'•^ f ' ' 
 
 ^L?\>" 
 
 '^> 
 
 ,*4 HZ, ■^ kJ 
 
 ')«K **. 4k t.k W. -tLM .'. , 
 
 
 
 -Sr:^> 
 
 
 
 ■fc' «i. JiM •» ' 
 
CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
Cornell University Library 
 DA 415.C85 
 Barnstaple and the northern. part. of .Deyo, 
 
 »*''_' 
 l-"^-- 
 
 3 1924 027 971 757 
 
 oltn 
 
r^.> 
 
 Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924027971757 
 
f 
 
 BARNSTAPLE 
 
 DURING THE GREAT CIVIL WAR, 
 
 1642-J646. 
 
BARNSTAPLE 
 
 AND THE 
 
 NORTHERN PART OF DEVONSHIRE 
 
 DURING THE 
 
 GREAT CIVIL WAR, 
 
 I 642-1 646. 
 
 BY 
 
 RICHARD W, COTTON, 
 
 PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR BY 
 
 UNWIN BROTHERS 
 
 CHILWORTH & LONDON. 
 MDCCCLXXXIX 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 1 •C>»- 
 
 IT was originally my intention to write a familiar 
 historical sketch of Barnstaple and its people 
 during the great Civil War of the seventeenth 
 century. This is mainly what is now submitted 
 to the reader ; but the story has, almost inevitably, 
 expanded into a detailed account of the war as it 
 affected North Devon. 
 
 The annals of an English fortified town which 
 changed hands four times during the four years' 
 struggle between Charles the First and the Parlia- 
 ment might well have been expected to contain 
 much of local and not a little of general interest. The 
 contemporary public records of Barnstaple, the town 
 to which I refer, are in this respect not wholly dis- 
 appointing; but they are far from being copious, and 
 the most that can, perhaps, be said of them is that, 
 so far as they go, they are valuable and suggestive. 
 No such chronicler, however, as, for instance, the 
 
vi PREFACE, 
 
 author of the diary of the siege of Lyme Regis, of 
 the time of the Civil War, has handed down to us 
 a narrative of the passing occurrences day by day ; 
 no such minute and voluminous details as those of 
 the siege accounts of Plymouth, of the same period, 
 have been preserved. Of the municipal documents 
 of Barnstaple a mass is know^n to have actually 
 perished, through almost inconceivable neglect, 
 w^ithin comparatively recent years. Those that sur- 
 vive, although unusually rich and extending from 
 the fourteenth century downward, are in a fragmen- 
 tary state, and the records of the period to which 
 this relation has reference are few and disconnected. 
 At the same time, there is not much room for doubt 
 that during the disturbed period of the war the affairs 
 of the Corporation lapsed into confusion ; that no 
 detailed accounts of an expenditure obviously ab- 
 normal were preserved ; and that after the first year 
 of the war, when the Corporation was practically 
 superseded by a military government, no records of 
 the municipal transactions were, in fact, kept. 
 
 A connected account of what took place in the 
 chief town of North Devon during the Civil War has 
 not been previously attempted. It is true that Mr. 
 J. B. Gribble collected a few materials of considerable 
 value — mostly *' cribbed" from original documents 
 in the then jealously guarded archives of the town, 
 many of which have since disappeared — for his Memo- 
 rials of Barnstaple, published in 1830 ; but he made 
 no very effective use of them ; his inferences were 
 often erroneous ; and he did not pretend to give a 
 continuous, much less a complete, narrative. Mr. 
 
PRE FA CE, vii 
 
 J. R. Chanter devoted a few pages to the subject in 
 his Sketches of some Striking Incidents in the History of 
 Barnstaple, which appeared in 1865, throwing upon it 
 some new light and attracting to it fresh interest ; 
 but he professed to give no more than a brief and 
 imperfect summary of the local transactions of the 
 Civil War period. This may be said to have been 
 all the existing literature of the subject. 
 
 It has been my object to recover the details — and 
 in my estimation no details could be too insignificant 
 ^of this episode of surpassing interest in the history 
 of Barnstaple. The surviving records of the period 
 among the archives of the borough, possessing the 
 invaluable quality of their local colouring, have 
 supplied me with, of course, important, if scanty, 
 materials. I have collected others from the works 
 of historians who were cognizant of, and in many 
 instances took part in, the events passing around 
 them ; from the concurrent ephemeral literature 
 which so copiously illustrates the progress of the 
 war ; from memoirs and official papers ; and from 
 contemporary letters, several of which have been now 
 for the first time printed from the original MSS. 
 Generally, I have had recourse to original sources 
 for my information. Local oral traditions relating 
 to the war have been of little use to me ; they are 
 few and, it is scarcely necessary to add, untrust- 
 worthy. 
 
 With the view of giving, so far as might be, the 
 complexion of the time to this account of the 
 transactions in Barnstaple and North Devon during 
 the eventful years 1642-1646, I have not hesitated 
 
viii PREFACE. 
 
 to extract contemporary notices, and to utilise con- 
 temporary documents pertinent to the story, that have 
 fallen under my observation or rewarded a not incon- 
 siderable research. In this respect I may have 
 perhaps followed too freely the bent of the antiquary, 
 and the method, I am aware, has its shortcomings ; 
 but it is one, nevertheless, which, for the purpose of 
 catching the spirit and sentiment of a past time, 
 may be allowed to have its advantages. 
 
 Barnstaple, if not one of the pivots upon which, 
 during the Civil War, great or critical military 
 movements turned, was at least more or less directly 
 affected by all the military operations in the West of 
 England, and the marching and counter-marching in 
 and through Devonshire, which for nearly four years 
 kept the whole county in a blaze. If the annals of 
 Barnstaple during that period are few, it can scarcely 
 be said, according to the well-known aphorism, that 
 the town was therefore happy. Like those of most 
 of the partisan towns, its inhabitants were, at one 
 time or another, the victims of arbitrary authority, 
 requisitions, exactions, and pillage. Once, at least, 
 its streets were the scene of actual conflict and 
 bloodshed. 
 
 Purposely, Barnstaple is the centre of whatever 
 interest there may be in this relation ; but neces- 
 sarily my scope has extended over a larger area, 
 and embraced transactions with which, if the scene 
 of them was more strictly speaking the county, this 
 town was in some way connected. I have, as far as 
 possible, however, limited this scope to the district, 
 vaguely defined it may be, which is familiarly known 
 
PREFACE. ix 
 
 to us as North Devon, Of most of the local military 
 incidents it cannot perhaps be generally said, any 
 more than it can be asserted of the numerous desul- 
 tory skirmishes which occurred over the greater part 
 of England, and produced what has been called 
 ** a fever of sporadic conflict,'' that they had any 
 distinguishable influence upon the final result of the 
 war. Yet two of the most graphically interesting 
 and politically not least important battles of the 
 whole war were fought within twenty-five miles of 
 Barnstaple. The battle of Stratton, in which 
 Cornishmen and Devonians were pitted against each 
 other, resulted in the defeat of the Parliamentary 
 forces raised in Devonshire, and by freeing Hopton's 
 Cornish army, enabled him to combine with the 
 Royalist main body and thus materially to conduce 
 to the ascendency which. the King's cause attained 
 in the second year of the war. The battle of Tor- 
 rington, fought in this corner of Devonshire, and 
 so lightly passed over by Lord Clarendon, the his- 
 torian of the Rebellion, was practically fatal to the 
 royal cause in the West — the only ground whereon, 
 at that late period of the struggle, it had any chance 
 of recovery. 
 
 It is remarkable that the county of Devon, so 
 remote from the point of initial impulse, should 
 have borne, whether by chance or by the exigencies 
 of military strategy, the large share that it un- 
 doubtedly did of the brunt of the war and the 
 calamities of the time. Many of the transactions 
 of the war which took place in Devonshire were of 
 course links in the chain of operations extending 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 over a much wider field. Others, to which promi- 
 nence is intentionally given in the following pages, 
 were more local in their character — that is to say, 
 they originated in the county, and were the achieve- 
 ments of locally-raised and native forces — and as 
 such, and for his purpose unimportant, they have 
 been passed over, and properly so, by the general 
 historian. The details thus neglected are, I believe, 
 precisely those which are of most value to the local 
 inquirer. The skirmishes and battles which took 
 place on Devonshire soil, and in which Devonshire 
 men, whether Royalist or Parliamentarian, fought 
 and bled, have something more than an historical 
 interest for many of us. Their story, however, is 
 even locally now but little known ; it has been 
 gradually disappearing in the mist of the past, and 
 is recoverable, if at all, from scattered, long-forgotten, 
 and not easily accessible sources. The chapter of 
 our county history which relates to the Civil War 
 has not been perhaps so well filled up as to 
 render such details as I have referred to superfluous 
 or unacceptable. It is remarkable, indeed, how 
 little has been done for this portion of the history 
 of Devonshire. There is absolutely no work that 
 has specially dealt with it. The Messrs. Lysons 
 merely summarize a description of the war as it 
 affected the whole county in eight or nine pages 
 of their Topographical and Historical Account of 
 Devonshire which is still the facile princeps of our 
 county histories. This and the separate notices 
 in their proper places throughout the work are de- 
 rived chiefly from Lord Clarendon's History of the 
 
PREFACE, xi 
 
 Rebellion and Civil War and Vicars's Parliamentary 
 Chronicle; but Clarendon is occasionally imperfect 
 — as witness the fact that one of the most consider- 
 able of the conflicts in Devonshire is dismissed by 
 him in less than a paragraph, while another is not 
 even alluded to — and Vicars is a fanatical and 
 exaggerated and, at best, but a second-hand 
 authority. By far the most accurate and copious 
 description, so far as it goes, of the war in Devon- 
 shire is contained in an article in the Retrospective 
 Review (vol. xii. p. 179), by Mr. J. H. Merivale ; but 
 unfortunately it stops short at the end of the first 
 year of the war. 
 
 Military transactions necessarily form much of 
 the burden of the following pages. As a non- 
 military writer I have described them from the 
 ordinary point of view, and too probably may have 
 erred in technicalities. I have incidentally touched 
 upon some of the political and social features of the 
 period, and have interspersed short biographical 
 notices of prominent Devonians, whose names are, 
 in many instances, still as household words with us, 
 who took part in the transactions described. 
 
 The causes which brought about the great Civil 
 War have been lightly passed over ; they belong to 
 a chapter of English history with which everybody 
 is supposed to be familiar ; and they have been the 
 subject of countless dissertations. Any detailed 
 relation of them would scarcely have been expected 
 in a work of this kind, and a critical treatment of 
 the subject would have been superfluous and out of 
 place. If I have adverted to them at all, it has been 
 
xii PREFACE, 
 
 for the purpose of showing, by a few illustrations, 
 how some of the larger political movements during 
 the period immediately preceding the outbreak of 
 the war bore upon local affairs, and likewise for the 
 purpose of introducing the immediate subject. If I 
 have referred to the general progress of the war and 
 its varying phases in the body of the work, it has 
 been only so far as was necessary to explain the 
 relation to them of the local events in North 
 Devon. 
 
 For convenience, I have divided the substance of 
 this work, not into chronological periods nor into 
 chapters of uniform length, but into Parts marked 
 out by certain distinct epochs in the history of Barn- 
 staple during the period from 1642 to 1646 inclusive. 
 This plan, I venture to think, gives more lucidity to 
 a narrative which may need all such help to make it 
 intelligible. 
 
 I have reserved for this place the particular ac- 
 knowledgment of my indebtedness to my friend, 
 John Roberts Chanter, Esq., of Fort Hill, not only 
 for much personal information, but also for the 
 assistance that I have derived from his important 
 selections from the Municipal Records of Barnstaple 
 which, I may almost say, were the original sugges- 
 tion of this work. Mr. Chanter has earned the 
 gratitude of every historical and antiquarian student 
 by his discovery and preservation of these ancient 
 and valuable records, and by his turning to account 
 a familiarity with legal and municipal antiquities 
 and an intimate local knowledge in amply elucidating 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 xiu 
 
 them, I have obtained from these recovered records 
 many facts and details to which, in most instances, 
 I have been able to give their due chronological 
 order and proper significance. 
 
 R.W.C. 
 
 woodleigh, 
 
 Newton Abbot, 
 1889. 
 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Introductory : Before the Civil War 
 
 PAGE 
 I 
 
 PART 
 
 I. From the Commencement of the Civil War 
 
 to the Surrender of Barnstaple to 
 Prince Maurice : August, 1642— September 
 2, 1643 41 
 
 II. From the Surrender of Barnstaple to 
 
 Prince Maurice to its Revolt to the 
 Parliament : September 2, 1643 — June |f, 
 
 1644 
 
 227 
 
 III. From the Revolt of Barnstaple to the 
 
 Parliament to its Surrender to the 
 King : June If— September 17, 1644 
 
 IV. FrOxM the Surrender of Barnstaple to the 
 
 King to its Surrender to Sir Thomas 
 Fairfax, General of the Parliamentary 
 Forces : September 17, 1644— April 14, 1646 
 
 Index .:.•;.•.... 
 
 259 
 
 338 
 545 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 -•<>*- 
 
 BEFORE THE CIVIL WAR, 
 
 HISTORICALLY, Barnstaple is perhaps best 
 known as one of those seaport towns of 
 Devonshire which figure, not inconspicuously, in 
 the maritime annals of our country, and from whose 
 harbours proceeded most of those enterprises — 
 legitimate or illegitimate, half mercantile, half 
 piratical — which characterize more particularly the 
 Elizabethan period. 
 
 As far back as in the reign of Henry VIII. a 
 Barnstaple fleet resorted for fishing to the coasts 
 of Newfoundland. In Queen Elizabeth's days ships 
 hailing from the North Devon port were to be met 
 with, trafficking their salt-fish and the woollen 
 fabrics, then of much repute and the manufacture 
 of which was the chief home industry of the town, 
 among the Western Islands, within the Straits of 
 Gibraltar, and along the shores of France and the 
 Peninsula. During the fitful struggle of our 
 
 2 
 
2 BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 countrymen with Spanish domination, armed re- 
 prisal-ships from the river Taw, at the head of the 
 estuary of which the town of Barnstaple is situated, 
 ranged the Western seas even as far as the Guinea 
 Coast, bringing home prizes freighted with Spanish 
 gold. When the Armada approached the English 
 Channel, Barnstaple and its member port, Bideford, 
 sent a contingent of five ships — some say more — to 
 join the squadron of Sir Francis Drake. 
 
 To these Western towns, again, may be traced the 
 very beginnings of our colonial enterprise. The 
 second unsuccessful expedition under Sir Walter 
 Ralegh's patent sailed from the North Devon port ; 
 and the band of pioneers, all of whom perished in 
 the Virginian forests, came, it is presumed, from 
 Barnstaple and Bideford. Later, about the year ^ 
 1620, when settlements of more promise had been 
 founded in America, considerable intercourse sprang 
 up between Barnstaple and Virginia, Bermuda and 
 New England.^ Some settlers from North Devon, 
 pitching their tents on the neck of land at the 
 bottom of Cape Cod Bay in New England, gave 
 the name '' Barnstable," which is retained, to their 
 settlement, perpetuating the corrupt but more 
 common spelling of the word which prevailed in 
 that century. The American town is no doubt still 
 as flourishing as it was in the year 1839, when the 
 
 ^ It is an interesting fact that it was by a Barnstaple "bark" 
 belonging to Mr. John Delbridge, trading in those parts, that the first 
 batch of semi-tropical seeds and plants was transported from Bermuda 
 to Virginia. {The Historye of the Bermicdaes or Slimmer Islands, 
 Hakluyt Society, 1882, p. 276.) 
 
BEFORE THE CIVIL WAR. 3 
 
 inhabitants enthusiastically celebrated the two hun- 
 dredth anniversary of its incorporation. Salem, 
 founded a little earlier, now famous in more ways 
 than can here be conveniently mentioned, had been 
 originally called " Bastable " — a still more corrupt 
 form of the word Barnstaple — the name having been 
 given to the place, as Captain John Smith informs 
 us,^ by Prince Charles, afterwards Charles the First. 
 
 Although it is not in its maritime or commercial 
 aspect that Barnstaple will figure in the following 
 pages, the characteristics of the town and the turn 
 of mind of its people will be best understood from 
 the foregoing cursory sketch. The merchants who 
 were engaged in the enterprises which have been 
 reviewed, and who by almost a birthright composed 
 the municipal governing body, were of a type to 
 which there is now no precise resemblance. Many 
 of them were allied to some of the best families 
 of the neighbouring landed gentry, and, if we may 
 credit the armorial devices which are still to be 
 seen displayed upon the ornate monuments in the 
 parish church, they themselves laid claim to good 
 and ancient lineage. Their strong local feeling 
 is everywhere apparent. They were stiff upholders 
 of the rights and privileges of their ancient town, 
 and were generous benefactors to their poorer 
 townsmen, as their almshouses and other charitable' 
 foundations still survive to testify. 
 
 The topography of Barnstaple has changed but 
 little during the last two centuries and a half. 
 Anciently a walled town and one of remote anti- 
 
 ' Works, Arber's Ed., 1884, p. 949. 
 
4 TOPOGRAPHY, 
 
 quity, Barnstaple retains distinctly to this day the 
 outlines of its earliest fortifications, although the 
 walls themselves had sunk into ruin before the time 
 of Henry VIII. The intramural streets have the 
 same lineaments, singularly well preserved, as in the 
 days of Charles the First ; but, unhappily, the river- 
 side quays, with which so many local historical 
 incidents were associated, have been unwisely 
 sacrificed, in wanton disregard of all such con- 
 siderations as well as of aesthetic propriety, to the 
 demands of railway engineers. High Street, which 
 probably since the time of the Roman occupatioi^ 
 had intersected the intramural town, was the main 
 artery, so to speak, of civic life which appropriately 
 centred at the High Cross, where stood the Guild- 
 hall, and, behind it, the parish church of St. Peter. 
 The frontages of but very few buildings now show 
 any traces of the domestic architecture of the first 
 half of the seventeenth century; but in the secluded 
 low back-parlours of some old houses are still to be 
 seen the somewhat coarse but highly-decorated plaster 
 ceilings and the carved oak wainscotting of that period. 
 There are not now many survivors of the generation 
 which saw the last of the old Guildhall, built about 
 the middle of the sixteenth century ; and within the 
 recollection of the present writer the last two of the 
 town gateways, each a double arch of massive stone- 
 work, yielded to the supposed exigencies of modern 
 traffic, and were unhappily destroyed. Two other 
 gateways, which seem to have been in existence in 
 Leland's time, about the year 1540, disappeared at 
 some unknown subsequent date. Leland, on his 
 
CONTEMPORAR Y NO TICES. $ 
 
 visit to the town, specially remarked that the houses 
 were built of stone — domestic architectural con- 
 struction being still generally of timber. Camden, 
 who wrote half-a-century later, mentions the reputa- 
 tion of the town for *' elegant building." Indeed, 
 by a remarkable consensus of contemporary opinion, 
 it was reckoned, at the time of which I am writing, 
 one of the pleasantest of English towns. In a 
 political sermon preached before the House of 
 Commons in the year 1646, the Rev. Samuel 
 Torshel calls it ** neat Barnstaple " — an epithet 
 which could have been suggested, I imagine, only 
 by personal observation- Ray, the naturalist, soon 
 after the Restoration, visited Barnstaple, when but 
 little change could have taken place in its material 
 features since the time of the Civil War. He 
 describes it as " a very handsome and large town ; 
 . . . the houses are all neat and in good repair ; 
 the streets are well paved, so that one may walk 
 in them in slippers in the midst of winter."^ '* It 
 is blessed," says Guillim, or rather Blome, in 
 Guillim's Heraldry ^ "with a sweet and wholsome 
 Air, hath fair and well built Buildings altogether of 
 stone and brick/' 2 And Dr. Yonge, who visited it 
 in the year 1674, with peculiar orthography writes : 
 " Its one of the pleasants towns I ever saw being 
 round on a plaine fayr, streight broad streets and 
 many good houses of old fashion.'' 3 Other features 
 
 * Memorials of Ray, 1846, p. 183. 
 
 2 Fifth edition, 1676, part ii. p. 172. 
 
 3 ^'Autobiography of Dr. James Yonge, F.R.S.," Trans. Devonshire 
 
 Association^ xiii. 338. 
 
6 ' POPULATION. 
 
 connected with the town, and quite as distinctive, 
 have been overlooked by these observers. At one 
 end of the water front of the town a picturesque 
 thirteenth-century bridge spanned the river, with 
 sixteen pointed arches — as yet unburdened with 
 modern accretions. Looking down the river, a wide 
 reach expanded westward, converted seemingly into 
 a lake by the overlapping hills in the distance. At 
 the other end of the river front were the Castle Hill 
 and Green, then a public resort, where the pastimes 
 of Elizabethan days still lingered, and over which 
 the rush of every flood tide into the river wafted 
 breezes straight from the Atlantic. With these data 
 it requires no great exercise of the imagination to 
 picture the external aspects of Barnstaple when its 
 streets alternately echoed to the clatter of Essex's 
 lifeguards and the roistering of Goring's disreputable 
 troopers. 
 
 The population of Barnstaple in the middle of the 
 seventeenth century can of course be computed 
 only approximately. I have been able, by well- 
 known methods, to estimate it as probably not much 
 exceeding 4,000. The municipal government of the 
 town was at that time wielded by a Corporation, 
 consisting of a Mayor, two Aldermen, and twenty-two 
 Capital Burgesses, who derived their authority from 
 a charter of James I. This charter confirmed to the 
 town certain rights, privileges, and immunities with 
 which it had been, in fact, endowed by successive 
 monarchs, and which, it was traditionally believed, 
 had been originally derived from King ^thelstan. 
 The government of the Corporation was all but 
 
MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT, 7 
 
 iespotic ; and it was characterized by the usual 
 :ivic and social peculiarities of the period ; but it 
 was on the whole beneficent. The dignity of the 
 Mayor was amply sustained and protected, and 
 terrible were the consequences of any " opprobrious, 
 vile, slanderous, unhonest or unseemly words" spoken 
 of him. Aliens had Uttle favour ; none could set up 
 any craft, mystery, or occupation without license of 
 the Mayor, on pain of imprisonment. The streets 
 were lighted at night until nine o'clock during the 
 winter, from Allhallowtide, by lantern and candle, 
 which the principal inhabitants hung out at their 
 front doors. Watch and ward were kept from sun- 
 set to sunrise by the chief townsmen — the survival, 
 after three hundred years, of the obligation created by 
 the Statute of Winchester in the time of Edward L 
 The supervision of the morals of the inhabitants/) 
 was characterized by the austerity of Puritanism.'' 
 Female immorality was punished by the open ■ 
 whipping of the offender through the town, and/I 
 male culprits were sent to prison. Of sanitary 
 regulations there is not much sign. Some attention 
 was paid to outward decencies, and no man could 
 raise a dunghill before his own door, or suffer 
 '* hoggs " to roam ; but the frequency of visitations 
 of the plague was probably due to insanitary habits 
 of which we have now no adequate conception. 
 
 I may now pass on to a review of the local life as 
 it was affected by the political agitations of the years 
 immediately preceding the outbreak of the Civil 
 War. 
 
8 SHIP-MONEY. 
 
 The inhabitants of Barnstaple, a maritime town,* 
 were of course familiar with the obnoxious impost' 
 of ship-money, which is popularly and correctly 
 supposed to have been one of the proximate causes 
 of the Rebellion. This impost was a revival of an 
 old royal prerogative which had fallen into desuetude, 
 and in the reign of Elizabeth had become merely 
 a call for volunteer ships, the hire of which was 
 honestly paid for by the Crown. Thus a levy was 
 made in the years 1619-20, in the reign of James I., 
 for the alleged purpose of suppressing pirates who 
 infested the Channel. The tax was personal in its 
 incidence, and was directed to be paid not only by 
 the merchants of every seaport town, but by all who 
 took ''any benefit by the port." Under that levy, 
 :f 500 was demanded of Barnstaple ; Exeter being 
 assessed at the same sum. 
 
 In the year 1626, at the opening of the reign of 
 Charles the First, the Privy Council again made a 
 demand upon the seaport towns for furnishing and 
 setting forth ships, ostensibly to guard the narrow 
 seas, whilst the fleet was engaged upon the expe- 
 dition to the Isle of Rhe. This demand was appa- 
 rently the first of its kind which met with overt 
 opposition, and it signally failed, at least in Devon- 
 shire. "The country,'* says Walter Yonge, "for 
 the most part did generally refuse to contribute 
 towards setting forth these ships ; as being unable 
 by reason of many taxes and burthens upon them.'' ^ 
 
 In the following year the demand was repeated, 
 but in a different form. Devonshire was ordered to 
 
 ^ Diary of Walter Yonge, Esq,, Camden Society, 1848, p. 93. 
 
SHIP-MONE V. g 
 
 furnish eight ships, of which Barnstaple was to 
 provide two. The towns were to supply the ships 
 and the county the men and victuals. A meeting 
 of the justices was to be held at Exeter for the 
 purpose of considering what should be done. The 
 result, it appears, was that the justices did nothing. 
 Following upon this was another demand, in the 
 year 1628, by the King and Council, for the raising 
 of ;f 17.400 from the county of Devon for the setting 
 forth of a fleet; but, says Yonge, '* our county 
 refused to meddle therein." ^ 
 
 In October, 1634, the first writ was issued by the 
 Privy Council for levying ship-money in the form of 
 an assessment, " according to their substance," on 
 the inhabitants of seaport towns. The assessment 
 on Barnstaple for its share, with other towns of 
 the county, in the cost of a ship of 400 tons, as 
 apportioned, was ^252 4s. Sd.^ Gribble (Memo- 
 rials of Barnstaple, p. 441), states that the total 
 amount paid by Barnstaple under this assessment 
 was upwards of ^^600, derived from a list of par- 
 ticular assessments " on the inhabitants and tene- 
 ments," which list is also quoted by Mr. Chanter, and 
 is estimated by him to represent at least ^fSoo in 
 total amount.3 Both were manifestly in error. We 
 
 * Diary ^ Camden Society, 1848, p. iii. 
 
 * Calendar of State Papers: Domestic — 1634-5, January 2, 1635. 
 
 3 Records, No. Iv. This reference, as well as the similar ones 
 which will follow, is to the selection of records from the Municipal 
 Archives of Barnstaple, made by J. R. Chanter, Esq., in which he was 
 assisted by the accomplished Master of the Barnstaple Grammar 
 School, Thomas Wainwright, Esq. The extracts, copiously annotated, 
 were printed from time to time as the work went on, in the two local 
 
lo SHIP-MONEY, 
 
 > 
 
 should not be surprised to find that the sum raised 
 was less than the quota demanded, but certainly 
 very much so if it proved to have been, as they 
 read it, more than twice as much. The principle 
 upon which ship-money was now levied seems to 
 have been the same as that upon which subsidies 
 had been usually raised, that is, by a rate on land 
 and goods. It is probable, therefore, that these 
 particular assessments represented mere fancy, or 
 arbitrary, rateable values of moveable goods from 
 which, by the Subsidy Act, 34 and 35 Henry VIII. , 
 c. 27, wearing apparel, plate, and jewels were 
 excluded, fixed by the assessors (especially as the 
 figures are all in round numbers), and not the actual 
 sums levied. It is of interest to record the leading 
 names, as they may be assumed to be those of the 
 most substantial inhabitants at the time : — 
 
 Nicholas Delbridge, rated at jT^^y^ 
 
 John Penrose 
 
 jj 
 
 24 
 
 William Palmer 
 
 >j 
 
 24 
 
 Nicholas Down 
 
 j> 
 
 12 
 
 Richard Harris 
 
 «i 
 
 12 
 
 A great many follow at ^10, £"5, ^3, and £1^ with a 
 very few at los., which was the lowest value assessed 
 in the case of the subsidy.^ The Act already referred 
 to provided for a graduated scale of payment at so 
 much in the pound, the charge increasing in propor- 
 tion to the means of the assessed ; but whether or 
 
 newspapers. Published in such a form, which was in the circumstances 
 the only practicable one, this extremely valuable collection must always 
 be comparatively rare. I have referred to it in the Preface to this work. 
 ' Records^ No. Iv. 
 
SHIP-MONEY. II 
 
 not it was followed in the levy of ship-money is not 
 apparent. 
 
 In the year 1635, the demand upon the county of 
 Devon for ship-money was for providing a ship of 
 900 tons ; and the assessment of £9,000 for this 
 purpose was extended to the inland towns. This 
 was the commencement of the fully-developed his- 
 torical tax of ship-money. The effect was, of course, 
 to relieve to some extent the seaport towns. At all 
 events, the quota of Barnstaple in this case was 
 only ;fioo. In the following year there was a 
 similar assessment ; but at a meeting of the mayors 
 of the corporation towns of Devonshire with the 
 Sheriff, it appears that in an apportionment, in 
 which all concurred, except the Mayor of Barnstaple, 
 who protested, Exeter succeeded in relieving itseJf of 
 £50, which was added to the quota of Barnstaple. 
 Against this arrangement the town petitioned, but 
 without avail, to the Privy Council. The petitioners 
 of Barnstaple, it was neatly answered, had no doubt 
 urged at the meeting of assessors of the county 
 what they could to ease their own Corporation ; but 
 since they could not prevail with their neighbours, 
 who best knew the ability of that town, the Council 
 thought it not fit to alter what had been done in so j^.), 
 orderly a way. The receipt for :^i50, accordingly |/] 
 paid by Richard Beaple, Mayor of Barnstaple, as the ' 
 share of ship-money levied on the town, is extant. 
 
 In each of the two following years, 1636 and 1637, 
 a similar assessment was made ; but the money was 
 obtained with some ominous difficulty : ** The 
 service has not passed without opposition, many 
 
12 SHIP-MONEY. 
 
 suffering distresses to be taken of their goods, and 
 some base people have not spared to spatter the 
 officers employed by the Sheriff with scandalous 
 language." ^ By and by arrears began to accu- 
 mulate, and conscientious and stubborn objections 
 to the payment supervened. Demands are made by 
 the Privy Council, viz., for ;^3 los. from Richard 
 Delbridge; los. from Julian Peard, widow; 15s. from 
 Martin Blake, vicar ; in default to appear before my 
 Lords. Their several answers are as follows : — 
 Delbridge refuses to pay, and will make answer to 
 the same; Peard says she will pay none ; and Blake 
 says he will appear, according to order, before the 
 Bishop of Exeter and render the reasons of his 
 refusal. 2 The Vicar, on the side of the Philistines, 
 is worth noting. 
 
 Gribble {Memorials, &c., p. 442), on the further 
 erroneous assumption that the whole amount of 
 the assessment of the last three years fell on the 
 maritime towns only, came to the absurd conclusion 
 that Barnstaple must have paid ship-money at 
 the rate of :^i,350 per annum for five successive 
 years ! 
 
 By a primitive superstition it was held that the 
 merchants of maritime towns were the only persons 
 interested in keeping the neighbouring seas free of 
 pirates — the chief object for which the tax was 
 ostensibly levied. It was the extension of this 
 original area of taxation that created most of the 
 clamour against the impost which in itself was far 
 
 ^ Calendar of State Papers : Domestic — 1637. 
 2 /t?zct.f 1639. 
 
MILITAR V ORGANIZA TION. 1 3 
 
 less onerous than our own income-tax.^ But when 
 ship-money became a mere pretence for fitting out 
 ships, and rather, as Lord Clarendon admitted, '' a 
 spring and magazine that should have no bottom, 
 and for an everlasting supply of all occasions," it 
 was at least obviously unfair that it should be 
 limited in its incidence to the seaport towns. 
 Besides being like the proverbial last straw, ship- 
 money was odious, chiefly, because it was taxation by 
 arbitrary royal decree and without the authority of 
 Parliament — a special heinousness to which the 
 inquiring mind had become fully alive. It was 
 resisted, as every one knows, by the illustrious 
 Hampden, whose conduct, says Macaulay, met with 
 the warm approbation of every respectable Royalist 
 in England. But the legality of the impost was 
 affirmed by an obsequious majority of the judges. 
 " After that," said George Peard, one of the Members 
 for Barnstaple, in a speech in the House of Commons, 
 ** I think not my gown my own." 
 
 As military transactions will inevitably form the 
 most considerable part in the relation which follows, 
 some account of the organization, equipment, and 
 strength of the local armed forces of the County of 
 Devon generally, and of the town of Barnstaple in 
 particular, immediately before the breaking out of 
 the Civil War, will be a convenient help to the 
 
 ^ Sir Anthony Weldon, a strong Parliamentarian, complains that the 
 grievance of gunpowder-men (who entered a man's house to dig up the 
 floor of his cellar for saltpetre) is '*far more pressing than shipmonie or 
 any other that I knowe." 
 
14 MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 
 
 understanding of the martial details of the period 
 following. The suddenness with which small bodies 
 of armed men started up in the most unlikely places 
 at the very commencement of the Civil War is 
 remarkable ; but the military organization of the 
 country, rough and of essentially locaL character as 
 it was, had been in reality kept up with consider- 
 able regularity during a long preceding period. It 
 will be desirable to glance at this feature to under- 
 stand how it was that such an apparently peaceful 
 mercantile community as that of Barnstaple dis- 
 played an aptitude for arms and, as will be seen 
 hereafter, no inconsiderable skill in the art of 
 fortification, when the emergency arose. A standing 
 army, it is scarcely necessary to say, was in the 
 early part of the seventeenth century unknown in 
 England. The only constitutional force was the 
 Militia, which was raised by the Lord-Lieutenants 
 of the counties ; and all able-bodied men were liable 
 to be impressed and enrolled by the constables 
 of the several Hundreds for training and service. 
 Such was the force which, as Wyot tells us, was 
 raised in the Hundreds of Braunton and Fremington, 
 and which, two hundred strong, was reviewed in 
 the Castle Green at Barnstaple by Mr. Hugh 
 Fortescue, its captain, in the Armada year 1588.^ 
 And such was the force which, in 1622, under Sir 
 Robert Chichester, of Raleigh, was ordered to be ready 
 at an hour's warning to concentrate at Ilfracombe, to 
 resist an apprehended landing of a Spanish army.^ 
 
 ' " Wyot's Diary," Chanter's Literary History of Barnstaple, p. 94. 
 2 Diary of Walter Yonge^ Esq.y Camden Society, 1848, p. 57. Yonge 
 
MILITARY ORGANIZATION, 15 
 
 A few years before this, in 1613, orders appear 
 to have been given by the Government of James I. 
 for general musters of the trained soldiers of the 
 counties. In May in that year, William, Earl of 
 Bath, Lord-Lieutenant of Devon, w^rites to the 
 Council, " that at musters in Devonshire, the 
 trained bands are five thousand men, but not half 
 of them know how to use their weapons. Asks an 
 order that their sporting time, which they chiefly 
 spend in hurling, should be given to exercising their 
 weapons. Some able men refused to produce their 
 horses and require punishment." ^ Hurling, by the 
 way, is generally considered to have been an ex- 
 clusively Cornish pastime- There seems to have 
 been no lack of ^eal on the part of the officers. 
 Stow tells us that, on the establishment of the 
 Artillery Company of London, in 1610, it was 
 the habit of country gentlemen when in London 
 to visit the Artillery Garden, and observe the 
 exercise of arms there, which was excellent, and 
 ** being returned, they practised and used the same 
 unto their trained bands." 
 
 An attempt was made to put the Militia upon 
 a stricter footing in the year 1626, ostensibly *'to 
 defend his Majesty's kingdom and to withstand the 
 attempts or invasion of his enemies." ^ At about 
 
 says that this was Sir Richard Chichester, which is a mistake. Sir 
 Robert was Colonel of a regiment of Foot. 
 
 ^ Calendar of State Papers : Domestic — 161 1-18. 
 
 2 A summary of the orders then directed to the Constables will give 
 a good idea of the constitution and discipline of the Militia — at least 
 theoretically— at that time : — Arms checked at the last muster were to 
 be amended or renewed by a certain day : soldiers enrolled not to 
 
i6 MILITAR V ORGANIZA TION. 
 
 the same time, according to Walter Yonge, sergeants 
 were sent for from the Netherlands and distributed 
 over England, six being sent into Devonshire, ** v^ho 
 exercised and disciplined the captains and officers 
 of every company and band in martial discipline." ^ 
 In the northern division of Devonshire there were, 
 
 remove their dwelling without license : the trained to be in readiness 
 to march upon an hour's warning : all able-bodied untrained men from 
 21 to 60 to be enrolled: every hundred *'trayners" to have three 
 baggage waggons : beacons to be diligently watched by discreet and 
 sufficient men, two by day and three by night : for every hundred 
 trayners, ten able men within the Hundred to serve for pioneers to be 
 provided with — 
 
 12 ** pike axes." 
 12 spades. 
 12 shovels. 
 
 6 iron bars. 
 6 axes. 
 6 hatchets. 
 
 2 tent saws. 
 
 4 hand saws. 
 
 12 small baskets to carry earth. 
 12 bills to cut wood. 
 10 " berriers " (augurs) of several 
 sizes. 
 
 It was to be signified to the best sort of men within the Hundred to 
 provide themselves with arms for their particular use. Trained soldiers 
 were to be warned to keep in readiness such horse? as they had for 
 more speedily conveying themselves, their arms and other necessaries, 
 and to provide themselves with knapsacks and provisions of victual for 
 ten days. That for every musketeer there be provided 3 lbs. of powder, 
 3 lbs. of lead to make bullets, and 3 lbs. of match, to be raised by tything 
 rates within the Hundred, and being provided to keep it safe. To 
 appoint the chief innkeeper of every market town in the Hundred to 
 be always furnished and provided with post-horses for his Majesty's 
 service, to be employed at the King's price, viz., twopence each mile. 
 Inquiry to be made what spare arms are in the Hundred besides those 
 belonging to the trained bands, and in whose hands they are. The 
 next and last clause seems to provide for scouting parties :— That in 
 case of any advertisement, either by firing the beacons or otherwise, of 
 the approach of the enemy, such strong and sufficient watchers both 
 of Horse and Foot to be set and continued in all fit places as shall be 
 necessary. {/Votes and Queries^ 2nd Series, iii. 27). 
 ^ Diary ^ Camden Society, 1S4S, p. 90, 
 
MILITAR V ORGANIZA TION, 1 7 
 
 according tcL-Westcote, in 1633, two regiments of 
 Militia— the^First commanded^y Qolonel-Sir Lewis 
 tollard, Bart, and ""the Second by Colonel John 
 Acland. These regiments were ** well armed with 
 pike and musket." There were also three cornets 
 of Horse in the county, under the command of Sir 
 Ferdinando Gorges, Governor of Plymouth.^ 
 
 The militaiy organization, of which we thus 
 obtain a glimpse, became a few years later the 
 basis of the army which was raised for the war 
 with the Scots, and, as will be seen, the North 
 Devon parishes contributed their quota. 
 
 The towns were always jealous of the right to 
 maintain their own military forces. These were 
 raised in the same way, were sustained by a m.artial 
 rate on the inhabitants, and went by the name of 
 Trained Bands. Exemptions from service were 
 apparently rare.^ AH through the sixteenth century 
 there are entries in the Municipal Records of Barn- 
 staple of disbursements for this purpose — muster- 
 roll expenses, payments for cleaning the '^town 
 harness," for making the butts, for bows and 
 sheaves of arrows, for swords, daggers, morris-pikes 
 and halberts, and for the defensive armour of the 
 period — tallets, corslets, and almaynryvets. These 
 items are typical ; they commonly occur in parish 
 and municipal accounts, and are only quoted here 
 to show the ordinary details connected with the 
 
 * View of Devonshire in 1630, p. 72. 
 
 ^ Raleigh Clapham of Barnstaple, apothecary, was exempted from 
 personal service, not on account of his profession, but because of " the 
 infirmity of his body " {Records^ Stippknientary, No. 4). 
 
 3 
 
1 8 MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 
 
 local military administration. In 1585, a contingent 
 of town soldiers was sent from Barnstaple to join the 
 expedition of the Earl of Leicester to the Nether- 
 lands, which sailed from Harwich in December of 
 that year. The pages of Motley ^ tell us to what 
 a miserable state of beggary the unfortunate men 
 pressed for this undertaking, intended as an oblique 
 thrust at Spain, already concocting an invasion of 
 England, were reduced. Wyot records that in 1587 
 the town soldiers were mustered '^ with a shewe of 
 their arms and artillery " ^ Jn the parish church, by 
 the heroic Sir Richard Grenville and other justices.3 
 In the year 1614, in the peaceful reign of James I., 
 there was a special call — it is not easy to see upon 
 what occasion — on the martial resources of the town, 
 and orders from the Privy Council came for increased 
 strictness to be observed at the musters of the 
 trained band. Items in the Corporation accounts 
 of that year show that one Mr. Lawday was paid 
 *^ to ride to Plymouth, and towards his charges 
 there to learn the feats of arms, £2'' Gunpowder 
 (two cwt.) was laid in at a cost of -£& 3s. 5d. The 
 armoury was overhauled and its contents furbished 
 up. William Scamp, the cutler, for making new 
 heads to the pikes, and cleaning the town armour, 
 and for girdles and hangers for the same, was paid 
 £ I 3s. 3d. .Dinners for the soldiers cost the con- 
 siderable sum in those days of ^^8 4s. 4 
 
 ' United Netherlands, ch. vii. 
 
 ^ Which then meant bows and arrows, arquebusses, and other small 
 arms. 
 
 3 "Diary," Chanter's Literary History of Barnstaple, p. 93. 
 *> Records, No. Ixi. 
 
ARMS AND EQUIPMENT. 19 
 
 It appears that in the same year in which the 
 attention of the Government was directed to the 
 state of the MiUtia in the counties, as already 
 noticed, the Mayor and Aldermen of Barnstaple, in 
 the excess of their loyalty or patriotism, petitioned 
 the Privy Council for, and obtained permission to 
 increase the number of their trained band from 
 sixty-five to one hundred men ; they were also em- 
 powered to elect a captain and officers of their own, 
 ** to assess arms upon the most sufficientest inhabi- 
 tants," and to muster within their own precincts. 
 A few years later this military enthusiasm cooled — 
 at least in some quarters — as the burden of the 
 martial rate became severely felt by the inhabitants 
 of the town, and falling upon them, as it did, 
 simultaneously with the new and grievous exaction 
 of ship-money. The Mayor and his brethren, in 
 a petition to the Privy Council in 1634, complain 
 that divers of the inhabitants *' being of a froward 
 disposition and averse from all good order do refuse 
 not only to provide arms but to contribute towards 
 the charge of so good and laudable a work, pre- 
 tending several reasons for exemption."^ 
 
 As the arms and equipment of the trained soldiers 
 of this period were the same as those with which 
 the levies for the Civil War were furnished, at least 
 during its earlier days, it may be useful in anticipa- 
 tion of what is to follow to see what they were 
 
 like. 
 There were two descriptions of foot-soldier — 
 
 ' Records^ No. Iv. 
 
20 ARMS AND EQUIPMENT. 
 
 pikemen and musketeers. The pikeman wore a 
 corslet, which was light body-armour defending the 
 breast and back, and tasses, which are otherwise 
 described as almaynrivets, so called because rivetted 
 after the German fashion, presumably an improved 
 construction, covering the lower part of the body 
 and thighs. A morion, or open iron helmet, turned 
 up at the edges and peaked in front, protected the 
 head. It seems that it was not always that he 
 could get these. His weapon, the pike, was from 
 twelve to eighteen feet in length, a (proverbially) 
 plain ash staff with a narrow spear-head of iron or 
 steel. He was also armed with a short straight 
 sword. There was as much glorification of the pike 
 in those days, as there was of the *' British bayonet" 
 (its successor) in the annals of the Peninsular War. 
 The defensive armour, which in almost all contem- 
 porary parish accounts is mentioned as ** harness," 
 as well as the offensive weapons, pikes and muskets, 
 was kept at the expense of the parish for the use of 
 the quota of soldiers which the parish was bound to 
 provide. Each farmhouse appears to have been 
 also '* charged" with its proportion of arms or 
 armour or both : e,g,^ Coombepyne Farm is "charged 
 with one corslet." ^ Queen Elizabeth, in her In- 
 structions to the Lord-Lieutenant of Devon in 1574, 
 orders not only that it shall be seen that armour is 
 provided, but, with minute consideration, that care 
 shall be taken that it fits the wearer. ^ It is doubt- 
 ful if there was anything like uniformity in the 
 
 ' Trevelyan Papers^ Camden Society, 1872, pt. iii. 191. 
 "^ ArchcEologia^ xxxv. 353. 
 
ARMS AND EQUIPMENT. 2i 
 
 equipment of men drawn as they were from various 
 parishes and provided with such armour as the local 
 resources happened to be able to supply. The 
 ** harness" was doubtless of various ages and 
 patterns, and in many cases had done duty at 
 musters in the time of the grandfathers of the 
 present wearers. 
 
 The original musketeer was dressed in a leather 
 doublet, the cost of which was as much as 14s. of 
 the money of that time. His trunk hose were of his 
 native kersey. The Parliamentary regiments raised 
 in London wore coats of distinguishing colours : 
 thus we meet with red-coats, green-coats, and blue- 
 coats — colours adopted from those of their regiments 
 which in turn were derived generally from the livery of 
 their respective colonels. The common badge of the 
 Parliamentarians was an orange-coloured sash, and 
 that of the Royalists a crimson one. The musketeer 
 wore on his head what he could get ; but as the war 
 went on the iron pot headpiece seems to have been 
 universally used. His musket was the match-lock, 
 fired by the lighted end of a twisted '' match " or 
 cord, prepared with saltpetre, brought down by a 
 spring on the priming, the other end of the cord 
 being held in the left hand. Match occurs as a 
 considerable item in the stores of ammunition. 
 When it ran short, as on one occasion at the defence 
 of Marlborough, houses were ransacked for bed-cords 
 to serve as a substitute. As the musket was too 
 heavy and clumsy to be fired from the shoulder, the 
 musketeer carried a " rest," like an attenuated crutch, 
 which was stuck into the ground, and supported 
 
22 'ARMS AND EQUIPMENT. 
 
 the piece while being fired. The musketeer wore 
 a bandoleer, or bandelara, as the word was some- 
 times written, a shoulder belt on which hung a row 
 of little wooden cases, containing each a charge of 
 gunpowder ; these were called *' shoots of powder." 
 The cartridge was not yet generally in use. The 
 bandoleer as an accoutrement has been recently 
 revived. As barrels of gunpowder were carried to 
 the field, it is to be inferred that each musketeer 
 filled his bandoleer from the open barrel ; and every 
 man seems to have carried his bullet-mould for 
 casting his own bullets. At the right side of the 
 musketeer hung a bag of bullets. The first bullet 
 for use was carried in the mouth ; hence the honour- 
 able article of capitulation which allows the soldier 
 of a surrendered garrison to march out ** bullet in 
 mouth.'* On the same side hung his *^ touch-box/' 
 containing lighted tinder. 
 
 All representations of the military formations of 
 the period show the pikemen in a solid square, like 
 the Greek phalanx, the men so close together that 
 probably, as in that classical precedent, the pikes of 
 even the fifth rank when levelled extended three feet 
 beyond the front. The musketeers were placed in 
 advance and on the flanks of the pikemen. The 
 sergeants carried halberts. In the records of Barn- 
 staple is this item of expenditure, in 1639-40 : '* Paid 
 to George Soucet for 6 halberts, which he bought 
 dt Bristol for the town, £2 9s. od." ^ 
 
 The horse-soldiers were also of two descriptions- 
 troopers and dragooners, or dragoons. The former, 
 
 ' Records^ No. Ixi. • • 
 
ARMS AND EQUIPMENT. 23 
 
 men who could provide their own horses, or who 
 were the substitutes of others who did not personally 
 serve, were generally of the class from which the 
 Yeomanry cavalry regiments are now recruited. 
 Every landed proprietor was *' set '' to furnish his 
 quota according to his supposed estate. The trooper 
 was armed with sword and pistols. It is stated by 
 military authors that, until the more impetuous 
 charges of Prince Rupert's cavalry led to another 
 fashion, the ordinary attack of horse-soldiers con- 
 sisted in the opposing squadrons trotting up to each 
 other and commencing the conflict by an affair of 
 pistols ; after discharging which and throwing them 
 at the heads of the enemy (which they generally 
 did) they fell to with their swords, if one or the other 
 did not break and scatter.^ 
 
 The other description of horse-soldiers was the 
 dragooner. The derivation of the name has not 
 been determined, but it is believed to have been from 
 a fire-arm called a dragon, with which he was origi- 
 nally armed. The dragooners were mounted on 
 country horses, and were armed with a short fire- 
 arm, which they dismounted to discharge. They 
 were, in fact, what are now called mounted infantry. 
 
 ' We notoriously exaggerate in imagination the size of the ancient 
 Romans. The same may be said with reference to the supposed stal- 
 wart troopers of the Civil War. Mr. Charles Greville, in his amusing 
 Memoirs, says that when he was at Littlecote House he saw the hall 
 hung round with the armour and bufif coats of Colonel Popham's 
 troopers, and states, as a remarkable fact, that they are all so small that 
 no man of ordinary size could wear them ; a clear pi oof (he adds) that 
 the present generation are much bigger than their ancestors of two 
 centuries ago. 
 
24 ARMS AND EQUIPMENT, 
 
 A regiment of Horse usually consisted of not more 
 than three or four troops of fifty or sixty men each. 
 A troop of dragooners, however, numbered one hun- 
 dred men. Officers of the higher grades wore body- 
 armour more or less complete, borrowed doubtless in 
 many cases from halls in which hung the — 
 
 " Armoury of the invincible knights of old." 
 
 It is rare to find a portrait of a military celebrity of., 
 the period in which the subject is not represented in 
 armour. The gentleman's buff coat worn by other 
 officers was an expensive affair, but then it lasted a 
 long time. Before the war there was '* not a good 
 one to be gotten under -^Tro [a sum equal to three or 
 four times as much now] ; a very poor one for five or 
 six pounds."^ But already the *' complete steel" 
 was going out of use. Sir Edmund Verney, in the 
 first campaign against the Scots, writes to his son : 
 *' I am resolved to use nothing but back, brest and 
 gauntlett. If I had a pott for the hedd that were 
 pistoll proofe, it may be I would use it, if it were 
 light; but my whole helmett will bee of noe us to 
 mee at all." ^ A military coat of *' French scarlet," 
 with trimming of eight and a half dozen of buttons 
 and loops, is mentioned as costing £'^0, 
 
 Besides the men of whom the forces constitution- 
 ally pressed for the Militia and trained bands were 
 composed, 'Volunteers'* are also frequently men- 
 tioned. These, it may be assumed, were mostly 
 
 ' Trevelyan Papers, Camden Society, 1S72, pt. iii. 194. 
 ^ Veriiey Papers i Camden Society, 1853, p. 227. 
 
PURITANISM, 25 
 
 professional soldiers — old campaigners who, havinp" 
 an eye to pay (which was usually not illiberal), 
 plunder, and — what the great Duke of Wellington 
 believed induced every man to enlist into the British 
 Army in his day— drink, willingly responded to the 
 call of the sergeant. As the war went on, they 
 shifted without compunction from one side to the 
 other as better prospects offered, indifferent to the 
 cause which they served. 
 
 The patriots of the Parliaments which met in April 
 and November, 1640, had succeeded, after the struggle 
 which had been going on since the beginning of the 
 century, in redressing most of the abuses of govern- 
 ment and, could the Stuarts have been trusted, in 
 safeguarding for the time to come the political liber- 
 ties of the people. It was the religious question, for 
 the settlement of which not even a compromise 
 could be found, that mainly brought about the Civil 
 War. 
 
 The Puritan and the Catholic are always with us. 
 The two parties, or rather schools, of religious thought 
 and sentiment which are represented by these names 
 need no description here. In the perturbed years of 
 the reign of Charles I., immediately preceding the 
 Civil War, each was endeavouring to shackle, if it 
 could not altogether suppress, the other; while both 
 professed attachment and allegiance to the Church 
 of England. The acrimony of a never-ending con- 
 troversy pervaded both public and private life. Tole- 
 ration of religious opinion by either party was almost 
 unknown, and its feeble voice was as a voice in the 
 
26 PURITANISM. 
 
 desert. If it was denounced by the one as soul- 
 destroying, it was stigmatized by the other as a 
 " child of the Devil." Puritanism, however, was in 
 the ascendant; and the sombre literature of Cal- 
 vinism was as much gloated over in many a 'squire's 
 hall as in the townsman's parlour. 
 
 On a review of the state of the religious question 
 at this period, it would seem that the alleged 
 grievances of the Puritan part of the nation were 
 not based upon any essential doctrinal differences, 
 and went no further than what may be summarized 
 as hatred of Popery, objection to prelatical govern- 
 ment, and aversion from ceremony and ritual. The 
 Puritan saw behind these forms and symbols eccle- 
 siastical pretensions and doctrines for which he had 
 very hard names indeed. It is common knowledge 
 that the early Puritans in private life were God- 
 fearing, exemplary in their lives and conduct, strict 
 in their religious observances, and grave and austere 
 in their manners. A temperate and judicious his- 
 torian thus tersely describes them in their public 
 attitude: — *'They were anxious for improvement, 
 sometimes fretful for change, but they revered the 
 great principle of an established Church, and did not 
 entertain a thought of separating from its communion. 
 Some of them would have moulded it anew; but few 
 or none of them desired its overthrow." ^ Such, I 
 conceive, were the Church Puritans, whose influence, 
 as we shall presently see, was paramount in the 
 affairs of the municipality of Barnstaple before and 
 
 ' Marsden's History of the Early Puritans, 1853, p. 5. 
 
PURITANISM, 27 
 
 at the beginning of the Civil War. They were 
 Churchmen first and Parliamentarians afterwards. 
 
 The influence of the earnest, though extravagant, 
 preaching of the Puritan ministers in fomenting the 
 prevalent temper of the times w^hich — religious in its 
 impulses, but political in its consequences — spread 
 throughout the length and breadth of the land, and 
 led up to the Civil War, has not probably been over- 
 rated. Comparatively, the influence of the printing- 
 press on the formation and growth of public opinion 
 was insignificant. Political news was always first 
 published from the pulpit ; and the preacher was 
 never at a loss for the text from the Old Testament 
 to apply to it, in accordance with the Judaical 
 method of illustration then in favour. Some curious 
 light is thrown upon this feature of the times by 
 the Municipal Records of Barnstaple. In the latter 
 part of the reign of Elizabeth itinerant lecturers 
 preached on Sunday afternoons in the parish church, 
 and were paid out of the Corporate funds. Their 
 services were in most instances appraised at what 
 strikes us as a moderate rate. For instance, in 
 1582-3, there is *' — Paid to a preacher by order of the 
 Mayor, 8d." ^ A course of sermons appears to have 
 been at one time arranged for Fridays throughout 
 the year, probably for the benefit of the country 
 people — Friday being the market-day. For these 
 I2d. a sermon was considered suitable remuneration. 
 It would be wrong, of course, to judge from this 
 of the value of the ministry. Afternoon sermons 
 on Sundays were an innovation of the Puritans, 
 
 ' Records^ No. Ix. 
 
28 PURITANISM, 
 
 and their peculiar institution, the importance 
 attached to which is astonishing. It was concisely 
 said of this abundant sermonizing, and of the con- 
 flicting notes that proceeded from the ** drum 
 ecclesiastic " (which is the key to the sarcasm), that 
 Canterbury was preached in the morning and Geneva 
 in the afternoon. One of the last acts of James I. 
 was a direction to the bishops, the effect of which, it 
 was said, was to ** cut off half the preaching in 
 England,*' that is, all afternoon sermons, at one 
 blow.^ At the same time a very equivocal in- 
 dulgence was offered to Papists and Puritans — no 
 preacher was to fall into bitter invectives or *^un- 
 decent " railing speeches against their persons 
 causelessly or without invitation from the text. One 
 of the chief complaints invited, or instigated, by the 
 Committee of Parliament on Religion in 1640, was 
 that of the apathy of the bishops with reference to 
 this great craving of the time. A petition from the 
 county of Kent alleges that of the bishops themselves 
 few preach and that but seldom, and that they '^ doe 
 restraine the painfull preaching of others both for 
 Lectures and Afternoon Sermons on the Sabbath 
 day." Ministers are very freely censured for their 
 shortcomings; one — but he was a curate— seldom 
 preached, and " did preach more syllily than 
 seldom." 2 in connection with these grievances, 
 the terms applied to the objectionable ministers of 
 the Established Church were sufficiently compre- 
 
 ^ Fuller's Church History, iii. 321. 
 
 2 Proceedings principally in the County of Kent, Camden Society, 
 1862. 
 
A SCANDALOUS MINISTER, 29 
 
 hensive. They were freely stigmatized as " un- 
 preaching ministers," ** non-residencearies," '' men- 
 pleasers," and ** dumb dogs.'' 
 
 In 1628, John Trynder, vicar of Barnstaple, died.' 
 By all accounts he was of a jovial temperament, 
 cared nothing for the local powers, and abused the 
 Aldermen to their faces from his pulpit. If Wyot 
 has handed down his character faithfully, he was 
 a specimen of the "scandalous minister" who so 
 greatly complicated the ecclesiastical difficulties of 
 the time. It is to be feared that Trynder, like a 
 certain Kentish vicar presented to the Committee of 
 Parliament on Religion, was a " common frequenter 
 of tavernes," and perhaps, like the Kentish vicar, he 
 added to this another enormity, to wit, that of being 
 " a drinker of healths." ^ The truculency of the 
 Rev. John Trynder may explain the fact that 
 towards the end of his career Benjamin Coxe was 
 formally appointed by the Mayor and Corporation at 
 the otherwise incredibly large stipend for the time 
 of ^50 a year for three years, if he continued so 
 long to read a weekly lecture in the church.^ 
 Trynder's epitaph contains a touching allusion, 
 perhaps to these incidents of his earthly pilgrimage, 
 in the quotation from the Psalmist, '* Many are the 
 troubles of the Righteous, but the Lord delivereth 
 them out of All." 
 
 The Rev. Martin Blake, B.D., a man of blameless 
 character and a good churchman, who lived through- 
 
 ^ Proceedings principally in the County of Kent^ Camden Society, 
 1862. 
 ^ Records^ No. xxxiii. 
 
30 PURITAN TENDENCIES. 
 
 out the Civil War and the Interregnum, and was 
 ejected from his living in Cromweirs time, succeeded 
 as vicar. Two contemporary divines of eminent 
 orthodoxy occasionally occupied the Barnstaple pul- 
 pit — the pious and learned John Downe, Rector 
 of Instow, Bishop Jewel's sister's son, and Dr. 
 George Hakewill, Rector of Heanton Punchardon 
 and ultimately Rector of Exeter College, Oxford, the 
 author of the Apology or Declaration of the Power and 
 Providence of God in the Government of the World, a 
 work of much repute in its day and frequently 
 reprinted. But the Puritan Lecturer was firmly estab- 
 lished and held forth in the afternoon discourse. 
 
 Archbishop Laud endeavoured, but ineffectually, 
 to suppress all lecturers and irregular preachers, 
 although the eminent Joseph Hall, at that time 
 Bishop of Exeter, who was no Puritan, gave it 
 as his testimony that those in his diocese were 
 godly men and had done much good. On the 
 other hand, perhaps the worst that has been 
 said of them is that they generally supplanted 
 the incumbents of livings in the affections of their 
 parishioners and gave the greatest growth to 
 nonconformity.^ With the deterioration of their 
 character as the war went on and their influence 
 increased, their contracted views, their affected 
 sanctimoniousness, their vindictiveness, and, in some 
 instances, their ferocity, we have here nothing to do. 
 
 The discontent which brought about the Scotch 
 invasion of 1640 is popularly supposed to have been 
 caused by no greater matter than the attempt of 
 
 ^ Fuller's Church History^ iii. 322. 
 
THE BISHOPS' WAR. 31 
 
 Charles and Archbishop Laud to impose upon the 
 Scotch national Presbyterian Church the liturgy 
 and canons of the Church of England. Scotch 
 Presbyterianism was amply avenged by imposing 
 itself afterwards for a melancholy period upon the 
 English people. The majority of Englishmen were 
 too much impressed at the time by a sense of their 
 own grievances to feel any interest in the suppres- 
 sion of Scottish rebellion, with which they had, on 
 the contrary, much reason to sympathize. The 
 Puritans openly condemned the impending war with 
 the Scots as impious. It was popularly called the 
 " Bishops' War '' — a war on behalf of Prelacy which 
 was supposed to be the cause of half the evils of the 
 times. So reluctant were the English troops to 
 engage in it that some of them mutinied and even 
 murdered their officers on their march. A company 
 of 160 soldiers under the command of Captain 
 Gibson, pressed in North Devon for Sir Thomas 
 Culpeper's regiment, had marched no farther than 
 Wellington, in Somersetshire, when they fell into 
 ''an insolent and desperate mutiny," and cruelly 
 murdered Lieutenant Compton Eures (or Evers), 
 one of their officers, because he was a Papist.^ 
 
 The House of Commons, in which there was a 
 large leaven of Puritanism, did not let slip the 
 opportunity of fomenting the prevailing intolerance 
 of Popery. Not only did they persistently insinuate 
 
 ' Some particulars of this transaction have survived, and may be of 
 local interest in this place. After dragging the body of their victim 
 *'in a barbarous and inhuman manner" through the streets of WeUing- 
 ton, the mutineers disbanded themselves. The following are named 
 
32 A PRO TESTA TION. 
 
 suspicion of the King's fidelity to Protestantism, but 
 held up to odium with less reserve the Queen's 
 notorious attachment to the Roman faith. According 
 to the pernicious custom of the period, a solemn Pro- 
 testationwas ordered to be taken in every parish. This 
 w^as a vow to maintain and defend, with life, power, 
 and estate, the true Protestant Reformed Religion 
 expressed in the doctrine of the Church of England 
 against all Popery and Popish Innovations within the 
 Realm, &c., as also the Power and Privileges of Parlia- 
 ment, &c. Of course, no one could refuse this test 
 without danger of being suspected as a '* recusant." 
 I have before me a copy of the Protestation, as taken 
 in August, 1641, from the form preserved in the Regis- 
 ter of the parish of S. Mary Arches, Exeter, to which 
 about eighty signatures, presumably of householders, 
 are appended. The position of the Roman Catholics 
 became pitiable. Under pressure of the alarm of the 
 Puritan Parliament, the King issued in March fol- 
 lowing a Proclamation for putting in force the laws 
 against Popish recusants. Hitherto the Roman 
 
 among the ringleaders in the Proclamation issued for their apprehen- 
 sion, July 24, 1640 : — 
 
 John Moor, Minet Episcopi (Bishop's Nympton). .,,;- 
 
 John Wall, Wittridge (Witheridge). 
 
 Edward Clarke, South Molton. 
 
 ' } Swimbridiie. 
 ', i "^ 
 
 William Shapcot, West Anstie. 
 
 Bartholomew Tucker, Chittlehampton. ' 
 
 Tohn Tout, ) AT- * IT ■ 
 
 Toby Tout, / ^^'"*' ^P'=™P'- 
 
 Edward Loverinn:, \ ^ ,, 
 
 ^' Landkey. . 
 William Gregory, J 
 
 (Rymer's Fadera, ix. pt. iii. 21.) 
 
 Thomas Clarke, 
 John Parramore, 
 
RAID UPON THE CA THOLICS, 23 
 
 Catholics had been suffered to pay compositions in 
 lieu of fines for their recusancy. All arms, gun- 
 powder, and other munitions of war in their posses- 
 sion were now to be seized. There were apparently 
 only a few families, of any position, in North Devon 
 who adhered to the old form of faith. Of these 
 the Chichesters of Arlington, the Courtenays of 
 Molland, and the Risdons of Parkham were the 
 best known. The houses of Mr. Chichester and Mr. 
 Courtenay were searched, apparently not without 
 resistance, as many persons are stated to have been 
 wounded, and much ''substantial armour" was found 
 in them.^ 
 
 The Rev. John Watkins, in his Essay towards a 
 History of Bideford, published in 1792, sarcastically 
 attributed the Parliamentary feeling in the North 
 Devon towns to the '* great credit and influence 
 which certain Puritan preachers had obtained in 
 these towns. Some of them were men of the most 
 respectable families in these parts, and of con- 
 siderable fortunes; and all this, added to the 
 affectation of peculiar sanctity, and an ardency of 
 zeal in the cause of pure doctrine and worship, 
 made them looked up to, by the multitude, as 
 infallible prophets, who could not possibly lead them 
 wrong.'* 2 Political reasons, perhaps, mainly in- 
 fluenced the commercial and trading communities, 
 which were predominant in the Devonshire towns, 
 "to take the side of the Parliament ; but there is no 
 
 ^ Letter quoted in Oliver's Collections Ilhisfratzng the History of 
 the Catholic Religion in Corjiwall, Devon, &c., 1857, p. 20. 
 2 Op. cit,, p. 2>^. 
 
 4 
 
34 PURITAN I NFL UENCE. 
 
 doubt that the religious question was much mora 
 keenly taken up by these communities than by the 
 less excitable rural population. When the sharp 
 reaction against Puritanism took place after the 
 Restoration, the Justices of Devon, then engaged in 
 harrying the Dissenters, and issuing an order for 
 putting in force the Acts of Parliament against 
 them, took the opportunity of publicly stigmatizing 
 the corporations and boroughs in the county as 
 " Nests and Seminaries of faction and disloyalty," 
 and of denouncing the Nonconformists, who resided 
 in some of the boroughs, for ** taking the same 
 seditious methods they did in the late rebellion of 
 drawing the people from their allegiance and duty." ^ 
 That there was a Royalist section of the in- 
 habitants of Barnstaple we have reason to know ; 
 but undoubtedly an overwhelming majority took up 
 the cause of the Parliament from the first ; and this 
 determination was sufficiently reflected in the 
 Corporation, whose influence, not to say authority, 
 was moreover of considerable weight in guiding the 
 popular opinion. It has been insinuated, I do not 
 know with how much justification, that the civic 
 potentates were flattered by the prospect of increasing 
 their power under the Parliamentary regime. Not- 
 withstanding such detractions, it is no inconsistency 
 to say that, in the whole course of Barnstaple 
 history, there are not more eminent names than 
 those to be found in the ruling majority of the 
 Corporation of that period. It is only necessary to 
 
 ' Hamilton's Quarter Sessions from Queen Elizabeth to Queen Anne^ 
 1878, p. 184. 
 
GEORGE PEARD. 35 
 
 mention those of Gilbert Paige, Richard Beaple, 
 Pentecost Doddridge (brother of the Judge), 
 Richard Ferris, Thomas Horwood, to show that, 
 not only the discreetest and wealthiest, but also 
 the most benevolent and philanthropic of its 
 merchants held the interests of the town in their 
 keeping. 
 
 It is not apparent that there were any special 
 causes for the early plunge which the Corporation 
 of Barnstaple took into the vortex of political strife. 
 If we endeavoured to seek any such we should 
 probably be disappointed. The leading inhabitants 
 of the town were prosperous if not affluent, and 
 had, at least, no burdens which others did not 
 equally bear. Their religious sensibilities had not 
 been outraged. They were not even on sympathetic 
 or amiable terms with their neighbours, and, there- 
 fore, the influence of example cannot be taken into 
 account. But the sense of political oppression was 
 seething throughout England ; some subtle influence 
 pervaded such comparatively isolated communities, 
 and there was no newspaper rhetoric as in these 
 days to act as its safety-valve. 
 
