British and Scottish Hammered Silver Coins

Charles I (1625-1649), Pontefract, Shilling, 1648, type II, large crown, rev. value dividing PC, 5.16g/12h (Hird 276-8; SCBI Brooker 1233, same dies; N 2647; S 3149). Slightly weakly struck, otherwise nearly very fine £3,500-4,000

After Cromwell took control of most of England in 1646, there was spasmodic resistance from forces loyal to the king. A royalist rising was crushed in Wales in May 1648 and at Colchester a royalist army from Kent was besieged and finally starved into submission in August. Further north, Pontefract Castle was taken for the king at the beginning of June 1648 and it was hoped that it would act as a base for a royalist revival with the aid of an army being raised in Scotland at the time by the Duke of Hamilton. On his way south, the Duke relieved Carlisle and joined forces with Sir Marmaduke Langdale. Soon after, however, his army was defeated at Preston and any revival based around events in the north began to look increasingly unlikely. The fall of Colchester to the Roundheads made the situation worse still. Despite this gloomy outlook, the castle held out throughout the autumn and winter of 1648/9, resisting the best efforts of Cromwellian generals Rainsborough and Lambert who had taken Colchester in the summer. The castle finally fell at the end of March 1649. Although one of the largest in England, it was then systematically demolished within a matter of weeks.