In a field in Nottingham in the summer of 1642, King Charles I watched his standard being raised in a high wind and driving rain. For six years thereafter, England was rent by civil war. Families and friends were bitterly divided as men left home to fight for King or Parliament. Castles and towns, which a year before had been 'scenes of happiness and plenty', were besieged and attacked. Houses were plundered, churches and cathedrals desecrated. In all, some 200,000 lives were lost.

Vividly recreating these scenes of war 350 years ago, 'Cavaliers and Roundheads' is enlivened by astute and revealing character sketches, not only of the leading participants, but also of such half-forgotten figures as Sir Arthur Aston, the brutal, detested Governor of Oxford, whose brains were beaten out of his skull with his wooden leg; and the fat French wife of the Earl of Derby, bravely defying her husband's enemies as cannon balls thudded into the walls of Lathom House.

Making skilful use of contemporary accounts as well as the fruits of modern scholarship, Christopher Hibbert once again demonstrates his mastery of narrative history.