 No estimate of the state of affairs in Barnstaple, 
 immediately before and during the period of the 
 Civil War, would be complete without taking into 
 account the extraordinary personal influence, for 
 good or for evil, which was exercised by George 
 Peard. He was a descendant of an old local family, 
 several of whom had been mayors of the town in 
 the sixteenth century. He was a son of John 
 
36 GEORGE PEARD. 
 
 Peard — probably the same who was admitted a 
 student of the Inner Temple, in 1582. There were 
 two contemporary John Peards — the other was a 
 goldsmith, b, 1573, d. 1632, whose grave-stone is in 
 the south aisle of the church. George Peard, who 
 is described as one of the learned counsel of the 
 town, in 1614, and who was one of the Members 
 of Parliament for the borough, in the 39th of 
 Elizabeth, and again in the first Parliament of 
 James I., was probably his uncle. It was this 
 George Peard who, in 1606, gave to the Corporation 
 one of the handsome silver-gilt hanaps still in the 
 possession of the Town Council. 
 
 George Peard, the younger, was born in 1594. 
 He also was bred to the law, and was a member 
 of the Middle Temple.^ He is described as "a 
 lawyer of good repute in his profession." He was 
 first returned as Member for Barnstaple, to what is 
 called the ** Short " Parliament, in April, 1640, with 
 Thomas Mathews, merchant, for his colleague ; and 
 afterwards to the ** Long " Parliament, which met 
 in November of the same year, with Richard Ferris, 
 merchant. He took part in the debates of that 
 memorable assembly, spoke against ship-money, 
 and was Chairman of a Committee of the whole 
 House of Commons upon the Bill of Attainder of 
 the Earl, of Strafford. According to Sir Symonds 
 D'Ewes, he was moderate and sober in his views, 
 
 ' xxiijo die Junii 1613. Mr. Georgius Peard filius et heres 
 apparens Johannis Peard de Barnestable in Comitatu Devon 
 generosus admissus est in Societatem Medii Templi specialiter' 
 (Records of the Middle Temple). 
 
7 GEORGE PEARD, yj 
 
 but a vehement speaker. On one occasion, when 
 D*Ewes was much interrupted in his speech, Mr. 
 Peard, he remarks in his Diary, '* reproved the noisy 
 members." The same gossiping authority tells us 
 that Peard spoke *' exceedingly well " in the debate 
 which followed the Lord Keeper Finch's defence. 
 Peard, it would seem, was not without a sense of 
 humour. On this occasion, referring to the refusal 
 of Finch, at the command of the King, to put, as 
 Speaker, the question from the chair, he remarked 
 that if the Speaker were to be silent, the House 
 would be dumb, and that it was like blowing up the 
 House without gunpowder — alluding, of course, to 
 the Gunpowder Plot. In one of the earliest of the 
 Journals of the Commons, in this Parliament, his 
 name is to be found associated, on a committee of 
 sixteen, with those of Hampden, Pym, St. John, 
 Selden, HoUis, and Cromwell. From Sir John 
 Northcote's notes we obtain another glimpse of his 
 manner. Referring in the House to the new Canons 
 — extreme in their intolerance — promoted by the 
 Bishops in Convocation, and alluding to the famous 
 " et caetera " oath, which was imposed upon the 
 clergy, binding them to attempt no alteration '' in 
 the government of the Church by bishops, deans, 
 archdeacons, &c,,'' ^ Mr. Peard exclaimed — " The 
 
 ' "Rubbish of Babel, for who will not say, 
 Tongues were confounded in &c. ? 
 Who swears «&c. swears more Oaths at once 
 Than Cerberus out of his triple Sconce : 
 Who views it well, with the same eye beholds 
 The old half Serpent in his numerous folds. " 
 
 {^Riunp Songs y L 122.) ' 
 
3§ GEORGE PEARD, 
 
 whole book of Canons is a bait and a hook; the 
 whole book the bait, the oath the hook." ^ His 
 strong Puritan leaning is apparent in another note 
 of a motion made by him on the 3rd of Dec, 1640 : 
 *' That order go from the House to the Sessions at 
 Newgate for quick proceeding against Recusants 
 [Roman Catholics], that they may be convicted next 
 Sessions : Ordered." ^ In a great debate on the 
 conduct of the judges in pronouncing for the 
 legality of ship-money, the House, suspecting that 
 they had been ''solicited" by the King's sup- 
 porters, Mr. Peard, it is noted, moved that Jones 
 (one of them), who was then lying in extremis be 
 sent to ; whereupon Sir P. Stapylton moved that 
 Mr. Peard be sent to Judge Jones.^ He was a firm 
 supporter of Mr. Pym, and was put forward to move 
 the printing of the Grand Remonstrance, as an 
 appeal to the nation, in December, 1641, although 
 on that occasion the motion was not carried. In 
 the following February, Mr. Peard was on a com- 
 mittee with Mr. Selden (the learned John Selden) 
 and others, to '* peruse the statutes in force against 
 priests and Jesuits." In June, 1642, when the 
 Members of the House of Commons volunteered 
 their names as contributors of " Horse, Money and 
 Plate," for the defence of the Parliament, there 
 occurs in the list the name of Mr. Peard, who ''will 
 bring in an hundred pownds and expect noe in- 
 terest." He also, following Sir Symonds D*Ewes's 
 example, offered to give ^^^50 yearly as long as the 
 Irish war lasted — considered a great public service. 
 
 ' Sir John Northcote's Note-Book, by A. H. A. Hamilton, p. 10. 
 = Ibid,^ p. 26. , , 3 Jhid.. p. 38. 
 
RICHARD FERRIS. 39 
 
 Peard at that time was Deputy-Recorder of 
 Barnstaple. Subsequently, in May, 1643, it appears 
 from a formal entry of that date in the Remem- 
 brance Book, that he held the office of Recorder,^ 
 the appointment to which, although apparently in 
 the nomination of the Crown, ^ was certainly assumed 
 on this occasion by the Corporation. 
 
 When war was seen to be inevitable, Peard, like 
 Cromwell, Hampden, and other active Members of 
 the Commons, went down among his own consti- 
 tuents to prepare them for the struggle. 
 
 Of Richard Ferris, Peard's colleague in the Long 
 Parliament, we shall find but little mention. He 
 was a man of a less fervid temperament and of less 
 decided views ; probably one of those who would 
 willingly have found some middle way in the pre- 
 vailing difficulties. Although he freely contributed 
 to the support of the Parliamentary cause in *^ Horse, 
 Money and Plate," and certainly took part in the 
 measures for the defence of Barnstaple in the 
 Parliamentary interest, yet he was afterwards '' dis- 
 abled," that is, voted out of the House of Commons 
 — a consequence of a suspected leaning to the 
 Royalist side. He is therefore classed, but I think 
 mistakenly, as a Cavalier.3 
 
 Ferris was a local benefactor, and left an endow- 
 
 ' Records^ Stipplevientary ^ No. 5" /'' 
 
 =^ See Cribble's Memorials, p. 293. The right was vested in the 
 
 Corporation by the first charter of James I., in 16 10. Mr. Chanter 
 
 seems to imply that this was one of the changes in the revising charter 
 
 of the following year {Records, No. xxxvij.). 
 
 3 So in a list in Sanford's Studies and Illustrations of the Great 
 
 Rebellion, p. 500, where the name is erroneously spelt ** Ferrers." 
 
40 
 
 RICHARD FERRIS, 
 
 ment to the Grammar School, which is still enjoyed. 
 He died in 1649. An inscription in verse, in the 
 turgid style of the period, on the sumptuous monu- 
 ment to his memory in the south aisle of the parish 
 church, alludes to him as a friend of the poor and of 
 education — '* to advance arts above our monster- 
 teeming ignorance " — a prudent magistrate, and a 
 zealous and devout frequenter of God's house. 
 
PART I. 
 
 -•<>♦- 
 
 FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE CIVIL WAR 
 
 TO THE SURRENDER OF BARNSTAPLE 
 
 TO PRINCE MAURICE, 
 
 Atigust, 1642 — September 2, 1643. 
 
 THE famous Parliament which met in November, 
 1640, and became historically known as the 
 Long Parliament, had a mandate — to use a modern 
 political term — to rectify abuses in the State and the 
 Church which had been revived or introduced under 
 the autocratic government of King Charles during the 
 previous eleven years. The House of Commons, 
 which assumed the chief burden of this work, was 
 not composed, as is sometimes supposed, of a band 
 of low fanatics. Looking down the roll, there will 
 be seen, alternating with the names of great mer- 
 chants and able lawyers, those of baronets, knights, 
 and esquires, the representatives of some of the 
 oldest families of the kingdom, whose names ai^ 
 still familiar to us. On the whole, it was a fair 
 
42 MEETING OF THE LONG PARLIAMENT. 
 
 reflection of the respectability, the intellect, the 
 learning, and the wealth of England. 
 
 This Parliament, although it drifted into the 
 commission of arbitrary acts and acts of cruelty, 
 which seem more strange to us, but which were the 
 survival of a still ruder age, had reversed many 
 encroachments on the rights of the people. It had 
 punished the insolent abuse of power by condemning 
 the Earl of Strafford. It had warned the upholders 
 of sacerdotalism, in the person of Archbishop Laud, 
 that they would not be tolerated. It had contended 
 with a despotically-disposed sovereign, surrounded 
 by a selfish and venal Court, for the civil and 
 religious liberties of the English people ; and not 
 without considerable success. Indeed, in the view 
 of many of the moderate politicians, who, upon 
 a reaction of loyalty to the Crown, seceded to the 
 King's party, too large a concession had been made 
 to the popular demand. 
 
 If the King had not already shown, by repeated 
 acts of duplicity, that no trust could be placed in 
 him, a reconciliation and a reasonable settlement 
 might have been, at this period, possible, if only it 
 had been a question of political differences. Un- 
 fortunately, the religious question, a legacy of the 
 Reformation, which had arrived at ** a place of 
 potency and sway o' the State," intensified those 
 differences, and, as on more than one occasion 
 afterwards, barred the road to peace. In the be- 
 ginning of January, 1642, the King precipitated a 
 crisis by outraging the dignity and independence 
 of Parliament, in his attempt personally to seize, 
 
. KING AND PARLIAMENT, 43 
 
 in the House of Commons itself, the five Members 
 whom he had accused of treasonable speech in 
 debate. 
 
 From this time there were distrust and resentment 
 on both sides, leading by inevitable steps to violence 
 and wrong. In those days, it should be remembered, 
 political failure did not mean merely a relegation to 
 the cold shade of the Opposition, but fine, im- 
 prisonment, and possibly Tower Hill or the gal- 
 lows. The Commons threw themselves upon the 
 City of London for protection. The King, mortified 
 and bewildered, left Westminster, never to return to 
 it but to pass to the scaffold. 
 
 The failure of this coup d'etat, attempted on the 
 4th of January, 1642, naturally strengthened the 
 hands of the extreme party in Parliament, against 
 which it had been obviously directed, and super- 
 added, as a consequence, the dangerous gift of 
 popular applause. The denounced Members, after 
 having been ostentatiously protected by the City, 
 were brought back triumphantly to Westminster. 
 The King admitted a mistake which had passed 
 beyond redemption, and waived any further pro- 
 ceedings. 
 
 Before the end of the month the House of Com- 
 mons sprung a mine upon the King by demanding 
 that the Tower of London, the other principal forts 
 of thekingdom, and the Militia should be put into 
 the hands of such persons as Parliament might 
 confide in, and as should be recommended to his 
 Majesty by both Houses of Parliament. 
 
 Queen Henrietta Maria, the most mischievous of 
 
44 PAPER WAR, 
 
 the King's advisers, went to Holland, taking with 
 her the Crown jewels — for what purpose there 
 could be but one ominous suggestion. Charles 
 withdrew in a hesitating, objectless manner towards 
 York, where he was soon joined by his more 
 intimate adherents, by a majority of the Lords, and 
 by many of the moderate section of the Commons — 
 those who *' had withstood the prerogative in its 
 exorbitance as they now sustained it in its de- 
 cline,"^ and instinctively apprehended danger to the 
 liberties of the country as much from the violent 
 and extreme party in Parliament as from the 
 inordinate pretensions of the Court. 
 
 The King was followed by a ** Declaration " of the 
 Parliament, in which, to some of the older grievances^ 
 others of later origin — the absence of the sovereign 
 being one — were added. This, with the King's 
 answer, was duly ordered by his Majesty to be 
 printed and read in all churches and chapels. Again 
 they were ordered by the Houses of Parliament to 
 be printed and read, with the addition of their 
 '^ Replication." Thus the ''distempers'' and ** dis- 
 tractions " of the times were carried into every 
 parish in England, and the whole country was in a 
 ferment. 
 
 The remarkable State papers, teeming with 
 crimination and recrimination, just referred to, have 
 been compared for their temper, reasoning, and 
 argumentative power, to the marked disadvantage 
 of those emanating from the Parliament. These, 
 in so far as they were public manifestoes, ac- 
 
 * Ilallam's Constitittional History^ vol. i. p. 558. 
 
S YMF A THY WITH PARLIAMENT 45 
 
 quired their greater influence from their unscru- 
 pulous appeal to the popular prejudices and terrors 
 of the time. A generation whose fear and detes- 
 tation of Popery was beyond all that can now 
 be conceived — who had been mentally fed on 
 Martyrologies, and to whom the horrors of the 
 Spanish Inquisition were still a living tale — were 
 implicitly informed, on the high authority of Parlia- 
 ment, that their sovereign was in treaty with the 
 Pope for bringing Spanish and French armies to 
 England for the purpose of suppressing the Parlia- 
 ment and subverting the Protestant religion. Pro- 
 positions were then transmitted to the King, 
 containing demands so aggressive, if not offensive, 
 that no answer, other than an angry protest, was 
 possible or perhaps expected. 
 
 In the earlier months of the year 1642 the popular 
 sympathy with Parliament spread far and wide. 
 From almost every county petitions were addressed 
 to the two Houses, many of them from counties 
 around London being brought up by thousands of 
 freeholders marshalled in procession. That from 
 Devonshire, signed by above two thousand persons (a 
 proportionately small number), and presented by Sir 
 George Chudleigh, of whom more hereafter, was one 
 of the earliest. These petitions were all of nearly the 
 same tenour — they prayed that the Bishops and 
 Popish lords might be expelled from the House of 
 Lords, that evil counsellors might be removed from 
 his Majesty, that there might be '' a happy reforma- 
 tion in Religion," that privilege of Parliament might 
 be maintained, and that the kingdom might be put 
 
46 QUESTION OF THE MILITIA. 
 
 in a posture of defence. A little later, the magistrates 
 of Devonshire, in Quarter Sessions assembled, 
 pleaded impartially with both King and Parliament 
 for peace and reconciliation, in addresses remarkable 
 for their epigrammatic force. ^ 
 
 Parliament had already, in February, assumed the 
 appointment of new Lord-Lieutenants of counties, 
 supplanting those opposed, or suspected of being 
 opposed, to their interests. William Russell, Earl 
 of Bedford, who had succeeded to the title the year 
 before, and had been Lord-Lieutenant jointly with 
 his father, was retained for Devon and for the county 
 of the city of Exeter. 
 
 The ordering and settling, as it was called, of the 
 Militia was the burning question of the next few 
 weeks — a question violently discussed in a host of 
 pamphlets. Whatever may have been the ostensible 
 pretext of the Commons in pressing for the King's 
 consent to the whole of the military force of the 
 kingdom (to which it amounted) being placed in 
 their hands, there can be no doubt, of course, that 
 the power which the control of this force would give 
 was the real object in view. To safeguard the king- 
 dom from fears and dangers and from the mischievous 
 designs of those who were enemies to its peace were 
 the professed motives. The King at first yielded 
 with a reservation, then prevaricated, and ultimately 
 refused to recognize the '* Ordinance " which the 
 Houses had precipitately prepared. On the ist of 
 March, Parliament announced to the King their 
 
 ^ See Hamilton's Quarter Sessions from Qtieen Elizabeth to Queen 
 Annej pp. 122-5. 
 
EXCITING RUMOURS, 47 
 
 resolution to dispose of the Militia by their own 
 authority. 
 
 The King himself, at this time, says Lord Claren- 
 don, " and they who best knew the state of his affairs, 
 seemed to be without any thought of making war and 
 to hope that the Parliament would at last incline to 
 some accommodation." ^ 
 
 During this exciting period the tension which 
 existed in public feeling gave rise, as usual in such 
 public crises, to the most absurd rumours — the 
 already notorious Colonel Lunsford, Lieutenant of 
 the Tower, had a scheme prepared for blowing up the 
 city of London and for setting Westminster and the 
 Parliament house on fire — the Irish papists were 
 coming over to combine with their English co- 
 religionists in a general massacre of the Protestants 
 — there was a design for laying a mine of powder 
 under the Thames to cause the river to drown the 
 city — 40,000 Danes were to be landed at Hull to 
 serve the King — the French king had sixty sail of 
 men-of-war at sea, hovering between the coast of 
 Devonshire and Brittany, manned by many thou- 
 sands of land soldiers ! 
 
 Towards the end of April, the King made an un- 
 successful attempt to gain possession of Hull and of 
 the magazine of arms there, the most important at 
 that time in the kingdom. It is usually considered 
 to have been the first overt act of the war ; but, this 
 being admitted, casuists have not decided who was the 
 
 ' History of the Rebellion mtd Civil War, p. 287a. (The edition 
 from which I quote is the single volume one of 1839, which is stated to 
 contain the genuine text of this important work.) 
 
48 CIVIL WAR. 
 
 breaker of the peace— the King who attempted, as of 
 right, to seize the place, or Sir John Hotham who, 
 by the authority of Parliament, resisted the attempt. 
 
 Soon after this, the trained bands of London were 
 mustered by order of Parliament and ostentatiously 
 paraded ; and the Lord-Lieutenants of counties and 
 their deputies were directed to take possession of all 
 magazines in their chief towns, and to provide all 
 well-affected persons with such arms as they might 
 require for the service of their country. The King's 
 retort was a Proclamation, issued on the 27th of 
 May, forbidding the trained bands of the kingdom to 
 rise, march, muster, &c., by virtue of any order or 
 ordinance of Parliament. 
 
 In this way the nation was drawn into the 
 calamities of Civil War. Whoever began it, says 
 Oldmixon, with probably strict truth, **the Parlia- 
 ment resolved to have all grievances, spiritual and 
 temporal, redressed and security against the like for 
 the future. The Court was as resolute against both. 
 Each side was sharpened by reproaches, and there 
 were not men of temper sufficient to be of weight in more 
 moderate counsels .'^ ^ 
 
 From this necessarily brief and imperfect review of 
 the state of public affairs immediately before the out- 
 break of the Civil War, I shall now turn to the 
 smaller arena, the limited scope of the ensuing 
 notices, in which the unhappy differences that rended 
 the heart of the nation will be found reflected. 
 
 On the 1st of March, 1642, unsatisfied by the 
 
 ' Clarendon and Whitlock conipard^ ^1^1} P« I04« 
 
RESOLUTION TO hORiiFY BARNSTAPLE. 49 
 
 King's answer to their petition demanding the con- 
 trol of the Militia, the Commons passed, among 
 other resolutions, the following one : — '* That such 
 parts of this kingdom as have put themselves into a 
 posture of defence against the common danger have 
 done nothing but what is justifiable and is approved 
 b}^ the House." ^ This was probably intended to be 
 read more as a prospective than as a retrospective 
 declaration, and Lord Clarendon remarks that Parlia- 
 ment was glad '* to put an obligation upon all 
 Corporations by showing they thought them capable 
 of the greatest trusts." It may have been, and pro- 
 bably was, the foregoing resolution, communicated 
 to the Mayor of Barnstaple, which suggested the 
 measures that I proceed to review. At all events, 
 almost before the Parliament had finally committed 
 itself to war, before a single Royalist soldier had 
 entered Devonshire, and with a precipitancy which 
 was noticed with wonder at the time, the Corporation 
 of Barnstaple, in an evil hour, decided upon forti- 
 fying their town. 
 
 Barnstaple was favourably situated for military 
 defence ; its earliest known history had been more 
 or less the history of a fortress. Some of its ancient 
 artificial works and, to a great extent, its natural 
 position were still available against the methods of 
 attack common in the seventeenth century. The 
 town was protected in front by the broad tidal river. 
 On its northern flank the deeply-cut channel of a 
 tributary to the Taw, called the North Yeo, and on the 
 
 ' May's History of the Parliament of E}i^la7id ivhich begaji November 
 3, 1640, &c., Ed. 1854, Appendix, p. 470. 
 
 5 
 
so THE ANCIENT DEFENCES, 
 
 other flank a smaller stream which at one time bore, 
 but no longer bears, the name of the South Yeo, 
 were impediments, if duly utilized, to an enemy's 
 progress. In larger volume probably than now, these 
 rivers took their serpentine courses through valleys 
 of flat, alluvial, and marshy land, periodically over- 
 flowed by the tides, to the Taw. Between the two 
 valleys the ground rose gradually from the almost 
 dead level which formed the site of the town into a 
 double ridge, ultimately attaining an elevation of 
 two or three hundred feet, and then joining the 
 medley of hills which characterizes this picturesque 
 part of North Devon. 
 
 In the extreme angle formed by the junction of 
 the North Yeo with the Taw were, as there still 
 are, the remains of a htirh ^ — an artificial, truncated, 
 conical mound surrounded by the moat from which 
 its materials were originally taken. Tht Anglo- S axon 
 Chronicle relates that the Danes in the year 894 
 *' besieged a fortress in Devonshire by the North 
 Sea." The fortress is not identifiable, and the re- 
 sult of the raid has not been recorded. The object 
 of the expedition was presumably (for on this point 
 history also speaks with an uncertain voice) to avenge 
 the defeat at Kenwith, near the mouth of the Taw, 
 which Hubba the Dane had suffered sixteen years 
 before. But, in any case, there are no traces re- 
 maining of a stronghold answering to the descrip- 
 tion in the Chronicle, except that of the burh at 
 Barnstaple. It is probable that the burh was con- 
 structed by the Saxon possessors of Barnstaple, in 
 
 ^ My authority for theuseof this word is Mr. Geo. T. Clark, Mcduzval 
 Military ArchitecUive in England. 1884. 
 
THE ANCIENT DEFENCES. 5 1 
 
 the interval betweeiv these two attacks, ix., between 
 87S and 894. It seems obvious that it was a defence 
 against an enemy approaching from the sea. 
 
 Under the protection of the burh, which was 
 originally only a stockaded fort/ the Saxon borough 
 grew up. William the Conqueror gave the burh 
 with its appurtenances, which had been held in 
 demesne by Edward the Confessor, and traditionally 
 by ^thelstan before him, to Judhael, a powerful 
 Norman, who on the Saxon mound built the circular 
 shell-keep of the period — a structure, the peculiar 
 form of which was necessitated by the artificial charac- 
 ter of the ground upon which it stood. At the same 
 time the ditch was probably deepened, and means 
 adopted for letting into it the tidal water from the 
 river when desired. Outside the ditch on the north, 
 and under the protection of the fortress, was the castle 
 water-mill which still, after grinding for probably a 
 thousand years, performs its customary functions. 
 
 The Castle of Barnstaple, as a fortress, probably 
 developed in the usual manner of a mediaeval strong- 
 hold, and as became the caput of an honour or 
 barony. The early Norman building was limited to 
 the shell-keep, surmounting the more ancient mound. 
 The castle from which Henry de Tracey, in the reign 
 of Stephen, sallied out with his knights in all their 
 bravery and, on behalf of the king, fought with 
 William de Mohun, of the Tor of Dunster, who 
 supported the cause of the Empress Matilda, 
 stood on the base-court west of the keep. The town 
 
 * A burh so fortified was described in the Anglo-Saxon Chro7iicle as 
 '^getimbrade" (Parker, Domestic Architecture^ &c., vol. i. p. xviii, note). 
 
52 PREP A RA TIONS. 
 
 was already walled in the Norman period — certainly 
 early in the reign of Henry I. (1100-35)^ — more 
 than probably at the time of the Domesday survey 
 (1086) ; how much earlier is an interesting question 
 which cannot here be pursued. Further on in 
 mediaeval times the whole town became the fortress. 
 Outside the South Gate, which was the most im- 
 portant entrance, lay the open space called the 
 bailey (^.g-., Old Bailey, London; Old Bayle, York; 
 Bailey, Oxford), between the walls and the barbican. 
 The precise position of the barbican is now unknown, 
 the name only having survived. This open space 
 called, at some time, the Bailey-meadow, the name 
 now corrupted into Belle-meadow, was covered in 
 the seventeenth century by suburban buildings. 
 
 Scarcely anything of the town walls remained in 
 Leland's time. In the year 1642, the whole of the 
 mediaeval defences, with he exception of the north 
 and west gateways, having disappeared, Barnstaple, 
 in a military sense, was an open town. 
 
 A '* Remembrance Book"^ of the Barnstaple Cor- 
 poration contains, under the date of August 8, 1642, 
 the earliest discoverable notice of the proceedings 
 upon the resolution of fortifying the town to which 
 
 ' The walls and gates are mentioned in the deed of gift, by Judhael 
 to the Priory of Barnstaple (Dugdale's Monasticon). 
 
 = The original (not now to be found) appears to have been a tran- 
 script made by Mr. John Rosier, who became town-clerk in 1661, 
 from loose minutes of the proceedings of the Corporation taken at the 
 time. There is a MS. volume of extracts, obviously from this tran- 
 script, in the Collection of the late Lieutenant-Colonel William Harding, 
 now in the Athen?eum at Barnstaple. The first entry in this volume is 
 that of the 12th of July, 1628, the last, thatof the6th of October, 1663 ; 
 but there are several large gaps between these dates. Gribble {Memorials 
 
PREPARATIONS. 53 
 
 I have referred. The limited ideas which it betrays 
 of the impending demands upon the Corporation, 
 consequent upon their adherence to the Parlia- 
 mentary causes, are slightly amusing. It was agreed 
 that, in this emergency, the Mayor for the ensu- 
 ing year should allow the sum of ten pounds 
 Out of his stipend of thirty pounds, and *' spare so 
 much cost att his feast when he is to be sworn ; " 
 but to mitigate a self-sacrifice so touching in a civic 
 sense, " he is to invite only those of the Common 
 Counsell " to the banquet. This sum was "to be 
 employed towards the fortifications of this towne." 
 As troubles thickened or threatened to do so, the 
 night watch was more strictly organized. A score 
 of the most substantial townsmen volunteered to 
 serve their turns. Others, unable probably to serve 
 in person, undertook to furnish each a musket ; and 
 a dozen new muskets were ordered to be bought 
 ** att the charge of the towne with snappanges,^ to 
 be imployed and used at watches and in other 
 service for the towne.*' At the same time (Aug. 27) 
 a committee of nine was appointed to " p'ceed on to 
 finish and p'fect the fortificacons." Mr., otherwise 
 Captain, Penfound Curry ^ was engaged by the Cor- 
 
 of Barnstaple)^ quoting many of the same passages which were, he says, 
 *' from a source of unquestionable authenticity " (p. 443, note), premises, 
 very strangely, that they are '* given without abbreviation or alteration.'* 
 But the Harding MS. is more full and evidently more literal, and I have 
 adopted itin preference to Gribble's version wherever there is any variation. 
 
 ' Sfiaphaunces — a newly invented spring fire-lock which had been 
 recently introduced from Holland. 
 
 ~ He had been, in 1628, captain of one of the "letters of marque," 
 and therefore, like more distinguished warriors of those times, was 
 soldier and sailor indifferently. (Records ^ No. Ixvii.) 
 
54 PREP A RA TIONS. 
 
 poration at a salary of ^^20 a year to drill the Trained 
 Band and also the volunteers, and to order the 
 watch. 
 
 There is not much to be gathered from the local 
 records which survive relating to the progress of the 
 work to which the Corporation were now committed. 
 At the outset, it is probable that the construction of 
 breastworks for the defence of the more vulnerable 
 entrances to the town was all that was considered 
 necessary. 
 
 Meanwhile the Ordinance of Parliament by which 
 the control of the Militia was assumed had been 
 published, and Members of the Commons had been 
 sent down to their respective counties to co-operate 
 with the Deputy-Lieutenants for the purpose of 
 raising and organizing the levies for that constitu- 
 tional force. *' The most confused months,*' to quote 
 the language of Carlyle, '* England ever saw. In 
 every shire, in every parish ; in courthouses, ale- 
 houses, churches, markets, wheresoever men were 
 gathered together, England with sorrowful confusion 
 in every fibre, is tearing itself into hostile halves, to 
 carry on the voting by pike and bullet henceforth." ^ 
 In Devonshire the most active of these agents of the 
 Parliament were Sir. George Chudleigh,^ Sir John 
 
 ^ Oliver CroinivelVs Letters aitd Speeches^ i857i i- 99* 
 ^ Sir George Chudleigh of Ashton, baronet ; of an ancient Devon- 
 shire family. He was son of Captain John Chudleigh, a seaman- 
 adventurer of Queen Elizabeth's days and friend of John Davis, who 
 essaying the circumnavigation of the world died in the Straits of 
 Magellan, having lived long enough, Prince says, to exhaust a great 
 estate. Sir George Chudleigh was married to a sister of William 
 Strode, one of the five Members impeached by Charles I. 
 
AGENTS OF PARLIAMENT, 55 
 
 Northcote/ Sir Samuel Rolle,^ and Sir Nicholas 
 Martyn.3 They were afterwards formally proclaimed 
 traitors by the King. 
 
 In the second week of July, the Commons resolved 
 to raise 10,000 men at once ; Robert Devereux, Earl 
 of Essex, was appointed General of the forces to be 
 so raised, and William Russell, Earl of Bedford, 
 General of the Horse. At the same time, the Court 
 being at Beverley, yet another Declaration, in the 
 form of a petition, was presented by both Houses of 
 Parliament to the King. It was intended to be con- 
 ciliatory. The voluminous reply of the King was 
 haughty and repellant, and in the replication of the 
 
 ' Sir John Northcote, of Hayne, in the parish of Newton St. Cyres, 
 knight and baronet ; M.P. for Ashburton in the Long Parliament. He 
 was subsequently M.P. for Barnstaple, in the place of Sir John 
 Chichester, in the parliament of Charles II., which met in 1661 
 (Browne Willis's Notitia Parliamentarian ii. 328). But Mr. A. H. A. 
 Hamilton (Sir John Northcote' s Note-Book, p. 127) supposes that Sir 
 John was not a Member of this parliament ; although he is at a loss to 
 account for his having taken notes during its session. The subject of 
 this note was ancestor of the present Earl of Iddesleigh. 
 
 ^ Sir Samuel Rolle (or Rolls as at that time it was indifferently 
 spelt), of Heanlon Sachville, knight ; the head of a younger branch of 
 Rolle of Stevenstone. One of the Members for the county of Devon 
 in the Long Parliament. Some literary moles of the last century 
 imagined that they had discovered in him the original of the character 
 of Sir Hudibras in Butler's immortal satire — on no better grounds, it 
 seems, than that he was a Puritan Colonel and a stout gentleman, and 
 that he had once lodged in the same house with Butler. (See Isaac 
 D'Israeli's Cu7iosi ties of Literature, ed. 1849, ii. 546-) 
 
 3 Sir Nicholas Martyn, of Oxton, knight ; after the expulsion of Sir 
 E. Se) mour, one of the Members for the county of Devon in the Long 
 Parliament. His daughter was married to Mr. Turner, a woollen 
 draper in Watling Street, London, where the five Members were con- 
 cealed when King Charles followed them into the City. (Somaster 
 MSS.) 
 
56 FINAL DECLARATIONS. 
 
 Parliament, war was, in Lord Clarendon's view, "now 
 denounced by their express words against his Majesty 
 as it had been long before in their actions ; and 
 both parties seemed to give over all thoughts of 
 further treaties and overtures." ^ On the 2nd of 
 August, Parliament issued a declaration of its 
 reasons for taking up arms ; on the gth the King 
 proclaimed Essex a traitor ; and a few days later 
 the ceremony of setting up the royal standard was 
 performed with mediaeval solemnity at Nottingham. 
 Towards the end of the month there was a final 
 parley through the agency of the amiable Lord 
 Falkland, who, if his counsel could have availed, 
 would assuredly have brought about peace even at 
 that hour. It is stated by Lord Clarendon that, at 
 this time, the King's hopes of raising an army 
 seeming so desperate that ** he was privately advised 
 by those whom he trusted as much as any and those 
 whose affections were as entire to him as any men's 
 [meaning, no doubt, himself as one of them] to give 
 all other thoughts over, and instantly to make all 
 imaginable haste to London and to appear in the 
 Parliament-house before they had an)^ expectation of 
 him. And they conceived there would be more 
 likelihood for him to prevail that way than by any 
 army he was like to raise." ^ fo the student of 
 ''the history of Events which have not happened" 
 this passage offers a fertile field for speculation. 
 
 Parliament, having been proclaimed traitors by the 
 King, retaliated by publishing a Declaration to the 
 kingdom that the arms which they had been forced 
 
 ^ History of the Rebellion^ p. 299 a. ^ Ibid, p; 313^. 
 
CAPTAIN BENNET. 57 
 
 to take up, or should be forced to take up, for the 
 preservation of the Parliament, religion, and the 
 laws and liberties of the kingdom, should not be 
 laid down until the delinquents who had assisted his 
 Majesty in an unnatural war against his kingdom 
 should be brought to the justice of Parliament ; and 
 that the charges sustained by the commonwealth 
 should be recovered out of the estates of the said 
 delinquents and of the malignant and disaffected party. 
 
 Already, early in August, the Parliamentary Com- 
 mittee of Devonshire were busy with the organiza- 
 tion of the local Militia. The earliest document that 
 I have found in evidence of their proceedings is an 
 order to Captain Robert Bennet,^ whose name will 
 recur in these pages in connection with the military 
 affairs of Barnstaple, to assemble his company at 
 Great Torrington. This was of course only one of 
 several orders issued at the same time to the officers 
 selected to raise and muster the trained men of the 
 different Hundreds. Captain Bennet had received 
 his first commission from Lord Roberts, the new 
 Lord-Lieutenant of Cornwall nominated by Parlia- 
 ment. The following is a copy of the order from the 
 original now before me : — 
 
 Sr 
 
 The Companye assigned to yo' commaund is to be 
 mustered at Great Torrington upon the 22'''^ day of August 
 
 ^He was a country gentleman, of Hexworthy, Lawhitton, near 
 Launceston ; described as a rigid Puritan. His only personal associa- 
 tion with North Devon, so far as I am aware, was derived from his 
 marriage with the heiress of Mules, of Helmston, Bishop's Tawton, 
 near Barnstaple. 
 
58 KING'S COMMISSION OF ARRA V. 
 
 by nine of the clocke in the morninge yo' presence then 
 & there is expected w*^ such officers, Drumes & colors as you 
 have or can for the tyme get, whereof wee praye you not 
 to faile as you tender his Mat^ service and the good of yo"" 
 Countrye, wee rest 
 
 Yo' assured ffreinds and 
 service 
 
 Pet. Prideaux 
 August 12*'' Geo. Chudleigh 
 
 1642. Sam. Rolle 
 
 Fran. Drake 
 
 To o'' verie loveinge 
 freind Robert Bennett 
 Esq""- these. 
 
 (Endorsed) 
 
 The deputy Lieutenants order to me from Exiter for the 
 ordering of the Mihtia at Torringdon. 
 
 August 12. 1642.^ 
 
 The King's Commission of Array, which was to all 
 intents and purposes the same thing as the Parlia- 
 ment's Ordinance of Militia under another name and 
 authority, was being put in force in several counties 
 at this time. In opposition to it the House of Lords 
 had issued an Order, in July, to the Sheriffs of 
 counties, Mayors of corporate towns, and others, to 
 prohibit its publication. 
 
 Henry Bourchier, Earl of Bath, like many other 
 peers, had put loyalty before patriotism. Desert- 
 ing his place in Parliament, he had gone to the 
 
 ^ Phillipps MSS. (Thirlestaine House, Cheltenham). Bennet Cor- 
 respondence, &c., No. 11,015, art. 27. 
 
THE EARL OF BATH, 59 
 
 King at York and engaged to raise a troop of fifty 
 Horse in the royal cause. He was now coming 
 into Devonshire, where he was thought to be *' of 
 notable power and interest," ^ with the King's Com- 
 mission of Array in his pocket. He was expected at 
 Exeter, where the authorities were prepared to 
 receive him as a friend or an enemy as the case 
 might be ; but he entered the city '* in a peaceful and 
 civil way" and without causing the popular explosion 
 that seemed rather to have been expected. Lord 
 Clarendon insinuates that the Earl was not a very 
 earnest Royalist, that " he neither had nor ever meant 
 to do the King the least service," and that he brought 
 upon himself the enmity of the Parliament (as will be 
 seen hereafter), because out of the " morosity of his 
 own nature " he had, in the House, " expressed him- 
 self not of their mind." ^ Another of the Earl's 
 personal peculiarities is incidentally mentioned by 
 the same historian — he "had no excellent or graceful 
 pronunciation." 3 He was, in fact, more a man of 
 letters than a politician. Lloyd refers to him as a 
 " great scholar." 4 As Sir Henry Bourchier he had 
 been the friend and correspondent of Mr. Camden, 
 Sir Robert Cotton, and Archbishop Ussher. 
 
 The Earl of Bath appears as a prominent figure in 
 North Devon in the earlier part of the period which 
 these notices will cover and until he was suppressed, 
 in a rather summary fashion, by the Parliament. 
 William Bourchier the third earl, who died in 1623, 
 had been intimately associated with Barnstaple ; on 
 
 ' Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 291 fl. ^ Ibid., p. 316 /^. 
 3 Ibid.^ p. 102 b, '■ Memoires, ^c, of the Royalists, p. 650. 
 
6o THE EARL OF BA TH, 
 
 more than one occasion he had the nomination of 
 one of its Members in Parliament ; and for some time 
 held the honorary office of Recorder, then usually 
 conferred upon some neighbouring county magnate. 
 Edward the fourth earl, who died in 1636, was a man 
 of literary and antiquarian tastes, the patron of 
 Westcote, the Devonshire topographer and genealo- 
 gist. He was succeeded by his cousin Henry the fifth 
 earl — the earl of the Civil War. Tawstock, the 
 ancient seat of the family, stands on the left bank of 
 the river Taw, two miles above the town of Barn- 
 staple, in a hollow lying between two gently swelling 
 hills, facing the east. The old house, built in the 
 reign of Elizabeth, was burnt down in the year 1786, 
 all but the gate-house, bearing the date 1574, which 
 still stands. In front of the house, which with its 
 range of gables faced the river and the open downs of 
 Coddon hill on the opposite side of the valley, there 
 were by successive gradations a terrace-walk, a bowl- 
 ing green, and a pleasaunce bordered by trimly 
 clipped hedges and formal alleys. On the slope 
 which fell away gradually to the river, midway, em- 
 bowered in trees, stood the parish church of Taw- 
 stock, now well known for its picturesque interior 
 and sumptuous monuments of the Bourchier family. 
 The event of the first coming of the new Earl into 
 the county, five years before, had been of sufficient 
 moment to call forth the hospitality of the Corpora- 
 tion of Barnstaple, who, after the manner of the 
 time, were thus wont to propitiate their powerful 
 neighbours. A minute of the municipal body in July, 
 "^^diJi records the resolution, that the Earl, with such 
 
THE EARL OF BATH. 6i 
 
 other knights and gentlemen as he shall think fit to 
 accompany him, shall be provided with ** a convenient 
 dynner for their entertainment att the charge of the 
 Towne." The immediate good w^ill of the town is 
 shown, however, in a gift : — 
 
 Paid for a present to the new Earl ot Bath 
 to give him his Welcome into the Country £^(i 12s. od.^ 
 
 With old-fashioned courtesy the Mayoress, accom- 
 panied by her fellow townswomen, must needs pay 
 court to the new Countess, and so, mounted on 
 pillions, they rode to Tawstock. The cost of the 
 expedition is duly entered in the town accounts, and 
 it was not excessive : — 
 
 vii^ x*^ p"^ when Mrs. Maiorisse and the rest of the Towns- 
 women rode to Tawstocke to visitt the Countis of Bath and 
 for horse meate and other expenses there.^ 
 
 The '* entertainment " was not given until later, 
 when the following item of expenditure relating to 
 it occurs : — 
 
 1639-40. Paid for an Entertainment to the Earl 
 of Bath and his Countess and other gentry by 
 the consent of the Aldermen and other Capital 
 Burgesses ;^i 0.3 
 
 On the 13th of August, the Earl of Bath issued 
 his mandate to the High Sheriff of the county, the 
 Justices of the Peace, Mayors, Bailiffs, &c., and 
 
 ^ Records, No. Ixii. 
 
 = From the ** Great Book " of Receiver*s Accounts. 
 
 3 Records ^ No Ixii. 
 
62 COMMISSION OF ARRA V. 
 
 officers of Trained Bands. It recited the King's 
 commission to himself under the Great Seal, dated 
 the 19th of July, 18 Car. I., and others of the Com- 
 mons, to arm, array, train, and muster, &c., and the 
 King's declaration that he intended nothing to the 
 damage of his subjects. He required all the inhabi- 
 tants of the County of Devon to yield no obedience 
 to any Commission for training and mustering military 
 forces not derived from his Majesty's authority, 
 and required all his Majesty's officers and ministers 
 to publish this in all market towns and other public 
 places.^ This was the publication of the King's 
 Commission of Array. 
 
 The manifesto created a great deal of excite- 
 ment throughout the county. The justices at the 
 Assizes, then being held at Exeter, complained to 
 Sir Robert Foster, the judge, that the Commission 
 of Array was *' a thing of extreme grievance and 
 terror to them all." And the constables of the 
 Hundreds petitioned the judge that the counter 
 declaration and order of Parliament condemning 
 all Commissions of Array as illegal might be openly 
 read in Court, that the petitioners and the rest of 
 the county might know the law thereon and how 
 accordingly to shape their opinion. Sir Robert 
 Foster, a Royalist, was not, however, to be 
 entrapped, and, although pressed, discreetly declined 
 lo give any opinion as to the legality or illegality of 
 the Commission of Array.^ 
 
 ^ De la Warr MSS. Foiir//i Report of the Historical Ma^tiiscripis 
 Commission^ iS74. P« 308. 
 ^ Calendar of State Papers : Domestic — 1641-43, pp. 369, 371, 375. 
 
EARL OF BATH A '' delinquent:' 63 
 
 Not long after the Earl of Bath's arrival at 
 Tawstock he received from the House of Lords 
 (that is, from the anti-royalist section of it which still 
 sat) a missive requiring his attendance on the 22nd 
 of August. To which he replied that he had given 
 his attendance, as of right, with as much diligence 
 and affection to the public as his poor ability could 
 express; but having "received many interruptions 
 by scorns, menaces, and affronts from the people 
 inhabiting about London and Westminster," &c., he 
 desired their Lordships to excuse his absence until 
 he might have some confidence of enjoying that 
 honour and safety which heretofore he had not had.^ 
 Whereupon it was ordered by the House *' That the 
 Earl of Bath should be sent for as a Delinquent. 
 And, upon further information that he had great 
 store of powder in his house in Devonshire, it was 
 ordered, That search should b^ made for such 
 powder or stores, and the same kept safe till the 
 pleasure of the House should be further known." ^ 
 Meanwhile, the Earl was planning, in conjunction 
 with his neighbours. Lord Chichester 3 of Eggesford, 
 Sir Hugh Pollard^ of King's Nympton, Mr. Bas- 
 
 V 
 
 ^ Cobbett's ParHa7nentary History^ ii. p. 1455. 
 
 ^ Ibid. A Delinquent was an offender against the Parliament in the 
 first degree ', a Malignant in the next and worse. 
 
 3 Edward, Viscount Chichester, of Carrickfergus, in the Peerage of 
 Ireland. He was a younger son of Sir John Chichester, of Raleigh, 
 near Barnstaple, and married the heiress of John Copleston, of Egges- 
 ford, Esquire. I do not find that he took any further part during the 
 war. 
 
 4 Sir Hugh Pollard, Baronet. He had succeeded his father. Sir 
 Lewis Pollard, the first baronet, in November, 1641. A Member of 
 Parliament in 1640, but having been implicated in the ** Army Plot " — 
 
64 COMMISSION OF ARRA V. 
 
 sett I of Heanton Court, Mr. Gifford ^ of Brightley, 
 and other Royalist gentlemen of North Devon, to 
 put in force the Commission of Array. 
 
 According to Judge Blackstone, there was no 
 doubt whatever of the illegality of the assumption by 
 the Parliament of the control of the Militia. It was 
 the opinion of the learned John Selden, an authority 
 certainly not inferior, that the King's Commission 
 of Array was equally contrary to law. The latter 
 proceeding was founded upon an obsolete statute of 
 the reign of Henry IV. Its purpose, originally, had 
 been to raise a military force to resist invasion. 
 The Commission had been attempted to be put in 
 force in North Devon for the Scotch War in 1640. 
 That with which the Earl of Bath had been armed 
 seems to have been a special one. Soon afterwards 
 a more general one was given to the Marquess of 
 Hertford (dated at York, August 2) extending over 
 
 a conspiracy for bringing up to London the remains of the army 
 originally sent against the Scotch, either to overawe Parliament or to 
 rescue the Earl of Strafford — was committed to the Gatehouse, by order 
 of Parliament, in June, 1641, upon suspicion of high treason, and in 
 the following December was expelled the House. He accompanied 
 the Earl of Bath from York. 
 
 ^ Afterwards Colonel Arthur Bassett, of Pleanton Court, one of 
 Prince's Worthies. He was one of the magistrates imposed upon 
 Barnstaple by letters patent under the Great Seal in 1640 [Records, No. 
 xxxix.), an unusual exercise of the royal prerogative. He survived the 
 Restoration, and died at Heanton -Punchardon, in the church of which 
 parish there is a monument to his memory. 
 
 " Afterwards Colonel John Gifford, of Brightley, in the parish of 
 Chittlehampton. Prince, who places him also in his gallery of 
 Worthies of Devon, says that for the part which he took in the Civil 
 War he was a great sufferer — **was decimated, sequestrated, and im- 
 prisoned." He was another of the exceptional magistrates imposed 
 upon Barnstaple. {See previous note.) 
 
COMMISSION OF ARRA K ' ' 65 
 
 all the Western counties. This was read in the 
 House of Commons on the 24th of August, and 
 ordered to be forthwith printed and published, pre- 
 sumably as a trump-card against the King. The 
 document, as one of our Constitutional antiquities, 
 is of some interest, but I can only afford space for 
 an abstract of it, and that must be relegated to a 
 foot-note.^ 
 
 South Molton, situated a dozen miles eastward of 
 Barnstaple, like other small country towns in Devon- 
 shire, has probabl}^ changed its general features but 
 
 * Whereas great Forces were being raised by the two Houses of 
 Parliament without the royal consent, &c. The King has found it 
 necessary to raise and levy Forces for the defence of the Protestant 
 Religion, his person, the two Houses of Parliament, the Laws of the 
 Land, the Liberty and Property of the Subject, and Privileges of 
 Parliament. The Marquess to be Lieutenant-General of the Forces 
 to be raised under this Commission. Power given to him in case of 
 any Invasion, Insurrection, and Rebellion, &c. , to raise and levy Forces, 
 as well of Trained bands as others within certain counties (of which 
 Devonshire is one). Commissioners of Array, Sheriffs, and Lieutenants 
 to send such numbers of subjects, apt and meet for the Wars, armed 
 and arrayed to such places as directed, &c. To try, array, and put 
 in readiness the persons so raised, levied, or assembled, &c., and every 
 of them after their abiHties, degrees, and faculties, well and sufficiently 
 to cause to be armed and weaponed, and to take the musters of them, 
 &c. And also the same,, so arrayed, tried and armed, as well men of 
 Arms as other Horsemen, Archers, and Footmen of all kinds of 
 degrees, meet and apt for the Wars, to conduct and lead as well against 
 all and singular Enemies, Rebels, and Traitors, &c., and the said 
 Enemies, &c., to invade, repress, and, in case of opposition or 
 resistance, to slay, kill, and put to execution of death by all ways or 
 means according to his good discretion. The Commission then goes on 
 to provide for the government of the Forces— for the appointment of 
 officers— to tender the royal pardon to all such traitors and rebels as 
 .shall submit— to command all forts and castles to be fortified— to 
 summon all Lieutenants, Deputy-Lieutenants, Justices of the Peace, 
 Mayors, Sheriffs, Bailiffs, Constables, &c., to aid and assist. 
 
 6 
 
66 TUMUL T AT SO UTH MOL TON, 
 
 little since the middle of the seventeenth century. 
 Somewhat resembling a Spanish town in plan, its 
 principal buildings, among which are of course 
 -the town hall and the church, face each other 
 across a quadrangular plaza, A market cross 
 appears to have formerly stood in the middle of the 
 square. This outline will help to make more in- 
 telligible the graphic details of the incident presently 
 to be described. From the district around South 
 Molton, the centre of an agricultural population 
 reputedly rough in character, had been drawn the 
 company of Militia which, in the year 1640, mutinied 
 and murdered one of its officers. However accus- 
 t<i)med they may have been to be impressed for the 
 Militia, there was not likely to be any desire on the 
 part of the eligible men of the district to be subjected 
 to a similar exaction from a novel authority which 
 they would, of course, suspect to be papistical, and, 
 on any ground, think should be stoutly resisted. A 
 better **sent to a worthy gentleman in London," 
 dated from South Molton, the 15th of September, 
 1642, printed in a contemporary tract ^ in my posses- 
 sion, gives the amusing account of an eye-witness of 
 the attempt of the Earl of Bath and his party to 
 enforce the Commission of Array at South Molton :^ 
 
 According to my bounden duty I cannot chuse but 
 acquaint your worship with the newes at SouiJimoulto7i, I 
 my selfe being present at it. 
 
 On Saturday last the Earl of Bath sent one of his ser- 
 
 ^ A Declaratio7i made by the right Hcmoiwable the Earle of Bath, one 
 of his Majesties Commissioners of Array, to the ivhole Coiintiy of Devon- 
 shire, Sec, Septemb. 29 [1642]. London: Printed for John Wright. 
 
TUMUL T AT SO UTH MOL TON, 67 
 
 vants unto the Maior of the Towne to know whether he 
 should have a peaceable entrance into his Town the Tuesday 
 following, for he was minded to come there, to meet some 
 Gentlemen upon some occasions ; the Maior answered the 
 messenger, that if his intent were for peace, he should come, 
 after better consideration, which the Maior had, he was 
 blamed by some of his friends, for that he had not taken 
 respite to give his answer, but that advice came too late. 
 
 The Tuesday [Sept. 13] being the day appoynted, there 
 came the Earle of Bath^ my Lord Chichester^ Baroiiet 
 Pollard^ Sir Popham Souihcof,^ Sir Palph Sidenham;" 
 Master Basset^ Master John Acland,^ Master John Giffbrd, 
 Captaine Newcond^^ with their followers, and diverse others 
 which I cannot name. A Banquet being provided at Henry 
 Hearders house the Inne-keeper, where the Earle sent store 
 of Venison, and his owne Cooke for to dresse it, the common 
 
 * Sir Popham Southcot, of Mohuns Ottery, in East Devon, which 
 came to him from Sir Peter Carew ; also of Indiho, Bovey Tracey, South 
 Devon. He was a grandson of Sir William Pole, the antiquary. 
 
 * Sir Ralph Sydenham, of Youlston, near Barnstaple (which he held 
 in right of his wife), was a younger son of Sir John Sydenham of Brimp- 
 ton, Somerset. He married, about the year 1628, Mary, the widow of 
 Sir Robert Chichester of Raleigh and mother of Sir John Chichester, 
 the first baronet. He was a Member of the Long Parliament, went 
 with the King to York, and was formally expelled the House of Com- 
 mons on the 29th of September, 1642, for his complicity in publishing 
 the Array. He escaped to France, was fined by Parliament ;!f 600 for 
 his delinquency, and after the Restoration was made Master of the 
 Charter House by Charles H. Aubrey says that he gave Monk on his 
 coming to London the hint of the good opportunity that God had put 
 into his hands {Letters and Lives, ii. 453)- 
 
 3 John Acland, Esq., of Columb John, a Colonel of the Devon 
 Militia, ancestor of the present baronet of Killerton. He fortified his 
 house against the Parliamentary forces, was one of the leaders of the 
 Royalists in Devonshire, and suffered much in person and property for 
 his loyalty. 
 
 4 Not identifiable ; but probably John Newcourt of Pickwell, in the 
 parish of Georgeham, Esq. His name does not again appear, and he 
 died in 1645. 
 
68 TUMUL T AT SO UTH MOL TON. 
 
 sort of the Towne fell in a great rage with the Maior and 
 his company, for giving licence that they should enter, and 
 swor that if they did attempt any thing there, or read their 
 Commission of Array, they would beate them all downe and 
 kill them, if they were all hanged for it; and thereupon 
 betooke themselves to Armes, both men, women, and 
 children, about the Crosse in the Market place. I doe 
 verrily beleeve they were in number at least looo, some 
 with Musquets loaden, some with Halberts and blacke JBills, 
 some with Clubs, some with Pikes, some with dunge Evells, 
 some with great Poles, one I saw which had beat the calke 
 of a Sive, and beat him out right, and set him into a long 
 staffe, the women had filled all the steps of the crosse with 
 great stones and got up and sate on them, swearing if they 
 did come there they would braine them. One thing which 
 is worth the noting, a woman which is a Butcher's wife, 
 came running with her lapfull of Rams-hornes for to throw 
 at them. Some of the Gentlemen were comming towards 
 the Crosse, it was thought to publish the Array, presently 
 the people gave a shoute, and did cry, they be come, at which 
 they were all ready to stand against them, the Gentlemen 
 seeing that, betooke themselves every one to house, and 
 after that not one of them nor their servants, durst show 
 themselves in the street ; it is thought of many, that if the 
 Towne had not risen against them, they would not so soone 
 have departed. Surely whatsoever collor they put upon it, 
 their intent was ill, for their men gave very dangerous 
 speeches, but God is able with his smalest creatures to 
 daunt the hearts of Kings, as with Lice and Frogs and such 
 like : so amongst this crew there were both men and women 
 with Clubs and Staves, which doe daily beg from doore to 
 doore; and when the Earl rod forth of Town, they did 
 throw stones after him and his men. I shall desire your 
 Worships to excuse my boldnesse in writing so large; but 
 if you had seene it, you would have thought this Relation 
 
EARL OF BA TITS DECLARA TION. 69 
 
 to be too little. Thus with my humble service unto you 
 and my young Master, I commend you both with the whole 
 pamily unto the divine protection, and ever rest. 
 
 [There is no signature"] 
 appended, J 
 
 Soulh-moulton the 15 of 
 Septeinber^ 1642. 
 
 A story told by Westcote {yiew of Devonshire in 
 1630, p. 291) of the manners and customs of the 
 inhabitants of Newland, a village not very far from 
 the scene of the foregoing transaction, renders the 
 account of the method adopted by the viragoes of 
 South Molton to express their feelings quite credible. 
 
 After the failure of this attempt to put the Com- 
 mission of Array in force in North Devon, the Earl 
 of Bath, with the view, it may be inferred, of allaying 
 the popular excitement which he had raised, issued 
 a short '* Declaration '* of his motives, as follows :— 
 
 As there are disturbances in some part of this Kingdome 
 so I understand this County of Devon^ in many places to 
 be falsly possessed of some arbitrary and Tirannicall 
 government pretended \i.e. intended] to be set up by the 
 King, and put in practice (among others by my selfe) 
 Wherefore out of my great affection to you and my Country, 
 being now immediately ready to receive the blessed Sacra- 
 ment, I doe solemnly in the presence of Almighty God 
 professe and declare that I have undertaken nothing con- 
 trary to the Lawes of this Kingdome, nor preiudiciall or 
 hurtfull to any that shall observe it : and I doe further 
 professe that I have no authority neither will I take the 
 value of sixpence from any man, but to- my utmost power to 
 protect you all, that every one may enioy their owne.^ 
 
 ^ A Declaration made by the right Honotn-able the Earle of Bath ^ &c. 
 
70 ANSWER TO THE DECLARATION. 
 
 This political manifesto was perhaps intention- 
 ally ambiguous. An ** Answer" to it immediately 
 appeared, which repeated the argument running 
 through a hundred pamphlets at that time, that 
 the Commission of Array was an arbitrary inter- 
 ference with the existing Militia, of which Parlia- 
 ment had (properly, it was alleged), assumed the 
 control. Admitting the sixpence : How, it was 
 sarcastically asked by the anonymous author, about 
 the power to take the unwilling man's body and lodge 
 it in prison ? Both Declaration and Answer were 
 printed together, after the fashion of the time, in 
 the tract above-mentioned. 
 
 A diurnal of the ist of October, quoting intelli- 
 gence brought to the House of Commons, reports 
 some circumstances of local interest at about this 
 time : the Earl of Bath *' is of certaine at his house 
 at Tauestocke neere Barnstaple and hath about 
 him with the least 500 Foot to guard his person : 
 and Sir Raph Sidenham his chief agent hath as 
 many more at his Manor House of Moulton 
 [Youlston], sometimes Rawley, and at other times 
 at Bewley [not identified] and that Sir Beevil Grene- 
 vile hath seconded their designes Insomuch that 
 for the North of that County there is not any 
 which stands for the Earle of Bath but Sir Bevill 
 and Sir Raph Sidenham." ^ It appears, from other 
 
 ' King's Pamphlets (otherwise, Thomason Collection), British 
 Museum, large 4tos, vol. iii. The diurnals, news-sheets or news-books, 
 under various titles, were the precursors of the modern newspapers. 
 The diurnal appeared weekly with the news and comments arranged 
 under each day's date — whence probably the name. It was roughly printed 
 on a sheet of bad paper folded to the size and shape of a scrimped quarto. 
 
EARL OF BA TH ARRESTED. 71 
 
 sources of information, that most of the Royalist 
 gentry of North Devon, among whom was Sir John 
 Chichester, of Hall, a territorial neighbour of Lord 
 Bath's, disapproved of these proceedings. The 
 " Array-men," as they were called, were looked upon, 
 not without reason, as the first instigators of a 
 breach of the peace. 
 
 Towards the end of September the Earl of Bath, 
 still refusing to attend the House of Lords, was 
 formally voted a Delinquent, and his estates and 
 lands were ordered to be sequestered. On the 
 28th of the month, Captain Dewett with a troop of 
 Horse, arrested the Earl at Tawstock, by order of 
 Parliament, and he was taken under the charge 
 of the Earl of Pembroke to London. On the 15th 
 of October, he was committed to the Tower, and for 
 twenty weeks remained a prisoner there. We shall 
 find him taking no further part in the affairs of 
 Devonshire. Subsequently, he was with the Court at 
 Oxford, and held the office of Privy Seal to King Charles. 
 
 Hitherto, the agents of the Parliament appear to 
 have done little in the way of raising a military force 
 in Devonshire. Shortly before this time, Sir Hugh 
 Pollard had written to the Earl of Bath about their 
 proceedings in a contemptuous tone : — *' The Earl of 
 Bedford is now at Taunton in want of men and 
 money; he hath sent to his sure friends Chudleigh, 
 Bampfield and Northcott, for a supply of both, whose 
 oratory cannot get one trained man to move, nor 
 above eight volunteers ; and their credits cannot 
 procure him a groat." ^ 
 
 ^ De la Warr MSS. Fourth Report of the Historical Manuscripts 
 Commission^ 1874, p. 308. 
 
72 BARNSTAPLE GARRISONED. 
 
 The fiasco at South Molton was not encouraging 
 to the Royalists in North Devon. On the other 
 hand, it appears to have quickened the action of the 
 Parliamentary party. Only two days afterwards, 
 that is, on the 15th of September, four companies of 
 Foot, and a troop of Horse, raised and armed at 
 the cost of the Corporation, in conjunction with the 
 municipal trained band, garrisoned Barnstaple in > ' 
 the interest of the Parliament. The fortification of 
 the town had been in the meantime carried forward. 
 Entrenchments and breastworks had been made 
 and redoubts thrown up.^ There is no mention as 
 yet of any more important work. The defences 
 were therefore far from being so complete as they 
 subsequently were, when the garrison received its 
 first alarm of the approach of the enemy. 
 
 At the same time when the Earl of Bath left the 
 Court at York, the Marquess of Hertford, who has 
 been already mentioned — one of the most eminent 
 of the Royalist peers — set out for Somersetshire, for 
 the purpose of furthering the King's cause, taking 
 with him a commission as Lieutenant-General of 
 all his Majesty's forces in the West. He was ac- 
 companied by Sir Ralph Hopton, of Somersetshire, 
 an already distinguished soldier who had seen 
 service in the Netherlands, and at the outset of his 
 career had fought in the cause of the Queen of 
 Bohemia, the King's sister, at the famous battle of 
 
 ' Mr. R. N. Worth, the author of the History of Plymoitth, is of 
 opinion that the breastwork of the contemporary fortifications of 
 Plymouth was merely a low rampart and ditch. A redoubt, as under- 
 stood at that time, was a small temporary detached work built up of 
 loose stones. 
 
ROYALISTS IN SOMERSETSHIRE. j^ 
 
 Prague. The Marquess arrived at Wells, and in 
 a "gentle way/' according to Lord Clarendon, en- 
 deavoured to raise a force for the King by means 
 of the Commission of Array. The Parliamentary 
 party in the county had been, however, beforehand 
 with him, and had got together a considerable body 
 of the Militia. The Marquess was no soldier, and 
 probably thought that the mere display of the royal 
 authority would suffice to quell all opposition. He 
 may be said to have failed in his immediate object ; 
 but he collected a troop of Horse, raised by Captain 
 John Digby, a young soldier, second son of the 
 first Earl of Bristol, another raised by Sir Francis 
 Hawley, and about one hundred Foot, all of which 
 had been intended to join the King's army in the 
 North. There were also a troop of Horse, and a 
 small troop of dragoons, which Sir Ralph Hopton 
 raised and armed at his own charge. A skirmish 
 between some of these troopers and the Militia at 
 a place called Martial Elm, was one of the first con- 
 flicts of the war, and according to Oldmixon, the 
 first in which a man was slain. The Marquess 
 being outnumbered retired to Sherborne, where with 
 altogether about four hundred soldiers he was 
 watched by a strong force under the Earl of Bed- 
 ford, who did not push his advantage, and was 
 evidently reluctant to commit himself to hostilities. 
 In the following year the Earl of Bedford went over 
 to the King. Withdrawing from Sherborne, the 
 Earl left a way open for the Marquess, who, finding 
 the Parliament feeling too strong for him in Somer- 
 setshire, made his way to the coast at Minehead, in 
 
74 SII^ R. HOP TON CROSSES NORTH DEVON 
 
 the second week of September, with the hope, it 
 appears, of seizing Dunster Castle. 
 
 Mr. Luttrell, who was for the ParHament, having 
 been warned, strengthened his castle and increased 
 his garrison by one hundred men, and supposing that 
 the Royalists would endeavour to cross over to Wales, 
 to prevent them, caused the rudders to be removed 
 from the vessels in Minehead harbour. The attempt 
 on Dunster Castle was defeated by the resolution 
 of Mrs. Luttrell, who fired upon the Royalists from 
 the castle. Eventually the Marquess and his foot- 
 soldiers escaped in some coal vessels to Wales. 
 Sir Ralph Hopton, Captain Digby, and Sir Francis 
 Hawley, with their troops of Horse, consisting, 
 according to Lord Clarendon, of about one hundred 
 and twenty men, a few fugitives, the same authority 
 remarks, whom the Earl of Bedford did not think 
 worth his further care — an indirect eulogium on this 
 afterwards distinguished Royalist force, — retreated by 
 the eastern skirt of Exmoor, intending *' to march 
 into Cornwall, in hope to find that county better 
 prepared for their reception." ^ 
 
 The Earl of Bedford, however, inert as he was, 
 made an effort to prevent their escape. Under the 
 erroneous impression that they would make for the 
 coast at some point in North Devon, with the object 
 of crossing over into Wales, he gave instructions to 
 Sergeant-Major Cary for their pursuit: — "Go to 
 Ilfracombe, and search for the fugitives. Apprehend 
 Sir Ralph Sydenham and Sir Hugh Pollard, Bart. 
 If the Earl of Bath assist any, then apprehend 
 
 ' Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 316 ^. 
 
BARNSTAPLE ALARMED. 75 
 
 him." I Almost on the same day (Sept. 25), Sir 
 Hugh Pollard, then at King's Nympton, was writing 
 to the Earl of Bath, supposing that the Earl had 
 heard that the Lord Marquess had gone into Wales 
 and that most of his troops had marched into 
 Cornwall. 2 
 
 A passage in a diurnal of September 30, com- 
 municated from Barnstaple, gives the following 
 account of the march of the Royalist flying 
 column : — 
 
 From Barnestaple. After the Marquesse Hertfords 
 departure from Mynehead about 400 of those Cavaliers 
 marched from thence to Dulverton, and from thence to 
 Exford in Somerset, about 14 miles from this Towne, and 
 on Satturday night last came to a Village called Chittle- 
 hampton, within ^vq miles of Barnestaple, the Inhabitants 
 of which Towne were all in armes expecting them, but th^y 
 durst not approach thither, having intelligence of their 
 readinesse, the Town being fortified with 16 Peeces of 
 Ordinance, and 500 men in armes. The malignant neigh- 
 bours assisted these Cavalieres with their servants, to guide 
 and direct them in the Countrey : They were tyred out 
 with their journeyes, and if the Countrey had risen against 
 them might have bin taken all or the most part of them : A 
 servant of the Earle of Bathes, and of Sir Raph Syden- 
 hams conducted them, and the last Sabbath day they 
 marched to Sir Bevyll Greinfields upon the edge of 
 Cornwall and were by him received and Billeted a day or 
 two. 3 
 
 It will be seen by any one familiar with the 
 
 ^ De la Warr MSS. Fourth Report of the Historical Maiiuscripts 
 Commission, 1874, p. 304. "" Ibid., p. 308. 
 
 - 3 King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. iii. 
 
-]() HOPTON ENTERS CORNWALL. 
 
 country that the geography of the writer of this, 
 paragraph is a little at fault, and that the first part 
 of the route taken is not easily understood. Exford 
 and Dulverton are, in fact, on two divergent roads 
 from Minehead, and the former is only half the dis- 
 tance of the latter from the point of departure. 
 Passing through, or by, South Molton, where it 
 does not appear that they were opposed, the 
 troopers evidently made for Umberleigh bridge, 
 which crosses the Taw seven miles above Barn- 
 staple, after halting for the night of Saturday, 
 Sept. 24, in the village of Chittlehampton. The 
 strength of this body of cavalry was of course much 
 exaggerated by rumour, and it is easy to gather from 
 the slender report that has come down to us that the 
 Barnstaple garrison was in a state of considerable 
 commotion in the anticipation of a possible attack, 
 -which however was not attempted. For the present 
 Sit Ralph Hopton and Captain Digby will be left on 
 the Cornish border — soon to come again under 
 notice. 
 
