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RUPERT OF THE RHINE 
 
By the same Author. 
 
 STAFFORD HOUSE LETTERS. With Two 
 Portraits. Demy 8vo. 
 
 MY REMINISCENCES. Miniature Edition, 
 printed on hand-made paper, limp parchment 
 antique, lOJ". 6d. 
 
 BRIC-A-BRAC. Being some Photoprints illustrating 
 Art Objects at Gower Lodge, Windsor. With De- 
 scriptions. Super royal 8vo., 15^*. j extra binding, 
 
 LAST DAYS OF MARY ANTOINETTE. An 
 
 Historical Sketch. With Portrait and Facsimiles. 
 "Fcap. 4to. loj. 6d. 
 
 NOTES OF A TOUR FROM BRINDISI TO 
 YOKOHAMA, 1883-1884. Fcap. 8vo. 2s. 6d. 
 
IPI^S.M€]E . mWFlIT^'.^. 
 
 ly- 
 
 X_ "''^^>^/^/-' '1^' t'y ij-f^r x/^x>y^j' .'f y ^'€'^(y c 
 
 
RUPERT OF THE RHINE 
 
 A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF^ THE 
 
 LIFE OF PRINCE RUPERT, PRINCE PALATINE 
 
 OF THE RHINE, DUKE OF CUMBERLAND 
 
 j^ ETC. 
 
 BY 
 
 LORD RONALD GOWER 
 
 WITH THREE PORTRAITS 
 
 LONDON 
 
 KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., Lt^ 
 
 1890 '■ 
 
( The rights of tra^islation and of reproduction are reserved.') 
 
TO 
 
 HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN. 
 
 Madam, 
 
 A century ago Sir George Bromley dedicated 
 a work entitled " A Collection of Original Royal Letters " 
 (chiefly written by and to his gallant ancestor, the subject 
 of the following Memoir) to King George III. That 
 dedication was addressed "To the Father of his People, 
 the Pattern of Virtuous Conduct, and the Protector of 
 the Liberal Arts." 
 
 In like terms I inscribe to your Majesty this Memoir 
 of an illustrious Prince, the near kinsman of the ancestry 
 of your Majesty, who in like manner may be justly called. 
 The Mother of her People, the Pattern of Virtuous 
 Conduct, and the Protector of the Liberal Arts. 
 
 R. G. 
 
INTRODUCTORY, 
 
 -*o*- 
 
 Few lives that have at one time filled so large a 
 place in an important period of our history are so 
 little known, or have been so little written about, 
 as that of the hero of the following pages. 
 
 There are, indeed, but two biographies of the 
 prince — the one a little tract of some eighty- 
 pages, not longer than an obituary notice, pub- 
 lished the year after Rupert's death, in 1683. The 
 other is a somewhat ponderous work by the author 
 of " The Crescent and the Cross," Eliot War- 
 ' burton, entitled, '* Memoirs of Prince Rupert and 
 
 the Cavaliers," published in 1849 in three volumes, 
 octavo, each volume containing over five hundred 
 K pages. In these days few have time or inclina- 
 
 ^ tion to wade through some fifteen hundred pages 
 
Vlll • INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 of matter, however interesting the subject may be ; 
 and the reason and excuse for the following little 
 work is the want I felt of finding a short and 
 readable life of Rupert — a hero worthy a niche 
 in the temple of fame. 
 
 There have recently appeared admirable records 
 of illustrious warriors, among such the lives of 
 Frederick of Prussia and of his rival Loudon. 
 Surely Rupert's brilliant but checkered career is 
 worth knowing better than it is. A life so full of 
 light, shade, and colour, so stocked with subjects 
 for writers of fiction or of fact, might have well 
 tempted far abler pens to describe than mine. 
 
 How little the generality of people know of 
 Rupert may be tested from the following fact. 
 I asked a generally well-informed friend if he 
 could give me any account of that prince. 
 " Well," he answered, " I do not know much about 
 him, except that he was a son of Charles I. " ! 
 
 Everybody has heard the name and of the fame 
 of Prince Rupert, but, if asked what he did besides 
 having led brilliant charges of cavalry during our 
 Civil Wars, few could add another fact unless they 
 recalled a plaything of their childhood, those little 
 
INTRODUCTORY, ix 
 
 tear-shaped glass drops, called after Rupert — little 
 bits of glass that, if touched at their pointed end, 
 fly into a thousand minute splinters, but resist a 
 hammer's blow in any other part. Perhaps, too, 
 some of an artistic turn will recall Rupert's name 
 as connected with the art of mezzotinting, carried 
 to its highest point by MacArdell, Watson, and 
 Cousins, the softest rendering of painting in black 
 and white. 
 
 For some unexplained reason the historian of 
 the Civil Wars, Lord Clarendon, had no love for 
 Rupert, and hardly mentions the prince in his 
 work ; neither did the memoir writers and diarists 
 of the reign of Charles 11. say much about him. 
 Rupert himself left no memoirs, only a pile of 
 letters and some fragments of a journal, not 
 written by, but corrected by, himself. From these 
 letters (contained in many private collections) 
 and journals, Mr. Warburton constructed his im- 
 portant history of " Rupert and the Cavaliers," a 
 work to which the following pages entirely owe 
 any merit they may possess. I trust that this 
 attempt to sketch the life of a very gallant man, not 
 only a "beau sabreur,'' but a man distinguished 
 
X INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 by high scientific attainments and art faculties, 
 
 may interest my former patron, the general 
 
 reader. 
 
 R. G. 
 
 Note. — The present mode of dating has been 
 used throughout this book. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 -•o^ 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 L Early Years ... ... ... ... ... i 
 
 II. Outbreak of the Civil War ... ... 15 
 
 III. Edgehill and Brentford ... ... ... 28 
 
 IV. ** Alarms and Excursions " ... ... 45 
 
 V. Lathom House and Marston Moor ... '" ... 63 
 
 VI. Naseby and Bristol ... ... ... 81 
 
 VII. Last Years ... ... ... ... ... 100 
 
 Appendix : 
 
 Descendants of Prince Rupert ... ... 125 
 
 Portraits of Prince Rupert ... ... ... 126 
 
 Works on the Life of Prince Rupert ... ... 129 
 
RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 v V V V 
 
 -•o*- 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 EARLY YEARS. 
 
 On the side of both his parents, the lineage of 
 Rupert was illustrious. On that of his father, 
 Frederick V., Elector Palatine of the Rhine, he 
 could claim descent through a long line of empe- 
 rors to Charlemagne. On that of his mother, 
 Elizabeth Stuart, daughter of James I. and of Anne 
 of Denmark, the blood royal of Great Britain. 
 
 " History," Coleridge has written, " is the essence 
 of innumerable biographies." However true this 
 may be, the lives of men are generally formed by 
 the events which surround them, and rarely do 
 men form the events. 
 
 Born in the thick of what Germans call a time 
 of Sturm und drang, Rupert tasted very early the 
 
 B 
 
2 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 vicissitudes that marked many of the illustrious 
 houses of Europe early in the seventeenth century. 
 Germany in 1619, when Rupert was born, was a 
 vast field of strife — the longest and most cruel war 
 that the civilized world had endured since the fall 
 of the Roman empire. During those thirty years 
 of agony, Germany, according to Schiller, had 
 thirty thousand villages destroyed, five hundred 
 thousand men, women, and children butchered, 
 and whole provinces wasted. 
 
 Let us glance at the causes which led Rupert's 
 ill-starred father, Frederick, to assume the regal 
 title of King of Bohemia. 
 
 The Northern, or Protestant, princes of Germany, 
 exasperated by the priest-led, bigoted tyranny of 
 the Emperor Ferdinand, had formed themselves 
 into a league in defence of their own and their 
 subjects' faith and privileges. At their head stood 
 Frederick, The states of Bohemia were included 
 in the league. Among a score of regal titles, the 
 German emperor had arrogated to himself that of 
 King of Bohemia. Emboldened by the protection 
 of the league, these states raised a revolt, declared 
 their independence, and, marching on Vienna, 
 forced Ferdinand to sign his abdication to the 
 crown of Bohemia. The states had now to look 
 for a new king; their choice fell on Frederick. After 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 some delay, he accepted the fatal gift. Had the 
 new king been a man of more vigour and character, 
 the Bohemian kingdom might have become some- 
 thing more than an empty name ; but Frederick 
 was weak and timid, wholly unfit for the post of 
 peril he now filled. 
 
 His wife Elizabeth had strongly urged his accept- 
 ance of the Bohemian crown ; she is said to have 
 almost reproached him when he hesitated, by 
 declaring that she could sooner eat dry bread at 
 the table of a king than feast at the board of an 
 
 * 
 
 elector — words which, if uttered, she must after- 
 wards have bitterly regretted. 
 
 On the 3rd of November, 16 19, the new king 
 was crowned in the stately old city of Prague, and 
 the queen three days later. The queen was borne 
 under a canopy of state of blue and silver. Eliza- 
 beth, who had gained the title of " Queen of Hearts," 
 had beautifully refined and delicate features ; and 
 the devotion of many to her throughout her mis- 
 fortunes proves that she had endearing qualities. 
 The king, bareheaded, but otherwise in complete 
 armour, rode by her side. He also possessed good 
 looks, a somewhat proud and sad countenance, 
 \vith dark, expressive eyes. 
 
 The six short years which this royal pair had 
 passed until this fatal year of their coronation, had 
 
RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 been more like a tale of fairy life than the usual 
 mundane experience of married folk. Heidelberg, 
 the glorious palace-castle by the Neckar, had been 
 their home— that beautiful home neither Frederick 
 nor Elizabeth were ever to revisit. Even now, 
 when wandering in its ruined halls, the memory of 
 that princely couple lingers on many a sculptured 
 emblazonment on the old walls, or above the cold 
 hearths ; and by far the most graceful portion of 
 the ruined palace yet bears the name of the fair 
 English princess. 
 
 A little more than a month after the coronation 
 at Prague, Elizabeth brought her third son, Rupert, 
 into the world. 
 
 The Emperor Ferdinand was not a man to 
 brook calmly the existence of this arrangement 
 in Bohemia, with his foe Frederick at its head. 
 Him he regarded as an upstart king and an in- 
 terloper. The emperor had also a bitter grudge 
 to settle against the Bohemians and their states, 
 who had so summarily deposed him and elected 
 another in his place. He soon made his anger 
 felt. 
 
 The unlucky Frederick, in his greatest need, 
 attacked by his powerful enemy, found himself 
 deserted on all sides. James L, a poltroon and 
 a miserable specimen of bigotry and indecision, 
 
EARLY YEARS, 5 
 
 would not Stir a finger for his child or son-in- 
 law ; and the other German princes dared not 
 move in his favour, and held themselves completely- 
 aloof The sequel was short. In a battle known 
 as that of the " White Mountain," close by the city 
 of Prague, the Bohemians were completely crushed 
 by the Imperialists. Frederick, who had taken no 
 part in the engagement, had only time to escape, 
 out of Prague with the queen. So precipitate was 
 their flight from the city that poor little Prince 
 Rupert was forgotten in the general confusion ; 
 and had it not been for Baron d'Hona, the king's 
 chamberlain, picking up the child and flinging him 
 into the last coach as it dashed out of the castle- 
 yard through the snow-covered streets into the 
 winter's night, his career would probably have 
 ended somewhat abruptly. 
 
 The fugitives halted at Breslau, at Frankfort- 
 on-the-Oder, in the old castle of Custrin, and 
 finally found a hospitable shelter at the Hague, 
 where the States - General received them with 
 far more kindness than had any of the German 
 princes. 
 
 Very little is known about Rupert's childhood 
 and early boyhood. We have a glimpse about 
 him in a passage from a letter of Frederick's to 
 Elizabeth (dated September, 1622), in which the 
 
RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 father writes, "Little Rupert"— he was then not 
 three years old — **is very learned to understand 
 so many languages." What the many languages 
 a child of three could know, it is difficult to guess ; 
 probably German, English, and French. 
 
 Rupert, during his family's exile in Holland, 
 was early sent to study at the dull old university 
 of Leyden. Here he had his elder brother, 
 Frederick Henry, to keep him company : this 
 young prince was soon after accidentally drowned 
 at Amsterdam ; he is said to have shown much 
 promise. Rupert, when still a mere lad, appears 
 to have shown extraordinary aptitude for all mili- 
 tary affairs, and was judged, when only fourteen, 
 to be able to command a regiment ! 
 
 I cannot find under whom he studied things 
 military ; but the Prince of Orange, a great autho- 
 rity, had a good opinion of the boy prince's 
 capacity, and it was through his good offices that 
 Rupert gained his first experiences in warfare. 
 
 Rupert appears to have been a general favourite, 
 idolized by his mother ; his bright, affectionate 
 nature endeared him to all he met, and one can 
 scarcely picture a prettier scene than one of the 
 hawking parties, in which Elizabeth delighted, as 
 she rode escorted by her handsome sons. 
 
 In 1633, the Prince of Orange gave a tournament, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 at which our prince distinguished himself; this 
 tourney was probably more like those cavalcades 
 which Louis XIV. delighted in, than the jousts 
 of the days of the Middle Ages. The boy prince 
 must have pined for something more exciting than 
 hawking and caracoling, and he soon had his 
 wishes gratified. Although he obtained leave to 
 take part in the siege of Rhynsburg, he was 
 not allowed by his mother to remain there long. 
 The queen had heard probably that a camp was a 
 very profane place, and doubtless even then, in the 
 low countries, they swore terribly ; so poor young 
 Rupert had to leave the siege and return to the 
 Hague. 
 
 Rupert had lost his father in 1632. Frederick 
 appears to have died of that rare complaint, a 
 broken heart When he heard of the death of 
 Gustavus Adolphus, he gave up all hope of a 
 restoration to the Palatinate, and shortly after 
 expired. In 1635 war was going on between Spain 
 and Holland. Rupert eagerly seized the oppor- 
 tunity afforded him of volunteering as a private 
 in the Prince of Orange's Life Guards. The war 
 itself was an inglorious one for Holland, but 
 Rupert seems to have won his spurs during it. 
 
 In the winter of that year (1635), our prince 
 paid his first visit to England, of which country 
 
8 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 his uncle Charles was now the king. There 
 Rupert passed a happy year, probably the happiest 
 of his life. 
 
 What his appearance was at this time, we can 
 judge of by the portrait which Vandyck painted 
 of him during this visit. It still hangs at Coombe 
 Abbey, then the house of the gallant Lord Craven, 
 the most devoted friend and adherent of Eliza- 
 beth's adorers. In that portrait Rupert appears as 
 comely a youth as any that the great Flemish 
 master painted. Tall, and stately, with regular 
 and delicate features, frank eyed, and thoroughly 
 engaging. 
 
 Looking at his likeness, one can readily under- 
 stand how popular he was in his uncle's court. 
 Even Archbishop Laud was fascinated by the 
 beautiful young prince, and wished to make a 
 bishop of him. Rupert, however, preferred his 
 love-lock and coat of mail to a crosier and lawn 
 sleeves. Others at court, including Lord Arundel, 
 wished Rupert to be sent as viceroy to Mada- 
 gascar, at that period looked upon as an El Dorado. 
 Hearing of this, his mother, Elizabeth, said she 
 could not have her son go out on any such voyage 
 of knight-errantry. Others, again, wished him 
 married, and a daughter of the house of Rohan was 
 proposed. But all these schemes came to nought, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 and Rupert escaped the dangers of entering the 
 state of the Church, of vice-royalty, and of matri- 
 mony. 
 
 During this visit Rupert accompanied the king 
 to Oxford, where the Mastership of Arts was 
 conferred on the prince, and both the king and 
 Rupert were afterwards entertained at a banquet 
 by the Chancellor of that University, Archbishop 
 Laud. 
 
 It is to be regretted that no detailed account 
 exists of our prince's visit to England. One can, 
 though, imagine how he must have revelled in his 
 uncle's court, the most refined, if not the most 
 splendid of those days. How welcome to his 
 tastes must have been the matchless collections 
 of art treasures collected by Charles in Whitehall, 
 and a score of other palaces ! What frequent visits 
 must he not have paid to Vandyck's studio at 
 Blackfriars, where all the court met to sit to, or 
 watch, rare Sir Anthony at work ! With what 
 delight must he have hunted in the vast glades of 
 Windsor or Richmond forests ! Alas ! the pleasant 
 bounteous time passed only too quickly away ; 
 and even then the dark shadow of civil war could 
 almost be seen slowly coming nearer to this still 
 gay and happy scene. How dearly Rupert loved 
 England, and how much he regretted leaving it, 
 
10 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 is shown in a letter from a Rev. Mr. Garrard, 
 written in July, 1637, to Lord Wentworth — "Both 
 the brothers (Palatine) went away unwillingly, but 
 Prince Rupert expressed it most, for being a-hunt- 
 ing that morning with the king, he wished that 
 he might break his neck, so that he might leave 
 his bones in England." Many necks, and hearts 
 too, were to be broken, before Rupert's wish could 
 be fulfilled. While Rupert and his brother, the 
 elector, were in England, they had been busy 
 raising a sum of money to aid them in collecting 
 troops for a raid on the Palatinate. To this fund 
 the largest subscribers were the king and Lord 
 Craven, who gave ;£" 10,000 each. 
 
 On returning to Holland, Rupert paid the Prince 
 of Orange a visit, while the latter was engaged 
 on the siege of Breda. Here Rupert found some 
 kindred spirits — Goring and Monk among others — 
 and here Rupert displayed his dare-devil courage, 
 leading forlorn hopes, and always in the place of 
 greatest danger. Rupert behaved, in fact, like one 
 of the heroes of a romance by Alexander Dumas ; 
 the wonder is that he ever lived to leave Breda. 
 
 He seems to have borne a charmed life, and 
 although constantly in the thickest of the fire, 
 never received so much as a scratch. At the fall 
 of Breda, Rupert returned to the Hague, and set 
 
EARL V YEARS. 1 I 
 
 to work to form an army wherewith to fight the 
 Imperialists. He succeeded in raising three regi- 
 ments of cavalry, one of these consisting of guards, 
 the two others of dragoons; to these he added 
 a small force of artillery. 
 
 Count Konigsmark was in command of this little 
 army, of which Rupert led one regiment, and Lord 
 Craven another. At Bentheim they were joined 
 by a detachment of Swedish troops under General 
 King. Their united forces then did not amount 
 to more than four thpusand men, and with this 
 little force they proposed to meet in combat one 
 of the most powerful armies in Europe ! Near 
 Lemgo the Imperialists appeared in force, both 
 of horse and foot They consisted of eight regi- 
 ments of cuirassiers and one of Irish dragoons, 
 the whole under the command of Colonel Deve- 
 reux, an old officer of Wallenstein's. 
 
 Of course the odds were terribly against the 
 Palatines ; but Rupert knew as little of caution 
 as of fear. He charged into the centre of the 
 enemy, rode his way through them, and then 
 found his little force hemmed in by ten times 
 their number; for a fresh force of Imperialists 
 under Marshal Gotz had appeared on the field. 
 
 After a desperate hand to hand fight, Rupert 
 was borne down and captured. When asked his 
 
12 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 name, he only said, '^ A. colonel ! " "The devil," 
 swore the Imperialist officer who took his sword 
 from him ; *' you are a young 'un." Rupert was 
 taken, under charge of Devereux, first to Warren- 
 dorp, where he had for fellow-prisoner Lord Craven, 
 The prince's unworthy elder brother had fled the 
 field early in the day, accompanied in his shameful 
 flight by King and Konigsmark, 
 
 After a fev/ weeks of close confinement, passed 
 at Warrendorp, Rupert was taken to the fortress 
 of Lintz, on the Danube. There he passed the 
 next three years, not harshly treated ; but how his 
 restless spirit must have rebelled at this long im- 
 prisonment ! Naturally, Elizabeth moved heaven 
 and earth in order to procure the freedom of her 
 beloved son ; but her prayers were met, even by 
 her kindred, with little sympathy. Rupert's brother, 
 the elector, advised her not to agitate herself use- 
 lessly in the matter. Charles Louis was indeed 
 a mean-spirited type of man, coarse and selfish, 
 like the later Stuarts ; Rupert, on the contrary, 
 seemed to have inherited the splendid chivalry 
 and refinement of his mother's ancestry, before 
 it had been tainted by the blood of Darnley. 
 Count Kuffstein was the governor of the fortress 
 of Lintz. Both he and his Imperial master tried 
 hard to make Rupert a Roman Catholic ; the 
 
EARLY YEARS. I 
 
 ■^ 
 
 governor even proposed to introduce some Jesuit 
 priests to his prisoner ; but Rupert naturally de- 
 clined this doubtful boon. 
 
