Stuarts and the English Civil War History School Workshop

We will set the scene by rolling out our lengthy living timeline creating a brilliant hands-on opportunity to establish a better chronological understanding of what was going on before, during and after the Stuarts.

Stuart England was a remarkable place. Great thinkers were doing their bit to solve great mysteries, incredible inventions were being produced by the bucket load and the height of Stuart fashion was truly remarkable. Yet the Stuarts could not escape war and plunged the country into another divisive and expensive conflict but this time within its own borders. We shall introduce you to those that fought in the Civil War from the lower ranks of musketeers and pikemen to the aristocratic officers.

Hands on History can work with just one class all day, or up to four classes in a year group. Each class will be kept busy and entertained all day by us! Please see below examples of 4 itineraries (for 1, 2, 3 or 4 classes).

Interactive learning for KS1, KS2 and KS3

Our Stuarts workshop has a range of available activities to enjoy, from a much closer look at the arms and armour of this fascinating period of military development to the lives and occupations of Stuart England with our ‘What’s my job?’ activity. This is a chance to investigate a range of roles from cartographers to cobblers with unique artefacts to handle.

Our helmet timeline fits well with a day looking at a time of change and continuity and it is a great opportunity for everyone to try on some of our kit.

Unique Educational Resources

A notable figure from this period was Samuel Pepys and therefore we think it is important to bring the man himself in all his fashionable glory to life in our workshop as well as his wife and a member of the household staff.

Despite his social status Pepys was still susceptible to the ills and irks of Stuart England and as such we will recreate a visit to a Stuart apothecary and barber surgeon to see just how sickness was diagnosed and what cures were available.

We have a brilliant barber surgeon who can remove a lower leg in under 3 minutes! Incredibly during a time when Sir Isaac Newton was calculating the forces of gravity and laying down the laws of physics, Stuart medicine was still very much based on the teachings of the Ancient Greeks.