 The House of Commons issued warrants on the 
 6th of October to '* certain officers*' to raise their 
 companies in the Western parts, and to train and 
 exercise, and upon all occasions to be in readiness. 
 The following letter, printed in the Trevelyan Papers 
 of the Camden Society (1872, part iii. p. 228), will 
 show how it was acted upon by the Parliamentary 
 Committee of Devonshire :— 
 
 Sir, — That wee may not bee fayling to our owne and 
 countryes preservation, wee invite and intreat you to meet 
 
PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE AT WORK, 77 
 
 at Exon, on Friday, the 21 of this instant, by 8 of the clocke 
 in the morning, at the signe of the Beare. You knowe in 
 what a sadd posture the body of the kingdome now stands. 
 You remember that lately 500 horse passed through ours 
 into our neighbor county, whoe now hang over us as a ter- 
 rible cloude, threatning ruyne, if wee provide not to with- 
 stand them. To bee prepared for the worst brings noe 
 disadvantage to any, but strength and confidence to all. 
 To effect this, your advise is desired. It is a tribute you 
 owe to yourself, to your country, to your religion. Be 
 pleased therefore to intreat your neighboring gentry to come 
 with you, that each man may contribute his advise what 
 he thinke fittest for the establishment of our defence and 
 peace, that wee may generally conclude to live and dye 
 together. For this unity pray 
 
 Your freinds and servants, 
 
 Pet. Prideaux. 
 Exon, 18° Octobris, 1642. 
 
 John Pole. 
 
 Sam. Rolle. 
 
 Nigh. Martyn. 
 
 Jo. Bampfylde. 
 To our honored friend John 
 Willougbby, Esq'., at Pehembury, 
 present these. 
 
 For his Ma^ service. 
 
 The incursion of the Somersetshire troopers, 
 although more by accident than design, v^as taken 
 as the first overt act of the war in Devonshire. 
 Sir Peter Prideaux who assumed the leadership of 
 the Parliamentary party in the county at this crisis, 
 although I do not find that he continued long in that 
 prominent position, was of Netherton, Farway, in 
 East Devon. Prince says that he, '' by striking in 
 
78 BARNSTAPLE WANTS MONEY, 
 
 with the prevailing party of those times, grew up to 
 great wealth and dignity." 
 
 The Memoirs of Prince Rupert and the Cavaliers, by 
 Eliot Warburton (London, 1849), is a work to which 
 the present writer is under some obligations, and 
 it has for him the additional interest that it was 
 written in the northernmost corner of Devonshire. 
 The gifted writer slipped, however, into a strange 
 error — an error which has been unfortunately copied 
 elsewhere — when stating (vol. i. p. 432) that about 
 this time (October, 1642), *' In the west Sir Ralph 
 Hopton and Sir Bevill Grenvil held Barnstaple . . . 
 for the King." Now, it is equally certain that Sir 
 Ralph never entered the town in that year, that Sir 
 Bevill never held any command in it whatever, and 
 that from the beginning of the troubles until nearly 
 a year after the period mentioned Barnstaple was 
 constantly in the hands of the Parliamentarians. 
 
 By the middle of October the Corporation of 
 Barnstaple found themselves in the condition w^hich 
 is best indicated by an extract from a minute in 
 their *' Remembrance Book " : — '' Decimo quinto die 
 Octobris 1642. There hath bene much money dis- 
 bursed in and about the fortificacions of the Towne 
 and much more likely to be imployed about the 
 defence of the Towne and the Towne is without 
 stocke of money." ^ In other words, the Corporation 
 had committed themselves to an enormous expen- 
 diture, and the public chest was already empty. 
 Recourse must be had to loans. Mr. George Peard 
 
 ^ Harding MSS. 
 
THE ''SUMMARY OF DISBURSEMENTS:' 79 
 
 offers and undertakes to furnish ;f 50, Mr. Richard 
 Beaple ^50, Mr. Pentecost Doddridge £^0, Mr. 
 Richard Ferris ^^25 ; and doubtless many more of 
 the leading men followed their example. As a 
 security for these advances the Mayor and Alder- 
 men gave at once their personal bonds, and with the 
 consent of the Corporation the town lands were to be 
 alienated to raise the money for their redemption. 
 
 The military expenditure voluntarily undertaken 
 by, or imposed upon, the town in the four years of 
 the war will be gradually unfolded. An official state- 
 ment of the highest interest has been fortunately 
 preserved which purports to be an analysis of it. 
 This is called a " Summarie of Disbursements made 
 by the Inhabitants of the Town of Barnstaple, in 
 Plate and Money, for fortifying the said Town and 
 the payment and quartering of Soldiers, under taken 
 upon ye Hon^ie W"^ Lenthall's letter (Speaker), 
 faithfully collected from the particulars, which by 
 credible and honest persons, in that behalf entrusted, 
 will appear upon oath." This has been already 
 printed in extenso, but with some inaccuracies, in 
 Gribble's Memorials (p. 457), and, with more inaccu- 
 racies, elsewhere. I shall prefer, therefore, to dissect 
 it as I go on, for the purpose of identifying the items, 
 severally, with the incidents to which they refer and 
 in their chronological order, which, however, is gene- 
 rally adhered to in the statement. I shall refer to it 
 for convenience as the *' Summary." Of course, the 
 paper having been of the nature of a claim on the 
 Government of the Commonwealth for reimburse- 
 ment, for which there was probably but little hope of 
 
8o THE « S UMMAR V OF DISB URSEMENTS:' 
 
 any satisfaction being obtained, there may have been 
 some exaggeration in the sums stated to have been 
 disbursed ; the fact that most of the items, although 
 not all, are in round numbers may seem in itself sus- 
 picious. I may observe, however, that having tested 
 the different statements of the occurrences involved 
 in these items, I have no doubt whatever of their 
 historical accuracy. I will add that, having had an 
 opportunity of collating two copies made, apparently 
 at different times and by different hands, from the 
 original document (which appears to have been lost), 
 some unimportant variations in each have been re- 
 conciled, and it is presumed a closer approximation 
 to the original text will be found in the extracts which 
 will be here given. 
 
 The first item in the Summary is — 
 
 Lent in Money and Plate ... ;^i,i9i 17s. 9d. ^ 
 
 This must have been in response to the first 
 demand made by Parliament on the loth of June, 
 1642. Contributions of the like kind poured in from 
 all parts of the kingdom, ^ The value per oz. was to 
 
 ^ It should be remembered that the figures, here and elsewhere, must 
 be multiplied by three or four to find the equivalent of the sum in 
 present money. 
 
 ^ Lady Brilliana Harley, in a letter to her son of July 9, from 
 Bramston Castle, Herefordshire, writes : *' I have bine so longe in pute- 
 ing up the plate to send your father [then in London], that I have no 
 time to rwite any more than that I longe to see you. I am confident 
 you are not troubled to see the plate goo this way ; for I trust in our 
 gratious God you will have the frute of it." Sir Robert Harley (Lady 
 Brilliana's liusband) brought in on this occasion £2S^ ^^ plate, and 
 engaged for £iSO more [Letie^^s of the Lady Brilliana Harley y Camden 
 Society, 1854, p. 177). 
 
CORPORA TION PLA TE GIVEN UP. 8 1 
 
 be allowed for the plate, and I2d. the oz. for the 
 " fashion," i.e., the ornamental work, and 8 per 
 cent, interest; ''for which both Houses of Parlia- 
 ment did engage the public faith." 
 
 It has been supposed that the Barnstaple corpo- 
 ration plate was sacrificed to the exigencies of the 
 time— either for the local defence or as a contribu- 
 tion to the Parliamentary exchequer. Among the 
 town records there is preserved an inventory in which 
 are included four pieces, of the aggregate weight of 
 io8 ounces, which were handed over from the mayor 
 of the time being to his successor in the year 1633.^ 
 These, which were apparently the articles of plate 
 in ordinary use at the municipal festivities, have all 
 disappeared. Fortunately, three beautiful silver-gilt 
 hanaps of rich repousse work of the sixteenth century^ 
 which had been given to the Corporation many years 
 before the period of the war by Richard Doddridge, 
 merchant (father of the Judge), George Peard, gent, 
 (the elder), and John Penrose, merchant, respectively, 
 were preserved, and are now in possession of the 
 Town Council of the borough. ^ It may not be too 
 much to assume, although I am alone responsible 
 for the assumption, that among the other sacrifices 
 of the like kind was that of a curious and unique 
 gold chain, worn by at least one of the mayors, 
 Richard Beaple, in 1635-6. All we know of it is 
 from its representation on the sculptured bust of that 
 
 ^ Reco?'ds, No. Iv. Ibid. Supplementary, No. 9. 
 
 ^ There is a precisely similar hanap among the church plate of the 
 parish of Bodmin. It has been described in Sir John ^vlaclean's History 
 of Trigg Minor ^ and is figured in vol. iii. p. 421 of that work. 
 
82 CHURCH PLA TE GIVEN UP. 
 
 / 
 
 civic dignitary, which forms part of the elaborate and 
 singularly interesting monument to his memory in 
 one of the chancel aisles of Barnstaple church. The 
 chain, although personal, so to speak, in a marked 
 degree, being composed of the initials of Beaple's 
 name and escallop shells, a charge from his coat-of- 
 arms, all ornamentally treated, was apparently one 
 of official character, and destined to be handed on to 
 his successors. It has disappeared, however, and 
 left not a shadow of a tradition relating to it behind. 
 In a sentimental point of view it might be supposed 
 that a more severe sacrifice was that of the church 
 plate. I am not sure that this was by any means a 
 common case. As to the sacrifice, it was after all, 
 perhaps, a small matter when Oxford had voluntarily 
 given up the priceless plate of the colleges to be 
 melted down for the King's use. As to the sacrilege, 
 it can only be said that that was a word unknown in 
 the Puritan vocabulary. Here, however, is a copy 
 of the document which gives the fact : — 
 
 1642, 1st October. Richard Harris of Barnstaple, mer- 
 chant, did deliver unto me, Mr, Alexander Horwood, 
 appointed commissioner for the plate and monies upon the 
 proposition of Parliament for this town, one hundred and 
 fourteen oz. of plate at 5s. 4d. per oz , which doth amount 
 unto ;£z^ 8s. sterling, which was freely sent in the proposi- 
 tions and publique faith the day and year aforesaid.^ 
 
 So far as it can be now known with any degree of 
 probability, the principal piece of this collection was 
 a pre-Reformation silver-gilt chalice and cover, weigh- 
 
 ' Records, No. liv. 
 
MEMBERS OF THE CORPORATION. 83 
 
 ing 2,^\ ounces, which had survived the wreck in the 
 last year of the reign of Edward VI. ^ ; the remainder 
 must have been mostly Elizabethan. The plate went 
 to add to the vast heap of ** bags and goblets," as it 
 seems to have impressed itself upon the memory of 
 May the historian, which by the autumn he saw piled 
 up in the Guildhall of London. The value in money, 
 lent on the security of the ** Public Faith,'* on the 
 invitation of Parliament, for the maintenance of 
 horse, horsemen, and arms, for the ** preservation of 
 the public peace," it is needless to add was never 
 repaid. 
 
 It may be interesting to give here, as a record, the 
 names of the Corporation of Barnstaple at this period 
 (October, 1642). If not an accurate list, it is the 
 nearest approach to it that I have found it possible 
 to make. All, with the exception of the three whose 
 names are printed in italics, appear to l\ave been 
 partisans of the Parliamentary cause. 
 
 I. Mr. William Palmer, Mayor. 
 
 2. Mr. Gilbert Paige, 1 Alder- 14. Mr. James Common. 
 
 3. Mr. Henry Masson,! men. 15. Mr. Richard Harris. 
 
 4. Mr. Richard Beaple. 16. Mr. Adam Lugg, 
 
 5. Mr. Pentecost Doddridge. 17. Mr. Lewis Downe. 
 
 6. Mr. Justinian Westcomb. 18. Mr. Lewis Palmer. 
 
 7. Mr. Richard Ferris (M.P.) 19. Mr. James Baker. 
 
 8. Mr. John Downe. 20. Mr. Walter Tucker. 
 
 9. Mr. William Nottle. 21. Mr. Charles Peard. 
 
 10. Mr. Roger Peard. 22. Mr. Alexander Horwood. 
 
 11. Mr. Anthony Gay. 23. Mr. Nicholas Cooke, 
 
 12. Mr. Thomas Horwood. 24. Mr, Thoinas Deniiis, 
 
 13. Mr. George Baker. 25. Mr, Thomas Matthews, 
 
 In October, the Corporation found it expedient to 
 
 ' Records^ No. xxxiii. 
 
84 APPROVAL OF PARLIAMENT. 
 
 delegate the practical military work to what was 
 called a *' Committee of Counsell of Warr," con- 
 sisting mostly of members of the Corporation, but 
 including professional experts. They are authorized 
 and required '* to meete together evy day att the 
 Guildhall by nine of the clocke in the morninge or 
 before, to consult & order what by them shalbe 
 thought fitt to be p'vided & done in & about the 
 fortificacons & defence of the Towne." ^ The 
 Mayor, reporting in a letter to the Speaker of the 
 House of Commons the proceedings of the Cavaliers 
 under Sir Ralph Hopton, gave an account of the 
 progress of the fortification of the town. Whereupon 
 the House came to a resolution highly flattering to 
 the Corporation, but costly in its consequences to 
 the inhabitants: — 
 
 Die Jovis 20*5 Octobris 1642. It is Resolved, upon the 
 Question, That this House doth approve of this Action of 
 the Town of Barnestaple, in Fortifying of their Town ; and 
 doth take it for an expression of their publick Affections to 
 the Good and Peace of the Commonwealth ; and that they 
 shall be saved harmless for their so doing, by both Houses 
 of Parliament: And the House doth desire the Lords 
 Concurrence herein.^ 
 
 The Lords duly concurred. On the 24th, the 
 Speaker's Letter to the Mayor of Barnstaple, con- 
 veying the thanks of the House of Commons, was 
 read and signed by Mr. Speaker ; and at the same 
 time Mr. Peard had leave to stay at Barnstaple, for 
 *'the service of that Town and Country," and his 
 
 ^ Harding MSS. 
 
 "" Journals of the House of Commons, ii. 817. 
 
BATTLE OF EDGEHILL, 85 
 
 attendance in the House was dispensed with.^ It is 
 scarcely necessary to remark that the undertaking of 
 Parliament to indemnify the town was never fulfilled. 
 
 This was on the very eve of the day on which the 
 first great battle of the war was fought at Edgehill, 
 in Warwickshire, a spot which with singular drama- 
 tic appropriateness is as near as may be the centre 
 of England. Two months had elapsed since the 
 King had set up his standard at Nottingham. His 
 levies of troops had come in at first but slowly. 
 They were armed with difficulty, and only by strip- 
 ping the local magazines of the Militia. In the 
 mean time the Earl of Essex, Commander-in-chief of 
 the Parliamentary Forces, was advancing to North- 
 ampton, with the object of barring the King's 
 approach to London ; he was by that time at the 
 head of 14,000 men of all arms. This demonstra- 
 tion compelled the King to remove to Shrewsbury, 
 where his force was increased to eight or ten thou- 
 sand men, a body of 3,000 Horse being under the 
 command of Prince Rupert, the King's nephew. 
 The King's body-guard was a brilliant troop of 
 noblemen and gentlemen. An advanced party of 
 the Parliamentary Horse came into collision near 
 Worcester with the Prince's troops, and were 
 defeated. The King, being strong enough to take 
 the field, determined to march to London. Essex 
 followed this movement, and reaching the village of 
 Kineton, found the royal army on the morning of 
 Sunday, the 23rd of October, drawn out on the slopes 
 
 ' Journals of the House of Commons, ii. pp. 821-2. 
 
86 BARNSTAPLE THREATENED, 
 
 of Edgehill, on the opposite side of the Vale of the 
 Red Horse, and between his own army and London. 
 The battle which resulted was stubbornly fought, 
 but with no decisive results. Our military critics 
 say that victory was at various times in the grasp of 
 either, but each failed to seize the opportunity which 
 fortune, rather than skill, offered it. At the close of 
 the day — 
 
 " Doubtfully it stood ; 
 As two spent swimmers, that do cling together, 
 And choke their art." 
 
 Of the 30,000 men, or thereabouts, who had 
 composed the two armies, between five and six 
 thousand lay dead upon the field. 
 
 It was whispered that many of the leading men on 
 each side wished their own party to be not too suc- 
 cessful ; and their wish was doubtless father to the 
 thought that this one battle would lead to some 
 accommodation and decide the quarrel. 
 
 After the troops forming the garrison of Barnstaple 
 had been for about three months within their en- 
 trenchments, the first opportunity occurred for a 
 detachment to take the field on active service. 
 Until this time it does not appear that they had 
 been in any way pressed by the Royalists; who, in 
 fact, had not yet gathered any force in North Devon. 
 The incident forms the subject of a contemporary 
 tract, a copy of which was catalogued in Mr. J. 
 Camden Hotten's Typographical and Genealogical 
 
CAPTAIN PA ULETS A TTEMPT. Sy 
 
 Collection of Books, printed about the year i860. 
 The title is **A Famous Victory, obtained by the 
 Inhabitants of the Towne of Bastable in the 
 County of SomiMerset [sic] against Captatne Pawlet 
 and 1000 Welch Cavaliers, also Capt. Pawlet's 
 speech to his Souldiers, encouraging them to plunder 
 the said towne, likewise an exact discovery of the true 
 Estate of Minyard [Minehead], 1642." Mr. Hotten 
 states in a note that it was written by one Rainton, 
 of Minehead. I regret that I have not been able to 
 consult this tract ; a copy of it is entered in the 
 Index to the King's Pamphlets, in the Library of the 
 British Museum, with the place and date of its pub- 
 lication given as ** London : Decemb. 20, 1642," but 
 the volume in which it was bound up (small 4tos, No. 
 87) is now unfortunately missing. On inquiry, I 
 have found that nothing is known of the tract in the 
 Bodleian Library. 
 
 The story, so far as we can make anything of it, 
 is, however, not without corroboration. It seems 
 that at this time some Welsh Royalists were giving 
 trouble on the Somersetshire coast : some blockaded 
 Minehead and prevented the supplies of coal from 
 entering the harbour. Others, about five hundred in 
 number, under Captain Paulet, landed there, '' in- 
 vaded " the county, and ''constrained the inhabitants 
 to yeeld to any taxation, and to submit themselves 
 servants and slaves to every poore base companion, 
 to save their throats from being cut." This party 
 attacked Dunster Castle, but Mr. Luttrell, being 
 prepared, was able to defeat them and secure the 
 town from plunder. Being thus unsuccessful there, 
 
SS STOW AA^B SIR BEVILL GRENVILLE. 
 
 Captain Paulet went on to Barnstaple with two 
 hundred of his musketeers and forty Horse. I am 
 indebted for these particulars to a paper on *' The 
 Siege and Surrender of Dunster Castle, 1645-6," 
 by Mr. Emanuel Green, printed in the ArchcBological 
 Journal^ xxxvij, 386. Mr. Green has assigned the 
 incident to a period early in January, 1643, but this 
 may possibly be rather about the date of the ephe- 
 meral publication from which he appears to have 
 derived his information. The missing tract, it will 
 be observed, was printed about a fortnight earlier. 
 I have little doubt that both accounts refer to the 
 same event, and that it was this seemingly bucca- 
 neering attack that the garrison of Barnstaple suc- 
 cessfully repelled. 
 
 Stow, the historical seat of the Grenville family, 
 stood on the southward-facing slope of a combe which 
 runs at right angles to the coast, and opens to the 
 Severn Sea, in the extremity of that acute wedge of 
 Cornwall which seems to cut off a considerable 
 portion of West Devon from its natural seaboard. 
 It was then the home of Sir Bevill Grenville — a 
 famous grandson of a still more famous grandsire, 
 the brave seaman and soldier. Sir Richard, of Queen 
 Elizabeth*s days, the hero of the immortal fight off 
 the island of Flores. It was the same mediaeval 
 fortified manor-house, the description of which, as it 
 appeared in the previous century, will be familiar 
 to the readers of Kingsley's Westward Ho ! Lord 
 Lansdowne, Sir Bevill's grandson, relates with 
 pardonable family pride that for five hundred years 
 
STOW AND SIR BEVILL GRENVILLE, 89 
 
 the Grenvilles had never made any alhance out of 
 the Western Counties, and that there was hardly a 
 gentleman in Cornwall or Devon who was not con- 
 nected with them by blood. He also describes Stow 
 in Sir Bevill's time as a kind of academy for all the 
 young men of family in the county, who were there 
 educated under the best masters with Sir Bevill's 
 own children.^ 
 
 Sir Bevill was the soul of the Royalist cause in 
 Cornwall, and his loyalty went almost beyond the 
 bounds of enthusiasm. Lord Clarendon sums up 
 a description of him in admiration of his bright 
 courage and gentle disposition. It may be doubted, 
 however, whether Sir Bevill did not inherit some of 
 the fierceness of his distinguished ancestor, who, if 
 Linschoten is to be trusted, was of *' so hard a 
 complection" that, in mere *' braverie," he would, 
 on occasion, take wine-glasses between his teeth 
 and *' crash them in peeces and swallow them 
 downe."2 Qne from his own neighbourhood, poli- 
 tically opposed to him, it is true, at that time 
 ^vj-ote — " Sir Bevill Grenville hath been a tyrant, 
 especially to his tenants, threatening to thrust them 
 out of house and home if they will not assist him 
 and his confederates." ^ And in one of his own 
 letters he deplores that he '' did not march presently 
 to fetch those traitors [the Parliament men] out of 
 
 ^ The Genuine Works . . , of the Right Honourable George 
 Granville, Lord Lansdowne, London : 1732, ii. 222-229. 
 
 2 Voyage of John Huyghe7t Van Linschoten to the East Indies, 
 Hakluyt Society, 1885, ii. p. 311. 
 
 3 Letter printed in the Retrospective Review, xii. 189. 
 
90 STOPV AND SIR BE FILL G RENVILLE, 
 
 their nest at Launceston, or else fire them in it."^ 
 Perhaps, after all, this was only the blood of the old 
 Danish Jarl, Rollo, from whom he claimed descent, 
 asserting itself. He had sat in seven Parliaments, 
 and in earlier life (he was at this time forty-seven 
 years of age) like many others of the now fervent 
 Royalists, had lent himself with patriotic impulses 
 to that other cause, which was more distinctly iden- 
 tified with the liberties of his country. He had been 
 on intimately friendly terms with Sir John Eliot, his 
 fellow West countryman, and when that devoted 
 patriot was imprisoned in the Tower went to London 
 purposely to visit him, but was refused access to 
 the illustrious prisoner. It must be said that Sir 
 Bevill now gallantly devoted himself to the cause 
 which, in his view, was ** such as must make all 
 those that die in it little inferior to martyrs." As 
 early as in the beginning of August he had been 
 taking part with several of the loyalist Cornish 
 gentry to put in force the King's Commission of 
 . Array at Launceston, which was opposed by the 
 Parliamentary Committee, of which Sir Richard 
 Buller, of Shillingham, was the leading member. 
 For this proceeding Sir Bevill had been formally 
 expelled from the House of Commons on the 21st of 
 September. 
 
 It was at Stow that Sir Ralph Hopton and his 
 party found both a refuge and a welcome. So 
 little was the meaning of the irruption understood, 
 or so contemptuously was it regarded by the Parlia- 
 
 ^ Letter printed in Elot Warburton's Prince Rupert and the 
 Cavaliers^ i. p. 420. 
 
PROCEEDINGS OF CORNISH ROYALISTS. 91 
 
 mentary Committee, that at the Michaelmas Quarter 
 Sessions^ then being held, the Committee caused 
 Hopton and his troopers to be presented in ordinary 
 form of law by the Grand Jury as " divers men un- 
 known, who were lately come armed into that 
 county contra pacem,'^ &c. The tables were turned, 
 however, when Sir Ralph appeared to the present- 
 ment, and quietly produced his commission. The 
 Cornish proclivities, notwithstanding this show of 
 opposition, were as overwhelmingly Royalist as 
 those of Devonshire were Parliamentarian. The 
 military resources of Cornwall were proportionately 
 larger than those of Devonshire. In the previous 
 generation there had been more than 6,000 men 
 under arms, of whom, as says Carew, besides those 
 pressed for the Militia, many served as volunteers. 
 Sir Bernard Grenville, father of Sir Bevill, had been 
 colonel of one regiment a thousand strong. Sir 
 Bevill and the Royalist gentry of West Cornwall 
 had, therefore, no difficulty in bringing their in- 
 fluence to bear on the Sheriff, himself a Royalist, to 
 raise the posse comitatus, and in a few days by this 
 means about 3,000 Foot of the trained Militia were 
 got together. Sir Ralph Hopton putting himself at 
 the head of these, and accompanied by his small 
 body of Somersetshire cavalry, appeared before 
 Launceston, which the Parliamentary Committee, 
 having Sir Alexander Carew of Anthony and Sir 
 
 ' These Sessions appear to have been held at Bodmin, and, there- 
 fore, neither of the alteratives suggested by Messrs. Peter [History of 
 Launceston and Dunheved, p. 261, note) can be accepted, especially as 
 they are based on an error as to the time of Sir Ralph Hopton's arrival 
 in Cornwall. 
 
92 PROCEEDINGS OF CORNISH ROYALISTS. 
 
 Richard Buller as leaders, had done something to 
 fortify, but which they at once evacuated. Sir 
 George Chudleigh and six troops of Parliamentary 
 Horse lay at Lifton, on the other side of the border, 
 but the Cornish being .technically *' Sheriff's men," 
 availing themselves of a legitimate right, refused to 
 go beyond the limits of their own county to attack 
 them. Sir Ralph advanced, however, upon Saltash, 
 which was held by Colonel William Ruthen, a 
 Scotch soldier of fortune, and about two hundred 
 Scots, who had put in from stress of weather when 
 on their way from Ireland to France for the service 
 of Louis XIII.^ On the approach of the Royalists 
 Ruthen retired to Plymouth, at that time being 
 fortified for the Parliament, and the local authorities 
 were glad to make him Governor of the garrison. 
 The Cornish levies appear to have then melted 
 away. The work had to be done again in another 
 form ; and an entirely volunteer force of nearly 
 1,500 Foot was immediatel}^ raised by Sir Bevill 
 Grenville and his neighbours. Sir Nicholas Slanning, 
 of Marystow, Mr. Arundell, of Trerice, and Mr. 
 Trevanion, of Carhayes, chiefly among their own 
 tenants and retainers. It was rumoured that these 
 levies were intended to march into North Devon, 
 
 ^ Derived from a letter printed in Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert 
 and the Cavaliers^ ii. 69. William Ruthen, or Ruthyen as he spelled 
 his own name, is called by Symonds in his Diary (Camden Society, 
 1S59), "Lord Ruthin Gray," explained by Symonds's editor to be 
 *' Grey de Ruthyn"; but both appear to have been in error. The 
 name of the then baron, Grey de Ruthyn, was Charles Longue- 
 ville. See Sir H. Nicholas's Historic Peerage ; Burke's Extinct 
 Peerage, 
 
CORNWALL AND DEVON OPPOSED. 93 
 
 One of the weekly budgets printed in London has 
 the following intelligence at this time : — 
 
 From Cornwall it was informed that ... Sir Bevill 
 Grevill Sir Nicholas Slany Sir Rich Vivian and Master 
 Arundell all Arraymen . . . amongst them have raised 
 about 2,000 men ... are now bending their Forces against 
 Barnstable in Devonshire, but they have provided them- 
 selves well against them by the meanes of Master Perd.a 
 Member of the House of Commons and have mounted 
 16 Peeces of Ordnance to defend the Towne.^ 
 
 This was probably only a rumour. At all events 
 it was not the plan of campaign subsequently 
 developed. 
 
 In the mean time the trained and untrained levies 
 of Devonshire were being rapidly organized by the 
 local Parliamentary Committee. The first com- 
 plete regiment of Foot*was raised by Mr. John Were, 
 of Halberton.2 
 
 The narrative of the proceedings of the Royalists 
 in Cornwall has been given in som.e detail to pre- 
 pare us for the remarkable drama of the next six 
 months to which those proceedings materially con- 
 tributed. While the main armies engaged in the 
 quarrel were pausing, and their leaders were dreaming 
 of accommodations, the two counties of Cornwall 
 and Devon, ranged on opposite sides, were vigorously 
 carrying on the war on their own account. In these 
 
 ' A Collection of Special Passages^ &c., London, Nov. 2, 1642, 
 King's Pamphlets, B- M., large 4tos, vol. iv. 
 
 - The Apologie of Colo7tell John Were^ &c., King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxxxv. 
 
94 ADVANCE OF HOPTON AND GRENVILLE. 
 
 hostilities North Devon was more deeply involved 
 than has been commonly supposed. 
 
 Plymouth was being put into the condition of 
 defence for the Parliament which it successfully 
 maintained, against repeated assaults, throughout the 
 war. The citizens of Exeter, also committed to the 
 cause of the Parliament, had as yet done but little 
 beyond repairing their ancient walls, which had 
 survived so many sieges, providing an engineer to 
 advise for the defence of the city in those '* tymes 
 of combustion/' and putting down the ill-affected 
 among themselves. The King's Proclamation of the 
 gth of November, of ** Grace, Favour, and Pardon" 
 to the inhabitants, had no effect in recovering the 
 allegiance of the city. 
 
 Sir Ralph Hopton and Sir Bevill Grenville, with 
 their Cornish forces, passed into Devonshire, with 
 the purpose either of marching to join the King's army, 
 then lying about Reading, or of forming a junction 
 with such Devonshire Royalists as could be got 
 together and making a dash upon Exeter. If we 
 may credit a tract printed in December, 1642, the 
 former project was the one more in favour with the 
 loyal, but truculent, Cornishmen :; — 
 
 They cry all is their owne, swearing and darning, blas- 
 pheming and cursing that they will up to the King in spight 
 of opposition ; and for the city of London, they intend 
 there for to keepe their Christmas and make the Citizens 
 wayte upon their trenchers, but for the Roundheads, as they 
 so terme them, they will send them pell mell to their father 
 the devil. ^ 
 
 ' A True Relation of the present Estate of Cornwall, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. Ixxxv. 
 
EXETER BESIEGED, 95 
 
 Exeter, however, was to be the first object of 
 attack. On the i8th of November the Cornishmen 
 approached the city, " flinging up their caps and 
 giving many great shouts of joy that they were 
 arrived so neare the Centre of their ungracious 
 wishes . . . but they reckoned without their host.*' 
 
 Propositions were sent in to the Mayor and 
 Aldermen " requesting them in friendly sort in his 
 Majesties name to render possession of their City to 
 Sir Ralph Hopton." The Mayor, in reply, desired 
 Sir Ralph " that he would with his Cavaliers depart 
 from before their walls otherwise they should quickly 
 receive such a greeting from thence as should be 
 smally to their contents." Entrenchments were 
 then made by the Cornish on the west side of the 
 city, and an artillery fire was opened upon it, which 
 the citizens briskly answered from the ramparts. 
 The extracts immediately 'preceding have been 
 taken from a rare contemporary tract, entitled — 
 True and loyfvll Newes from Exeter Shewing how Sir 
 Ralph Hopton, Sir Bevill Greenvill, with clivers of the 
 Cornish Malignants, made their approaches thither with 
 five thousand Horse and Foot, intending to plunder that 
 great and rich City; and how they were manfully 
 repulst by the valour of the Citizens, with the losse of 
 fifteen hundred of their Men, on Munday last, being 
 the one and twentieth of November. London, Nov. 25 
 [1642] (5^ pp-)-^ Notwithstanding its voluminous 
 title, from which all experience teaches a moderate 
 expectation of what is to follow, this tract gives a 
 
 ^ King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. Ixxxiv. 
 
96 FIGHT OUTSIDE THE WALLS, 
 
 really spirited description of a night-sally, led by the 
 Mayor himself, from the east gate of the city upon 
 the rear of the besiegers' works. The citizens sur- 
 prised the *' drunken sentinels," and got into the 
 centre of the enemy's quarters, like '* hungry Lyons " 
 bearing down their prey, with halberts, poleaxes, and 
 butts of their muskets. Dutch engineers threw hand 
 grenades among them. Many of the Cornishmen 
 were drowned in the river. Sir Ralph and Sir 
 Bevill, with their officers, stood together opposing 
 to their uttermost until daylight appeared, when the 
 townsmen, issuing from the city on all sides, com- 
 pleted the business, and the army of the besiegers 
 was routed and temporarily dispersed. 
 
 There ensued upon this first collision between the 
 Cornish and the Devonshire forces great commotion 
 in the southern parts of the county. Isolated 
 houses were pillaged, horses were requisitioned, and 
 provisions were everywhere swept up, so that whole 
 villages were beggared by the troopers of one or 
 both of the contending parties ; and the gaols of 
 Exeter and Totnes were full of prisoners. ^ This 
 
 ' It would be unnecessary, perhaps, to go out of the county for an 
 example to show that this system of plunder, already, it appears, 
 extensively in operation, was not confined to one party. But the 
 following excerpt from a document which has survived illustrates the 
 proceedings of the partisans of Parliament in another part of the 
 kingdom about the same time. It is from a letter of some of the 
 deputy-lieutenants of Kent to a magistrate and a neighbour : — "We 
 have thought upon you as a most fit man, in regard of your known 
 integrity and faith to this cause of religion and liberty, to entreat you 
 to give your best assistance unto Captain George Wither, employed by 
 the Parliament with a troop of Horse, into Kent, to seize all the horses 
 
DISTURBANCE OF TRADE. 97 
 
 state of affairs is indirectly alluded to in a rejoinder 
 of the Houses of Parliament, printed early in 
 January following, to a Proclamation issued by the 
 King prohibiting the payment and receipt of customs 
 and other maritirae duties to the agents of the 
 Parliament, and alleging the restraint of trade 
 caused by the proceeding of Parliament in engros- 
 sing the public funds. The rejoinder says : — " We 
 might here justly take occasion to manifest what 
 have been the causes of the obstruction of Trade, 
 and so set forth the Rebellion of Sir Ralph Hopton 
 in the West, wholly destroying the most flourishing 
 Manufacture of the new Draperies in those- Parts ; 
 the Robbing of the Common Carriers and Trawnters^ 
 by his Majesty's Forces and Cavaliers, of Wollen 
 Cloth and other Manufactures, whereby the Com- 
 merce and Intercourse of Trade between the 
 Clothiers of remote Parts and the Merchants of 
 City of London is interrupted." ^ 
 
 The fact was that neither party had yet sufficiently 
 realized what war really meant. 
 
 At Modbury, in the rear of Hopton's army, the 
 
 of malignants and ill-affected persons to the Parliament. . . . V«ni 
 know Mr. Dixon of Hylden, a notorious malignant, hath good coach- 
 horses, and some others, if they be not at home you may help to 
 enquire where they are bestowed. . . . Accompany him to Sir Win. 
 Boteler's at Teston, and others there, to Robert Hodges, of Farley, and 
 some there who have good horses in their teams for to make dragoons ; 
 this will be an acceptable service to the State ... 15 Nov. 1642." 
 {^Papers relating to Proceedings in the County of Kent, 1642-46, 
 Camden Miscellany, 1855, vol. iii.) 
 
 ' Men who bring fish from the sea coasts to sell in the inland parts 
 (Bailey). A word now, I believe, obsolete. 
 
 * Rush worth's Histo7'ical Collections^ ii. 89. 
 
 8 
 
98 SHERIFF A TTA CKED A T MODE UR V. 
 
 Sheriff of Devon (Sir Edmund Fortescue ^) and a 
 party of Royalist gentlemen were in the mean time 
 raising the posse comitattis. In the first week of 
 December, Colonel Ruthen, with four troops of Horse 
 and about one hundred dragroons, sallied out of Ply- 
 mouth- — not yet, therefore, closely invested — at three 
 o'clock in the morning, and avoiding a Royalist post 
 at Pl3^mpton by a flank march swept round by Iv}'- 
 bridge to Modbury. The trained bands and volunteers 
 — described as *' naked men," from which it is not 
 to be understood that they were in ptcris naturalibus, 
 but merely unprovided with weapons — dispersed at - 
 the first alarm, leaving their officers, with Sir 
 Edmund Fortescue, Sir Edward Seymour, Bart., of 
 Berry Pomeroy Castle, Mr. Edward Seymour, his 
 son, one of the Members of Parliament for the 
 county, ** Squire " Arthur Bassett, of North Devon, 
 *' a notable malignant," Master Sheptoe [Shapcote], 
 Clerk of the Peace for the county. Master Bayly of 
 Barnstaple, '' a papist," ^ and others, to take refuge 
 in the Court House, an ancient mansion of the 
 Champernowne family, at the west end of the town, 
 where they were at once besieged. Ultimately, 
 after the outbuildings had been fired, they sur- 
 
 ' Sir Edmund Fortescue, Knight, of Fallapit, Sheriff of Devon in 
 1642-3, was at the time about thirty-two years of age. In a fine 
 portrait of him, painted evidently several years earlier, in the possession 
 of W. B. Fortescue, Esq., of Octon, Torquay, he is represented as a 
 young man of almost feminine beauty, with blue eyes, long fair hair, of 
 Cavalier fashion, reaching to the shoulders, and a trace of a moustache 
 only on the face. He is encased in body-armour. 
 
 2 George Bayley, in 1636-7, was lined ;^20 for refusing to be one of 
 the Corporation of Barnstaple, " being thereunto chosen " [Records, 
 No. lix.). 
 
PRISONERS SENT TO LONDON 99 
 
 rendered, and were marched to Dartmouth, put on 
 board the Cresset frigate {i.e., the Crescent, of 167 tons, 
 carrying twelve guns), conveyed to Plymouth, and 
 thence to the Parliament in London.^ Sir Ralph 
 Hopton and Sir Nicholas Slanning are stated to have 
 escaped very narrowly ; but it does not appear that 
 they were among the besieged party. 
 
 The Parliament treated their first haul of eminent 
 prisoners with sufficient consideration. These were 
 brought by sea to Gravesend, and then taken to 
 "the prisons of Winchester-house and Lambeth- 
 house ; barges with musquetiers being sent to 
 Gravesend to bring them up safely to the prisons 
 aforesaid that no incivility might be offered to their 
 persons." ^ 
 
 Parliament was now taking the course of enlarging 
 the Committees in the several counties under their 
 influence ; and to these Committees extraordinary 
 powers were given for obtaining the sinews of war — 
 powers which came to be exercised arbitrarily and 
 with excessive severity.3 
 
 ^ A True and Perfect Relation of a great and happy Victory obtained 
 by the Parlia?nents Forces^ under the Command of Co lone II Ruthin^ over 
 Sir Ralph Hopton and his Cavaliers^ neer Fly7n?nouth^ with the Names 
 of the Prisoners^ &c., King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4to, vol. Ixxxvi. 
 Several accounts of this affair are extant. 
 
 ^ The Kingdoms Weekly Intelligencer^ Dec. 27 - Jan. 3, 1642-3. 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4to, vol. Ixxxix. Sir Edmund Fortescue 
 was almost immediately removed to Windsor Castle, at that time appro- 
 priated by the Parliament. There, in a chamber near the Norman Gate 
 and Round Tower, he beguiled his imprisonment by sculpturing his 
 name, family arms, motto, &c., and the cause for which he was suffer- 
 ing, "Pour le Roy C," on the walls. He was released in a few 
 months. 
 
 3 Thursday, I Dec. 1642: '*An order was made by the Pari, on 
 
loo HOPTON AGAIN A TTEMPTS EXETER, 
 
 During the greater part of December, Sir Ralph 
 Hopton and the forces under his command were 
 lying about Totnes, or between Totnes and Exeter, 
 the troopers scouting and pillaging the country 
 villages. On the 30th of the month Sir Ralph's 
 headquarters were at Alphington, and again (for the 
 third time, it is stated) he summoned the Mayor of 
 Exeter to surrender the city, to which the Mayor, 
 Mr. Christopher Clarke, returned a firm but 
 courteous refusal. On New Year's day, at three 
 o'clock in the morning, an attempt w^as made to 
 surprise the city, which, being discovered and re- 
 pelled, a cannonade was opened on the southern 
 defences, followed by an attempted assault on the 
 north-east side, where the defenders were for a time 
 beaten from their works. A sally was then made 
 with eight hundred men by Captain Alexander Pym 
 (son of the illustrious statesman, John Pym), which 
 resulted, it appears, in another complete defeat of 
 the besiegers. All this is told in a contemporary 
 
 Tuesday last That Committees shall be named in all Counties to take 
 care for Provisions of Victuals for the Army raised by the Pari, as likewise 
 for the taking up of horse for service in the field, dragoners and draught 
 horses, as likewise for borrowing of money or plate to supply the 
 Army," &c. (/4 Perfect Dhirjiall of the Passages in Parliament^ from 
 28 Nov. to 5 Dec. 1642, King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. iv.) 
 " Malignants of Exeter pressed to contribute money for safety of the 
 Commonwealth refusing were put into ships and sent to sea, which has 
 made them reasonable. One answered that he was an old man of four- 
 score years and daily expected his departure out of the world, had long 
 since provided his coffin. Knowing him to be very rich they notwith- 
 standing must carry him on shipboard together with his coffin, which 
 they accordingly did, whereupon he relented and gave £%oo " {Eng- 
 ia7id's Memorable Accidents^ Jan. 9-16, 1643, King's Pamphlets, B. M., 
 large 4tos, vol. vi.). 
 
HY WORD'S NARRATIVE. loi 
 
 tract containing an interesting narrative, in the 
 form of a letter, of which the following is an abbre- 
 viation : — 
 
 On Christmas day we had a falce allarum by reason that 
 some three Hundred of Sir Ralph Hopton's Troopers had 
 scouted out and were pillaging the Country Villages there- 
 abouts . . . the Citie being all in an uprore . . . they 
 got into Kingsbridge where Sir Ralph Hopton himselfe is 
 quartered. 
 
 All the weeke after we did little . . . sent out parties to 
 discover whether the Cavaliers made any attempt upon any 
 part of the county but they lay very close. 
 
 Thus we continued till Sunday morning (being New 
 yeeares day) about three o'clock in the morning I being 
 riding the Round to discover whether my Gentries did their 
 duty carefuly on a sudden I discovered neare forty Horse- 
 men stealing upon them. Sentries discharged Carbines 
 and retreated to Court of Guard — ''in a quarter of an 
 Houre the City was in a posture of defense, onely the cryes 
 of women and Chilldren did so trouble us, that I professe I 
 had rather oppose an Enemy in the field though with some 
 disadvantage, than to endure that torment in a City most 
 strongly fortefied." 
 
 Hopton's guns placed upon the side of a hill which lies 
 on the south side of the City cannonading for three 
 hours — on the N.E. our men beaten from the works and 
 they drew so nigh the wall that they began to cast granadoes 
 over the wall into the city. 
 
 Capt. Pym sallied out with 800 men, and with the loss of 
 25 men seized their ordnance and 17 cannoniers prisoners. 
 By this time the Country came in and fell upon Sir Ralph 
 Hopton's rear and Captain Pym upon his flank with his own 
 ordnance so mauled him that presently he retreated, and 
 having got clear of our forces betook himself to flight ; in 
 
1 02 HOP TON'S RE TREA T, 
 
 this battle we slew above a thousand of his men and lost 
 not above fourscore or a hundred at the most, besides we 
 took seven pieces of artillery and eight and thirty persons, 
 but none of any note.^ 
 
 This is signed, *'Abell Hyword,'* and is dated, 
 Exeter, January 2, 1643. 
 
 The w^riter of the letter vv^as lieutenant of Captain 
 Pym's troop. The sanguinary affair (if the account 
 of the narrator is not an exaggerated one) compelled 
 Hopton to drav^ off his troops. The retreat is 
 attributed by Lord Clarendon to the v^ant of am- 
 munition, a supply of which was soon afterwards 
 received from France at one of the Cornish ports, 
 ** as if sent by Providence '* — the historian properly 
 hesitates absolutely to assert that it was part of the 
 divine order of things to furnish the Royalists with 
 gunpowder. It may be suspected that it was in fact 
 hastened by the advance of the Earl of Stamford (or 
 Stanforde as he himself wrote his name), the newly- 
 appointed Parliamentary General of the Western 
 Counties, who, with three regiments of Somerset- 
 shire and Dorsetshire men, reached Exeter on the 
 6th of January. 
 
 Hopton's proceedings had prompted Parliament 
 to make further provision, other than what local 
 demands might have already supplied, for the 
 prosecution of the war in the West ; and the 
 
 ^ A Favious Victory obtained before the City of Exeter on Sunday 
 jattuary i. [1643] ^^y Captain Fym, against Sir Ralph Hopton and 
 the Cornish Cavaliers ^ dfc, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, 
 vol. Ixxxix. The title of this tract is misplaced in Davidson's 
 Bibliotheca Devoniensis (p. 71) a year too late. 
 
BA TTLE OF BRADOCK DO WN. 103 
 
 following " Ordinance " was accordingly passed on 
 the 24th of December : — 
 
 Whereas divers persons well affected to the good and 
 safety of this Kingdom, have contributed in Money, Plate 
 and Horse for suppression of the present Rebellion and 
 Insurrection by Papists, Delinquents, and other Malignant 
 persons in the Westerne parts under the command of Sir 
 Ralph Hopton and his Adherents, Rebells and Tray tors ; 
 and for the reliefe of the good Subjects there — Ordered 
 that all who have raised or shall raise money &c. shall be 
 satisfied within six months with interest out of the first 
 moneys that shall be levied in Cornwall, Devon, &c. 
 Hugh Sowden and Thomas Young of London merchants 
 to be Treasurers and Receivers.^ 
 
 Sir Ralph Hopton's army recrossed the Tamar at 
 Newbridge, in some confusion, on the nth of 
 January — ten days, therefore, after the defeat which 
 he had sustained. He was followed by the forces of 
 Ruthen, drawn out of Plymouth, and by those of 
 the Earl of Stamford, which had been augmented 
 by such of the Devonshire Militia as had been 
 collected about Exeter. Near Liskeard, on the 
 19th of January, Ruthen's army, which was drawn 
 up on *' a fair heath between Boconnoc and Bradock 
 church," was met by Hopton's Cornishmen, who 
 had turned at bay, and signally defeated. Lord 
 Clarendon asserts that Ruthen, confident of success, 
 precipitated the engagement with the hope of 
 obtaining the sole credit of the anticipated victory. 
 A letter of -striking and vivid interest, written on the 
 
 ' King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. Ixxxviii. 
 
I04 GARRISON OF BARNSTAPLE REINFORCED. 
 
 evening of the battle, by Sir Bevill Grenville, who 
 led the van of the Cornish army, is extant.^ 
 
 Further on, I shall again take up the thread of Sir 
 Ralph Hopton's proceedings. In the campaigns of the 
 West during the Civil War, from beginning to end, 
 there is no more conspicuous figure than that of Sir 
 Ralph Hopton. He was one of the most dis- 
 tinguished of the Royalist generals, although 
 neither a brilliant nor always a successful leader. 
 His career is of especial interest for us, as the scene 
 of his greatest victory and that of his severest defeat 
 both lie within a few miles of Barnstaple. It is now 
 time to return to North Devon. 
 
 On the i6th of December — the date being fixed 
 by an item in the Summary — the garrison of 
 Barnstaple was reinforced by a contingent of the 
 Militia levies of the county. The entire strength of 
 the garrison in foot-soldiers, as I read the important 
 document referred to, was by this means raised to 
 640, under the orders of Colonel (Sir Samuel) Rolle, 
 Colonel (James) Chudleigh, Captain Trevillian, and 
 Captain Bennet. The troop of seventy Horse, already 
 in garrison, was commanded by Captain Freeman. 
 This body of troops, it appears, was maintained in 
 the town during the next nine months at the very 
 considerable cost to the Corporation, in '' money," 
 i.e,, pay, *-'and quarters," of ;£^500 a month. 
 
 Not long after the affair with Paulet's marauders, 
 the particulars of which are unfortunately wanting, 
 the garrison of Barnstaple had another opportunity 
 of making a sortie upon the enemy. 
 
 ^ See Noies and Queries^ ist Series, x. 417. 
 
ROYALISTS OCCUPY TORRINGTON, 105 
 
 It seems that the Royalist forces, which lay about 
 Exeter, were not so straitened in the beginning of the 
 month of December, but that their commander, Sir 
 Ralph Hopton, could detach a party, numbering, it 
 is stated, 500 men, under Colonel Acland, and 
 Captain Arundell, to advance into North Devon, 
 secure Great Torrington, and settle the posse comi- 
 tatus in those parts. So much is learnt from the 
 Mercuruis Atdicus of January 7, 1643, the news- 
 sheet of the Court party, printed and published at 
 Oxford. 
 
 Torrington, or, more correctly. Great Torrington, 
 which several times became involved in the military 
 struggle in North Devon, is a small town, situated 
 about ten miles nearly due south of Barnstaple. 
 It is famous for its picturesque and commanding 
 position on the summit of a hill which rises 
 abruptly from the right bank of the river Torridge. 
 The more particular description of its surroundings 
 will come appropriately a little later. A melancholy 
 incident in connection with this occupation of 
 Torrington is to be found recorded in the parish 
 register. Among the entries of burials in Decem- 
 ber, 1642, is the following, which has been often 
 printed, and as often incorrectly : — 
 
 Christopher Awberry gent borne at or by mere in Somsett 
 on of Sr Ralphe Hoptons troopers who was kild by the 
 goeing ofife of a muskett unawares upon the maine gard 
 was buryed the xxvth of December Souldier Like. 
 
 Two days later there occurs this entry : — 
 
io6 MEETINGS OF ROYALISTS. 
 
 Thomas Hollamore was buryed the xxvijth day slaine 
 by ye goeing off of a muskett. . . . 
 
 probably another victim of the same accident. 
 
 From the news-letters in the diurnals of this 
 period it is evident that the Royalist gentry v^ere 
 now on the move, and were combining their en- 
 deavours to raise men in North Devon. A writer 
 reports from Atherington : — '' At Sir Hugh Pollard 
 his House [King's Nympton] forty or fifty Gentle- 
 men from Tavestocke ^ were feasted upon the two 
 and twentieth day of December, and the day after 
 they went to Mr. Pollard of Filley, Mr. Pollard of 
 Horwood, and Mr. Hatch of AUer and to other 
 gentlemen thereabouts in the North parts, and had 
 great entertainments everywhere, Master Gifford of 
 Brightly excepted, who absented himselfe from his 
 House to save charges. At Southmolton, the Mayor 
 feasted them all." From Barnstaple it is reported 
 that " at Tawstock, at the Earl of Bath's house, 
 there hath been these ten days about 200 gentlemen, 
 by their carriage men of quality ; yet no attempts 
 against the town have as yet been practised ; and 
 how long they mean to continue there, our mayor 
 knows nothing." ^ These threatening movements 
 alarmed the Barnstaple garrison, and in the town it 
 was evidently believed that an attack upon it was 
 contemplated. The fire-eaters show their colours in 
 
 ' Tawstock, the seat of the Earl of Bath, is meant. The mis- 
 reading is a common one from which the Calendars of State Papers 
 are not wholly free. It arose from the v and the u being used inter- 
 changeably in old writings. 
 
 ^ Trtie Newes frojn Devonski?'-e and Cornwall, December 31, 1642, 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. Ixxxviii. 
 
EXPEDITION FROM BARNSTAPLE. 107 
 
 a London news-sheet of the last week of December: 
 — Sir Ralph Hopton, who, with his '* despicable 
 pillagers," was overrunning the people of Devon- 
 shire, "hath taken Great Torrington and threatneth 
 Barnstable, but that Towne is fortifying itselfe and 
 resolves to spend the last drop of their bloods before 
 he shall gaine it ; and they have ordnance sufficient 
 to defend it." ^ 
 
 The authorities of Barnstaple determined to 
 anticipate the Royalists by a surprise of the party 
 lying at Torrington, This party is stated to have 
 consisted of 200 Horse under Colonel Acland, Mr. 
 Gifford, and Mr. Yeo.^ In the gathering gloom of a 
 December evening a body, consisting of 460 Foot and 
 a troop of forty horse-soldiers, set out on their march 
 over the narrow Long Bridge, which connected Barn- 
 staple with the left bank of the Taw. A moon just 
 past the full lighted them on their way along a hilly 
 road which still has the reputation, surviving proba- 
 bly from those days, of being mile for mile one of the 
 worst in Devonshire. The following Royalist account 
 of the subsequent affair is from the notoriously 
 mendacious Merctmtcs Aulicus, printed at Oxford : — 
 
 They of Barnstable not willing to have such neighbours 
 neere them, with neere 1,000 Horse and Foot did upon 
 Saturday night last, being the last of Decemb. assault the 
 town upon the sudden. But contrary unto their expectation, 
 
 J England's Memorable Accidents. From the 26th December [1642] 
 to the 2nd January, 1642 [1643]. King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 
 4tos, vol. V, 
 
 * The Weekly Account ^^o. 2, King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, 
 vol. X, 
 
I o8 TORRING TON A TTA CKED, 
 
 they were so manfully kept out, that they were faine to goe 
 away with the losse of an hundred of their men, which 
 they carried backe on 1 7 horses with some other carriages ; 
 and this done with the losse of one man only and the hurt 
 of two. After w^hich service done, Colonell Ackland left 
 the Towne and marched to Sir Ralph Hopton's Army neere 
 to Exeter, and came to him at Crediton.^ 
 
 There is the usual exaggeration of numbers, if of 
 nothing else, in this account ; and an impartial 
 critic might infer from the strategic movement 
 noticed at the close of the paragraph that the 
 Royalists found their position untenable and that the 
 attack was not so ineffective as the narrator would 
 have had it supposed. In fact, another contemporary 
 publication tells a different story, although it should 
 be taken with equal reservation : — 
 
 From Barnstaple they write that the Inhabitants of that 
 Towne, after they had well fortified themselves sallied out 
 to Great Torrington, where Sir Ralph Hopton had left 500 
 of his men whom they drove from thence, slew ten of them, 
 tooke forty prisoners and 200 armes, and so have freed that 
 part of the county also from those rebellious plundering 
 pilferers.^ 
 
 I have put these two accounts of the affair in 
 juxtaposition without further comment. They are 
 hopelessly irreconcilable, but are the only ones that 
 I have been able to discover. 
 
 ^ King's Pamphlets, B. M. , large 4tos, vol. iv. 
 
 "^England's Memorable Accidents^ Jan. 9-16, 1642-3, Burney Collec- 
 tion, B. M., No. 12. 
 
FOR TIFICA TION OF BARNSTAPLE, 1 09 
 
 The Summary records the cost of this expedi- 
 tion : — 
 
 For setting forth 460 foote and 40 horse against 
 Torrington, Jan^* the ist, 1642-3, with Money 
 and Victuals, 2 daies ... ... ... ... jQ'jo 
 
 The popular mind in Barnstaple during the next 
 few weeks seems to have been in a state of consider- 
 able tension. There were rumours afloat of offensive 
 designs upon the town. One of these looms upon us 
 in a paragraph of news in the Mercurius Aulicus of 
 February 8 : — 
 
 Sir Bevil Greenvil with his Forces went towards his own 
 house at Bid[e]ford in Devonshire and hath got posses- 
 sion of the same ; by means whereof, it is conceived that he 
 will quickly master Barnstable, being already master of the 
 Haven there, and consequently of the mouth of the 
 Severn.^ 
 
 If this was authentic intelligence, of which I have 
 considerable doubt, it must have alluded to some 
 movement immediately after the battle of Bradock 
 Down ; but there is evidence that Bideford could not 
 have been in possession of the Royalists at this time 
 or, if so, only temporarily. 
 
 The fortifications of Barnstaple were deemed to be 
 yet unfinished, and the time was come for the Cor- 
 poration to take counsel with the inhabitants in order 
 to '* propound a rate '' for the completion of the works. 
 A public meeting or *' Assembly," as it was called, 
 
 ^ King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. vii. The Grenvilles were 
 lords of the manor of Bideford. 
 
I lo FOR TIFICA TION OF BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 having been "warned," accordingly took place two 
 days after this decision, when a rate was agreed upon 
 for the purpose of defraying the expenses already 
 incurred and of providing for a further contemplated 
 outlay for the defence of the town. The following 
 is the resolution as it is recorded in the ** Remem- 
 brance Book " : — 
 
 [1643.] January 26. It is this day agreed upon that 
 seaven men shall be chosen and appointed to make a rate 
 for moneys to be raysed for the defraym* of the charge dis- 
 bursed, and to be disbursed, about the fort and for defensive 
 p'visions for the towne, wch raters are to take a voluntary 
 oath to rate men indifferently, without p'tiality accordinge to 
 their sevrall estates, and none to be by them rated but such 
 as have been rated to the subsidy, and such others as the 
 raters shall think fitt, and that consideracon and notice be 
 by them taken whoe have allready subscribed and paid, and 
 what they have soe subscribed and paid, and alsoe of such as 
 have not yet subscribed att all, and of such as have sub- 
 scribed and not paid according to their subscripcons, and that 
 such as have not subscribed or not paid and such as shall 
 refuse to pay accordinge as they shalbe rated shalbe taken 
 as malignants and p'ceeded against as malignants and 
 enemies of the towne and such as are ill asserted to the cause.^ 
 
 It is not difficult to see in this proceeding the work 
 of Mr. Deputy-Recorder Peard, who was present on 
 the occasion and sworn as one of the ** Raters'* or 
 assessors, and who was, no doubt, generally advising 
 the Corporation. And it is noticeable how distinctly 
 the local authorities now began to take their tone 
 
 'Harding MSS., p. 40. There is an imperfect copy in Cribble's 
 AJemo?'ialSj p. 445. 
 
THE GREA T FORT, 1 1 1 
 
 from the Parliamentary declarations. The rate 
 was probably the first of many to which the 
 unfortunate Barumites had to submit as further 
 military necessities arose. So earnest were the 
 Corporation in the prosecution of the work of 
 fortifying the town to which they were now 
 committed, that simultaneously with their other 
 efforts, they appealed to Parliament for assistance, 
 and not without success. The following is from the 
 record of the proceedings of the House of Commons : 
 
 23 Januarii 1642. [t,e., 1643]. The humble Petition of 
 the Mayor and Inhabitants of the Town of Barnestable, 
 Com Devon, was read : Whereupon — 
 
 It is Ordered, That the Committees of the County of 
 Devon do pay the sum of Two Hundred Pounds to the 
 Mayor of Barnstable, to be employed by him for the Defence 
 of that Place. ^ 
 
 This is the only order with reference to the indem- 
 nity of Parliament to the Corporation of Barnstaple 
 that I have found. It does not follow that the 
 money was ever paid ; no credit, it may be re- 
 marked, is given for it in the Summary. 
 
 At this time, that is, in the middle of January, 
 1643, we find the first mention of ** the Fort." This 
 important work, which afterwards came to be known 
 as " the Great Fort," was constructed on the 
 eminence above the town, which terminates the 
 southernmost of the two ridges previously described. 
 The site is still called Fort Hill. Beyond it, to the 
 east, a nearly level plateau extends for a few 
 
 ^ Journals of the House of Commons^ ii. 939. 
 
112 THE GREAT FORT, 
 
 hundred yards to where the upward slope of the 
 ridge recommences. It was probably at first planned 
 only as an earth-work, but evidently on scien- 
 tific principles, and the precision of its outlines, 
 which is perceptible after the wear and tear of 
 nearly two and a half centuries, shows that it was 
 skilfully and deliberately constructed. The outer 
 line of the work was nearly a regular heptagon in 
 shape, with bastions, or bulwarks, as they were then 
 called, at the angles ; and a dry ditch protected the 
 external face. There were of course embrasures in 
 the parapet of the bastions for the guns, of which 
 twenty-eight altogether were mounted. Whether or 
 not the escarp, or front of the rampart, was revetted, 
 that is, built up on a foundation or retaining wall of 
 masonry, it is now impossible to determine. My 
 own impression is that it was not. What is hereafter 
 referred to as ^' the breastwork of the trench of the 
 fort," was probably a faiisse-braye^ an intrenchm.ent 
 within the dry ditch itself, masked by the counter- 
 scarp and forming an advanced line of defence. 
 There was also an internal structure which, from 
 the existing remains of it, appears to have been a 
 heavy earth-work, enclosing buildings which formed 
 quarters for soldiers, and a court- dit- gar d (an old 
 military term), or place of muster. The face of 
 the escarp was no doubt palisaded like the defences 
 of Bristol,^ and those of Plymouth, which Mr. Worth 
 thinks were of earth and in their most complete 
 
 ^ "These forts be all palisaded; but have no fauxbrayes or fore- 
 defences" ("Journal of the Siege of Bristol," Eliot Warburton's 
 Frince Rupert and the Cavaliers y ii. 240). 
 
THE GREAT FORT. 
 
 13 
 
 ■form "stockaded." ^ The minute and circumstantial 
 description given by William Lithgow of the ex- 
 traordinary fortifications of London, constructed 
 about the same time, will, however, bring before us 
 a more distinct image of the structure. I take one 
 of the works that were raised at intervals in a cir- 
 cuit of eighteen miles around London as almost 
 a duplicate of it ; this was the fort at Wapping : — 
 
 Here, close by the houses and the river Thames, I found 
 a seven-angled fort, erected of turffe, sand, watles, and 
 earthen worke (as all the rest are composed of the like) 
 having nine port-holes, and as many cannons ; and near 
 the top, round about pallosaded with sharpe wooden stakes, 
 fixt in the bulwarkes, right out, and a foot distant from 
 another, which are defensive for suddain scalets, and single 
 ditched below, with a court du guard within. . . . All the 
 port-holes are soled and syded with timber ; the platformes 
 where the cannons ly are laid with strong oaken planks \ all 
 the ordonnance are mounted upon new wheeles ; besides 
 the pallosading and barrocading of them without, with yron 
 workes and other engynes.^ 
 
 The Great Fort occupied a remarkably strong 
 defensive position. The road which enters Barn- 
 staple from the south through Newport and along 
 a causeway crossing what was then a marsh over- 
 flowed by the tides, being easily rendered imprac- 
 ticable, the fort commanded all other approach to the 
 town on that side. It quite as effectually domi- 
 
 ' **The Siege of Plymouth," by R. N. Worth, Esq., Journal of the 
 Plyviotith Institution^ v. 262. 
 
 2 The Present Sufveigh of London y &c., by William Lithgow, 1643, 
 Somers's Tracts, iv. 539-42. 
 
1 14 THE ENTRENCHMENT. 
 
 nated the east, or Bristol, road, which falls into Bear 
 Street, the accustomed approach from West Somer- 
 setshire ; and it was from that quarter that an 
 attack, at least in the earlier period of the war, was 
 most to be apprehended. It completely blocked 
 another road to the town, and that probably the 
 most ancient one — the earliest London road — coming 
 from the south-east ; across this the work was 
 actually thrown up.^ 
 
 The Entrenchment referred to in the Summary 
 and elsewhere was part of the general system of 
 defence, and is assumed to have extended around the 
 
 ^ I believe that this road, now called Sowden Lane, anciently, and, 
 I have little doubt, down to the time of the Civil War entered the town 
 by the narrow lane called Hardaway Head, which would have been its 
 continuation in an almost direct line — thence following the evident 
 course of Silver Street and Well Street (indirect like the other ancient 
 approaches to the gates of the town), to the South Gate. The name 
 ** Hardaway Head " is peculiar and etymologically suggestive. Long 
 before houses had sprung up on each side of it, this road, starting from 
 the South Gate, was probably a causeway passing along a low-lying 
 extramural tract liable to incursions of the tides. Where it began to 
 ascend the slope of the hill the pavement ended, and there it came 
 to be called hard-way head. After the Civil War the replacement of 
 the disturbed roadway appears to have been effected in the manner 
 ingeniously conjectured by Mr. Chanter: — ''The ancient highway was 
 purposely stopped by the fortifications thrown up at the time of the 
 Civil War, and when after the storm was passed it became necessary 
 to reopen the road, it was found easier and more convenient to carry 
 it round outside the fort, rather than in the old line across it. The 
 new bit of road simply followed the ditch or curtain until it reached 
 a bastion which it was necessary to go round and thus caused a curve 
 which still partially exists" (Records^ Supplementary^ No. 15). It 
 should be added that, by this new departure at a sharp angle from its 
 original direction, the highway was carried to its present junction with 
 the east road. 
 
COST OF THE IVORKS. 115 
 
 whole landward front of the town. The cost of it, a 
 mere earthwork as it must have been, fully confirms 
 the idea that may be formed of its extent. From 
 the town mill-leat at one end, to the river at the 
 other, it would have been little short of half a mile 
 in length. No distinct traces of it, so far as I am 
 aware, have ever been discovered, nor are they likely 
 to have survived. 
 
 From the Summary we learn the cost of these 
 works : — 
 
 In Disbursements for Materials and 
 Wages to build the Fort in which were 
 mounted 28 Pieces of Ordnance ... ;^i,i2o o o 
 
 For entrenching the Town ... ... 450 o o 
 
 The damage by the laying waste of land and the 
 demolishing of houses is not included in these items, 
 but appears under a separate head and will be quoted 
 hereafter. 
 
 Immediately following the foregoing items is one 
 which, although apparently plain enough in its 
 meaning, has yet led to some difference of opinion, 
 as I shall proceed to show. This item is : — 
 
 In Fortifying the Castle, building 3 de- 
 fensible Gates, and making 16 platforms ... £660 o o 
 
 * 
 
 The '' Castle '' — meaning, primarily, the ancient 
 mound with what remained of the keep on its sum- 
 mit, but, generally, the site of the ancient Castle of 
 Barnstaple with its purlieus — there can be no 
 
ii6 THE CASTLE. 
 
 question, I believe, was colloquially understood in 
 the same sense in the seventeenth century as it is 
 now. Mr. Chanter ^ is of opinion that the *' Castle '' 
 referred to in the item of the Summary was not 
 this, but the central work within the Fort previously 
 mentioned. I am unable, however, to concur with 
 him in this view. It is unlikely, I think, that the 
 term ** Castle" would have been applied to another 
 and an entirely new construction, when there was 
 already a Castle familiarly known by that name to 
 every inhabitant. And it is unlikely that in the 
 Summary, which is distinguished throughout by 
 an accuracy of expression which leaves no room for 
 suspicion that there was any confusion in the mind 
 of the compiler, this structure (supposing that it 
 were part and parcel of the Fort) would have been 
 distinctly separated from the earlier item referring 
 to the main work. 
 
 Before the outbreak of the war, and before the 
 Fort was thought of, there was already a magazine 
 of arms and ammunition in the ** Castle and keep." ^ 
 
 But if there is any doubt, now, whether the 
 ancient Castle was meant in the distinct clause of 
 the Summary, there was certainly none at the time 
 as to the fact of its being a fortified place distinct 
 from the Fort, if the observations, which I am 
 about to quote, of one who was apparently a per- 
 sonal observer are to be trusted. The following 
 
 ^ Sketches of 507716 Striki?ig I7uide7tts 171 the Histoiy of Barnstaple 
 [1865], p. 23, and Reco7'ds, S tipple }7ie7itary^ No. 15. 
 
 ^ Reco7'ds, No. Iv. This is the only instance of the occurrence of the 
 word Keep in the Records. 
 
THE CASTLE. 117 
 
 extract is from The Weekly Account, No. 2, of Sept. 
 I3> 1643,1 one of the news-sheets of the time, and, 
 irrespective of the point now raised, is of consider- 
 able interest as a contemporary view of the fortifi- 
 cations of Barnstaple : 
 
 This Towne of Barnstable is an eminent and wealthie 
 Towne, and ever since the beginning of great strength of 
 horsmen and ammunition, yea and before any word of 
 these troubles was thought on elsewhere the Towne was at 
 least ten thousand pounds charges in making of Out-workes, 
 Bulwarks, and other Fortifications, besides the infinite 
 charge of a great work in the midst of the Towne^ almost im- 
 possible to be taken. 
 