 Rupert's love of art came to him in good stead 
 at this period of his life ; and he is said to have 
 passed much of the tedious days of his imprison- 
 ment in drawing and painting ; and it was at Lintz 
 that he perfected an instrument with which per- 
 spective could be accurately tested. Many years 
 afterwards the prince submitted to the Royal 
 Society of London this invention, or rather improve- 
 ment on an invention, first made by Albert Durer. 
 
 An incident as romantic as any to be found 
 in a tale or a play, occurred to our prince during 
 his imprisonment. With Count Kuffstein lived 
 his daughter. She is described by Rupert's un- 
 known chronicler as being *' one of the brightest 
 beauties of the age," and " no less excelling in the 
 charms of her minde than of her faire bodye." 
 What probably happened when two such beautiful 
 and gifted young creatures as Rupert and the 
 count's daughter met, I will leave to the imagina- 
 tion of the reader. It may be that the reason 
 of Rupert never having married, although he had 
 many inducements in later life to do so, was owing 
 to this romantic affair during his confinement at 
 
 Lintz. 
 
14 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 During the second year of his captivity, Rupert 
 made the acquaintance of the emperor's brother, 
 the Archduke Leopold, who appears to have 
 been favourably impressed ; and after this visit, 
 Rupert was allowed a good deal more freedom. 
 Tennis, and even hunting, were now permitted, and 
 his parole being given, he was allowed to be away 
 from Lintz on hunting expeditions for three days 
 at a time. Before his final release, Rupert had, 
 however, again to undergo a period of severe im- 
 prisonment. The emperor had been willing to 
 release his prisoner on the condition that Rupert 
 should declare his repentance for having taken up 
 arms against him. This Rupert proudly and firmly 
 declined doing. The emperor, highly displeased, 
 commanded Rupert to be rigorously guarded, and 
 all exercise and amusements taken from him. 
 
 It was then that Rupert centred his affections 
 on two animals, one of these a beautiful white doe 
 ^\Y^n him by Lord Arundel " Boy," as the prince 
 called his dog, never left his side until, to Rupert's 
 great grief, it was slain on Marston Moor. So 
 inseparable were Rupert and " Boy " that the 
 Puritans called the dog his " familiar spirit." The 
 other favourite was a tame hare. 
 
 At length intercession was made for Rupert's 
 release by the empress, that Spanish princess for 
 
EARLY YEARS, I 5 
 
 whose hand Charles I. had made a romantic but 
 fruitless voyage to Spain. 
 
 It was owing to her prayers that the emperor 
 at length agreed to release his captive ; and once 
 more our prince was a free man. 
 
1 6 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 OUTBREAK OF THE CIVIL WAR. 
 
 After a brief visit to his mother at the Hague, 
 we find Rupert again in England. He had been 
 summoned thither by his uncle Charles, who had 
 now need of his chivalrous relative to assist him in 
 the coming war. 
 
 Rupert arrived at Dover in the month of Febru- 
 ary, 1642, and there he found the king, who had 
 accompanied Henrietta Maria thus far on her way 
 to Holland, bound thither to assist her husband's 
 cause, and also to escape her enemy, the Parlia- 
 ment. Rupert, finding that the war had not yet 
 commenced, escorted the queen back to Holland ; 
 and shortly after, accompanied by his younger 
 brother Maurice, returned again to England. The 
 princes narrowly escaped being captured by the 
 cruisers of the Parliament off Flamborough Head. 
 Disembarking at Tynemouth, Rupert was thrown 
 
^S^.e/^/a^t^e/i/uAe-'^ 
 
 J'lht/Tuz/yu S^.^t^r3i-^^^ 
 
 FI^mCIE EWrPlE^o 
 
 '-^1^ 
 
 /■^. 
 
 'yz.CiKKi^zy --z^ri^iS^ ^z<^.'/^<^z^-a>cy "2^%;?^ 
 
 c-^e^ 
 
outbreak: of the civil war. 17 
 
 from his horse, dislocating his shoulder. After 
 three days' delay, they rode on to Leicester Abbey, 
 where they found Charles. He at once conferred 
 his charge on Rupert, naming him ''General of 
 the Royal Horse." The Royal Horse consisted 
 only of eight hundred men ; but Rupert soon 
 largely augmented their strength. The next day 
 the Royal force marched to Nottingham, where, 
 on the 22nd of August, the Royal Standard was 
 unfurled, proclaiming ,to all the land that war was 
 now declared in grim earnest. 
 
 I have no intention, even in the briefest way, 
 of attempting to recount the events of that war, 
 excepting in so far as where Rupert took personally 
 a leading part. The reader who wishes informa- 
 tion regarding that war cannot do better than 
 consult its history by Mr. Gardiner. 
 
 It was a war of special interest, from its having 
 been fought, not by paid and trained soldiers — for 
 no regular standing army then existed in England, 
 — but by the people, and of their own free will. 
 
 It was war essentially waged between the classes 
 and the masses ; for although there were a few 
 nobles in command on the side of the Democratic 
 or Parliamentary party, these were the exceptions. 
 
 Each side fought with the conviction of its right 
 and duty to take up arms for its cause : the one 
 
 C 
 
1 8 ' RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 to support the rights of the people and the privi- 
 leges of Parliament ; the other in defence of the 
 king and his prerogatives. 
 
 Whatever may be one's personal sympathies or 
 antipathies, no unprejudiced person can be other 
 than grateful for the result of the conflict, inas- 
 much as the Civil War proved that the people were 
 willing to sacrifice their lives for constitutional and 
 national freedom. 
 
 It is because of this, that our great Civil War 
 owes its deep interest and importance in the history 
 of mankind ; of far greater interest is anything 
 relating to that war than the record of most 
 Continental warfare, where vast herds of men 
 were driven like sheep to the slaughter, without 
 knowing the reason or the cause for which they 
 were slaying and being slain. 
 
 Rupert was a born and a bred Cavalier ; but had 
 he been as liberal minded as Hampden or Fairfax, 
 it would have been humanly impossible for him in 
 his position not to have gone m heart and soul 
 with his uncle Charles and the Royalists. It was 
 quite in accordance with the splendid energy and 
 daring of his nature to throw himself heartily into 
 the cause of a monarch to whom he was so closely 
 allied by blood, and whom he doubtless regarded 
 as a victim of rebellious and disloyal subjects. 
 
i i 
 
 OUTBREAK OF THE CIVIL WAR. 1 9 
 
 Rupert was now in his twenty-third year. The 
 following description of his appearance at this very 
 important part of his life is worth quoting. " His 
 portraits represent to us the ideal of a gallant 
 Cavalier. His figure, tall, vigorous, and symme- 
 trical, would have been somewhat stately but for 
 its graceful bearing and noble ease. A vehement, 
 yet firm character predominated in the counte- 
 nance, combined with a certain gentleness, apparent 
 in the thoughtful but not pensive eyes. Large, 
 dark, and well-formed eyebrows overarch a high- 
 bred, Norman nose ; the upper lip is finely cut, 
 but somewhat supercilious in expression ; the lower 
 part of the mouth and chin have a very different 
 meaning, and impart a tone of iron resolution to 
 the whole countenance. Long flowing hair floats 
 over the wide embroidered collar on the scarlet 
 coat ; he wore neither beard nor moustaches, then 
 almost universal ; and his cheek, though bronzed 
 by exposure, was marked by a womanly dimple." * 
 
 It required all Rupert's light spirit at this time 
 to cheer up Charles ; and there was much reason 
 to account for the gloom that weighed on the 
 spirit of the sad king during these days passed at 
 
 Nottingham. 
 
 Bad news came from all sides; Coventry had 
 
 * Warburton's '* Rupert and the Cavaliers." 
 
20 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 fired on the royal flag, the town of Leicester was 
 rebellious ; there was no enthusiasm shown to rally 
 round the standard. Nor were ill-omens wanting, 
 and Charles w^as extremely superstitious. The 
 Royal standard had been blown down a few hours 
 after it had first been erected in the park before 
 Nottingham Castle. 
 
 Probably to change a little the growing gloom 
 that all these events caused the king, a chapter of 
 the Garter was held at Nottingham, when the 
 Prince of Wales and Rupert were made knights — 
 the only chapter ever held away from Windsor. 
 
 Essex was now on the march from London, 
 with orders from the Parliament to bring back 
 with him the king and his two sons, " by battle or 
 otherwise." 
 
 The ''Lord General," as Essex was styled on 
 arriving at Northampton, found assembled fourteen 
 thousand men of all arms. Most of these troops 
 were armed with weapons seized at Hull or in the 
 Tower. The Parliamentary army seems to have 
 been rather a showy one. Essex's men wore his 
 colours, orange, on their scarfs and badges. 
 Hampden's men wore green coats ; Lord Saye 
 and Lord Mandeville's blue, Lord Brooke's purple, 
 and the Londoners, under Denzil Holies, wore red. 
 
 That so mixed a body of men, mostly, as Crom- 
 
OUTBREAK OF THE CIVIL WAR, 21 
 
 well described them, " formed from decayed serving 
 men and tapsters," should have been, as time went 
 on, more than a match for the Royal army, would 
 seem strange ; but it must be remembered that they 
 were led by many an excellent commander who 
 had served under the great Gustavus. They had, 
 too, French and German officers to instruct them 
 how to work their artillery. As the war progressed, 
 so did the soldier-like capacities of these men ; and 
 before long they had for chief one of the greatest 
 soldiers that ever appeared to lead them from one 
 victory to another ; but at this time Oliver Crom- 
 well's name was little known beyond Parliament 
 and the counties of Huntingdon and Cambridge. 
 The flag of the Parliament represented five buff- 
 coloured Bibles on a black ground, its ugliness 
 a little atoned for by the motto worked in gold 
 letters, " God with us." 
 
 At the time the king hoisted his standard at 
 Nottingham, he had with him but a single regiment 
 of foot and a few train-bands hastily brought 
 together ; and, until he got his artillery and muni- 
 tions from York, could not advance. As time 
 passed, his forces were increased by regiments 
 commanded by Lord Lindsey, and his son. Lord 
 Willoughby, and two Yorkshire regiments, led by 
 Sir William Penniman and by Bellasis, a son of 
 
22 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Lord Falconbridge, from Yorkshire. With these, 
 and having- received the artillery from York, Charles 
 was ready to make a move. On the 13th of 
 September, the king marched to Derby, thence 
 to Stafford.* From Stafford Prince Rupert was 
 despatched, with orders to occupy Worcester, with 
 the intention of forming a line of communication 
 along the valley of the Severn as far as Bristol. 
 This plan was doomed to fail. In a very short 
 time Rupert greatly strengthened his little army : 
 on leaving Leicester he had under his command 
 but eight hundred horse, poorly equipped ; on ap- 
 pearing before Shrewsbury, a month later, he had 
 over three thousand troopers under him, in admir- 
 able condition. 
 
 The Parliament issued a proclamation declaring 
 Rupert a traitor, and accusing him of " flying with 
 great fury through divers counties, raising men for 
 the king in a rigorous way." 
 
 Rupert must have laughed at the proclamation, 
 and at being called a traitor, and it only seems 
 to have given him greater zeal in the king's cause. 
 
 That he impressed horses for the king's service, 
 
 * While with the king at Stafford, a local tradition says that, 
 riding by the church of St. Mary's in that town, Rupert displayed 
 his skill as a marksman by twice piercing the weathercock on the 
 steeple ; if we look at the awkward pistols of that day, this was a 
 feat worth recording. 
 
OUTBREAK OF THE CIVIL WAR. 23 
 
 and obtained arms, was certainly the case ; but so 
 did also the other side. But as to the "rigour" 
 exercised, I cannot find a single instance in which 
 Rupert showed undue harshness, much less cruelty, 
 throughout the whole course of the war. 
 
 What distinguished so especially our great Civil 
 War, and made it stand out in such a conspicuous 
 manner from the wars that had so long raged in 
 Germany and the Netherlands, was the aversion, 
 on both sides, to cause unnecessary suffering. 
 
 Perhaps, with the exception of the American 
 Civil War, none has ever been so free of cruelty 
 towards non-combatants as the English war of 
 
 1642. 
 
 Well and truly does Sir Walter Scott write 
 
 on this subject— 
 
 ** England's war revered the claim 
 Of every unprotected name, 
 And spared amidst its fiercest rage, 
 Childhood, and womanhood, and age." 
 
 A case proving how Rupert conducted his part 
 in the war, is worth giving in some detail. 
 
 In the north of Warwickshire was a place 
 called Caldecot Manor House, belonging to a Mr. 
 Purefoy, a member of Parliament, at this time 
 commanding a body of troops on the side of the 
 Parliament Rupert, in command of five hundred 
 troopers, summoned the garrison. It so happened 
 
24 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 that the garrison consisted of only a Mr. Abbott 
 eight men-servants, Mrs. Purefoy, and a few women^ 
 servants ; but of this fact the prince was ignorant. 
 
 The brave little garrison refused the summons, 
 and defied the troopers. 
 
 The outer gate was forced, but a well-directed 
 fire laid low three officers and many more ; and 
 Rupert had to retire. The attack, however, soon 
 recommenced ; the wind blowing towards the house, 
 Rupert had some outhouses fired, and, under cover 
 of the smoke, returned to the assault. The little 
 garrison, finding further resistance hopeless, sur- 
 rendered ; probably their stock of ammunition had 
 failed : but throughout the siege Mrs. Purefoy and 
 her maids kept reloading the muskets, and even 
 melted the pewter plates for bullets. When this 
 brave woman came forth, and Rupert found how 
 small had been the defending force, he not only 
 gave orders that nothing should be injured or 
 taken from the place, but paid a deserved tribute 
 of admiration to the lady of the house. 
 
 How different would have been the conduct of 
 Tilly, or any other of the Imperialists, under the 
 same circumstances ! 
 
 After leaving Stafford (in order to intercept 
 Essex, who was moving on Worcester, and, as I 
 have already said, to maintain communication 
 
OUTBREAK OF THE CIVIL WAR. 25 
 
 along the Severn valley), Rupert first halted at 
 Bridgenorth, wishing to .keep touch between 
 Shrewsbury and Worcester. Sir John Byron, con- 
 veying some treasure to the king, had reached 
 Worcester, coming from London, and it was feared 
 he might fall into the hands of Essex's force. 
 Hearing of Byron's peril, Rupert at once advanced 
 on the enemy, and so eager was he to engage him 
 that he sent Essex a challenge to meet him either 
 *'in an encounter in a pitched field, at Dunsmore 
 Heath," or in single combat. Essex's answer is 
 not forthcoming. 
 
 On arriving at Worcester, Rupert found that 
 place utterly unfit for defence, and he settled to 
 retire from it, and, with Byron, occupy Shrewsbury. 
 While the arrangements for making this move 
 were pending, Rupert, with his brother Maurice, 
 and other officers, and between four or five hundred 
 troopers, had gone a little distance out of the town, 
 and were resting in the harvest-fields, little dream- 
 ing how near Essex's cavalry were. Suddenly 
 Rupert's quick eye detected a line of mounted men 
 rapidly forming in the open by the Pershore road. 
 
 To seize the nearest horse, arouse his comrades, 
 and, all unarmoured as he was, to dash forwards on 
 the enemy, with his battle-cry of, " For a king ! " 
 was the work of a few seconds. The Parliamentary 
 
26 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 troopers made a stout resistance ; their leader, the 
 brave Colonel Sandys, was slain. Rupert charged 
 the main body, and sent round Lord Crawford to 
 attack their right flank, and soon a panic seized 
 Essex's men, and they fled in wild confusion, never 
 stopping till they reached Pershore, four miles from 
 the place where they had been defeated. 
 
 The fight had been little more than a sharp 
 skirmish. Rupert, although all his officers except 
 himself had received wounds, had as usual escaped 
 scatheless, and only half a dozen of his men had 
 been killed ; but the enemy had lost largely. Ac- 
 cording to Lord Falkland, four hundred had been 
 killed, many drowned in the river. Rupert cap- 
 tured six standards and a large number of horses, 
 of which he never could have too many. The 
 moral blow to the Parliamentarians had been great, 
 and it took a long time before they recovered from 
 the shock which Rupert had given them. 
 
 It was soon after this engagement that our prince 
 played off a prank on the enemy which must have 
 made the whole king's army merry for many a 
 long day. 
 
 In order to ascertain the strength of Essex's 
 position and of his force, Rupert disguised him- 
 self in an ordinary civilian attire, and, calling at a 
 cottage near Worcester, asked the old dame within 
 
OUTBREAK OF THE CIVIL WAR, 2/ 
 "? 
 
 for the latest news while he partook of some " col- 
 lops " and eggs. From her he learnt that he had 
 been utterly routed by Essex's horse. " A plague 
 choke Prince Rupert and his cavaliers ; he might 
 have kept himself where he was born ; this kingdom 
 has been the worse ever since he landed." 
 
 The prince was highly amused at the old lady's 
 spleen, gave her three pieces of money, and told 
 her he quite agreed with her. 
 
 He next accosts a countryman riding a horse 
 laden with sacks of apples, on his way to sell them 
 to Essex's soldiers. Rupert inquires why he does 
 not bring them to sell to the king's. " Oh," says 
 the fellow, " they are cavaliers, and have a mad 
 prince among them, and a devil a penny could I 
 get in the whole army." Finally the prince changes 
 clothes wath the vendor of apples, rides into Essex's 
 camp, takes stock of everything there, and, return- 
 ing to the man, tells him when he reaches the camp 
 to ask Essex's soldiers how they liked the apples 
 that Prince Rupert had sold them that day. 
 
 On the 1 2th of October the king set out on 
 his march to London. 
 
28 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 EDGEHILL AND BRENTFORD. 
 
 The king's army consisted of two thousand cavalry, 
 and of six thousand infantry, besides fifteen 
 hundred dragoons. 
 
 Apparently the Royal force was almost destitute 
 of artillery. Rupert commanded the horse. 
 
 Besides fighting men, a motley crew of non-com- 
 batants, including Secretaries of State, and even 
 such useless encumbrances as heralds, brought up 
 the whole number of Charles's army to near twelve 
 thousand men. 
 
 Rupert wished to advance as quickly as possible 
 on London, taking Birmingham on the way ; but 
 Charles, for no obvious reason, dallied several days 
 at Bridgenorth, and also at Wolverhampton. On 
 the news reaching the capital that the king was 
 advancing in force, a panic seized the Londoners. 
 
 Aided by their wives and relations, the terrified 
 
EDGEHILL AND BRENTFORD, 29 
 
 citizens hastily fortified the western side of the 
 town. Lincoln's Inn Fields was strongly defended ; 
 and in the open fields, where now stands Grosvenor 
 Square, a large fort was thrown up. The train- 
 bands mustered, and barricades blocked the streets 
 to the west. Parliament called on Essex to pre- 
 pare to meet the enemy. Essex was at this time 
 at Worcester, thence he marched on the 19th 
 of October to Stratford-on-Avon, and on the 
 night of the 22nd he reached Kineton. The 
 king's army advanced by slow marches through 
 Packington, Killingworth, and Southam, to Edge- 
 worth, where Charles slept the night before the 
 battle, Rupert, meanwhile, had made an ineffec- 
 tual dash on Coventry. On the same day on which 
 the Parliamentary General reached Kineton, the 
 prince arrived at Wormleighton, in the immediate 
 neighbourhood of Essex, without being aware of it. 
 
 Soon, however, Rupert was informed of the fact 
 by his quartermaster, who had, while seeking quar- 
 ters for his men, fallen in with some of Essex's 
 advanced guard. Rupert at once threw himself on 
 his horse, and galloped to tell the news to Charles, 
 then at Edgeworth, a distance of some six miles 
 from Kineton. 
 
 The night was far advanced when the prince 
 reached the king's head-quarters, and Charles had 
 
30 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 already retired. Rupert insisted on immediately 
 rousing the king : but he was met by Lord Falk- 
 land, whose manner apparently roused the prince's 
 ire ; angry words passed between the prince and 
 the Secretary of State, and Rupert apparently 
 rode back to Wormleighton without having seen 
 the king, in probably a towering passion. Charles, 
 perhaps, felt he had given his nephew some offence, 
 and, before the morning dawned, sent Rupert this 
 curiously spelt letter. '' Nephew," writes the king, 
 ** I have given orders as you desyred, so I dout not 
 but all the foot and cannon will be at Eggehill be- 
 tymes this morning, where you will also find your 
 loving uncle and faithful friend, Charles R." 
 
 Accompanied by his two eldest sons, the king 
 mounted his horse at early dawn of a bleak October 
 day, and rode towards Edgehill. 
 
