to Derby.
Telwright: But they came back when they found their way blocked by the Duke.
Leigh: They did, and the Squire thought he’d maim one for robbing him, so he
caught a Scotch rogue that had been lagging behind at a sign post at Leek and flayed him like a calf, and sent his hide to the tanners yard to make it into a drum head.
The memory of Murhall taking his vengeance on a young straggler in the rebels returning party, capturing him in Leek and flaying him to make his skin into the drum, is also recorded in the local parish records of the time;
William Murhall, at the time of the ’45 rebellion, inflicted upon one of the Scottish stragglers who fell into his hands...the punishment out of revenge for injuries he received from a detachment of horse which came
to Bagnall and then retreated avoid encountering the Duke of Cumberlands army encamped on Stone field.
It appears that not only is the tale of the flaying true, but that it was widely known throughout the region at the time. In all probability, it would have been celebrated as retaliation against some of the more nefarious acts committed by the rebels during their passage through. The drum made of the young boy's skin is believed to have been on display at St Lukes's in Endon village until the twentieth century. One might suspect, although undoubtedly now tucked away from view, it may well still be there.
In the tale of Armshead we can find probable and plausible means relating to the circumstances surrounding the destruction of Cheddleton House which allow us to reach a position whereby the local stories of both the armoury and the slaughter on the Stafford road, fit together in a way that feels remarkably close to history. It is entirely likely therefore that the local stories associated with the legend really do find themselves born out in the events of August 1643.
In the legend of the drummer boy, we have to acknowledge that this horrific event really did take place, with the actions of William Murhall likely having been viewed through the brutal, colloquial prism of the times as fair, if savage recompense, for both the experience he personally had with the rebels in Bagnall and the wider troubles brought with their presence in the region. The village of Bagnall and its surrounding settlements represent a beautiful part of North Staffordshire, both aesthetically and due to their representation of living history. But also, when considering their folk memories and the darker history to which they elude, the area is a genuine font of that sense of eerie Englishness, where the skulls beneath the flower beds are ever-present, no matter how idyllic the view above the ground may be.
Eli Lewis-Lycett 2021