 I do not see how the words which I have italicized 
 can be understood to refer to anything but the 
 ancient Castle. Further illustrations, which I can- 
 not now give without anticipating, will occur in the 
 course of this relation and, I believe, amply confirm 
 my assumption. 
 
 Fifty-five years ago the Castle mound was esti- 
 mated to be then 65 feet in height from the bottom of 
 the moat, although it had been intentionally reduced 
 
 II feet not long before. The circular area of the trun- 
 cated summit was 60 feet in diameter.^ It is now from 
 65 to 70 feet ; from which it may be inferred that some 
 further lowering of the height has taken place in the 
 interval. For a long period subsequent to the Civil 
 
 ^ King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. x. 
 
 = Cribble's Memorials, p. 79. Ethel fleda's famous burh at Tamworth 
 is, or was, about 50 feet in height and 100 feet in diameter on the flat 
 summit. 
 
ii8 THE CASTLE, 
 
 War the mound, or Castle Hill as it was commonly 
 called, was used as a town play-ground until it was 
 unfortunately alienated from the public ; and it may 
 consequently to some extent have suffered denu- 
 dation, as geologists would say. To the present and 
 the preceding generation this oldest relic of antiquity 
 which Barnstaple possesses has been all but lost to 
 sight. Hidden by a dense mass of trees in private 
 grounds, no eye living has seen the uninterrupted 
 outline of the ancient burh or Castle mound. It 
 would be curious to inquire how many of the modern 
 Barumites are aware even of its existence. 
 
 The '' three defensible Gates '' were probably 
 formed in the wall which enclosed the precincts of 
 the Castle. The position of the sixteen platforms 
 (for guns) may have been on the summit of the 
 mound — it was a favourite one with the artillerists of 
 the period — although it is equally likely to have been 
 on a base, or bases, excavated from the sloping face 
 of the mound high enough to enable the glacis called 
 the Castle-haye to be swept by the fire from the 
 guns. 
 
 The fortification of the Castle seems to have been 
 a work of some magnitude. Powerless against an 
 attack on the town from the landward side, it would 
 easily have rendered the town untenable by an 
 enemy. It is not easy, indeed, to see what was the 
 immediate object of the work except it was the pro- 
 tection of the town from an attack from the sea. 
 That this is not unlikely is shown by the fact that at 
 a little later period a small naval force was added to 
 the other defences and lav in the river. An item of 
 
SHIPS ARMED. 119 
 
 of the Summary which will be hereafter given 
 refers to two ships which, after the month of May, 
 1643, were provisioned and furnished *'to keep 
 the Port,'' and a man-of-war that was *' set forth ; " 
 we shall find that she mounted six guns. The 
 Houses of Parliament had, in fact, so early as in 
 March, 1642, ordered the Lord High Admiral, the 
 Earl of Northumberland, to make known to all 
 masters and owners of such ships as were then in 
 or about any of the harbours of the kingdom and 
 might be of use for the public defence thereof, that it 
 would be an acceptable service if they would cause 
 their ships to be rigged, and so far put in a readiness 
 that they might be at a short warning set forth to sea 
 upon any emergent occasion.^ 
 
 Now, it will be remembered that the fortification 
 of the town was begun in August, 1642. The first 
 notice of any artillery being actually in position 
 occurs in a letter dated from Barnstaple on the 30th 
 of September following, already quoted,^ in which it 
 is circumstantially stated by the local reporter, who 
 is not likely to have been mistaken, that the town 
 was "fortified with 16 pieces of ordnance." It may 
 of course be only a coincidence, but the correspond- 
 ence between this number of guns and the number 
 of platforms mentioned in the Summary as having 
 been constructed on the Castle mound seems to me 
 to point to the conclusion that the Castle work was, 
 in reality, one of the first defences undertaken. 
 
 There follows from the foregoing contention a 
 
 ' May's History of the Parliament^ &c., App., p. 472. 
 ^ See p. 75, supra. 
 
I20 THE ORDNANCE, &-c. 
 
 remarkable consistency between the facts assumed 
 and other evidence which is strictly historical. The 
 total number of guns ultimately mounted appears 
 from the several accounts just cited to have been 
 as follows : — 
 
 In the Fort ... ... ... ... ••• 28 
 
 On the Castle mound ... ... ... 16 
 
 In the Man-of-war ... ... ... ... 6 
 
 Total ... 50 
 
 and authorities which I shall quote in due course 
 state that, in the year following that at which we 
 are now arrived, *' fifty,'' or "above fifty," pieces of 
 ordnance fell with the town into the hands of its 
 captors. 
 
 If it be asked how the town came to be so 
 conveniently possessed of this considerable arma- 
 ment, the answer, I think there can be no doubt, 
 must be that the artillery consisted of the larger 
 ship-guns taken out of the merchantmen (which 
 were all armed in those days) belonging to the port.^ 
 Only a few years before, ten of these, averaging 
 about 100 tons each in burthen, had been licensed 
 by letters of marque, and were employed in priva- 
 teering. In ordinary times these ships were engaged 
 in the Newfoundland fishery, and their coming home, 
 which was customarily in August or September, was 
 
 ^ John Rous says, in his Diary^ that the long-continued peace with 
 Spain had caused such security in the maritime towns and " ordinary 
 shippes " that many had sold away their ordnance, and then, on the 
 breaking out of a new war with Spain in 1625, were enforced to buy 
 new. (Camden Society, 1856, p. 2.) 
 
THE CO UR T— THE PARLIAMENT. 1 2 1 
 
 now opportune for the transference of their guns, in 
 the existing state of affairs, to the defences of the 
 town. Like the shot provided for them (presently 
 to be noticed) the guns, it is to be inferred, were of 
 different sizes — ** great and small " — ranging from 
 sakers ^ and minions— the former carrying a 5^ pound, 
 and the latter a 4 pound shot — down to the falcon, 
 a long 2}^ pounder which had been the favourite 
 piece used on boar-d small ships in the time of Queen 
 Elizabeth. These guns were mounted on wooden 
 carriages which, j udging from contemporary drawings, 
 were of the same pattern as those which were used 
 down to Nelson's days and later. 
 
 To complete these details relating to the fortifica- 
 tions of Barnstaple, the quantities and cost of the 
 ammunition laid in store should be added. These 
 are set down in the Summary as follows : — 
 
 
 
 
 
 £ 
 
 s. 
 
 d. 
 
 I'br 
 
 ninety barrels of Powder 
 
 « • • 
 
 450 
 
 
 
 
 
 bov four tonne of Match 
 
 • > • 
 
 • • • 
 
 112 
 
 
 
 
 
 For 
 
 four tonne of Shotte 
 
 great 
 
 and 
 
 
 
 
 
 small 
 
 • • • 
 
 • ft • 
 
 72 
 
 
 
 
 
 During the winter of 1642-3, Charles and his 
 volatile Court were in quarters at Oxford, and the 
 remarkable scenes which were to be witnessed 
 during those months in the picturesque university 
 city have been vividly portrayed by the author of 
 John Inglesant in the ninth chapter of that book. 
 
 ' The saker appears to have been the largest piece of artillery used in 
 the defence of Bristol. 
 
122 WAR GOES ON IN DEVONSHIRE. 
 
 Meanwhile Parliament, again appealing for money 
 and plate for the prosecution of the war, traded 
 on the fears of the people by outrageously perverted 
 explanations of the crisis. They warned the Lon- 
 doners of an army of many thousands of professed 
 Papists in the North, who, it was notorious, would 
 prevent the shipment of coals to London ; and their 
 ** Declaration " goes on to suggest that ** the said 
 Popish Army is advancing toward London, with 
 Hope that by this and other Devilish Artifices they 
 may find all in combustion here, whereby they may, 
 with less Resistance, pillage and sack this City, cut 
 the Throats of all men of estate, and ravish their 
 Wives and Daughters without Difference (for Papists, 
 in such Cases, never make Difference between Friends 
 and enemies)," &c.^ 
 
 There was no relaxation of the struggle in Devon- 
 shire throughout those winter months. The alarm 
 caused by the active proceedings of Sir Ralph Hopton 
 still existed at Westminster, and in an order for 
 money and plate to be raised in Somersetshire for the 
 defence of the Western parts at this time, a Parlia- 
 mentary Declaration recites that **Sir Ralph Hopton 
 and his Adherents, Rebels and Traitors . . . have 
 levied divers Forces in the County of Cornwal, and 
 in a warlike Manner already entered into the County 
 of Devon, and besieged, robbed, spoiled, plundered 
 and pillaged divers Towns and Places in the said 
 County, and divers Rapes, Murthers, and other 
 Misdemeanors, have acted and committed upon 
 
 ' Declaration of both Houses of Parliament, January 7, 1642-3, in 
 Rushvvorth's Collections^ ii. 106. 
 
WEEKL Y ASSESSMENT B Y PARLIAMENT, 1 23 
 
 divers of his Majesty's good Subjects there, and 
 many of them have utterly destroyed/' ^ 
 
 The battle of Bradock Down, it will be remem- 
 bered, had been fought on the 19th of January, 1643. 
 Ruthen and the remains of his beaten army, after 
 being dislodged from Saltash, where they had 
 attempted to make a stand, retired into Plymouth. 
 Hopton at once summoned the town to surrender, 
 and, being refused, the Cavaliers, it is said, pledged 
 themselves by oath to capture it, *' kneeling on their 
 knees with each man a glass of sack in his hand." 
 The Earl of Stamford withdrew by Tavistock to 
 Exeter. 
 
 The Parliamentary forces at that time occupied 
 the greater part of Devonshire so completely as to 
 cut off the Cornish army in the south of the county 
 from all communication with the King, '* not one 
 messenger in ten," Lord Clarendon says, '* arriving 
 at his journey's end." Exeter was being strongly 
 fortified and was crowded with Parliamentary 
 troops. 
 
 At this time (February, 1643), an *' Ordinance " of 
 Parliament, which was an Act without the King's 
 assent, was passed for levying a weekly assessment 
 upon every county, to continue for three months from 
 the 1st of March, unless the King's army should be 
 disbanded in the mean time. Devonshire was assessed 
 in the weekly sum of ;^i,8oo, and Exeter in ^^50 los. 
 ** A prodigious sum," indeed, as Lord Clarendon says, 
 *' for a people to bear, who before this war thought 
 
 ' Declaration of the Lords and Commons, January 27, 1642-3, in 
 Rushworth's Collections^ ii. 123. 
 
124 MILITIA OF DEVONSHIRE, 
 
 the payment of two subsidies in a year/' which, in 
 the best of times, was proportionately less than one- 
 eight of this amount, ** an insupportable burden upon 
 the kingdom." ^ The names of the Commissioners 
 for the assessment of Devonshire will be interesting 
 as showing who were the political leaders on the 
 Parliamentary side : — 
 
 Sir Peter Prideaux, Bart. Sir Shilston Calmady, Knt. 
 
 Sir George Chudleigh, Bart. Sir Nicholas Martyn, Knt. 
 
 Sir John Pole, Bart. Robert Savery, Esq. 
 
 Sir John Northcote, Bart. Henry Walrond, Esq. 
 
 Sir Francis Drake, Bart. Henry Worth, Esq. 
 
 Sir John Davy, Bart. Hugh Fortescue, Esq. 
 
 Sir Edmond Fowell, Knt. Arthur Upton, Esq. 
 
 Sir Samuel Rolle, Knt. George Trobridge, Esq. 
 
 It is stated that the Militia of the county at that 
 time formed a body of 6,579 nien, of whom 2,573 
 were pikemen and 4,006 musketeers. They were 
 nominally officered by gentlemen of the county \ but 
 these gentlemen were now mostly either in the ranks 
 of the Royalists with Sir Ralph Hopton, or prisoners 
 in London, or under scarcely less vigorous surveil- 
 lance on their own estates. Their places were 
 supplied, partly by the gentry of the Parliamentary 
 party, partly by the needy adventurers, soldiers of 
 fortune — great numbers of them Scotchmen — who 
 swarmed in the Parliamentary armies. ^ 
 
 In the month of January, Sir John Bampfield, Sir 
 John Northcote, Sir Samuel Rolle, Colonel Were, 
 
 ' History of the Rebellion^ p. 382 a. 
 
 ^ These particulars are derived from the article by the late J. H. 
 Merivale, in the Retrospective Review^ xii. 205. 
 
EXPEDITION TO RE LIE VE PL YMO UTH, 1 2 5 
 
 and others, had been active in raising a force in the 
 northern parts of the county, and had got together a 
 body of men variously estimated at from eight to 
 nine thousand in number, designed to march south- 
 ward for the rehef of Plymouth. It appears that 
 from the scarcity of arms in the magazines of the 
 county or at the command of the Parliamentary 
 officers, many of these v^ere ** Club-men," a term 
 which is met with for the first time in the accounts 
 of this expedition. They were, in fact, men pressed 
 from the farmyards, who, for want of better, were 
 armed with pitch-forks, scythes, and reaping-hooks 
 fastened to long poles, *' flayles, spits, clubs, bills and 
 halberts, and such like rusticke weapons." The poli- 
 tical views of these irregulars, many of whom were 
 probably willing volunteers, were circumscribed ; 
 and at first they doubtless thought it all in the 
 nature of things that they should make a stand 
 against the palpable invaders of their county. It is 
 not perhaps surprising that this portion of the 
 Parliamentary forces should have been styled a 
 *' rabble " by their opponents. But in the King's 
 own army, at the battle of Edgehill, there had been 
 some Welsh levies who had come fresh from their 
 native mountains armed in the same primitive 
 style. 
 
 Barnstaple supplied a contingent of two companies, 
 numbering altogether 154 men, to this expedition. 
 It was under the command of Captain Benson ^ and 
 Captain Curry ; and as the latter, it will be remem- 
 
 * I have been unable to identify this officer. His name does not 
 recur. 
 
126 BARNSTAPLE SENDS A CONTINGENT. 
 
 bered, was the adjutant of the trained bands of the 
 town, it may be inferred that his company was drawn, 
 if both companies were not drawn, from the local 
 corps. The fact that the commissariat was supplied 
 at the cost of the town lends its evidence to the 
 supposition. 
 
 The neighbouring town of Bideford, which had 
 followed the lead of Barnstaple and sided with the 
 Parliament, appears to have been also represented 
 by a contingent, the strength of which has not been 
 recorded ; but it must have been numerically smaller 
 than that of Barnstaple, although it shared, as will 
 be seen, the chief military honours of the expedition. ^ 
 The rendezvous appointed for the whole force was 
 Totnes. We know from local sources that the 
 Barnstaple men set out about the end of January. 
 In due order of time an armed force which, we learn 
 from a Royalist report, was under the command 
 of Sir John Northcote, is found marching along the 
 northern slope of Dartmoor, through Chagford, on 
 its way to Totnes ; and with this circumstance is 
 associated an incident recorded by Lord Clarendon, 
 but for the ''ignominy" of which, Chagford, the 
 historian hazarded the assertion, *' could never other- 
 wise have had a mention in the world." ^ Although 
 lying far out of what would now be considered the 
 highway, Chagford was on the direct route by country 
 roads, in more common use in those days than they 
 are now or have been in the present century, from 
 
 ^ This is a sufficient proof that Bideford was not at that time in the 
 possession of the Royalists. See supTa p. 109. 
 ^ History of the Eebellicn, p. 366 0, 
 
SKIRMISH A T CHA GFORD. 1 27 
 
 Barnstaple to Totnes and the south of Devon. Mr. 
 P. F. S. Amery states {Trans, Dev. Assoc, viii. 329), 
 that in the seventeenth century there was a regular 
 pack-horse traffic from Barnstaple and Bideford 
 through Chagford to Ashburton and on to Brixham, 
 and that it was a great smuggling route. It is 
 sufficiently obvious that this line of march to the 
 rendezvous would not have been taken from any 
 other than the north-western parts of the county. 
 This consideration may serve us to assume that 
 the North Devon contingent formed part of the force 
 which occupied Chagford at that time. 
 
 During the halt at Chagford, the Parliamentarians 
 were surprised before daybreak by Sir John Berkeley,^ 
 who with what Lord Clarendon calls a ** party volant 
 of Horse and dragoons," detached from Sir Ralph 
 Hopton*s army, had been on the look-out for them. 
 The most circumstantial account of this attack 
 comes to us through a Royalist medium under the 
 date of February 28 ; the story therefore had had 
 time to gather volume. The affair is magnified into 
 a *' defeat given by the Cornish forces unto those of 
 Devonshire" — at a place called Chagford which the 
 rebels had then newly entered under the conduct of 
 Sir John Northcote. The rebels upon the first ap- 
 proach of the King's forces threw down their arms 
 and ran away, there being 140 men taken in the chace 
 and thirty horses laden with provisions — one whole 
 troop of Horse under Captain Baskerville was taken 
 
 ' He had received a commission under the Great Seal to raise a 
 regiment of 500 Horse in Cornwall. (Add. MSS., B. M., No. 18980, 
 f. 20.) 
 
128 DEATH OF SIDNEY GODOLPHIN, 
 
 by the Cornish — the rebels retreated to Totnes.^ 
 Another account, from the other side, purporting 
 to be an extract from a letter written by the Earl of 
 Stamford, is not inconsistent with the foregoing — but 
 of course omits the losses.^ 
 
 But the incident for which this skirmish — for it 
 was nothing more — is most remarkable was the 
 death of the gifted and accomplished scholar and 
 poet, Sidney Godolphin — '* a young gentleman," 
 says Lord Clarendon, in his history, " of incom- 
 parable parts." He was the second son of Sir 
 William Godolphin, of Godolphin in Cornwall, and 
 Thomasine, one of the Sidney family, of Wrighton 
 in Norfolkshire. He represented Helston in the 
 Parliament of 1640, and was now a Colonel of Horse 
 in the royal service. There is a fuller personal 
 description of him in Lord Clarendon's autobio- 
 graphy : " There was never so great a Mind and 
 Spirit contained in so little Room ; so large an 
 Understanding and so unrestrained a Fancy in so 
 very small a Body . . . and it may be, the very 
 Remarkableness of his little Person made the Sharp- 
 ness of his Wit and the composed Quickness of his 
 Judgment and Understanding the more notable." ^ 
 Hobbes, the philosopher of Malmsbury, has left an 
 equally eulogistic tribute to this remarkable character. 
 To Sidney Godolphin is attributed the authorship of 
 the beautiful Cavalier song — '' Or love me less, or 
 
 ^ Abstract from the ^(^rtrz/m^j'^z^/eVz^j-, 8th week, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., large 4tos, vol. vii. 
 
 "" A Tme Relation, &c., King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. 
 xcvi. ♦ 
 
 3 Life of Edward, Earl of Clarendoft, 3rd ed., i. 46. 
 
BA TTLE OF MODE URY, 129 
 
 love me more/' Bullets, however, are not discri- 
 minative, and, as Hobbes says, by " an undiscerned 
 and undiscerning hand '' — perhaps, alas ! by the base 
 hand of a Barnstaple musketeer — was this gifted man 
 unhappily slain. It is stated in the passage which 
 I have partly quoted from the autobiography of 
 Lord Clarendon that he was shot with a musket, 
 and, without saying any word more than ** Oh God ! 
 I am hurt," fell dead from his horse; although local 
 tradition will have it that he died in the porch of 
 the '* Three Crowns," a hostelry in the village 
 which in its structure still retains probably the same 
 features that it possessed at the time of the event. 
 
 The contemporary accounts agree in stating that 
 the Parliamentarians were worsted. Nevertheless, it 
 would seem that Sir John Berkeley and his party, 
 without following up their advantage, retired at once 
 by the way they had come, taking with them the 
 body of Godolphin, which was buried in Okehampton 
 church. The North Devon men, defeated, but not 
 demoralized, continued their march to Totnes. 
 
 A brief note in the parish register of Chagford pre- 
 serves the following record of the skirmish : — 
 
 Mem. That there were fower strangers buried . . . the 
 . . . day of January 1642 [/.e?., 1643] that were slayend in 
 the fight at Chagford.^ 
 
 . Of the battle of Modbury, which followed, there 
 are three different accounts, all printed in contem- 
 
 ' Trans, Devon. Association^ xvij. 340. Mr. Ormerod, to whom we 
 are indebted for this note, states that *' the dates of the day of the week 
 and of the month are indistinct." 
 
 10 
 
1 30 BA TTLE OF MODE UR Y, 
 
 porary tracts, bound up in one of the volumes of the 
 King's Pamphlets, in the Library of the British 
 Museum.^ It is a necessary reservation that all 
 three are on the Parliamentary side. I shall now 
 gather from them, indifferently, thestory of the battle 
 which Lord Clarendon, the historian of the Rebellion 
 and Civil Wars, did not condescend to notice, and 
 which, for us, has the special interest that in it the 
 men of Barnstaple and Bideford took a conspicuous 
 part. 
 
 Early in February, the miscellaneous regular and 
 irregular forces which made up the Parliamentary 
 army of Devonshire met at Totnes. It is stated, 
 and may be easily credited, that the men were raw 
 and not so well disciplined as was desired ; and a 
 few days were spent in drilling and organizing them. 
 ** The country men [whereby is meant presumably 
 the Club-men] upon exercise proved so valiant and 
 hardy that they desired nothing more than to fall 
 on/' ^ The army, for some days, appears to have 
 been distributed between Totnes and Dartmouth, 
 and at Kingsbridge a depot of provisions and stores 
 was established. On Monday, the 20th, the whole 
 force was concentrated at Kingsbridge. After a 
 council of war, a party was detailed **to march to 
 a place called Hutton-bridge to make good a pas-* 
 sage." There can be no difficulty in identifying the 
 advanced post which was thus seized with the bridge 
 at Aveton ('^ which," wrote Risdon, in his Survey, 
 
 ^ Small 4tos, vol. xcvi. 
 
 - A Trtie Relation of the late Victory obtained by the Right Hoiioiirable 
 the Erie of Stanford^ &c., King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. xcvi. 
 
BA TTLE OF MODE UR Y, 131 
 
 "we corruptly call Auton") Giffard, about three 
 miles from Kingsbridge, and nearly half-way on the 
 direct road to Modbury. The bridge, which crosses 
 the river Avon at the head of its tidal estuary, is not 
 far short of a quarter of a mile in length. As it 
 appeared in the year 1643, it was partly a narrow 
 paved causeway, raised above the rich meadows 
 which border the river, and partly two series of low 
 stone arches — five and two respectively — which 
 spanned the two channels into which the river is 
 here divided. To secure this, which was the only 
 practicable passage, was a matter of strategic im- 
 portance. It was here that the Royalists had at 
 first intended to dispute the advance of their oppo- 
 nents. Mr. William Lane, rector of the parish of 
 Aveton Giffard, Mr. Champernowne, and other 
 Royalist gentlemen, had begun to build a fort on a 
 hill (part of the glebe of Aveton) commanding the 
 bridge, but there had been no time to finish it.^ 
 
 The disposition of the Royalist forces about 
 Plymouth at this time is learnt from a highly 
 interesting letter, written from Plympton, by Sir 
 Bevill Grenville to his wife, on the 20th of Feb- 
 ruary — the same day on which the Parliamentarians 
 seized the bridge of Aveton Giffard. Sir Ralph 
 Hopton and Lord Mohun, with two regiments, lay 
 upon the north side of Plymouth ; Colonel Ash- 
 burnham,2 gij. John Berkeley, and Sir Bevill 
 Grenville, with two regiments, on the east side at 
 
 ^ Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part ii. p. 291. 
 2 William Ashburnham, younger brother of John Ashburnham the 
 faithful attendant upon Charles I. 
 
132 BATTLE OF MODBURY. 
 
 Plympton. Sir Nicholas Slanning and Colonel John 
 Trevanion were posted with two regiments at Mod- 
 bury to hold it and check the expected advance of 
 the Parliamentary army. This arrangement is 
 described in the following extract from Sir Bevill's 
 letter : — 
 
 S' Ni Slan. w^^ Jack Trevan. & their two Regim*' were sent 
 the last weeke to Modbury to possesse that quarter before 
 the enimy come, being the richest part of this countrey, 
 whence most of our provision & victualls does come, if it 
 were taken from us we might be starvd in our quarters. 
 Modbury lyes 6 miles to the Eastward of us & now the 
 Enimy w^^ all the power y^ they can gather of those that we 
 disperst at Okeham. & Chag. & other aydes, advanc'd 
 w^^in two mile of ou . . at Modbu : they are many thousand 
 as the report goes, & we are like to have speedy worke. 
 We have sent more ayde to them both of horse & foote. 
 God speed us well.^ 
 
 Even Sir Bevill thought hopelessly of the siege of 
 Plymouth, and was evidently conscious of being out- 
 numbered by the enemy in the field. The following 
 passage from the letter already quoted, betrays his 
 apprehensions : — 
 
 So now the most danger that hangs over the K^^ side is 
 in these parts . . . We have advertizm* that some ayde is 
 coming from his Ma*'^ to us, but it is so slowe as we shall 
 need it before we see it. but gods will be done, I am satis- 
 fied I cannot expire in a better cause.^ 
 
 Nominally, all the Parliamentary forces were 
 under the command of the Earl of Stamford, who 
 
 ^ Printed in Notes and Queries^ 2nd Series, xi. i66. = Ibia^ 
 
BATTLE OF MOD BURY, 133 
 
 was then in Plymouth. The plan of the Parliamentary 
 leaders was to attack the Royalists occupying Mod- 
 bury by a force sallying out of Plymouth, at the same 
 time that the main body, advancing from Kings- 
 bridge, assailed them on the other side. The invest- 
 ment of Plymouth appears from this to have been 
 far from complete. In the mean time the Earl was 
 to divert the attention of Sir Ralph Hopton by 
 assaulting his entrenchments on the north side of 
 Plymouth. The Earl accordingly detached a party 
 of about four hundred Horse and dragoons, part of 
 Sir John Meyrick's foot-regiment of London *^ gray 
 coats,'' then in garrison, and some volunteers from 
 the town, who marched out in the night between the 
 20th and 21st of February. The advanced guard 
 was commanded by Sir George Chudleigh and Sir 
 John Pole,^ and it is remarked that '^ had the other 
 Brigadoes [that is, of the Plymouth contingent] made 
 an equall haste in their march, the enemy had been 
 clearly cut off.'' ^ 
 
 The town of Modbury is seated on a hill amongst 
 hills — the rounded hills highly cultivated to their 
 summits, which characterize this fertile centre of 
 the South Hams 01 Devonshire. Risdon tells us 
 that, in his day, it was well frequented and some- 
 what the more for the sake of its " nappy " ale 3 — a 
 
 ' Of Shute, baronet ; son of Sir William Pole, the antiquary. His 
 two sons were on the Royalist side. 
 
 2 A True Relation of the late Victory^ &c., King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol xcvi. 
 
 3 ** Assist me all ye tuneful Nine ; 
 Support me in the great design, 
 To sing of nappy Ale." — Gay. 
 
134 ^A TTLE OF MODE UR V. 
 
 speciality, smacking of the richness of the surround- 
 ing soil, which for aught I know has vanished, as 
 elsewhere, before the overwhelming flood of Burton. 
 The hill is of saddle-back form, and the main street 
 of the little town runs straight east and west, 
 following the dip of the hill along its length. For 
 a century or more, Modbury has stagnated in the 
 back-water, as it were, of the stream of traffic, and 
 its topographical features cannot have changed 
 much since the middle of the seventeenth century. 
 Its most distinctive ornament at that time was the 
 fortified manor-house or " Castle " of the Champer- 
 nownes — licensed for crenellation in the reign of 
 Edward III. — the sumptuous maintenance of which 
 in the days of Queen Elizabeth, is still matter of 
 local tradition. The mansion which, it will be 
 remembered, had sustained a short siege in the 
 previous December, stood on the eminence near 
 the church at the west end of the town, command- 
 ing the two roads from Plymouth, which here met. 
 In this position the Royalists, it may be assumed, 
 resolved to make their principal stand. Sir Nicholas 
 Slanning, who was related to the Champernownes, 
 was about to fight on what was to him probably 
 familiar ground. Slanning and Trevanion, says one 
 of the narrators, had " strongly fortified themselves 
 with brest workes and laid all the hedges round 
 about the Towne for half a miles compasse with 
 Musquetiers." ^ What was meant by the latter 
 part of this sentence is not quite clear. It is not 
 
 ^ A True and Perfect Relation of the Passages in Devonshire^ &c., 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. xcvi. 
 
BA TTLE OF MOD BUR V, 135 
 
 conceivable that any commander would have 
 scattered his force of not more than two thousand 
 men, over a circumference of three miles, which 
 appears to be the literal meaning of the statement. 
 It is more likely that it refers only to the detach- 
 ments which covered the different roads converging 
 upon the town. 
 
 The concerted attack by the Parliamentary forces 
 had been arranged to be made early in the morning 
 of the 2ist of February. But such arrangements 
 are rarely carried out with precision, and in this 
 case the plan appears to have been partially frus- 
 trated by the tardiness of the Plymouth men, who 
 had been, in fact, entertaining themselves by a raid 
 upon Flete House, then belonging to Sir Thomas 
 Hele, Bart., who was absent with the Court at 
 Oxford and therefore of notorious malignancy. At 
 Flete they took about twenty horses and several 
 prisoners. However, they appeared on the scene, 
 we are informed, in " time enough to doe good 
 
 service." 
 
 '* The Bastable and Biddeford men were the first 
 that came on." ^ From this it may be inferred, I 
 think, that they formed the advanced party which 
 had held the bridge at Aveton Giffard, the day before. 
 While the rest of the army was still struggling 
 through the narrow and deeply-cut road which led 
 to Modbury, " before they were aware about halfe 
 a mile ere they came to the Towne, not expecting 
 to be charged by the enemy so soon," the North 
 
 ' A True and Perfect Relation, &c. " Bastable " is the still common 
 vulgar pronunciation of the word Barnstaple. 
 
J 36 BA TTLE OF MODE UR F. 
 
 Devon men were encountered by a brisk fire from 
 the Royalists. 
 
 At what precise spot the fight began must now 
 be a matter of conjecture ; but I think it highly 
 probable that it was the summit of Stolliford Hill, 
 somewhat more, it must be admitted, than the half- 
 mile from the town at which the narrative puts 
 it, although well within a mile by present measure- 
 ment- Upon this assumption there is no great 
 difference between the fact of the narrator and the 
 evidently good information which Sir Bevill Grenville 
 possessed the day before, and which is doubtless the 
 full meaning of a mutilated passage in his letter, that 
 the advanced posts of the two armies were then within 
 two miles of each other ; in reality it would have 
 been nearly three. ^ Over the summit of StolHford Hill 
 the old road, obliterated by the modern one, passed 
 through a slight depression. Until this was reached, 
 to any one approaching from the east, Modbury would 
 not be discovered, and even then only the broach- 
 spire of the church at the western extremity of the 
 town would be visible. At the summit of the hill 
 a lane crossed the road at right angles, running 
 along its crest, and hereabouts the enclosures were 
 small and the banks and hedges of formidable 
 
 ^ The popular mile of the period was a long one. In the con- 
 temporary Military Metnoir of Colonel John Birch, printed for the 
 Camden Society, 1873, ^^ distances given by the original MS. in 
 miles between places mentioned are invariably corrected by the 
 Commentator, who was familiar with the country, and in most cases 
 increased by about one half, to adapt them to the modern measurement. 
 The same discrepancy has occurred in the extract given supra p. 75. 
 Lord Clarendon notoiiously estimated distances in the san:e fashion. 
 
BATTLE OF MODBURY. ' 137 
 
 thickness. Obviously, a better position for defence 
 could not have been selected. It was just the 
 example which Sir William Waller — who if not 
 himself a Devonian, had married a Devonshire 
 heiress and may be presumed to have been per- 
 sonally familiar with what he was describing — had 
 in his mind's eye when referring to the West as 
 a country where '* every field was as good as a 
 fortification, and every lane as disputable as a 
 pass.*' ^ From a lower hill, skirted by the road, 
 on the eastern side of this veritable pass, and in 
 their front, the Royalist scouts could, moreover, 
 detect in good time the advance of the Parlia- 
 mentary forces along a straight piece of the road 
 running for a quarter of a mile directly towards 
 them. 
 
 In this position, therefore, it appears probable 
 that the advanced party of the Royalists, posted 
 in the lane and lining its hedges extending right 
 and left of the main road, were ready with matches 
 lighted when the ** Bastable and Biddeford men," 
 not suspecting the nearness of the enemy, ascended 
 the eastern side of the hill and were, no doubt, 
 momentarily taken aback. 
 
 The further description of the battle will be given 
 in the words of the tract already quoted — written 
 from Plymouth three days afterwards, and printed 
 in London : — 
 
 So forward and desperate were the Cavallieres that they 
 let flye amaine upon them, but did little or no execution, 
 
 Vindication i &c., p. 18. 
 
1 3S BA TTLE OF MODE UR K 
 
 nor did abate the courage of the assailants ; but the 
 Bastable men went on with such abundance of resohition, 
 as if they feared no bullets ; and the whole Army comming 
 up, and our \i.e.y the Plymouth] men joyning with them, 
 they beate the Cavallieres from hedge to hedge. The 
 fight beganne about one of the clocke at noone, and 
 towards night they drave most of them into the Towne, 
 and to their Workes, where they made a very hot defence, 
 and had many men slaine, which they perceiving, and our 
 Forces having beaten them out of their Workes, and falling 
 upon them with undaunted Courage, the Chiefe of them 
 finding the service to be too hot for them, privately stole 
 away about three of the clocke in the morning, (the fight 
 continuing all night) and by degrees drew away all their 
 Forces, by a way which the Easterne Army supposed was 
 kept by our [/.^., the Plymouth] men, but in truth neglected 
 by both, onely their haste forced them to leave their Armes 
 behinde them, and some threescore of their Dragooners 
 to keepe our men in suspence, with command to keepe 
 shooting continually, untill the day appeared ; and then to 
 take their Horses and to follow them ; but when day came 
 on, our men found out their drift, how they were deluded, 
 and pursued them, tooke fourescore prisoners, and many 
 Horse, much Armes scattered in the way, which they were 
 faine to cast off, that they might flye the faster.^ 
 
 The two thousand Royalists — the victors of Bra- 
 dock Down — held the strong defensive position on 
 Stolliford Hill against the eight thousand Devonshire 
 Parliamentarians (half of whom were, however, a 
 rudely armed and undisciplined mob) for some hours. 
 Driven from this position, where probably they lost 
 their cannon, and attacked at the same time by the 
 fresh arrivals from Plymouth on their flank, the 
 
 ' A True and Perfect Relation, &.c. 
 
MEMORIALS OF THE BATTLE, 139 
 
 Royalists seem to have retreated fighting, field by 
 field and through the streets of Modbury, to the 
 Court House of the Champernownes, which had 
 been fortified. This they defended during part of 
 the night until compelled to evacuate it. 
 
 The Parliamentarians admitted the loss of only 
 seven men killed and a few prisoners. The 
 Royalists are reported to have left behind them five 
 pieces of artillery besides about a thousand muskets 
 which they threw away in their flight. Their loss 
 is further vaguely stated to have been one hundred 
 killed and twice as many wounded, and more than 
 a hundred prisoners. ^ One of the accounts satiri- 
 cally states that fifteen hundred fled, many of them 
 being Cornish " hullers " (by which the hurlers or 
 athletes of the county were meant) and ** nimble of 
 foot." 
 
 The pious and amiable Puritan who indited one of 
 these accounts of the battle remarks, "You see how 
 the Lord doth follow us with mercy upon mercy ; I 
 desire and will endeavour to follow him with Prayers 
 and Prayses. We heare Sir Nicholas Slane [s/c] 
 received a death's wound at Modbury, and fell dead 
 off his horse before he came to Plympton, which I 
 hope is true.'' ^ 
 
 Both Sir Nicholas Slanning and " Jack " Tre- 
 vanion, however, survived their defeat at Modbury 
 to fall together when gallantly fighting at the 
 assault of Bristol a few months later. 
 
 ^ Perfect Diurnall, Feb. 20-27 and Feb. 27— March 6, 1642-3, 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. vii. 
 
 2 A True and Perfect Relation of the Passages in Devotishire this 
 weeke, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. xcvi. 
 
140 MEMORIALS OF THE BATTLE, 
 
 Referring to this light, a young gentleman called 
 John Staynings, of Holnicott, Somersetshire, writing 
 from Plympton on the loth of March to his uncle, 
 John Willoughby, says : '' In the way of a soldier I 
 have not been backward, as it hath been knowene 
 unto the rest of the soldiers and officers, and for a 
 performance I have a colour or towe from them 
 which I tocke in the towen of Madborrough wheare 
 the fight was ... if I could find a convenient 
 messenger I would have presented a colour unto you 
 of the Cavilers." ^ 
 
 In the well-preserved churchwardens' accounts of 
 the parish of Modbury there occurs a solitary me- 
 mento of the event in an entry suggesting some 
 participation, voluntarily or involuntarily, of the 
 townsmen in the defence of the place : — 
 
 1642-3. P"^ John Springer for castinge and meltinge 
 172 lbs. of ledd into bullets att oy^, y^ pound. 07s. 2d. 
 
 At Horncastle in Lincolnshire, a road is still 
 called Slash Lane — traditionally from the execution 
 done there on the Royalists by Parliamentary 
 troopers. At Modbury, the narrow way — little 
 more than a ditch — down the hill at the west end 
 of the town, by which the Cavaliers escaped, goes 
 by the name of Runaway Lane.^ Mr. G. A. Cawse, 
 
 ^ Trevelyan Papers^ Camden Society, part iii. p. 233. The editors 
 have erroneously supposed "Madborrough" to be Marlborough in 
 W^iltshire. 
 
 - The popular belief at Modbury, according to a high local authority 
 adduced by Mrs. H. P. Whitcombe in her Bygone Days in Devonshire 
 and Cormvall (1874, p. 78), is that down Runaway-lane *'the 
 inhabitants of Modbury, who were staunch Royalists, were driven bv 
 
SIEGE OF PLYMOUTH RAISED. 141 
 
 who in his little work on Modbury disposes of the 
 battle in a single paragraph, assigning it mis- 
 takenly to the year 1646, remarks, with reference 
 to the Court House, that ** the destruction from 
 assault and plunder to the venerable pile and sur- 
 rounding works was deemed irreparable, so that the 
 palace of the once mighty Champernouns in Mod- 
 bury soon fell into decay." ^ 
 
 While the fight was going on at Modbury the 
 garrison of Plymouth made a vigorous sortie with 
 Horse and Foot, and fell upon the works of the 
 besiegers. In the language of the contemporary 
 narrator they — 
 
 gave on upon the enemies quarters with such 
 
 valour and fiercenesse, that Sir Ralph and his Forces were 
 forced out of their Works, left good store of Beefe boiling 
 in their pots, and that spacious work which they called after 
 his name, was fired and slylted [slighted = razed], and so 
 the towne of Plimmouth is rid of such an ill neighbour, and 
 by this means they have bread and fresh water, which was 
 their greatest want, the Lord make them thankfull.^ 
 
 The immediate result of these operations was the 
 raising of the siege of Plymouth. The Earl of 
 Stamford then combined his forces and followed 
 
 the soldiers of Cromwell after a siege " ! Unfortunately for this version 
 of the tradition Cromwell, to whom, as to another Personage, mischief 
 otherwise inexplicable is often conveniently attributed, was at the time 
 an undistinguished Captain of Horse in the Eastern Counties, and he 
 certainly did not come into Devonshire until nearly three years later. 
 
 ^ Modbury J by George Andrews Cawse, i860, p. 17. 
 
 ^ A True Relation of the late Victory obtained by the Right 
 Honourable the Erie of Stanford^ at Plimmouth and Modbury , &c. , 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. xcvi. 
 
142 AN ARMISTICE. 
 
 Sir Ralph Hopton to Tavistock ; a parley took place 
 and an armistice was agreed upon.^ We shall 
 presently find indications that Sir Bevill Grenville 
 retired with his regiment to his own country between 
 Stratton and Bideford.^ 
 
 The Barnstaple men seem to have returned at 
 once, under cover of the armistice, to North Devon, 
 and many of the Parliamentary forces to have been 
 disbanded. The Summary has this entry of the expe- 
 dition and its cost to the town of Barnstaple : — 
 
 For setting forth 2 Companies to Modbury, consisting 
 of 154 souldiers under Capt". Benson and Capt^ Currie, 
 27 dales with Money and Victual ... ... ... ;^5o 
 
 This did not of course include the pay of the 
 soldiers, which is elsewhere accounted for. 
 
 ^ The parley took place, it is stated, at ** Agcombe House." I have 
 been unable to identify this with Mount Edgcumbe, and rather think 
 that it was Edgcombe in the parish of Milton Abbot near Tavistock. 
 
 ~ In Lloyd's Meuioires, 6^r., a collection of Royalist biographies 
 published in 1668, there is (p. 345) a garbled extract from May's 
 Histoiy of the Long Parliavieiit to the effect that Sir Ralph Hopton " by 
 a Parthian stratagern of a feigned flight " turned upon and defeated 
 the Parliamentary forces during this interval, *'in so much that the 
 Earl of Stamford desired a truce for twenty days, which Sir Ralph con- 
 descended to, <S:c." Now, there is not the slightest confirmation of this 
 incident to be found, and Lord Clarendon who, when compiling his 
 history, was in intimate communication with Sir Ralph Hopton, does 
 not make even the least allusion to it. The fact is evident that May, 
 in the actual but very confused account which Lloyd professed to quote, 
 was referring, out of place in the order of time, to the action at Bradock 
 down, which preceded the battle of Modbury. So far was this from 
 being a case of condescension on Sir Ralph Hopton's part, that at the 
 parley, some of the Parliamentary officers thought themselves in a 
 position to demand, among other things, the surrender of Hopton and 
 Slanning as prisoners. 
 
PROVISIONAL TREATY, 143 
 
 At this time negotiations for a cessation of arms 
 with a view to a treaty of peace were passing between 
 the Court at Oxford and the Pariiament at West- 
 minster, but proved abortive. As Secretary Nicholas 
 discovered, the *' omnipotent powers " had no real 
 desire for peace yet. The rumour, however, was in 
 the air, and under its benign influence why should 
 not the armistice of Tavistock ripen into an arrange- 
 ment for at least a local pacification ? This is what 
 in fact happened. The idea of the gentlemen of 
 Devon and Cornwall who met together on this com- 
 mon ground was to neutralize the two counties ; 
 that the war, if it continued, might go on elsewhere, 
 and that they should combine to resist the entry of 
 the troops of either party into the associated counties. 
 A provisional treaty to this effect was actually made ; 
 it was looked upon with favour by the Court, but. 
 Parliament refusing to sanction its continuance, it 
 expired on the 22nd of April. 
 
 Whether truly or not. Sir Ralph Hopton was 
 accused of treacherously breaking the treaty by 
 plotting to seize and fire the town of Bideford with 
 the object of opening a way for some supplies ex- 
 pected from Wales. The following is the current 
 report of this plot from one of the authorized news- 
 sheets ; — 
 
 Wednesday the 12th [April, 1643]. By letters from 
 Devonshire this day to the H[ouse] of C[ommons] from 
 Mr. Nicholas one of their members appointed to oversee 
 the Treaty there, it is certified that Sir Ralph Hopton's 
 Commissioners dealt unfaithfully in the Treaty and plotted 
 to fire the Towne called Biddleford [stc\ on the sea-coast, 
 
144 ALLEGED BREACH OF TREATY, 
 
 that so they might with more ease transport the Welsh to 
 assist them, which being discovered was declared a breach 
 of the Treaty.^ 
 
 The following are farther particulars of the story 
 as told in another of the weekly news-sheets : — 
 
 From Excester in Devonshire they write, that the Treaty 
 betweene the Gentry of Cornewall and Devon is continued 
 for ten days longer from Tuesday last untill Friday next, 
 and in the mean while the Towne of Beddiford in the North 
 part of the County of Devon should have been betrayed 
 and delivered up to Sir Ralph Hopton in this manner : Sir 
 Bevil Greenvill sent some of his soldiers into the towne 
 like countrimen one after one who confederated themselves 
 with some of the malevolent Townsmen, to surprise the 
 Watch of the Towne and to cut their throates in a certaine 
 night, and then an Alarm sho"^ have been given by them as 
 a call to the rest of Sir B. G's Regiment which sh'^ have 
 attended neere to the Towne to have come in to their aide 
 and finished the exploit ; but it pleased God in his mercifull 
 providence to discover the Treachery thus ; One of the 
 Conspirators being a Townsman hapned to be drunke the 
 afternoon before that dismall night and in his drunkenesse 
 openly babbled out what feates he and the rest of his Com- 
 plices meant to performe the night following, which being 
 taken hold of and thoroughly examined, the Conspiracie 
 was discovered and all the Conspirators were instantly ap- 
 prehended together with all Sir B. G's souldiers that were 
 then in the Towne and their persons secured & committed 
 to safe custody to receive condign punishment according to 
 their demerits. ^ 
 
 ' A Pe7'fect Diurnall of the Passages in Parliament, April 10- 1 7, 
 1643, King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. viii. 
 
 ^ Certaine hiformation^ &c., April 10-17, 1643, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. cii. 
 
CAMPAIGN REOPENED. 145 
 
 The plot was probably only one of the numerous 
 scares of the period. But, whatever may have been 
 the truth about it, some alarm was very likely to 
 have arisen from the incident which was thus re- 
 ported — ** that a small bark was taken coming 
 from Wales to assist Hopton in the West Countries, 
 set out by the Earl [he was then Marquess] of Wor- 
 cester, laden with store of money and plate and five 
 or six hundred arms covered three feet deep with 
 Coals . . . that the bark was brought into Barn- 
 staple, and that three companies were sent from 
 Exeter thither to unlade the same and bring the 
 arms and money to Exeter." ^ Another report was 
 that these companies were sent from Exeter, not only 
 to guard the prize but to make complete the regi- 
 ment of Sir John Northcote, '' who lieth there to 
 defend those parts." ^ There is no allusion to the 
 incident, however, in the local records, and Sir John 
 Northcote's name is nowhere mentioned in connec- 
 tion with the garrison of Barnstaple. 
 
 North Devon was to be the scene of the chief 
 incidents of the campaign which was now reopened 
 with considerable vigour. From the London news- 
 sheets we get, as usual, the floating rumours of the 
 time : — 
 
 From Devonshire [it is reported] that the Treaty & 
 Cessation of Arms between them and the Cornish Gentry 
 expired on Saturday last and that now they prepare for 
 
 ^ Cei-tain Special! aiid Remarkable Passages, &c., April 20-27, 1643, 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. civ. 
 
 = Certaine Information, &c., April 17-24, 1643, ibid, 
 
 II 
 
146 JAMES C HUD LEIGH. 
 
 the warre on. both sides, for which purpose the Inhabitants 
 of Barnestable and Beddiford had sent 5,000 foote and 
 9 Troopes of Horse to Holsworthy ... to fall into Cornwall, 
 which forces were remanded from thence again with much 
 discontent.^ 
 
 Although confirmation of this item of intelligence 
 is wanting, there was probably some truth in it. 
 There is room for suspicion, however, that the 
 numbers stated must have been greatly exaggerated. 
 
 It may have been noticed that hitherto the Par- 
 liamentary party in Devonshire had not produced 
 any military leader of distinction. Henry Grey, 
 Earl of Stamford, was nominally the commander of 
 the forces of the Parliament in the West, Of him 
 great things were at first expected, and for a brief 
 period he was the object of popular adulation, but 
 he proved to be incompetent and useless to the 
 cause. 
 
 The secondary officers were, as a rule, merely 
 active and zealous Colonels of Militia, possessing 
 but little military knowledge or experience. There 
 now came to the front a young soldier whose name 
 for a short time was in everybody's mouth. This 
 was Colonel James Chudleigh, a younger son of Sir 
 George Chudleigh, Bart., of Ashton, and grandson of 
 John Chudleigh, the Navigator. James Chudleigh's 
 political leaning may not improbably be traced to his 
 relationship to William Strode, one of the patriots 
 imprisoned in the Tower with Sir John Eliot, and one 
 
 ' Ce7'taine Infoj-matiotz, &c., April 24-May i, 1643, King's Pam- 
 phletSj B, M., small 4tos, vol. cv. 
 
OKEHAMPTON. 147 
 
 of the five Members impeached by the King. Strode 
 was his maternal uncle. James Chudleigh was at 
 this time twenty-five years old, he had served in the 
 Irish campaign, and had been a captain in Ashburn- 
 ham's regiment in the expedition against the Scotch 
 in 1640. He appears to have been in command of 
 a party of the Parliamentary levies which occupied 
 Bideford in the beginning of the war. One of the 
 defences which he constructed there on the summit 
 of a hill on the east side of the river was called 
 Chudleigh Fort, and its remains are still visible. 
 He was one of the colonels commanding the 640 
 foot-soldiers which garrisoned Barnstaple. 
 
 On the eve of the expiration of the Treaty, 
 Colonel, or as he is now styled Sergeant-Major- 
 General ^ Chudleigh, with a field force of Horse, Foot, 
 and artillery, occupied an entrenched position at 
 Okehampton with the purpose, it may be assumed, 
 of preventing the advance of the Cornish army, 
 under Sir Ralph Hopton, which was then quartered 
 in Launceston and its neighbourhood. 
 
 The little granite-built town of Okehampton, with 
 its atmosphere ever redolent of peat-smoke, lying 
 sheltered in a deep hollow in the border-land of 
 Dartmoor, under the highest elevations of that wild 
 and treeless waste, was destined to be frequently the 
 scene of military marching, countermarching, and 
 occupation during the war. The two high roads 
 which led from Cornwall by Launceston and 
 Tavistock, respectively, to Exeter — the assumed 
 
 1 Sergeant-Major-General is an obsolete military rank, but corre- 
 sponding nearly to that of Major-General. 
 
148 OKEHAMPTON OCCUPIED, 
 
 *' objective" of Sir Ralph Hopton, converged at 
 about three miles from Okehampton before enter- 
 ing it, and, thus combined, the road passed for a 
 mile over a hill, the flank of which rose preci- 
 pitously out of the valley v^here stood the ruins of 
 Baldwin's Norman castle, before falling by a sharp 
 descent into the town. Chudleigh's entrenchments 
 were on the summit of this hill — on a piece of com- 
 mon land called Stonypark, probably in those days 
 only partially reclaimed ; it is now allotted and 
 cultivated. The position lies on the south side of 
 Okehampton church, which stands on the brow of 
 the hill, isolated and nearly half a mile distant from 
 the town. For the purpose of commanding the 
 Cornish road, as well as for defence, it was well 
 chosen. In the rear the churchyard wall, and for 
 that matter the church itself, formed a strong base 
 of support, and communication with the town might 
 be kept open by more than one avenue. 
 
 The force under Chudleigh's command was a 
 division of the local army, having the county Militia 
 for its nucleus, which was being raised for the Par- 
 liament in Devonshire by the Earl of Stamford. 
 It seems to have been composed of promiscuous 
 materials. There can be no doubt that the garrison 
 of Barnstaple, of which Chudleigh had been in 
 command since the i6th of December previously, 
 supplied a considerable contingent to this force. 
 The fact that the men were now in the pay of the 
 Parliamentary Committee is the sufficiently obvious 
 reason why this particular service is not mentioned 
 in the Summary. One of the London diurnals 
 
FIGHT BEFORE LAUNCESTON, 149 
 
 reported as follows : — *' From Barnestaple they write 
 that there is 1500 Saylers ready to march against 
 Sir Ralph Hopton's army." ^ The number was of 
 course an exaggeration — a sort of war-paint designed 
 to intimidate the enemy ; but from more than 
 one source we learn that Chudleigh's force was 
 composed partly of seamen-volunteers, and it is 
 implied that they belonged to Barnstaple and Bide- 
 ford. 
 
 The treaty or truce was to expire at midnight of 
 the 22nd of April. On that day Chudleigh occupied 
 Lifton. On the morning of Sunday the 23rd,2 the 
 Parliamentarians, being in number about 1700 Horse 
 and Foot, and having with them a few pieces of 
 artillery, advanced to Polston Bridge, which crosses 
 the Tamar about two miles from Launceston.3 
 Captain Drake's troop drove in an outpost of the 
 Royalists which held the bridge, and the Parlia- 
 mentarians, preceded by their pioneers, made their 
 way through the fields towards the town, beating 
 out " like sheep," it is stated, the Royalist mus- 
 keteers, who lined the hedges. 
 
 The Cornish head-quarters had received an 
 ** alarum" in the night; but the Royalist troops 
 were scattered and evidently unprepared for this 
 prompt resumption of hostilities. Sir Ralph Hop- 
 ton had constructed a ** kind of fort " on Windmill 
 
 * A Perfect Diurnall of the Passages in Parliament^ April 24-May 
 I, 1643, King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. viii. 
 
 2 Not the 25th of March as statecf by Messrs. Peter. See History 
 of Launceston and Dunheved, 1885, p. 263. 
 
 3 The original bridge, since destroyed, was about a furlong higher up 
 the river. 
 
1 50 CHUDLEIGH'S RE TREA T. 
 
 Hill, an old beacon station which flanked the eastern 
 front of the town of Launceston.^ The fight, which 
 began at about ten o'clock, lasted the greater part of 
 the day, and seems to have been mostly what Oliver 
 Cromwell, in one of his letters, calls a *' hedge- 
 dispute," although the artillery was brought into 
 action by the Parliamentarians, and *' did much 
 execution." Towards four o'clock in the afternoon. 
 Royalist reinforcements coming in, the Devonshire 
 men, who had never reached the town, were com- 
 pelled to draw off, taking with them by their own 
 account seven men killed and about forty wounded. 
 At this moment some of Meyrick*s gray-coats, billeted 
 at Tavistock, who had been hurriedly sent for, 
 arrived on the scene, '* led on by a godly minister, 
 the Earl of Stamford's chaplain, in the absence of 
 their commander," and covered the retreat of the 
 Parliamentarians over Polston Bridge. During the 
 succeeding night the retreat continued in great 
 confusion, and on the 24th Chudleigh's broken 
 forces had fallen back upon their entrenchments at 
 Okehampton. The *' seamen were all sent away 
 to make good Bidford and Bastable." ^ 
 
 At this time two of the Royalist regiments, one 
 
 ^ In the Launceston Records there occurs the following entry : — 
 " April 23rd. They had for the gard 2 seam wood and 5 li candells 
 being the day that the melecia was at Winmill. The Capt. of the 
 gard had 2 seame wood to make buUetts" (Peter's Histories of 
 Launceston and Dunheved, p. 265). 
 
 ^ These particulars are derived from a tract entitled Exploits 
 Discovered in a Declaration of so7ne more proceedings of Serjeant- 
 Major Chtidley, Generall of the Forces tmder the Earle of Stamford 
 against Sir Ralph Hopton^ London, May 2, 1 643, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M.J small 4tos, vol. cv. 
 
HIS ARMY DISORGANIZED, 1 5 1 
 
 of them Sir Bevill Grenville's, lay in Launceston 
 church. Several entries of payments for fire-wood 
 and candles for the use of the troops in these 
 unusual quarters occur in the accounts of the 
 borough. Captain James Basset and Ensign John 
 Arundell, scions of two great Cornish families, fell 
 in the action of the 23rd of April, and were buried 
 in the church.^ 
 
 On the morning of the 25th of April, Chudleigh 
 pushed forward a party of Horse to Bridestowe, a 
 village six miles distant on the Launceston road, to 
 watch the enemy's movements. They returned with 
 the intelligence that the whole body of the enemy 
 was advancing. The disorganization of Chudleigh's 
 force had meanwhile begun. Many men had al- 
 ready " gone away disheartened," and others had 
 gone on the well-understood errand of bringing the 
 deserters back. His transport service had broken 
 down ; carriages had been dismissed as not able to 
 serve longer, and no new supply of horses and 
 " plowes " 2 had come in ; his artillery was con- 
 sequently immoveable. His force within his entrench- 
 ments was reduced to about one thousand Foot and 
 sixty Horse. To retreat or to stand still seemed 
 equally disastrous, and to involve the loss of " their 
 artillery, ammunition, themselves, and (by probable 
 consequence) the whole county." 3 
 
 ^ Peter's Histories of Launceston and Dwiheved, pp. 264-5. 
 
 2 Plowes seems to mean teams of oxen, in which sense it is said to 
 be still used in South Devon. See Transactions Devonshire Associa- 
 tion, vii. 525. 
 
 3 Exploits Discovered, Sec, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, 
 
 vol- cv. 
 
152 so URTON DO WN. 
 
 In the course of the day the Royalist army was 
 reported to be drawn out to the estimated number of 
 five hundred Horse and dragoons, and between four 
 and five thousand Foot, on Sourton Down. The road 
 from Launceston, almost immediately after leaving 
 Bridestowe, was for two miles an open track-way 
 over this down — a strip of outlying moor-land on 
 the flank of Dartmoor, from which it is separated 
 only by the wild and picturesque valley of the West 
 Ockment river. 
 
 So much of the relative positions of the opposing 
 forces has been gathered from various sources. 
 Vicars, a violent and relentless Puritan writer — im- 
 mortalized in Hndibras — who wrote in what Carlyle 
 has characterized as '* a not mendacious, yet loud- 
 spoken, exaggerative, more or less asinine manner," 
 has left a description of what followed in a narrative 
 which, although doubtless inflated, is graphic and 
 full of minute and interesting detail. It is fair to 
 say, however, that it is not inconsistent with other 
 accounts to be found in the contemporary tracts and 
 news-sheets. Of these there seems to have been a 
 plentiful crop relating to the fight, the alleged remark- 
 able incidents of which had evidently taken hold at 
 once of the popular fancy. 
 
 I shall now proceed to quote from the pages of 
 Vicars in continuation: — 
 
 This great strait caused or rather forced the Major ^ 
 and his Captains to resolve to draw out their horse, with a 
 
 [' Here and elsewhere Sergeant-Major-General James Chudleigh.] 
 
FIGHT ON SOURTON DOWN, 153 
 
 purpose to face the enemy and to give order to the foot to 
 march to the townes end, and to favour the retreat of the 
 horse, if need were. This done the Major marched with 
 the horse, the uttermost of their designe being but to 
 skirmish with the enemies forlorn hope, and to put the 
 body of their army to a stand ; that so night coming on, 
 they might haply be forced to lie on the Down and so give 
 him time to provide carriages, and to retreat fairly with his 
 Artillery and Ammunition, before the enemy should come 
 on the next morn. But the Lord (usually seen most in 
 greatest exigents and dangers) gave him and some others 
 great courage as they marched on toward the enemy, and 
 the Major espying a plot of ground which seemed to 
 promise much advantage for him to lie in ambuscado, and 
 fair opportunity to charge the enemy \ which in probability, 
 might come upon them undiscovered to their great disadvan- 
 tage. He, animated with some strong and strange hopes 
 herein, drew his horse (which were but an hundred and eight) 
 into six divisions, gave order that none should give fire 
 upon the enemies Scouts, but suffer them to come on, and 
 to fall into their troops, and so become their prisoners to 
 prevent intelligence. But one of their own men by accident 
 discharged a carbine, whereby the enemie had notice of 
 them and thereupon drew up into a full body, both their 
 horse and foot in good order, marcht on, and some of them 
 gave fire. Whereupon Captain Thomas Drake,^ with a 
 partie of eighteen Horse (being ordered to fall on first) 
 most courageously charged upon the enemies horse, kill'd 
 his first man, commanded his company, saying, Charge o?i, 
 charge on, they run, they rim. Presently the Major himselfe 
 charged with the like brave courage and undaunted resolu- 
 
 [' Captain Thomas Drake was the second son of Sir Francis Drake, 
 the first baronet, of Buckland Abbey, and a grand-nephew of the great 
 admiral. He was about twenty-five years of age in 1643. His son 
 succeeded as third baronet.] 
 
154 FIGHT ON SOURTON DOWN. 
 
 tion, and cried out to his Souldiers, Charge all, &c. . . . 
 The enemies Horse, Dragoons, and the Van of the Foot, 
 were routed at the very first assault, and by the help of 
 them, routed the rest of their Army, charging them through 
 to their very Ordnance ; and had not most of the greedy 
 troops failed to charge-on after their Commanders, and 
 fallen to pillage the backes and pockets of such as they 
 thought were best furnished, they had, in probability, driven 
 the enemy from their Ordnance ; But the number of those 
 which charged this thus far was very few, and the Regiment 
 set to defend the Ordnance, was strong, and furnisht with 
 Swedes feathers,^ so that all that was possible to be done, 
 was to rout them thus far, which was two miles from their 
 Van ; and so far, by the mighty hand of God, a few of the 
 hundred and eight, did rout their whole Army, killed divers, 
 hurt many, caused most of them to throw down their arms, 
 made all their Horse and Dragoons, and many of their foot 
 to flie like base Cowards, took one Captain, and some few 
 prisoners, one Cornet, three foot colours, divers staves, and 
 eighteen Drums. 
 
 After this the Major endeavoured to rally his horse again, 
 and commanded the foot from the Townes end to the 
 Down, to fall on ; but most of the Horse were so spent in 
 that charge of intolerable length, as that he could not get 
 them into good order, and the foot not having their Artillery 
 (which was this while marching to Crediton) and hearing 
 two shot of the enemies Cannon, had not courage to fall on, 
 but retreated towards the town ; which the Major perceiv- 
 
 [' "Double-pointed stakes, shod with iron at each end, and planted 
 before the squad of pikes to prevent an onfall of the cavalry. The 
 whilk Swedish feathers, although they look gay to the eye, resembling 
 the shrubs or lesser trees of ane forest, as the puissant pikes, arranged 
 in battalia behind them, correspond to the tall pines thereof, yet, 
 nevertheless, are not altogether so soft to encounter as the plumage of 
 a goose" (Captain Dugald Dalgetty, Scott's Legend of Montrose),'\ 
 
^IGHT ON SO UR TON DO WN 1 5 
 
 ^ 
 
 ii^g> gave them order to leave their matches burning on 
 the Furzes which were on the Down, that neither the 
 enemy, nor the more faint-hearted of their own troops, 
 might discern the retreat of their foot, but continue the 
 apprehension of them, as still ready to fall-on. By this 
 time also the enemy was again drawn into some orderly 
 body ; and our Captains, with such Horses as they could get, 
 charged the enemy again, but it being far in the night, 
 exceeding dark and raining, they did not prosecute their 
 charge, but all the Horse retreated toward the Town, except 
 the Major himselfe, Captain Gold, Captain Fym, Captain 
 Drake, Captain Downing, Captain Fenton, Captain Lutterell, 
 three Lieutenants, one Corporall, and about twelve Troopers. 
 These staied to keep the field, maintained the ground they 
 had got on the enemy, beat back their Scouts, kept off 
 intelhgence, and altogether with the foresaid light matches 
 on the Furzes, continued to be formidable to the enemies. 
 . . . Among the visible passages of God's extraordinary 
 working in this businesse was this : that the Devon forces 
 of Horse and Foot were no sooner retreated into the town 
 to refresh themselves for their march to a safer quarter, but 
 the Lord sent the most hideous claps of thunder, lightning 
 and hail on the Down, as the like had not been heard a 
 lorg time before. These improbabilities strook such terrour 
 and amazement into the guilty conscience of Sir R. Hopton 
 and his traiterous spoiling and robbing crue, that in the 
 morning there was not a man, but divers of their dead, left 
 to be seen in the whole Down, Armes great store, at least a 
 thousand Muskets and Pikes lay scattered in the fields : 
 some Troop and Dragoon Horses were left behinde, five 
 barrels of powder; and one the enemies themselves had 
 blown up, a great quantity of match, many instruments for 
 Pioners, Portmantas, Snapsacks, Swedes Fethers, and such 
 kind of Implements, with divers peeces of armour and some 
 apparrell. All these the Souldiers and countrey-people 
 
156 FIGHT ON SOURTON DOWN, 
 
 adjacent made pillage of, whiles the Cornish returned to 
 their Countrey, with losse, shame and guiltinesse.^ 
 
 I have discovered a contemporary letter giving 
 another, and a highly interesting, account, of the 
 two fights, which will be of especial interest, as 
 having been written from Barnstaple. Its author 
 signs with the initials '' W. N." — not improbably 
 William Nottle, one of the Council of War at that 
 time. It is as follows : — 
 
 Barum the 2^ of Aprill^ 1643. 
 My Constant Friend, 
 
 Your health wished &c. I received your Letter by 
 the Post, and doe thanke you for your intelligence, our 
 forces being not above 1500 lay on Friday last 10 miles 
 from Lancestone, but on Saterday they advanced to Listen 
 within 3 miles of Lancestone, and yet in Devon where they 
 thought to have met with 3 or 4 regiments of trayners those 
 being all Sea-men and Volunteeres, but there was no aid 
 come thither as was promised by the Lieutenants : Sergeant 
 Major Chiidleigh commanding in chiefe. Of these 1500 on 
 Sunday morning at 10 of the clock marched over Poulson 
 bridge into Cornewall, upon this ground hearing that there 
 was not above 1000 men and that of Sir Bevel Greenvils 
 Regiment, so that he thought to have set upon Lancestone, 
 but before they came neere the Town the Cavaliers came 
 out and lay halfe a mile off the Towne in hedges, and shot 
 upon our men from 10 till 3 or 4 of the clock, but our men 
 beate them from hedge to hedge till they were come neere 
 home to the Towne ; and then about 5 or 6 of the clock 
 there was 2 or 3 Regiments came in to the helpe of the 
 Cavaliers, but we held two or three small brasse peeces 
 which did great execution among them, but their number 
 
 ^ Y\Q,diis\ Jehovah- J irehj Cod in the Mounts pp. 317-318. 
 
FIGHT ON SOURTON DO WN, 157 
 
 being so much increased they were like to have begirt our 
 men round, and had sent a great number to the bridge, but 
 by the providence of God 500 of the E. of Stampfords 
 men came in from Plymoth and cleered the bridge, and 
 our men made a faire retreate about 9 of the clock at night 
 on Sunday and marched to Southampton [Okehampton], 
 but I must tell you that our men killed above 20 for one, 
 we lost but 8 men, and they lost above 200 and some say 
 for certain 240 whereof M. Basset their high Sheriffe was 
 one shot in two by our brasse peeces, blessed be God 
 for this mercie. Well, our men on Munday came to 
 Southampton \sic\ 15 miles from Lanson in the way to 
 Exeter : The Cavaliers on Tuesday advanced from Lanson 
 into Devon, Sir Ralph came but with 4000 almost starved 
 poore Cornish and 500 horse, our men by their Scouts sent 
 out, brought newes to Major Chudleigh that the Cornish 
 Airmie was within 4 miles of the Towne, they sent out 3 
 Troopes of Horse, Major Chudleigh^ Captaine Gould and 
 Cap. Drake^ which in all made but 108 horse, who lay 
 close under a hill where the enemie was to come, who just 
 in the edge of the evening came to the place our horse 
 possessed, our men presently charged the Van very furiously, 
 got their word, and fell in among them pel mel : Cap. 
 Drake slew 12 or 13 with his battel axe and sword, and one 
 of his Corporals the like number, he charged through and 
 through the midst of the Armie, and had the foote come 
 up had gotten their guns, being 3 they had possession of 
 them but wanted foote to carry them away : It is thought 
 the Cavaliers kild one another, seeing they saw them kill 
 their fellows that had the worde, there was no difference 
 but our men in the moonelight knew every one by his skarfe 
 and colours, our men killed above 120 of them tooke 6 or 
 700 Arms, buffe coats and scarlet coates store, 12 drums, 
 3 Ensines, 11 prisoners, swans feathers, and much other 
 pillage, and beate them back to Lancestone where they 
 
158 FIGHT ON SO URTON DO WN. 
 
 shamefully arived Wednesday the fast day, but we must not 
 ascribe it to man but to God, that they had this great 
 successe, being above 45 to one man. One thing is re- 
 markable, that as soon as our horse charged them being on 
 great downe, it grew darke and it thundered and lightned 
 in a very terrible manner, and the thunderclap brake just 
 over their heads and then raine extraordinary, and it was a 
 very great winde and hard weather all that day and night, 
 and they were amazed at our suddain charge, that they ran 
 amain to save their lives. So let all our enimies perish. 
 