 Early as was the hour at which he arrived, he 
 found Rupert prepared to receive him. 
 
 The prince had been long keenly watching the 
 enemy coming through the mist in the valley below 
 — called the Valley of the Red Horse. Eagerly, 
 too, the king scanned through his '' perspective 
 glass " his rebel subjects. It was no ordinary sight 
 that Charles beheld, and one, indeed, that no 
 English monarch had ever looked upon before. It 
 was, as Charles remarked, the first time that he 
 
EDGE HILL AND BRENTFORD. 3 I 
 
 saw his enemies " in a body." But the sight only 
 stirred him to exclaim, " I shall give them battle ; 
 God and the prayers of good men assist my cause ! " 
 
 Stapleton's cuirassiers, or, as they were generally 
 called, " Essex's Life Guards," were the first to 
 take up their station to the right. Sir William 
 Fairfax's corps formed the reserve ; next came 
 the men under the command of Denzil Holies and 
 Fielding. Lord Brooke was in command of the 
 centre, having Essex's regiment in his front, and 
 Ballard's men in his rear. Lord Robarts and Sir 
 William Constable commanded the right centre ; 
 Lord Mandeville and Charles Essex, the left. The 
 cavalry, under Meldrum and Stapletdn, were drawn 
 up on the right wing, besides some horse, under Sir 
 John Ramsay, on the left wing. Both these cavalry 
 regiments were flanked by artillery. The total 
 force of these long lines of Parliamentary troops 
 amounted to some sixteen thousand men. 
 
 For hours neither army moved ; it was nearly 
 noon before the Royal army had taken up its posi- 
 tion. Precious time had been wasted owing to a 
 council of war, during which a violent altercation 
 took place between Rupert and the veteran Lord 
 Lindsey. Rupert insisted on charging the enemy 
 without delay, and Lindsey, more cautious, declared 
 against this rash mode of beginning the battle. 
 
1 
 
 2 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 But the old lord was overruled, and in some dudgeon 
 gave up his command, but volunteered his services 
 as colonel of his Lincoln regiment. 
 
 Rupert was supported in his scheme of immediate 
 attack by Lord Ruthven, an old campaigner, who 
 had fought in Germany under the great Gustavus. 
 With a strong body of cavalry at their flanks, the 
 Royal infantry were marshalled in ranks six deep. 
 Sir John Byron was intrusted with a reserve of 
 horse, and Lords Carnarvon and Digby had a 
 reserve of six hundred troopers. On the left stood 
 Ashton's dragoons ; those of Washington were 
 placed on the right. The Royal artillery faced that 
 of the Parliament. Lord Bernard Stuart's fine 
 troop of Life Guards formed the king's body- 
 guard ; but their zeal after the battle broke, and 
 the wish to remove an impression that they were 
 more for show than for service, unfortunately in- 
 duced this fine body of young soldiers to leave 
 their king, and Charles at one period of the fight 
 was almost deserted. It was about one o'clock 
 in the afternoon of that memorable 23rd of 
 October when at length the Royal army de- 
 scended into the valley. A i^\sf moments before 
 moving, the king addressed some spirited words 
 to his soldiers. Clad in complete armour, and 
 probably mounted on one of those noble steeds on 
 
EDGE HILL AND BRENTFORD. 33 
 
 which Vandyck loved to portray him, Charles must 
 have looked every inch a king. '* Come life or 
 death, your king will bear you company," he said, 
 " and ever keep the field, this place, and this day's 
 work in his grateful remembrance." 
 
 Surely such kingly words had not stirred a 
 soldier's heart since Henry V. had called on his 
 fellow-countr>'men to conquer or die with him at 
 Agincourt. The Parliamentary artillery was the 
 first to open fire ; it was promptly returned by that 
 of the king. Rupert, at the head of his cavalry, 
 dashed down on the enemy with his ringing battle- 
 cry, " For God and the king." The impetus of the 
 charge sent the Roundhead horse flying, after a 
 short resistance. What added, at the commence- 
 ment of the battle, to the confusion of the Par- 
 liamentarians was the defection of Sir Faithful 
 Fortescue, who joined the Royalists, carrying with 
 him a large body of deserters. In vain did Man- 
 deville and Cholmondeley attempt to rally their 
 men ; the wildest panic prevailed, and away rode 
 the Roundheads, until their flight was stayed by 
 some reserves that Hampden was bringing up 
 from Stratford. 
 
 While Rupert was carrying all before him on 
 the king's right, and pursuing the enemy into 
 Kineton, the left wing of the Royal cavalry broke 
 
 D 
 
34 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Meldrum's horse, whom the panic, caused by 
 Rupert's victorious charge on their companions, 
 had demoralized. 
 
 The wild spirit of Rupert had seized all the 
 cavalry of the king, and, regardless of the 
 monarch's safety, away flowed the Royal horse. 
 The contagion of the victorious Cavaliers carried 
 away even Byron and Digby's reserves and the 
 immediate body-guard of the king. 
 
 The tide of battle now changed, and for some 
 time the king was in imminent danger of being 
 captured. Almost alone, and with the enemy 
 all around, the king was in the midst of a hand- 
 to-hand melee, during which the Royal standard 
 was taken after a desperate fight. The gallant 
 Sir Ralph Verney was slain, bravely protecting 
 his precious charge to the last. The Royal pennon 
 was seized out of his dying grasp, but recovered 
 later in the day by an able ruse. Here, too. Lord 
 Lindsey fell mortally wounded, fighting on foot, 
 pike in hand. In vain Charles was entreated to 
 leave the field ; he refused to fly, and showed 
 a calm courage throughout that wild scene of 
 storm and turmoil. Still, Ruthven and Astley 
 gallantly held their ground, although almost over- 
 whelmed by the enemy. At length Rupert re- 
 turned from his pursuit ; but only to find the battle 
 
EDGEHILL AND BRENTFORD, 35 
 
 all but lost. Darkness was now closing in ; and 
 in vain he begged the king to be allowed to make 
 one more charge to retrieve the day : it was too 
 late ; and even had there been more daylight, 
 the cavalry were too scattered and exhausted 
 to enable him to get together a sufficient force, or 
 to make an effectual charge. Rupert had unwill- 
 ingly enough to submit to the inevitable. 
 
 Our prince might be said both to have won and 
 lost the battle. Like chaff before the wind had 
 he scattered the enemy ; but he had also allowed 
 the infantry on his side to be deprived of support, 
 and had thus imperilled his king and his army. 
 The battle was a drawn one ; and, as usual on 
 such occasions, both sides claimed the victory. 
 On the whole, the advantages lay on the side of 
 the Royalists, for the road was now open for the 
 advance to London. 
 
 Charles passed the night after the battle on the 
 field — part of it by the side of a watch-fire, part 
 in his coach. It was bitterly cold, and the suffer- 
 ings of the wounded, in those days so neglected, 
 were terrible. 
 
 It has been estimated that in this first pitched 
 battle of the Civil War, between five and six thou- 
 sand men fell. Of these, two-thirds belonged to 
 the army of the Parliament. Essex had lost two 
 
36 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 of his ablest officers — Colonel Charles Essex and 
 Lord St. John. The loss of officers on the side 
 of the king was far heavier — Lord Lindsey, Sir 
 Ralph Verney, Lord Aubigny, Colonel Munroe, 
 " a great commander," were among the slain. 
 Lord Lindsey's son, and also many other officers 
 on the side of the Royalists, were taken prisoners. 
 The day following was passed in a fruitless at- 
 tempt at negotiation between the leaders of the 
 two armies. That evening the king went to 
 Edgcot, and Essex to Warwick. 
 
 Rupert having obtained the king's leave to 
 harass the enemy's retreat, did so effectually, until 
 stopped by the Parliamentary baggage-waggons 
 blocking up the narrow streets of Kineton. How- 
 ever, he secured prisoners, and some booty ; among 
 the latter a portion of Essex's correspondence. 
 This block at Kineton, and a heavy fog, saved 
 Essex's army from further molestation, and thus 
 ended the first engagement of much consequence 
 between the two armies. 
 
 Although, to modern ideas of warfare, accus- 
 tomed as we are to armies of hundreds of thou- 
 sands in collision, Edgehill may seem but a paltry 
 affair, it was one of the most obstinately contested 
 fights in our history. It had been a hand-to-hand 
 struggle throughout, for the artillery and musketry 
 
EDGEHILL AND BRENTFORD. 3/ 
 
 had hardly been called into action on either side. 
 The fact of six thousand men having been killed, 
 out of a combined force of thirty-one thousand, 
 proves how desperately both sides fought. Lud- 
 low records that he counted no less than sixty 
 corpses of the Royal Horse Guards, who had 
 fallen in defending the king's standard, all heaped 
 together on one small plot of ground. 
 
 Bloody as the day had been, its results were 
 
 insignificant. 
 
 Now that the road to London was open, Rupert 
 implored the king to march instantly on the 
 capital. The eager prince declared that, if he 
 were permitted, he could with his cavalry seize 
 Westminster, and occupy the Houses of Parlia- 
 ment ; and that if he only had command of some 
 three thousand infantry, in addition to his cavalry, 
 he promised that in a few days Charles should be 
 reinstated at Whitehall. 
 
 But, as was his wont, Charles refused to take 
 the responsibiUty of so bold a step ; and council 
 followed council, delay caused fresh delay. The 
 king was told that if Rupert were let loose in 
 London, he would set the town in a blaze ; and 
 Lord Bristol went so far as to declare that even 
 the city would be fired did the prince once get 
 possession of it. . 
 
38 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 In this way much precious time was lost. The 
 king lingered on near Banbury, undetermined what 
 advice to follow. Essex, in the meanwhile, used 
 the time to concentrate his shattered troops at 
 Warwick. 
 
 The next event in the campaign was Banbuiy 
 falling into the king's hands. At length Charles 
 moved south, and re-entered his loyal town of 
 Oxford. i 
 
 While the king held his court in the most 
 beautiful of English cities, Rupert scoured the' 
 neighbouring country ; one day he appeared at 
 Abingdon, the next he is in the vale of Aylesbury. 
 At Aylesbury he has a fight with the Roundheads, 
 who, under Charles Pym and Balfour, tried in vain 
 to keep him out of that town. 
 
 In one of these autumn days our prince dashes 
 across a ford and scatters the enemy's horse ; but 
 the latter close in behind, reinforced by fresh 
 troops. Rupert finds himself terribly outnumbered ; 
 he has to beat a hasty retreat, and recross the 
 river. His quarters were now at Maidenhead, from 
 whence he made a bold but impossible effort to 
 capture the fortress of Windsor, then strongly 
 garrisoned. Even had it not been, Windsor was 
 hardly a likely place to be taken by a regiment 
 or two of cavalry, however brave, and led by such 
 a " beau sabreur " as Rupert. 
 
 I 1 
 
EDGEHILL AND BRENTFORD. 39 
 
 After this somewhat Quixotic attempt to ride 
 into the keep of Windsor Castle, the prince was 
 obliged to retire on Staines, and later to Kingston. 
 After garrisoning Colnbrook, Rupert returned to 
 his headquarters at Maidenhead. There he col- 
 lected as many cavalry as he could muster in 
 order to carry out his scheme of entering London. . 
 
 News reaching Charles that Rupert thought the 
 favourable moment had at length arrived for a 
 decided blow on the capital, the king left Oxford 
 and came as far as Reading, which had recently 
 declared itself for Charles. Its late Parliamentary 
 governor had promptly retired when he found 
 Rupert in his neighbourhood. f- - 
 
 While Charles remained at Reading, a Parlia- 
 mentary commission arrived from Westminster 
 to negotiate terms with a view of making peace. 
 Among the peers who formed part of this com- 
 mission were the Earls of Pembroke and of 
 Northumberland. 
 
 The negotiations came to nothing; although the 
 commissioners could not have been more moderate 
 in their demands and tone, Charles foolishly 
 refused to receive one of the commissioners. Sir 
 John Evelyn, a member of the House of Commons, 
 and, owing to this personal pique and obstinacy 
 on the part of the king, things remained as before. 
 
40 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 While these negotiations were pending, with 
 or without the royal sanction (it is not easy to 
 find the truth in this affair), the king's army con- 
 tinued to advance on Brentford. 
 
 This apparent want of faith with the Parliament, 
 as it was regarded by the Parliament, taking place 
 at a time of truce, embittered intensely the national 
 feeling against the king, and from that time all 
 hopes of a peaceful solution to the war between 
 king and Parliament had to be abandoned. 
 
 By some writers, Charles has been severely 
 blamed for allowing his army to advance on 
 London during the negotiations, and they accuse 
 him of playing a double game by having done so. 
 
 On the other hand, it has been contended that, 
 situated as Charles was at Reading, he might, had 
 he not acted as he did, been easily taken prisoner 
 by the hostile army, and that in self-defence he 
 was obliged to push on his troops to Brentford. 
 He was certainly almost surrounded by the Par- 
 liamentary army ; it being in force close by at 
 Windsor, at Acton, and also at Kingston. Essex's 
 main strength lay at Turnham Green, where his 
 soldiers protected the main road to London. 
 Strong fortifications had been erected at Brentford, 
 and that place was also fully garrisoned by 
 Hampden and Holles's troops. The main street 
 
EDGEHILL AND BRENTFORD. 4I ' 
 
 was barricaded, and it must have appeared a sheer 
 impossibility to the Parliamentary chiefs, that any 
 force, unless strongly armed with artillery, would 
 run its head against such a position, or attempt 
 to enter London thence. 
 
 But Rupert had already made up his mind that 
 nothing should deter him from his darling plan of 
 taking Brentford, however hopeless such an attempt 
 might seem to ordinary eyes and understandings. 
 
 Brentford he must have, despite all the Hamp- 
 den and Holles's barricades and stockades that 
 might try to bar his way. 
 
 Aided by a thick November fog, Rupert made 
 a wild dash on the fortifications ; not only did the 
 fog allow him to fall on the enemy, almost before 
 he and his cavalry could be seen, but it also 
 protected his flanks from being attacked by the 
 enemy. The odds were terribly against Rupert, 
 and certainly none but he could have gained even 
 the shortlived success which he obtained in that 
 desperate . struggle. 
 
 Through the enemy-girt street and over the 
 barricades the Royal horse dashed and forced their 
 way with splendid courage. The men Rupert led 
 were principally Welsh, and never had the prince 
 led finer soldiers ; every man seemed inspired by 
 the example of their leader, all fought like heroes. 
 
42 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 In spite of their strongly fortified position, 
 Holles's splendid regiment of red-coated guards 
 could not stand the first attack, and even the sup- 
 ports brought up to their assistance by Hampden 
 and Lord Brooke were also beaten back. 
 
 That night Rupert passed in the bloodstained 
 town. The victory was complete, fifteen of the 
 enemy's guns were captured, besides five hundred 
 prisoners, and eleven stands of colours. 
 
 Next day all London was in an uproar at the 
 news of the capture of Brentford. 
 
 Essex was immediately despatched to take the 
 command of his army at Turnham Green, and, if 
 possible, to give the terrible prince battle. 
 
 At Turnham Green, Essex had under his com- 
 mand a force of some twenty-four thousand men ; 
 this included the city train-bands, which answered 
 in those days to our present force of volunteers — 
 a well-organized, disciplined, and reliable body of 
 citizens. Far more powerful than this army was 
 the moral force which Essex felt at his back, for 
 now the Londoners were completely roused, and 
 ready to fight it out to the death before Rupert 
 and his, to them hateful, soldiery should enter 
 their gates. This desperate feeling of the London 
 citizens was known to the king, and it was this, 
 probably, which led him to recall his nephew at the 
 
EDGEHILL AND BRENTFORD. 43 
 
 very time that Rupert felt further victory all but 
 certain. 
 
 It must have been a grievous mortification to 
 the prince when the order arrived from the king, 
 ordering him to leave Brentford, after so brilliant 
 a success ; but the royal orders had to be obeyed, 
 and he and his brave Welshmen were obliged to 
 evacuate Brentford and fall back on Reading. It 
 appears that Rupert insisted on seeing all his men 
 safely across the Thames before he crossed the 
 river himself. Like the captain of a sinking vessel, 
 he remained the last at the post of honour and 
 of danger. 
 
 Not until all his men had safely crossed Brent- 
 ford Bridge did he move, although the enemy kept 
 up a heavy fire on the departing Cavaliers. 
 
 Cheering on his men, and directing them to 
 return the fire, Rupert was the last to cross the 
 bridge. Essex, naturally only too glad to have 
 been able to get back into Brentford on such easy 
 terms, made no attempt to pursue Rupert. At 
 Hounslow the prince encamped that evening. 
 
 Meanwhile Charles passed a few days between 
 his palaces of Hampton Court and Oatlands, 
 before returning to Oxford, where he fixed his 
 court at the end of that month, and where he 
 remained during the following winter. 
 
44 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Gloomily closed in that first year of the Civil 
 War for the Royal side. 
 
 The king, in an almost defenceless position at 
 Oxford, anxiously awaiting news of the queen's 
 arrival, who was then tempest-bound between the 
 Dutch and English coasts, in imminent danger of 
 falling into the clutches of Warwick and the fleet 
 of the Parliament. 
 
 Essex known to be advancing from Windsor on 
 to the weakly defended town of Oxford ; while 
 Rupert, disgusted at being obliged to give up the 
 attack on London, scours the country in all direc- 
 tions, in order to get supplies for the Royal army. 
 
 No help seems likely to come from allies from 
 over the sea, for France, Holland, and Spain have 
 grown lukewarm. Thus mournfully ended the 
 year 1642 for the cause of the king. 
 
( 4S ) 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 "ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS." 
 
 During the next year (1643), to quote Carlyle, 
 " all England is in a hot, but very dim, state, and 
 the country is all writhing in dim conflict, suffering 
 manifold distress, and from his majesty's head- 
 quarters ever and anon there darts out, now hither, 
 now thither, across the dim smoke element, a swift, 
 fierce Prince Rupert, too like a streak of sudden 
 fire." 
 
 While Charles anxiously waited for the queen's 
 arrival (bringing, it was hoped, more money and 
 fresh means of carrying on the war) at Oxford, 
 Rupert becomes a difficult figure to follow ; the 
 dry and scanty chronicles of the time give but 
 little clue to his erratic movements. 
 
 Early in the year he took possession of Ciren- 
 cester — a prize of much value to the king, for, 
 besides finding much booty in the town, its posses- 
 sion laid open the road to Wales. 
 
4^ RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 From Cirencester Rupert darted to Gloucester ; 
 but that place he found strongly garrisoned by 
 the enemy, and he unwillingly returned to Oxford. 
 
 While there, he issued a long answer, or, rather, a 
 defence to a host of accusations made against him 
 by the Parliamentary pamphleteers. He defies his 
 enemies to prove one single case of cruelty or 
 brutality committed by him throughout the cam- 
 paign. This paper, which was printed and pub- 
 h'shed, is far too long to be given here, but may be 
 read at full length in Warburton's compendious 
 work. It closes with this characteristic passage, 
 in which the prince, alluding to his personal conduct, 
 says : " And for myself, I appeal to the consciences 
 of those lords and gentlemen who are my daily 
 witnesses, and to those people wheresoever our 
 army hath been, what they know, or have observed 
 in my carriage which might not become one of my 
 quality, and the son of a king.'' 
 , About the end of March, Rupert concocted a 
 scheme for joining hands with the queen, now at 
 length safely arrived at York. This plan was a 
 bold one — for the country between Oxford and 
 York was in the hands of the enemy — and met with 
 the king's approval. 
 
 Early in April the prince left Oxford with a 
 force of twelve hundred horse and six hundred 
 
''ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS!' 4/ 
 
 foot. Passing through the south, and up the centre 
 of Warwickshire with little opposition, Rupert 
 arrived before Birmingham — then, as now, con- 
 spicuous for its strong Democratic sympathies — and 
 there Rupert had to pause ; the gates were closed, 
 and the town was strongly garrisoned, and the 
 streets rendered impassable by barricades. No 
 more daunted by these obstacles than he had been 
 at Brentford, Rupert ordered an assault to be 
 made, and soon the Royal flag waved over the 
 city walls. In the Parliamentary accounts of this 
 event, Rupert and his soldiers are accused of 
 having behaved with unnecessary vigour, and of 
 having set fire to the town. " They have made 
 Birmingham," wrote these scribes, '' a woeful spec- 
 tacle to behold, a thoroughfare for thieves and 
 plunderers." According to the Royalist version of 
 the taking of Birmingham, the prince gave orders 
 that one or two houses should be fired, in order to 
 enable him to make his way into the town, and 
 that when the enemy retired he gave orders that 
 these fires should be, if possible, extinguished. It 
 seems that the day after the town was taken, some 
 of the Royalist soldiers set fire to some other 
 houses ; this was done entirely against the prince's 
 
 orders. 
 
