1643 in Europe

Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 30. Chapters: 1643 in Denmark, 1643 in England, 1643 in France, 1643 in Ireland, 1643 in Norway, 1643 in Scotland, 1643 in Sweden, Battle of Rocroi, Battle of Camp Hill, First Battle of Middlewich, Battle of Alton, Torstenson War, Westminster Assembly, Storming of Bristol, Siege of Hull, Battle of Roundway Down, Battle of Winceby, Treaty of Oxford, Battle of Lansdowne, Siege of Gloucester, Battle of Stratton, Solemn League and Covenant, Licensing Order of 1643, Battle of Chalgrove Field, Battle of Braddock Down, Battle of Hopton Heath, Battle of Aldbourne Chase, Battle of Adwalton Moor, Battle of New Ross, Battle of Seacroft Moor, First Battle of Newbury, Second Battle of Middlewich, Siege of Reading, Battle of Tuttlingen, Battle of Gainsborough, Battle of Sourton Down, Battle of Olney Bridge, Battle of Heptonstall. Excerpt: The Battle of Camp Hill (or the Battle of Birmingham) took place during the First English Civil War, on Easter Monday, 3 April 1643, when a company of Parliamentarians from the Lichfield garrison with the support of some of the local townsmen, in all about 300 men, attempted to stop a detachment of Royalists, of about 1200 cavalry and dragoons and 600 to 700 foot, under the command of Prince Rupert from passing through the unfortified parliamentary town of Birmingham. The Parliamentarians put up a surprisingly stout resistance, and according to the Royalists shot at them from houses as they drove the small Parliamentary force from the town and back towards Lichfield from whence they came. To suppress the musket fire, the Royalists torched the houses from which the shooting was thought to come. After the battle the Royalists spent the rest of the day in the town during which time they pillaged it. The next morning after the main body of the Royalist force had left town, many more houses were put to the torch. While pillaging and firing an unfortified town in retaliation for resistance was common at that time on Continental Europe in was not usual in England and this handed the Parliamentary side a propaganda weapon which they used to disparage the Royalists. At the start of the Civil War the area that would become known as the Black Country in North-East Worcestershire and Birmingham was one of the few places in England that could produce the various military stores of which King Charles I was in dire need. As he had failed to secure the arsenals of Portsmouth and Hull, he did not possess any supply of swords, pikes, guns, shot; all these Worcestershire could and did provide. Shot came from Stourbridge and from Dudley cannon. The numerous small forges which then existed on every brook in the north of the County turned out successive supplies of sword blades and pike heads. It is said that among the many causes of anger Charles had against Birmingham was that one of t