Battle of Inverkeithing

Who Fought

History & Significance

The Battle of Inverkeithing was fought on 20 July 1651 between an English army under John Lambert and a Scottish army led by James Holborne as part of an English invasion of Scotland. The battle was fought near the isthmus of the Ferry Peninsula, to the south of Inverkeithing, after which it is named.

An English Parliamentary regime had tried, convicted, and executed Charles I, who was king of both Scotland and England in a personal union, in January 1649. The Scots recognised his son, also named Charles, as king of Britain and set about recruiting an army. An English army, under Oliver Cromwell, invaded Scotland in July 1650. The Scottish army, commanded by David Leslie, refused battle until 3 September when it was heavily defeated at the Battle of Dunbar. The English occupied Edinburgh and the Scots withdrew to the choke point of Stirling. For nearly a year all attempts to storm or bypass Stirling, or to draw the Scots out into another battle, failed. On 17 July 1651 1,600 English soldiers crossed the Firth of Forth at its narrowest point in specially constructed flat-bottomed boats and landed at North Queensferry on the Ferry Peninsula. The Scots sent forces to pen the English in and the English reinforced their landing. On 20 July the Scots moved against the English and in a short engagement were routed.

Lambert seized the deep-water port of Burntisland and Cromwell shipped over most of the English army. He then marched on and captured Perth, the temporary seat of the Scottish government. Charles and Leslie took the Scottish army south and invaded England. Cromwell pursued them, leaving 6,000 men to mop up the remaining resistance in Scotland. Charles and the Scots were decisively defeated on 3 September at the Battle of Worcester. On the same day the last major Scottish town holding out, Dundee, surrendered.

In 1639 and again in 1640 Charles I who was king of both Scotland and England in a personal union, went to war with his Scottish subjects in the Bishops' Wars. These had arisen from the Scots' refusal to accept Charles's attempts to reform the Church of Scotland, known as the Kirk, to bring it into line with English religious practices. Charles was not successful and the ensuing settlement established the Covenanters' hold on Scottish government; they required all civil office-holders, parliamentarians and clerics to sign the National Covenant and granted the Scottish Parliament authority to approve all of the King's councillors in Scotland. After years of rising tensions, in part caused by Charles's defeat in the Bishops' Wars and his need to fund them, the relationship between Charles and his English Parliament also broke down in armed conflict, starting the First English Civil War in 1642.

The ground they fought on

The site of Battle of Inverkeithing lies on Clackmannan Group, bedrock that formed in the Westphalian. The rock here is sedimentary rock cycles, clackmannan group type.

Frequently Asked Questions

Scheduled Monuments near Battle of Inverkeithing

North Wood, Dunfermline, cairn 140m NNW of crematorium

Scheduled monument · Iron Age · ~0.5 mi

North Wood, Dunfermline, is a cairn located 140 metres north-north-west of Dunfermline Crematorium in Fife, Scotland. The monument is protected as a scheduled monument by Historic Environment Scotland under reference SM8556. Dating to the Iron Age, it represents an important funerary structure fr…

Middlebank House, souterrain 370m ENE of

Scheduled monument · Iron Age · ~0.8 mi

Middlebank House souterrain is an Iron Age underground stone-built structure situated 370 metres east-north-east of Middlebank House in Fife. The monument survives as a partially preserved passage chamber, typical of souterrains constructed during the later Iron Age across eastern Scotland. These…

Balbougie, enclosed settlement 310m NNE of

Scheduled monument · ~1.4 mi

Balbougie is an enclosed settlement situated in Fife, Scotland, standing on bedrock formed from a Carboniferous to Permian mafic igneous intrusion. The dark volcanic rock underlying the site would have presented particular challenges to its builders, who would have needed to work with the natural…

Rosyth Castle Dovecot

Scheduled monument · ~1.7 mi

Rosyth Castle Dovecot is a sixteenth-century stone structure located within the policies of Rosyth Castle in Fife, Scotland. The dovecot is a rectangular building constructed in rubble masonry, designed to house pigeons which provided a valuable source of fresh meat and fertiliser for the castle…

Rosyth Castle

Scheduled monument · ~1.8 mi

Rosyth Castle is a fifteenth-century fortress situated on the Firth of Forth in Fife, Scotland. Built by the Scottish Crown in the 1420s, the castle comprises a distinctive L-shaped tower house constructed of rubble masonry, representing a significant example of late medieval Scottish military ar…

Dunfermline Abbey, Nether Yett, 10m NNE of Old Kirk Cottage

Scheduled monument · ~2.3 mi

Dunfermline Abbey is a Benedictine monastery founded in the eleventh century by Queen Margaret of Scotland, establishing one of medieval Scotland's most important religious and political centres. The abbey church, begun around 1150, became the burial place of Scottish kings and queens, including…

Paul McIlroy / CC BY-SA 2.0 / Wikimedia Commons

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Battles near Battle of Inverkeithing

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• Battle of Inverkeithing · Wikidata
• Battle_of_Inverkeithing · Wikipedia