 Such things as the above will, and must occa- 
 
48 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 sionally, take place in all warfare, be it civil war or 
 not ; but it would not be fair to blame Rupert's 
 conduct at Birmingham. He seems to have done 
 no more than what he deemed was necessary in 
 order to capture the town ; nor was it in the prince's 
 character or disposition to cause any wanton 
 destruction, or add to the horrors of a place taken 
 by assault. This is proved by the whole of his 
 career. Rupert far more resembled a Sidney than 
 a Tilly or an Alva. 
 
 Among the slain at the taking of Birming- 
 ham was a noted cavalier, Denbigh, who had 
 distinguished himself by his distant sea-voyages ; 
 but at sea he had been unfortunate. He had 
 served the state as ambassador to the Court of 
 Persia, and had fought valiantly at the battle of 
 Edgehill. In a letter to Rupert, Charles deplores 
 the death of so devoted a subject as Lord Denbigh 
 had ever been to him From Birmingham Rupert 
 advanced to Stafford, and thence to Lichfield. 
 That town was in the hands of the Parliament, 
 and had been strongly fortified ; even its cathedral 
 bristled with cannon, and the cathedral close had 
 been turned into a fortress, loopholed and full of 
 troops. Lichfield was perhaps at that time the 
 most powerful place in the hands of the Parliament 
 of any in the Midland Counties. Its governor, 
 
ft 
 
 ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS^ 49 
 
 Rousewell, was a man of ability and determination, 
 and ready to defend his post to the last extremity. 
 On the other hand, our prince was as determined 
 to take Lichfield, and he prepared to lay siege to 
 it in the most systematic manner. Sending for a 
 strong detachment of miners from the neighbouring 
 collieries, he employed them to help his infantry 
 to dry up the moat around the cathedral close, and 
 to undermine the stout walls protecting the citadel. 
 These operations occupied a long time, and ten 
 days passed before Rupert could strike a decisive 
 blow. The attack commenced with a heavy 
 artillery fire, directed against the outer fortifica- 
 tions ; but they were too thick to suffer from the 
 cannonade ; then scaling-ladders were brought 
 against the walls ; but these too had no success. 
 Rupert now, with the aid of his amateur engineerSj 
 sprung a mine, the first ever used in war in Eng- 
 land, and through the breach the storming party 
 rushed. It was met with an obstinate defence by 
 the besieged, and a terribly severe musketry fire 
 obliged the besiegers to retire with the loss of theii 
 leader, Colonel Usher. Again the artillery was 
 employed on the now weakened walls and on the 
 inner defences with better effect. The following 
 day Lichfield capitulated to Rupert ; but the garri- 
 son were allowed to march out of the citadel 
 
so RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 with all the honours of war, such as " flags flying," 
 etc. Rupert, with his accustomed courtesy, warmly 
 complimented Governor Rousewell on the brave 
 defence which he and his garrison had made. 
 
 During the siege of Lichfield, the prince had 
 received several pressing letters from Charles, 
 urging him to return south, in order to protect 
 Reading, now threatened by Essex. 
 
 Accordingly, leaving Colonel Henry Bagot, "a 
 son of a good and powerful family in that county," 
 as Governor of Lichfield, Rupert returned with all 
 haste to the king. Two days after leaving Lich- 
 field, so quickly did Rupert march, Charles was 
 able to welcome his nephew at Caversham, where 
 the king had come from Oxford, in order to save 
 Reading from falling into Essex's hands. Charles 
 arrived too late to prevent this, for the Parlia- 
 mentary general had arrived on the 17th of 
 April before Reading, with an army of sixteen 
 thousand foot and three thousand horse. 
 
 Sir Arthur Ashton, the governor, had been 
 badly wounded early in the siege, and the whole 
 burden of the defence of the place devolved 
 on Colonel Fielding, who appears to have been 
 somewhat lukewarm in his zeal for the Royal 
 cause ; and ere the king could prevent it, the place 
 had fallen. A charge of treason was later pre- 
 
''ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS.'' 5 I 
 
 ferred against him for the surrender of Reading 
 to Essex. The town of Reading, according to 
 the Parliamentary accounts drawn up of the 
 surrender of the town, was still well provisioned. 
 The king was greatly incensed, and had it not 
 been for Rupert's generous intercession, and that 
 of the Prince of Wales, the unlucky colonel would 
 certainly have been executed. 
 
 The army of the Parliament gained but little 
 by having possession of Reading, for, soon after 
 they entered that town, a fever of a malignant 
 nature broke out among the soldiers, owing to the 
 overcrowded state of the place. 
 
 Hampden, who, on his side, was almost as 
 impetuous for immediate action as Rupert, on that 
 of the king, was anxious to attack the Royal force 
 at Oxford ; but Essex, with his usual caution, pre- 
 ferred remaining quietly at Reading, and watching 
 from thence what Charles's next move would be. 
 .; Rupert, although obliged to forego, after the 
 siege of Lichfield, joining Henrietta Maria at York, 
 had not given up his intention of carrying out that 
 plan ; but while Essex was in the vicinity of the 
 king, he felt it his duty to remain in his neighbour- 
 hood, doing as much damage as possible to the 
 enemy by his wild raids around Oxford. ''Often," 
 writes Warburton, " the old pavements of Tring, 
 
/ / 
 
 52 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Wycombe, Watford, and such isolated places, ran^ 
 to the clatter of the Royal troopers, startling the 
 burghers from their midnight sleep ; and soon 
 afterwards, with hose and doublet hastily arranged, 
 the responsible authorities were hurried before the 
 commanding-officer, and obliged to furnish such 
 matters as he demanded ; or to follow him, at 
 speed, behind a steel-clad trooper, back to his 
 head-quarters. Before the morning light, the in- 
 vaders would be far away, or the last glitter of 
 their armour just seen on the remote horizon. 
 Yet, it is evident, even these expeditions were 
 conducted, if I may say so, in something of a 
 gentlemanlike manner, otherwise we should hear 
 more of their excesses from the Parliamentary 
 organs. They are sufficiently unscrupulous in 
 their assertions and abusiveness, yet they relate 
 singularly few acts of outrage, and scarcely any 
 atrocity. In the German wars, thousands of 
 villages were laid in ruins, and the country left 
 desolate ; but, in the very heat of the English war, 
 the population continued to increase, wealth on 
 the whole accumulated, and the judges went their 
 circuits, administering justice in the midst of 
 violence." 
 
 The only parallel to this humane conduct, of 
 the same nation waging a desperate warfare 
 
''ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS: 53 
 
 within itself, is to be found in the great Civil 
 War of America ; when, terrible as was the de- 
 struction of life, both the armies of the Federal 
 and the Confederate sides abstained from any 
 unnecessary destruction of life or property. 
 
 Early in June, when the floods in the Thames 
 valley had subsided, Essex moved on towards 
 Oxford as far as Caversham. Charles accordingly 
 quitted the shelter of Christchurch, and drew up 
 his army to the east side of Oxford, on some hilly 
 ground. In the mean while a report had reached 
 Rupert that a large treasure, said to consist of 
 some twenty thousand pounds, was shortly to be 
 sent to Essex from London; the prince resolved 
 to intercept this booty, and to seize the prize 
 at Thame, where the bulk of the enemy's army 
 had now concentrated. Leaving Oxford on the 
 17th of June, in the evening, the prince rode 
 through the night to Lewknor, where he drew 
 rein in the early dawn of the next day. Here he 
 had a skirmish with some of the advanced guard of 
 the Roundheads ; he then galloped on to the village 
 of Chinnor, strongly garrisoned by the rear-guard 
 of Essex's army; Rupert attacked them unex- 
 pectedly, and slew or made prisoners all he found. 
 From Chinnor the prince continued his course, 
 but not unobstructed for long. The firing at 
 
54 
 
 < 'i 
 
 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Chinnor had brought his enemy from all sides, 
 and had given timely warning to the drivers of the 
 carts containing the treasure, who, with their pre- 
 cious freight, were able to escape among the Chil- 
 tern Hills. Rupert, with the foe before, behind, 
 and around him, had nothing left him now to do 
 but to fight his way through the enemy, and make 
 the best way he could back to Oxford. 
 
 It was still early in the morning of the i8th 
 of June (a date eventful in English military 
 annals) when Rupert formed his men in an 
 open field, that of Chalgrove, and prepared for 
 the battle. To beat a retreat, he was obliged to 
 cross the river Cherwell. In. order to do this, 
 he sent some of his soldiers to occupy the bridge 
 over that river at Chislehampton, about a mile 
 and a half distant from Chalgrove Field. The 
 enemy began the fight as they descended Gelder's 
 Hill. For a wonder, the prince allowed the attack 
 to begin from his opponents. This unusual tactic 
 on his part may be accounted for by his having 
 placed some of his troops in ambush on either 
 side of a lane through which the enemy were 
 obliged to pass before making their attack. But 
 when the Roundheads commenced firing on his 
 men, Rupert's short stock of patience gave out. 
 " This insolency is not to be borne ! " he cried ; 
 
 
*' ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS!' 55 
 
 and clapping spurs to his horse, he cleared the 
 hedge which divided him from the enemy's advanced 
 guard, and, followed by his cavalry, after a short 
 but decisive combat, drove them back in confusion. 
 He captured a large number of colours and many 
 horses, then much required in the Royal army^ 
 and many prisoners. 
 
 This success made up in some measure for 
 Rupert's disappointment in having missed the 
 treasure, which was safely conveyed into Essex's 
 lines. What made the fight of Chalgrove Field 
 for ever memorable in English history, was the 
 death-wound that one of the best and bravest 
 patriots met with on that summer's day, near his 
 own homestead. At the commencement of the 
 engagement, Hampden had ridden up from Wat- 
 lington, attracted by the sound of firing. Early 
 in the day two bullets smashed his shoulder, and, 
 hardly able to sit his horse, he rode slowly away 
 from that fatal field a dying man. 
 
 A purer patriot, or a less self-seeking one, never 
 lived ; and the universal respect felt for his cha- 
 racter was shown by even the Royalists acknow- 
 ledging that in him England had lost one of her 
 best and bravest sons. 
 
 As Macaulay truly says, *'With him died the 
 last hope of a victory as spotless as its cause." 
 
56 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 To the credit of Charles, it should be recorded 
 that he volunteered to send his own surgeons to 
 his wounded enemy. 
 
 At the close of that month, Henrietta Maria 
 at length left York, to join her husband at Oxford. 
 Rupert hastened north to escort the queen on her 
 progress south. Leaving Oxford on the ist of 
 July, he met the queen ten days after at Stratford- 
 on-Avon. Henrietta and the prince were lodged 
 at New Place, a house built by Shakespeare in 
 his palmy days, in the centre of the little town, 
 then occupied by the great granddaughter of the 
 poet, who, with her husband, Mr. Nash, entertained 
 the royal guests. From York the queen had been 
 escorted by a force of four thousand soldiers, and 
 in her train were no less than one hundred and 
 fifty waggons and a field of artillery. After quitting 
 Stratford-on-Avon, the queen and prince passed 
 through Kineton, and at Edgehill they were met 
 by Charles, The royal pair had not seen one 
 another during the last fifteen troubled months. 
 
 Far better had it been for Charles and for Eng- 
 land had Henrietta Maria never set foot in this 
 country. The queen's love of plotting and schem- 
 ing was pregnant with untold mischief to the 
 Royal cause, and her Jesuitical craft and want of 
 truth made itself but too soon felt in the some- 
 
''ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS'' 5/ 
 
 what gipsy-like court that the poor hurried king 
 now held. Henrietta Maria was endowed with 
 the most unfortunate knack of always selecting 
 the most incompetent and untrustworthy advisers 
 to influence the king ; and she never lost an oppor- 
 tunity of baffling any one who was likely to give 
 reasonable advice to the monarch. Charles was, 
 however, devotedly attached to this fatal woman, 
 and this meeting appears to have been a happy 
 one. Great were the rejoicings on the 4th of July 
 at Oxford, when the royal pair made what ap- 
 peared to the Cavaliers a triumphal entry into 
 that town. There was more cause for the Cavaliers 
 to rejoice at the news which now reached Oxford, 
 namely, of Waller's defeat at Roundway Down, 
 than at Henrietta Maria being again amongst 
 them. Even with the still fascinating queen again 
 at court, Rupert could not keep out of the saddle, 
 and he was away again soon after the queen's 
 arrival at Oxford, to lay siege to Bristol ; that 
 town he had already once tried to take, but had 
 failed, and this failure he now burned to retrieve. 
 Bristol was at that time the second most important 
 town in England, strongly fortified and stoutly 
 garrisoned, all of which things only made the 
 prince the more eager to take it. 
 
 Having left Oxford on the i8th of July, Rupert 
 
5 8 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 arrived at Clifton on the 23rd, and there he 
 established his head-quarters. At Clifton he was 
 strengthened by the Royalist troops fresh from 
 their victory on Roundway Down. The attack 
 on Bristol was made from two quarters simul- 
 taneously : on the Somerset side, the town was 
 attacked by Sir Ralph Hopton at the head of his 
 brave Cornish men ; while Rupert advanced from 
 the Gloucestershire side, where the defences were 
 less strong, and not so well guarded as those 
 attacked by Hopton. On the first assault, the 
 Cornishmen were repulsed with a heavy loss. 
 After a pause of three days, a fresh joint attack 
 was made on the city, a general assault of the 
 fortifications took place, and in an incredibly short 
 time the place was carried. The governor. Sir 
 Nathaniel Fiennes, who seems to have had but 
 little capacity for command, at once capitulated. 
 For this he underwent a court-martial ; but Essex 
 granted him a pardon. 
 
 Thus, after a short siege of three days, and a 
 couple of assaults, the most important town, 
 London alone excepted, had fallen into the hands 
 of the Royalists. The losses of the Cavaliers, 
 however, had been great, some five hundred slain, 
 and many officers of note ; the best known of 
 these being Lord Grandison. 
 

 (( 
 
 ALARMS AND EXCURSJONS^ 59 
 
 , After the capitulation of Bristol, an angry dis- 
 pute broke out between Rupert and Lord Hert- 
 ford ; — the latter held the appointment of Governor- 
 General of the West; Rupert had omitted to place 
 the. marquis's name in the articles of capitulation. 
 Hertford revenged himself by making Hopton 
 governor of the conquered town, an appointment 
 which Rupert, who had had so prominent a part 
 in the taking of the place, had expected to have 
 been offered. So great waxed the dispute between 
 the prince and the marquis that, in order to make 
 peace between them, the king, who was then 
 besieging Gloucester, came thence to Bristol. 
 
 Rupert took no part in the siege of Gloucester ; 
 it was thought that he had sacrificed a far too large 
 number of lives in the last assault at Bristol, and 
 the command of the besieging force was entrusted 
 to Lord Ruthven, or, as he was now styled, the 
 Earl of Forth and Brentford. 
 
 In the mean while, Essex, with an army of fifteen 
 thousand men, had started from London, to raise 
 the siege of Gloucester ; and Rupert was ordered 
 to prevent him carrying this into effect. On the 
 borders of Gloucestershire, at Stow-in-the-Wold, 
 the prince and Essex met. Rupert found himself 
 greatly outnumbered by the army of Essex, and 
 his mission came to nought. :■ , 
 
 y^ 
 
6o RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 On the morning of the 5th of October, the Par- 
 liamentary forces approached the king's army ; 
 Charles had reluctantly to raise the siege of 
 Gloucester, and to retire to Newbury. After 
 relieving Gloucester, Essex marched on Ciren- 
 cester, closely followed by Rupert. On the 
 1 8th of September the prince came up with the 
 enemy at Aldbourn Chase, within a few hours' 
 march of Newbury, where he had intended arriving 
 that evening. 
 
 In one of his resistless charges, Rupert swept 
 through the enemy, driving him back with great 
 slaughter. The result of that charge was, that 
 instead of Essex entering Newbury on the day 
 following, Charles did so in his place. The day 
 after, the 20th of September, much against Rupert's 
 advice, the king gave battle to Essex. The latter 
 had taken up a strongly fortified position at a 
 place called Bigg's Hills. That battle is known 
 as the first battle of Newbury ; it resulted in the 
 king being badly beaten. 
 
 Like at Edgehill, the artillery played a very 
 small part in the action ; and also as at Edgehill, 
 this first battle of Newbury was a hand-to-hand 
 encounter. 
 
 Never before had the Roundheads fought with 
 such stubborn courage and dogged determination. 
 
(( 
 
 ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS^ 6 1 
 
 In vain Rupert led charge upon charge against 
 the enemy. Not even the princess desperate fight- 
 ing could cut a lane through that serried array of 
 pikes, or daunt the stern men that held them. 
 
 Before night closed in, some of the king's best 
 and bravest officers lay dead. First and foremost 
 on that day fell Falkland "the incomparable," as 
 his contemporary chronicler loved to call him. 
 There, too, fell young Lords Sunderland and Car- 
 narvon ; both not only distinguished for their 
 courage, but their brilliant parts and rare manly 
 beauty. 
 
 With a bleeding heart must the king have re- 
 turned that luckless day to Newbury, after losing 
 three such friends as these. 
 
 Falkland's death must have been to Charles one 
 of the greatest of his many sorrows and misfor- 
 tunes, and bitterly must he have regretted having 
 gone into battle against the advice of so daring 
 a spirit as that of Rupert's. Out of the prince's 
 brigade, three hundred men had been slain ; out of 
 his own troop (which Warburton conjectures only 
 numbered some sixty men) thirty were killed. 
 
 Rupert remained on horseback throughout the 
 night after the battle, and, as soon as it>was light, 
 returned to the attack, harassing the enemy on 
 their march to Reading. 
 
62 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 The last successes for the Royalist cause in that 
 year were the taking of the town of Bedford, and 
 the castle and town of Arundel by Hopton. "The 
 capture of Arundel/' writes Mr. Gardiner, " marked 
 the high tide of Royalist success, which had begun 
 to swell at Stratton." But both Arundel and the 
 royal tide of success were doomed soon to fall, 
 and in less than a month from the day when the 
 royal standard waved above the old keep of the 
 Howards, Arundel fell again into the power of 
 the Parliament The loss of Arundel to the king 
 dashed all hopes of a successful invasion of the 
 south. Thus ended this year of "alarms and 
 excursions," 1643. 
 
* ■: :*•• < 
 
 i 63 ) 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR. 
 
 With Henrietta Maria back again at Oxford, a pale 
 shadow of the old court life of Whitehall of former 
 days may have appeared to have returned. Oxford, 
 " the only city," writes Clarendon^ " in England at 
 that time wholly devoted to his Majesty," has often 
 been described by historians and novelists, during 
 the time that its beautiful colleges sheltered all 
 that remained to Charles and his queen of their 
 former life and its splendours. The most pictu- 
 resque description of that incomparable city at 
 this period, methinks, is by the pen of the author of 
 " John Inglesant," who makes us feel we are living 
 in the midst of those noble halls and colleges, filled 
 with the still stately wreck of what was the most 
 refined and polished of European courts. 
 
 It will be remembered that the king and Rupert 
 were lodgers at the deanery of Christchurch, and 
 
64 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 that the queen occupied rooms and held her court 
 in Merton College. As ill luck would have it, no 
 sooner had Henrietta Maria arrived in Oxford 
 than she insisted on her former favourites — who 
 were mostly men without a shadow of principle, 
 and in every way unworthy of filling important 
 positions — being placed in high command. One of 
 these men was Lord Digby, whom she persuaded 
 the king to appoint as State Secretary, in the 
 place of Falkland. Another was Wilmot, another 
 of the queen's creatures ; and another, Ashburnham. 
 Rupert, knowing but too well how unfitted these 
 three men were for the offices they were to fill, 
 protested in vain with the king, who was com- 
 pletely in the power of the queen, and the prince ^ 
 soon experienced how strong was the cabal formed 
 against him by the queen's party ; in every way 
 he was now thwarted and hampered. In the 
 picturesque sense, the presence of the queen, who 
 had still remains of the singular charm that her 
 portraits by Vandyck convey, must have added 
 greatly to the attractions of Oxford in those days, 
 surrounded as she was by some of the loveliest 
 women in England ; among these the most note- 
 worthy were the fair Duchess of Richmond, the 
 young widowed Lady Aubigny, whose lord had 
 fallen at Edgehill, and the lovely Isabella Thynne 
 
 .,;l-^ .»•• 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR. 65 
 
 -fair faces that still smile on us in their fadeless 
 
 colours from the canvas of the great Sir Anthony. 
 
