Hopton Castle

Hopton Castle lies in a village of the same name 12 miles to the west of Ludlow and seven miles southeast of Bishops Castle.

It is uncertain as to when the castle was actually constructed but it was most probably built by a minor baronial family, the Hoptons, during the reign of King Stephen (1135-54), who was the grandson of William the Conqueror.

Stephen spent much of his rule fighting his cousin Matilda for the throne, whilst his nobles did as they pleased and law and order were largely forgotten about. Hopton Castle, with its position deep within the Welsh Marches would have encountered numerous attacks by the Welsh.

The building

The rectangular stone keep tower that survives on he site today is thought to date to the 13th century. This stone keep sits on a low motte (mound), around which was built a large curtain wall with towers but only the foundations of this wall remain today. The motte was further protected by a water-filled moat.

In the middle of the 13th century Hopton Castle was home to Justice Walter Hopton, who rose to fame in the Baron’s Wars in the 1260’s but was later to fall from Royal favour, being imprisoned in the Tower of London in the 1290’s.

Another Walter Hopton fought under the Yorkist Banner at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485, during the Wars of the Roses. Walter died in battle along with Richard III, for whom he was fighting for.

Improvements to Hopton Castle took place until the 16th century when an attic was added to the two-storey keep. Other surviving features of the keep include a projecting stair turret and double string course on the two western turrets.

The seige in the Civil War

The key event in the history of Hopton Castle took place during the English Civil War in the 1640’s. By this time the castle was owned by the Wallop family, who were strong Puritans and therefore had taken the side of the Parliamentarians.

To guard against Royalists Hopton was garrisoned by 30 men led by Colonel Samuel Moore.

Early in 1644, a 500 strong Royalist army arrived to besiege and take the castle. This Royalist army was under the command of Sir Michael Woodhouse and a Mr Sutton. For almost a month the Hopton garrison stood strong, despite being so outnumbered. Various attempts were made at undermining the castle, including tunnelling and artillery shelling.

Eventually the defenders could take no more and they made a deal with the Royalists. They would leave and surrender the castle but only if it was guaranteed that their lives would be spared.

The Parliamentarians walked out of the castle believing that the Royalists would keep their end of the bargain, but in fact they did no such thing as they believed the garrison had defended a hopeless cause for too long and so lost any right to name a deal or be shown any mercy. Colonel Moore was taken away and imprisoned at Ludlow Castle, but compared to the fate of his men he got off lightly.

The rest of the men were tied together, back to back, whilst the Royalists (ignoring their pleas for mercy) slit their throats and then dumped them in the moat. The barbarity of the Royalists sunk further when they also attacked two of the maids of the castle. One of them was killed, whilst the other was wounded and sent to the Parliamentarians at Brampton Bryan Castle in Herefordshire to report what had happened at Hopton and tell them that they were the next stop for the Royalist army.

It is said that there were two other survivors of the atrocities at Hopton. Major Phillips, 2nd in command, was severely beaten up but thrown into the moat alive and a member of the garrison hid in a gap in the wall. He escaped to Brampton Bryan Castle, where he is said to have married the maid from Hopton Castle.

The Royalist army then set about making sure that Hopton Castle could never be used against them again and they tore the castle apart and set fire to it.

Hopton Castle is said to be haunted by the ghosts of the men murdered there as well as four Royalist soldiers who died in the fighting. The ghost of Elizabeth Mayrick, the widow of the men, is also said to haunt the castle crying for the love that she lost.

Hopton Castle is on private property and not accessible to the public.