 There was a Letter intercepted which came from the 
 King going to Sir Ralph Hopton 3 or 4 dayes since neere 
 Exon wherein he wrote that he should come away to his 
 helpe speedily, and it is thought that if he could have cut 
 off that little force wee had in Southampton \sic\ then hee 
 would have plundered the Countrey when we had gone, and 
 so gon away to the King, but he is gone to his corner with 
 weeping crosse : Lord Major [? Mohun] lost his scarlet 
 coate and Sir Stalling [Nicholas Slanning] his skarfe and 
 many beaver hats found cut and hewed, it is thought [there] 
 is 500 hurt of them, hee [we] lost in the last fights 5 or 6 
 horses but not one man, and 3 or 4 hurt, Gods name be 
 glorified. Pray let us heare what newes. You I hope this 
 weeke will produce great newes, God send it to be good, 
 under God this war doth ly much on the E. of Essex 
 his Army if well or ill, therefore it concernes London to 
 afford him all the helpe you possible can, your true friend 
 for Jerusalems peace, I rest, 
 
 W, N. 
 I heare the Letter fro77i the King zms written upon white 
 Sattin and found in a clokebag^ wherein was many papers, 
 and will discover all our Malignants of Devon.^ 
 
 ' Printed in A Ftdl Relation of the Great Defeat given to the Cornish 
 
 Cavaliers by Sergeant- Major- General Chudley, King's Pamphlets, B. M., 
 small 4tos, vol. cv. 
 
VICTORY OF THE PARLIAMENTARIANS. 159 
 
 I know of nothing in the whole story of the 
 war more calculated to be impressed upon the 
 imagination than this brief entry in the Journal 
 of Master John Rattenbury, attorney and town 
 clerk of Okehampton, who, if he was not an actual 
 witness of the fight, must have been within hear- 
 ing of every rumour which came from the field 
 during that hurly-burly of wind and storm and 
 human strife : — 
 
 And there was a fight at Meldon downe by night in a 
 great tempest of wind and rain.^ 
 
 Meldon Down is a continuation of Sourton Down, 
 in the direction of Okehampton, and may be taken, 
 on the authority of Rattenbury, to have been the 
 precise scene of this striking incident. 
 
 In this remarkable action is apparently to be ob- 
 served the effect of a sudden rush of cavalry in pro- 
 ducing a panic and its overwhelming consequences. 
 It was, in the language of the news-sheets, a ** most 
 miraculous and happy victory " — a " great Deliver- 
 ance and a wonderful Victory " for the Parliamen- 
 tarians. Vicars was fairly carried away by his 
 enthusiasm and his ^* asinine " characteristic is 
 finely exhibited. ** Such a wonderful victory as 
 hath not hapned since this warr began nor may be 
 paralleled b^'' the stories of many ages past : the 
 memory whereof most worthily deserves to be 
 engraven on a markable pillar or high towring 
 Pyramides " ! ^ 
 
 ' Rattenbury 's Diary. Some Account of the Barony and Town of 
 Okehampton. From the Collections of William B. Bridges [1836]. 
 ^ Jehovah-Jirah, p. 319. 
 
1 60 EXTRA ORDINAR V CIRCUMSTANCES, 
 
 In accordance with the ideas which prevailed at 
 that time, this remarkable conflict was supposed to 
 have been attended by some peculiar supernatural 
 evidences. When, only a few years before, the 
 astute Joseph Hall, then Bishop of Exeter, had 
 pronounced one of the severe thunderstorms, which 
 occur on the borders of Dartmoor, to have been 
 *' plainly wrought by a stronger hand than 
 Nature's," it is not surprising if commoner people 
 were influenced by the same superstition. And so 
 we are told — the story coming to us from the 
 Cavalier side — that in the midst of the storm *' one 
 of the enemy's scouts came in sight mounted on a 
 great black horse at whom the sentinels gave Fire 
 and missing him concluded among themselves that 
 it was the Devill which had appeared to them : 
 Reporting the same to others of the Army, which 
 did breed a general consternation among them." ^ 
 The Puritan interpretation of the extraordinary 
 weather was that *' the Lord sent Fire from Heaven 
 so that the Cavaliers Powder in their Bandaliers, 
 Flasks and Muskets took Fire, by which Meanes 
 they hurt and slew each otiier to the Wonder and 
 Amazement of the Parliament Forces." ^ The 
 supernaturalism of these accounts, it will be ob- 
 served, is rather comprehensive. The bare fact of 
 this remarkable effect of lightning is more circum- 
 stantially given by one of the diurnals which says 
 
 ' Baker's Chronicle^ 3rd ed., 1 660, p. 450. 
 
 2 Extract from the title of a tract, Joyfull Newes from Pli mouth, &c., 
 in Davidson's Bihliotheca Devoniensis^ P- 7i- (This tract is not placed 
 in its proper chronological order in that work.) 
 
RESULTS OF THE FIGHT. i6i 
 
 that the lightning fired many of the CavaHers' 
 bandoleers, by which their clothes, faces and hair 
 were burnt, and that many of the wounded and 
 *' scalled" men died in Launceston. And a curious 
 confirmation of this is to be met with in the 
 Launceston accounts, in which there is an item of 
 payment for " sending 3 malitia men by a pass into 
 Devon that were scalded, 6d." ^ 
 
 The Royalist song- writers were not slow to 
 satirize the gush of Puritan triumph. The follow- 
 ing are the first two verses of a ballad entitled '' A 
 Western Wonder " attributed to Sir John Den- 
 ham : — 
 
 *' Do you not know, not a fortnight ago 
 
 How they bragg'd of a Western wonder ? 
 When a hundred and ten slew five thousand men, 
 With the help of lightning and thunder ? 
 
 There Hopton was slain, again and again, 
 
 Or else my author did lie ; 
 With a new thanksgiving, for the dead who are living. 
 To God, and his servant Chidleigh.'' ^ 
 
 Hopton was reported, and not for the first time, to 
 have been killed. 
 
 The moral effect of this defeat on the Cornish 
 army was not less remarkable than the physical. 
 
 ^ Peter's History of Launceston and Dunheved^ p. 264. The date 
 given by Messrs. Peter is, to me, doubtful ; and I think it not unlikely 
 that the incident is to be fixed by the foregoing story. 
 
 2 I have taken this from Mr. Henry Morley's Collection, 1868, p. 95. 
 The version in the Reprint of the Rump Songs, i. 134, is obviously 
 imperfect. 
 
 12 
 
1 62 FORTIFICA TION OF BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 Lord Clarendon, who passes over the action itself 
 with the briefest possible notice, admits that it 
 *' struck a great terror into " the Royalists, '' and 
 disordered them more than they were at any other 
 time.'' ^ 
 
 During the construction of the defensive works 
 around Barnstaple the Corporation seem to have 
 had to encounter an unexpected difficulty. Some 
 of the owners and occupiers of the lands interfered 
 with, however quietly they may have acquiesced in 
 the prevailing political sentiment, resisted the en- 
 croachment upon their private rights. It became 
 necessary, therefore, to resort to martial law to 
 override such obstacles. The following is a copy 
 of a warrant accordingly issued by the Earl of 
 Stamford. We gather from it that the Great Fort 
 was now finished, and, as a detail, that the trees 
 which interfered with the line of fire from its guns 
 were to be felled. Banks and hedges could be and 
 were restored, but who shall say how much was lost 
 by this sacrifice of the trees ? 
 
 Whereas for the defence of the Towne of Barnestaple, it 
 is verie needful!, that the same be secured and fortefied by 
 Intrenchm\ and other works and fortificacons on the East 
 parts thereof, and that the Trees hedges and bancks w^^'in 
 ayme and Comaund of the Fort there made, hindringe 
 Service and Execucon from the Same be Cutt downe 
 sleighted and Levelled, And wheras alsoe I am informed 
 that some Owners and Possessors of the Lands and grounds 
 in and through w^^ the said Trench and works are to be 
 
 ^ History of the Rebellion , p. 425 h^ 
 
INDEMNITY OF PARLIAMENT.^ 163' 
 
 made, p'ferring their owne private Interests and Comoditie 
 before the publique and Comon good and Safetie, have hin- 
 dred and opposed the doeing thereof, It is therefore hereby 
 Ordered, And I doe by theis p'sents Authorize and Require 
 all and eu'y the well affected Burgesses and Inhabitants of 
 the said Towne, and all other psons by them or any of 
 them to be iniployed in this behalfe, w'*^ all expedicon to 
 pceed and goe on to make Intrehchments and any other 
 works or fortificacons necessarie for the defence of the said 
 Towne, in and through the Lands and grounds of any Per- 
 son or Persons whatsoever and to Cutt downe sleight levell 
 and remove any Trees hedges bancks or other things 
 whatsoever, w*^^ may hinder or be p'iudiciall to the Ayrae 
 execucon or service of or from the fort or any other forti- 
 ficacons or works soe to bee made For the doeing whereof 
 this shalbe yo"" sufficient warrant for your discharge and 
 indempnitye. Given vnder my hand and Scale this x'^ of 
 Aprill 1643.^ 
 
 Stanforde.' 
 
 This was followed by an Act of Indemnity (so 
 far as an " Ordinance " was an Act) to all the 
 parties concerned, passed by both Houses of Par- 
 liament, of which the following are the records in 
 the Commons Journals : — 
 
 [29th of April 1643.] Ordered, that Mr. Serjeant Wilde 
 do bring in an Ordinance for the Fortifying of Barnestaple ; 
 and for the Indemnity of such as shall fortify it. 
 
 [2nd of May 1643.] The Ordinance concerning Barne- 
 stable, the keeping them from Indemnity, for making of 
 Forts on other Mens Ground, was read ; and assented unto ; 
 and ordered to be sent up to the Lords for their Concur- 
 rence. 
 
 ^ Tanner MSS., Bodleian Library, Ixii. f. 48. 
 
i64 INDEMNITY OF PARLIAMENT. 
 
 [The same day] the Lords concurred concerning the 
 Town of Bastable.^ 
 
 The following is a copy of the Ordinance from 
 another source : — 
 
 An Ordinance of the Lords and Commons Assembled 
 in Parliament, for protecting and saving harmlesse all 
 such as shall use their best endeavour for fortifying 
 and preserving the Town of Barfistable in the County 
 of Deifon, 
 
 Die Martis 2 Maii^ 1643. 
 
 Whereas divers well affected Burgesses and Inhabitants of 
 the Town of Barnstable, in the County of Devon, out of 
 their good affection to the publique, and by warrant and 
 direction from the Earle of Stanford, Lord Generall of the 
 Forces raised by Authority of ParHament in the Western 
 parts, of this Kingdom : Have for the necessary defence of 
 the said Town in the times of eminent danger, and actuall 
 Warre in those parts, made, or caused to bee made divers 
 intrenchments, Fortifications, and Workes in and about the 
 said Town, in and through the Lands and grounds of 
 severall Persons, and for the doing thereof, have been and 
 may bee occasioned to cut down, slight, levell and remove 
 the Trees, Hedges, Banks or other things whatsoever, which 
 may hinder or bee prejudicial! to the ayme, execution or ser- 
 vice from the Fort there, or any other Fortifications, or 
 Works, in, or about the said Town : It is Ordered by the 
 Lords and Commons in Parliament, That whatsoever the 
 said Burgesses and Inhabitants of the said Town, or any of 
 them, or any other Person or Persons by them imployed, 
 have, or hath done, or shal do in, and about the Premises, 
 is good & acceptable service to the Common-wealth : And 
 that they, & every of them for so doing, shall be therein 
 
 ^ Journals of the House of Commons^ iii. 63, (i*]. 
 
HOPTOATS DIFFICULTIES, 165 
 
 protected and saved harmlesse by Authority of both houses 
 of Parliament : And all such Persons as shall oppose the 
 same, shall be proceeded against as contemners of this 
 Ordinance, And such Owners and Possessors of any 
 Lands or grounds that shall suffer any damage thereby, 
 shall have reparations out of the publique.^ 
 
 Chudleigh's victory had checked, at least for the 
 time, the advance of Hopton's Cornish army. It 
 seems, moreover, to have become known to the 
 Royalists that behind Chudleigh a much superior 
 force v^as now preparing to march against them. 
 Hopton's troops, cooped up in the northern corner of 
 Cornwall about Launceston, were, meanwhile, in 
 great straits. They had been only scantily supplied 
 through Falmouth with arms and ammunition, pro- 
 cured in France by Sir George Carteret, the 
 Governor of Jersey. And they had so far exhausted 
 of provisions a poor country, that even the officers, 
 it is said, had at last to be content for two days with 
 a biscuit a day each. 
 
 A tract printed about this time^ mentions the 
 names of some of the Royalist gentry — '* delin- 
 quents," of course, they are styled — who, by 
 information received from Plymouth, are reported 
 to " follow the army*' of Sir Ralph Hopton. Those 
 of Devonshire are the *' Sheriff of Devon " (Colonel 
 Acland), '' Colonel Thomas Fulford of Fulford," and 
 
 ^ Husbands's Collection of all the publicke Orders Ordinances and 
 Declarations of both Houses of Parliament^ «S:c., London, 1646, p. 156. 
 
 "^ A true Relation of the Proceedings of the Cornish Forces tinder the 
 cornmand of the Lord Mohune and Sir Ralph Hopton^ &c , King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cvii. 
 
1 66 STAMFORD TAKES THE FIELD, 
 
 ■ 
 
 '' Gifford of Brightley, Esquire/' There was also a 
 cleric in this unusual association, Edward Cotton, 
 Archdeacon of Totnes and Rector of Shobrooke. It 
 is of some interest also to learn that there were 
 many *^ Reformado Captains^ being a company of 
 younger Brothers." '' Reformado," a term fre- 
 quently met with in the histories of the Civil 
 War, means, I believe, simply unattached, as now 
 understood. They were, in fact, volunteers. 
 
 On the nth of May, the Earl of Stamford set out 
 from Exeter for the rendezvous of the Parliamentary 
 army of Devonshire at Okehampton. When brought 
 together, these undoubtedly heterogeneous forces, 
 according to credible information, derived, it is said, 
 from its own officers, consisted of 1,400 Horse and 
 dragoons and 5,400 Foot, '* by the poll." These 
 were mostly the Militia levies which the Parlia- 
 mentary Committee during the preceding months 
 had been actively organizing. A train of artillery, 
 consisting of thirteen brass guns and a mortar-piece,^ 
 was attached to the force. It has been assumed, but 
 on no sufficient authority, so far as I know, that the 
 army marched out of Exeter of this strength ; ^ but 
 Chudleigh's division, which was certainly included, 
 already, as has been seen, occupied Okehampton, the 
 appointed rendezvous. 
 
 Sir George Chudleigh (father of the Major-General) 
 was detached with 1,200 of the Horse to march to 
 
 ' Mortars to throw shells filled with powder had only just come into 
 general use, although they had been invented as early as in the reign of 
 Henry VIII. 
 
 " See Jenkins's History of Exeter^ 18063 p. 159. 
 
A BARNSTAPLE CONTINGENT, 167 
 
 Bodmin by a route not mentioned, but evidently by 
 the Tavistock road, which had been practically 
 cleared of the enemy by James Chudleigh's victory. 
 The meaning of this movement or diversion, if it 
 may be so called, is not obvious; and we learn only 
 through Royalist sources that its object was to 
 overawe the Sheriff of Cornwall and prevent further 
 Royalist levies from being made, and also to cut off 
 the anticipated retreat of Hopton's army. The 
 destination of the remainder of the Parliamentary 
 forces was Stratton ; where they eventually took up 
 a strong position on a hill within a mile of that 
 town. The Horse, not exceeding by all accounts two 
 hundred, appears to have alread}^ reached Stratton 
 on the I2th of May,^ and the Foot probably followed 
 on the 13th and 14th. 
 
 It has been already surmised that part of Chud- 
 leigh's division had been drawn from the garrison of 
 Barnstaple. We have now good evidence of this in 
 the fact that Captain Freeman, commandant of the 
 troop of Barnstaple Horse, was present with the 
 force at Stratton. The same reason already sug- 
 gested will account for the absence of any mention 
 of this particular service in the Summary — the 
 contingent was in the pay of the Committee. The 
 town, however, had to contribute to the victualling 
 of the Parliamentary army, as appears from the 
 following item in that useful record : — 
 
 For Bisquett, Bacon, Pease and Beere, 
 sent to Stratton by order to the Army, 
 May 3, 1643 £^^^ ^ Q 
 
 ^ A Perfect Diurnall, &c., 15-22 May, 1643, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., large 4tos, vol. ix. 
 
i68 OBJECT OF THE EXPEDITION. 
 
 The date of this entry In the Summary seems to 
 show that the destination of the force had been 
 determined several days before the advance. The 
 Parliamentarians were taunted by their adversaries 
 on account of the abundance of their commissariat 
 and the ample supplies of their ammunition, of both 
 of which necessaries the Royalists were themselves 
 painfully deficient. 
 
 The plan and object of this expedition are even 
 now, by the light of its sequel, utterly incompre- 
 hensible, and no contemporary explanation is avail- 
 able. The general aim may be assumed to have 
 been that of preventing Hopton's advance from 
 Launceston. The Earl of Stamford knew, from a 
 letter found amongst the spoil of Sourton Down, that 
 the King had ordered Hopton to come to him at 
 once, and with such urgency that Hopton was advised 
 to mount his foot as dragoons. What, then, was the 
 motive of Stamford's roundabout march to Stratton, 
 more than fifteen miles beyond the enemy's left flank? 
 Can it be that there was anything in the obscure 
 rumours of a descent of a Royalist force from Wales 
 upon the North Devon coast, which have been quoted 
 from the contemporary news-sheets, and that part of 
 the Earl of Stamford's scheme was to intercept this 
 threatened support to the army of Hopton ? I can 
 only put these questions without being able to supply 
 an answer to them. To the ordinary mind, not pre- 
 tending to any deep insight into military strategy, 
 the object of the commander of the expedition may 
 appear to have been that of contriving for Hopton 
 (whose head-quarters it will be remembered were all 
 
STRATTON. 169 
 
 this time at Launceston) an easy outlet of escape 
 between Sir George Chudleigh's Horse and the main 
 body of the Parliamentary army. This, however, 
 was not the opportunity which Sir Ralph Hopton 
 chose to take advantage of; on the contrary, he 
 determined at once by a forced march, which, if 
 considered, must be deemed a remarkable one, to 
 assault the Parliamentarians in the position which 
 they had taken up at Stratton. 
 
 Geographically, Stratton is not in Devonshire, 
 although close to the north-western border of the 
 county. Lying in that extreme angle of Cornwall 
 which is ethnographically more Devonian than 
 Cornish, it may be said, perhaps, that if not in 
 Devonshire it ought to be. The site of the battle 
 is, however, really in the adjoining parish of 
 Poughill. 
 
 The battle of Stratton, in which were arrayed 
 against each other the men of Cornwall and of 
 Devon — representing almost accurately by their 
 two counties the two factions into which the nation 
 was unhappily divided — was fought on Tuesday, the 
 i6th of May, 1643. There are two graphic historical 
 accounts of the battle which have come down to 
 us — one by Lord Clarendon, and the other by Dr. 
 Thomas Fuller, the quaint and facetious author of 
 the Worthies of England, Both accounts, from 
 certain internal resemblances which they bear to 
 each other, appear to have been derived from the 
 same source ; and Fuller, who was afterwards chap- 
 lain to Sir Ralph Hopton, states that he obtained his 
 information from a paper revised by Hopton him- 
 
I70 RO YALIST DISPOSITIONS, 
 
 self.i We may be sure, therefore, that the Royalist 
 commander was the common authority of both 
 writers. 
 
 The Cornish army marched from their quarters 
 in and about Launceston on Monday, the 15th, and 
 reaching Stratton stood to their arms all that night. 
 By five o'clock on the morning of the i6th, the dis- 
 position of the forces described in what follows had 
 been made : — 
 
 The number of foot was about two thousand four hundred, 
 which they divided into four parts, and agreed on their 
 several provinces. The first was commanded by the Lor(J 
 Mohun and Sir Ralph Hopton ; who undertook to assault 
 the camp on the south side. Next them, on the left hand, 
 Sir John Berkeley and Sir Bevil Greenvil were to force their 
 way. Sir Nicholas Slanning and colonel Trevannion were 
 to assault the north side : and, on the [their ?] left hand, 
 colonel Thomas Basset, who was major general of their 
 foot, and colonel William Godolphin were to advance with 
 their party ; each party having two pieces of cannon to 
 dispose as they found necessary ; colonel John Digby com- 
 manding the horse and dragoons, being about five hundred, 
 stood upon a sandy common which had a way to the camp, 
 to take any advantage he could on the enemy, if they 
 charged ; otherwise, to be firm as a reserve. ^ 
 
 The ** sandy common " upon which Colonel Digby's 
 Horse and dragoons were drawn up is easily identi- 
 fiable as Burn Downs — a level piece of ground lying a 
 little way from the base of the hill on the south-west, 
 now divided into three or four fields and still ap- 
 parently only half-reclaimed. 
 
 ' Woi-t hies of England, Cornwall, Ed. Nuttall, 1840, i. 331. 
 ^ Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 424 a. 
 
STAMFORD'S POSITION, 171 
 
 No Devonian or Cornishman would agree with 
 Lord Clarendon in calling the site of the battle a 
 ** very high hill.*' As the historian wrote the ac- 
 count amidst th^ tamer scenery of Jersey, the imagi- 
 nation of his informant and fellow exile Hopton 
 may have magnified, by comparison, the physical 
 features of the scene. Stamford Hill— as it has 
 been called since the battle — but more properly 
 (according to a local informant) Grist Hill, is how- 
 ever a prominent object in the landscape as the last 
 of the series of rolling hills which here subside into 
 a tract of comparatively level ground extending a 
 mile or so farther to the sands of Bude. The hill is 
 elliptical in shape, having the longer axis running 
 north and south. At the foot of the southern 
 slope is the little town of Stratton, standing on a 
 slight eminence where the narrow valley, on the 
 eastern side of the hill, opens out. The town, which 
 numbers scarcely more than a hundred houses closely 
 packed together and crowned by the stately church - 
 tower with massive pinnacles of the type common 
 to this part of the country, has no modern accretions, 
 and its present aspect differs probably but little from 
 that which it presented in the seventeenth century. 
 
 The side of the hill which rises out of the deep 
 valley above the town was very steep — it may almost 
 be said precipitous — and quite impracticable for horse- 
 men. Everywhere else the slopes of the hill were 
 easy, broken by a few fences which, it may be, 
 existed then as they do now and were held by the 
 defenders. There is no reason to doubt that the 
 remains of an earth-work still to be seen on the 
 
172 THE TWO ARMIES, 
 
 summit of the hill are those of an entrenchment 
 thrown up by the Parliamentarians, where, as Fuller 
 says, they *' advantageously barricaded themselves." 
 This earth-work was in the form of a circular 
 arc of about two-thirds the circumference of the 
 circle, and from sixty to seventy paces in diameter ; 
 the gap was opposite the eastern or steepest face 
 of the hill from which an attack was least to be 
 expected. The entrenchment was evidently intended 
 only for the protection of the ammunition stores and 
 baggage-train ; it was too small to be any cover to 
 more than a fraction of the defenders. Guns mounted 
 here would have been of little use offensively, as they 
 would have only commanded a small extent of the 
 natural glacis of the hill on the western side. The 
 lighter field -pieces were probably planted on the 
 brow of the hill. 
 
 On the almost level area of the summit of the hill 
 the whole of the Parliamentary Foot were drawn up 
 in battalia. Close as the infantry formation was in 
 those days, every inch of the ground must have been 
 occupied. Here Major-General James Chudleigh was 
 virtually in command. The small body of Parlia- 
 mentary Horse, which seems to have been completely 
 paralyzed, was kept inactive at a distance and took 
 no part in the battle. 
 
 The numerical strength of the two armies respec- 
 tively may be thus recapitulated : — 
 
 Horse 
 
 and dragoons. Foot. Total. Guns. 
 
 Royalist 500 2,400 2,900 8 
 
 Parliamentarian... 200 5,400 5, 600 14 
 
BA TTLE OF STRA TTON. 1 71 
 
 The position of the Parliamentarians, surrounded 
 and vigorously attacked by the Royalists, in accor- 
 dance with the pre-arranged plan, in front, rear, and 
 both flanks at once, was as obstinately defended. 
 The Cornish pikemen and musketeers in their succes- 
 sive assaults by the four several wajs up the hill 
 were as often driven back and overpowered by the 
 superior numbers of the Devonshire men. The fight 
 continued in this way, without any decisive advantage 
 on either side, from five o'clock in the morning until 
 three in the afternoon. At one period, Chudleigh 
 himself with a body of pikemen charged Sir Bevill 
 Grenville's regiment which was engaged on the west 
 slope of the hill and threw it into disorder, Sir Bevill 
 being " in person overthrown ; " from which unusual 
 expression we somehow get a picture of the knight 
 in full armour (as he probably was) borne down from 
 his horse; The disaster was retrieved by Sir John 
 Berkeley, leading the musketeers who flanked Sir 
 Beviirs pikemen on each side. In the midst of the 
 struggle that ensued Chudleigh was taken prisoner. 
 Towards three o'clock, the ammunition of the 
 Royalists beginning to run short, orders were passed 
 round for a simultaneous advance and a general 
 storm -of the position with sword and pike only. 
 Thereupon, some of the Parliamentarian guns, of 
 the effect of which no mention is made and which 
 very likely had been fired over the heads of the 
 assailants, were seized and turned upon the camp. 
 The Devonshire Foot thus resolutely pressed, and 
 discouraged by the loss of their favourite commander, 
 broke into confusion; hundreds surrendered them- 
 
174 BA TTLE OF STRATTONr 
 
 selves as prisoners and the rest became a crowd of 
 fugitives. So ended this hotly contested battle.^ 
 
 The Royalists admitted the loss of but very few 
 men and of no considerable officer. According to- 
 the same authority, about three hundred of the 
 Parliamentarians were killed on the field, seventeen 
 hundred were taken prisoners, and all their cannon^^ 
 seventy barrels of gunpowder, and a large magazine^ 
 of biscuit and other provisions fell into the hands of 
 the captors." 
 
 Then followed a remarkable scene which, if not- 
 peculiar to Cornwall, was not what is commonly' 
 believed to have been of the sort usually witnessed 
 
 ^ Since the above was written, Dr. Samuel R. Gardiner's History of 
 the Great Civil War— 1642-49— has' been published (1886). Dr. 
 Gardiner differs from me in some unimportant details of description, 
 but I see no reason for altering what I have written. In a note at 
 p. 81 of vol. i., he says that "Lord Hopton's account of the affairs of 
 the West," which is mentioned in the Calendar of the Clarendon MSS., 
 under the number 1,738 (i) is not only missing, but has evidently never 
 been bound up with the other MSS. At p. 161 {note) he suggests that 
 '* a more correct account " of the battle of Stratton would be possible 
 if the lost document could be recovered. He was apparently not 
 aware of the version given by Fuller, of which I have made use, and 
 which was derived, according to Fuller, from Sir Ralph Hopton's own 
 manuscript, being '*a memorial of the rcmarkables in the West" — 
 jDrobably the identical paper which is missing, and it is obvious from 
 internal evidence that it was also, as I have suggested, the basis of Lord 
 Clarendon's narrative. Dr. Gardiner, who wrote his description after 
 personal observation of the ground, suggests a doubt whether the- 
 earth-work mentioned above was thrown up at that time or had a far 
 earlier origin. Of course either is incapable of actual proof. The work 
 certainly would have done little credit to the skill of the Dutch engineer 
 who was employed at that time in the defence of Exeter, and who, if 
 one may conjecture, accompanied the expedition. All that can be said 
 is that it has none of the characteristics of an ancient British hill-fort — 
 the only other probable alternative. 
 
DEFEAT OF THE PARLIAMENTARIANS. 175 
 
 in the King's camps. The four divisions of the"* 
 Royalist army met, with mutual congratulations ; 
 and as, before the battle of Bradock Down, Hopton' 
 and Grenville had offered up solemn prayers at the; 
 head of each division, so, now, public thanksgiving 
 for the victory and deliverance was made on the* 
 summit of the hill. To the Rev. Henry Wilson,, 
 Rector of Buckland Filleigh, who attended as" 
 chaplain of the army and waited on Sir Bevill to 
 congratulate him after the victory, the soldier piously 
 and politely replied that it was more owing to the 
 parson's good prayers than to anything else.^ 
 
 " Had the Trayned-band men," says a con-^ 
 temporary reporter on the Parliamentary side, who 
 seems to have had special opportunities of knowing 
 the circumstances — "stood to it as well as the 
 Volunteers, though their want of Horse was a great 
 disadvantage, they had doubtless got the day." ^ 
 
 The flight of the defeated Parliamentarians must^ 
 have been down the north-eastern slope of the hill,, 
 whence they would at once have reached a high- 
 road leading into North Devon. The pursuit 
 appears to have been kept up by a party of 
 Digby's cavalry for only a mile or two, the 
 Royalists contenting themselves with the success 
 already achieved, and being somewhat apprehensive 
 of the still undeveloped movement of Sir George 
 Chudleigh's strong body of Horse in their rear. 
 
 Sir Bevill Grenville's local celebrity and the fame 
 
 I Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, pt. ii. p. 392. 
 ^ A Contutuation of Certain Speciall and Remarkable Passages^ Slc, 
 May 18-25, 1643, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cvi. 
 
176 CHUDLEIGH'S CONDUCT, 
 
 of his chivalric bravery had earned him a prominent 
 place in connection with this victory ; it has not 
 been given to every military hero to fight a pitched 
 battle in the parish next to his own. It may be 
 doubted if this is not a little too conspicuous in the 
 inscription on a tablet placed on the battle-field by 
 his grandson, Lord Lansdowne, and since affixed to 
 the front of the Tree Inn at Stratton, in which the 
 '' signal overthrow " of the Rebels is exclusively 
 attributed to the '* valor of Sir Bevill Grenville" 
 and the Cornish Army. 
 
 The defeat of the Parliamentarians was probably 
 due in a great measure to their inferior discipline, 
 their want of coherence, and finally perhaps to the 
 loss of their immediate commander. Major-General 
 James Chudleigh was openly charged by the Earl 
 of Stamford, his chief, with having treacherously 
 deserted to the enemy in the heat of the fight, and 
 thus to have been the cause of the disaster. We 
 have seen that he was taken prisoner. The point 
 has never been made quite clear. Lord Clarendon, 
 who could not praise Chudleigh's '' excellent parts 
 and courage '' highly enough, repudiated the 
 ''scandal," as he termed it, and asserted that it 
 was not until after Chudleigh had been some days a 
 prisoner that he recovered his loyalty and entered 
 the King's service. However this may have been, it 
 is, of course, a question whether the circumstance 
 of Chudleigh's wavering state of mind may not have 
 influenced the result of the battle, although the 
 obstinacy of the defence from five o'clock in the 
 morning until three in the afternoon seems to 
 
EARL OF STAMFORD, 177 
 
 forbid the supposition of Chudleigh's deliberate 
 treachery. ■ 
 
 Sir George Chudleigh, who on receiving news of 
 the defeat at Stratton hastily retreated to Plymouth, 
 also went over to the opposite party soon after- 
 wards, issuing a strikingly plausible manifesto to 
 his countrymen when doing so. Perhaps he pre- 
 maturely thought that the game of the Parliament 
 was already played out, or he had discovered, as 
 many others did later, that he was helping to ex- 
 change one sort of tyranny for another. Anyhow, 
 he got little more for his pains than the nickname of 
 the ''Grand Ambo-dexter," and for his exceeding 
 delinquency his estate afterwards suffered heavily. 
 James Chudleigh was killed a few months later, 
 fighting on the Royalist side at the siege of 
 Dartmouth. ^ 
 
 The Earl of Stamford, according to Lord Claren- 
 don, whose allusions to the Earl are the reverse of 
 complimentary, " stood at a safe distance all the 
 time of the battle, environed by all the Horse," 
 which, although " not above six or seven score, 
 might have done great mischief" if properly em- 
 ployed. Some of the Parliamentarians, he adds, 
 threw away their arms, others fled, dispersing 
 themselves, and every man- shifting for himself^ 
 their General giving the example." ^ 
 
 ^ Prince erroneously states that this was at the second siege in 1646 
 
 by Fairfax. 
 
 2 History of the Rehellion, p. 424 b. The insinuations made by Lord 
 Clarendon seem never to have been directly assailed. But, indirectly 
 and quite incidentally, it was completely refuted at the time by a 
 competent witness, a Devonshire gentleman of good repute, who was 
 
 13 
 
178 THE BATTLE-FIELD, 
 
 Hals, a Cornish antiquary who wrote at the 
 beginning of last century, remarks — " The country 
 people hereabout will tell you that the field where 
 this battle was fought, being afterwards tilled to 
 barley, produced sixty bushels of corn, Winchester 
 measure, in every acre ; the fertility whereof is 
 ascribed to the virtue the lands received from the 
 blood of the slain men and horses, and the trampHng 
 of their feet in this battle."^ The searcher in quest 
 of other local traditions of the fight will not be 
 surprised to learn that King Charles himself was 
 present on the occasion, or to be shown the bed 
 in which he slept ! 
 
 In the parish church of Poughill, half a mile from 
 the battle-field, there is still to be seen, painted on a 
 board affixed to the wall of the south aisle, a copy of 
 the King's Letter of Thanks to the Inhabitants of 
 Cornwall. 
 
 For this service Sir Ralph Hopton, in the follow- 
 ing September, was created Baron Hopton of 
 Stratton. 
 
 The " fitters of that broken Army " — to borrow the 
 language of Bruno Ryves in his Mercurms Rtisticiis — 
 
 present during the battle. Colonel John Were, in a vindication of 
 himself, written soon afterwards, and, of course, long before Lord 
 Clarendon's calumny was published, recounting his own services, 
 says — '*I continued all the fight and came off with my generall who 
 continued to the last, having I suppose not twenty men with him, when 
 he fired with our assistance divers peeces of Ordnance upon the 
 enemy" {The Apologic of Colonel I John Were I)i Vinduaiion of his 
 Proceedings since the beginning of this pi-esent Parliament, London, 
 printed in the year 1644, King's Pamphlets, B. AL, small 4tos, 
 vol. clxxxv.) 
 
 ' Davies Gilbert's Parochial History of Cornwall, iv. 14.] 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 179 
 
 Streamed back over Devonshire. Most of the Mili- 
 tiamen probably found shelter in the garrison towns, 
 others returned to their homes ; but they were never 
 again organized as a field force. The Earl of Stam- 
 ford retreated by Barnstaple to Exeter,^ attended, it 
 may be presumed, by the remnant of his body-guard. 
 His welcome at the former place if not cordial was 
 generous, as the following item in the Records 
 indicates : — 
 
 Paid for entertaining the Earl of Stamford 
 on two occasions ... ... ... ... ;7^io o o^ 
 
 The other occasion must have been previously — 
 whether on his advance to Stratton or earlier there 
 is nothing to show. 
 
 Captain Freeman and others — meaning, as I 
 understand it, his subordinate officers, as the same 
 circumstances apply to all of them — after receiving 
 many wounds, were taken prisoners in the battle, 
 ** lost money, horses and apparel, and, though very 
 weak, were compelled to march on foot to Truro 
 and were there long kept close prisoners in a 
 lamentable condition, till at last some by escape 
 and some by exchange got to Barnstaple." 3 
 
 The exultation of the Cornish Royalists is shown 
 in the following letter, written after receiving the 
 news of the victory, by Mr. Francis Basset, of 
 Tehidy, to his wife then at St. Michaers Mount, of 
 which he was governor. It is apparent that to the 
 writer the war seemed already over : — 
 
 ^ Rushworth, v. 272. . ' "^ No. Ixii. 
 
 3 Historical MSS, Commission^ Fifth Report, App., p. 1096. 
 
1 80 EXUL TA TIQN OF THE RO YALISTS, 
 
 Truro, this iZth May 1643, 6 o'clock, 
 
 ready to march. 
 Dearest Soule, 
 
 Oh, dear soule, prayse God everlastingly. 
 Reade this enclosed, ringe out the bells, rayse bonfyres, 
 publish these joyfuU tydings. Believe these truths, excuse 
 my writing larger, I have no tyme ; wee march on to meete 
 o"" victorious friends, and to seaze all the rebells left, if wee 
 can finde such livinge. Your dutyous prayers God hass 
 heard. Bless us accordingly, pray everlastingly, and Jane, 
 and Betty, and all you owne. Thy owne, 
 
 Frs. Basset. 
 Pray let my cousin Harry know these joyful blessings. 
 Send word to the ports south and north, to searche 
 narrowly for all strangers travellinge for passage, and 
 cause the keepinge them close and safe. 
 
 To my dearest^ dearest friend^ Mrs. Basset^ att the Mount, 
 Speede this^ haste^ haste,'^ 
 
 One of the earliest acts of the victors of Stratton, 
 w^as the arbitrary assumption of authority which is 
 evidenced by the follow^ing Letter of marque, issued 
 in the names of the leaders of the Royalist army, 
 w^ith the object of crippling the maritime resources 
 of the port towns, more particularly those of Devon- 
 shire, which were still held for the Parliament. 
 This document was printed by order of the House 
 of Commons, evidently for the purpose of showing 
 up the proceedings of the Royalists. The following 
 is a copy : — 
 
 Warwicke, Lord Mohun, Baron of Okehampton ; Sir 
 Ralph Hopton, knight of the Bath; Sir John Barkeley, 
 
 * Printed in Polwhele's Traditions arid Recollections, 1826, i. 17. 
 
A LE TTER OF MARQUE, 1 8 1 
 
 knight ; and William Ashburnham esquire, or any two 
 of them Commissioners authorized under the great 
 seal of England, in the absence of William Marques of 
 Hertford, to command all his Majesties forces in the 
 West. To George Chappell of Topesham Merchant. 
 
 We doe hereby nominate, authorise, and appoynt you 
 George Chappell to b^e Captaine and chiefe commander 
 of a ship called the Hope of Topesham, requiring you with 
 all diligence and expedition to endeavour the furnishing and 
 compleating of her with men, victuall, and ammunition, as 
 also with tackell and furniture, fit for a voyage to sea, 
 commanding all inferiour officers, souldiers, mariners, and 
 seamen, under your command in the said ship and vessell 
 to obey you as their Captaine, according to this Commis- 
 sion, authorizing you to set to sea at any time, and as often 
 as you in your discretion shall thinke fit, for the space of 
 six moneths next ensuing. And during the. said time to 
 apprehend seise and take for his Majesties service all such 
 Shipps, barques, and vessels as doe belong to the Citties, 
 towns, and ports of London, Exeter, Hull, Portmouth, 
 Dartmouth, Barnestable, Bideford, and Plimmouth, or to 
 any of them, or to any other Cities, Townes, or Ports of 
 this kingdome of England now in Rebellion against his 
 Majestic, or to the inhabitants of the same or any of them : 
 And the same to carry or bring into any of his Majesties 
 Ports or harbours within the Countie of Cornwall. That 
 the said shipp, or goods so taken by you, together with the 
 Merchants, Officers, Masters and Seamen may be proceeded 
 against according to the lawes of this Land; giving you 
 also full power and authority in case of resistance to kill 
 and slay all such as shall resist you in the execution of this 
 your commission. And you are likewise to observe and 
 follow such orders and directions as from time to time you 
 shall receive from us. Given under our hands and 
 
1 82 FEELING A T BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 scales at Honyton the first day of June Anno Domini 
 
 1643. 
 
 Warwick Mohun, 
 
 Ralph Hopton, 
 
 John Berkeley.^ 
 
 Although the authorities of Barnstaple had now 
 more reason than ever to apprehend an attack upon 
 the town, and *' surprisalls and attempts against the 
 same " were actually expected, they did not lose 
 heart and there is no suggestion of panic. In the 
 gravity of the situation further precautions were, 
 however, considered necessary, and on the 30th of 
 May, at a public meeting of the inhabitants, a new 
 '^Counsell of Warr" was appointed to concert 
 further measures for the defence of the town and 
 to provide against any sudden emergency. A 
 minute of the resolution is recorded in the " Remem- 
 brance Book " as follows : — 
 
 1643, May 30th. It is this present daye att a generall 
 meetinge agreed that there shalbe a Counsell of Warr 
 chosen for the orderinge of martiall affaires within this 
 towne duringe these troublesome tymes, and the pties soe 
 to be chosen of the towne as Mr. Will"* Palmer, Maior, 
 Mr. Geo. Peard, Esq^^, Recorder, Mr. Henry Masson, Mr. 
 Alex"" Horwood, Mr. Rich. Harris, and Mr. Willm. Nottle, 
 and of strangers, Mr. Hugh Fortescue, Esquire,^ Collonel 
 
 ' A Letter of Marl, London, July 25, 1643, King's Pamphlets, B. M., 
 small 4tos., vol. cxviii. 
 
 p Of Wear-Giffard ; second son of Hugh Fortescue of Wear-Giffard, 
 Esq., (who died 1600) by Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John Chichester 
 of Raleigh, Kt. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Coffin of 
 Portledge, Esq., in 1623, and died without leaving any issue in 1650. 
 
MORE MONE V IV A NTED, 1 8 ^ 
 
 Chudleigh,^ Collonel Rolls, Livetennte Collonel Stevenson,^ 
 and Capt. Bennett, the major parte of whom psent shall 
 from tyme to tyme have power to order and determine 
 what shalbe necessary to be done for the defence of the 
 towne, and yf there shalbe instant occasion to alter any of 
 the forenamed psons that then by the common counsell 
 of the towne shalbe chosen in the roome of such pson soe 
 to be altered another, wch Counsell of Warr are to meete 
 once a daye att nyne of the clocke in the morninge, the 
 first meetinge to be on Tuesday next, unless extraordinary 
 occasion present a necessity of speedier meetinge. 
 
 This Council practically superseded the Committee 
 appointed in the month of October previously, Mr. 
 William Nottle being the only one w^ho was retained. 
 The municipal sheep had been already so w^ell 
 shorn that it is a marvel that any wool was still 
 left. But on the question of ways and means the 
 Corporation, a fortnight later, passed a resolution 
 extending their powers of alienating the town 
 property and the lands of the Bridge Feoffees (now 
 for the first time assailed). They also authorized 
 the sale of reversionary leases, for the purpose of 
 indemnifying members of the Corporation and others 
 who had engaged for the repayment of loans raised 
 
 Mr. Fortescue was not a Member of Parliament, but took the Parlia- 
 mentary side. He was not, however, an active partisan, although he 
 contributed largely in money to the cause, as we shall presently see. 
 He appears to have been successful in assuming an outward attitude of 
 neutrality, as on the King's coming into Devonshire, in 1644, he 
 obtained a letter of protection, under the King's hand, which is still 
 preserved at Castle Hill. 
 
 ' The defection of the Chudleighs was of course not then known. 
 
 2 Of Lieutenant-Colonel Stevenson, I know nothing. His name 
 does not again occur.] 
 
£ 
 
 s. d. 
 
 400 
 
 
 
 SO 
 
 
 
 60 
 
 
 
 40 
 
 ' 
 
 184 PURITAN ZEAL, 
 
 for the purpose of further strengthening the defences 
 of the town. If this resource failed, some other 
 course should be taken to make good the deficiency. 
 Among those who now advanced the principal sums 
 were the following : — 
 
 Hugh Fortescue, Esqr. 
 Mr. George Peard ... 
 Mr. Richard Beaple 
 Mr. Pentecost Doddridge ... 
 
 The three latter contributed the sums set against 
 their names, in addition to those which they had 
 lent in the previous October. 
 
 Some slackness in the fulfilment of the engage- 
 ments made by sundry of the inhabitants was the 
 occasion of the following threat, characteristic of 
 the period, which was launched by the Corporation 
 against possible defaulters : — 
 
 Yf any of the said pyties who have soe p'mised or sub- 
 scribed shall refuse to enter into bond accordinge to his said 
 p'mise and understandige that such p'sn or p'sns soe re- 
 fusinge shall be taken and declared to be adversaries to the 
 King and Parliam^ the libtyes of the subject and professed 
 enemys to the good and welfare of this towne and of the 
 inhabitants thereof.^ 
 
 In London the fever of Puritan zeal and fanaticism 
 was at this time rising rapidly. Cheapside Cross had 
 been demolished — *' a Troop of Horse and two Com- 
 
 ' '' Remembrance Book." 
 
 " Ibid.^ under date June 27, 1643. 
 
PARLIAMENTARY TAXATION, 185 
 
 panics of Foot waiting to see it done, and at the fall 
 of the Top Cross, Drums beat, Trumpets blew, and 
 a great shout was made : Charing Cross and all other 
 Crosses in and about London were pulled down about 
 the same time." ^ " On May 10,'' says William 
 Lithgow, " I saw at noone day two great heaps of 
 books burned both where the golden crosse formerly 
 stood and before the Royall Exchange, which books 
 had been compyled b}^ the popish prelaticall faction.'' ^ 
 London was being hastily fortified and this is the 
 remarkable scene described by the same observer : — 
 
 The daily musters and showes of all sorts of Londoners 
 here were wondrous commendable in marching to the 
 fields and out-works (as merchants, silkmen, mercers, shop- 
 keepers, &c.) with great alacritie, carrying on their shoulders 
 yron mattocks and wooden shovels ; with roaring drummes 
 flying colours, and girded swords ; most companies being 
 also interlarded with ladies women and girles, two and two 
 carrying baskets, for to advance the labour where divers 
 wrought till they fell sick of their pains. All the trades and 
 whole inhabitants . . . went, day about, to all quarters, 
 for the erection of their forts and trenches ; and this hath 
 continued these four months past.^ 
 
 The pressure of Parliamentary taxation for the sup- 
 port of the war increased in severity. An Ordinance 
 of a very sweeping character was passed on the ist of 
 April, 1643, sequestering the estates, as well real as 
 personal, of the bishops ; of all who had been in arms 
 against the Parliament ; and of all who had volun- 
 
 ^ R. Burton's Wars, &c., p. %%. 
 
 ^ The Present Survsigh of London^ &c., 1643, Somers's Tracts, iv. 
 
 536. 3 ^^*'^. 
 
i86 SEQUESTRATORS. 
 
 tarily contributed to any force, or had entered into 
 any association against the Parliament. The net 
 was a wide one, and this does not exhaust the 
 calendar of delinquency, A committee of seques- 
 trators was appointed for each county, with extraor- 
 dinary powers for carrying the Ordinance into effect. 
 Those for Devonshire were — -Sir George Chudleigh, 
 Sir John Pole, Sir John Northcote, Sir Francis 
 Drake, baronets; Sir Edmund Fowell, Sir Samuel 
 Rolle, Sir Shilston Calmady, Sir Nicholas Martin, 
 knights ; Robert Savery, Henry Walrond, Francis 
 Rous, Edmund Prideaux, Henry Worth, Hugh For- 
 tescue, Arthur Upton, John Yeo, William Frye, 
 George Trobridge, esquires; The Mayor of Plymouth 
 for the time being, and Mr. John Waldon.^ 
 
 The regular weekly assessments ordered in Feb- 
 ruary had failed to bring in the expected supplies. 
 Even the partisans of the Parliament were now 
 subjected to an additional turn of the screw. Another 
 Ordinance of Parliament of the 7th of May, 1643, 
 appointed Committees in the several counties for 
 speedy raising money throughout the whole king- 
 dom, by taxing those who had not contributed or had 
 not done so according to their estates and abilities. 
 It provided for assessing and collecting from all 
 possessing ^^'lo a year in land or yearly profit, or ;;^ioo 
 in personalty, to the extent of one-fifth of their yearly 
 revenue or i-20th of the value, to be paid by collectors 
 
 ^ All the severall Ordinances and Orders made by the Lords and Com- 
 mons assefnbled in Parliament ; concerning Seqttestring the Estates of 
 Delinquents^ Papists, Spyes and Intelligencers ^ <S:c. London, Printed 
 for Edward Husbands, 1644. 
 
KING AND PARLIAMENT, 187 
 
 of the several parishes to the Treasurer at Guild 
 Hall, London, before the 24th of June. Distress if 
 necessary on refusal, with power to force, &c. Pay- 
 ments made in accordance with this demand within 
 ten days, to be " repaid upon the publick faith in such 
 sort as moneys let upon the Propositions aforesaid are 
 
 to bee repaid." ^ 
 
 At the beginning of May the main bodies of the 
 
 two armies which had fought at Edgehill were still 
 lying in their winter quarters. The King was at 
 Oxford surrounded by his troops, who were sadly 
 in want of necessaries, especially of ammunition. 
 The Parliamentary general, Essex, lay at Reading, 
 which garrison had just surrendered to him after an 
 ineffectual attempt of the King to relieve it. Mes- 
 sages with a view to a treaty between the rival powers 
 were still going to and fro. Sir William Waller, with 
 a force of two thousand Horse and dragoons detached 
 from the Parliamentary army, had made a rapid and 
 brilliant march through the South-western Counties, 
 had successively reduced several strong towns, crossed 
 the Severn, and annihilated the " mushroom army," 
 as Lord Clarendon calls it, which the Earl of 
 Worcester had raised on the Welsh side of the 
 river. 
 
 After the battle of Stratton, the news of which 
 appears to have created considerable sensation at the 
 headquarters of both the King and the Parliament, 
 Waller, who was then at Bristol, was ordered by the 
 Earl of Essex " to proceed at once with all haste to 
 Devonshire with his forces " to suppress Sir Ralph 
 
 ' Husband s's Collection, p. 169. 
 
1 88 PRINCE MA URICE, 
 
 Hopton. On the other hand, Su' Ralph, by an 
 express from Oxford, was advised of the advance of 
 Prince Maurice ^ and the Marquess of Hertford into 
 Somersetshire, and directed to co-operate with them. 
 Their business was to resist Waller, whose orders 
 seem to have been known, and who, it was expected, 
 would be reinforced by the defeated Parliamen- 
 tarians who had escaped from the battle of Stratton. 
 Waller and Hopton had been old friends and 
 comrades. 
 
 According to Lord Clarendon, Sir Ralph Hopton 
 had been uncertain, after his victory at Stratton, 
 whether to attack Plymouth or Exeter, or both ; but 
 the peremptory orders from Oxford for the concen- 
 tration of the Royalist forces determined his advance 
 into Somersetshire at once. A small detachment 
 was left in the neighbourhood of Plymouth for the 
 protection of Cornwall. The garrison of Barnstaple 
 was probably considered too isolated to be taken into 
 account. Exeter, into which the Earl of Stamford 
 
 ' Prince Maurice, who was brought into relation with the governing 
 authority of Barnstaple at a later period, was one of the sons of th 
 Princess Elizabeth, sister of Charles I. and wife of the unfortunate 
 Frederick, Prince Palatine and sometime King of Bohemia. On the 
 breaking out of the Civil War he came over to England with his elder 
 brother, the more brilliant soldier Prince Rupert, to place his sword at 
 the service of his uncle, and was at once given a high command. The 
 brothers corresponded in English — their mother's tongue. Prince 
 Maurice was at this time twenty-two years of age. He was phlegmatic 
 and arbitrary in temperament and unpopular as an officer. Schooled 
 in the military gymnasium of the Low Countries, and in a war of dynastic 
 interests and religious differences, carried on by professional and mer- 
 cenary soldiers in utter disregard of the sufferings of civilians, he per- 
 mitted a license in his English quarters which was intolerable. 
 
ADVANCE OF THE ROYALISTS. 189 
 
 had thrown himself with the wreck of his army, was 
 watched by a small force which garrisoned Columb 
 John. Within the city there was a considerable 
 Royalist element which appears to have paralyzed 
 the garrison. 
 
 Hopton reached Chard about the middle of June 
 with above 3,000 Foot, 500 Horse, 300 dragoons 
 and four or five field-pieces, and there met Prince 
 Maurice whose forces were somewhat less in number. 
 The march of Hopton*s victorious army had been 
 characterized, as m.ight be supposed, by instances 
 of plundering and license which now began to be 
 common. Here is a case which crops up in the 
 homely diary of a Devonshire yeoman : — 
 
 There came in at Credition of Coinishmen some four 
 ether five thousant and did Riefell and take away many mens 
 goods from Mat Buegingame and M*' John Rowe M*^ Throw 
 Bridge M"^ Prouse M'' Boult M'' Rogers M'"" Young with 
 others to the vallue of one thousant pounds and a half and 
 upwards by relayton of others.^ 
 
 Lord Clarendon states that "very many" of the 
 Parliamentary officers and men who had been taken 
 prisoners at Stratton had joined Hopton's army.^ 
 A general advance of the Royalist Forces then took 
 place to Taunton, which with Bridgwater and 
 Uunster Castle, was at once surrendered to them. 
 Sir Ralph Hopton was returning to Exeter when, 
 
 ^ ** Extracts from a Memorandum Book belonging to Thomas 
 Roberts and Family of Stockleigh Pomeroy," Trans. Devonshire 
 Association, x. 325. 
 
 * History of the Rebellion, p. 426 a. 
 
I90 LANSDOWN AND ROUND A WA V DO IVN 
 
 learning that Sir William Waller was in force at Bath, 
 he turned to meet him. The progress of the Royalists 
 was arrested at Wells by a body of Parliamentary 
 troops, partly from Somersetshire, partly those sent 
 out of Exeter on the apprehension of a siege, and 
 partly ** the remainder of those Horse and dragoons 
 that escaped out of Cornwall after the battle of 
 Stratton," ^ and the first that had since made a 
 stand. This force stubbornly contested the ground 
 but, after a series of sharp cavalry skirmishes, was 
 obliged to give way and retire within the lines of 
 Sir William Waller, who was now posted with a 
 newly recruited army at and about Bath. 
 
 On the 5th of July, the two armies met on the 
 heights of Lansdown, and a fiercely contested but 
 indecisive battle ensued, in which the Cornish 
 Royalists distinguished themselves by their valour, 
 and the gallant Sir Bevill Grenville was killed. 2 On 
 the whole, the advantage remained with the Parlia- 
 mentarians. A few days later Sir William Waller, 
 while slowly following up his doubtful success, was 
 defeated and crushed, on Roundaway Down, near 
 Devizes, by a sudden and haphazard attack given by 
 Lord Wilmot who had come out of Oxford with 
 fifteen hundred of the King's Horse to the support 
 of the Western army. There the last remnant of 
 
 ' Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 428 h. Meaning probably 
 the Horse and dragoons lately under .Sir George Chudleigh's command. 
 
 ^ It is stated that the Royalist Colonel John Gififord, of Brightley, 
 "commanded the Devon Pikemen at the battle of Landsdown " 
 (Vivian's Visitations of Devon, i. 400). Lord Clarendon's statement 
 (p. 189) may explain the fact of these men being on the Royalist bide. 
 
ANOTHER EXPEDITION FROM BARNSTAPLE. 191 
 
 the Devonshire Horse, after witnessing the repulse 
 of Hazlerig's cuirassiers, turned with the rest of the 
 Parliamentary cavalry and dispersed. On the 24th 
 of July, Bristol was invested on one side by Hopton 
 and his Cornishmen and by Prince Rupert, who 
 had marched from Oxford with a large force of 
 cavalry, infantry, and siege artillery, on the other. 
 On the 26th, the city was simultaneously stormed 
 on both sides and thereupon capitulated, and this 
 important success secured for some time the ascen- 
 dency of the King's cause in the West. 
 
 Having seen what became of the scattered remains 
 of the defeated Devonshire Army, it will now be 
 time to return to the garrison of Barnstaple which, 
 meanwhile, had not remained entirely inactive ; for 
 in the month of July it again took the field. The 
 incident is thus briefly referred to in the Sum- 
 mar)^ : — 
 
 For setting forth 400 foote and 70 horse to 
 beate off the enemy in Southmolton, with 
 money and victualls, 17th July 1643, 2 daies £a,o o o 
 
 It is not easy to throw any further light upon the 
 object of this expedition, or to discover its results, 
 if there were any. It will be remembered that the 
 northern part of the county had been absolutely 
 denuded of Royalist troops after the battle of 
 Stratton. The detached force which remained 
 watching Exeter, although stated by the Royalist 
 historian to have been numerically weak, had kept 
 
192 COL ONEL JOHN DIGB K 
 
 the neighbouring country in a state of terror as yet 
 new to the people. In these '' alarums and ex- 
 cursions " Sir James Hamilton's regiment of Horse 
 and dragoons, which formed part of that force, 
 committed such excesses that it had to be ex- 
 changed lest its license should weaken the in- 
 fluence of the King's party. Sir John Berkeley, 
 who had turned the tide of fortune at a critical 
 moment at the battle of Stratton, was consequently 
 sent back from the army, then at Wells, with Col. 
 Howard's regiment of Horse, to take the place of 
 Hamilton's, and with instructions to raise whatever 
 forces he could in the county for the purpose of 
 blockading Exeter. Upon this work Berkeley was 
 now engaged. In the third week of July he is found 
 defending Topsham from an attack of a Parliamen- 
 tary squadron under the Earl of Warwick which had 
 entered the Exe with the object of relieving Exeter.^ 
 In this aspect of affairs the advance of an enemy 
 upon Barnstaple from that quarter would seem to 
 have been highly improbable. 
 
 However, according to the information at the 
 Ro3^alist quarters, the north parts of Devonshire 
 had ''gathered apace into a head for the Parliament" 
 and were '* notoriously disaffected." Berkeley there- 
 fore detailed Colonel John Digby (who, it will be 
 remembered, was already familiar with the country) 
 to proceed into North Devon with his regiment of 
 Horse and " some loose troops of dragoons," for the 
 purpose of preventing a junction of the North Devon 
 rebel forces with those of Plym.outh intended, it was 
 
 * 
 
 ' See JVbfes and Gleanings, Exeter^ i. 153. 
 
ALLEGED EXPEDITION, 193 
 
 supposed, for the relief of Exeter.^ As a matter 
 of fact, Parliamentary intelligence from Plymouth 
 reported that two thousand men had been raised 
 there and at Dartmouth, who had taken Flete, 
 driven the Cavaliers from Totnes, and were marching 
 towards Exeter, hoping to meet other forces from 
 Barnstaple and the northern parts of Devon to join 
 with them in that expedition.^ Whatever may have 
 been the scheme thus concerted, that it led to 
 nothing is sufficiently known. ^ It was probably the 
 advance of Digby's force, the intention or destination 
 of which was not apparent to the garrison of Barn- 
 staple, but which anyhow threatened it, that drew 
 out the party from the town on the 17th of July, and 
 led to the two days' expedition to South Molton 
 which is noted in the Summary. 
 
 An obscure and entirely unsupported item of intelli- 
 gence which occurs in one of the London diurnals of 
 this period seems to refer to another and subsequent 
 expedition of which there is no account in our local 
 guide, the Summary. It is as follows : — 
 
 Aug. 15. Out of Devonshire it is informe that the In- 
 habitants of Barnstable, Beddyford and Torrington, in the 
 North part of that County, are joyned in a body, and are 
 gone into Cornwall, and that they intend to seize upon the 
 houses, estates and goods of such of the Cornish Cavaliers 
 
 ^ Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 453 b. 
 
 2 Certaiiie Informations, &c., No. 26, July 1 0-17, 1643, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cxvii. 
 
 3 This was apparently the expedition under the command of Sir 
 Alexander Carew to which Berkeley alludes as having been repulsed 
 (see his letter printed in Notes and Gleanings, i. 154). 
 
 .14 
 
194 ITS FAILURE, 
 
 as now besiege Excester, endeavouring by that meanes to 
 draw them from that City, to looke to the safety of their 
 owne substances at home : which Policie was heretofore 
 used by the Romans to draw Hanniball out of Italy, when 
 he had almost wasted and overrunne it.' 
 
 This must have happened, if at all, very early 
 in August at the latest, because, as v^ill presently 
 appear, the passage of such a force from North 
 Devon into Cornw^all would soon afterguards have 
 been barred by a strong Royalist force on its path. 
 The same diurnal reports the following further in- 
 formation of two days' later date in reference to this 
 expedition : — 
 
 Aug. 17. Out of the West it is informed that the Devon- 
 shire Forces which went lately into Cornwall, to seize upon 
 the estates of those Cornish men that besiege Excester (in 
 hope to draw them from thence) are againe retired into their 
 own County, without effecting much to their purpose, because 
 the whole power of the County of Cornwall rose against 
 them, so that their numbers being farre unequall to the 
 Cornish strength, they were forced to give over their designe, 
 and returne to their own homes againe.^ 
 
 There is, so far as I am aware, and as I have 
 already implied, no other account of the alleged 
 expedition. The fact, however, would not have been 
 inconsistent with the evident determination of the 
 Parliamentarians of North Devon to carry on the 
 war locally with the utmost vigour. 
 
 ^ Certaine Infoi'mations, &c., No. 31, Aug. 14-21, 1 643, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M. , small 4tos, vol. cxxii. 
 ^ Certaiite hiforjiiations^ &c., ibid. 
 
DIGBY OCCUPIES TORRINGTON, 195 
 
 Colonel Digby, whose flying column, notwith- 
 standing Lord Clarendon's previous statement, could 
 not have consisted, upon the historian's own sub- 
 sequent showing, of many more than two hundred ' 
 Horse and dragoons, reached Torrington without, 
 so far as we know, having fallen in with the 
 detachment from the garrison of Barnstaple which 
 had sallied out on the 17th of July in the direc- 
 tion of South Molton, or with the combined 
 force which is stated to have attempted the raid 
 upon the Cornish Cavaliers. A passage in Lord 
 Clarendon's History implies that this happened 
 within a few days after the fall of Bristol. ^ That 
 was on the 26th of July ; the occupation of Tor- 
 rington may therefore be approximately set down 
 as having taken place about the ist of August. 
 Within the next fortnight it appears that Digby 
 received an addition to his strength of a troop of 
 Horse and a regiment of Foot raised in Cornwall, 
 bringing up his force to above three hundred Horse 
 and six or seven hundred Foot.^ 
 
 The presence of Colonel Digby '3 force at Torring- 
 ton was a menace to the Parliamentarians of Barn- 
 staple and Bideford who, with more boldness than 
 discretion, resolved, in the phraseology of the time, 
 to try their fortune by beating up the Royalist 
 quarters, instead of waiting for an attack. With 
 this object, a combined expedition was planned and 
 carried out by the troops which garrisoned the two 
 towns. Lord Clarendon, who is not always to be 
 relied upon in such a particular, exaggerated when he 
 
 ' Histojy of the Rebellion^ p. 442 a, "" Ibid, p. 453 ^« 
 
196 A SURPRISE INTENDED. 
 
 estimated the number of the confederates as superior 
 to that of Digby's force, and .to have amounted to 
 above 1,200 Foot and 3C^o Horse. We know from 
 our local record, which is more trustworthy than the 
 Royalist historian's estimate, that the garrison of 
 Barnstaple actually furnished only 370 Foot and 130 
 Horse ; ^ and the Bideford contingent, the strength 
 of which is not known, was almost certainly smaller 
 in number. It is doubtful if the whole force ex- 
 ceeded 500 Foot and 200 Horse. Captain Bennet, 
 whose company was one of those which garrisoned 
 Barnstaple, was in chief command of the expedition, 
 and Captain Freeman led the Barnstaple cavalry. 
 
 Watkins, the author of the Essay towards a History 
 of Bideford (1792), with transparent antipathy to 
 the Puritans, embellished his paraphrase of Lord 
 Clarendon's narrative with the probably gratuitous 
 observation that if the Parliamentarians had not 
 ** wasted their time in preaching and praying and 
 seeking the Lord" they might have attacked Digby 
 with more advantage before he had received his 
 reinforcements. The postulate, at least, seems in- 
 disputable. 
 
 A surprise seems to have been intended; but some 
 Royalist in Barnstaple succeeded in giving Colonel 
 Digby timely intelligence of the enterprise the night 
 before it took place. Lord Clarendon has preserved 
 in a quotation the very words of the traitorous com- 
 munication — " that the forces drew out thence to 
 
 ' As the number of Horse quartered in Barnstaple at this time is 
 stated in the Summary to have been only seventy, it seems that another 
 troop was mounted, or called in, perhaps for this particular service. 
 
TORRINGTON. 197 
 
 Bideford in th-e night, and that they intended to fall 
 on his quarters early in the morning." ^ 
 
 The road by which the Barnstaple troops marched 
 to join their allies at Bideford diverges only slightly 
 from the more direct road from Barnstaple to 
 Torrington. The length of this first stage was 
 rather more than eight miles. From Bideford to 
 Torrington it was about six miles farther. 
 
 The hill upon which the town of Torrington stands 
 is, on the south side, almost a precipice, rising to the 
 height of about 300 feet, from the right bank of the 
 river Torridge. On the north side of the town 
 it slopes, at first steeply, but afterwards more 
 gradually, towards a shallow valley, opening, a mile 
 farther west, into that of the Torridge. Down this 
 slope for half a mile extends a road, now called 
 Church Lane, in most places deeply cut into the 
 soil, which leaves one of the main thoroughfares 
 of the town opposite the parish church, and is, in 
 fact, the old road to Bideford. The ground on each 
 side of this road is enclosed, and was no doubt much 
 the same at the time of the incidents to be described 
 as it is now. For some distance eastward of the 
 point where the road reaches the bottom of the 
 slope a thick bank, or hedge, extends longitudinally 
 up the valley, forming the boundary of the enclosed 
 land on this side of it. On the opposite side of the 
 valley the ground rises less steeply in almost an 
 amphitheatrical form. It is a piece of rough moor- 
 land, sprinkled with furze-bushes, and is known 
 partly as Norwood Common and partly as Fisher's 
 
 ' History of the Rebellion ^ p. 453 b. 
 
 * » 
 
198 APPROACH OF THE PARLIAMENTARIANS, 
 
 Down. The extent of the actual open waste is evi- 
 dently less than it was in the seventeenth century, 
 some of it having been since enclosed. On the 
 higher ground are the cultivated fields of the farm 
 belonging to the old manor-house of Norwood. The 
 open common is intersected by three roads which, 
 converging, fall into Church Lane before mentioned, 
 where it reaches the bottom of the valley. The 
 middle one is the old road from Bideford. 
 
 Colonel Digby, having been apprised, as we have 
 seen, of the intended attack upon his position, dreW 
 up his forces on the hillside below the town, lining 
 the hedges with his Foot, and placing the Horse in 
 the enclosures. He had broken gaps in the fences 
 through which the cavalry could freely operate. 
 Here he remained in expectation of the coming of 
 the Parliamentarians until noon, when the scouts 
 who had been sent out having "returned with 
 assurance that there was no appearance of an 
 enemy,'* he ''believed they had given over their 
 design ; and so dismissed his Horse to their several 
 quarters reserving only one hundred and fifty upon 
 their guard and returned himself into the town with 
 the Foot." I 
 
 Thus far Lord Clarendon. But the Mercurius 
 Aiiliciis of August 20-26,2 printed at Oxford, in 
 an account purporting to have been written by " a 
 gentleman who was an actor in the business," states 
 that Colonel Digby advanced with four troops of 
 Horse four miles out of the town, where he made 
 
 ^ Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 453 3. 
 == Burney Collection, B. M., vol. ii.. No. 13. 
 