 Early in that year (1644), a descent into England 
 was threatened by the Scotch. To meet this new 
 danger, Rupert's services were required. In order 
 to give the prince greater authority in this com- 
 mand, the king, during the sitting of the Parlia- 
 ment which he had summoned to meet at Oxford, 
 created Rupert, on the 22nd of January, a peer of 
 England, with the titles of Duke of Cumberland 
 and Earl of Holderness. 
 
 The Royal army was recalled from Ireland ; that 
 army had been defeated by Fairfax at Nantwich, 
 on the 26th of January, a defeat which caused a 
 scare in the counties of Cheshire and Shropshire ; 
 and Rupert was despatched to "give new life," as 
 Clarendon expresses it, to the Royal cause in the 
 north-west. 
 
 The prince left Oxford on the 6th of February, 
 and on the 19th he arrived before Shrewsbury. 
 The comparative slowness of his march on this 
 occasion appears to have been caused by the ill 
 will towards him of the queen's faction, who threw 
 almost as many obstacles in his expedition to 
 the north as were met by Wellington during his 
 Peninsula campaign at the hands of the Govern- 
 ment. The war had now assumed a far more 
 
 F 
 
66 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 bitter character than it had previously done. This 
 embittered feeling on both sides was owing to a 
 decree from Parliament, commanding that every 
 soldier in the Royal pay, belonging to the army of 
 Ireland, when captured was to be immediately 
 hung as an " Irish rebel and a papist" The con- 
 sequences were not slow in showing themselves, 
 and the war had now become a far more vindictive 
 and a crueller conflict on both sides. At Nantwich, 
 .thirteen men belonging to Rupert's regiment, who 
 had been taken prisoners, were hung by the 
 governor of that town. 
 
 - Reprisals naturally followed, and the next batch 
 of prisoners that fell into the hands of the Royalists, 
 out of fourteen, thirteen were executed : the lucky 
 one who escaped was sent to Essex to tell him 
 what had happened to his unfortunate comrades ; 
 and Rupert, whose temper was fully roused, sent 
 further instructions, notifying that for every single 
 man on the Royalist side not killed in fair fight, 
 two of the enemy should suffer. This stern, but 
 not unjustifiable, act of high-handed justice on the 
 side of Rupert had the desired effect of checking 
 the new fashion of hanging prisoners, which had 
 been inaugurated by the Parliament party. 
 
 The prince now pushed northwards, marching 
 by Shrewsbury, Chester, and Newark. At the last 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR. 6/ 
 
 place the prince had a narrow escape ; he was, 
 as usual, well in advance of his men, when three 
 of the enemy's troopers dashed on him. One of 
 these he run through the body, a second was shot 
 by one of Rupert's troopers, and the third, whose 
 hand grasped the collar of the prince's coat, had 
 his hand lopped off by one of Rupert's officers, 
 who had come up in time to his assistance. Al- 
 though not wounded, a musket-ball had passed 
 through the prince's gauntlet. Newark was in 
 the hands of the enemy, and Sir John Meldrum 
 was the governor. A spirited sortie was made 
 by the besieged, but Rupert had the advantage, 
 and on the day following, the 22nd of March, 
 Meldrum capitulated. 
 
 The relief of Newark gave fresh courage to the 
 Royal cause ; but the want of the two most vital 
 elements in war — men and money — was now sorely 
 felt by the prince. In spite of his success, Rupert 
 was obliged to fall back into Wales, in order there 
 to raise fresh troops. In the mean while, the Mar- 
 quis of Newcastle was in full retreat before the 
 Scottish army, and Rupert received pressing mes- 
 sages from him to come to his assistance. From 
 Oxford also came urgent entreaties that he would 
 return ; it seemed that wherever Rupert was not, 
 the Royal cause was in peril. But with all his 
 
 i^'i^t',' 
 
68 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 amazing energy, Rupert could not equal the per- 
 formances of Sir Boyle Roche's historical bird. 
 The king's orders had first to be obeyed ; and we 
 accordingly next find the prince soon back at Oxford 
 where he arrived on the 25th of April. Oxford 
 had been much alarmed lest Essex should capture 
 it ] so great was the danger considered, that the 
 queen had fled some days before Rupert's return, 
 and taken shelter at Exeter, there to await her 
 approaching confinement. The king now again 
 prepared to take the field ; he had sent troops 
 to Marlborough with a view of intimidating the 
 western counties. On the arrival of the prince, 
 Charles summoned a council of war. Rupert 
 advised that the neighbouring towns, as well as 
 Oxford, should be strongly garrisoned — to wit, 
 Reading, Wallingford, Abingdon, and Banbury — 
 and that any other forces that were available 
 should be sent to Lyme, where his brother, Prince 
 Maurice, was then quartered. Rupert left Oxford 
 for Shrewsbury on the 5th of May, in order to 
 carry out an enterprise such as suited his gallant 
 temperament to perfection. This was to raise the 
 siege of Lathom House, which place had for the 
 last eighteen weeks been stoutly defended against 
 Fairfax by that heroic dame Charlotte de la Tr6- 
 mouille, Countess of Derby. Leaving Shrewsbury 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR. 69 
 
 in the middle of the month of May, Rupert arrived 
 at Chester on the 20th. Three days after, he had 
 a successful brush with the enemy at Knutsford ; 
 and on the 25th he took the town of Stockport. 
 The old castle of Lathom stood about half way 
 between Ormskirk and Wigan ; it had been strongly 
 fortified, and had a most determined though small 
 garrison within ; but its chatelaine inspired that 
 garrison with a courage such as is rarely recorded 
 in history. Left, when her lord was fighting in the 
 south, in charge of his castle, and with but a few 
 devoted retainers, Lady Derby, on being sum- 
 moned by Fairfax, on the 28th of February, to 
 surrender, acted, in order to gain time to be able 
 to strengthen her position, with all a woman's 
 ruse. Fairfax's patience lasted till the 12th of 
 March, when his guns opened fire on Lathom 
 House. The castle unfortunately lay in a hollow ; 
 but the walls were in many places six feet thick, 
 strengthened with towers, one of which, called • 
 the Eagle's Tower, formed the keep of the build- 
 ing. Again the summons to surrender was made 
 by the Parliamentary general. 
 
 Lady Derby's answer is worth recording. 
 ** Though a woman and a stranger, divorced 
 from my friends and robbed of my estate, I am 
 ready to receive your utmost violence, trusting 
 
70 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 to God for protection and deliverance." Proud 
 and noble words, and nobly kept to the last ! 
 
 The siege now waxed hot, and the small gar- 
 rison of some three hundred men with six officers, 
 armed with but some insignificant pieces of cannon 
 and blunderbusses, were hard pressed. The be- 
 sieeers numbered between some two and three 
 
 o 
 
 thousand men, and were amply supplied with 
 munition and stores from the town of Stockport 
 and from Bolton. 
 
 The siege was carried out under the command 
 of a Colonel Rigby, who appears to have had an 
 old grudge against Lord Derby. On hearing that 
 Rupert was on the march to relieve the garrison 
 of Lathom, Rigby sent a final summons to the 
 countess ; but she scornfully rejected any terms, 
 tearing up the paper on which Rigby demanded 
 the surrender of her castle. "Go back," she said, 
 *'to your commander, and tell that insolent rebel 
 he shall have neither person, goods, nor house. 
 When our strength is spent, we shall find a fire 
 more merciful than Rigby ; and then, if the pro- 
 vidence of God prevent it not, my goods and house 
 shall burn in his sight — myself, my children, and 
 my soldiers. Rather than fall into his hands, we 
 will seal our religion and our loyalty in the same 
 flame." 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR, J I 
 
 What a lion's heart beat in this woman's breast ! 
 Strangely, enough, her portrait at Knowsley bears 
 nothing striking in the countenance ; nothing in 
 
 her features or expression indicate a courage that 
 placed Charlotte de la Trdmouille nearly on a 
 par with such heroines as Joan of Arc or Grace 
 Darling. 
 
 There is to my mind nothing more superb, more 
 truly satisfactory, than this episode of a woman's 
 courage, throughout that long series of mistakes 
 and misfortunes, blunders and butchery, known 
 as the great Civil War. The deeds performed 
 by that little garrison were as spirited as Lady 
 Derby's words. She superintended every detail 
 of the defence. 
 
 One night a sally was made by the besieged, 
 in which a large number of the enemy were killed, 
 and the plucky little garrison returned to Lathom 
 House, dragging back in triumph a huge mortar, 
 which had played with much effect on the castle. 
 During the height of the bombardnient, a huge 
 bomb from this mortar had fallen into the room 
 where Lady Derby and her children were together. 
 Finding that no one was injured, the countess 
 at once ordered a fresh sally to be made in return 
 for the compliment paid her by the enemy. This 
 incident has been made the subject of a picture 
 
72 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 by Mrs. E. M. Ward. Lady Derby is seated at 
 the dinner-table, with her children about her ; she 
 watches with apparent unconcern the entrance of 
 the dangerous missive from the foe, and remains 
 mistress of herself though " bombshells fall." 
 
 Be this incident true or not, it \s> certain that 
 this " martial lady," as the old chroniclers rightly 
 called her, changed nothing of the manner of her 
 ordinary life or occupations during the duration 
 of the siege ; and she even found time, during 
 that protracted and stormy siege, to attend prayers 
 with her children four times daily. At length her 
 courage was rewarded, for, on the 25th of May, 
 Rupert the deliverer, accompanied by Lord Derby, 
 appeared. Rigby and his crew took to their heels 
 and fled to Bolton. Rupert followed them, and, 
 after a bloody engagement, took the town. 
 
 Of the Parliamentarians there fell at Bolton 
 sixteen hundred men. Thirty-two stands of colours 
 were captured ; these were very appropriately 
 taken to Lathom House, and laid at the feet of 
 the heroic countess by her kinsman and deliverer, 
 Prince Rupert Charlotte de la Tremouille cer- 
 tainly deserved such homage ; and I should 
 recommend any painter in want of a good subject, 
 to portray the moment when the prince kneels 
 at the feet of his brave kinswoman, as she receives 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR. 73 
 
 the spoils of his victory from his hands. Rupert 
 now carried victory on his helm ; after the relief 
 of Lathom, and the taking of Bolton, nearly all 
 Lancashire fell into his power. 
 
 On the 1st of June the prince, having been 
 reinforced by ^v^ thousand horse with Goring at 
 their head, and eight hundred foot soldiers, made 
 his way towards Liverpool. When he reached 
 Wigan, Rupert rode through streets which had 
 been strewn with flowers. 
 
 Liverpool was then an insignificant town as to 
 size, but a place of importance from its being the 
 port through which the troops to Ireland passed 
 in order to reach Lancashire. 
 
 The prince was soon in possession of Liverpool 
 — that town had made but a feeble resistance to 
 the Royalists. Rupert was now free to strike up 
 country to York. He had recently received a 
 very pressing order from the king to give battle 
 to the enemy before that city. This order is 
 important to remember, having been given by 
 Charles, as it absolves Rupert from the accusation 
 made against him, after the battle of Marston 
 Moor, that it was fought at his own instigation ; 
 and that he was consequently responsible for the 
 result of that disaster. 
 
 Among the Parliamentary generals who were 
 
74 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 now besieging York, were Fairfax, Manchester, 
 and Leven. Parliament sent orders that Rupert's 
 advance should be stopped, if possible, while the 
 prince was in Lancashire. 
 
 However, the Parliamentary generals could not 
 leave York, and Rupert was allowed to ride across 
 the hills which divide the counties of Lancashire 
 and Yorkshire without molestation. 
 
 The prince arrived at Knaresborough on the 
 30th of June. On the ist of July, the two hostile 
 armies came within sight of one another near 
 Gartrey Forest. At all risks Rupert was deter- 
 mined to relieve the besieged garrison in York 
 hard by. Crossing the Ouse, he approached the 
 city on its northern side, and bivouacked nearly 
 beneath its walls that night. Messengers were 
 sent to apprise Lord Newcastle, in command of 
 the garrison, of his arrival, and the prince desired 
 him to join the Royal army on the following day. 
 Meanwhile the Parliamentarians passed the night 
 in and around the village of Long Marston, some 
 seven miles distant from York. In command of 
 their cavalry was Cromwell, and with him David 
 Leslie ; they were quartered on Marston Moor. 
 Newcastle, a poor soldier, wished for delay before 
 attacking the enemy ; the marquis believed that if 
 the battle were deferred there might be a split in 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR, 75 
 
 the enemy's camp, as it was rumoured that the 
 Parliamentary generals were not on good terms. 
 Rupert showed him the king's letter, giving the 
 prince absolute command to fight the enemy when- 
 ever he came near him. Then Newcastle had to 
 yield. On the subject of Rupert's determination 
 to fight, Mr. Gardiner writes as follows : " Rupert 
 had never yet met the horsemen whom he had not 
 scattered, and, as the events of that evening were 
 to prove, had he been personally as successful on 
 Marston Moor as he had been on every field 
 stricken since the war began, the victory would 
 have been won along the whole line, and there can 
 be no serious doubt that that victory would have 
 given to Charles once more an undisputed throne.'* 
 Throughout that long July day the two armies 
 stood face to face. The army of the Parliament 
 occupied the summit of the Moor ; they exceeded 
 that of the Royalists by upwards of a thousand 
 men. 
 
 The cavalry commanded by Cromwell and 
 Leslie were drawn up on the left ; next stood 
 Crawford's and Baillie's Scottish infantry. On the 
 extreme left, and leaning on the village of Long 
 Marston, was more cavalry, under the leadership 
 of Sir Thomas Fairfax. The reserves of foot and 
 horse were placed in the rear, under the charge of 
 
76 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Lord Fairfax. The army was thus arranged in 
 five columns. Facing Cromwell's redoubtable 
 Ironsides stood Rupert's cavalry. . Lord Newcastle 
 commanded the centre of the Royal force, and 
 opposite to Sir Thomas Fairfax was placed Goring's 
 horse. 
 
 It was the first time that the prince had found 
 an opportunity to measure himself and his Cavaliers 
 with Cromwell and his Ironsides ; and we can be 
 sure he eagerly waited the signal of attack. 
 
 '* Is Cromwell there ? " asked Rupert of a prisoner, 
 pointing to the enemy's horse across the Moor ; 
 ** and will they fight ? If they will, they shall have 
 fighting enough." The prince sent a messenger 
 challenging Cromwell. Oliver's answer was as 
 warlike as the prince's message. '' If it please God, 
 we shall ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 A strange sight it must have been to watch these 
 serried battalions facing each other, and eager to 
 be at each other's throats, on that second day of 
 July, 1643. 
 
 As if the elements were in accord with the scene 
 about to be enacted on earth that summer's day, 
 heavy thunder-clouds gathered above, and as the 
 evening closed, a heavy thunder-storm broke over 
 Marston Moor. While the thunder-claps rolled 
 further away in lessening peals of sound, there 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MARSTON MOOR. yj 
 
 uprose from the ranks of Cromwell's troopers a 
 stentorian hymn of praise to the God of battles, 
 and of defiance to their enemies. Rupert, not to 
 be outdone even in this respect, had prayers read 
 at the head of his regiment, and, this service being 
 over, the battle commenced at last. 
 
 Simultaneously the artillery flashed along the 
 darkening moor, and in another instant Rupert 
 charged the Scottish infantry. These were regarded 
 by both Charles and himself as doubly traitors ; 
 and, longing as the prince was to measure swords 
 with Cromwell, his first attack was directed at the 
 northern double-dyed traitors, as he considered 
 them. Clear and distinct above the clash and din 
 of arms rang out Rupert's well-known battle-cry, 
 and soon the Scotch were hurled back, and had 
 not Cromwell now arrived to their aid, it would 
 have gone ill with them ; but the hour had arrived 
 when the fiery young prince was to meet his match. 
 Cromwell, although slightly wounded in the neck, 
 and with his first line of Ironsides broken, came 
 thundering down on Rupert. An heroic fight 
 ensued. To add to Rupert's difficulties, Leslie 
 appeared with fresh cavalry in support of Oliver ; 
 and for the first time during the war, the prince 
 experienced the bitterness of defeat. While Crom- 
 well and Leslie were driving back the Royal horse, 
 
78 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 the battle continued with varying success. In the 
 centre the Parliament, however, were gaining 
 ground ; but Sir Thomas Fairfax and his cavalry 
 were forced to fly by Goring's horse. But this 
 success could not turn the fortunes of the day, and 
 Rupert's defeat seems to have discouraged the 
 Royalist army. Before Leslie the Irish horse is 
 scattered, and the celebrated " white coats,*' under 
 Newcastle, are cut to pieces almost to a man ; but, 
 like the old Guard at Waterloo, scorn to surrender. 
 Cromwell is triumphant ; his star has indeed arisen, 
 bloodstained but brilliant. 
 
 The loss of the battle of '' Marston Moor " 
 was a crushing blow to the king, for it entailed 
 the loss of all the north of England, a few places 
 of little importance excepted. Newcastle, after 
 throwing the entire blame of the disaster on 
 Rupert, got into his coach and drove calmly 
 out of York, and succeeded in putting the sea 
 between him and the enemy. Rupert's conduct 
 was of a very different kind. Although defeated, 
 he had no idea of throwing up the cause for which 
 he had so nobly fought, and, with his splendid 
 power of organization, succeeded, in a short time, 
 in raising a fresh force of cavalry to the number of 
 some six thousand. With these at his back, he 
 retreated from York, which, soon after his depar- 
 
LATHOM HOUSE AND MAKSTON MOOR. 79 
 
 ture, on the i6th of July, fell into the hands of the 
 victorious Roundheads. 
 
 Besides the immense moral effect of the battle 
 of Marston Moor, the loss to the Royal side was 
 very great, both in bag and baggage, artillery and 
 colours ; so great were the number of the latter, 
 that a writer of the time said the victors had 
 enough material to make surplices for all the 
 cathedrals in the land, had these standards only 
 been white in colour. Some four thousand men 
 of the Royal army had fallen. Perhaps what the 
 prince most regretted on that day was the loss of 
 his favourite friend and companion, his beautiful 
 dog, " Boy," who had accompanied him like his 
 shadow, and had shared all his dangers and priva- 
 tions, until it became a belief with the Roundheads 
 that '' Boy " was Rupert's " familiar spirit ! " Fol- 
 lowing his beloved master wherever he went, poor 
 " Boy " met with a soldier's death on Marston 
 
 Moor. 
 
 Marching rapidly to the south, where his presence 
 was much wanted, the prince met the gallant 
 Montrose at Richmond in Yorkshire. A strong 
 fellow-feeling united these two Cavaliers ; and to 
 the end of his life Montrose evinced a strong feel- 
 ing of affection and admiration for Rupert. Passing 
 through Lancashire, Rupert reached Shrewsbury 
 
So RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 at the close of July. It is worth while noting, 
 before we leave the bloodstained field of Marston 
 Moor, that it was in that battle that Rupert named 
 Cromwell's cavalry ** The Ironsides " — a surname 
 proudly adopted by all Oliver's cavalry. No term 
 could better have described these splendid troopers, 
 probably the grandest specimens of self-made 
 soldiers that the world has seen. 
 
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 CHAPTER VL 
 
 NASEBY AND BRISTOL. 
 
 A CONSIDERABLE lull in the campaign followed the 
 defeat of the Royal army at Marston Moor ; but 
 as the summer of 1644 commenced, Rupert was as 
 active as ever, but without taking part in anything 
 of much moment till the day of Naseby. 
 
 For many a long week Rupert awaited fresh 
 ammunition from Ireland ; he remained most of 
 the early part of the year in Lancashire, with a 
 force of five thousand horse. 
 
 Early in July, Charles determined to follow 
 Essex into the west, and if possible to give him 
 battle. 
 
 On the king's march through Somersetshire, 
 
 great efforts were made to raise that county in 
 
 his favour, but without much success. 
 
 ^ Charles arrived at Exeter at the end of July, 
 
 where he was met by Rupert's brother. Prince 
 
 G 
 
^2 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Maurice, who brought with him five thousand 
 men. Essex was at this time at Tavistock. 
 
 On the 27th of July, Essex crossed the Tamar. 
 Cornwall received him badly, that county being 
 on the side of the Royalists. 
 
 Following up Essex, the king arrived, on the 
 2nd of August, at Liskeard. Essex meanwhile 
 retreated from Bodmin to Lostwithiel. 
 
