Reprint of the original, first published in 1874.

The Civil Wars of the seventeenth century had a devastating effect upon Wales and the Marches, stripping the country of its human resources and ruining whole communities. This book explores the years of conflict between 1642 and 1649, detailing the campaigns, sieges and battles which took place in every corner of the country, presenting information from a wide variety of sources to paint a wide-ranging picture of the nation at a significant turning point in its history.

The appalling effects of civil war are often suffered most horrifically by the ordinary men, women and children involuntarily caught up in it, as it tears asunder the very fabric of their lives. Such was the fate of the citizens of Chester, who for almost four years found themselves at the centre of the battle between King and Parliament. Chester's inhabitants withstood the terrors of bombardment and the rigours of starvation, in one of the most fiercely contested sieges of the Civil War. Using myriad contemporary sources it is possible for the first time to present a detailed picture of the part played in the siege by the 'common sort', the 'forgotten voices' of Chester: ordinary citizens forced by their employers to enlist in the City Regiment, their brutal introduction to the realities of war and their gallant defence of Chester.