Today is the anniversary of the death of Sir Thomas Tyldesley 1612-1651 who fell at the Battle of Wigan Lane.
In 1679, Alexander Rigby, then High Sheriff of Lancashire, who had fought alongside Sir Thomas Tyldesley erected a monument to him at the site of the battle in Wigan Lane. The monument stands at the junction of Wigan Lane and what is now Monument Road and can be seen on Google Maps.
The current inscription reads:
An high Act of Gratitude,
which conveys the memory of
Sir Thomas Tyldesley
to posterity.
Who served King Charles the First
as Lieutenant Colonel at Edge Hill Battle,
after raising Regiments of Horse, Foot,
and Dragoons, and for the desperate
storming of Burton-on-Trent,
over a bridge of 36 arches
received the Honour of Knighthood,
He afterwards served in all the Wars in great command
was Governor of Lichfield,
and followed the fortune of the Crown,
through the three Kingdoms, and never
compounded with the Rebels, though strongly
invested, and on the 25th August A.D. 1651
was here slain, commanding as Major General
under the Earl of Derby,
To whom the grateful Erector,
Alexander Rigby, Esq.
was Cornet: and when he was
High Sheriff of this County
A.D. 1679.
placed this high obligation on
the whole family of the Tyldesleys,
to follow the noble example of their
Loyal Ancestor.
A later post describes the state of the Tyldesley Monument in 1750, and an article published in Past Forward in April 2013 records the changes in wording which have occurred in the inscription over the years.