 About this time some futile attempts were made 
 to patch up a truce, if not a peace, by Essex. The 
 Parliamentary general was in a fix, and, indeed, his 
 situation was one of great danger. Unable to 
 receive help from Waller, and at the head of only 
 ten thousand men, Essex now found that he 
 was being gradually surrounded by the Royalists, 
 whose strength exceeded his by six thousand 
 horse and foot 
 
 The king's army had also the superiority over 
 that of Essex of having open communication 
 across the river Fowey. The result was that Essex 
 was hemmed in on two sides, on the land side, as 
 well as on the side of the sea. 
 
 There was nothing left for him to do but either 
 to surrender or to cut his way through the far 
 larger force which now blocked him in on every 
 side. 
 
 On the last day of the month, the Parliamentary 
 
NASEDY AND BRISTOL. Z^ 
 
 army retreated to Fowey. During the following 
 night, Essex, accompanied by only two other 
 officers, succeeded in making his escape in an 
 open boat, and in reaching Plymouth. 
 
 To compare great events to small, this miserable 
 ending of the Western campaign by the army of 
 the Parliament, and the escape of its commander, 
 somewhat resembled Napoleon's retreat out of 
 Russia, in 1812. 
 
 On the 2nd of September, the Parliamentary 
 army surrendered. On this occasion the king 
 showed unusual leniency, for he allowed the 
 soldiers their liberty, after they had surrendered 
 their arms. 
 
 The close of the month again saw Charles and 
 Rupert re-united. The prince's next task was to 
 collect recruits for the king's army from Bristol ; 
 an ineffectual effort was made by Charles to bring 
 Waller to bay, but the general succeeded in escap- 
 ing from the king, and was able to join forces with 
 Manchester. The king was not more successful in 
 his attempt to relieve Lord Winchester, or "Old 
 Loyalty," as he was called, besieged at Basing 
 House. Foiled again on this occasion, Charles 
 retired to Newbury, where he waited till Rupert, 
 with his Bristol reinforcements, could join him. 
 What is known as the second battle of Newbury 
 
84 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 took place on the 27th of October. Rupert took 
 no part in this engagement, and therefore it is 
 not necessary to do more than allude to it in 
 passing. The battle, like so many in these wars, 
 was a drawn one, and neither side profited by it. 
 
 On the ist of November, the king was back 
 again in his good city of Oxford, where Rupert 
 soon appeared, bringing with him ^v^ thousand 
 fresh troops from Bristol. At Oxford, Rupert was 
 given the entire command of the horse. On the 
 7th of November, the king and prince left Oxford 
 to the relief of Donnington Castle. The royal 
 army now numbered some eleven thousand men. 
 Two days after leaving Oxford, they arrived 
 before Donnington. Although they were close to 
 the enemy, no engagement took place. Rupert 
 had shown, since his defeat at Marston Moor, 
 greater prudence in his tactics, and determined 
 not to attack the enemy, without doing so from 
 a place of vantage, and none could he find near 
 Donnington. Without striking a blow, the Royal 
 army returned, the 23rd of November, to Oxford. 
 That city had in the mean while been fortified, and 
 the king felt now more secure. 
 
 The defeat of Essex had damped the ardour of 
 the Parliament,' and the issue of Marston Moor 
 was well-nigh forgotten ; even Cromwell seems, at 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL. 8$ 
 
 this period of the war, to have been discouraged. 
 At the close of that year and the early months of 
 1645, Rupert was as indefatigable as usual. He 
 was ever in the saddle, and visited every garrison 
 in the neighbourhood, organizing the fighting 
 strength of places as far distant as Bristol and 
 Ludlow, among a score of others. 
 \ He deserves all the more praise, as not only 
 was he the life and soul of the war, but his task was 
 made more difficult from his having but little assist- 
 ance from such incompetent officers as Goring, 
 Digby, and Ashburnham. 
 
 Rupert's last campaign during the Civil War 
 commenced on the 7th of May, of the year 1645. 
 Although the Royal army numbered early in that 
 year but eleven thousand men, thanks to Rupert's 
 zeal Charles had in the early summer at his 
 back twenty thousand soldiers. With this army, 
 the king considered himself strong enough to 
 relieve Chester, to recover Yorkshire, to seize 
 Taunton, and finally to drive the rebel Scots over 
 the border. Regarding these weighty matters, a 
 council was held at Stow-in-the-Wold, at which 
 both the king and Rupert were present 
 
 At Stow the king was met by Lord Byron, with 
 the good news that Brereton, on hearing of Charles's 
 northern march, had retired from Chester. . 
 
S6 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 Pushing on to the north, the Royal army sat 
 down before Leicester. Here Rupert took in hand 
 the siege operations ; he soon cut a breach in the 
 walls from his guns placed in a couple of batteries, 
 and through this breach Colonel Leslie led the 
 storming-column. The struggle was severe ; and 
 repeatedly had the stormers to fall back before 
 the heavy fire poured on them. Rupert now 
 ordered up the king's guards, who, with levelled 
 pikes, soon made themselves masters of the place. 
 The town was sacked, and the loss of life very 
 large. 
 
 The king was much elated at the fall of Leicester, 
 and wrote very jubilantly thereon to the queen. 
 Another council of war was now summoned. 
 The prince was strongly in favour of continuing 
 the march to the north, but he was overruled by 
 the king, who lent his ear to the councils of Digby 
 and Ashburnham ; these urged him to return to 
 Oxford, and raise its siege, then being carried out 
 by Fairfax. 
 
 The prince was highly incensed. Writing to 
 his " dear Will " (Colonel Legge), at that time 
 Governor of Oxford, and in whom Rupert placed 
 the most unlimited confidence, he describes the 
 conduct of Digby and Ashburnham as "a plot." 
 
 One of Charles's many misfortunes during these 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL, %^ 
 
 wars was that he never could get his officers to 
 agree ; and the above is but an instance out of 
 many. On arriving at Daventry, Charles received 
 the unexpected intelligence that Fairfax had 
 abandoned the siege of Oxford. In consequence 
 of this the king again marched north. 
 
 During this march a tradition tells of the king, 
 when passing the night at Lukenham Old Hall, 
 an ancient manor house, being for the second time 
 visited by the spectre of Strafford. This was 
 considered a sure presage of coming disaster. 
 
 That evening news reached Rupert, at Har- 
 borough, that some of the enemy's cavalry had 
 had a skirmish with a body of Cavaliers in the 
 neighbourhood of Naseby, a village standing on 
 a stretch of wild open country, a few miles to the 
 
 south. 
 
 A messenger was despatched to apprise the 
 king of the enemy's being at hand. Charles 
 joined the prince at Harborough, where at mid- 
 night a council of war sat. Again Rupert advised 
 prudence ; he showed how necessary it was to 
 await fresh reinforcements before making a general 
 attack. Again the fatal councils of Digby and 
 Ashburnham prevailed, and Charles, following 
 their advice, hastened his coming doom. Straf- 
 ford's spectre seemed to be hovering near the 
 
S8 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 unfortunate monarch. All told, the king's army 
 consisted of ten thousand five hundred men. 
 
 The army was made up of the following regi- 
 ments. First, the two troops of the Royal Life 
 Guards, under the command of Lord Bernard 
 Stuart ; these, with Rupert's horse, and a few 
 others, brought up the Royal cavalry to about 
 five thousand five hundred. The infantry was 
 composed of five regiments, namely, the King's 
 Life Guards, Colonel Leslie's Foot, Prince Ru- 
 pert's, Lord Astley's, and Lord Bard's. These 
 made in all five thousand infantry. The Royal 
 force was drawn up on some rising ground about 
 a mile to the south of Harborough. The king 
 commanded in person the main body of the in- 
 fantry. Rupert was in command of the right 
 wing of the cavalry ; the left was under Sir Mar- 
 maduke Langdale, and the reserve were under the 
 care of the Earl of Lindsey. 
 
 The day commenced with a fatal move on the 
 part of the Royal army. For some unknown cause, 
 it commenced the attack, believing the enemy to 
 be in retreat. 
 
 Ireton, Cromwell, and Fairfax, who commanded 
 the enemy's battalions, seeing the mistake the 
 Royalists had made, calmly waited until the Royal 
 force had descended from the excellent position 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL. 89 
 
 they had at first held, until they were well in 
 between the village of Naseby on one side, and the 
 little town of Harborough on the other. Cromwell 
 commanded the cavalry on the right wing, Ireton 
 that on the left, and Fairfax on this occasion com- 
 manded in chief It was ten o'clock when, to the 
 cry of " Queen Mary ! " the Royalists charged. 
 
 That cry was answered by a shout of " God our 
 strength ! " from the army of the Parliament. 
 In the first charge Rupert beat back Ireton's 
 troopers. That general received a wound, and 
 for a short time became a prisoner ; but in the 
 hurly-burly of the fight managed to get away from 
 his captors. After pulverizing Ireton's division, 
 Rupert dashed on to the Parliamentary reserves, 
 and captured some of the enemy's artillery ; but 
 these he was not destined to keep. 
 
 As had so often happened before, while every- 
 thing gave way before the prince, the main body 
 of the Royalists were getting the worst of the day. 
 In order to reach the enemy, the king's infantry 
 had to march under a heavy fire up a hill, on the 
 top of which Fairfax and Skippon had placed 
 their forces. A murderous fight ensued in the 
 mel^e. Skippon was wounded ; and Fairfax, bare- 
 headed, for his helmet had been struck off, fought 
 like a lion. 
 
90 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Cromwell, with his Ironsides, now thundered 
 down the hill, and charged Langdale's horse, both 
 in front and flank, sweeping them down the hill. 
 Oliver then turned to where the main battle raged 
 fiercest, and came not too soon to Fairfax's relief 
 In a short time the fate of the day was decided. 
 In vain the king strove to rally his dispirited 
 soldiers. 
 
 In the bitterness of that moment of defeat, 
 Charles seemed eager to meet a glorious death. 
 But at this juncture his bridle was seized, and his 
 horse's head turned from the fight by the hand of 
 the Earl of Carnwarth. When the king was seen 
 to leave the field, the Royalists gave up all for lost, 
 and a general sauve qui pent took place ; and 
 when Rupert returned, he found the king's army 
 hopelessly beaten and in wild confusion. With 
 some difficulty did the prince force a w^ay for the 
 king through the mingled mass of friends and 
 foes. Of the effect that the loss of the battle 
 of Naseby had, Clarendon writes " that the king 
 and kingdom were both lost." 
 
 The spoils made by the enemy were immense ; 
 they had taken all the king's artillery, two 
 hundred gun-carriages, the king's horses and 
 coaches, nine thousand stands of arms, one hun- 
 dred stands of colours — among the latter were 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL. 9 1 
 
 the royal standard and the queen's "white 
 pennon," that, too, of the Princes Palatines — and 
 even the king's private correspondence. The loss 
 of the Royal army amounted to some five thou- 
 sand men slain or taken. For fourteen miles the 
 enemy pursued the beaten Cavaliers, till within 
 a few miles of Leicester. 
 
 An eye-witness has recorded that he saw the 
 dead on Naseby field extended over a distance of 
 four miles ; and on the spot where the king had 
 stood, they laid together in heaps. 
 
 Among the Cavalier officers slain on that day, 
 and whose names, as Clarendon writes, should be 
 held in remembrance, were, among others, Sir 
 Richard Cave, Sir Thomas Dallison, and Sir Peter 
 Brown. 
 
 A revolting and most discreditable incident, 
 which tarnished all the glory that the Roundheads 
 had gained at Naseby, was, that after the battle 
 was over a number of women, wives a few, but 
 mostly camp-followers of the officers and men on 
 the Royal side, were killed or wounded. 
 
 As a miserable palliation for this atrocious con- 
 duct, a plea was invented by the Parliamentarians, 
 that these wretched victims were nothing but Irish 
 *' queans," and consequently not within the pale of 
 humanity. 
 
'?^^- 
 
 92 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 This butchery, after the battle was over, was the 
 greatest infamy committed during the whole course 
 of the Civil War, and stains with everlasting dis- 
 grace both the men who acted so brutally, as well 
 as those who excused this inhuman conduct. 
 
 The king and Rupert rested during their flight 
 one night at Ashby-de-la-Zouch ; thence they rode 
 to Hereford, where Rupert left Charles to join 
 his garrison at Bristol. The king now went to 
 Ragland Castle, where the old Marquis of Wor- 
 cester, the wealthiest subject in the land, enter- 
 tained Charles with all manner of sports and 
 magnificence, just for all the world as if the 
 country were at peace, and no Cromwell and Fair- 
 fax triumphant. 
 
 On taking leave of the king, Rupert had some- 
 what rashly pledged his word to hold Bristol 
 against the enemy for at least four months ; an 
 impossible promise on the prince's part this proved 
 to be. At Bristol, under Rupert's command, were 
 about five thousand horse and foot, and the town 
 was amply provisioned. 
 
 Fairfax now approached Bristol, capturing on 
 his way Bridgewater, after a siege of two days, 
 also Sherborne Castle. What now befell Rupert 
 and the Royal army at Bristol, brings us to the 
 most critical event of the prince's military career — 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL. 93 
 
 a career which, although it had met with many 
 reverses, had till now been, even in adversity, so 
 brilliant, and placed above all the jealous shafts 
 that his enemies cast at him. But the prince's 
 conduct at Bristol is so out of accord with his 
 wonted rash courage and splendid daring, that it 
 has given some cause for the malignant tongues of 
 such men as Digby and Ashburnham, who were 
 never tired of saying that the prince could not be 
 relied upon, and that although no one could doubt 
 his courage, his uncertain temper made him un- 
 trustworthy in critical situations. 
 
 What occurred was as follows. Fairfax's plan 
 to take Bristol was by blockade ; but Cromwell 
 was impatient for a speedier issue, and pressed 
 Fairfax to storm the place. In a letter to his dear 
 friend, Colonel Legge, written on the 29th of July, 
 the prince says that he does " well to wonder why 
 Prince Rupert is not with the king ; but when you 
 know the Lord Digby's intention to ruin him, you 
 will not then find it strange. But all this," he 
 adds, "shall not hinder me from doing my duty 
 where I am, and that which shall become your 
 friend Rupert." 
 
 On the 1 0th of September, the town was 
 stormed from all sides at once, the signal be- 
 ing given by lighting a bonfire on the top of a 
 
94 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 neighbouring hill, and by a discharge of cannon 
 from Fairfax's quarters. Colonel Montague and 
 Pickering's brigade effected a successful entrance 
 at Lawford's Gate, taking twenty-two " great guns," 
 and many prisoners. They were ably seconded by 
 Desborough with one of Fairfax's regiments of 
 horse and a part of Colonel Graves's. Sir Hardress 
 Waller's regiment attacked the works between 
 Lawford's Gate and the river Frome, while Pride's 
 regiment stormed fiercely the two other principal 
 forts. In vain Rupert made desperate efforts to 
 keep out the enemy, they swarmed in on every 
 side. 
 
 On the Somersetshire side, the enemy were not 
 so successful ; owing to a mistake regarding the 
 height of the works, the scaling-ladders were found 
 to be too short ; but eventually, there, too, the 
 Parliamentarians gained the day. 
 
 A council of war was now held by the Royalists ; 
 and the fact of the council being in favour, is a 
 fact which ought to exonerate the prince from the 
 heavy blame he incurred in the eyes of the king 
 at the surrender of Bristol. 
 
 That the siege might have been prolonged 
 from the Castle, in spite of the outer works beino- 
 taken, was indeed possible, but with a certainty of 
 a great loss of life, and with little prospect of outer 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL. 95 
 
 assistance arriving in time to save the garrison. 
 As to the relief which Charles, after the fall of 
 Bristol, said he would certainly have been able to 
 carry to that place, we have the testimony of Sir 
 Edward Walker, no friend of Rupert's, who states 
 that this assistance spoken of by the king was 
 entirely theoretical. 
 
 The council of war who, as well as the prince, 
 signed the conditions of surrender, was composed 
 of such good men and true on the king's side as, 
 among others. Lords Hawley and Lumley, Colonel 
 John Russell, Sir Matthew Appleyard, and two 
 Slingsby's, When the news of the capitulation of 
 Bristol reached Charles, his indignation knew no 
 bounds. In the first paroxysm of his fury, he 
 threatened to have his nephew court-martialled, 
 and the king showed his vindictiveness by putting 
 Colonel Legge, a staunch Cavalier, and at that 
 time Governor of Oxford, under arrest, merely 
 because of his being a great personal friend of 
 Rupert's. In a letter Charles wrote at this period 
 of his unjust anger towards Rupert, he says to his 
 secretary Nicholas, "Tell my son" (the Prince of 
 Wales) '' that I shall less grieve that he is knocked 
 on the head than that he should do so mean an 
 action as is the rendering of Bristol Castle and 
 Fort upon the terms it was." He also wrote a 
 
g6 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 scathing letter to Rupert, in which he revoked all 
 his commissions, and ordered him to leave the 
 country. 
 
 Such is sometimes the gratitude of princes ! 
 And well now might the prince have quoted, like 
 Strafford, the Psalm in which reliance in princes 
 is discouraged by the Psalmist. . 
 
 One may be sure that at this time Digby and 
 Ashburnham kept up the king's rancour against 
 the prince, and it was Digby who signed the pass- 
 port to enable Rupert to leave the country. But 
 Rupert had no intention of leaving yet. The 
 prince's reply to his angry relation was respectful 
 in tone and dignified in its quiet self-defence. Its 
 effect was soon apparent on the king ; but Charles 
 seems to have avoided a personal interview at this 
 time with his nephew — an interview which Rupert 
 had applied for, — but Rupert was not easily baffled. 
 
 Before passing to other events which took place 
 soon after the surrender of Bristol, it would be as 
 well to refer those readers who wish to have more 
 detail about that surrender, to Warburton's work, 
 '* Rupert and the Cavaliers," in which the prince's 
 defence or declaration regarding that event is 
 given, from the original, at full length. 
 
 To doubt Rupert's loyalty to his uncle and king 
 were as absurd as to doubt his personal valour ; 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL. 9/ 
 
 but Rupert's nature was impetuous — a nature in 
 which patience was not combined with bravery. 
 He appears, after the rout at Naseby, to have lost 
 all hope of saving the Royal cause. His was also 
 a nature better suited in warfare for attack than 
 for defence. 
 
 Determined to see his uncle, and to give him a 
 verbal explanation of the surrender, Rupert, with a 
 body of eighty followers, rode to Banbury, where he 
 was joined by Prince Maurice. In order to reach 
 the king, the princes had to fight their way through 
 a crowd of enemies ; but they arrived at length in 
 safety at Belvoir Castle. The following day they 
 pursued their journey, and arrived at Newark, 
 where Charles was now residing. Before reaching 
 that town they were met by its governor, Sir 
 Richard Willis, who came some distance to welcome 
 the two princes after their perilous ride through 
 the heart of the country then qccupied in force by 
 the enemy. The prince was coldly received by 
 Charles, and Rupert insisted on being tried by 
 a court-martial. At this council, which met on 
 the 1 8th of October, the following were present :— 
 '' Our right trusty and well-beloved cousin and 
 councillor, Montagu, Eari of Lindsey, Lord Great 
 Chamberiain of England; our right trusty and 
 well-beloved cousin, Richard, Earl of Cork; our 
 
 H 
 
98 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 right trusty and well-beloved Jacob, Lord Astley, 
 Field Marshal-General of our Army ; John, Lord 
 Bellasis, Captain-General of our Horse Guards ; 
 and Charles, Lord Gerrard, Lieutenant-General of 
 all our horse forces ; our trusty and well-beloved 
 Sir Richard Willis, Knight and Baronet, Governor 
 of Newark ; and John Ashburnham, Esquire, our 
 Treasurer of War/' It is satisfactory to know that 
 the result of this court-martial was entirely to 
 exonerate Rupert of any act of infidelity to his 
 king and trust. However, in spite of this, Charles 
 showed that he still bore ill will to his nephew, 
 who had on a hundred occasions risked his life in 
 his cause. 
 
