William Compton (army officer)
English army officer
Sir William Compton (1625 – 18 Oct 1663) was an English royalist army officer. He earned the name of the "godly cavalier" in 1648, from Oliver Cromwell, for his conduct at the siege of Colchester.
Life
Compton was the third son of Spencer Compton, 2nd Earl of Northampton and his wife Mary Beaumont. At the beginning of the First English Civil War, he was directed by his father to take up arms for Charles I, who gave him the command of a regiment. He was in action at the taking of Banbury. He led his men on to three attacks, and had two horses shot under him. On the surrender of the town and castle, he was made lieutenant-governor under his father, and was knighted at Oxford on 12 December 1643.
The parliamentary forces of Northamptonshire, Warwick, and Coventry, came before the town of Banbury on 19 July 1644, but he defied them. A siege lasted thirteen weeks, relieved on 26 October by his brother, James Compton, 3rd Earl of Northampton by that time. Compton continued as governor of Banbury until the king left Oxford, and when the whole kingdom was submitting to the parliament he, on 8 May 1646, surrendered upon honourable terms.
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This entry incorporates text from “William Compton (army officer)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.