RO YALISTS ALARMED. 199 
 
 a stand for eight or nine hours. There being no 
 appearance of the rebels, the troops were then 
 retired to their quarters in the town. This may 
 refer to a reconnaisance earlier in the morning. 
 
 About two o'clock in the afternoon an alarm came 
 in that the enemy was within half a mile of the 
 town. In the midst of some confusion the Royalist 
 Foot was hastily placed in the best manner possible 
 ** upon the avenues" (presumably the streets and 
 lanes which converged on both sides of the church- 
 yard upon the Bideford road); Sir James Colebrand's 
 dragoons lined the hedges nearest the town ; and 
 Colonel Digby himself hurried off to the Horse 
 which had been left on guard outside. Then he 
 discovered the enemy, with their cavalry in front, 
 drawn up on the common which faced his own 
 position in the enclosures. 
 
 '' The 'Colonel . . . intended rather to look upon 
 them than to engage with them before his other 
 troops came up." In the meantime he '^ divided 
 his small party of Horse, the whole consisting but 
 of one hundred and fifty, into several parties, and 
 distributed them into several little closes out of 
 which there were gaps into the larger ground upon 
 which the enemy stood." ^ 
 
 We will now return, for a moment, to the pro- 
 ceedings of the Parliamentarians. 
 
 The military tactics of that period are usually 
 styled simple. In this case the enterprise of the 
 combined Barnstaple and Bideford forces was not 
 merely simple, but obviously foolhardy. To assault, 
 
 ^ History of the Rebellion, pp. 453 ^"453 ^« 
 
200 THE ATTACK. 
 
 and by a direct front attack, a force numerically 
 superior, as Digby's undoubtedly was, and occupying 
 a position admirably capable of defence, was, to say 
 the least of it, hazardous. These very men, it is 
 true, had distinguished themselves by their bravery 
 at Modbury ; but over-confidence in themselves and 
 bad generalship led to the results not unfrequently 
 to be met with in the pages of English military 
 history. 
 
 The main body of Parliamentary forces which, 
 according to the circumstantial information sent to 
 Colonel Digby, had marched out of Barnstaple at 
 night, must have needed rest and refreshment when 
 they reached Bideford. Whatever may have been 
 the concerted plan, there was not much likelihood 
 of their forming a junction with the Bideford con- 
 tingent,' advancing at once, reaching Torrington, 
 more than fourteen miles by this route from their 
 starting-point, and surprising the Royalists at day- 
 break on an August morning. Delay inevitably 
 intervened. It was not until past noon, as we have 
 learnt, that the whole body was discovered passing 
 over the brow of the hill at Norwood and forming on 
 the common opposite Digby*s position; the infantry 
 composed chiefly of pike-men, drawn up, as was 
 usual, in a solid phalanx, with musketeers on their 
 flanks, and supported by two field pieces ; the small 
 force of Horse, as the account tells us, in the van. 
 
 *' A forlorn hope of fifty musketeers *' of the 
 Parliamentarians (to continue Lord Clarendon's 
 narrative), *' advanced towards that ground where 
 himself [Digby] was ; and if they had recovered the 
 
THE FIGHT, 2oi 
 
 hedge they would easily have driven him thence. 
 And therefore as the only expedient left, himself 
 taking four or five officers into the front with him 
 charged that forlorn hope ; which immediately threw 
 down their arms and run upon their own body, and 
 . . . without making a stand, or their horse offering 
 once to charge, the whole body routed themselves 
 and fled/*' The account in the Mercuritis Atdicus 
 is not materially different from Lord Clarendon's. 
 
 To the present writer who, one clear day in early 
 autumn, stood on the ground occupied by the 
 Parliamentarians, which may be indicated by the 
 position of the 14th milestone from Barnstaple, the 
 whole scene, to the mind's eye, could be perfectly" 
 realized. The ''forlorn," or advanced party of fifty 
 musketeers, feeling their way towards the hedge 
 which has been described as running longitudinally 
 up the valley at the bottom of the opposite slope, 
 to attack the small parties of the enemy's Horse' 
 which were discernible in the fields beyond — the 
 sudden rush of the Cavaliers, led by Digby himself, 
 imitating the tactics of Prince Rupert, out of the 
 little enclosures farther up the valley, through gaps 
 which almost seemed still visible in the hedgerows, 
 taking them in flank and throwing them back in 
 
 ' History of the Rebellion, p. 454 a, Gribble {Memorials of Barn- 
 staple, p. 449) assumes from Lord Clarendon's description of the engage- 
 ment that the whole Parliamentarian force was routed by Colonel Digby 
 and five of his officers ! This may be a permissible, but is not, I ven- 
 ture to think, the right, interpretation even of the historian's meaning. 
 The account in the Mercurius Aulicus allows the more reasonable 
 inference that Digby made his onslaught at the head of about one 
 hundred of his Hojse. 
 
202 PARLIAMENTARIANS ROUTED, 
 
 confusion upon their main body — the general panic 
 which ensued — and the pursuit of the broken force 
 by the exultant Royalist troopers. 
 
 Our knowledge of the details of the conflict is 
 derived from the two slightly varying accounts 
 which I have used. What follows may be taken 
 perhaps with a customary reservation ; for the 
 Royalist historian has generally little that is compli- 
 mentary to say of the courage or military skill of his 
 political opponents. In the action — for he will 
 hardly call it a skirmish, much less a battle — Lord 
 Clarendon states that '* near two hundred were 
 killed and above two hundred taken prisoners," and 
 that the remainder '* were scattered and dispersed 
 over all the country and scarce a man without a cut 
 over the face and head or some other hurt ; " and he 
 indulges in the extravagant hyberbole that the 
 swords of the pursuers ^'were blunted with slaughter." 
 He also intimates that the Divine interposition in 
 favour of the Cavaliers was unconsciously acknow- 
 ledged by those who escaped, inasmuch as they told 
 strange stories of the horror and fear that seized 
 upon them, although nobody had seen above six of 
 the enemy that charged them.^ 
 
 The Mercuritis Aulictts gives as the result of this 
 action that loo of the Parliamentarians were slain 
 upon the spot, that 211 officers and common soldiers 
 were taken prisoners, most of them miserably 
 wounded ; and that there were captured — 2 field- 
 pieces, 6 barrels of powder, 400 weight of bullet, 
 200 and a half of match, and above 300 arms, 
 
 ^ History of the Rebellion^ p. 454 a. 
 
PARLIAMENTARIAN LOSSES. 203 
 
 besides all the Foot-officers' horses. The rebel 
 Horse, according to this authority, '*ranne all away 
 leaving their poore Foot to the mercy of the 
 Conqueror: who having soone given order con- 
 cerning the prisoners and the spoile, pursued the 
 run-awayes to the very workes of Biddeford; but 
 the night being now come on, he return'd 
 victoriously, having lost in all this service but 
 one man, the rest of his men not having bled so 
 much as one drop all the day.'' ^ 
 
 The record of this disastrous expedition occurs 
 with characteristic brevity in the Summary : — 
 
 For setting forth 370 Souldiers and 130 
 Horse against Torrington, with money and 
 victualls 3rd August 1643 2 dales £Zo o o 
 
 Then, as a counterpart to this, the following item 
 appears in the accounts of the Receiver of the 
 Corporation for the year ending Michaelmas that 
 year — the last account which has survived, of 
 the period under notice — a confirmation of the 
 sanguinary nature of the merciless cavalry charge 
 which was the sequel of the affair. It is an 
 allowance of 
 
 v/. paid to Mr. Will"" Palmer [mayor] for soe much by 
 him paid to Salisbury towards the curinge of the hurted 
 soldiers att Torrington. 
 
 Captain Freeman returned to Barnstaple with the 
 remains of his two troops of Horse to receive the 
 
 ^ Mercuriiis AtiHcus^ Aug. 20-26, 1643, Burney Collection, B. M., 
 vol. ii., No. 13. 
 
204 MEMORIALS OF TORRINGTON FIGHT. 
 
 malediction or condolence of the authorities, as the 
 case may have been. But he was treated not un- 
 generously. His dinner bills were discharged, and 
 a gratuity was presented to him, as we find in the 
 same account : — 
 
 vii/. xi". paid Richard Harris vintner for dyett & other 
 charges for Captaine Freeman, And of v/. more paid 
 Captaine Freeman by the Approbation of the Maior 
 Aldermen & others for his paynes & service done for this 
 Towne. 
 
 Captain Freeman, whose name is not otherwise 
 connected with Barnstaple, was probably one of 
 those soldiers of fortune who had learnt the art of 
 war amongst the mercenary forces employed in the 
 Netherlands, and who, on the breaking out of 
 the English Civil War, offered their services and 
 valuable experience to one or other of the contend- 
 ing parties. 
 
 In the parish register of Torrington the following 
 entry occurs among the burials in the month of 
 August, 1643: — 
 
 Seaven of the militia men that came ag' Torrington from 
 Bideford & Barstable being slaine neare about norwood & 
 the Comons were buried the xxth day. 
 
 There is recorded, in the month of September, the 
 burial of a Parliamentarian, who, presumably, had 
 been mortally wounded in the fight and had lived 
 long enough to give his name : — 
 
DATE OF TORRINGTON FIGHT. 205 
 
 William Herman a souldyer of Pilton [Barnstaple] for 
 the militia was buryed the iiijth day ; 
 
 » 
 
 also of a Royalist, in the same month : — 
 
 Brace Vawen [Vaughan ?] Chirurgion to Colonell Digby's 
 Army was buryed the viijth day. 
 
 The precise date of the fight at Torrington has 
 been involved in unnecessary confusion. Watkins, 
 in his history of Bideford, categorically fixes it as 
 the 2nd of September, for which there is no 
 authority whatsoever, and which is irreconcilable 
 with other authenticated circumstances. The in- 
 ferences with which he follows up this assumption 
 are therefore equally erroneous. 
 
 I am reluctant to question the strict accuracy 
 of the dates in the Summary, having tested and 
 proved their general trustworthiness ; but in this 
 case the date of the expedition to Torrington, given 
 as " 3rd Aug," is certainly wrong. It was not until 
 the end of July, as has been stated, that Digby 
 reached Torrington, and he had been there long 
 enough to be strengthened by additional troops from 
 Cornwall before he was attacked. Besides, the 
 burial of soldiers killed in the fight at Torrington, 
 as recorded in the parish register, took place on 
 the 20th of August — obviously too long afterwards 
 not to raise the question. The true date seems to 
 be fixed by the Mercttrms Aidicus, in the number 
 from which I have freely quoted. The news of the 
 incident is there stated to have reached Oxford on 
 Thursday the 24th of August. Allowing three days 
 
2o6 DIGB V BESIEGES BIDEFORD. 
 
 for its transmission (which is ample), the letter con- 
 taining it may have been written at Torrington on 
 the previous Monday, and it mentions that the 
 incident had happened on ** last Saturday." There 
 can be no reasonable doubt, therefore, that the 
 Torrington fight took place on Saturday the 19th of 
 August ; and this is perfectly consistent with the 
 date of the burial of seven of the slain recorded in 
 the parish register. The "3rd August" of the 
 Summary is manifestly an error — probably of a 
 transcriber who read iij for xix in the original ; a 
 mistake into which, from my own personal know- 
 ledge of the caligraphy of the local records of the 
 period, I should judge that it was easy to fall. 
 
 No time was lost by Colonel Digby in following 
 up his advantage. He appears to have immediately 
 threatened Bideford, and within two or three days 
 after his victory, according to Lord Clarendon, a 
 small fort or battery at Appledore, which com- 
 manded the navigable channel of the rivers Taw 
 and Torridge at their confluence, was yielded up to 
 him. It must have been at this time —at least it 
 seems so to me judging from the whole wording 
 of the following extract — that the authorities of 
 Barnstaple helped their neighbours in the way 
 which this item in the Summary shows : — 
 
 For money corne and powder sent to 
 Bideford to incourage them to hold out 
 against ye Seidge of Coll. Digby ... ... ;^2oo o o 
 
 These timely supplies were probably sent by water 
 and so escaped the notice of the enemy. It is clear, 
 
BARNSTAPLE PREPARES TO RESIST 207 
 
 therefore, that the town of Bideford was in a 
 position to make at least a show of defence. The 
 front of the town rested on the wide tidal river 
 Torridge. On the opposite bank a thin suburb, called 
 East-the-Water, extended along the river-side, and 
 was surmounted by Chudleigh's fort already men- 
 tioned. The entrances of the town proper were 
 no doubt defended, and a small fort or redoubt 
 had been thrown up on the top of the hill on the 
 steep slope of which the town stands. Digby does 
 not appear to have been provided with artillery, 
 if we except the two pieces which fell into his 
 hands at Torrington fight. The proceedings of the 
 Barnstaple authorities may not have originated 
 altogether in disinterested generosity. Bideford, as 
 it were an outlying post, if it fell, would carry with 
 it the command of the entrance of the river Taw, 
 and cut off theaccessof Barnstaple to and from the sea. 
 As for Barnstaple itself, it is not unlikely that, as 
 the full purport of the defeat before Torrington be- 
 came known to the inhabitants, something of the 
 nature of a panic set in. As is often the case, a con- 
 tingent event, always possible, and carefully provided 
 against, came at last as a surprise. In the immi- 
 nent prospect of an assault from the enemy, the more 
 likely if Bideford fell, the earthworks were, by order 
 of the Corporation, hastily strengthened, and *' gates '' 
 were erected, presumably at the most assailable en- 
 trance to the town on the south side, or for barricading 
 the bridge. These additional precautions may be 
 inferred from the following items of expenditure in 
 the Receiver's account of the year : — 
 
2o8 ROYALIST DESIGNS AFTER BRISTOL. 
 
 • ymf vi^ p^ Beniamyn Roweley for cuttinge of Turfe by 
 M' Thomas Cope his order. 
 
 1" viij' paid for Carriage of two & twenty boates of 
 Turfes from the key. 
 
 And of v^ ij^ w'*^ he paid unto John Witheridge for two 
 peices of Tymber for beames for gates. 
 
 And of xviij' paid Nicholas Symons for the Plowmans 
 dyett that brought in the tymber for the gates. 
 
 The trifling incident of the provision of diet for the 
 *' plowmen" {i.e., the drivers of teams) seems to 
 suggest the urgency of the proceeding.^ 
 
 It v^^ill now be desirable to revert for a moment to 
 the Royalist army which was left around Bristol after 
 the surrender of that city. It was perceived that 
 there were strong military reasons, after the defeat 
 
 ^ I think I am warranted in the inference which I have drawn from 
 these details of expenditure in the Receiver's account of the year ending 
 Michaelmas, 1643. The items relate, of course, to only a fraction of 
 the whole defences of the town, and they have this peculiarity, that they 
 contain the only record of payments with respect to the construction of 
 fortifications occuring in the Corporation accounts, the extraordinary 
 cost of these works having been met, as v/e have seen, from exceptional 
 sources. Although the order of time in which the entries appear 
 in the Receiver's accounts is not exactly to be depended upon, no 
 monthly dates being ever mentioned, it is significant that these items 
 are all mixed up indiscriminately at the end of the year's account with 
 those already extracted relating to the losses at Torrington, and others 
 consequent upon that disaster. They seem to belong, therefore, to 
 this particular crisis. Had they appertained to the time when the 
 first moderate scheme of the Corporation for fortifying the town was 
 concocted, they would have occurred in the previous year's account ; 
 had they been connected with the defences of the town carried out in 
 the interim, it is reasonable to assume that they would have been merged 
 into the far larger expenditure-account, the full particulars of which have 
 unfortunately not survived. 
 
PRINCE MA URICE BEFORE L VME, 209 
 
 and dispersion of the Parliamentarians under Sir 
 William Waller, and the series of successes which 
 had been gained by the King's detached forces, for 
 combining the whole of those forces for some decided 
 movement. It is on record that the main cause of a 
 different plan being adopted was the refusal of the 
 Cornishmen, who had so brilliantly distinguished 
 themselves in these operations, to advance any 
 farther. They had lost their favourite leaders — 
 Grenville, Slanning (who, by thfe v/ay, was a Devon- 
 shire man), and Trevanion — and, if not discouraged, 
 at all events, preferred to return to their own county.^ 
 While the King in person, therefore, set out with 
 his own immediate forces to prosecute the siege of 
 Gloucester, then held for the Parliament by Colonel 
 Massey, the Cornishmen, with some other local 
 troops, were placed under the orders of Prince 
 Maurice and the Earl of Carnarvon. The latter set 
 out from before Bristol with about two thousand 
 Horse and dragoons, and the former two days later 
 with the Foot and artillery. These flying columns 
 had no enemy in the field to meet ; their business was 
 to attack those fortified towns in Dorsetshire and 
 Devonshire which still held out for the Parliament. 
 Dorchester, the first assailed, at once capitulated, 
 and Weymouth followed. The Royalist troops under 
 the Prince were then indulged in such license that 
 Lord Carnarvon threw up his command in disgust. 
 Prince Maurice advanced to Lyme Regis, which 
 
 ^ Lord Clarendon intimates another reason— that of providing a suit- 
 able independent command for Prince Maurice ! {//isto;y of the Rebellion, 
 p. 442 b.) 
 
 15 
 
2 TO PRINCE MAURICE'S ADVANCE TO EXETER, 
 
 " returned so peremptory a refusal to the Prince's 
 summons that his highness resolved not to attack 
 them." ^ He then marched with the whole force 
 to Exeter, and, forming a junction with Sir John 
 Berkeley, completely invested the city. This took 
 place about the middle of August. For more than a 
 month the Earl of Stamford, whose incapacity has 
 been before alluded to, had suffered himself and a 
 garrison more numerous and better supplied with 
 means than the besieging force under Berkeley, to 
 be shut up within the walls of Exeter, notwithstand- 
 ing that a Parliamentary squadron under the Earl of 
 Warwick had come up the Exe as far as Topsham to 
 divert the attention of the besiegers. Apparently 
 only one attempt in the way of a sortie had been 
 made, when, after a useless fight, eighty prisoners 
 are stated to have been taken from the enemy by the 
 citizens. 2 But Lord Stamford, it seems, was playing 
 a double game. So recently as the 4th of August he 
 had written a letter to King Charles professing to be 
 holding Exeter for him and for the preservation of 
 peace. 3 
 
 The steps leading to the fate of Exeter were almost 
 coincident with those by which the fortunes of Barn- 
 staple were now descending. To the former I can 
 only incidentally refer. I return to North Devon 
 
 ^ Clarendon's History of the Rebellion^ p. 453 a. 
 
 - The Copie of a Letter sent from Exeter^ &c. (Davidson's Bibliotheca 
 Devoniensis^ p. 69). 
 
 3 Calendar of Clarendon State Papers in the Bodleian Library^ No. 
 1,720. 
 
. BARNSTAPLE DESPONDENT, 2 1 1 
 
 and to the transactions which followed the disaster 
 at Torrington. The few days which intervened be- 
 tween that disaster and its sequel were days, we may 
 be sure, of intense anxiety and of great perplexity in 
 Barnstaple. The Mayor, as virtually governor of the 
 fortress, bore the burden of a grave responsibility. 
 The news of the entry of a fresh Royalist army into 
 the county may well have accentuated the alarm, if 
 it did not, as Lord Clarendon puts it, bring '* a new 
 terror." But, in truth, the Parliamentary cause was 
 at that time almost everywhere, but especially in the 
 West, at a low ebb and in a critical condition. The 
 common people were already tired of the war. " My 
 countrymen," writes one at this time, *'love their 
 pudding at home better than a musket or pike 
 abroad, and if they could have peace care not what 
 side had the better." ^ 
 
 After the first burst of the excitement, conspicuous 
 in the hurried despatch of supplies to Bideford, 
 had expended itself, despondency seems to have 
 settled down on the spirits of the ruling authorities 
 of Barnstaple. The first glimpse of what was pass- 
 ing in this interval is obtained from Oxford, where 
 the following piece of intelligence was circulated 
 under the date of August 29 : — 
 
 It was this day signified from the West that Barnstaple 
 and Biddeford being sensible of their own condition since 
 the defeat given to their partizans : and (to say truth) to the 
 whole body of the Forces, by that brave and Noble Colonell 
 John Digby, of which you heard at large in the former 
 
 * Cartels Original Letters ^ &c., i. 2i, 
 
2 1 2 NEGO TIA TION FOR A S URRENDER, 
 
 weeke ; and being utterly unable to repaire that losse, were 
 upon treaty of Accommodation, with some of His Majesties 
 Officers and Commanders in those parts of that County : 
 and that there was nothing wanting to the settlement of a 
 good accord, but the petulancy of Master Peard (that pru- 
 dent, learned, and comely Gentleman) who did as much 
 oppose it there as my Lord Say, or Pym, or Isaac Penning- 
 ton ^ could doe, in any of the three Houses wherein they are 
 leaders.^ 
 
 In this passage the hand of Sir John Birkenhead, 
 whose sarcasm enlivened the pages of the weekly 
 news-sheet which he conducted for the delectation 
 of the idlers about the Court, is discernible. The 
 information, however, was undoubtedly authentic. 
 Negotiations for the surrender of Barnstaple had 
 been entered upon. On the very day, in fact, on 
 which this print made its appearance at Oxford, the 
 Corporation of the town were in debate on certain 
 propositions which had been received from Prince 
 Maurice, Commander of the King's forces in Devon- 
 shire. George Peard, it appears, was present, and, 
 with unshaken faith in his cause, counselling further 
 resistance — if any could be said to have been yet 
 seriously offered. The Prince's letter was dated two 
 days before from his head-quarters at Polsloe, one 
 mile from Exeter. This summons or invitation, 
 whichever it may be more appropriately called, was 
 
 p Sir Isaac Pennington, Lord Mayor of London, who swayed the 
 Civic Council as Say is supposed to have done the Lords, and Pym the 
 Commons. George Peard's influence with the Barnstaple Corporation 
 is here not obscurely girded at.] 
 
 = jMt'rcurius Atilicus^, Aug. 27-Sept. I, 1 643, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos,*voL cxxiv. 
 
PRINCE MA URICE'S PROPOSITIONS. 213 
 
 evidently the result of a previous conference. The 
 following is the exact text : — 
 
 To the Mayor 6^ Corporation of Bar staple. 
 
 His Maties gratious disposition rather to reduce with 
 Clemency his seduced Subiects, then wth severity to Cutt 
 them off, & to drawe no bloud where milder remedies 
 may worke y^ Cure, hath byn evidenced to y^ Kingdome in 
 severall declaracions & pclamations : w*^ phaps have byn 
 detayned from y® sight of you or most of you (as in divers 
 other places) by y^ practice of such as desired either to 
 sowe or foment causeless iealousies ag^^ their most gratious 
 Soveraigne & desired to carry well meaning Subiects 
 hoodwinkt wth faire but false ptences to y^ furthering of 
 theyr owne secrett & unlawful! designes, though not wth- 
 out indangering y^ miserable ruyne both of Subiects and 
 Kingdome. To open yo"" eyes, & to deliver you from 
 these vinnst [? evinced] surmises of y^ Kings intencon to 
 introduce Popery «Sc arbitrary Govermnt, I knowe not 
 what clearrer and fuller security y^ subiect needs desire or 
 y^ King is able to give then y* his Mat'^^ most solempne 
 Protestation (extant in print) made at Oxford as hee was 
 goeing to receyve y^ holy Sacram*, wherein w**^ a sacred 
 reverence hee publiquely pfessed, before y^ God of Heaven, 
 and the Lords of his owne Court, y' hee will to y^ death 
 defend & maintayne y^ true protestant Religion as it was 
 pfessed in y^ purest tymes of Queene Elizabeth, y^ iust 
 Priviledges of Parliam', y^ Lawes of y^ Land, and y^ Libty 
 & pperty of y^ subject. 
 
 W^^ declaration, together w'^ Gods Almighty assistance 
 evidently demonstrated by y*" many late successes of his 
 Mat'^^ Forces both in y^ North & West, hath so farr 
 pvailed w^*" many, that not onely y^ Earles of Holland, 
 Bedford, Clare, and Lord Lovelace, but divers of the House 
 of Comons have come in to his Mat'^; & the Lords of 
 
214 PRINCE MAURICES PROPOSITIONS. 
 
 Northumberland, Pembroke and Salisbury have deserted 
 y* party, and are retyred from London : that there remayne 
 in y^ House of Lords not above seven at y^ most, and of 
 the Comons not y^ 5^^ parte. Nevertheles to psecute his 
 Mat'^ sweete & mercifall intencons, & to pvent y^ 
 effusion of his Subiects bloud, w*"^ hee esteemeth as his 
 owne, & to save his (formerly well governed) Towne from 
 Calamity & ruyne, I declare to you in his Mat'^^ name, 
 y^ hee is ready to impute yo*" breach of duty & Loyalty 
 hitherto unto others seducing yo"" hearts & yo"" mistaking 
 his. And therefore if now to testify yo"^ reall intencon to 
 live hereafter in due obedience to his Mat'^ & y^ Lawes of 
 y'' Land, & to submitt to y*" discipline of y^ Church of 
 England established by Lawe, you shall forthwth, before or 
 upon y^ last day of this instant moneth, disband and dis- 
 misse all yo'" extraordinary Forces, & abstayne from all 
 Military actions not warranted by his Mat'" authority, 
 
 I doe hereby pmise & undertake on myne Honor, in y^ 
 words of a Prince, 
 
 1. That yee all, & y^ rest, who (at y® date hereof) are 
 wthin yo"* Walls or Jurisdiccon shall bee freely & fully 
 pardoned. 
 
 2. That no man shall bee permitted to plunder or violate 
 yo'' psons goods or estates. 
 
 3. That yo"" Towne shall bee left unto yo"* selves (free 
 from any Garrison) to bee governed as formerly by y^ Mayo' 
 & his Brethren. 
 
 4. That you shall not bee burthened w*^ any Fines or 
 extraordinary rates & taxes, but onely in a due pporcon 
 w^^' y^ rest of y^ County. 
 
 Maurice. 
 Given at my Quarter at Polesloe 
 the 27th of August, 1643.^ 
 
 A Copy, Additional MSS., B. M., No. 18,980, f. no. 
 
REPL V OF THE CORPORA TUN. 2 1 5 
 
 The result of the deliberation of the Mayor and 
 Corporation in this crisis of their affairs was the 
 following reply to Prince Maurice's overture : — 
 
 To the Most Excellent Prince Maurice. The Humble 
 Submission and thankfull acceptation of the Mayor 6^ 
 Corporacon of Bar staple : 
 
 Most Noble & Vertuous Prince. 
 
 On Monday Last towards y^ end of the day wee 
 receyved y® pledge of y*" Highnes Favor in y^ pposicons of 
 Peace, w""^ you were gratiously pleased to send unto us, 
 both for o"" selves and all y^ rest who at y^ date of that 
 writing were wthin our Walls or Jurisdiccon, & accord- 
 ingly with the best & greatest expedicon wee could, wiee 
 did all meete aboute it the next Morning, where yo' Highnes 
 expressions of Grace were made knowne unto us ; & with 
 all Humble & due respect considered of by us. The 
 Close and upshott of all being this, our Cheerfull submission 
 to what was therein required, & our thankefull acceptaton 
 of what is thereby granted unto us. May it please you 
 therefore (Most Excellent Prince) to understand that 
 (indeed) our intencons have alway beene, are now, & (by 
 the grace of God) ever shall bee reall to Live in all due 
 obedience to his Mat'^ and y^ Lawes of y*" Land, & to 
 submitt to y^ discipline of the Church of England Estab- 
 lished by Lawe : & y' in testimony hereof, wee have 
 already disbanded & dismissed all our extraordinary 
 Forces, & shall certainly abstaine from all Military 
 Actions not Warranted by His Maties Authority : & 
 thereupon doe now Most Humbly beseech, that your High-. 
 nes offers of Grace (under f supposall of these things 
 pformed) may come freely & effectually to us w'^' that 
 Fulness of Confirmacon w'*' the Cause requireth, & yo^ 
 Noble Justice shall direct; and y* his Maties Forces in these 
 
2 1 6 S URRENDER OF BAENSTA PLE, 
 
 parts may bee certified of these things in such a way that 
 (wthout any theyr Lett or Molestacon) wee may enjoy y^ 
 fruite & Comforte of this blessed Reconcihacon. And 
 wee according to our bounden duety shall ahvay pray unto 
 y"-' God of Heaven for his blessings in all kinds to rest upon 
 y"" person of our Deare Sovraigne, his Royall Consort, theyr 
 Royall Issue, and y'' Noble Princes of his bloud, amonge 
 whom yo"" Highnes is so endeared to us, that we shall 
 account it a good parte of our Happines to finde the 
 oportunity of manifesting our selves such as wee doe 
 pfesse our selves really to bee, Yo^ Highnes most Humble 
 & thankful! servants.^ 
 
 tNo sigfiatiire-^ 
 or date. J 
 
 Making allowance for an effusiveness which was 
 rather the style of a previous generation, this re- 
 markable composition can only be characterized as 
 abject and hypocritical. 
 
 Barnstaple, with its forts and other defences, 
 was given up upon this capitulation, on Saturday, 
 the 2nd of September,^ 1643. The causes of the 
 collapse are, I think, on the surface. Half of the 
 garrison had been either killed, or otherwise lost, in 
 an ill-judged, ill-conducted, and unsuccessful sally. 
 Perhaps few of those left of it could be depended 
 upon to resist an assault. Half of their arms and a 
 
 ^ A Copy, Additional MSS., B. M., No. 18,980, f. no. 
 
 ~ John Aubrey in the notes on " Day-latality," in his Miscellanies 
 {ed. 1857, p. 16), assumes that the surrender of Barnstaple was on the 
 3rd of September — one of his "remarkable days"; this was also 
 Cromwell's Thanksgiving Day for the victories of Dunbar and Wor- 
 cester, of which it was the anniversary, and, as it turned out, the day 
 on which the Protector died. 
 
CAUSES OF THE COLLAPSE. 217 
 
 considerable quantity of ammunition had also been 
 lost. Besides, there had been, of course, always a 
 Royalist faction in the town, although not, it seems, 
 a numerous one. At Plymouth, such '' malignants " 
 were secured, and the more troublesome sent up to 
 the Parliament in London to be dealt with. These, 
 the Royalist inhabitants, had now an opportunity of 
 making their voices heard ; and the intermediate 
 party, comprising the indifferent, the irresolute, and 
 the selfish, were probably not less tired of the re- 
 peated impositions of martial rates, exactions which 
 were practically forced loans, and the other demands 
 of an entirely arbitrary authority, for the defence 
 of the town. They would naturally incline to an 
 arrangement on terms which were admitted to be 
 conciliatory, and which at least promised a release 
 from similar extraordinary burdens in future. In 
 addition to these influences, the forts at Bideford 
 and Appledore had already passed into the hands 
 of the enemy, who consequently commanded the 
 entrance to the port ; ^ and the fall of Bristol a 
 month before, and the belief at the moment that 
 Gloucester and Exeter were on the verge of a 
 similar fate, shook the confidence of the majority of 
 the dominant party in the ultimate success of their 
 cause. 
 
 This, then, was the issue of all the efforts and 
 
 * The precise date of the surrender of Bideford and Appledore is 
 uncertain ; but as it was '* certified " at Oxford on the 2nd of Septem- 
 ber that the forts had been given up by their several garrisons to 
 Colonel Digby, it must have been not later than the 30th of August, 
 and perhaps earlier [Merczirius Auliais, Aug. 27 — Sept. 2, 1643, 
 Burney Collection, B. M., vol. ii.). 
 
2i8 COST OF THE DEFENCE. 
 
 sacrifices of the previous twelve months. The 
 fortress fell at the first summons, and, it may 
 almost be said, before a hostile soldier had been seen 
 from its defences ; there is no evidence, so far as 
 I have discovered, that Colonel Digby molested the 
 town in any way. What those defences were I have 
 endeavoured to describe. The fortifications alone 
 had cost the town an enormous sum for those days. 
 Besides the items relating to the construction of the 
 Great Fort, the entrenchment, and the Castle works, 
 already quoted at p. 115, the compiler of the Sum- 
 mary estimated in a round sum, where it was 
 obviously impossible to ascertain particulars, other 
 expenses as follows : — 
 
 The Repaire of our Bridge the demo- 
 lishing of Houses and laying Waste of 
 Land on which the Fort Lyne and 
 Intrenchments were made, more than ... ;^3,ooo o o 
 
 The whole cost of these material defensive works 
 alone could not therefore have been less than five 
 thousand pounds.^ 
 
 But this did not, of course, comprise the whole of 
 the military expenditure of the town down to the 
 date of the first surrender. There are other items of 
 the Summary which will be properly given in this 
 place — they have already been drawn upon for their 
 important historical material, and are now quoted 
 statistically : — 
 
 ' Exeter, the walls of which, however, were intact, although out of 
 repair, spent about a thousand pounds less on its defences. 
 
COST OF THE DEFENCE. 219 
 
 For raising and arming 4 foot companies 
 and a troop of horse upon the first pub- 
 lishing the Commission of Array, which 
 in money and quarters from 15th Sepf to 
 15th Dec"" 1642 came to p£^i)03o o 6 
 
 For Money and Quarters for 640 foot 
 Souldiers under Col. Rolls, Col. Chidley, 
 Capt. Trevillian, and Capt. Bennet to- 
 gether with 70 Horse under Capt. Free- 
 man from i6th Dec' 1642 to 17th Sept. 
 ^^43 ••• ••• ... ... ... 4,900 o o 
 
 In Money and Provisions to furnish 2 
 Ships to keep the Port from May to Sept. 
 ,2nd, 1643, and setting forth a Man of war 190 o o 
 
 The total expenditure, according to all the items 
 of the Summary already enumerated, bringing the 
 account down to the first surrender, amounts to 
 ^^13,721 i8s. 3d. 
 
 What was thought of these reverses to the Parlia- 
 mentary cause by the rank and file of the party in 
 Devonshire may be gleaned from the following 
 extracts. The first is from one of the London 
 news-sheets, under the date of September 7, and 
 the passage is inspired, it appears from internal 
 evidence, by a South Devonian. It is rough and 
 vigorous, not to say vulgar, but not an uncommon 
 specimen of the news-reporter's style of that 
 period : — 
 
 There is lately intelligence from Devon, that the three 
 Maritime Townes in the North, Barnstable, Biddiford, and 
 Appledore, are revolted, and have entertained the Cavaliers, 
 where of necessity it must needs prove trechery, and a long 
 
220 TREA CHER V IMP UTED. 
 
 time double dealing .... Now what number of the Kings 
 forces have thus frighted their cowardly hearts, is not cer- 
 tainly knowne, some say 800, other some a thousand, but 
 by the story the greatest number not 1500 horse and man, 
 and under such weake spirits, Captaine Lord \sic\ Digby 
 only excepted, that it is ahiiost incredible to beleeve it : as 
 for Colonell Ackland, and Captaine Gifford, a Hare starting 
 out of a fur [fuz?] bush hath often cast them off their 
 horses, and make each kisse the ground. The conditions 
 and termes, or summes of money to be paid to the kings 
 party, is not yet knowne, but whensoever it be, they must 
 not expect the favour and love, &c. [The writer then gets 
 somewhat incoherent, but goes on — ] And are the Cavaliers 
 now their friend ? It might be wished that they knew them 
 so well as Master Parker of Borrington, Sir Richard Stroud 
 of Mevy, Mr. Savery of Shilston, Mr. Hele of Curlew [?], 
 and others, whose houses, goods, and cattell within and 
 without doore, by old experience have triall of their curtesie.^ 
 
 The suggestion of treachery is further developed 
 in the following piece of intelligence. But noii^ 
 sommes trains ! is the not unfamiliar cry of a beaten 
 party : — 
 
 By a messenger this day from Devonshire it is certified 
 That Barnstable and Bedyford, two eminent Towns in those 
 parts are of late most treacherously betrayed to the King's 
 forces under the command of the Lord [sic] Digby, through 
 the perfidiousness of the Maior of Barnstable, who to secure 
 or regain a small moity of his estate in danger to be carried 
 away by the Cavaliers, basely and treacherously conspired 
 with the Maior of Bedyford to betray both Towns ; but they 
 
 ^ T/te Weekly Account, No. 2, King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, 
 vol. X. 
 
A P URITAN DIRGE, 22 1 
 
 have not admitted of any Garrison of the Kings Forces but 
 covenanted to pay contribution to that party: What the 
 issue will be, we shall hear afterwards.^ 
 
 One more extract must be given. It is a Puritan 
 dirge over the fall of Barnstaple : — 
 
 Bastable is taken, and severall other Townes in the West, 
 as for Bastable, we are assured it was delivered through 
 the cowardise of the Mayor, or worse^ and that which makes 
 the story most sad, is, there were in that Towne more true 
 Blades for Religion and Liberties, then in any Towne in 
 England : and such, as had they had any of valour and 
 understanding in Armes to have governed them, they had 
 been long happy ; but misery hath befallen them, and they 
 are become a prey to Spanish Digbie, and now they hang 
 their harps upon the willows, and remember Jerusalem 
 weeping. 2 
 
 It was very true. Had there been one resolute 
 man — ** of valour and understanding in Armes'* — 
 with the requisite commission in this crisis, a 
 different page of the history of Barnstaple might 
 have been written. Such a man would have been 
 Robert Blake, a citizen soldier who, as a matter of 
 fact, defended Lyme successfully during a siege of 
 eight weeks against the very army (Prince Maurice's) 
 
 * A Perfect Diurnall of some Passages in Parliame7it^ &c., Sept. 
 4-1 1, 1643, King's Pamphlets, B. jNI., large 4tos, vol. x. 
 
 ^ The Parliament Scout ^ communicatiiig his Intellige7tce to the 
 Kingdom^ Sept. 7-15, 1643, Burney Collection, B. M., vol. iii. The 
 epithet applied to Colonel Digby is in allusion to his having been born 
 in Spain, which happened whilst his father, Lord Digby, afterwards 
 created Earl of Bristol, was the English Ambassador there. It was 
 intended to be damnatory, as the family was suspected of a leaning to 
 Popery. 
 
222 KING CHARLES'S LETTER, 
 
 which was at this time looming as a threatening 
 cloud over Barnstaple, and who subsequently held 
 Taunton against all comers. The only professional 
 soldier connected w^ith the garrison of Barnstaple of 
 whom any mention is made, Captain, or, as he is now 
 styled, Lieutenant -Colonel Freeman, according to 
 his own account, left his post, excusing himself on 
 the ground of the *^ treacherous surrender of the 
 town by the inhabitants.'* ^ 
 
 Some unknown collector has preserved with the 
 other MSS. relating to the surrender of Barnstaple of 
 which I have given copies, an "Extract," as it only 
 purports to be, of a letter from King Charles to 
 Prince Maurice, in which the articles granted by the 
 Prince are approved and confirmed. The letter, it 
 appears, was written from before Gloucester, which 
 the King was then besieging. In the night following 
 that very day the camp-fires of Essex and his reliev- 
 ing army of London apprentices appeared on Pres- 
 bury Hill, and the King, burning his huts, drew off 
 his army and abandoned the siege. The following is 
 a copy of the interesting document to which I have 
 referred : — 
 
 Exti-act of a Letter from his Maf^ to Prince Maurice 
 
 ^th Septemb, 1643. 
 
 Charles R. 
 
 Right Deare & right Entirely beloved Nephew &c. 
 whereas wee receyved in a Letter from you y^ Condicons 
 made by you wth our Towne of Barstaple, wee doe hereby 
 
 ' Fifth Report Historical MSS. Commission, App., p. 1096. 
 
THE KINGS PARDON. 223 
 
 signify to you, & wish you to declare as much to that our 
 Towne, that wee doe very well approve of theui, & shall 
 bee very carefull to see the same observed. And pticularly 
 for as much as concerne y°^ Articles of Pardon ; And if any 
 pticular pson concern'd in that agreement shall thinke it fiit 
 to take out our Pardon in a more Formall manner under our 
 greate Scale, wee have given order to both our Principall 
 Secretaries of State, that upon theyr addresse unto them 
 within y^ Space of a moneth after y^ date hereof wth 
 Sufficient Certificate that hee was at y*^ tyme of the agree- 
 ment wthin or wthin y^ jurisdiccon of that our Towne hee 
 shall forthwth ppare a Warrant for our hand to give order 
 for the passing of his Pardon in the manner aforesaid, &c.^ 
 
 No time seems to have been lost by the Mayor and 
 Corporation in availing themselves of the very 
 lawyer-like suggestion of the latter part of the King's 
 message, in which no doubt may be discerned the 
 hand of Mr. Secretary Nicholas. In the Corporation 
 accounts for the year ending Michaelmas, then close 
 at hand, there is an item of expense allowed which 
 is evidently connected with this business of suing 
 out the pardon : — 
 
 x/. paid Theodore Martyn for his journey to Oxford. 
 
 This is confirmed, indirectl}^ by a letter printed in 
 Gribble's Memorials (p. 464), which fixes the period 
 of the transaction — the commission, still extant, 
 therein referred to as having been obtained at Oxford 
 when the townsmen of Barnstaple " were there 
 soliciting for their pardon," is dated October 10.^ 
 
 The pardon, which is general and inclusive, was 
 
 ^ Additional MSS., B. M., No, 18,980, f. no. 
 ^ Records, Supplementary^ No. 7* 
 
224 WILLIAM PALMER. 
 
 subsequently passed under the Great Seal, and is 
 still preserved among the archives of the borough. 
 It is beautifully engrossed on parchment, and 
 appended to it is the great seal of England in perfect 
 condition. The text is apparently an adaptation to 
 some extent of a general formula, but in other 
 respects is applicable to the special case. It is, 
 however, too lengthy and formal to be reproduced 
 in this work.^ 
 
 Colonel Digby, having taken possession of Barn- 
 staple for the King, remained there several days, 
 enjoying the involuntary hospitality of the Mayor, 
 the shadow of which is still to be seen in the records 
 of the borough : — 
 
 xx/. Allowed to Mr. Will"^ Palmer maior towards his 
 expenses in entertayninge of Collonell Digby & his com- 
 pany here xi dayes. And of iiij' vii"* paid for Wyne bestowed 
 in entertayninge of seven Captaines & gent, by Mr. Maior 
 att Mr. Dawe's howse.^ 
 
 Of William Palmer, Mayor of Barnstaple, whose 
 troublous year of office was now drawing to a close, 
 a brief notice may here appropriately find a place. 
 We need not, I think, credit the unworthy charge 
 levelled at him by the scurrilous writers whose 
 words have been quoted in another page. Perhaps, 
 with reference to the part which he took in the 
 surrender of Barnstaple, nothing worse was really 
 to be said of him than is reported of the Mayor of 
 
 ' It is printed in Mr. Chanter's Records, No. xxvj. 
 
 - Extracted from the original Book of Receiver's Accounts. 
 
TROOPS DISBANDED, 225 
 
 York, in Shakespeare's play, when sorely tried in 
 somewhat similar circumstances : — 
 
 " The good old man would fain that all were well." ^ 
 
 This was the third time that William Palmer had 
 sat in the mayoralty chair; the first time had been 
 forty years before. He was a merchant, the friend 
 and trading partner of John Penrose one of the 
 philanthropic townsmen of the period whose memory 
 is still green in Barnstaple. Penrose mentions him 
 and the relations existing between the two in his 
 will, dated nearly twenty years earlier, alluding to 
 him as '* a most just and upright dealer, and just in 
 all his accompts,'' and leaves a legacy to each of 
 his eight children. Palmer's public character was 
 acknowledged by the Corporation in a peculiar way 
 some years afterwards, when Anthony and John 
 Palmer (presumably his sons) were exempted from 
 payment of interest on a sum of mone}'* ** on 
 account of good services to the Town by William 
 Palmer." 
 
 The " extraordinary forces " within the defences 
 of Barnstaple — that is, as I understand the term, 
 the militiamen, volunteers, and all soldiers except 
 the local trained band — had been already disbanded 
 according to the articles of capitulation. In the 
 accounts of the year the Town Clerk has payment 
 for '* passes made to all the souldiers att their 
 depture out of the Towne." No Royalist garrison 
 was to be imposed upon the town ; but whether 
 
 ^ •' Henry VL," pt. iii. act iv. sc. 7. 
 
 16 
 
2 26 EXETER SURRENDERED, 
 
 this article was adhered to subsequently is very 
 questionable. The conditions which, according to 
 Lord Clarendon, '' Colonel Digby saw precisely, 
 observed," seem to have been covertly limited by 
 the Royalist historian to those relating to plunder 
 of the town and violence to the inhabitants. 
 
 Two days after the surrender of Barnstaple — that 
 is, on Monday, the 4th of September^— Exeter capi- 
 tulated to Prince Maurice on probably similar terms. 
 Vicars, the furious Puritan writer, in a spirit chas- 
 tened by this reverse, and with a reckless use of 
 metaphor, remarks: ** The Lord suffered the wheel 
 to turn and to give us a sore lash, to curb and 
 correct our former high hopes and carnall conceipts 
 of nothing but victories." ^ 
 
 Colonel Digby was thereupon ordered by Prince 
 Maurice to proceed to the investment of Plymouth, 
 and to take part in a combined operation there. 
 This was delayed, however, by the movements of 
 the Prince himself, who lingered in the '^ rich and 
 pleasant" city of Exeter, and was detained by the 
 subsequent obstinate defence of Dartmouth, which 
 lasted a month, and by a fever which he contracted 
 during the siege. It is stated by Lord Clarendon 
 that Coljonel Digby, within a few days, had received 
 so considerable an addition to his force, presumably 
 from North Devon, that he marched to Plymouth at 
 t'he head of 3000 Foot and 800 Horse. 
 
 ' So Clarendon. Isacke says the 3rfl. Dr. Oliver, who is very 
 confused on this point, says on Wednesday, the 5th (which was the 
 6th), and that the garrison marched out on the Friday following. 
 
 ^ Jehovah-Jireh — God in the Mounts p. 409. 
 
PART II 
 
 FROM THE SURRENDER OF BARNSTAPLE TO PRINCE 
 MAURICE TO ITS REVOLT TO THE PARLIAMENT, 
 
 September 2, 1643 — June |-?-, 1644. 
 
 IT is to be inferred that the Royalists, having 
 peaceably obtained possession of Barnstaple, had 
 no intention, at the time, of maintaining it as a 
 fortified place. It had been stipulated that no 
 garrison should be imposed upon it ; and one of 
 the articles of the formal capitulation (which has 
 not been preserved), quoted with effect somewhat 
 later, seems to have provided for the levelling of 
 the fortifications. At all events, Colonel Digby, 
 during his eleven days' occupation of the town, and 
 before drawing off his troops, took the obvious pre- 
 caution of compelling the Corporation to dismantle 
 the works. 
 
 To ''slight," as was then the term, these elabo- 
 rate defences seems to have been, as such processes 
 usually are, a comparatively easy and inexpensive 
 
228 BARNSTAPLE WORKS SLIGHTED, 
 
 business ; but that it was done superficially is 
 abundantly evident. The works not long after this 
 were not only susceptible of reparation, but were 
 actually reinstated ; and the remains of the Great 
 Fort, still existing, show so much of the original 
 construction of the work as to indicate that it could 
 have been but little reduced or impaired. The fol- 
 lowing interesting particulars connected with the 
 proceeding have been taken from the Receiver's 
 accounts of the year ending Michaelmas, 1643 : — 
 
 The Receiver demandeth allowance of . . . iij^' paid 
 sevrall persons for castinge downe y^ brest worke of the 
 trench of y^ fort as by the pticulars thereof appeare. 
 
 And of ij" vii^ iii"* paid sevrall psonns for pluckinge downe 
 of all the Redoubts as by the pticulars thereof appeareth. 
 
 And of xij'* xi^ paid sevrall psonns for fillinge upp of cclj 
 yeards of the Trenches as by the pticulars thereof appeare. 
 
 And of iiij^' xvi^ & vi"^ paid for dismountinge of all the 
 great Ordinance & for portrage keyage & Carriage of them. 
 
 These items seem to refer to the levelling of the 
 outer breastwork only of the Great Fort, which 
 would amount to a partial filling-up of the dry 
 ditch — to the similar treatment of some of the line 
 of entrenchment about the town — and to the razing 
 of the redoubts, of which there must have been 
 several. The guns of the forts were removed to 
 the quays, where some at least of them were still 
 lying several months later, as we learn from a casual 
 observer who noticed them. 
 
 There is no evidence, so far as I am aware, that 
 the inhabitants of Barnstaple, at this time, suffered 
 
EXCESSES OF ROYALISTS. 229 
 
 any particular ill-treatment at the hands of the 
 Royalist troops, although that such was the case 
 is far from improbable if one may infer from the 
 military insolence which appears to have been 
 rampant in Exeter. Nehemiah Wallington, who 
 copied and jotted down in his note-book, it must 
 be admitted with strong Puritan bias, every report 
 that was in circulation, tells us that the Cavaliers 
 in Exeter, after taking possession of the city, '* used 
 the people most cruelly, and did all the violence 
 they could do to them, only sparing their lives. . . . 
 The rude soldiers would not forbear upon the least 
 discontent given to them, to draw their rapiers upon 
 the citizens and wound them ; but especially when 
 they are in their cups, they swagger, roar, swear, 
 and domineer, plundering, pillaging, or doing any 
 other kind of wrong ; to break shops and houses 
 they count it as nothing, taking away boots, shoes, 
 stockings, hats, or other commodities they can lay 
 their hands on, and no justice dares to resist them, 
 and by this means the city is in such a miserable 
 condition that they are even terrified to the death." ^ 
 A curious contemporary tract printed in September, 
 1643, a copy of which is in the British Museum,^ 
 confirms this account. It is entitled Strange, true 
 and lamentable Newes from Exceter, &c., and has the 
 then somewhat uncommon feature of woodcut illus- 
 trations. On the title-page is a figure of Devonshire, 
 personified by a woman, kneeling ; and issuing from 
 
 ^ Historical Notices, &c., by Nehemiah Wallington, from the 
 original MSS., 1869, ii. p. 175. 
 
 ^ King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cxxvii. 
 
230 GEORGE PEARD LAMPOONED. 
 
 her mouth is a label on which is inscribed, '' Have 
 pity upon me, Have pity upon me, O my friends, for 
 the hand of God hath touched me. Job 19, verse 
 28." On the last page is represented a man, naked 
 and tied to a post, being flogged by another man 
 with a cat-o'-nine-tails. 
 
 A passage from the Mercurhts Aulicus of October 
 22-28, 1643, full of allusion to the sentiments pre- 
 vailing at Barnstaple at this time, I must quote entire; 
 of course it should be taken with due reservation. 
 It is a specimen of the literary manner of Sir John 
 Birkenhead, the editor of the Oxford diurnal, which 
 Vicars called the '' King's Lyer-in-Chiefe.'* The 
 elder Disraeli quoted it, in part, as an illustration 
 of Birkenhead's sarcasm and wit— or what passed 
 for such — in the Quarrels of Authors (1814, ii. 
 262) : — 
 
 When we told you last weeke of a Committee of Lawyers 
 appointed to put their new Seale in execution, we named 
 among others Master George Peard^ whom since we are 
 informed was none of that Committee. And this I confesse 
 was no small errour, (to reckon Master Peard among the 
 Lawyers) because indeed he now lyeth sicke at Barnstable 
 in Devonshire, so farre from being their new Lord Keeper, 
 that he now despaires to become their doore-keeper^ which 
 office you know he performed heretofore, to the generall 
 satisfaction of the Kingdom. [The meaning of this allusion 
 is lost] But since Master Peard hath been thus desperately 
 sicke, (his Vote, his Law, and haire having all forsooke him) 
 his Corporation of Barnstable hath beene in perfect health 
 and loyalty. For we had certaine notice (from those who 
 saw it done) that when newes was brought to this Towne, 
 that His Majestic had defeated the Rebels at Newbury, 
 
COMPARA TIVE ST A TE OF PARTIES, 23 1 
 
 taken part of their Canon, and made them fly towards 
 London, the Inhabitants of Barnstable rung their Bels and 
 made Bonefires for joy of the good newes. And when a 
 factious Londoner had raised a slander and put it in print, 
 that the Towne of Barnstable did now repent their admitting 
 His Majesties Forces into their Towne, the Maior and Chiefe 
 of the Towne declared in a purposed voluntary writing 
 (which I have seene) that whoever said so was an enemy to 
 their Countrey ; adding farther, that they were grieved at no 
 one thing so much as that they had submitted to His Majestic 
 no sooner^ which will be no doubt a speciall cordiall to their 
 Jaiguishing Burgesse.^ 
 
 No one within the political horizon of Barnstaple 
 was at that time so obnoxious to the Royalists as 
 George Peard. The offence of his active and pro- 
 minent agency in the town on behalf of the Par- 
 liament had been recently aggravated. He had 
 been appointed one of the sequestrators within the 
 county of Devon for " the speedier and more effec- 
 tually putting in execution " of the Ordinance of 
 Parliament for seizing and sequestering the estates 
 of *' notorious Delinquents" for the use and main- 
 tenance of the Parliamentary army> 
 
 The surrender of Barnstaple to the Royalist forces 
 corresponded, in point of time, very nearly with the 
 culmination of the King's cause in this war. Par- 
 liament, on the other hand, had distinctly lost 
 
 ' Merctcrius Aulicus, October 22-28, 1643, Burney Collection, 
 F. M., vol. iii. The sanguinary but indecisive battle of Newbury 
 between the forces of the King and those of the Earl of Essex, had 
 been fought on the 20th of September. 
 
233 PRINCE MAURICE BEFORE DARTMOUTH, 
 
 ground ; its efforts had been spasmodic and wanting 
 in combination. Oliver Cromwell, then a colonel of 
 Horse in the Eastern Counties, was just emerging 
 from obscurity, and endeavouring to infuse energy 
 into its adherents. *' It's no longer Disputing " — 
 he wrote about this time to his honoured friends the 
 Parliamentary Commissioners at Cambridge — '' but 
 Out instantly you can ! Raise all your Bands . . . 
 get up what Volunteers you can ; hasten your Horses. 
 ... I beseech you spare not, but be expeditious 
 and industrious ! . . . You must act lively; do it 
 without distraction- Neglect no means ! "^ 
 
 In Devonshire the Parliament had no forces left in 
 the field. But it still held Dartmouth and Plymouth. 
 Prince Maurice, on the loth of September, directed 
 Sir Edmund Fortescue and Colonel Edward Seymour 
 to summon the garrison of the former town to sur- 
 render. The Prince then left Exeter ''with 1,030 
 soldiers, with their carriages and waggons," for 
 Totnes, where he was joined by Colonel Digby and 
 500 Horse and Foot, which had been withdrawn from 
 before Barnstaple, '* and so went to besiege Dart- 
 mouth." 2 It does not appear that this town was at 
 that time so strongly fortified as at a later period ; 
 in the summons of Prince Maurice the demand made 
 is for the surrender of ''the castle, town, and block- 
 house, only." 3 Dartmouth made an obstinate de- 
 
 ' Carlyle's Oliver Cronnvell, \. 129. 
 
 ^ Strange, true and lamentable Neives fro7n Exceter, &c., London, 
 1643, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cxxvii. 
 
 3 Printed in Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert and the Cavaliers, ii. 
 p. 306 note. 
 
TWO POLITICAL TRANSACTIONS, 233 
 
 fence, however, of nearly a month, during which the 
 besiegers lost many men from the excessively wet 
 weather and from desertion. On the 30th of Septem- 
 ber, the Royalists attempted an assault, and the 
 recreant James Chudleigh, now a Royalist colonel, 
 foremost among the assailants, was mortally wounded 
 and left, it would seem, within the town. He was 
 buried at St. Saviour's, according to the parish 
 register, on the 4tb of October. On the 5th, Dart- 
 mouth capitulated on honourable conditions. At, or 
 soon after, this time the Prince was laid up at 
 Milton,^ by ** the ordinary raging disease of the 
 army, a slow fever," and Dr. William Harvey, the 
 ^reat physiologist and discoverer of the Circulation 
 of the Blood, came from the Court to see him.^ 
 Colonel Digby proceeded with the army on the 17th 
 to the investment of Plymouth. 
 
 Two transactions of extreme political significance 
 were taking place in the autumn of the year 1643. One 
 was a league into which the Parliament entered with 
 the Scotch, for the avowed purpose of bringing into 
 England a Scotch army in aid of the further prosecu- 
 tion of the war against the King; the price paid for 
 the compact being the undertaking on the part of the 
 Parliament to impose the " Covenant," which meant 
 the Presbyterian system of Church government, 
 upon the English people. The other was a truce 
 made by the King with the Irish rebels, with the 
 object of withdrawing, for his use against the Parlia- 
 
 ^ Probably South Milton, near Kingsbridge. 
 
 2 Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert aiid the Cavaliers^ ii. p. 307 note. 
 
234 SCOTCH AND IRISH. 
 
 ment, the avenging army which had been sent over 
 to Ireland before the quarrel between King and 
 Parliament had reached its crisis of civil war in 
 1642. As a retaliatory measure this counter-move 
 has been defended. But to make peace, and without 
 the consent of Parliament, with the Irish Papists, 
 whose frightful massacres of the Protestants in the 
 autumn of 1641 were yet fresh in the minds of the 
 English people, was considered -bad enough ; to 
 bring over those very Irish ruffians to fight in the 
 Royalist ranks, which the King also was bargaining 
 to do, was held infinitely worse. The Covenant was 
 not accepted with unanimity by the Puritans them- 
 selves. The threatened Irish invasion provoked 
 everywhere beyond the influence of the King's 
 armies feelings of dread and horror. The effect was 
 to embitter the rehgious difficulty still more, and to 
 make the chances of a peaceful accommodation in- 
 definitely remote. A regiment was landed at Mine- 
 head from Ireland in October, and reached Bristol, 
 joining Lord Hopton's command. These soldiers 
 were at first erroneously believed to be an instal- 
 ment of native Irish who had been brought over to 
 massacre the English Protestants ! 
 
 I have not discovered that any troops from Ireland 
 were actually landed at Barnstaple ; but it seems 
 that the landing was apprehended, at all events, 
 now that the town was in the hands of the Royalists, 
 and as it was known to have been a favourite port 
 of communication with Ireland. 
 
 The ascendency, at this time, of the Royalist party 
 
ASSOCIATION OF DEVON AND CORNWALL, 235' 
 
 in Devonshire led to the formation of an Association 
 of Cornwall and Devon for the King, in January, 
 1644. In this proceeding the authors of it, the 
 leading Royalists of these counties, were following 
 precedents which had been established by both 
 parties elsewhere. The outcome of it was ** An 
 Agreement to a Protestation,'' a copy of which is 
 here given from Rushworth's Historical Collections 
 (v. 382), where it is called *' The Cornish and Devon- 
 shire mens Oath " : — 
 
 I, A. B., do in the Presence of Almighty God promise, 
 vow and protest, with my utmost Power to maintain and 
 defend the true reformed Protestant Religion, established 
 by Law in this Kingdom, against all Popery, Popish, and 
 other Innovations of Sectaries and Schismaticks, as also 
 his Majesty's Person and Rights, against all Forces whatso- 
 ever, and in like manner the Laws, Liberties, and Privileges 
 of Parliament, and of this Kingdom ; and I shall to the 
 utmost of my Power preserve and defend the Peace of the 
 two Counties of Cornwal and Devon, and all Persons that 
 shall unite themselves by this Protestation in the due Per- 
 formance thereof, and to my Power assist his Majesty's 
 Armies for reducing the Town of Plimouth, and Resistance 
 of all Forces of Scots Invaders, and others, levied under 
 pretence of any Authority of two Houses of Parliament, or 
 otherwise, without his Majesty's personal Consent. 
 
 Certain " Articles " were further agreed upon by 
 the Association, the full text of which is also to be 
 found in Rushworth (v. 381). There are no signa- 
 tures appended. One of the articles engaged that 
 there should be provided '' a thousand barrels of 
 powder and ten thousand fire-arms at the charge of 
 
236 WREKL V CONTRIB UTIONS. 
 
 both counties, whereof Cornwall to be a fourth and 
 Devon three parts, according to the proportion of the 
 grand Subsidie." Another enjoined *' The solemn 
 Celebration of the Fast on the second Friday of the 
 month [ordered in Council by the King] and con- 
 formity to the services appointed." 
 
 The prime motive of this organization was, of 
 course, that of raising money for the purposes of 
 the war. The unfortunate Devonians soon dis- 
 covered that they had exchanged one set of arbitrary 
 and rapacious requisitionists for another. The form 
 which the new exaction took was a weekly assess- 
 ment levied on the parishes, but upon what principle, 
 if any, is not ascertainable. The amount was 
 probably elastic, and in each case as much, roughly 
 speaking, as the victim would bear. The machinery 
 of the old rate-books of the subsidy collector, already 
 existing in every parish, was conveniently available 
 for the purpose. I have only met with one instance 
 conveying anything like a specific idea of this assess- 
 ment. In August (1644) the weekly contribution of 
 Malborough and Portlemouth, in South Devon, the 
 former amounting to ;^ii 15s. and the latter to £^, 
 w^ere made over to Sir Edmund Fortescue by the 
 Commissioners for the maintenance of the garrison 
 of Fort Charles, in Salcombe Harbour.^ 
 
 Malborough is an agricultural parish of average 
 size, and from the foregoing statement of the quota 
 levied upon it, the enormous pressure of the imposi- 
 tion, equal, it should be remembered, to three or 
 four times its amount in present money, may be con- 
 
 ^ Fox's Kingsbridge audits Suri'oundingSy 1874, P* 166. 
 
A PROTESTATION, 237 
 
 ceived. We need not wonder that the families of the 
 smaller gentry, of the yeomanry and of tenant 
 farmers, were impoverished and ruined — not always, 
 as is often boasted by their descendants, for their 
 loyalty, but by the curse of civil war, from which 
 all suffered alike. Besides, these exactions came 
 after others, no doubt just as burdensome, which 
 had been enforced by the Parliamentary Committees; 
 and they were supplemented at a later period, especi- 
 ally within the sphere of influence of the King's 
 military officers, by simpler and more sweeping 
 spoliation, both in money and in kind. 
 
 The Association was merged, in the month of June 
 following, into a Committee of the four associated 
 counties of Somerset, Dorset, Devon, Cornwall, and 
 the city of Exeter. The signatories of this Com- 
 mittee include the following known Devonshire 
 names : — John Hele, Peter Balle, and John Were ^ — 
 the last, I believe, of Silverton ; not, of course, the 
 Parliamentary colonel, of Halberton, already men- 
 tioned in these pages. 
 
 To return to the original Association of the two 
 Counties. The arbitrary assumption of authority is 
 conspicuous no less in the attempt of the Association 
 to fetter the consciences of the people than in their 
 extortion of money. The form of Protestation, or 
 oath, was ordered to be delivered by the Sheriffs to 
 the Constables, and by them to the ministers of all 
 churches and chapels, to be published the next 
 Sunday following; when every man present was to 
 take and subscribe the same, others within ten days ; 
 
 ^ Trevelyan Papers, Camden Society, pt. iii. p. 250. 
 
238 DISTURBANCE A T BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 the result to be certified to the Commissioners (as 
 they style themselves) at their next meeting after 
 the 20th of February. 
 
 Oaths and protestations were then an important 
 part of the recognized apparatus of government, 
 from which, even at this day, we are unfortunately 
 not wholly emancipated. We have had one illustra- 
 tion of this in the imposition of the Covenant by the 
 Parliament, and the Royalist party were only adopt- 
 ing an ordinary practice, however futile. 
 
 The Protestation, says the Merairius Aulicus — 
 
 was universally taken by the two Associated Counties, 
 onely Master Peards nest (the good towne of Barnstable) 
 began to scruple, and as their Burgesse taught them, began 
 to consider their workes were yet standing, and looked as 
 though they would mutiny : whereupon their Maior (a 
 sufficient Corporation-Brother) commanded all the Towne 
 fo bring what Armes they could to keepe the Peace. 
 
 This seems to point to a popular disturbance, and 
 to the measures prudently taken by the authorities 
 to suppress it. But the opposite inference was 
 apparently drawn from it by the Aulicus, and it is 
 not obscurely hinted that the Recorder was at the 
 bottom of it. Charles Peard, the mayor of that 
 year, was the Recorder's kinsman, but their precise 
 relationship to each other I have not be able to make 
 out. The incident must have occurred early in the 
 month of February, as on the 19th of that month 
 Arthur Trevor, Prince Rupert's correspondent at 
 
 ^ Alercurius Aulicus^ week ending Feb. 24, 1643 (1644), King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cxlvii. 
 
ABORTIVE REVOLT, 239 
 
 Oxford, whose sparkling and delightful letters so well 
 deserve to be collected, communicated to the Prince 
 this morsel of intelligence : — 
 
 Barnstable in the west that submitted to yo** Bro : & by 
 his Mediacon wth his Ma^ was receaved into the Kings 
 Protection & had his pardon is now upp in Armes for the 
 Parliam* w^*" is done as is strongly conceaved by that son of 
 Pardicon Perd the Recorder there.' 
 
 The same number of the Merctirius Aulicus con- 
 tinues with the information that notice of the state 
 of affairs at Barnstaple — 
 
 w 
 
 being brought to Prince Maurice he . . . sent some 
 Troops of good Horse with these demands — That after 7 
 \sic] monthes forbearance they would perform their Articles, 
 which were to slight their workes (not yet demolished), to 
 pay their weekly Contribution, to take the Protestation, and 
 to render up Master Peard. The answer was all affirmative, 
 onely Master Peard who could not without danger of his 
 life looke upon Oxford . . . haih beene able to runne away 
 without the Physitian's Certificate. 
 
 The last words are of course an allusion to Peard's 
 illness, which had been previously the subject of a 
 coarse jest of the Mercurius Aulicus. 
 
 This meagre account is all that I have been able 
 to gather relating to this abortive revolt of the 
 Parliamentary party in Barnstaple. The move- 
 ment was ill-timed, and it seems to have collapsed 
 ignominiously at the first sight of Prince Maurice's 
 troopers. It should be observed, however, that the 
 
 ' Additional MSS., B. M., No. 18,981, f. 47. 
 
240 PLYMOUTH, 
 
 only description of the incident which I am able to 
 adduce is derived from exclusively Royalist sources. 
 The Military Scribe, a Parliamentary news-sheet 
 which enjoyed but a transient existence, contains the 
 following item of intelligence, adding a little, from 
 the other side, to what has already been collected in 
 reference to this incident : — 
 
 Sir John Berkeley, the Governour of Excester, is gone 
 from thence to Barnstable in the North part of Devonshire, 
 to raise raen and moneys, and to plunder those well-affected 
 People that will not take the new Cornish Protestation.^ 
 
 After the taking of Dartmouth in the previous 
 October, Prince Maurice had proceeded with his 
 whole force to besiege Plymouth. The place had 
 been previously invested on the 15th of September. 
 The Plymouth of to-day gives no idea whatever of 
 the closely-packed town of the middle of the seven- 
 teenth century. It was about a third larger than 
 the contemporary Barnstaple, with a population, 
 estimated by Mr. Worth at about 6,000, in the same 
 proportion. It was an irregular quadrangle in 
 shape, one side bounded by the water of its inner 
 harbour, Sutton Pool ; the other three sides im- 
 perfectly protected by the medieval town walls. 
 Beyond this line of defence, however, a series of 
 detached earthworks had been thrown up by the 
 besieged ; and with the advantage of an open com- 
 munication with the sea the town was successfully 
 held against the repeated assaults of Prince Maurice's 
 
 ^ The Military Scribe, No. 2, Feb. 27-]\Iarch 5, 1644, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cxlv. 
 
