A Plan of the City and Environs of London as fortified by Order of Parliament in the Years 1642 & 1643.

A charming plan of London showing and describing the fortifications erected by Parliamentarian forces during the English Civil War. The fortifications were large banks of earth surrounded on the outside by a deep trench. Over 100,000 labourers worked on constructing the earthen banks, which were completed by May 1643. Ultimately, Royalist forces never attacked the city of London and the fortifications went unused. The walls were ordered to be demolished by the New Model Army after the defeat of Charles I to prevent London from ever rising up against the country's new rulers. By 1647 the walls were largely demolished and no traces now survive of these immense earthworks.

Coloured. [LDN7395]