 Soon after the above events, an angry scene 
 occurred in the presence of the king. Sir Richard 
 Willis, a friend of Rupert's, was dismissed from his 
 post of Governor of Newark, and Lord Bellasis 
 replaced him. Lord Bellasis was a friend of 
 Digby*s, and consequently an enemy of Rupert's. 
 On hearing of this nomination, Rupert complained 
 with much bitterness to the king of the slight 
 which this appointment was to him, and an angry 
 discussion ensued. The king left Newark shortly 
 after, and returned to Oxford. Rupert fought his 
 way to the south, by Belvoir Castle, Worcester, 
 and Woodstock. Later on, towards the close of 
 
NASEBY AND BRISTOL, 99 
 
 that year, the king became reconciled to Rupert ; 
 and when Charles apprised the prince of his fatal 
 intention of throwing himself on the honour of the 
 Scottish army, Rupert did all he could to dissuade 
 him from taking that step, and, finding that the 
 king was not to be shaken in his resolution, begged 
 that he might at any rate accompany him to the 
 north, and share his dangers. Charles, it is said, 
 feared that the stately form and well-known face 
 of the handsome prince would be recognized, 
 and betray them to his enemies, and declined. 
 Disguised as a servant, Charles left Oxford almost 
 alone. With the flight of the king, the war was for 
 a time at an end in England, and both Rupert and 
 Maurice's occupation in fighting for their royal 
 uncle was at an end. The Parliament allowed the 
 royal brothers to leave the country without moles- 
 tation ; their bearing and courage had made them 
 respected even by their foes. 
 
lOO RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 LAST YEARS. 
 
 Although it is not an easy matter to follow 
 Rupert's campaigns when on land, it is infinitely- 
 more difficult to do so when he is fighting at sea. 
 The only authority one has to follow is a very ill- 
 written, wearisome journal, or rather log, kept by 
 some nameless scribe, which embraces the four 
 years during which the prince's rather piratical 
 adventures lasted. 
 
 This log has been copied in full by Warburton, 
 in his work on Rupert, and I shall merely attempt 
 to %\N^ as clear an abstract of that diary as 
 possible. 
 
 Before starting on his adventures at sea, our 
 prince, after leaving England in the early summer 
 of 1646, had some more fighting on shore. 
 
 Warmly welcomed by Louis XIV., Rupert was 
 entrusted with the command of all the fugitive 
 English Cavaliers who had sought refuge in France. 
 
LAST YEARS, 1 01 
 
 France was at that time at war with Spain, the 
 campaign taking place, as usual, in that European 
 cockpit, the Netherlands. It was a war of skir- 
 mishes and surprises, where not much glory could 
 be gained. The only event that I can find in 
 which the prince especially distinguished himself, 
 and where he showed his habitual daring, was when 
 a young English knight, Sir Robert Holmes, 
 having been severely wounded and his horse killed, 
 was about to be taken prisoner by the enemy, 
 when Rupert galloped up to the rescue, and 
 hoisting Sir Robert on his own horse, carried him 
 back in safety. Soon after this brave act, Rupert 
 was disabled from further fighting. A ball struck 
 him on the head, and he was for some time inva- 
 lided at Bethune. On his recovery, the prince paid 
 his relations a visit at St. Germain, already then 
 the abode of the banished house of Stuart. 
 
 While in France, Rupert was repeatedly asked 
 by the French king to enter his service ; but the 
 prince declined all these offers, and declared his 
 determination of adhering to the fortunes of his 
 uncle's cause, and of continuing to do battle with 
 his old enemies, the Parliamentarians. 
 
 In the following summer, Rupert went to Hol- 
 land, where the Prince of Wales and the chief of 
 the Royalist party had assembled. The king was 
 
I02 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 at this time a prisoner in the Isle of Wight, and a 
 scheme was afloat to attempt his rescue thence ; 
 but circumstances prevented this from being carried 
 into effect. 
 
 Part of the fleet had taken the Royalist side, and 
 of this portion Rupert was appointed, in the autumn, 
 Admiral-in-Chief It seems most incongruous that 
 such a post should be given to a soldier, however 
 distinguished that soldier might be, either from his 
 birth or his merit. In those days, however, it was 
 quite an ordinary change in command. The cases 
 of Monk and Blake are among the most notable of 
 such appointments. 
 
 Throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth cen- 
 turies it was not unusual for a statesman or a 
 soldier — provided he were of high rank — who 
 perhaps had never had any technical knowledge 
 of naval matters, to be suddenly placed in a position 
 of high command at sea. The wonder is that 
 fleets commanded by these landsmen were so often 
 able to do good service to the state. 
 
 In Mr. Hannay's admirable life of Blake, we 
 read that, '' To form an idea of the ships of that 
 time from anything which now floats is impossible. 
 A comparison with a steamer would of course be 
 absurd ; but even the great sailing clippers of to-day 
 are so widely different as to be utterly unlike. 
 
LAST YEARS. 10 
 
 1 
 
 These are longer, narrower, simpler in form, and 
 far more elaborately rigged. If we wish to realize 
 the sort of vessel which carried Blake's flag, per- 
 haps the best way would be to pay a visit to the 
 Victory, at Portsmouth, and then to the model 
 rooms at Greenwich. The deck of Nelson's flag- 
 ship looks small when seen from the poop, and the 
 George would have looked far smaller. She was 
 even broader in proportion to her length, and built 
 higher out of the water. Few of the ships in the 
 navy were over a thousand tons. 
 
 "These comparatively small vessels were more 
 imposing than they would seem likely to have been 
 from their mere size. Look at the model of the 
 Royal Sovereign (Mr. Peter Pitt's great ship) at 
 Greenwich, or at the Bristol of fifty guns, which 
 lived to be taken by Duguay-Trouin, or at the 
 nameless fifty-gun ship built in 1650. The stern 
 towers up, broad at the water-line and narrow 
 above. Here there is a thin strip of deck from 
 side to side. From below this runs out another 
 deck, with a slight downward slope, which ends 
 before the mizzen-mast. This is the poop. From 
 under this, again, comes out another, which ends 
 just before the main, and is known as the quarter- 
 deck. Standing on the edge of this, one would 
 look down on what, with some absurdity, is called 
 
104 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 the upper deck, because it was the highest of all 
 which ran the whole length of the vessel. Under 
 this was the main-deck, which, in the case of the 
 great ships, carried guns. From either side of the 
 quarter-deck two narrow gangways ran forward, 
 and ended in the forecastle. 
 
 " This was then exactly what its name implied : 
 a solid square fort rising from the level of the 
 upper deck, rather higher than the poop, carrying 
 guns, and capable of being defended, even if the 
 rest of the ship was in possession of an enemy. 
 These vessels were armed with from thirty-six to 
 seventy guns, ranging from six to forty-eight 
 pounders. The English ordnance of that day was 
 famous for its excellence, which may have had 
 something to do with inducing the Admiralty to 
 over-gun their ships, to the ruin of their sailing 
 powers. It is also to be noted that the English 
 men-of-war of the seventeenth century were the 
 best built vessels of their time. They were stronger 
 than the Dutch, in which timber was spared, from 
 motives of economy, and they drew more water. 
 The mediaeval love of adorning weapons and ships 
 still survived. Our war-vessels, and those of other 
 nations, were elaborately ornamented. Mr. Pitt 
 covered the stern, sides, and bows of his Royal 
 Sovereign with graven images of Neptune, Father 
 
LAST YEARS. 105 
 
 Thames, the Genius of England, Valour, Fortitude, 
 and his sacred Majesty. She was a slow ship ; 
 but even smaller vessels were covered with wood 
 carving, and had gilded laurel wreaths round the 
 upper parts. The rigging had just reached a 
 stage short of its complete development. 
 
 " Three-masted vessels carried courses, topsails, 
 and top-gallant sails. The place of the spanker, 
 on the mizzen, was occupied by a lateen sail, and 
 the bowsprit, which rose from under the front side 
 of the forecastle at a sharp angle, had a small 
 mast stepped at the end, carrying a square sail 
 known as the sprit." 
 
 It was a wretchedly inefficient fleet which 
 Rupert commanded, consisting of only three large 
 men-of-war : the Convertine^ the Antelope^ and the 
 SwalloWy and of four small cruisers. To strike 
 a blow at Blake and the Parliament fleet, now 
 under Warwick's command, was impossible, and 
 the chief object of the small Royalist fleet was 
 to collect as much money, in the shape of prizes, 
 for the Royal cause as they could lay hands on. 
 
 So impoverished were the Cavaliers that Rupert 
 had to sell the guns out of the Antelope in order 
 to be able to refit two of the smaller craft. Having 
 made some prizes, Rupert was at length able 
 to leave Helvoet Sluys on the 21st of January, 
 
106 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 .1649, cind to put out to sea with his fleet of • seven 
 sail. He made straight for Ireland, where at 
 Kinsale the news of his uncle's execution reached 
 him in a letter from Hyde, then at the Hague. 
 
 Disaster followed on disaster, and soon the 
 insurrection in favour of the new king lay crushed 
 to death under Cromwell's heel. With a small, 
 ^ feeble, and almost mutinous crew, Rupert, with all 
 his temerity, was unable to attack the enemy's 
 fleet, which now blockaded the harbour of Kinsale. 
 That fleet was commanded by Blake and Deane ; 
 and Blake at sea was a more formidable foe to 
 Rupert than had even been Cromwell on land. 
 • The summer passed in forced inaction, and not 
 until the storms of the autumn set in was the 
 prince enabled to give Blake the slip. He did so 
 successfully, and made straight for the coast of 
 Portugal. 
 
 . In November, Rupert arrived at Lisbon, where 
 he met at first with a cordial welcome from the 
 king. 
 
 When the news of his arrival at Lisbon reached 
 London, Blake was ordered to follow Rupert. 
 Two months passed before the Parliamentary fleet 
 was ready, and in February of the following year 
 (1650) Blake, at the head of a fleet of seventeen 
 war-ships, started in pursuit. - 
 
LAST YEARS. 10/ 
 
 During the interval between Rupert's arrival . 
 and that of Blake, the Prince appears to have 
 passed a pleasant time in Portugal, being popular 
 with the people, and also at court. He hunted 
 and took part in all the gaieties of the place. 
 
 But when Blake and his fleet appeared at the 
 mouth of the Tagus, matters took a very different 
 turn ; nor could all the prince's popularity keep 
 him from finding what an awkward fact his presence 
 at the Portuguese court was to his host the king. 
 
 Blake's orders were to "pursue, seize, scatter, 
 fight with, or destroy all the ships of the revolted 
 fleet." 
 
 It was already known throughout Europe that 
 Cromwell never threatened but that which he 
 would carry out, and consequently one can imagine 
 the feelings of poor King John of Braganza in 
 his dilemma. On the one side, he felt that his 
 honour and his word were engaged to Rupert to 
 protect him and his fleet ; on the other, this 
 terrible Admiral Blake, with his formidable fleet, 
 were ready, did he not obey the English Govern- 
 ment, and give up Rupert and surrender his ships, 
 to bombard and blow up his good town of Lisbon. 
 . For weeks a great deal of diplomatic business 
 was carried on between Blake and the court of 
 Lisbon. Although within cannon-shot fo one 
 
I08 RUPER7 OF THE RHINE. 
 
 another, little fighting took place between the 
 English hostile fleets. Blake failed in an attempt 
 to waylay and kidnap Prince Rupert when out 
 on a hunting expedition, and the prince also 
 failed in blowing up the admiral's own vessel, the 
 George, with what appears to have been for those 
 times a good imitation of one of our modern 
 torpedoes. \ 
 
 At length the admiral's patience came to an 
 end, and he captured a dozen of the richly laden 
 ships belonging to the Portuguese fleet returning 
 from South America. 
 
 Rupert now felt he must either quit his present 
 quarters or be taken by Blake. 
 
 Again he succeeded in getting away from the 
 enemy, and again successfully gave Blake the slip. 
 
 Rupert's course lay now for Toulon. He had 
 expected that the Spanish court would befriend 
 him ; but the Court of Madrid were in as great 
 terror of Cromwell as that of Lisbon, and orders 
 were given that the prince's vessels should not 
 be allowed to enter any Spanish port. In the 
 tedious narrative of these sea-adventures of Rupert 
 occurs the following passage, which is almost 
 eloquent, from its tone of despairing sadness, at 
 this period of the prince's voyage : — " We take 
 the confines of the Mediterranean for our harbour, 
 
LAST YEARS. 109 
 
 poverty and despair bring our companions, and 
 revenge for our guide.'' Admiral Blake was soon 
 again in pursuit of Rupert The latter had, after 
 leaving Portuguese waters, captured some merchant- 
 vessels off Malaga — whether Spanish or English 
 vessels, does not appear. 
 
 Blake came up with the Royal squadron off 
 Carthagena, and a severe skirmish took place. 
 The Royalist ships were driven ashore at the end 
 of this unequal fight, for Blake's vessels out- 
 numbered those of Rupert by three to one. 
 
 Fortunately for the prince, at the time of this 
 attack on his fleet, he was cruising at some distance 
 from his fleet, and by this chance again escaped 
 capture. After further adventures, Rupert at 
 length reached Toulon in safety, where he was 
 joined by his brother, Prince Maurice. The next 
 event in the prince's career was a long buccaneer- 
 ing expedition he made in company with Maurice. 
 Coasting at first along the Andalusian shore, they 
 made prizes of any Spanish vessels that they met ; 
 and on arriving at the island of Madeira, they 
 sold the contents of their vessels to the Portuguese. 
 After laying in an ample stock of provisions in 
 that friendly isle, the brothers proceeded to the 
 Canary Islands, looking out for fresh English or 
 ' Spanish vessels to seize. . 
 
I lO RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 While at the Canaries, Rupert had some difficulty 
 with his officers ; the prince wished to sail straight 
 to the West Indies, where he expected to find many 
 Spanish treasure ships, but his officers preferred 
 the shelter of the Azores. Rupert consented to do 
 as the officers wished, and while at the Azores had 
 a very narrow escape of drowning, his ship sprang 
 a leak during a storm, and soon sank, carrying over 
 three hundred men down with her. 
 
 Rupert had to be carried out of the vessel by 
 main force, as he declared that he would remain 
 and perish with his crew. The prince's next visit 
 was to Cape Blanco, which was, according to the 
 log already referred to, " in the kingdom of Argin, 
 in Africa,'' where the natives are described as being 
 '* tawny of complexion, habited in vests after the 
 Turkish fashion." These natives, who were armed 
 with bows, arrows, and lances, showed some fight. 
 In the early summer of 1652 Rupert sailed to the 
 Cape de Vert Islands. He had hoped there to 
 have fallen in with the Newfoundland fleet, which 
 called there to take in salt ; but in this expectation 
 he was disappointed. 
 
 It would be only tedious to follow the move- 
 ments of the princes in those seas, for there is 
 nothing of any importance to chronicle, beyond the 
 capture of some English and Spanish trading ves- 
 
LAST YEARS. Ill 
 
 sels ; nothing- of any interest took place while Rupert 
 was waiting for a fleet which never appeared. 
 
 One can imagine how heartily sick and tired the 
 prince must have been getting of leading such a 
 life ; and in being so long cut away from all 
 European news. 
 
 All through the years during which Rupert's sea- 
 roving career lasted, there is not a single act of 
 cruelty or even of severity brought against the 
 prince, even by his bitterest foes ; this fact, in 
 those days of evil license at sea, and of brutality 
 which was allowed on board men-of-war, as well as 
 other vessels, speaks volumes for the character of 
 Rupert. ■ - . 
 
 At length, after being more than once thwarted, 
 the prince was able to sail to the West Indies, 
 where he hoped to meet with many Spanish prizes. 
 At the island of Martinique he was received with 
 much honour by the Dutch governor ; but he now 
 heard that all the English possessions in the West 
 Indies had declared in favour of the Parliament ; 
 this bad news was confirmed on Rupert's arrival 
 off Montserrat, on Whit Sunday (1652), where his 
 ships were fired on from the land batteries, but 
 fortunately with little effect. 
 
 This expedition is commemorated in one of the 
 Virgin Islands, where a bay is named after Rupert. 
 
112 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 While off these islands, a tornado scattered the 
 prince's fleet His ship escaped almost miracu- 
 lously, but his brother Maurice and crew were 
 never again seen, although in later days a report 
 told that Maurice had been captured by African 
 pirates ; but this tale was never confirmed. This 
 crowning disaster determined Rupert to return to 
 Europe. 
 
 He had now lost even the hope, with the destruc- 
 tion of his fleet, and with his brother's death, of 
 maintaining even a war of reprisals in the Western 
 seas. 
 
 Sailing by the Azores, Rupert made straight for 
 France, and after sundry adventures and hardships 
 he at length landed at Paimbaeuf, near Nantes. 
 
 Of all the vessels that had accompanied him on 
 his expedition, the one he returned in to France 
 was the only one remaining ; and, singularly enough, 
 he had hardly left her when she caught fire, and 
 burnt down to the water's edge. 
 
 Although he had now finished his buccaneering 
 career, the prince found but little rest. When back 
 again on shore one is not surprised to hear that, 
 shortly after he landed, Rupert was struck down 
 by a serious illness : he had undergone during the 
 last four years hardships, perils, and privations 
 enough to try even his iron constitution to the 
 
LAST YEARS. 1 1 3 
 
 utmost ; sick, too, may he well have been at this 
 time in mind as well as in body. 
 
 He had returned almost alone, without having 
 carried out any of his brilliant plans of capturing 
 fleets, and succouring the English who remained 
 still loyal to the Royal party ; and the tragic fate 
 of his brother Maurice must have weighed heavily 
 on his heart. While lying between life and death 
 at Nantes he received warm letters of affectionate 
 greeting on his safe return from his cousin, now 
 Charles II., in which he begged him to return 
 as soon as well enough to the French court. 
 Louis XIV. also urged him to come, and the 
 French king got into some trouble with the English 
 Government for having sent one of his own coaches 
 with a guard to escort the prince back to Paris. 
 
 There are but very few facts recorded about 
 Rupert's life during the years immediately follow- 
 ing his return to France from the West Indies. 
 He became a great favourite with Louis, who gave 
 him the post of Master of his Horse. 
 
 The prince now seems to have entered on those 
 scientific pursuits which engrossed most of his 
 
 later life. 
 
 We find that the Parisians, ever curious about 
 something out of the common, were much excited 
 by the "blackamoors," as some West Indian or 
 
 I 
 
TT4 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 African natives were called, that the prince brought 
 with him to Paris, as well as with some strange 
 birds and monkeys. We are informed that the 
 "blackamoors " were dressed in gorgeous costumes. 
 
 In the summer of 1654 Rupert paid his mother 
 a visit at the Hague. The Queen of Bohemia was 
 still a pensioner on the charity of the States- 
 General, for her eldest son, a mean, sordid creature, 
 the very opposite to Rupert, had refused her assist- 
 ance, and had even prevented her from returning 
 to a dower house which belonged to her near 
 Heidelberg. 
 
 ' While in Holland, the report of Prince Maurice 
 liaving escaped shipwreck, and having been made 
 prisoner by African pirates, got wind. His mother 
 at this time seems to have taken some steps to 
 verify this story, and asked the French ambas- 
 sador at the States to make inquiries into the 
 matter, and,, should he be alive,, to demand his 
 release from the Sultan ; but nothing came of it, 
 and, doubtless, had Rupert believed the report, he 
 would have gone himself to ascertain at Algiers, or 
 elsewhere, what had become of his lost brother. 
 
 In the year following, Rupert is supposed to 
 have taken the side of the Austrians in the war 
 they were then engaged in with the Swedes ; but 
 this is more than doubtful,, and a letter, written by 
 
LAST YEARS, IIJ 
 
 him at that time to Charles IL, makes it highly 
 improbable that he had taken up arms against his 
 old allies. 
 
 During the course of that year, Rupert paid 
 two visits to Heidelberg, the proud cradle of his 
 race ; but both these visits must have been pain- 
 ful to the prince, as he and the elector were so 
 diametrically opposed to one another, both as to 
 feelings and character ; and his stay at Heidelberg 
 seems to have been, on both visits, of the shortest. 
 
 During these years of exile from England, and 
 while in Paris, Rupert commenced those practical 
 experiments in chemistry, and in the improvement 
 of war materials, which would have made him 
 famous had he been born in a laboratory, and not 
 in a palace. In his laboratory in Paris, where 
 he was credited with trying to discover the philo- 
 sopher's stone, he made some of those discoveries 
 which have unfortunately not outlived his own 
 career. Among these was a new kind of gun- 
 powder, which was said to possess ten times the 
 strength of that then in use. On his return to 
 London, the Transactions of the Royal Society 
 contain long descriptions of this and some others 
 of the prince's inventions; among others, of a 
 new way of blowing up rocks in mines, and 
 also under water. It may be remembered that 
 
Il6 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 Rupert had, while before Lisbon, attempted to 
 blow up Blake's ship with a kind of infernal 
 machine, a precursor probably of this new sort 
 of blasting machine. He is also credited with 
 the discovery of " an instrument to cast platforms 
 into perspective" — whatever that may be, and of 
 a "hydraulic engine, and an improvement in the 
 naval quadrant." The prince is also credited by 
 the Royal Society with having discovered what 
 appears to have been a kind of "mitrailleuse," 
 a gun described as being able to discharge a 
 quantity of bullets very rapidly. He also invented 
 a machine for the improvement of the locks of 
 firearms. Not only was he successful in his results 
 in the workman's forge, but also in the laboratory 
 of the chemist. 
 