BARNSTAPLE OCCUPIED, 241 
 
 army. A minutely detailed and interesting account 
 of this defence survives. On Christmas Day the siege 
 was abandoned. Prince Maurice*s subsequent move- 
 ments are not distinctly recorded. At first he retired 
 to Tavistock, from which there is a letter of his, dated 
 January 12, mentioning his want of muskets. Later, 
 at the beginning of March, he is found at Totnes and 
 Exeter, endeavouring, but with ill-success, to recruit 
 his forces ; and many of his men who had been 
 pressed in Devonshire and Cornwall were deserting 
 daily.^ 
 
 In the interval, this haughty and impassive 
 young General may have found the occupation of 
 Barnstaple, on the plausible pretext of a breach of 
 its articles of capitulation by the town, a not un- 
 welcome compensation for the disappointment arising 
 from his recent failure before Plymouth. The pro- 
 ceeding also looks very much like an illustration of 
 the fable of the wolf and the lamb. In the result 
 Barnstaple had again to submit to military domina- 
 tion. 
 
 The occupation of the town by Prince Maurice's 
 troopers was signalized by excesses on the part of 
 the RoyaHsts to which apparently the inhabitants 
 had hitherto been strangers. A Parliamentary news- 
 sheet of this date, with the purpose, as it states, '' to 
 cleare the doubt and different reports of Bastable in 
 the North of Devon "—declares that—** they [the 
 Royalists] have not spared a house unplundered, 
 besides their cruelty to Master Charles Peard the 
 
 ^ The True Informer, March 16-23, 1643 {1644), Iving's Pamph- 
 lets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cxlviii. 
 
 17 
 
242 GEORGE PEARD IMPRISONED, 
 
 Maior which they did halfe hang and plunder[ed ?J 
 Master George Peard and carryed him and some other 
 of the cheife to Exceter gaole where they yet remaine 
 in durance, if Master Charles Peard be not dead.'' ^ 
 The mayor lived, however, at least long enough to 
 survive other troubles in the eventful year of his 
 office. For some unexplained reason, he refused to 
 give up the mayoralty at the proper time in the 
 following October, and, according to the Rev. Richard 
 Wood's notes, was dismissed from the chair and 
 fined. 2 The description of the treatment suffered by 
 George Peard comes to us through the medium of a 
 publication authorized by Parliament and is perfectly 
 credible. It is suggestive of the troubles into which 
 the patriotic fervour of our eminent townsman, who 
 had provoked the utmost animosity of his political 
 opponents, had at last involved him. His incarcera- 
 tion appears to have been only for a short time. He 
 returned to Barnstaple, but did not long survive. 
 Already in ill health, the hardships of an imprison- 
 ment in the county gaol — as the county gaol then 
 was — may have hastened the end. 
 
 I have not discovered any record of the state of 
 affairs in Barnstaple from the time when it was 
 occupied by Prince Maurice's troopers in February 
 until the end of June, when an incident occurred 
 which again brought the town within the vortex of 
 
 ^ A Continuation of Cei'taiJi Special! and Remarkahle Passages 
 informed to the Parliament^ Feb. 29-March 7, 1643 (1644), King's 
 J* mphlets, B. M. , small 4tos, vol. cxlvi. 
 
 ' Chanter's Literary History of Barnstaple^ p. 120. 
 
COMPARA TIVE S J A TE OF PA R TIES. 243 
 
 military operations. A small garrison, which the 
 Prince, at that time engaged elsewhere upon an 
 undertaking which taxed his utmost resources, had 
 barely spared from the forces at his disposal, held 
 possession of the forts and overawed the inhabitants. 
 Prince Maurice, in the second week of April, with 
 all the forces that he could collect, and possibly after 
 depleting the garrison of Barnstaple to its lowest 
 limit, laid siege to Lyme Regis — ** a little vile fishing 
 town," says Lord Clarendon, ** defended by a small 
 dry ditch, which after he had been before it a month 
 was much more like to hold out than it was the first 
 day he came before it." ^ Lyme, in fact, made 
 an heroic and a successful resistance, lasting until 
 the middle of June. 
 
 I may here digress a little and find place for a 
 ' description of the state of the rival parties in the 
 winter of 1643-44. But obviously it can only treat 
 of a few salient features. 
 
 The King's army or, to be precise, that portion of 
 it under the immediate command of the King, lay 
 quartered in and around Oxford. The university 
 city was a camp, or rather a barrack, again thronged 
 as it had been during the winter before by a hetero- 
 geneous crowd. Gownsmen and buff-coated soldiers 
 elbowed each other in its streets and pleasant walks ; 
 and college dignitaries, gay Cavaliers, and political 
 
 ^ History of the Rebellion y pp. 516 b, 527 a. 
 
244 COURT AT OXFORD, 
 
 notabilities paced its quadrangles together. In 
 semblance, at least, a stately Court was kept up. 
 Feminine intrigue was in full swing — a lively 
 Republican gibes at the ladies of Oxford as '* Plotters 
 in petticoats and politicians in fardingales " ; and 
 mirth and gaiety pervaded the temporary drawing- 
 rooms of the Queen and her satellites. Once a 
 month, when a day was set apart as a solemn Fast, 
 for which a form of Divine Service was enjoined in 
 all churches and chapels, the distractions of the 
 times asserted their presence. And, underlying the 
 surface of careless frivolity, there were in truth abun- 
 dant elements of anxiety for the King and his intimate 
 counsellors. It has been remarked by Eliot War- 
 burton that the past campaigns had thinned the 
 adherents of the Royalist cause of many of the best 
 and worthiest, while the reprobates lived en merrily.^ 
 How truly this was illustrated in Devonshire we 
 shall see as the story developes. 
 
 A considerable body of troops had landed from 
 Ireland in November, composed mostly of native 
 Irish, to join the King's army. They were met and 
 defeated by a Parliamentary force under Sir Thomas 
 Fairfax (who now first appears on the scene) in 
 Cheshire. Eight hundred of his prisoners, who 
 were English, and as equally ready to fight for the 
 Parliament as for the King, after taking the 
 Covenant (an indispensable preliminary), were en- 
 listed by Fairfax. In January the Scots, under 
 engagement with the Parliament, crossed the border 
 in large force, their professed object being ''the good 
 
 ^ Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert and the Cavaliers, ii. 314. 
 
PARLIAMENT AT WESTMINSTER, 245 
 
 of religion in England, and the deliverance of their 
 brethren out of the depths of affliction." 
 
 At this time the Court had attracted to Oxford 
 most of the Peers and Commons who had seceded 
 from the Parliament at Westminster ; and the 
 setting-up of a rival Parliament at Oxford was in 
 reality aimed at by the King's Proclamation sum- 
 moning thither all members of both Houses, except- 
 ing those employed in the military service of the 
 King. It was a hollow pretence, leading to no 
 results, except to give a quasi authority for the levy- 
 ing of the money in the old form of a benevolence 
 (successful to the extent of ;£*ioo,ooo), and for 
 exacting contributions of plate which was at once 
 coined into money at the Oxford mint. 
 
 On the other side, Parliament also had lost by 
 death two of its most prominent Members — Pym, 
 the leader of the House of Commons, the principal 
 author of '* a revolution which he never intended 
 and which he did not live to see; " and Hampden, 
 who has been placed in a special niche of fame as 
 the Englishman's ideal patriot. From that time, 
 it is not too much to say, the political aspirations 
 of the Parliamentarv leaders in the direction of 
 popular liberties were less conspicuous than their 
 efforts, v^ith the Covenant millstone about their own 
 necks, to enforce a general conformity to the narrow 
 Presbyterianism which they had adopted. 
 
 Parliament had also ordained their monthly fast- 
 days — the last Wednesday in every month being set 
 aside — on which occasions much Puritan fervour 
 
246 PARLIAMENT A T WESTMINSTER. 
 
 characterized the religious services. How the day 
 was observed by the highest exemplar at West- 
 minster v^e are thus told : On one of the fast-days, 
 Nov. 29, of this year, the Commons met at St. 
 Margaret^s early in the morning, and sat out two 
 learned sermons, which were ''not ended until about 
 four of the clock in the after-noone." 
 
 As a companion to this sketch, the following 
 instance may be given of their practical Christianity. 
 A pamphlet in the British Museum Library,^ purports 
 to be the Confession of Father Bell, executed at 
 Tyburn, Dec. 11, 1643, who is stated to have been 
 a priest beyond the seas, and being an Englishman 
 born, to have said Mass in England and seduced 
 divers of his Majesty's subjects. He was hanged 
 and quartered with another Roman Catholic. They 
 *' died," says the pamphlet, '* very obstinately, living 
 and dying in blindnesse and darknesse; what was 
 in their minds, whither they should goe, and where 
 they are, God knowes ; we are not to judge.'' 
 Arthur Bell's name is one in the list, given by Dr. 
 Lingard, of Jesuits and priests who were executed 
 iu the years 1642 and 1643. As many seem sus- 
 piciously enough to have died in Newgate after con- 
 demnation. This persecution was consequent upon 
 the proclamation issued by the King, goaded on by 
 Parliament, in March of the former year, for putting 
 in execution the laws against Popish recusants, which 
 had fallen into desuetude since the days of Elizabeth. 
 In their methocis of raising money for carrying on 
 the war, the Parliament financiers were more fertile 
 
 ' King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cxxxv. 
 
O VER TURK OF PEA CE. 247 
 
 in resources than those of the King. Forced loans 
 of money and plate on the security of the *' Public 
 Faith " have been mentioned. All who failed to 
 
 • 
 
 contribute were assessed to pay the twentieth part 
 of their estates towards the support of the cause. 
 Each count3^or town, at the same time, was required 
 to provide for the maintenance of its own soldiers. 
 Then came the weekly assessments in the counties. 
 Delinquents, that is, supporters of the Royal cause 
 either in person or by money, had their estates 
 sequestered and their rents, goods, and moneys 
 seized. An Excise was established for the first time 
 in English history — literally a cutting-off from the 
 sale price of most of the commodities of ordinary 
 consumption. And, not to leave a stone unturned, 
 in March, 1644, an Ordinance was promulgated 
 exacting a contribution of the value of one meal in 
 the week from each household in London, for the 
 special purpose of arming and forming into regi- 
 ments the auxiliary forces within the city. 
 
 Although the '^ mongrel " Parliament of Oxford 
 (so called by the King himself) could do nothing 
 collectively, an apparently well-meant effort was 
 made by its members in their individual capacity to 
 open negotiations for peace with the opposite party. 
 This overture signed by the Princes, Peers, and 
 Commons, was addressed to the Earl of Essex, the 
 Commander-in-chief of the Parliamentary forces ; but 
 it omitted any recognition of the Parliament sitting 
 at Westminster. A dangerous power, such as would 
 have dazzled many a statesman, was thus placed in 
 
248 ESSEX OPENS THE CAMPAIGN, 
 
 the hands of Essex; but the temptation was rejected, 
 and the overture scornfully ignored by the slighted 
 and diplomatically insulted Parliament. Lord 
 Clarendon, who blamed Essex for his contumacy, 
 declared, with many compliments on his previous 
 successes and highmindedness, that he never throve 
 afterwards. 
 
 This correspondence took place at the end of 
 January. On the 8th of February the Earl of Essex 
 issued a proclamation ordering all soldiers to repair 
 to their colours. 
 
 It is a remarkable and, from a local point of view, 
 very striking fact that in the summer of 1644, the 
 year upon which these notices have now entered, no 
 less than three armies — as armies were accounted in 
 those days — marched through Devonshire. Not one 
 of these had any business, so to speak, in North 
 Devon ; but each directly and materially affected 
 the fortunes of Barnstaple. The incident in the 
 military history of the town, to which the course of 
 the story is now tending, can only be made intelligible 
 by an explanation of the objects and movements, so 
 far as can be ascertained, of these armies; and for 
 that purpose it will be desirable to take a purview of 
 the operations of the war in their larger area from 
 the beginning of the year. Much military science 
 (so-called) will not be found displayed in these 
 operations, for the modern military critic assures us 
 that there was little or none.^ 
 
 * Major Walfoid's Parliamentary Generals of tJie Great Civil War^ 
 lSS6j passim. 
 
HOPTON AND WALLER, 249 
 
 Of the two sufficiently well-defined series of 
 military operations into which the new campaign 
 resolved itself, with that of the Northern counties 
 this relation has no concern ; it led up to the battle 
 of Marston Moor (July 2) in which the combined 
 forces of the Marquess of Newcastle and Prince 
 Rupert were crushed by Fairfax and Cromwell, and 
 the King's cause in the North was damaged beyond 
 recovery. In the Southern and Western Counties, 
 in the beginning of the year, Sir William Waller 
 with a division of the Parliamentary army occupied 
 the country south of Oxford. In March, Lord 
 Hopton, with the forces under his command quar- 
 tered about Bristol of which he was Governor, 
 advanced to attack him^ and was defeated at 
 Cheriton near Alresford, on the 29th of that month. 
 Our only interest in connection with this battle is in 
 the fact that Sir John Berkeley brought to Hopton's 
 army a reinforcement of two Devonshire regiments, 
 the first raised by the Royalists in the county, which 
 were involved in the defeat. It is also a curious fact, 
 in connection, that Berkeley was accused, whether 
 justly or not, of having released some Algerine 
 pirates from Launceston gaol in consideration of 
 their enlisting into the King's army. 
 
 The Parliamentary army under the Earl of Essex, 
 recruited principally in London, now took the field. 
 It numbered, on paper, 7,500 Foot, 3,000 Horse, and 
 a train of artillery. The military affairs of the 
 Parliament were managed by a Committee of Lords 
 and Commons, associated with Commissioners from 
 Scotland, who sat as the ''Committee of Both 
 
250 THE KING LEA VES OXFORD, 
 
 Kingdoms" at Derby House, Westminster. The 
 two armies, Essex's and Waller's, were to act 
 independently, but under the supreme command 
 of Essex. The investment of Oxford, to be followed 
 possibly by its siege, was one of the first details 
 of the Parliamentary plan of campaign. The fore- 
 shadowing of this movement reached the Court ; and 
 Queen Henrietta Maria, who was one of the first to 
 take alarm, resolved, apparently against the advice 
 of those about her, to seek a place of refuge. After 
 hesitating between Chester and Exeter, the latter 
 was chosen. She left Oxford in the middle of April, 
 and (being in a delicate condition) travelled by easy 
 stages through Bath and Bristol, and reached Exeter 
 on the 1st of May, 
 
 As the Parliamentary armies closed upon Oxford 
 and forced back the King's outposts, the situation 
 of the Royalists became almost desperate. At all 
 events, before the threatened close investment of 
 the city could be completed, the King with 6,000 
 Horse and Foot, in the night of the 3rd of June, 
 slipped out of Oxford between the two Parliamentary 
 armies. The subsequent proceedings of the two 
 Parliamentary Generals were the result of a quarrel 
 between them which is historical. Waller's army, 
 contrary to the design of the Parliamentary War 
 Office, was ordered by Essex to follow the King. 
 Essex's attention was diverted at this important 
 juncture to the enterprise of crushing Prince 
 Maurice and relieving Lyme Regis ; although 
 Maurice might well have been considered, in dip- 
 lomatic phrase, a quantite ncgligeable, and the 
 
FOLL WED B V WALLER. 2 5 1 
 
 " little vile fishing town," with the support of the 
 fleet, was well able to hold its own. From Essex's 
 own letters it would appear that he thought the 
 command of Devon and Cornwall of vital import- 
 ance, and that it would weaken the King by 
 depriving him of the contributions exacted from 
 those counties. It was certainly believed by the 
 Royalists that they were threatened by a com- 
 bined movement of both armies. " Had Essex 
 and Waller," wrote Lord Digby in a letter to 
 Prince Rupert describing the critical position of 
 the Royalist army, ''jointly either pursued us or 
 attacked Oxford, we had been lost." ^ To the 
 non-military observer it may occur that if there had 
 been any real generalship on the side of the Parlia- 
 ment on this occasion, the battle of Naseby might 
 have been fought a year earlier, and the war brought 
 to an end in 1644. 
 
 The flying march of the King's army, after 
 escaping from Oxford, has been compared to the 
 flight of a hunted hare. Followed by Waller, the 
 King made for Worcester, and a few days later 
 advanced to Bewdley. Then, finding Waller in 
 his path, he doubled back upon his former course, 
 and skirting Oxford without entering it was joined 
 by the infantry which had remained in the city. 
 Here he learnt that the army of Essex had been 
 drawn off to the south ; whereupon the King 
 advanced northwards, and at Cropredy Bridge, 
 about twenty-five miles from Oxford, a small two- 
 arched structure on the Cherwell, over which he had 
 
 ^ Eliot V^arburton's Prince Rtipert and the Cavaliers^ ii. 418. 
 
2 5 2 ESSEX RE LIE VES L YME. 
 
 ridden on the morning of the battle of Edgehill, his 
 army came into collision with Waller's. This was 
 on the 29th of June. The result of the encounter 
 was on the whole unfavourable to the Parliamen- 
 tarians. The King faiUng, as was usual, to follow 
 up such success as he had obtained, marched off 
 two days afterwards. 
 
 The Queen had given birth to a daughter at 
 Bedford House, Exeter, on the 16th of June ; and 
 concern for her safety undoubtedly influenced the 
 King in his determination to follow Essex, who was 
 already known to be on his march towards Devonshire. 
 
 The advance of Essex with a much superior force 
 through Dorsetshire compelled Prince Maurice, on 
 the 15th of June, to abandon the siege of Lyme. 
 The Prince had lost nearly 2,000 men during the 
 operations. He retired upon Exeter with the re- 
 mains of his army, amounting, according to Lord 
 Clarendon, to '* full 2,500 Foot and 1,800 Horse'*; 
 but as Lord Jermyn, writing at the time from 
 Exeter, estimated, not 3,000 altogether. Rushworth, 
 however, states that the force divided, part going to 
 Bristol — with what motive is not obvious.^ The 
 garrison of Exeter under Sir John Berkeley was 
 consequently strengthened, affording all the pro- 
 tection to the Queen that was then possible to be 
 given. But it was believed by her to be insufficient. 
 An ineffectual attempt was made to obtain a pass 
 from Essex for her removal, but as she had been im- 
 peached of high treason by the Parliament she could 
 
 ^ History of the Rebellion^ p. 520^. Eliot Warburton's Prince Rttpert 
 and the Cavaliers^ ii. 423. Riishworth's Collections^ v. 683. 
 
THE QUEEN ESCAPES FROM EXETER, 253 
 
 only be offered safe conduct as a prisoner to London. 
 From a letter written by her to the King on the 
 28th of June, in which she describes herself as " the 
 most miserable creature in the world," it is clear 
 that a flight had already been determined on. On 
 the 30th, the same day on which the troops of 
 Essex were crossing the border of Devonshire at 
 Axminster, the Queen set out in a litter from 
 Exeter. The mouth of the Exe and Torbay being 
 watched by the ships of the Parliamentary fleet, her 
 only way of escape lay through the loyal county of 
 Cornwall to Falmouth, where it would seem that 
 some provision had been made for the contingency 
 of her escape thence to France. That night she 
 rested at Crediton. A local chronicler has recorded 
 this first stage of the journey: — 
 
 In June The Queene lay at Credyton at Mr. Tukers 
 house and from thence shee rode at [? to] Lanson with all 
 her Troope. At the same time Prince Morrish came at 
 Crediton with all his foreses.^ 
 
 The following day, the ist of July, the same on 
 which King Charles recommenced his march ** with 
 drums beating, colors flying, and trumpets sound- 
 ing" after the. fight at Cropredy Bridge, the Queen 
 continued her journey to Okehampton. Here a 
 local chronicler also recorded the incident : — 
 
 July I, 1644. Queen Mary came hither with a great 
 many and stayed 2 nights. ^ 
 
 ^ "Thomas Roberts's Diary," Trans. Dev. Assoc. ^ vol. x. p. 325. 
 
 - " Rattenbury's Journal," Bridges's OakhamptoUy p. 95. Henrietta 
 Maria was designated ** Queen Mary " in the Liturgy of the Church of 
 England, and it appears was popularly so called. 
 
254 BARNSTAPLE HAS AN OPPORTUNITY. 
 
 On the 3rd she reached Launceston ; from which 
 place Mr. Francis Basset, of Tehidy, Sheriff of the 
 county, writing to his wife, says : '* Here is the 
 woefullest spectacle my eyes yet ever look'd on ; 
 the most worne and weake pitifull creature in y^ 
 world, the poore Queene, shifting for one hour's 
 liffe longer."^ And so the unfortunate Queen 
 passed onward, taking shipping at Falmouth, and, 
 only barely escaping the Parliamentary cruisers, 
 eventually reached the French coast.^ 
 
 I have detailed these incidents, in their chrono- 
 logical order, with what may have perhaps seemed 
 unnecessary minuteness, for the purpose of eluci- 
 dating an important episode of Barnstaple history, 
 hitherto obscure, which it will appear was closely 
 consequent upon them. It was in the midst of the 
 events just described that the Puritan town seized 
 the opportunity of revolting to the Parliament. 
 
 The incitement to this, as it proved in the sequel, 
 ill-timed action, is generally supposed to have been 
 the accident that Prince Maurice, either from un- 
 willingness further to deplete his attenuated army 
 then lying in and around Exeter, or for some other 
 reason, incautiously withdrew part of the Horse which 
 he had placed in garrison at Barnstaple, to serve as a 
 life-guard to the Queen in her projected journey. ^ 
 However this may have been, the Parliamentary 
 
 ^ Printed in Pol whele's Traditions and Recollections^ 1826, i. 15. 
 
 ^ Miss Strickland's romantic and inaccurate story of this flight has 
 been finally disposed of by Mr. P. Q. Karkeek in his elaborate paper 
 printed in vol. viii. of the Transactio7is of the Devonshire Association. 
 
 3 The True Informer^ No. 38, July 6-13, 1644, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxyi. Rushworth's Collections^ v. 682. 
 
COL ONEL JOHN L UTTRELL, 2 5 5 
 
 party in Barnstaple were of course aware of the 
 approach of Essex's relieving army, and we are not 
 without suspicion that the design of recovering the 
 town had been secretly entertained even before the 
 opportune occasion of the withdrawal of the Royalist 
 troopers had arisen. 
 
 The ground upon which this suspicion rests is the 
 veiled meaning which appears to run through an 
 original letter, still extant, which was written on the 
 25th of June by a Parliamentary partisan then in 
 Barnstaple — Colonel John LuttrelP — to Captain 
 Bennet, the same who had held command in the 
 Parliamentary garrison there, who was now at Tenby 
 in South Wales, Here follows the letter, or so much 
 of it as is necessary to show what it conveyed : — 
 
 Brother Bennet immediately after my landing and loosing 
 your company, I received intelligence not only of the great 
 change of the affections of the inhabitants of the country 
 but alsoe of great expectation they had of ayd and releife 
 from the easterne p^, not to trouble you w*^ relations of 
 every pticular passage leaving it which may better become 
 the hearing than the pen I only insert thus much to you ; 
 
 * 
 
 [He then writes that the army of the Parliament in con- 
 siderable force had come to Lyme Regis and raised 
 the siege there, not a little to Prince Maurice's damage ; 
 that there were reports of the Queen's confinement at 
 Exeter and that she was likely to die; that Taunton 
 
 ' He was of the Santon Court family, a branch of the Luttrells of 
 Dunster Castle, and was born in 1610. Narcissus Luttrell, the diarist, 
 was a nephew of his. The old manor-house of Santon, on the north 
 coast of Devon, on the verge of the wild waste of sand-hills known as 
 Braunton Burrows, still stands. It was probably Colonel Luttrell who, 
 as Captain Luttrell, was at Sourton Down (see p. 155). 
 
256 LUTTRELLS LETTER, 
 
 had been forsaken by the Cavahers, who had gone to 
 Dunston Castle and Bridgwater, which might prepare 
 for pillage ; others had gone to Minehead, and he 
 hopes ships are kept on those coasts " to prevent the 
 flight of those vipers." Resuming, he comes to the 
 main purpose of his letter.] 
 
 S""- I find a considerable number of able men such as I 
 question neither for resolution or ability the only defection 
 is armes and ammunition, the pvision whereof I must neces- 
 sarily engage you to pcure from Capt. Molton,^ that w^^ is 
 desired from you is that you importunately solicite him that 
 he will be pleased to send us a considerable quantity of 
 powder and match I believe we shall pvide bulletts enough our 
 selves, but least the ships may not bee all at Milford at recit 
 hereof wherby such store may not presently be sent as hee 
 may bee able & willing to spare us [What] I therefore 
 earnestly entreat you to send away is barrells of powder 
 presently w*^ a proportion of match to it to supply our present 
 want, and such greater proportion as may bee . . . spared 
 us w^^ speed/: w^^all pray use your utmost & most preva- 
 lent endeav'^ w**" Capt. Molton that hee send us 300 armes 
 bee they musqetts or carbynes if it bee possible, I desire 
 them but for a short season and will certaynely returne 
 them safely to you agayne I hope wee shall not need any men 
 from thence (being certayne of 1000 here already) except 
 those who fled from hence to the ships for shelter whom I 
 must desire may bee speedily returned : S' I hope no en- 
 gagem' in the Countrey hath withdrawn your pvdent care 
 from your owne, though I am enformed you ar ayd gover- 
 nour at Tinbey, the bearer hereof will declare to you the 
 place to land w'^ such other occurrences as are considerable : 
 wh"^ I doubt not but will be thoroughly pondered and 
 
 [' Captain Moulton was in command of a Parliamentary man-of-war 
 in the Bristol Channel.] 
 
DESIGN TO RECOVER THE TOWN. 257 
 
 maturely ... by you w""^ will ever engage your frendes 
 here to you [&c.J. 
 
 Yo" brother 
 
 John Luttrell. 
 Bastable, June 25, 1644. 
 
 [Indorsed by Captain Bennet] 
 
 CoUo Luttrell fro Bastaple to 
 
 me in Tenby June 25. 1644.^ 
 
 At first sight it might appear from this somewhat 
 enigmatical letter that at the time when it was 
 written the insurrection had actually taken place ; 
 an allusion towards the close of it seems to be mad« 
 to some such incident which Bennet was already 
 familiar with. But I do not think that this is its 
 right interpretation. Besides being inconsistent 
 with what we know of collateral events, it is obvious 
 that Colonel Luttrell wrote with cautious reticence, 
 purposely reserving, as he says, that *' which may 
 better become the hearing than the pen," and hints 
 only at some undertaking in conception, for which 
 the arms and ammunition were urgently wanted. 
 There would have been no occasion for this reserve 
 if the event had taken place ; there would have been 
 no motive for omitting all reference to it. Nor would 
 there have been any necessity for smuggling the arms 
 and ammunition ashore. There is little doubt, there- 
 fore, in my mind that on the 25th -of June, when 
 Luttrell wrote, the design had not come to maturity. 
 The allusion to the Barnstaple men who had fled to 
 
 ^Phillipps MSS. (Thirlestaine House, Cheltenham). Bennet Cor- 
 respondence, &c., No. 11,015, ^^^^ Zl- 
 
 18 
 
I'SB THE REVOLT, 
 
 the ships for shelter must have been connected with 
 some previous incident, the story of which is at 
 present unknown. 
 
 It would appear, in the absence of any further 
 information, that the coiip-de-main was precipitated 
 immediately after the dispatch of this letter; the 
 arms and ammunition had not been waited for. It 
 was no doubt carried out by Colonel Luttrell him- 
 self, leading the old trained-band soldiers and vo- 
 lunteers, who had remained in the town after the 
 first surrender, some of whom may have been im- 
 pressed into the Royalist service, and were not un- 
 willing to revolt at the first opportunity. Colonel 
 Luttrell's estimate that he could calculate upon a 
 thousand men for the contemplated rising (for so his 
 letter seems to read) may have been a sanguine one. 
 But whatever may have been the available force at 
 his command, at all events all accounts agree that as 
 soon as the Queen's body-guard had left Barnstaple 
 the revolutionists overpowered the small Royalist 
 garrison that remained, and took possession of all 
 the defensible points of the town for the Parliament. 
 
:^i? 
 
 PART III. 
 
 FROM THE REVOLT OF BARNSTAPLE TO THE PAR- 
 LLAMENT TO ITS SURRENDER TO THE KING. 
 
 June f f — September 17, 1644. 
 
 THE precise date of the Revolt of Barnstaple, 
 which forms the subject of the concluding 
 passages of the foregoing Part, has not been 
 recorded ; but there is sufficient circumstantial 
 evidence to show that it must have taken place on 
 the 26th or 27th of June. 
 
 The Queen's flight had been planned before the 
 28th of June, on which day she wrote revealing her 
 intention to the King, and, as we have seen, she 
 actually set out on the 30th. It may be inferred 
 that Prince Maurice had already, on or before the 
 28th, ordered the withdrawal of his troopers from 
 Barnstaple to serve as the Queen's escort. 
 
 Among the De la Warr MSS.^ there is preserved 
 
 ^ Fourth Report of the Historical MSS. Commission, App., p. 304. 
 
26o CAPTAIN PAGET S A TTEMPT. 
 
 a letter from the Prince to the Earl of Bath, dated 
 Exeter, June 28, notifying that he is sending Major 
 Paget with a party to prevent disturbances ** appre- 
 hended" at Barnstaple. A "party," I believe, means 
 any indefinite number of troops detached on any 
 particular service. It is implied that this was a 
 precautionary measure ; but it is doubtful if the out- 
 break at Barnstaple, from its very nature obviously a 
 a surprise, could have given time for apprehension. 
 It is more likely that the detachment of the force was 
 prompted by a rumour of the actual insurrection. In 
 the contemporary account of an official and autho- 
 rized Parliamentary news-sheet, it is stated that 
 ** Colonel Pricket — the Governor of Barnstaple — 
 sometime a major under Inchequeen [Lord InchiquinJ 
 of his own Regiment, a true Irish plunderer," ' com- 
 manded the party. The Parliamentary writers were 
 not always conversant with the names of their Cava- 
 lier opponents, and Colonel Pricket may possibly be 
 identified with the Major Paget of the previous 
 notice. And his description as '' Governor of Barn- 
 staple " leads to the conjecture that that was the 
 reason why Major Paget was so employed, although 
 there is no other trace of his connection with Barn- 
 staple. Be this as it may, Major Paget appears to 
 have attempted to enter Barnstaple, but, finding the 
 townsmen up in arms, to have retired and awaited 
 support. 
 
 Prince Maurice who, as we have seen, was with 
 his army at Crediton on the 30th of June, havin 
 
 cy 
 
 ' Perfect Occurrences of Parliament, July 5-12, 1644, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xii. 
 
COLONEL DIGBY'S ASSAULT. 261 
 
 become aware of the reception which Major Paget 
 had met with at Barnstaple, detached Colonel John 
 Digby (by a coincidence the same who had made 
 acquaintance with Barnstaple in the previous 
 September), with a strong reinforcement to Paget's 
 assistance. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Prince was personally escorting 
 the Queen as far as Launceston, where he was three 
 days later, having brought with him the news of 
 " greate rebellyon " at Barnstaple.^ 
 
 Colonel Digby's immediate command was pro- 
 bably composed of Horse and dragoons, but it seems 
 to have also comprised several companies of Foot. 
 The whole, including Paget's party, amounted, if 
 we may credit the local estimate, to five or six 
 hundred in number. Reckoning with the dates 
 before us, it may be observed that no time was lost ; 
 but assuming that the reinforcement set out on its 
 march from Crediton on the 30th of June and lay 
 that night at Chulmleigh, it could very well come 
 within sight of Barnstaple in the afternoon of the 
 following day — a distance altogether by the direct 
 road of that period of about thirty miles. Digby, 
 having reached Barnstaple, assaulted it on Monday, 
 the 1st of July. 
 
 The approach to the town of Barnstaple from the 
 south-east, after passing over Cooney Bridge, then 
 a timber structure which crossed the deeply-cut 
 channel of a stream running through the Port 
 marshes to the Taw, was by a narrow and some- 
 
 ^ Mr. Basset's Letter, printed in Polwhele's Traditions and Recol- 
 lections, 1826, i. 18. 
 
262 BARNSTAPLE FOREWARNED. 
 
 what crooked road through the thinly-built suburb 
 of Litchdon. In this thoroughfare stood the then 
 newly-erected pile of Almshouses founded by John 
 Penrose. The buildings, which still exist unaltered, 
 enclose a spacious quadrangle, the front being on a 
 line with the roadway and close to it. Between the 
 two wings of the facade is a loggia, or open colonnade 
 of short granite pillars, which support its roof and 
 stand on a wall or plinth breast-high. 
 
 Between the suburb of Litchdon and the main 
 entrance to the town, where the South Gate had 
 formerly stood, the approach was by a causeway 
 over an open space — which then was a waste, periodi- 
 cally overflowed by the tides — in modern times an 
 ornamental area called the Square. There was 
 another way, by a narrow lane which swept round 
 at the back of Litchdon and entered the town by 
 two branches, one of which reached the same 
 destination. 
 
 The Parliamentarians in Barnstaple having been, 
 it seems, forewarned, were on the alert. The warn- 
 ing had come in a terrifying form — a threat, which 
 is not incredible, from Prince Maurice that he would 
 sack and burn their town. The Prince had some 
 of the same kind of temper as his brother Rupert, 
 who, notwithstanding his brilliant qualities as a 
 soldier, was unscrupulous, and whose severity after 
 the storming of Bolton only a few weeks before, 
 when the houses were pillaged, and i,6oo persons 
 were said to have been slaughtered in the streets, 
 was doubtless fresh in recollection. 
 
 The Great Fort, it will be remembered, had been 
 
THE ATTACK, 263 
 
 dismantled after the surrender in the previous 
 September; the guns had been removed, the 
 trenches had been levelled, and all the redoubts 
 had been '' plucked down." In the interim, so far 
 as is known, these conditions remained unaltered. 
 As there is evidence that the guns were still lying 
 on the quays several weeks later, the inference is 
 that little if anything had been done to restore the 
 defences of the town. 
 
 The point where the two roads diverged and led 
 to the town was too vital a one to be left unde- 
 fended ; and probably here and on the piece of 
 waste, called for many years afterwards Litchdon 
 Green, which lay between these two roads within 
 the angle where the}^ separated, such breastworks 
 as could be hastily constructed were thrown up in 
 the two days which the warning given to the towns- 
 men allowed for preparation. The first resistance 
 to the attack of Colonel Digby's force was probably 
 offered at the outpost at Litchdon Green. The 
 party which held it were driven in, and the conflict 
 then surged onwards through the narrow road in 
 front of the Almshouses. Of the details we have 
 only the merest glimpses. There are still to be 
 seen in the oaken door of the hall of the building, 
 opening at the northern end of the loggia, bullet- 
 holes (bullets still sticking in them, not long before 
 Gribble*s time) which are traditionally said to have 
 been made in some fight of the Civil War. The 
 shots, from the position of the marks which they 
 left, must have been fired by the assailants, whoever 
 they were, when the loggia was defended from 
 
264 A STJ^EET FIGHT, 
 
 an enemy approaching from the southern road. 
 Whether or not these tangible evidences of a fight 
 are to be connected with Digby's assault can of 
 course now be only a matter of conjecture, but there 
 is sufficient ground for the supposition. 
 
 The conflict did not end here. It would seem from 
 a letter written by an inhabitant, and possibly an 
 eye-witness — ^^ An eminent man to a M.P." — and 
 printed in one of the contemporary news-sheets ^ that 
 Digby's party succeeded in forcing his way into the 
 town, and the struggle became a street fight. The 
 resistance appears to have been obstinate, and, as 
 we certainly know, the result was the defeat of the 
 assailants, the town remaining in the hands of its 
 defenders. '' In this," says the writer of the letter, 
 '' is not to be left out the remembrance of that true 
 man, Colonel John Luttrell, who behaved gallantly, 
 and repulsed the enemy when they had gained a 
 great part of the town. The actions of this noble 
 Colonel were so gallant and heroic in this business, 
 that we desire you would take notice of it and return 
 him thanks." 
 
 The writer of the letter which has been just 
 quoted reported that the Royalists lost " about 
 seventy slain and mortally wounded." This esti- 
 mate, made in the first flush of victorv, turns out to 
 have been exaggerated ; more sober accounts agree, 
 however, in stating that about twenty of Colonel 
 
 ' So at least I infer. This interesting extract was communicated to 
 the North Devon Jourjiaim December, 1881, by *' C. C," who gave 
 no further reference than to the Library of the British Museum. I 
 have not been able to verify it. 
 
ROYALISTS REPULSED. 265 
 
 Digby's force were killed in the fight. A Lieut- 
 Colonel Hide, the writer of the letter adds, was one 
 of these. ** Major-General Pigott," who led on the 
 Irish, had his arm broken. There was a Major 
 Pigot, of Lord Inchiquin's Irish regiment, who had 
 distinguished himself at the assault of Wareham a 
 few weeks before. ^ Nearly thirty prisoners were 
 taken, among whom were Howard, Jones, and some 
 other officers. The loss of the defenders in killed and 
 wounded is nowhere stated. A significant entry in 
 the Summary, however, throws this much light 
 upon it : — 
 
 In money paid 2 Chirurgions for curing 
 wounded Soldiers ... ... ... ... ;2£'2o o o 
 
 A large item. The entry comes a few weeks later in 
 the chronological order of the entries of the Sum- 
 mary, which is generally very accurate, and may 
 have been in consequence of the time occupied by 
 the cures. The item can hardly relate to any other 
 conflict. 
 
 ^Scanty as these notices unfortunately are, they 
 leave an impression of the severity of the conflict 
 which on that summer's day, in the year 1644, raged 
 in the streets of Barnstaple, and in the sequel show 
 the deep thankfulness of the inhabitants as for a 
 deliverance from some great peril. " God hath 
 wonderfully preserved us," says the writer of the 
 letter, **from the French and Irish, who did combine 
 
 ^ The confusion introduced by the names Pricket, Paget, and Pigott, 
 is deplorable. My own impression is that by all three the same person 
 is meant. 
 
266 THE DELIVERANCE, 
 
 to plunder our town, and to fire the houses, and to 
 put the inhabitants to the sword without so much as 
 giving us summons." A note from the Journal of 
 the Rev. Richard Wood, Vicar of Fremington, near 
 Barnstaple, is to a similar effect : — 
 
 1644. Memd"^. That the i day of July 1644, a day 
 never to be forgotten by the inhabitants of Barnestaple for 
 God's mercie and favor shewed in that miraculous deliv- 
 rance of them from that bloody conspiracy of some of our 
 neighbours in inviting and bringing in 5 or 600 horse and 
 foot, being French, Irish, and some English ag^ the said 
 town with purpose to have put all therein to the sword, and 
 to have possessed themselves of the whole town, but 
 were repulsed and driven away by the small power the 
 townsmen had ; our warning and notice was but two days 
 before.^ 
 
 There can be no doubt that Mr. Wood's highly 
 coloured allusion to the '' bloody conspiracy of some 
 of our neighbours," implicates the Royalist party 
 within the town. 
 
 In a more concise way a notice of the event was 
 also recorded in the parish register; it is in duplicate, 
 one form, of which the following is a copy, being in 
 the register of the burials, and the other in that of 
 the baptisms : — 
 
 The First day of July 1644 this Towne was most wonder- 
 fully preserved from the Irish and French which came 
 against them for to destroye this Towne which is a day to 
 be remembered of us of this Towne for ever. 
 
 John Sloly, Clarke. 
 
 ^ Printed in Chanter's Literary History of Barnstaple [1866], 
 p. 120. 
 
FRENCH AND IRISH. 267 
 
 The extreme dread of the French and Irish which 
 haunted the minds of the Puritans of Barnstaple 
 may appear, and has no doubt appeared, strange and 
 improbable to many not aware of the peculiar com- 
 position of Prince Maurice's army. I have been 
 told that in the circle of literati, who flourished at 
 Barnstaple early in the present century, some of 
 whose effusions are still to be found by the curious 
 in the pages of the North Devon Magazine, and the 
 North Devon Miscellany, and whose knowledge of 
 local histoiy appears to have been neither critical 
 nor very profound, it was even an idea that the 
 whole story of the French and Irish irruption was 
 the result of a scare, and that no such attack upon 
 the town ever really happened ! 
 
 The landing of several parties of Irish soldiers at 
 the south-western ports in the previous months has 
 been already mentioned. Not only was the horror 
 which pervaded the country after the atrocious 
 massacre of the Protestants in Ireland in 1641 still 
 fresh, but it was aggravated by the stories now in 
 circulation with reference to these new arrivals. 
 Everywhere they robbed and murdered. In Shrop- 
 shire, they had buried wounded men alive ; it was 
 even reported that they were cannibals. It was 
 quite true that by an order of Parliament they were 
 to be refused quarter. Lord Inchiquin, with 800 
 " Irish Rogues " had landed at Weymouth and 
 joined Prince Maurice's army before Lyme, and it 
 was a detachment of these which Major Paget led 
 against Barnstaple. Again : that the Royalist 
 armies were supplied through the Queen's influence 
 
268 COMMEMORATION OF THE DELIVERANCE. 
 
 with men and ammunition from France is certain. 
 Many of these men were doubtless old campaigners, 
 and did as Frenchmen always do in, what this was 
 to them, an enemy's country. In Prince Maurice's 
 army was the Queen's regiment of French, out of 
 which 200 men were cashiered about this time for 
 their insubordination and license. The ** pressure 
 and abuses of the French Horse " at Cullompton 
 were a subject of complaint by a local writer.^ 
 Perhaps their vices — peculiarly French vices — were 
 still more a terror of the country. Some horrible 
 stories were in circulation. ^ 
 
 Besides the notices of the Del-iverance of Barn- 
 staple recorded at the time, there are some interesting 
 subsequent references in the Borough accounts to 
 its commemoration in after years. One occurs in 
 the year 1650 — a disbursement of -£^ for yslbs. of 
 powder "' used on the ist of July; " 3 and again in 
 the year 1656 — an entry of -£z paid for *' gunpowder 
 spent the ist July," 4 in celebrating, it may be 
 assumed, the anniversary of the event. Another is 
 among the town memorials nearly a century after- 
 wards, showing how the commemoration had been 
 persistently kept up. This is a statement, incidentally 
 set forth in a legal document, that upon all occasions 
 of public rejoicing — '' and also on the first day of 
 July yearly, which was kept by some antient inhabi- 
 tants of the Town in remembrance that the Town 
 
 ^ Trcvelyan Papers, Camden Society, pt. iii. 248. 
 ^ See A Diary or an Exact Journal, &c., July 4-12, 1644, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xii. 
 
 3 Records, No. Ixviii. 4 Jhid., No. Ixix. 
 
INCIDENT MISREPRESENTED, 269 
 
 was on that day delivered from French and Irish 
 which came against it/' — bonfires had time out 
 of mind been made on the top of the Castle Hill, 
 &c.^ 
 
 .1 
 
 Our county historians have taken great liberties 
 with this incident. The perversion of history even in 
 so small a matter is to be deprecated ; it is a less con- 
 sideration, perhaps, whether or not the Barumites, 
 be our sympathies what they may, should have their 
 due credit. Nothing can be more certain than that 
 the Parliamentarians of Barnstaple, by their unaided 
 efforts, repulsed the attack upon them made by 
 Colonel Digby. The Messrs. Lysons, however, in 
 their Topographical and Historical Accotmt of Devon- 
 shire (1822), 2 giving what they allege to be Vicars's 
 account of the transaction, state that Digby's attack 
 was repulsed by a. detachment sent by the Earl of Essex, 
 The Rev. Thomas Moore, in his History of Devonshire 
 (1829), copies the version of the Messrs. Lysons ; 
 and our latest Devonshire historian, Mr. R. N. 
 Worth, in his Popular History of the county — a 
 work of very considerable merit on its own lines — 
 unfortunately perpetuates the same error. But 
 Vicars's account, although undeniably confused and 
 incoherent, scarcely admitted of an interpretation 
 which is now known to be historically inaccurate. I 
 give the passage, less for the intrinsic interest which 
 as a contemporary chronicle it may possibly have 
 than as a justification of my criticism of the modern 
 historians who have perverted it : — 
 
 ^ Cribble's Memorials oj Barnstaple^ p. So. ^ P. 34. 
 
2 70 A UTHENTIC A CCO UNTS. 
 
 The greatest part of the Garrison at Barnstable being 
 called off by Prince Maurice (who it was then said was to 
 goe to Pendennis Castle to be a Life-guard to the Queene) 
 yet the Garrison would needs leave a stinking savour behind 
 them of their old trade of Plundering. Whereupon the 
 Inhabitants (knowing the Lord Generall [Essex] was at 
 hand) tooke courage, and stoutly resisted them, and in the 
 issue, bravely overcame their late tyrannicall Masters; which 
 the most noble Lord Generall understanding of, presently 
 sent them a strong Party of Horse, under the Command of 
 the noble Lord Roberts and Sir Phillip Stapleton to helpe 
 them to beat them quite away and keep them out from 
 returning againe. And thus they most happyly shooke off 
 that servile yoake of those cruell Cavees, and twice repulsed 
 young Digby and others whom Prince Maurice sent to have 
 reduced them again under that banefull bondage, and killed 
 divers of them and tooke many others prisoners.^ 
 
 The contemporary Parliamentary news-writers, 
 who would have had no interest in extolling the 
 exploit of their friends in Barnstaple by lessening 
 any credit due to the Earl of Essex, refer to the 
 transaction in no uncertain terms. This, for in- 
 stance, is the report given in an authorized publi- 
 cation : — 
 
 Prince Maurice . . . thought to have seized Barnstaple, 
 and for that purpose selected a party, but upon intelligence 
 of their arrivall, the Townsmen rose against them and beat 
 them out, fought with them & slew almost 20, where upon 
 they presently acquainted the L. Generall [Essex] of their 
 desires to be protected by him, and so the Lord Roberts 
 
 ^ God's Arke, or, The Third Part of the Parliamentary Chronicle, 
 1646, p. 266. "Cavee'' was of course a nickname given to the 
 CavaUers. 
 
THE EVIDENCE, ^. 271 
 
 was forthwith sent with a strong party to secure and settle 
 the Towne, &c.^ 
 
 Rushworth, who may have helped to mislead our 
 county historians, fell into the error of stating that 
 Prince Maurice's attack on Barnstaple was after the 
 Earl of Essex had reached Tiverton.^ 
 
 I have given proof which is, I believe, incontro- 
 vertible, that the day on which Colonel Digby 
 assaulted Barnstaple — the day of the great Deliver- 
 ance — was the ist of July ; the evidence is the entry 
 in a contemporary private diary, the informal record 
 in the parish register, and the commemoration of 
 the event on the anniversary of the day for nearly a 
 century afterwards. On that day the army of the 
 Earl of Essex was advancing from Axminster to 
 Honiton. This fact is derived from an authentic 
 Itinerary in the Diary of Richard Symonds, printed 
 by the Camden Society.^ The army was therefore 
 at a distance of sixty^ miles, or about two days' 
 cavalry march, from Barnstaple, and what was more, 
 a hostile army was on the flank of the line of march. 
 The extreme improbability that any of Essex's force 
 was at Barnstaple on the first day of July is at once 
 apparent. 
 
 The army of the Earl of Essex, consisting of about 
 3,000 Horse and 7,000 Foot, and accompanied by a 
 
 ' Speciall and Reinarkable Passages informed to the Parliament^ July 
 
 3-10, 1644, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxiv. llie 
 
 Weekly Account of July 11, the Pei'fect Diurnall of July 1-8, and The 
 
 Perfect Occttrrences of Parliament of July 5-12, have paragraphs to the 
 
 same effect. 
 
 = Historical Collections^ v. 684. ^ 1859, p. 97. 
 
2/2 ESSEX SENDS RELIEF. 
 
 train of artillery numbering more than 40 guns, 
 marched from Honiton to Cullompton on the 2nd 
 of July. On the 3rd it reached Tiverton, where it 
 remained quartered for more than a fortnight. 
 
 It was at Cullompton on the 3rd of July, that 
 the Earl first received intelligence of the state of 
 affairs in Barnstaple, which, it appears, at once 
 influenced his further movements. An extract from 
 a letter which he wrote from Collompton to the 
 Committee of Both Kingdoms, and which has never 
 been printed, disposes of all doubt with reference 
 to the time and nature of the General's succour : — 
 
 Part of.y^ Enemy's forces having beene against Barn- 
 staple (the siiccesse whereof y'' Lo^^ will see by y^ inclosed) 
 hath caused me to send a p'^ of horse and foote for their 
 releife, and am adrawing with the rest of y^ body my selfe 
 to Tiverton and soe to steare my course according to 
 y*" intelligence I have from them. Collhampton, July 3, 
 1644.^ 
 
 The enclosure to which Lord Essex refers, and 
 which would have been of the highest interest to us, 
 has not been preserved. His lordship's epistolary style 
 is more concise than lucid ; the ^* success " to which 
 he alludes evidently means not the success of the 
 enemy's forces, but that of the Barnstaple men two 
 days before. Not a moment seems to have been lost 
 in detaching the support which he mentions. The 
 advanced party of Horse, we learn from other 
 
 ^ Letters received by the Committee of Both Kingdoms at Derby- 
 House, MS., Record Office, v(j1. ii. 
 
LORD ROBERTS A T BARNSTAPLE, 273 
 
 sources, was under the command of Lord Roberts/ 
 " field-marshal of the army " (an office in that sense 
 now obsolete), and it reached Barnstaple on the 4th 
 of July. 
 
 At Tiverton, says Sir Edward Walker, Essex 
 "' countenanced the rebellious Town of Barnstaple 
 in their second Revolt and put a Garrison into it/'^ 
 This allusion to a previous revolt must be to the 
 little - understood insurrection of the previous 
 February. 
 
 Lord Roberts*s party at Barnstaple was im- 
 mediately strengthened and made up to three 
 regiments of Foot and two of Horse. 3 
 
 Whilst Lord Roberts was at Barnstaple, where 
 he remained ten days, a tragedy was enacted in 
 the town, the like of which had neither before 
 nor has since been witnessed by the inhabitants. 
 The Rev. Richard Wood, in his '* Journal," from 
 which I have already quoted, has recorded : *' On 
 the 9th July, one Howard, a lieutenant, who was 
 taken prisoner in the fight [of the ist July], was 
 hanged at the Highcross of Barnestaple." 4 His crime 
 was that of having been a deserter. He had been 
 a lieutenant in Captain Pym's troop in the Pania- 
 
 ^ John Lord Roberts, or Robartes as it is now spelt, the second 
 baron of Lanhydrock in Cornwall. At the Restoration he judiciously- 
 hailed the rising sun, became Lord Privy Seal to Charles II., and 
 Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, and was created Earl of Radnor in 1679. 
 *'A man of a sour and surly nature, a great opiniatre " (Ckren- 
 don). 
 
 ^ HistoHcal Discourses, 1705, p. 41. 
 
 3 Letters received by the Committee of Both Kingdoms, MS., Record 
 Office, vol. ii., Earl of Essex's Letter: Tiverton, 10 July, 1644. 
 
 ^ Chanter's Literary History of Barnstaple, p. 120. 
 
 19 
 
274 LIEUTENANT HOWARD. 
 
 mentary army in Devonshire, and, seduced by the 
 example or influence of James Chudleigh and Cap- 
 tain Thomas Drake,^ had gone over with a score of 
 troopers to the Royahst side. He had nov/ been 
 taken in arms against the Parliament. He appears 
 to have been condemned in due form by (as it is 
 called) a council of v^ar, or as v^e should say a 
 court-martial. 
 
 There is some doubt v^hether his real name was 
 Howard, Hyword, Haward, or Hayward. Phoneti- 
 cally, these are much alike. Perhaps, in common 
 with the historic Howards, and after the manner 
 of the period, he wrote his own name at large. In 
 the contemporary notices of this unfortunate officer 
 and his fate, he is stated to have been lieutenant 
 in Captain Pym's troop of Parliamentary Horse. I 
 have, at page loi, given an abstract of a printed 
 letter describing a fight outside the walls of Exeter, 
 on New Year's day, 1643, between troops of the 
 garrison under Pym and Sir Ralph Hopton's forces. 
 The signature of the writer of that letter is printed 
 '' Abell Hyword"; he is called in the title-page of the 
 pamphlet " Lieutenant Hyword;" and from the in- 
 ternal evidence of the letter he was associated with 
 Pym, and, there is no doubt, was his lieutenant. 
 In '^ The List of the Armie Raised under the com- 
 mand of his Excellency, Robert Earle of Essex," 
 &c., printed in 1642, the name of the lieutenant of 
 Captain Pym's troop (No. 29) occurs as '^Arnold 
 
 ' Captain Drake had been taken prisoner, and sent from Plymouth 
 to London to be dealt with by Parliament. He was discharged from 
 the custody of the Sergeant-at-arms about this time. 
 
HANGED AT THE HIGH CROSS. 275 
 
 Haward."^ Here the Christian name is different, 
 although the initial letter is the same, and the sur- 
 name is spelt in another way. In another form 
 the same name occurs in a now rare tract, published 
 in 1642, relating to some of the earliest incidents 
 of the war which occurred in Somersetshire. I have 
 not seen the tract, but its title runs as follows : **C^r- 
 taine and true News from Somersetshire, with the 
 besieging of Sir Ralph Hopton's House, together 
 with the valiant and manfully performed courage of 
 Mr. Arnold Hayward, gentleman souldierJ" ^ The 
 mystification is curious ; but I have little doubt of 
 the identity of this officer with the *' Hyword " of 
 the letter, the ** Haward " of the Army List, and 
 the " Howard " of the story. 
 
 Lieutenant Howard, as a Parliamentarian, had 
 taken part in all the engagements during the war 
 in Devonshire and Cornwall, from Modbury to Sour- 
 ton Down. In the Royalist service, to which he 
 deserted, he appears to have had the rank of Captain. 
 
 Eight days after the fight of the ist of July — in 
 that narrowest part of High Street where Cross 
 Street joins it, in the centre of the town of Barn- 
 staple, and in front of the old guildhall, which, with 
 its single, broad, timbered gable supported by a row 
 of four square stone piers, overhung the street — 
 
 " They brought him forth to die 
 In the face of the sun." 
 
 ' Peacock's Army Lists of the Roundheads and Cavaliers, 1874, 
 
 P- 51- 
 
 2 Catalogued in J. Camden Hotten's Hand-Book to the Topography 
 
 and Family History of Engla?zd and Wales ^ &c., p. 202. 
 
2/6 CONSEQUENCES OF THE ACT, 
 
 With circumstances of studied degradation, sur- 
 rounded by Lord Roberts's red-coats, the ill-fated 
 young officer was sacrificed a victim to outraged 
 military honour. It was soldiers' law, from which 
 there was no appeal. 
 
 The act led to some noticeable consequences. 
 A few days later, Sir John Berkeley, the Governor of 
 the garrison of Exeter, as a retaliatory measure pro- 
 duced from gaol one Captain Turpin, and hanged 
 him. Turpin was not a military officer, but a 
 Topsham or Exmouth sea-captain, who, just twelve 
 months before, had been taken prisoner in an attack 
 which he had made with his armed ship on Sir John 
 Berkeley's position at Topsham, with the object of 
 throwing supplies, into Exeter, then invested by 
 the Royalists.* At the instigation, it is said, of 
 Sir John Berkeley himself, and notwithstanding 
 the remonstrance of Colonel John Acland the sheriff, 
 the judges, Heath, Foster, Banks, and Glanville, had 
 sentenced Turpin to death at the Assizes. There 
 does not appear, however, from the original letter, 
 which I am about to print, that there was any in- 
 tention of carrying this sentence into effect. Turpin 
 had been, at all events, respited ; and Sir John 
 Berkeley, desirous perhaps of escaping a scandal, 
 had, in fact, offered to exchange him. 
 
 The Earl of Essex, writing to the Committee of 
 Both Kingdoms from Tiverton, July 15, thus com- 
 ments upon the affair : — 
 
 ^ Letter of Sir John Berkeley, July 21, 1643, Add. MSS., B. M., 
 No. 18,980, f. 88^. (Printed in Notes and Gleanings, Exeter, i. 
 
CAPTAIN TURPIJSrS CASE. 277 
 
 Upon the hanging of Capt. Howard taken at Barne- 
 stable, formerly imployed under Capt. Pym (who had a 
 Troope in y® West Country) who being a Lieut, ran away 
 w'^ twenty horse at one time, they hanged Capt. Turpin 
 on Satterday last, a sea Capt. taken in seeking to relieve 
 Excester, and since condemned by Justice Heath by Ojer 
 & terminer, but had beene kept a prisoner ever since, and 
 at my being here they sent to exchange him for Serjeant 
 Major Willis, w*"^ exchange was so unreasonable as I re- 
 fused it, not thinking they had beene soe bloudy minded 
 to execute a man in cold bloud that had been soe long 
 condemned ; I am informed it was by P. Maurices Com- 
 mand, but if it please God I may have time to make them 
 repent it.^ 
 
 The Commons were so incensed by this transaction 
 that they at once (July 22) formally impeached 
 the four judges of the Western Circuit at the bar 
 of the House of Lords.^ In the result Sir Robert 
 Heath fled the country and died in France. 
 
 If Colonel Luttrell wrote to his friend and com- 
 rade Bennet an account of the transactions which 
 have been detailed, his letter unfortunately has not 
 been preserved. But on the 12th of July, when 
 the position was assured, he writes as follows : — 
 
 Sr. 
 
 Your presence is longed for exceedingly by me 
 & as much wanted for the settlement of the affairs of 
 this Country, I beseech you hasten the Armes, but if 
 
 ^ Letters received by the Committee of Both Kingdoms, MS., Record 
 
 Office, vol. ii. 
 
 2 llie Court Mer curie, No. 4, July 20-27, 1644, King's Pamphlets, 
 
 B, M., small 4tos, vol. clxviii. 
 
278 LUTTRELL TO BENNET. 
 
 they are not yet arriv'd att Milford, that you stay not for 
 them but leave David Langdowne to come w'^ them as soone 
 as they are ready : Your Collo" Rolle is callinge in of his 
 Regim^ of trayned souldiers & hopes one you to take your 
 company as Captain TreviUian who is here doth for my 
 pte my Lord Generall hath given me a Regi""^ of Vollun- 
 teirs w^^ I am raisinge as fast as I can & have presumed 
 to chuse your selfe A Leiuten^ Collonell, whither of 
 them you please to elect I much desire to know, I am 
 very loath there should be a separation between us nowe 
 if it may be otherways, however I leave it to your owne 
 discretion, and if I may not be a fellowe souldier w^^ you 
 in the same Regim' yet I shalbe ready to be your second. 
 I desire your aunswere if you come not your selfe w*'' theis 
 bearer. Things succeed onexpresably well in England the 
 Lord God of hoasts be praised. Old Anthony Moore was 
 shott through the body in our fight at this Towne but is 
 one recovery : if possibly you can pray bringe my gray- 
 hound home with you : 
 
 Your friend bro : & servant 
 
 John Luttrell. 
 Barnistaple, July the 12*^ Ann° 1644. 
 
 [Indorsed by Captain Bennet] 
 Collo. Luttrell Letter from 
 Bastaple to me in Tenby 
 July 12, 1644.' 
 
 The effect of this letter w^as to bring Captain 
 Bennet back to Barnstaple, where he appears to 
 have received from Lord Roberts his commission as 
 Colonel. Lord Essex, while staying at Tiverton, 
 was anxious to obtain local reinforcements, but the 
 
 * Phillipps MSS. (Thirlestaine House, Cheltenham). Bennet 
 Correspondence, No. 11,015, art. 39. 
 
COST OF THE RELIEF, 279 
 
 trained men of North Devon, as he complains, were 
 only willing to serve under their own colonels, and 
 there was not a sufficiency of arms for them. What 
 was the result of Sir Samuel Rolle's muster is not 
 known. Colonel Luttrell does not seem to have 
 been successful in raising for his regiment of volun- 
 teers more than the 374 men which, according to the 
 Summary, formed part of the garrison of Barn- 
 staple under his orders until September. 
 
 Lord Roberts's troops, according to one of the 
 diurnals, had been ''cheerfully entertained " on their 
 coming to Barnstaple. They had given immediate re- 
 lief from the apprehension of exasperated enemies from 
 without and of malignants from within. But there is 
 reason to believe that, on the whole, Barnstaple must 
 have been glad at their departing. The Summary 
 gives an insight into the terrible burden imposed 
 upon the inhabitants by their guests, who, moreover, 
 borrowed for their exodus what they had as little 
 intention of repaying as the Israelites had in the 
 biblical precedent. These are the items : — 
 
 For quartering the Lord Marshall's Brigade 
 with his Traine, 10 days, July 1644 ... ;£^So o o 
 
 In money lent the Lord Marshall to be 
 repaid m 20 daies, yet unsatisfied ... ••• 465 o o 
 
 Raised for his Soldiers upon the Town at 
 their departure ... ... ... ... 3^4 10 ^ 
 
 If this was the cost of ten days' entertainment of the 
 friends of the Puritan town, what must have been the 
 sum extracted by the Royalist occupants during the 
 previous months which the Summary (restricted, it 
 
2So THE MAYOR MADE GOVERNOR. 
 
 will be remembered, to claims for services to the 
 Parliament) of course omitted ? 
 
 Leaving, as it appears, three companies, w^hich 
 may be set down as numbering 300 men, under 
 Captains Deane,^ Needham, and Spooner, to 
 strengthen the garrison, Lord Roberts, with the 
 remainder of the detachment, rejoined the Earl of 
 Essex's head-quarters at Tiverton on the 17th of 
 July. The cost to the town of this reinforcement is 
 duly recorded in the Summary : — 
 
 For quartering Capt" Deane's, Capt" Need- 
 ham's, and Capt" Spooner's Companies from 
 4 July to 17 Sepf 1644 ... ... ... j[^\^'2. 10 o 
 
 The Corporation, at this time, having presumably 
 had enough of military governors, sent a petition to 
 the Earl of Essex, which he forwarded to Parliament, 
 and recommended to their serious consideration. In 
 this petition — ** the Town desires that their present 
 Maior [Charles Peard] be made Governour, and 
 Colonell to command and govern the Town in chiefe, 
 that they may have power to summon in the County 
 upon any occasion for their assistance, and to raise 
 money by some easy tax in the north part of the 
 County of Devon, being their division, to maintain 
 
 ^ This, I believe, was Richard Deane — in the following year Comp- 
 troller of Ordnance in Fairfax's army — Major-General at the Battle of 
 Worcester, and afterwards Admiral at sea in the time of the Common- 
 wealth — killed by a round shot by the side of Monk on board the Reso- 
 lution^ in the great three days' battle with the Dutch, under Van Tromp, 
 off the North Foreland, in June, 1653. He was buried in Westminster 
 Abbey with great state. 
 
DEATH OF GEORGE PEARD. 281 
 
 their Garrison." ^ What came of this is not known, 
 nor is it of much moment, as the town remained so 
 short a time in the hands of the Parliament ; but 
 Whitelock states that the petition was granted.^ 
 
 In the midst of these incidents we obtain our last 
 glimpse of George Peard, the associate of Pym and 
 Hampden in the earlier struggles for freedom, and 
 the life and soul of the Parliamentary cause in 
 Barnstaple. It could have been no other than he 
 who was the " eminent man '' who wrote one of the 
 accounts of the great Deliverance which I have 
 quoted. And, according to the only evidence extant, 
 this must have been in the last month of his life, for 
 he was born certainly not later than in July, 1594, 
 and he died, according to his epitaph, in the fiftieth 
 year of his age. He was buried in the parish church. 
 Among the fine mural monuments of the seventeenth 
 century which still give so much interest to the 
 interior of the ancient church of St. Peter, in Barn- 
 staple, there are more sumptuous and elaborate ones, 
 but there is none for design and workmanship com- 
 parable with that which memorializes George Peard. 
 A finely executed bust of the patriot, in alabaster, is 
 the central feature in a niche between two columns 
 of Corinthian architecture which support an entabla- 
 ture and pediment all in the Renaissance style. He 
 is habited in his Recorder's gown. The face is of 
 an ascetic and thoughtful type not unlike that of 
 Cardinal Manning. Over the entablature, enclosed 
 
 * A Perfect Diurnall of so?ne Passages in Parliament^ July 22-29, 
 1644, King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol: xiii. 
 2 Memorials, ed. 1682, p. 92. 
 
282 PEARUS EPITAPH, 
 
 by the broken pediment characteristic of the Jacobean 
 period, is an escutcheon on which the arms of Peard 
 are emblazoned — or, 2 wolves pass, in pale sa. 
 langued gu. Crest, a pard's head couped at the neck or, 
 pierced with a broken spear ppr. — and beneath the 
 plinth is another escutcheon containing the same 
 arms quartered with two other coats. The inscrip- 
 tion, soaring far above the usual platitudes, seems to 
 bear witness pathetically to the fervent spirit with- 
 drawn from a struggle which it believed to be in the 
 highest cause of all : — 
 
 M S 
 
 Hie iacet Depofitum Georgij Pearde militis lesu Chrifti 
 sub cuius vexillo contra mundum, carnem, et diabolum 
 militavit, eaq. militia expleta per Ducem pugnae teftem 
 vi6loriae authorem, Angelis et Sandlis congaudentibus 
 coronatus fseliciflime vivit : Commilitonibus in carne 
 contra carnem bellantibus vidoriam exoptans ut 
 in illis etiam fselicitetur. 
 
 Veftum induit f t\ ■ • fPartu 164.4. 
 
 a J->ucis sui ] ~~ 
 
 triumphatum annoj itriumpho 163 1. 
 
 die [ militiae suae 50. 
 
 Which may be thus translated : — 
 
 Sacred to Memory. Here lie buried the remains of 
 George Pearde, a soldier of Jesus Christ, under whose 
 banner he fought against the world, the flesh, and the devil, 
 and his warfare being accomplished, having received his 
 crown at the hands of his Captain, who had witnessed his 
 fight and given him the victory, he lives in bliss rejoicing 
 with Saints and Angels, and eagerly longing for the victory 
 
ESSEX'S ADVANCE RESUMED, 283 
 
 of his fellow soldiers in the body still warring against the 
 flesh, that in them also his bliss may be perfected. 
 
 He put on his fhirfVi ^f^AA 
 
 triumphal gar- . , [^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^^H ^ri ^^^ 
 
 5 .t m the year- (trmmph 1631. 
 
 ment on the ^ r u- r 
 
 I of his warfare 50. 
 day ^ 
 
 It will be observed that the day and month of his 
 death are left blank in the inscription. The date of 
 his burial cannot be supplied from the parish register, 
 which was not kept from April, 1643, to July, 1647. ^ 
 
 The fortunes of Barnstaple during the next two 
 months were, as I have remarked, so closely con- 
 nected with the operations of the several armies 
 which in turn pervaded Devonshire, that it will be 
 desirable to take up again the thread of the story of 
 those transactions — a story as strange, confused, 
 and, I believe, in a military sense, inexplicable as 
 any in the whole course of the war. 
 
