ABSTRACT
The defensive position chosen by the king’s military advisers was on the north side of the town rather than in the enclosures and chalk downs to the south, where the first battle had been fought. The two Royalist armies occupied a narrow triangle of land between the River Kennet and its tributary the Lambourn, which joined the main river a mile to the east. The only bridge over the Kennet within the triangle led to Newbury itself. Instead of being destroyed, it was defended by an infantry detachment in case it was needed as an escape route. There were also two small bridges carrying roads over the Lambourn, one leading to the village of Donnington and the other to the village of Shaw. Both bridges were protected by fortified positions on the north bank of the river – Donnington Castle, which had held a small Royalist garrison since the first battle, and Shaw House, which was put into a state of defence when the two armies arrived. The third side of the triangle was a north–south line between the two rivers. It passed through the village of Speen, which was surrounded by enclosures, but there was open land beyond on all four sides of the settlement. To the south was a long narrow field between the enclosures and the water meadows lining the Kennet, to the north a piece of parkland between the enclosures and the Lambourn. The approach to Speen from the west was across a narrow piece of open common flanked by woods. Here the enclosures in front of the village were defended by Maurice’s infantry, supported by artillery and winged by two brigades of horse. Beyond the enclosures to the east lay the large open field of Speenhamland. Here the Royalist reserves were deployed: at least four brigades of cavalry and two of the king’s infantry brigades, the third being the defenders of Shaw House. 1 The second battle of Newbury: the landscape https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9781315835617/61a24393-0d19-4284-a442-db9eae2eb435/content/fig_15_B.tif" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/>
