Blencowes in the English Civil War

Timothy Blencowe (c.1611-1669) was the seventh son of John Blencowe of Marston St Lawrence and his wife Mary Waleston. He was a student at Oxford and became a Fellow of New College*. In 1702 William Beaw, Bishop of Llandaff, told how Timothy came to join the Royalist forces: ‘In the beginning of the war between Charles I and the Parliament before the Battle of Edgehill' he (Beaw, who had been made a Fellow of New College, Oxford in 1638), `left his studies and advantages and went into the King's service, carrying with him of his Pupils and other scholars and gentlemen no less than twelve.' Timothy was one of these: `Fellow of the same College, his Pupil and afterwards Major of Foot'. Blencow had also been a Fellow since 1638; he served under Colonels Edward Broughton and Richard Beard. It was probably Timothy (`Major Blyncott') who was taken prisoner at Colchester in 1648. Certainly, in 1648, the Parliamentarians ejected him from his Fellowship, a post that was restored to him in 1660. Timothy seems to have remained in the Army; in 1661 he was a lieutenant of Captain Legge's company in the garrison of Portsmouth. He died unmarried in 1669 leaving everything to the Mayor of Portsmouth.

The Robert Blencowe in the garrison of Banbury which `saw but little action until the stubborn defence of the castle in the autumn of 1644' was probably Timothy's elder brother who died unmarried in London in 1648.

*Clinton's alma mater

[Based on extracts from Great Battles - Edgehill 1642 by Peter Young]

Stuart Blinco