Watch us teach Alice Roberts how to fire a musket!

Back before the pandemic, members of the Sealed Knot gathered at a location outside of Oxford to help Professor Alice Roberts uncover the Civil War history of King Charles’ wartime capital — and it got explosive!

In Britain’s Most Historic Towns, Professor Roberts studies a key period in British history by telling the story of a single historic town. To understand how each town was shaped by the dominant forces of the age, she visits historic sites, meets local historians, and experiences life as it would have been in decades and centuries past. Meanwhile, aerial archaeologist Ben Robinson takes to the skies to see how the layout of each town reflects a historical era to this day, whilst CGI allows Professor Roberts to bring long lost monuments back to life and paint pictures of the towns at key stages in history.

We were honoured — and not a little nervous — to be a part of the episode focusing on Oxford and the part it played in the first English Civil War.

Alice Roberts and Michael Molcher prepare a matchlock musket for firing.

Oxford was King Charles’ de facto capital during the first Civil War, after he failed to capture London after the Battle of Turnham Green and chose to winter his forces in the university town. The city endured three sieges between 1644 and 1646 but, overcrowded and isolated, eventually surrendered to Sir Thomas Fairfax’s New Model Army at the close of the first civil war.

As well as doing our best skirmishing, we showed Alice how to fire a matchlock musket, before demonstrating the effects of live firing with REAL musketballs!

Our sections were filmed at Yarnton Manor, a large Jacobean country mansion built in 1611 which served as a Royalist military hospital during the first Civil War; about 40 Royalist soldiers were buried in nearby St Bartholomew’s churchyard. It was a great day of filming — thanks to all the members of the Sealed Knot who joined Manchester’s to take part!

You can now watch the complete episode on YouTube:

Professor Alice Roberts with members of the Earl of Manchester’s Regiment outside Yarnton Manor, near Oxford

And don’t forget, you can march onto the battlefield with us this summer for as little as £10, with all your historical kit provided! Go on, give it a go – get in touch and discover this incredible hobby for yourself!