 Although none of his discoveries have, with 
 one or two exceptions, come down to our time, 
 Rupert has the honour of having, if not discovered, 
 at any rate of having done much to help the 
 popularity of that delightful art of engraving 
 known as "mezzotint," an art which will always 
 be associated with Rupert's name. 
 
 With the return of Charles Stuart, in 1661, 
 "to enjoy his own again," and until this prince's 
 death, in 1682, Rupert made England his adopted 
 home. 
 
LAST YEARS. IIJ 
 
 It is remarked how seldom his name appears 
 in the memoirs of those days ; Pepys and Evelyn 
 hardly do more than mention him once or twice ; 
 nor are there any letters to or from him during 
 this last score of years of his life, which give any 
 information about the prince. 
 
 What is still more to be regretted is that Rupert 
 has left no account of his career ; when, had he 
 taken up the pen with half the energy he had done 
 in his fiery youth the sword, or in his later days the 
 ironsmith's hammer or the crucible of the alchemist, 
 he would have certainly written a most thrilling 
 memoir of one of the most adventurous of lives. 
 
 Rupert again paid his mother a visit in Hol- 
 land. The Queen of Bohemia was at length en- 
 abled, through the devotion of Lord Craven, to 
 return to England ; but she was only able to carry 
 out this long-wished-for desire shortly before her 
 earthly troubles ceased in the following year (1662). 
 Rupert's mother died in Lord Craven's London 
 home, Leicester House ; she was in her sixty-sixth 
 year. 
 
 In one of her last letters, written from the 
 Hague to Rupert, she thus concludes: ''I have 
 resolution to suffer all things constantly ; I thank 
 God He has given me courage. I love you ever, 
 dear Rupert." Few royal lives have been sadder 
 
Il8 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 than that of Ehzabeth Stuart, even in those of 
 her family, full of so much suffering as many of 
 them were. Her early years of happiness only 
 enhances the gloom and sorrow that clouded over 
 her middle life, and darkened all her latter days. 
 Of all her children, Rupert seems to have beer^ 
 the nearest to her heart. 
 
 In 1662 Rupert, who since his return from 
 France worked harder than ever in his forge and 
 laboratory, became a member of the Royal Society. 
 He was also appointed by the king a privy coun- 
 cillor and Governor of Windsor Castle. When 
 that most unjustifiable (on the side of England) 
 war broke out, in 1666, between England and 
 Holland, Rupert was given a command over a 
 portion of the English fleet, which was ordered 
 to attack the French. Monk had the command 
 of the other half of the fleet, which was told off 
 to attack the Dutch. Monk led off the ball, 
 fighting a desperate battle, which raged from the 
 1st to the 3rd of May. 
 
 Rupert was only able to reach Monk during 
 the last day's engagement. The result was not 
 a decisive one ; but the Grand Pensionary de 
 Witt generously wrote about this action, that 
 " all that we discovered was that Englishmen 
 might be killed and English ships burnt, but that 
 
LAST YEARS, ug 
 
 English courage was invincible." Noble words 
 these from an enemy ! 
 
 Both Monk and Rupert were blamed for not 
 having annihilated the Dutch by the stay-at-home 
 critics. 
 
 Rupert, rather unnecessarily, drew up a long 
 statement of his conduct, in which he recounts 
 how totally unexpected was the meeting between 
 the Duke of Albemarle and the Dutch, and of 
 the impossibility it was for him to arrive earlier, 
 as he was waiting off Brest to attack the Duke 
 of Beaufort and the French fleet The prince 
 bitterly complains of the atrocious condition and 
 want of commissariat in the English ships, of the 
 lack of seamen, and of the " horrible neglect of 
 his Majesty's officers and the workmen of his 
 yards." Rupert found now to his disgust that the 
 king had virtually sold his fleet to the French 
 king. Thoroughly disgusted, he retired to Windsor 
 Castle until the desperate state of public affairs 
 again called him from his retirement. 
 
 A fresh war had meanwhile broken out with 
 Holland — a war which will always be looked back 
 upon with shame by our countrymen, for there 
 is no more disgraceful page in English history 
 than the manner in which that war was carried 
 out. Charles had not only sold himself to the 
 
I2C RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 French, but the money that should have gone 
 to the defence of our coasts and the maintenance 
 of our fleets was employed by the king in main- 
 taining his harems of abandoned women and 
 adventuresses ; and the flag which had made Rome 
 and all Europe tremble, under Cromwell, was 
 derided by the Dutch ; and had it not been for 
 an event in which Rupert acted a conspicuous part, 
 the disgrace of the Medway and the flames of 
 Sheerness might have culminated in a far greater 
 shame and disaster than they actually did, al- 
 though that was bad enough. 
 
 •' Only two small squadrons were ready to put 
 to sea in the summer of 1667; this was all that 
 England then could muster to protect its capital. 
 On the 7th of June, in spite of Albemarle, the 
 Dutch sailed up unmolested as far as Sheerness, 
 which they bombarded ; thence they sailed up 
 the Medway, burning all the shipping within range; 
 and it was not until they came as far as Upnor 
 Castle that they met with a check. 
 
 But at Upnor Rupert had prepared a surprise 
 for the Dutch. He had strongly fortified and 
 garrisoned the fort, and when the enemy came 
 within range of his guns, Rupert gave him so warm 
 a reception that he hastily retired. Even now, one 
 hardly likes to think what would have happened 
 
 _ ) 
 
LAST YEARS. 121 
 
 had it not been for this admirable bit of gunnery 
 on the part of Rupert. Certainly, by this action, 
 Rupert might have claimed the credit of having 
 prevented a greater disaster to England than any 
 she had ever experienced. 
 
 Rupert's fighting days at sea were, however, not 
 yet over. Again war broke out between the Eng- 
 lish and the Dutch in 1672 ; and at the end of 
 the month of May, Rupert, who commanded in the 
 Royal Charles, signally defeated the great Dutch 
 admiral. Van Tromp. During the battle, the 
 Dutch admiral had to shift his flag no less than 
 four times. The prince's vessel was, according to 
 the account of the fight written at the time, ** so 
 crooksided, and fetched so much water in at the 
 ports, that her lower tier of guns could not be 
 made use of." In spite of the wretched state of 
 his vessel, Rupert, according to the contemporary 
 accounts of the fight, " performed wonders." When 
 night fell, both sides claimed the victory. After 
 fighting another undecisive battle, Rupert returned 
 to London, in order to lay before Charles a state- 
 ment of the miserable condition of his fleet. The 
 prince seems to have succeeded in stirring up the 
 slothful king ; and after revictualling his ships, the 
 prince returned again to his naval duties, and again 
 encountered the Dutch. During the fight, the 
 
122 RUPERT OF THE RHINE, 
 
 French fleet, although our alHes, contented them- 
 selves with looking on at a safe distance at the 
 engagement This, Rupert's last sea-fight, took 
 place on the nth of August, 1673. 
 
 By this time Rupert must have felt what a thank- 
 less task it was to fight for such a monarch as 
 Charles, nor can it have been to his liking to make 
 war on his former friends the Dutch. 
 
 That the prince took a kindly interest in the 
 welfare of the seamen under his command, and 
 generally throughout the fleet, is shown by his 
 having been called " the seamen's friend." 
 
 The prince was also much interested in many 
 public companies : he was the first governor of the 
 Hudson's Bay Company, and a large district of 
 what is now the province of Manitoba still bears 
 the name of Rupert's Land. 
 
 The closing years of this most checkered and 
 eventful life appear to have been passed tranquilly, 
 engrossed by his artistic, chemical, and engineering 
 works, and in field sports, among the glades and 
 forests of Windsor. 
 
 " The brief remainder of Prince Rupert's exist- 
 ence was passed," writes Warburton, " in tranquil- 
 lity and retirement — a calm and quiet evening 
 closing in after his life's stormy day. The philo- 
 sophical veteran is still visible to our imagination, 
 
LAST YEARS. 1 23 
 
 as he dwelt in the Old Tower at Windsor, sur- 
 rounded with armour and strange implements and 
 curious old books. The walls were hung with 
 maps of countries that he would have visited and 
 plans of battles that he might have fought. As he 
 gazed from his citadel on the matchless scenery 
 that surrounds it, he could trace the course of 
 many a midnight march and bold assault. He 
 had seen many of his faithful troopers perish on 
 the very slopes beneath his eyes ; and further off, 
 to the very horizon, there was no town that had 
 not echoed to the tramp of his bold troopers, no 
 church tower that had not given warning of his 
 march. Those troopers had all passed away, the 
 very name of Cavalier was almost forgotten ; the 
 cause for which they had fought and fallen was 
 now triumphant, yet in dishonour, and he, their 
 leader, was estranged, if not exiled, from the king 
 he had served so well." 
 
 Could Rupert have been on friendly terms with 
 such a man as the king, one could have doubted 
 his natural nobility of mind and character, and 
 he appears to have kept as aloof as his position 
 allowed him from the king and his rakish court. 
 
 His remaining years were passed at Windsor, or 
 in his house in London, in Spring Gardens. He 
 was. idolized by all the country folk around Windsor ; 
 
124 RUPERT OF THE RHINE. 
 
 and in Campbell's " Lives of the Admirals " we 
 find the following allusion to his popularity : ** In 
 respect to his private life, he was so just, so bene- 
 ficent, so courteous, that his memory remained 
 dear to all who knew him. This I say of my own 
 knowledge, having often heard old people in Berk- 
 shire speak in raptures of Prince Rupert." With 
 this pleasant notice of the princely old Cavalier in 
 his last days, I will now conclude this most inade- 
 quate sketch of a very remarkable life, regretting 
 how imperfect it necessarily is, but hoping that the 
 sentiment which impelled me to write it will be its 
 excuse, if not its recommendation. 
 
 Prince Rupert's death took place on the 29th of 
 November, 1682. He was in his sixty-third year, 
 and the cause of his death was a fever, complicated 
 with pleurisy. The funeral was conducted with 
 great pomp and ceremony, and his remains were 
 placed among those of his mother's ancestors in 
 Henry VH.'s Chapel at Westminster Abbey. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 DESCENDANTS OF PRINCE RUPERT. 
 
 Prince Rupert had by Frances, daughter and co-heiress 
 of Henry Bard, Viscount Bellarmont in the peerage of 
 Ireland, a son named Dudley Rupert, who was killed 
 at the siege of Buda, a volunteer in the imperial army. 
 Dudley Rupert died without issue. Prince Rupert had 
 also, by Margaret Hughes,* a daughter Ruperta, who 
 
 * The following account of Prince Rupert and his liaison with 
 the actress, Mrs. Hughes, is taken from Dr. Doran's ''Annals of 
 the English Stage : " — ''When the former (Mrs. Hughes) subdued 
 Prince Rupert, there was more jubilee at the Court of Charles II., 
 at Tunbridge Wells, than if the philosophic Prince had fallen upon 
 an invention that should benefit mankind. Rupert, whom the 
 plumed gallants of Whitehall considered as a rude mechanic, left 
 his laboratory, put aside his reserve, and wooed in due form the 
 proudest, perhaps, of the actresses of his day. . . . The Prince 
 enshrined the frail beauty in that home of Sir Nicholas Crispe, at 
 Hammersmith, which was subsequently occupied by Eubb Dod- 
 dington, the Margravine of Anspach, and Queen Caroline of 
 Brunswick. She wellnigh ruined her lover, at whose death there 
 was little left beside a collection of jewels, worth ;,^20,ooo, which 
 were disposed of by lottery in order to pay his debts. . . . The 
 daughter of this union, Ruperta, who shared with her mother the 
 modest estate bequeathed by the Prince, married General Emmanuel 
 Scrope Howe. One of the daughters of this marriage was the 
 beautiful and reckless maid to Caroline, Princess of Wales, whom 
 the treachery of Frantz Lowther sent broken-hearted to the grave 
 in 1726. Through Ruperta, however, the blood of her parents 
 is still continued in the family of Sir Edward Bromley." 
 
126 APPENDIX. 
 
 married Emmanuel Scroope Howe, brother of Scroope, 
 Viscount Hood in the peerage of Ireland. Emmanuel 
 Scroope Howe was a lieutenant-general in the army, 
 and had issue three sons by Ruperta his wife, namely, 
 William, Emmanuel, and James, and also a daughter, 
 who was maid of honour to Queen Caroline, the wife 
 of George the Second. William Howe, a major in 
 the army, married Elizabeth, daughter and co-heiress 
 of William Pauncefote, Esquire, by whom he had an 
 only daughter, who married Sir George Smith, Baronet, 
 from whom descends the present Sir Henry Bromley, 
 Baronet. 
 
 PORTRAITS OF PRINCE RUPERT. 
 
 Portraits of Prince Rupert are not uncommon in the 
 private galleries of this country. 
 
 The three reproduced in this work give as good an 
 idea of his likeness at different epochs of his life as can 
 be had. 
 
 The first, after Vandyck, represents the young Prince 
 during his first visit to England, in all his youthful bloom 
 and beauty. 
 
 The second, taken from a superb engraving by 
 Faithorne, represents him after the hard life of a tried 
 soldier had set its seal on the almost stern face of the 
 warrior Prince. 
 
 The third is taken from an original portrait by Kneller, 
 painted after the Restoration. The expression is softened 
 and aged. 
 
APPENDIX, 127 
 
 Among many other portraits of Rupert is a miniature 
 at Windsor Castle, which I have had reproduced in my 
 book on the "Great Historic Galleries of England." 
 The only plastic portrait that I believe exists of the 
 subject of this memoir is a life-size bust, in Fulham 
 stoneware, in the British Museum.* This bust closely re- 
 sembles the Prince's portrait by Kneller. The expression 
 
 * Of a dozen mezzotints in the Museum, all by Rupert, none bear 
 an earlier date than 1658. Not the least curious among them are 
 two portraits of Oliver Cromwell. The French artist Le Vaillant 
 no doubt assisted Rupert with his work, but never claimed the 
 discovery which will always remain associated with that of the 
 gallant Rupert. 
 
 The following is a list of Rupert's mezzotints, of which some 
 are in the British Museum : — 
 
 1. The Executioner of St. John. With the letters ''R.P." sur- 
 mounted with a crown. Dated 1658. Height, 25^ inches j width, 
 17! inches. 
 
 2. Portrait of a Magdalene. Inscribed: '* Rupertus D.G., 
 C.P.D.B., Princeps Imperis Animi gratia lusit." Height, SJ 
 inches ; width, 6^ inches, 
 
 3. Portrait, supposed to be of the Prince's cap and feathers. 
 Height, 8 inches ; width, 6^ inches. 
 
 4. A three-quarter length portrait, known as the Standard Bearer. 
 Inscribed : ** 1658. Rup^ P. Fee." Height, 11 inches ; width, %\ 
 
 inches. 
 
 5. The same portrait to the shoulders. Height, 7^ inches; 
 
 width, 6^ inches. r . j 
 
 6. Bust of an old bearded man. " R.P." m capitals m left-hand 
 
 top corner. Five inches square. 
 
 7. Head of the executioner of St. John. " R.p.f ," with crown. 
 Height, 5|: inches; width, 6^ inches. 
 
 8. The same, looking to the right. 
 
 9. Oliver Cromwell ; an oval. At the comer, " O.C, P.R. fc." 
 
 10. Another of the same, unfinished. 
 
 11. A monk in his cell. Inscribed at top '*R.V.P. P^ fee 
 Height, 5i inches ; width, \\ inches. 
 
 12. A woman's head looking down, in an oval. 
 
128 APPENDIX, 
 
 is full of determination, and the mole on the left cheek 
 is represented ; he wears a heavy wig and the collar of 
 the Garter. 
 
 Rupert, whose coffin appropriately rests close beside 
 that of his mother in the Chapel of Henry VII., bears 
 the following inscription on it : — 
 
 Depositnm 
 
 Illust : Principis Ruperti, Comitis Palatini Rheni, 
 
 Ducis Bavarise et Cumbriae, Comitis Holdernessioe, totius Angliae 
 
 Vice-Admiralli, 
 
 Regalis Castri Windesoriensis Constabularii et Gubernatoris, 
 
 Nobilissimi Ordinis Perescelidis Equitis, 
 
 Et Majestati Regiae a Sanctioribus Conciliis, 
 
 Filii tertiogeniti Ser"^ Principis Frederici Regime Bohemise, etc. 
 
 Per Ser""^ Principiss : Elizabetham, Filiam unicam Jacobi, 
 Sororem Caroli Primi, et amitam Caroli ejus nominis secundi, 
 
 Magnse Britannise, Francise et Hiberniae Regum, 
 
 Nati Pragse, Bohemia Metrop. ^ Decembr. A° MDCXIX", 
 
 Denati Londini XXIX Novembr : MDCLXXXIP, 
 
 ^tatis su^ LXIII. 
 
WORKS ON THE LIFE OF 
 PRINCE RUPERT. 
 
 I. The Atlantic Monthly, vol. iii. 1859, p. 725. Article, " A 
 Charge with Prince Rupert." 
 
 II. Cust, Sir Edward, '* Lives of the Warriors of the Civil Wars 
 of France and England." London, 1867. 8vo. Published by 
 John Murray. 
 
 III. Jesse, John Heneage, "Memoirs of the Court of England 
 during the Reign of the Stuarts," London, 1855. 8vo. Published 
 by Richard Bentley. 
 
 IV. Edgar, J. E., " Sea- Kings and Naval Heroes." London, 
 1861. 8vo. Published by Bell and Daldy. 
 
 V. Warburton, Eliot, " Memoirs of Prince Rupert and the 
 Cavaliers, including their Private Correspondence." London, 
 1849. 8vo. Published by R. Bentley. 
 
 VI. Bromley, Sir George, " A Collection of Original Letters, 
 containing, amongst others, some written by Prince Rupert." 
 London, 1787. 8vo. 
 
 VII. Warner, Rebecca, *' Epistolary Curiosities, consisting of 
 Unpublished Letters, some of them by Prince Rupert." London, 
 1 8 18. 8vo. Published by Longman and Co. 
 
 VIII. " Historical Memoirs of the Life and Death of that Wise 
 and Valiant Prince Rupert, Prince Palatine of the Rhine, Duke 
 of Cumberland, etc. Containing a Brief but Impartial Account of 
 his great and Martial Achievements, during the time of the Civil 
 Wars ; together with his several Ingagements in the Wars between 
 His Majesty and the States-General of the United Provinces. 
 Entred according to order." London, printed for Tho. Malthus, at 
 the Sign of the Sun in the Poultry, 1683. 8vo. 
 
 K 
 
I30 WORKS ON THE LIFE OF PRINCE RUPERT. 
 
 IX. Guizot, F.P.G., '* Memoirs of George Monk." London, 
 1838. 8vo. 
 
 X. Carte, Thomas, " A Collection of Original Letters and Papers 
 concerning the Affairs of England, from the year 1641 to 1660, 
 found among the Duke of Ormond's Papers." Two vols. London, 
 1739. 8vo. 
 
 XL Evelyn, John, F.R.S., " Miscellaneous Writings." London, 
 1825. 4to. 
 
 XIL "The Clarendon State Papers," from 1621. Oxford, 
 1767-86. Fol. 
 
 XIIL Warwick, Sir Philip, "Memoirs of the Reign of King 
 Charles I., with a Continuation of the Happy Restoration of King 
 Charles II." Published from the original manuscript. London, 
 1 701. 8vo. 
 
 XIV. Roe, Sir Thomas, " The Negociations of Sir Thomas Roe." 
 London, 1740, Fol. 
 
 XV. Betitky^s Miscella7iy. Vol. xxvi. p. 100. London, 
 1849. 8vo. 
 
 XVI. ColburrCs New Monthly Magazine, Vol. Ixxxvi. p. 353. 
 
 1848. 8vo. 
 
 XVII. Diibli7i University Magazi7ie. Vol, xxxv. p. 507. Dublin, 
 1853. 8vo. 
 
 XVIII. Erase)-. Vol. xl. p. 52. London, 1849. 8vo. 
 
 XIX. Tait's Edinburgh Magazine. Vol. xvi. pp. 394, 415. 
 
 1849. 8vo. 
 
 BIOGRAPHIES. 
 
 XX. Rose, " Biographical Dictionary." Vol. xi. p. 406. 
 
 XXI. Chalmers's "Biographical Dictionary." Vol. xxvi. p. 466. 
 London, i8r6. 8vo. 
 
 PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, 
 LONDON AND KECCLES. 
 
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