 The advance of the Earl of Essex to Tiverton 
 with a largely superior force had compelled Prince 
 Maurice to withdraw his army from about Crediton, 
 and to recall the detachment which had ineffectually 
 attempted to recover Barnstaple. Abandoning Exeter 
 to its own resources. Prince Maurice concentrated, 
 
 ' Another peculiarity of this inscription is its Christian chronology. 
 The "triumph," or Resurrection, is usually supposed to have occurred 
 A.D. 33, therefore the year of Peard's death would have been (dating 
 from it) i6n and not " 1631." That this was not a clerical error of the 
 inscriber may be inferred from a precisely similar computation having 
 been made, in the same decade, in an entirely disconnected case ; as I 
 have more fully shown in a query which appeared in Notes ana 
 Queries, 7th Ser.,v. 8, asking for an explanation, but to which no reply 
 has been elicited. . 
 
284 PRINCE MA URICE A T OKEHAMPTON, 
 
 on the 2nd of July, at Okehampton. The Queen 
 was resting there on that day. Whilst at Okehamp- 
 ton, the Prince strengthened his army by drawing off 
 most of the blockading force from before Plymouth. 
 Rattenbury records something of the local experience 
 of this occupation : — 
 
 July 2 to 19. Prince Maurice with the Kings army 
 quartered here almost 3 weeks; during which tyme very 
 many sheepe were plundered and killed and eat by the 
 soldiers, and the yeast hay and other provisions of the 
 inhabitants were spent/ 
 
 Incidentally, this extract gives us an idea of one of 
 the collateral evils of military occupation in the time 
 of the Civil War. The plundering which Ratten- 
 bury recorded in his homely fashion was apparently 
 on a regimental scale. Petty pillage was almost 
 irrepressible, and was common in the armies on both 
 sides alike. Symonds^ tells us that Essex's soldiers, 
 at this very time, robbed the church of Newton St. 
 Cyres of its communion plate, and took away from 
 Whitstone church a pall of black velvet, worth, he 
 estimated, ;^io. It is fair to add, however, that in 
 the King's own army greater strictness in this respect 
 was at least attempted, and the route might have 
 been almost traced by the examples which were left 
 hanged, duly ticketed with their crimes, on the 
 nearest trees on the line of march. 
 
 Some of the difficulties encountered by the Earl 
 of Essex in his dealings with the local supporters of 
 
 X c< 
 
 Journal " in Bridges's Okehampton^ p. 95. 
 Diary of Richard Symoiids^ Camden Society, p. 41. 
 
ESSEX'S LEVIES, 285 
 
 the Parliament, and which hampered his movements, 
 are given in one of his letters to the Committee of 
 Both Kingdoms, dated from Tiverton, the loth of 
 July :— 
 
 . . . Although y® Countyes of Sumersett and Devon 
 shew great affeccon to y^ ParP and to be rid of y^ Egiptian 
 slavery, yet there are two things great hinderances to the 
 ayde we should have of y^ Country. The first is their 
 desire to serve under their owne Countrymen, and not to be 
 listed in my Army ; And those few Country gent, that are 
 here wanting Armes to Arme them, soe that although there 
 be multitudes of bodyes of men appeares, yet little use can 
 be made of them for the psent till Armes & the gent, who 
 have the power over them be come downe. The second is, 
 The Garrisons of the Enemyes keep the Countrys greatly 
 in awe both for hindering of Contribucon and their rising, 
 in Sumersetshire, Bristoll, Bridgwater, Castle of Taunton 
 and the Castle of Dunster : For the preventing of these 
 inconveniencyces I have taken the best care I can, my 
 Army being much devided, the Lord Roberts being still 
 w*^ three Regim^ of foote, and tw^o of horse at Barnestaple.^ 
 
 I Letters received by the Committee of Both Kingdoms, MS., Record 
 Office, vol. ii. I am able to trace to its source an anecdote of the 
 Earl of Essex but little known. Gambling is not peculiar to any age, 
 nor, it seems, are fantastic wagers to the era of the Prince Regent. 
 While the Earl was lying with his army before Exeter at this time, 
 he received news of the battle of Marston Moor, and learnt that, 
 within the city, Sir John Berkeley and the garrison were rejoicing 
 as if for a Royalist victory. Whereupon the Earl sent in a trumpet 
 to Berkeley, offering him that if it turned out so, he, Essex, would 
 surrender Weymouth and Melcombe Regis (then in possession of the 
 Parliament), provided that Berkeley would engage, on the other hand, 
 if Prince Rupert was defeated, to surrender Exeter. The wager was 
 not accepted. This was gravely communicated in a letter from the 
 Earl to the Committee of Both Kingdoms, dated Tiverton, July 15, 
 1644. 
 
286 ESSEX'S COUNCIL OF WAR. 
 
 With reference to the levies here alluded to, I find 
 that Colonel Were, in his ^j^jc/og-z^, published towards 
 the end of the same year, claims to have raised, 
 presumably in his own neighbourhood of Tiverton, 
 *' two regiments, one of Horse and one of Foot, 
 without money, when he went with Essex into 
 Cornwall. '* ^ 
 
 It was whilst Essex was at Tiverton that he 
 became first aware of the significance of the King's 
 sudden southward march from Worcestershire, which 
 began on the 12th of July. He rightly divined that 
 the king was in pursuit of him. '* My Lord 
 Roberts [wrote Essex on the i8th of July, from 
 Tiverton] returned from Barnstable yesternight, and 
 we were resolved to have marched this day towards 
 P. Maurice & soe westward, but upon notice y^ y^ 
 King was come to Bathe a Council of Warre was 
 called," &C.2 Lord Digby, who was with the King's 
 army, writing the day before, says, " We are • . . 
 not out of hopes to crush Essex betwixt Prince 
 Maurice's army and ours before Waller can incom- 
 mode us, who, for aught we can hear, is yet about 
 Warwick, and likely, if he follow us suddenly, to 
 follow us weak. If he stay to gather up and join 
 other forces, probably he may be with us too late, so 
 that we are not unlikely, by God's blessing, to have 
 a fair blow for it in these parts." 3 Waller, however, 
 
 ^ The Apologie of Colonel! John Were, &c., King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxxxv. 
 
 "" Letters received by the Committee of Both Kingdoms, MS., Record 
 Office, vol. ii. 
 
 3 Printed in Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert and the Cavaliers, 
 ii. 477. 
 
PRINCE MAURICE FALLS BACK. 287 
 
 did not follow the King into the West. In this per- 
 plexity, Essex held the council of war ; and three 
 proposals were submitted to it — whether he should 
 march back to meet his Majesty's forces ; whether 
 he should sit down before Exeter; or whether he 
 should "rouse and disperse" the Royalist forces 
 in Cornwall which were harassing Plymouth. The 
 " unskilfulness " of Essex, which seems to have 
 been apparent to Lord Digby, led him to yield to 
 a disastrous resolve. The military critic tells us 
 that the first course should have been undoubtedly 
 the one adopted, but the last and worst was deter- 
 mined on by the majority of the council. 
 
 Prince Maurice broke up from Okehampton on 
 the igth of July, and fell back with all his forces to 
 Heavitree, on the other side of Exeter. The Prince, 
 Sir Edward Walker says, was not then aware of the 
 advance of the King, who had just entered Somer- 
 setshire, but was manoeuvring to check Essex. ^ 
 On the way, he narrowly escaped coming into con- 
 tact with the advanced guard of Essex's army, 
 which, after its inaction of more than a fortnight at 
 Tiverton, was at length in motion, and on its march 
 to Crediton, early in the morning of the 20th. The 
 inaction is perhaps accounted for by the three- 
 cornered dilemma and divided counsels. The 
 opportunity of crushing Prince Maurice's army at 
 Okehampton had been lost. 
 
 Lord Digby, writing from Exeter a few days 
 later, supposed that it was the purpose of Essex to 
 intercept the Prince — '' Essex . . . thought with a 
 
 * Historical Discourses, p. 42. 
 
288 ESSEX'S ARMY ON THE MARCH. 
 
 swift march in the night to have surprised him, or 
 clapped betwixt him and Exeter, of which he missed 
 but very little. But the Prince, by good intelligence, 
 got an hour before him in his retreat to Exeter, by 
 which miss Essex was cast westward of us both.** ^ 
 But as the whole of the Parliamentary army, with 
 its impedimenta, 2 was on the march, it is more than 
 probable that Lord Digby's assumption that it was 
 the purpose of Essex to strike a flank blow at Prince 
 Maurice was an after-thought. 
 
 Resting during the night of the 2ist of July at 
 Bow, the Parliamentarians reached Okehampton on 
 the 22nd, on which day the local diarist records : — 
 
 The Earle of Essex came with the L. Roberts and the 
 Parliament Army to a very great number, and very many 
 carriages, but tarried but one night. 3 
 
 The march was continued on the following day to 
 Tavistock. Sir Robert Pye, who had been employed 
 with Colonel Blake in the capture of Taunton, 
 coming up, had a skirmish with some of the Prince's 
 Horse, in the neighbourhood of Okehampton, on the 
 24th.4 
 
 At Tavistock a party was detailed by Essex to 
 attack Fitzford, the neighbouring fortified house of 
 Sir Richard Grenville, a personage then and after- 
 
 ^ Printed in Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert aiid the Cavaliers^ 
 
 111. 2 
 2 
 
 It was reported that the baggage train consisted of more than 350 
 carriages, for which 2,000 draught horses were employed. *' Roberts's 
 Diary," Trans. Dev. Assoc. y x. 326. 
 
 3 " Rattenbury's Journal," Bridges's Okehampton^ p. 95. 4 /^/^, 
 
S//^ RICHARD GREAVILLE, 289 
 
 ^vards peculiarly obnoxious to the Parliamentary 
 party. This remarkable man, who became a con- 
 spicuous figure in Devonshire during the remainder 
 of the war, was a younger brother of Sir Bevill 
 Grenville who had fallen at Lansdown ; but he pos- 
 sessed none of the chivalric virtues for which Sir 
 Bevill was famous. He was born at Stow in the 
 year 1600. At the outset of his career, when a 
 youth, he earned in the military school of the 
 Netherlands a reputation as a soldier, which his 
 enemies never at any time denied to him. He 
 served in the expedition to Cadiz in 1625, and sub- 
 sequently in the equally disastrous one to the Isle 
 of Rhe. He owed his advancement to the patronage 
 of the Duke of Buckingham, and was knighted and 
 created a baronet. He married a wealthy widow, 
 the owner of Fitzford in her own right. Before the 
 Civil War he had held a command in the Irish 
 Expedition, and on his return received the thanks of 
 Parliament by the mouth of the Speaker for his 
 services. When the Civil War broke out he was 
 given a troop of Horse in the service of the Parlia- 
 ment; but in what way he was employed in the earlier 
 period of the war is not apparent. He first becomes 
 notorious by a splendid act of perfidy. In order, it 
 is said, to obtain his arrears of pay and the return 
 of his horses, which for some reason had been with- 
 held from him, he *' openly, before the House of 
 Commons, as a further testimony of his real affection 
 to the Parliament, made a serious protestation that 
 he would never take up arms against but for the 
 Parliament, and die in the defence of them with 
 
 20 
 
290 SIR RICHARD GRENVILLE. 
 
 his last drop of blood." ^ He obtained what he 
 wanted. Early in the year to which we are now 
 come, he was given the con^mand of -the Horse under 
 Sir William Waller, who was preparing to advance 
 (as was then the intention) into the West of England. 
 He also received from Parliament a sum of money 
 for his equipage, " in which," says Lord Clarendon, 
 *' he always affected more than ordinary lustre." 
 With an advanced party of Horse, and travelling, 
 himself, in a coach drawn by six horses, accom- 
 panied by other stately appointments, Grenville set 
 out from London ; but instead of proceeding to Sir 
 William Waller's rendezvous, as directed, he went 
 to Oxford, and placed himself and his party of Horse 
 at the disposal of the King. All Waller's plans, which 
 had been confided to him, were, of course, forthwith 
 divulged at the Royalist head-quarters. There was 
 a good deal of changing sides during the war, but 
 there had been nothing, as yet, parallel to this 
 except the desertion of Sir Faithful Fortescue,^ who 
 had gone over with his troop from the Parliamentary 
 to the Royalist army in the midst of the battle of 
 Edgehill. The same excuse has been made for both: 
 that they were Royalists at heart, but having been 
 employed by the Parliament before any disruption 
 was thought of, only awaited the best opportunity — - 
 for their ow^n personal interests — of declaring their 
 real sentiments. The Parliamentary press was 
 
 ' A Peij'ect Diuniall, Sept. 25-Oct. 2, 1643, Icing's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., large 4tos, vol. x. 
 
 - He was a North Devon man, and he and Sir Richard Grenville 
 were born at places within fifteen miles of each other ; the former 
 at Buckland Filleigh, and the latter at Stow. 
 
S/J^ RICHARD G RENVILLE. 291 
 
 furious at the treachery of Grenville, and piled up 
 its choicest epithets on the traitor ; he was not 
 only that, but a '' Turke, Infidell or limme of the 
 Devill." Grenville soon left the Court for the West, 
 ostensibly to help Colonel Digby, who was then 
 besieging Plymouth, but really, it was said, for the 
 purpose of sequestering the estates of his wife, who 
 was at that time residing in London, and **much 
 affected to the Parliament." 
 
 On the discovery of Grenville's treachery, Parlia- 
 ment, not to be outdone in the use of the language 
 of vituperation, solemnly denounced him as, '* Tray- 
 tor, Rogue, Villain and Skellum," ^ in a proclama- 
 tion, copies of which were affixed vvith all possible 
 circumstances of ignominy to two gibbets, one over 
 against the Royal Exchange, and the other in 
 Palace Yard, Westminster. 
 
 Sir Richard Grenville was as magnificent in his 
 tastes as his contemporary, the Marquess of New- 
 castle ; he was as audacious in his projects as a 
 modern Brunei. At one time he proposed to cut a 
 channel across the isthmus from Barnstaple to the 
 English Channel, and let the sea into it, for the 
 purpose of keeping Devon and Cornwall safe for the 
 King. Such were his eccentricities. Lord Claren- 
 don alludes to his vanity and ambition. His greatest 
 faults were developed in his military character ; he 
 represented the worst type of the Cavalier. He was 
 
 I The precise meaning of the opprobrious term *' Skellum " has 
 given rise to some discussion. It was undoubtedly derived from the 
 Dutch. According to Mr. Rider Haggard, who uses the word in his 
 novel of Jess, it is still in vogue in Dutch South Africa, and means 
 vicious beast. 
 
292 ESSEX ENTERS CORNWALL. 
 
 oppressive, high-handed, unscrupulous, and cruel 
 even to brutality, and the name of '* Skellum Gren- 
 ville " became for the remainder of the war a terror 
 in the Western Counties. 
 
 Fitzford, w^hich is better known as the scene of 
 one of Mrs. Bray's romances, was stormed and taken 
 on the 23rd of July, quarter being given to all the 
 garrison except the Irish. Two pieces of cannon, a 
 quantity of arms, and 150 prisoners fell into the 
 hands of the captors, besides " excellent pillage to 
 the value of ;f 3,000 and provisions a great quantity." ^ 
 While this was going on Sir Richard Grenville, who 
 had been directing the blockade of Plymouth, aban- 
 doned his works before that town, and passed into 
 Cornwall by Saltash. 
 
 The Earl of Essex continued his march on the 
 26th, advancing to the Tamar at two points, New- 
 bridge and Horsebridge. At Newbridge, Grenville's 
 force, consisting of three regiments of Foot, Colonel 
 Acland^s, Colonel Fortescue's, and Colonel Carew's, 
 was in position to dispute the passage. A '*hot 
 encounter" ensued, in which the Parliamentarians 
 lost about forty men. But the bridge was carried, 
 and Essex's army entered Cornwall.^ 
 
 ' A Perfect Diwnail, July 29- Aug. 5, 1644, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., large 4tos, vol. xiii. 
 
 ^ Both Rushworth {Collections^ v. 691) and Whitelock [Memorials^ 
 ed. 1682, p. 92) mention this affair. It is somewhat remarkable, how- 
 ever, that Hals, the old Cornish antiquary, who describes Grenville's 
 movements on leaving Plymouth, and derived his information orally 
 from several old men who had been officers in Grenville's army, not 
 only does not say a word about it, but intimates rather that Gren- 
 ville's object was to '* shun or avoid " Essex, fearing, as well he might, 
 .hat "he was not strong enough to engage his great army " (see Davies 
 
LORD ROBERTS TO BENNET, ' 293 
 
 From Bodmin, on the 31st of July, Lord Roberts 
 wrote to Colonel Bennet at Barnstaple, the main 
 object of his doing so being to order him with his 
 regiment, if he had raised it (which was not at all 
 probable, considering the shortness of the time), to 
 join the Parliamentary army. It was too late, how- 
 ever, as the King's forces already blocked tlie road, 
 and Colonel Bennet remained in Barnstaple, as we 
 shall see later ; but there is no mention in the 
 Summary of any men being under his command 
 in the garrison at this time. The letter is of suffi- 
 cient interest to find a place here : — 
 
 Sr 
 
 I hope yo"" Regym'^ is in such a forwardnes & the 
 Towne of Barnestaple & country about so well furnished as 
 you & yo"" men may bee spared without prejudice to the 
 Town or Country, w*^^ if it may bee I desire you to advance 
 w*^ yo' men assone as may bee towards mee, and that you 
 will use yo'' best endeavours to understand if y^ Kings 
 movem ^ Prince Maurices as also wher S"" W"" Waller is & 
 y* hereof you would advertise mee assone as you gott any 
 
 Gilbert's Parochial History of Cornwall, 1838, iv., 185). This view 
 is certainly supported by the statement of Sir Edward Walker, who had 
 exceptional opportunities of knowing the facts. Mentioning Horsebrid^e 
 as the only point of passage, he says that it was broken down and held 
 by Sir Richard Grenville for a while, but implies clearly enough that 
 there was no fight, inasmuch as he remarks that '*a small number 
 might have given a stop to a far greater army than Essex had then," 
 and that " the quitting of this bridge gave him the conveniency of 
 coming over without the least opposition''' [Historical Discourses ^ 
 pp. 48, 49). 
 
294 MARCH OF THE KINGS ARMY. 
 
 certayne informacon I have nothing now to add but of my 
 
 being 
 
 Yo"" very affectionate friend 
 
 Bodmyn 31° Jno. Robertes. 
 
 July 1644. 
 For Colonell Bennett 
 at Barnstaple these. 
 
 [Indorsed by Colonel BennetJ 
 Lo. Roberts fro Bodmin 
 about my Regime- 
 July 31. 1644.^ 
 
 The King, with an army originally not inferior to 
 that of the Earl of Essex in strength, and now in- 
 creased by the accession of Lord Hopton with a 
 contingent from the garrison of Bristol, was advanc- 
 ing slowly through Somersetshire. His immediate 
 apprehension for the safety of the Queen had been 
 removed, and the anticipation of coming up with 
 Essex at Exeter necessitated caution. The advance 
 had not been remarkable for its celerity. Owing, I 
 suppose, to the badness of the roads, although it was 
 summer, one day's march of sixteen miles, an un- 
 commonly long one, had occupied twenty-one hours, 
 *' without any bayte," as Symonds, who was himself 
 in the army, feelingly remarks.^ In the seventeenth 
 century there appears to have been three main 
 overland approaches to Devonshire from the north 
 and east in ordinary use ; of these, the road from 
 Bristol to Exeter was blocked at Taunton, which 
 
 ' Phillipps MSS. (Thirlestaine House, Cheltenham), Bennet Cor- 
 respondence, No. 11,105, art. 41. 
 
 ^ Symonds's Diary ^ Camden Society, p. 28. 
 
THE KING ENTERS DEVONSHIRE. 295 
 
 was held by a strong Parliamentary garrison 
 under the resolute Colonel Blake. The royal 
 army advanced from Bath along the well-beaten 
 Fosseway, on which Celtic warriors and Roman 
 legionaries had marched centuries before, by II- 
 chester, reaching Honiton on the 25th and Exeter 
 on the 26th of July. The trained bands of Devon- 
 shire were summoned to join the royal colours while 
 the King was in Exeter ; it is not surprising that of 
 these much-distracted '* trainers," alternately pressed 
 by King and Parliament, only a few came in. 
 
 Prince Maurice's army had returned to Crediton 
 after Essex's departure. There, in the Lord's meadow, 
 it was reviewed, 4,500 strong, and, it is stated, in 
 the finest order, on Saturday the 27th by the King 
 in person, who afterwards, attended by his own troop 
 of Horse, proceeded to Bradninch, where he supped 
 and passed the night at the house of Mr. Sainthill. 
 On the following day, Sunday, the whole of the 
 King's army advanced to Crediton, and on the Monday 
 resumed the pursuit of Essex, the Prince's army 
 being a day's march in front. 
 
 The King travelled in his coach, and was accom- 
 panied in this expedition by the young Prince of 
 Wales. On the line of march through this part of 
 Devonshire there were no great country houses in 
 which Royalty could, willingly or unwillingly, have 
 been entertained. That night the King was lodged 
 at Bow in the village alehouse. On the following 
 day the army reached Okehampton, and the King 
 was *' put up " by Mr. Rattenbury the town-clerk, 
 the diarist to whom I have been indebted for some 
 
296 THZ KING ENTERS CORNWALL, 
 
 valuable local notes. Mr. Rattenbury lived in an 
 ancient house which had belonged apparently to the 
 Courtenay family.^ He does not seem to have been 
 much impressed by the unexpected honour done him, 
 as he makes no allusion to it in his diary, merely 
 recording that on the 29th of July " King Charles 
 came with many lords and his Army staied one 
 night." He also mentions that "Mr. Mayor gave to 
 his Matys servants twenty pounds being ... re- 
 quired by them with much earnestness." ^ This 
 transaction is scarcely saved by a euphemism from 
 inevitable comparison with the plundering for which a 
 soldier had been duly hanged at Bow the day before. 
 The cupidity of his Majesty's servants may have been 
 sharpened by the constrained generosity of the Mayor 
 of Exeter, who had presented the King with ^^500 in 
 gold, the Prince with £100, and the Prince's servants 
 with -£zo. 
 
 The march was continued on the following day to 
 Lifton, the army passing over the open downs which 
 had been the scene of Lord Hopton's disaster of 
 the previous year. Launceston, which had been 
 temporarily occupied by a detachment from Essex's 
 army, was found to have been evacuated. On the ist 
 of August, five days only after the enemy had pre- 
 ceded them, the whole of the King's forces crossed 
 the Tamar at Polston Bridge and entered Cornwall, 
 the King " staying a while " in Launceston during 
 the operation. 
 
 While these considerable and eventful movements 
 
 ' Symoiids's Diary, Camden Society, p. 42. 
 
 Rattenbury 's Journal," Bridges's Okehampton, p. 95. 
 
 2 4 < rv> 
 
APPLEDORE FORT. 297 
 
 were passing in another part of the county, the new 
 garrison of Barnstaple, entertaining, it nnay be, the 
 idea which was then prevalent elsewhere that the 
 Earl of Essex was *' in a probable way " to reduce the 
 West wholly to the obedience of Parliament, were 
 not idle in the cause. Bideford, according to the 
 Merctirms Atdicus, had at the time a very good 
 Royalist garrison — a statement for which there is no 
 corroboration, and the truth of which the ensuing in- 
 cident leaves questionable. It is certain, however, 
 that the Fort at Appledore, which had been sur- 
 rendered to Colonel Digby by the Parliamentarians in 
 September of the previous year, was held by a small 
 detachment of soldiers put into it by Prince Maurice 
 after the revolt of Barnstaple '' to make the river 
 useless to that town." ^ 
 
 There is little doubt that the remains still to be 
 seen on the summit of Staddon Hill around the base 
 of which cluster the irregular houses, picturesque as 
 seen from a distance, but redolent of maritime 
 associations when approached, which form the 
 western prolongation of the town of Appledore, indi- 
 cate the position of this work. The outline was 
 evidently quadrangular with bastions at the angles, 
 one of which, with traces of a revetment, is tolerably 
 well preserved. There is not a vestige of a tradition 
 now attached to it. At the outbreak of the war it 
 was occupied, as we know, in the interest of Parlia- 
 ment ; but whether it was constructed at that time, 
 as the Rev. J. Watkin, the historian of Bide- 
 ford, implies, or had been in existence previously, 
 
 * Walker's Historical Discourses^ P* ^5* 
 
298 APPLEDORE FORT. 
 
 which appears to me the more probable supposition, 
 is unknown. The position is one from which there 
 is an uninterrupted panoramic view of sea and land. 
 With the artillery even of those days the fort must 
 have commanded the entire estuary of the Taw and 
 Torridge — in the old maps called Barnstaple Water.^ 
 The Mercicrms Aulicus went so far as to declare that 
 it made Barnstaple ''a mere inland Towne." The 
 fort, although of small size, was garrisoned by about 
 forty men. These were Cornishmen — probably the 
 '' underground men," that is, miners, who, as the 
 result showed, well knew how best to secure them- 
 selves in such an isolated work which could have 
 been little more than a redoubt. How many guns 
 were mounted in the fort is nowhere stated. 
 
 It is easy to understand that the fort may have 
 been an offence to the essentially mercantile com- 
 munity of Barnstaple, and that it may have inflicted 
 annoyance and actual injury upon the shipping 
 which necessarily had to pass under its guns when 
 entering or leaving the port. There was probably 
 a cessation of most of the foreign trade and of the 
 resort to the Newfoundland fishery, but the coasting 
 traffic with Bristol and with Wales, from which coal 
 and limestone were brought, was a matter of every- 
 day concern to the town. 
 
 Towards the end of July, with the object of 
 getting rid of this annoyance, the troops com- 
 posing the garrison of Barnstaple, then under the 
 
 ^ '* Barnstabell Water," in A Plott of all the Coast of Cornwall and 
 Devonshire as they were to be fortified in 1588 against the landing of any 
 Enciny> Taken from the original in the Cottonian Library, by John 
 Pine, Engraver, London, 1739. 
 
ATTEMPT UPON THE FORT i(^c^ 
 
 command of Colonel John Luttrell, proceeded in 
 force to attack Appledore Fort. It may be 
 conjectured that this was a boat-expedition ; the 
 distance from Barnstaple by water was only seven 
 miles, and the approach by land would have been 
 very circuitous. The enterprise seems to have been 
 less easy of execution than had been calculated 
 upon. The attack resolved itself, after the failure 
 of a surprise, into a regular siege, during which 
 the assailants appear to have suffered heavily. 
 The siege degenerated into a close blockade. 
 The defenders ultimately were "much straitened 
 both for bread and fresh water '' — as well they 
 might have been, considering the situation of the 
 fort on the summit of a hill — and had no chance 
 of conveying intelligence of their condition through 
 the lines of their besiegers. A certain colonel, who 
 is stigmatized covertly as ** no Cornishman,'' had 
 been entrusted with the victualling of the fort, but 
 had neglected this duty. Although Bideford was 
 scarcely more than two miles distant, no help 
 seems to have come to the beleaguered fort from 
 the Royalist garrison, stated to have been there 
 at that time ; from which it may not unreasonably 
 be inferred that the garrison, if any, was weak and 
 powerless. In these circumstances the critical posi- 
 tion of the garrison attracted even the King's atten- 
 tion ; " by his Majesty's direction," according to Sir 
 Edward Walker, a party of Horse and Foot, under 
 the command of Colonel Sir Allen Apsley, was sent 
 by Sir John Berkeley from Exeter on the 17th of 
 August, arrived on the scene on the 20th, and forced 
 
300 THE FOR T RE LIE VED, 
 
 the besiegers to retire hastily to Barnstaple. The 
 garrison, adds Sir Edward Walker, " had during the 
 siege slain and wounded many more than loo of 
 those rebels." ^ In his customary style the editor 
 of the Mercurms Atdictcs improves upon this com- 
 paratively sober account of the transaction : — '' The 
 well beaten rebels fled home to Barnstaple . . . being 
 so piteously wearied out that they were glad so faire 
 an occasion made them quit their siedge, the valiant 
 Cornish in the Fort having killed above six score of 
 them, besides wounded, and those that ran away 
 during the siedge." ^ As this authority is certainly 
 not an impartial one, nor distinguished for its 
 veracity, and as the particulars appeared in print 
 at Oxford only four days after the event, it may 
 be conjectured that the losses sustained by the 
 Barnstaple force were, as usual in the first excite- 
 ment of such intelligence, largely exaggerated. The 
 only other diurnal which mentioned the affair, a 
 Parliamentary print, gave no particulars, but alleged 
 that the abandonment of the siege of the fort by the 
 Barnstaple men was ** by occasion of the late acci- 
 dent " — which, if it meant anything, alluded to an 
 event presently to be described, but which certainly 
 had not at that time happened.3 
 
 ^ Historical Discourses^ p. 65. Sir Edward Walker was with the 
 King during this campaign, and acted as his Secretary. He wrote his 
 *' Discourses " often on the drum-head, dictated, or at all events daily 
 revised, by King Charles himself. 
 
 ' Alercurius Atiiicus, Week ending August 24^ 1644, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M. , small 4tos, vol. clxxiii. 
 
 ^ Mercurius Civicusy'No. 68, Sept. 5-1 1, 1644, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxxii. 
 
SEIZURE OF THE EARL OF BATH'S HORSES. 301 
 
 There occurred, just at this time, an almost 
 dramatic interlude, the scene of it in North Devon, 
 which is characteristic of the high-handed pro- 
 ceedings of Sir Richard Grenville. A mysterious 
 paragraph in The True Informer, a Parliamentary 
 diurnal, of July 6-13, had notified that *' it was 
 advertized by Letters out of the West that a great 
 Person of note, and an eminent officer under His 
 Majesty, was come in to his Excellencie the Earle 
 of Essex." I The allusion (put in connection with 
 the other circumstances which follow) was un- 
 doubtedly to the Earl of Bath. That such a 
 rumour was afloat is apparent from the fact that 
 on the mere suspicion of the Earl's insincerity, 
 and although the Bourchier and Grenville families 
 had been on terms of the greatest intimacy, Sir 
 Richard Grenville sent Captain Edward Roscorrock 
 to Tawstock House with a warrant, which, alleging 
 that divers officers of his Majesty's army had lost 
 their horses by hard duty, that the Earl of Bath had 
 forty or fifty horses and men, that neither he nor 
 any of them had appeared at the Posse, that he 
 had not given any advice or encouragement by 
 letter or otherwise, and (worst of all) that, as he 
 (Sir R. Grenville) was informed, he had protection 
 from the Earl of Essex, authorized him, the said 
 Roscorrock, to search for and take six of the Earl 
 of Bath's horses, whereof a grey horse called 
 York is especially named. The morose Earl was 
 no soldier, which may account for these short- 
 comings if true, but he was not the one to 
 
 ' King's Famphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxvi. 
 
302 LOCAL RECORDS DEFECTIVE. 
 
 submit tamely to the indignity ; he therefore com- 
 plained directly to the King. Sir Richard, called 
 upon to explain, excused himself, and submitted 
 whether it was not with sufficient reason that he 
 had so acted? Nothing could have been more 
 graceful than the soothing letter which thereupon 
 Lord Digby, on the part of the King, wrote to the 
 incensed Earl — the King would be very sensible of 
 any disrespect offered to one of his, the Earl of 
 Bath's, quality, and asks him not to press the 
 matter, and not to take too much to heart the 
 roughness of a soldier. The sequel is not re- 
 vealed ; but I think it may be inferred that the 
 much-coveted '* York *' was returned to his stable at 
 Tawstock.^ 
 
 The course of the history of the Civil War in the 
 West now brings us near another important crisis in 
 the affairs of Barnstaple. Little or no light can be 
 thrown on the state of affairs in the town during its 
 military occupation by the detachment from the 
 Earl of Essex's army. The local records of this 
 period yield no information whatever. The civil 
 government was probably superseded by, or at 
 least subordinated to, the military, especially now 
 that, as we have seen, the Mayor himself, like 
 Sir Hudibras, '* rode a colonelling." It is certainly 
 remarkable that during this period of two months 
 
 ' The papers from which these particulars have been taken are in 
 the possession of the Earl de la Warr. See Fourth Report of the 
 Historical J\/SS. CoDunission. The Earl is the lineal representative of 
 Lionel Cranfield, third Earl of Middlesex, who married the Earl of 
 Bath's widow. 
 
DEFENCES NEGLECTED. ^o^, 
 
 and a half, in which Barnstaple was again held in 
 the Parliamentary interest, no effort seems to have 
 been made to repair the defences, which, to a con- 
 siderable extent, might have been still made avail- 
 able ; and more than half of the guns remained 
 unmounted and lying on the quays. The casual 
 evidence upon which this assumption has been 
 founded will be presently given. The inference 
 from all that we know of this apparently anoma- 
 lous state of things may be that the Corporation 
 had no inclination again to invite attack or a 
 possible siege by a demonstration of their defences, 
 and that they were sagaciously awaiting events 
 occurring not very far off — events upon the deve- 
 lopment of which the immediate fortunes of Barn- 
 staple were very likely to turn. But, in the mean 
 time, the local forces in garrison were maintained, 
 and of course at a very considerable cost to the 
 inhabitants, as this extract from the Summary which 
 occurs next in order will show : — 
 
 In Money and Quarters of 374 Soldiers 
 under Col. Luttrell, 11 weeks from July i 
 to Sept. 17, 1644 £1^"^ o o 
 
 For Money which Col. Luttrell raised in 
 the Town 160 o o 
 
 Of all the incidents of the Civil War in Devon- 
 shire, those which have received less illustration 
 from the local historian are the military operations 
 which affected the county in the latter part of the 
 summer of 1644. If the omission of any adequate 
 reference to them is to be attributed to the patent 
 
304 ESSEX IN DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 fact that these manoeuvres were extraneous, so to 
 speak, and had their impulse from beyond the county 
 which was only accidentally their theatre, and that 
 they bore no comparison in interest with the contests 
 of the previous year, which were almost entirely 
 fomented in the two most westerly counties, and 
 were fought on local lines, the explanation would 
 perhaps suffice. The truth is that the campaign of 
 this year left the greater part of the county un- 
 touched. Exeter and Dartmouth did not change 
 hands, and remained Royalist. Plymouth continued 
 to be held by the Parliamentarians. There was no 
 longer a field-force of either party which had not 
 been absorbed into the armies. It was only in the 
 northern part of the county that any disturbance of 
 the status quo ante took place ; and the issue of the 
 campaign, as it affected North Devon, has been left 
 hitherto undescribed. 
 
 The Court Mercuries a Parliamentary newspaper, 
 of August 10-21, alludes, in its budget of the 
 week, to the tension of public feeling existing in 
 London at this time — '' The Towne is bigge with 
 expectation of newes from the West." Sir Philip 
 Stapylton, the commander of Essex's life-guard, 
 had been sent from Tavistock to report to the House 
 of Commons the triumphant progress of the Lord 
 General's army. By and by, when Essex's own 
 letters, appealing for help, reached Parliament, the 
 truth became known, and the sanguine expectations 
 of the Londoners were dashed to the ground. Again 
 Essex wrote — '' If succour come not speedily we 
 shall be put to great extremity ; if we were in a 
 
LIEUTENANT-GENERAL MIDDLETON 305 
 
 countrey where we could force the enemy to fight, it 
 would be some comfort, but this countrey consists so 
 much upon passes that he who can subsist the 
 longest must have the better of it ; which is a great 
 grief to me who have the command of so many 
 gallant men." ^ 
 
 Sir William Waller's army had been too much 
 \veakened by desertion to be in any condition to 
 follow the King. The infantry, composed chiefly of 
 Londoners, who could never be kept long under 
 arms, and whose cry was always, after a short service, 
 " Home ! Home ! " had melted away after the affair 
 of Cropredy Bridge. Now, in hot haste, Sir William 
 Waller was ordered to detach Lieutenant-General 
 John Middleton, with 3,000 Horse and dragoons, to 
 go to the assistance of Essex; and 4,000 more were 
 to be sent speedily after him.^ 
 
 Middleton, a Scot, although at this time only 
 about twenty-four years of age, was already a dis- 
 tinguished Parliamentary officer ; he had commanded 
 a brigade which suffered most at the battle of Crop- 
 redy Bridge. By the time when he reached Devon- 
 shire his force was reduced to 2,000 men. In Somer- 
 setshire, when endeavouring to intercept a convoy of 
 provisions passing from Bristol to Exeter for the 
 King's army, he had fallen in with a party of Royalist 
 Horse, under Sir Francis Dodington, and, according 
 to Lord Clarendon, had received such a check that 
 he withdrew his force to Sherborne in order to 
 refresh. 3 Such, however, was not the version of the 
 
 ^ Whitelock's JManorials, p. 96. ^ Ibid., p. 94. 
 
 3 History of the Rebellion^ p. 532 b, 
 
 21 
 
3o6 SIR FRANCIS DODINGTON, 
 
 affair given by the Parliamentary intelligencers, who 
 called it a '' beating" given to Dodington. Middle- 
 ton himself wrote to the Committee of Both King- 
 doms — " I have driven S^ Francis Dorington, w^h 
 eight other Colonells to Mynhead. ... I have 
 always partyes out towards Devonshire and am to- 
 morrow to advance to Chard. . . . This party now 
 under my Comand consists of 15 hundred Horse 
 & neere upon 500 Dragoones." This letter is dated, 
 '' Ilchester, 20 August. 1644." ^ The affair must 
 have taken place in the second week of August. 
 Again advancing on his mission, Middleton entered 
 Devonshire at Honiton on the 27th of the month ; 
 but he was too late to be of any further service to 
 Essex. 
 
 Sir Francis Dodington, a Somersetshireman (whose 
 name is more often, but erroneously, spelt Dorring- 
 ton in the contemporary notices), was one of the trio 
 of unscrupulous Royalist commanders who, at one 
 time or another during the war, by the military 
 license which they permitted or encouraged, made 
 the very name of Cavalier odious in Devonshire. 
 ^^^hile the King was passing through Somersetshire 
 in July, Dodington was besieging Woodhouse, the 
 fortified house of a Mr. Arundel. The place was 
 taken almost under the eyes of the King, who had 
 sent from Bath a party of Foot and two cannon to 
 Dodington's assistance. As an act of retaliation for 
 the execution of some Irish prisoners by the Parlia- 
 ment, Dodington hanged fourteen of the inmates, 
 
 ^ Letters received by the Committee of Both Kingdoms, MS., Record 
 Office, vol. ii. 
 
SIR FRANCIS DODINGTON. 307 
 
 "men of good estate and quality," after they had 
 surrendered upon quarter.^ He is said to have shot 
 *' an honest minister," one Mr. James, near Taunton, 
 whom he met on the highway, for no better reason, 
 it appears, than that he disliked the minister's 
 creed.2 Dodington was one of the seven who after- 
 wards were scheduled by the Parliament to be 
 expressly excepted from pardon at the treaty of 
 Newport. ,^ 
 
 Dodington's movements after the skirmish in 
 Somersetshire are only explicable on the theory that 
 he was retreating before the advance of Middleton's 
 superior force. It was known on the 22nd of August 
 to the Committee of Both Kingdoms at Derby 
 House, who were then directing the operations of the 
 Parliamentary armies, that he had with him 1,000 
 Horse, 3 an estimate which is precisely confirmed by 
 the information possessed at the King's head- 
 quarters.4 On the 20th of August, the same day on 
 which the fort at Appledore was relieved, Doding- 
 ton's troopers appeared before Ilfracombe. He had 
 avoided Barnstaple, although at that moment it was 
 in an ill condition to resist any sudden attack ; and 
 it may be conjectured that he had made his way 
 across Exmoor from Minehead, to which place, as 
 we have seen, he had been pressed by Middleton. 
 
 ^ This seems to have been approved by the King. At all events it 
 is the natural inference from Sir Edward Walker's relation of the act, 
 without any comment — a relation revised by the King himself [His- 
 torical Discourses^ p. 40). 
 
 ^ Nehemiah Wallington's Historical Notices^ ii. pp. 224, 227. 
 
 3 Manchester'' s Quarixl with Cromwell^ Camden Society, p. 17. 
 
 ^ Symonds's Diary ^ Camden Society, p. 62. 
 
3o8 ILFRA COMBE. 
 
 Ilfracombe, on the north coast of Devon, and 
 within a dozen miles of Barnstaple, has been, for at 
 least a hundred years, a more or less famous sea- 
 side resort. To-day, villas of the period and terraces 
 of a little earlier taste cling to the sides of its rugged 
 hills, courting the soft airs of the Atlantic here pre- 
 vailing nearly all the year round. In the middle of 
 the seventeenth century it was little more than 
 one long, straggling street, which, starting from the 
 little rock-bound harbour, where the houses clustered 
 more thickly, climbed a spur of one of the hills, and 
 extended along the side of a valley towards the 
 parish church. Its population was chiefly of the 
 seafaring class. The same influences which else- 
 where in Devonshire swayed the minds of the town 
 populations predominated here, and the inhabitants 
 of Ilfracombe had taken the Parliamentary side. 
 Although lying outside and indeed remote from what 
 had been the area of actual contest it seems that 
 the town had been quietly put in some way of 
 defence. It possessed a fort, the name of which, 
 '^ Ilfracombe Castle," indicates that it had been 
 built in Tudor times, for the protection of the 
 harbour and its shipping, when Dunkirkers, Bis- 
 cayans, and Algerine pirates haunted the entrance 
 of the Bristol Channel. The situation of this work 
 cannot with any certainty be now determined, but 
 it is probable that it occupied the site of the present 
 Quayfield House and grounds, on the steep acclivity 
 which rises above the harbour. A drawing by 
 Mr. Tippetts, engraved in 1774, represents on 
 this spot a castellated building which may possibly 
 
' ILFRACOMBE ASSAULTED, 309 
 
 have been a restoration of the original fort. The 
 road from Exmoor through Combmartin, by which 
 It may certainly be conjectured that Dodington 
 approached Ilfracombe, passed under the walls of 
 the castle, on its landward side, before entering the 
 town. 
 
 Sir Francis Dodington attempted to seize this 
 work and was apparently repelled ; but he entered 
 the town and set it on fire, actually burning twenty- 
 seven houses. His troopers were ultimately beaten 
 off, however, by the townsmen and sailors, after a 
 fight in which many of the assailants were killed, 
 and which, considering the odds against them, re- 
 dounded considerably to the credit of the sturdy de- 
 fenders. 
 
 It is an illustration of the remarkable obscurity 
 which hangs over the events of this year in Devon- 
 shire that the incident just related is to be found 
 mentioned, so far as an extensive research may be 
 relied upon, in one only of the contemporary news- 
 sheets — The Kingdom's Weekly Intelligencer, of Aug. 
 27 -Sept. 3.^ No date is assigned to the in- 
 cident, which of course must have been, anyhow, 
 before the end of August ; ^ but it is supplied by the 
 trustworthy evidence of the parish register of Ilfra- 
 combe, which contains the following interesting entry 
 of burials on the 21st of August, and fixes the actual 
 day of the fight as the 20th : — 
 
 ' King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxxii. 
 
 2 In Stewart's Ilfracombe ZT^m//^^^/^, section — " ArchiKology of North 
 Devon," pp. 44, 45, this affair is erroneously supposed to have been 
 identical with one which took place in the following month. 
 
310 REPULSE OF THE ASSAILANTS. 
 
 Slain in fight 
 2oth day. 
 
 Peter Harris 
 John Skinner, Sen. 
 Thomas Latchford 
 Thomas Knight 
 John Estway 
 Robert Estway 
 Nathaniel Moule 
 John Skinner, Jun. 
 John Davies 
 William Davis 
 Flourence Abatha 
 
 The 20th of August is the very My on which 
 General Middleton was writing from Ilchester that 
 he had driven Dodington to Minehead. 
 
 Defeated in this attempt Dodington retired. It 
 is not apparent what route he took, but he must 
 have again avoided Barnstaple. Three weeks later 
 we shall find him in the centre of the countv. 
 
 The manoeuvring of the Royalist armies through- 
 out the month of August around the forces of the 
 Earl of Essex, which were shut up in a pound, as 
 Fuller says, at Lostwithiel, in Cornwall, is the 
 despair of the military critic. There was very little 
 fighting. If, as the Duke of Alva is said to have 
 remarked, the true test of generalship is to gain all 
 the advantages of victory without ever giving your 
 opponent a chance to fight, then Charles might 
 apparently be credited with the faculty. But there 
 is no reason to assume anything of the kind ; it is 
 more likely that the situation was owing to the 
 military incapacity of the Parliamentary commander- 
 in-chief opposed to him. 
 
POSITION OF ESSEX'S ARMY. 311 
 
 The Earl of Essex, disregarding the instructions 
 of the Parlian:ient — it was suspected from a personal 
 unwillingness to meet the King — had marched off 
 with his army nearly two hundred miles, having no 
 adequate or definite purpose, into a cul-de-sac. He 
 was now, by the perversity which seems to wait 
 upon human affairs, confronted by his Majesty, who 
 had run him to earth. Early in August, Essex's 
 troops which had at first been extended from Fowey 
 to Bodmin were concentrated around Lostwithiel. 
 The three Royalist armies, the King's, Maurice's, 
 and Grenville's (for each acted independently), had 
 closed in upon him, with the result that the Parlia- 
 mentarians found themselves in a corner, jammed 
 against the sea, straitened in their quarters and 
 without means of obtaining supplies, hemmed in by 
 a superior force, and strategically altogether in a 
 perilous position. Lostwithiel, on a small scale, was 
 a prototype of Sedan in 1870. 
 
 Essex had no hope of receiving any succour from 
 Waller, and perhaps scorned it ; their quarrel was 
 still open. All the blame of the disaster which 
 followed he laid upon Middleton's delay. 
 
 On the morning of the 31st of August, before day- 
 break, the greater part of Essex's Horse, led by Sir 
 William Balfour, slipped through the Royalist lines, 
 which were loosely guarded, and escaped. On the 
 following morning, the Earl, accompanied by Lord 
 Roberts, basely deserted the army which he com- 
 manded, and taking boat at Fowey, landed at 
 Plymouth. The brave old General Skippon, left in 
 command of the Foot, proposed to his officers that 
 
312 CAPITULATION OF THE FOOT. 
 
 they should cut their way through the enemy or 
 die in the attempt ; but, as Defoe's Cavalier remarks, 
 they '' shook their heads at it, for, being well paid, 
 they had at present no occasion for dying." 
 Evacuating Lostwithiel, therefore, and retreating 
 towards Fowey in the vain hope of holding it until 
 they could obtain shipping, the ragged and dispirited 
 Parliamentary Foot, after making a show of fight, 
 surrendered, on the ist of September, on conditions 
 more favourable to themselves than they were wise 
 from a Royalist point of view. They were allowed to 
 march away with their colours, leaving behind them 
 their artillery and all their arms and ammunition, 
 
 Essex's Horse, having escaped previously, had no 
 benefit of the capitulation, and were of course still 
 to be accounted for, and Goring, General of the 
 King's Horse, was at once sent in pursuit. The 
 Parliamentarians appear to have divided into several 
 parties ; one of these crossed the Tamar at Saltash 
 and found refuge in Plymouth. Other parties went 
 in different directions towards the northern part of 
 Devonshire^ evidently avoiding Exeter and making 
 for Taunton. Messages were promptly sent from 
 the King's head-quarters to Sir John Berkeley, com- 
 mander of the Royalist garrison of Exeter, and also 
 to Sir Francis Dodington, directing them to inter- 
 cept the fugitives. Middleton, the Parliamentary 
 Genera], was believed to be somewhere in Devon- 
 shire with a strong force, and Goring was warned 
 not to follow the pursuit too near him. 
 
 I am following the details of these little known, 
 but locally interesting, movements partly because 
 
ESCAPE OF THE HORSE, 313 
 
 they re-open a page in the history of Barnstaple 
 which had been entirely lost sight of. Middleton's 
 orders were to relieve Essex ; but in the interim, for 
 what purpose is not apparent, he had marched 
 across North Devon, and at this time with his two 
 thousand Horse and dragoons was occupying Barn- 
 staple and the surrounding villages. 
 
 Never, surely, had there been such a turmoil 
 throughout Devonshire as in that first week of Sep- 
 tember. Large parties of cavalry, the pursuing and 
 the pursued, were pervading the whole of the 
 western half of the county and spreading alarm in 
 every direction. The escape of Essex's Horse is 
 one of the liveliest episodes in the history of the 
 campaigns in the West. Sir Edward Walker has 
 left a description of it,^ which is mainly apologetic, 
 and an excuse for Goring's apparent laxity in follow- 
 ing up the pursuit. Our local knowledge and other 
 fragmentar}' notices will supplement the circum- 
 stantial details. One body of Parliamentary Horse, 
 after crossing the Tamar, appears to have made at 
 first for Tavistock. A detachment of picked men 
 was sent by Goring to fall upon their rear, but was 
 repulsed, and a few prisoners who had been taken 
 were recovered. This was on the 4th of September. 
 On the same day, as mentioned in a letter which I 
 shall presently quote, the advanced party, said to 
 have been six hundred in number, were met and 
 routed on Hatherleigh Moor by Sir Francis Doding- 
 ton, who pursued them as far as Little Torrington, 
 where they joined some of Middleton's force posted 
 
 ^ Historical Discourses, p. 81. 
 
314 ESCAPE OF THE HORSE. 
 
 there, and took refuge in Barnstaple the same 
 night. 
 
 The main body of Essex's Horse, under the com- 
 mand of Sir William Balfour, got to Crediton, 
 having escaped Goring and eluded Sir John Berkeley, 
 who had advanced with a party from Exeter as far as 
 Chagford without falling in with it. The following 
 extract of a letter from Berkeley to Prince Rupert, at 
 this time, will be of interest : — 
 
 Exox. 7^*"" 4. 5 afcernoone. 
 
 • • • • • • • 
 
 . . . Notwithstanding all our dilligence, the rest of their 
 horse (neare 2,000) are broken out by us, having passed 
 over the ferry at Saltash and came ye:5terday at 12 from 
 thence wthout drawing bridle to Kirton, w'''' is (as they 
 passed over the more^) 40 long and ill miles, they have lost 
 many in the march, and are much tyred, Gen^ Goring is 
 w^hin 8 or 10 miles of them (as I conceive) I have marched 
 15 miles \vth 800 foote and 300 horse, and am now in this 
 place, almost as far advanced eastward as the Rebbells, and 
 shall continue my march this night (if it be possible). I 
 beleeve the Rebbells will endeavour to march to Taunton 
 and from thence into Dorsetshire, how it will stand in your 
 highnes power to prevent them I am not able to judge, 
 being ignorant where and what force you are.^ 
 
 Goring, who had taken up his quarters at Okehamp- 
 ton, found time also to write from thence to Prince Ru - 
 pert; he had been in pursuit of some of Essex's Horse, 
 but excused himself for letting them get out of his 
 reach by reason of his own being tired and disorderly. 3 
 
 ^ [/.^., Dartmoor.] 
 
 =^ Add. MSS., British Museum, No. 18,981, f. 239. 
 3 x\bstract of Rupert Correspondence in Eliot Warburton's Prince 
 Rupert and the Cavaliers^ i. 519. The letter is there misdated ; it 
 
LIFE-GUARDS ENTER BARNSTAPLE. 315 
 
 *' At Kyrton [Crediton]," says Sir Edward Walker, 
 *'the Rebels' Horse severed, one part making their 
 Escape towards Lyme and the other went towards 
 Barnestaple and joined with Middleton."^ The latter 
 party was in all probability Essex's life-guard of 
 cuirassiers which, as we know from local sources, 
 came into Barnstaple on the 6th of September. 
 This distinguished troop (which had numbered when 
 at Tiverton on the outward march thirteen officers 
 and one hundred troopers), in the absence of its com- 
 mander. Sir Philip Stapylton, was under the orders 
 of Captain Doyley. It was a select corps, of which 
 the troopers were gentlemen, or at least persons of 
 consequence ; Edmund Ludlow, the author of the 
 memoirs, Ireton, Fleetwood, and Richard Cromwell, 
 rode in it. 
 
 Berkeley, having missed the object of his pursuit, 
 turned off to the right and reached Tiverton, where, 
 on the 5th of September, he had a brush with the 
 still retreating main body of the Parliamentary 
 Horse, and '' forced them thence disorderly." 
 
 Middleton's position at Barnstaple was now in the 
 highest degree critical. The following comment 
 v^ritten from Exeter at this time sufficiently reveals 
 it:— 
 
 Middleton who came down here with Wallers Brigade 
 & hath now under his comand about 3000 horse & 
 dragoons was marching through y^ north of Devon to 
 y^ relief of y^ E of Essex, and it is cons'^ is soe farr engaged 
 
 should be Sept. 5, not Aug. 15. The substances of this and the next 
 abstract seem to have been transposed. 
 * Historical Discourses. 
 
3 1 6 MIDDLE TON IN NOR TH DE VON. 
 
 that way that there is Httle Hkelyhood of his returne, the 
 Countrey being all risen & order given for y^ cutting downe 
 of I'rees & stopping of all passages & a great part of y^ 
 Kings Forces being under march towards him.^ 
 
 Sir William Waller, writing from Wotton, on the 
 7th of September, to the Committee of Both King- 
 doms, betrays his alarm : — 
 
 This bearer Capt. Guilliame came this evening unto me 
 out of Devonshire & brings the sad confirmation of our losse 
 of the Western Army, w'''' is doubled to me in y^ desperate 
 Condicon of my poore Troopes under Lieu^ General Middle- 
 ton. ^ 
 
 It is easy to see that Middleton's position was 
 untenable. With a force variously estimated at from 
 two to three thousand Horse he could not have safely 
 shut himself up in Barnstaple while the surrounding 
 country, upon which he would have had to rely for 
 support, was likely to be swept by Goring's and 
 Berkeley's cavalry, superior in number to his own, 
 up to the very entrenchments of the town. Not a 
 trace of his brief occupation of North Devon is to be 
 found in the local records. 
 
 On the 5th of September, the same day on which 
 Berkeley was engaged with Balfour's Horse at 
 Tiverton, Middleton hurriedly moved from his 
 quarters at Barnstaple and made direct for Taunton, 
 with the object of falling back into Dorsetshire and 
 
 ^ P'rom the " Copy of a Relation of the King's Success in the West. 
 Exeter, Sept. 4, 1644." Add. MSS., British Museum, No. 18,981, 
 f. 241. 
 
 - Lettifrs received by the Committee of Both Kingdoms, MS., Record 
 Office, vol. ii. 
 
PERPLEXITY A T BARNSTAPLE. 3 1 7 
 
 joining Waller's army. ''That night," to take up Sir 
 Edward Walker's narrative, '' both Middleton's and 
 Essex's Horse believing themselves to be over- 
 powered prepared for their Escape ; which they pre- 
 sently made over Exmore on the North of Devon 
 and so by Dunster to Taunton, not staying at any 
 place until they came there. By that time they 
 were so wearied and overwatched ^ that a very small 
 Number of fresh Horse might have destroyed their 
 great. Body. Our Horse were likewise much harassed 
 in this Pursuit and not in a Condition to follow them 
 in their hasty Flight." ^ This movement is referred 
 to in a letter of the Committee of Both Kingdoms, of 
 the nth of September, in which they state that they 
 had that day received intelligence that the Lord 
 General's Horse under Commissary-General Behre 
 had joined those of Middleton, and were marching 
 through Somersetshire.^ 
 
 The news of the disaster to the Parliamentary forces 
 in Cornwall, the rush of Royalist cavalry back through 
 Devonshire, and the imminent prospect of the return 
 of the King's victorious army through the county, had 
 brought home to the ruling authorities of Barnstaple 
 a sense of their critical position. Whilst in this 
 state of perplexity Middleton appears to have held 
 a consultation with them and to have advised 
 resistance : — 
 
 ' . . . '* What thou speak'st drowsily? 
 Poor knave, I blame thee not ; thou art 0' er-ivatLh\iy 
 
 (Shakspeare, Julius Ccesar^ act v. sc. 3.) 
 ^ Historical Discourses^ p. 81. 
 3 Manchestej''' s Quarrel, Camden Society, p. 26. 
 
3 1 8 MIDDLE TON LEA VES NOR TH DE VON 
 
 The Town of Barnstable called a Councell of War and 
 a Councell of the Inhabitants, and upon debate it was 
 resolved that they would defend the Town against the 
 Enemy, Lieu. Generall Middleton telling them that all the 
 North of England was reduced into the obedience of the 
 Parliament, except some few garrisons, and that they need 
 not doubt of present supplies, and left [the] Townesmen 
 and Souldiers resolved to hold it to the last.^ 
 
 The same night or, at the latest, on the following 
 morning, the 5th of September, Middleton with his 
 flying column took his departure. ^ 
 
 One of the incidents of this remarkable campaign 
 was the march back through Devonshire of Essex's 
 Foot after they had passed under the yoke. It had 
 no influence upon the affairs of Barnstaple, and only 
 a transitory connection with North Devon ; but as 
 it has not been noticed, so far as I am aware, by any 
 Devonshire historian the episode strikes me as of 
 sufficient interest to find a place in this relation. 
 
 It fell to the lot of Major-General Philip Skippon to 
 lead these five or six thousand beaten soldiers, who, 
 under the articles of the capitulation, were allowed to 
 pass freely to either Poole or Portsmouth. The 
 men were mostly of the London trained-bands. On 
 
 ' The Parliament Scout, Sept. 5-13, 1644, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxxii. 
 
 - Lieut. -General John Middleton, of whom we here take leave, sub- 
 sequently went over to the Royal cause, and led the cavalry of 
 Charles II. at the battle of Worcester in 165 1. After the Restoration 
 he was raised to the peerage as Earl of Middleton. He was ultimately 
 Governor of Tangier, and died there in 1673. (Evelyn's Diary and 
 Correspondence, ed. 1850, ii. 24, 380.) He is generally confounded 
 with Sir Thomas Middleton of Chirk Castle— notably so in the Index 
 to the fine Oxford edition of Clarendon's Rebellio7i, 1849. 
 
SKIPFON'S MARCH. 319 
 
 Monday, the 2nd of September, the day after the 
 surrender, *' about 10 of the clock," they set out 
 Avith only their staves in their hands; and '* Skippon 
 first or in the front," says Richard Symonds of the 
 King's troop of Horse, who was an eyewitness of the 
 scene, '^marched with all that rowt of rebells, after 
 the colours of their several regiments. ... It rayned 
 extremely as the varlets marched away ... so durty 
 and dejected as was rare to see." ^ Colonel Were's 
 Tiverton regiment was one that Symonds saw 
 marching off. The colonel himself bad gone over 
 to the King — as the best thing that he could do. 
 Abused and insulted by the King's soldiers, they 
 met with further rough treatment, when passing 
 through Lostwithiel, from the Cornish women who 
 owed them no goodwill, and who, moreover, stripped 
 the shirts from off the backs of the sick and maimed 
 who were left behind.^ The story of their sub- 
 sequent sufferings on the march has been told with 
 unusually graphic detail by one of their officers in a 
 letter contained in a pamphlet entitled, A True Rela- 
 tion of the sad Passages between the Two A rinies in the 
 West, &c., London, Oct. 2, 1644.3 On the Tuesday 
 they passed into Devonshire : *' We marched that 
 night," says the writer, '' to Bren-farr [Brentor ?J 
 where we scarce had the benefit of water ; we lay 
 in the open fields that night also it being a bitter 
 rainy night." On the Wednesday, the 4th of Sep- 
 tember, they advanced towards Okehampton, where 
 
 ^ Diary, Camden Society, pp. 66, 67. 
 
 2 The rarlia7nent Scout, Sept. 5-13, 1644, King's Pamphlets, B. M., 
 small 4tos, vol. clxxii. 
 
 3 King's Pamphlets, B. ^NI. , small 4tos, vol. clxxiv. 
 
320 SKIPPON'S MARCH, 
 
 they desired to quarter, but when within a mile of 
 the town had news that they must advance no 
 farther, the King's troops being quartered there 
 (these were Goring's men). This was the third day 
 they had marched without victuals, all manner of 
 provisions having been stopped from them. The 
 soldiers lay this night in the fields near the town : 
 *' That night a penny loaf would have been sold for 
 half-a-cro\vn and many thanks besides.'' Goring, 
 they learnt, had sent warrants to the country 
 to bring in provisions for them, which, it is 
 elsewhere remarked, " did as much good as was 
 intended, nothing to the purpose." ^ On Thursday, 
 the 5th of September, they marched from Okehamp- 
 ton by the London road, that they might avoid the 
 King's forces which always lay in their way on 
 purpose to eat up their provisions for them. They 
 came that night to a little village (probably Cheriton 
 Bishop), where they had some accommodation for 
 themselves {i.e., the officers) and the soldiers. Next 
 morning, the 6th, they advanced towards Tiverton, 
 but were forbidden to enter it, for the King's forces 
 were there also (Berkeley's men). They "lay in the 
 hungry fields ; " those who had lost their way or 
 straggled were miserably wounded, and some were 
 killed within a little distance of Tiverton. '' In all 
 this trouble," concludes the writer, ** I observed 
 Major-General Skippon in his carriage ; but never 
 did I see any man so patient, so humble, and so 
 truly wise and valiant in all his actions as he." 
 
 ^ The Parliament Scout, Sept. 5-13, 1644, King's Pamphlets, B. M., 
 small 4tos, vol. clxxii. 
 
THE GARRISON OF BARNSTAPLE, 321 
 
 Demoralized as the followers of Skippon must 
 almost inevitably have been, yet a fair proportion — 
 Lord Clarendon, with not unusual inaccuracy says, 
 **not a third part'* — of them managed to reach Ports- 
 mouth, where they were reclothed and armed. At 
 the second battle of Newbury, which took place on 
 the 27th of the following month, and where they 
 were face to face with their former antagonists, the 
 survivors of Essex's old army, who had fought so 
 well at Edgehill and at the first battle of Newbury, 
 amply redeemed their reputation, and retook some 
 of the guns which they had lost in Cornwall. 
 
 Skippon, ** the Christian Centurion," as he was 
 called by his contemporary admirers, one of the 
 finest characters of the military section of the 
 Parliamentary leaders, has a transient interest for 
 us, inasmuch as, in 1646, he succeeded George 
 Peard, deceased, as one of the Members of Parlia- 
 ment for Barnstaple. 
 
 The movements of General Goring have been 
 followed down to the 6th of September, when his 
 force joined that of Sir John Berkeley at Tiverton. 
 '' General Goring," continues Sir Edward Walker, 
 '' stayed at Tiverton [and] refreshed his troops 
 having an Eye on the rebellious Town of Barnstaple, 
 at that time not defensible, being very much unpro- 
 vided of Ammunition and Men, having only 600 
 Foot that Essex left there when he went into Corn- 
 wall." ^ Sir Edward's estimate of the number of 
 foot-soldiers in the garrison of Barnstaple at that 
 
 , ' Historical Discourses^ p. 81. 
 
 22 
 
^22 
 
 PARLIAMENT SENDS AMMUNITION. 
 
 time was not far wrong ; but those who had been 
 left there by Essex were, as we have seen, not more 
 than one half of the number. He was obviously 
 not then aw^are of the addition made to the garrison 
 by the Parliamentary Horse. 
 
 We are absolutely without any local record of the 
 state of affairs in Barnstaple during this very critical 
 period. There had been apparently a cry for help 
 to Parliam.ent, and Parliament awoke to a sense of 
 the importance of strengthening Barnstaple if it was 
 to be held at all. On the nth of September the 
 House of Commons ordered : — 
 
 That it be referred to the Committee of both Kingdoms, 
 to take care that Barnstaple may be supplied with Ammu- 
 nition out of the Ammunition left at Lime for the service 
 of the West : And that the Committee may be acquainted, 
 that there are Four Ships now ready to go for Wales ; the 
 which, the House thinks, may conveniently have Order to 
 take in the Ammunition at Lyme, and to convey it to 
 Earnestaple/ 
 
 On the i6th of September there was a further 
 Order.: — 
 
 That the Lieutenant of the Ordnance do forthwith issue 
 out Fifty Barrels of Powder, for the Service of the Town of 
 Barnstaple.^ 
 
 Both these orders were too late. 
 
 It is only by side-lights that we obtain casual 
 glimpses of the internal state of the town at this 
 time. One of these comes from a contemporary 
 
 ^ Journals of the House of Cojnmons^ iii. 62^. ^ Ibid., iii. 628. 
 
PRUST'S LETTER, 323 
 
 letter in the De la Warr MSS., which has been 
 printed by the Historical Manuscripts Commission. 
 This letter was written by one '* H. Prust " from 
 Stow, to the Countess of Bath, who apparently 
 was not then at Tawstock. Who Prust was, or in 
 what relation he stood to the Grenville family, I am 
 not aware. Prust's information was second-hand; 
 but it gives some probably authentic and certainly 
 very curious and interesting details of the actual 
 condition of Barnstaple when on the very brink of 
 the crisis — if it may not be said in the midst of it. 
 The letter, from which I proceed to quote, was 
 apparently written on Tuesday, Sept. 10,^ and it 
 will be all the clearer for a little interjected expla- 
 nation. This is what Prust wrote : — 
 
 Last Wednesday [Sept. 4] about 600 of the enemy's 
 horse that came out of Cornwall were beaten in Hathroley 
 [/>., Hatherleigh] Moor by Sir Francis Dorrington's party, 
 and chased to Little Torr[ington] church ere they made a 
 stand and got a guide to conduct them towards Bristow 
 \i.e,y Bristol], who carried them that night to Barn[staple], 
 where Middleton's brigade that was about Torr[ington] 
 guarded them. Thursday [Sept. 5] they rested there, and 
 on Friday [Sept. 6] marcht to Moulton \i,e.^ South Molton], 
 and the Chiefe of Barn[staple] took occasion to bring them, 
 going with the soldiers and chief commanders, purposing to 
 return no more as the Townsmen suspected, who sent after 
 them, that if they returned not presently they would plunder 
 all their houses. Upon this summons the Burgeis [probably 
 the trained-band] and Luttrel's and Bennett's soldiers 
 
 ^ The date, Sept. 20, assigned to the letter by the Commissioners, 
 cannot be correct. 
 
324 PRUST'S LETTER, 
 
 returned. Saturday [Sept. 7] the horse marching over 
 Exmoor espied the strength of His Majesty's horse which 
 they shunned, and scattered themselves it is not known 
 whither, as their guide reports ; only about 200 got to 
 Combe [/.<?., Ilfracombe] to take shipping. But the Combe 
 men and Barn[staple men] had agreed to stop them, as 
 report goes, and to return them to Barn[staple] to share 
 with their fortune, where they were yesterday [Sept. 9] 
 as an Irish tenant that was went thither to the fair in- 
 forms me.^ 
 
 It is interesting to light upon this casual mention, 
 at a time so dark and distressful for the town, of 
 the Barnstaple Great Fair — an irrepressible insti- 
 tution which, in this present year of grace, retains 
 as much vitality as ever. The fair, which lasted 
 several days, began, before the New Style was in 
 use, on the 8th of September, the day of the 
 Nativity of the Virgin Mary. That day, in the year 
 1644, being a Sunday, the fair began on the 
 following day, the 9th, as implied in the foregoing 
 letter. As might be expected, in the midst of such a 
 conjunction as at that time beset the affairs of Barn- 
 staple, Prust's informant found that *' there was no 
 show of a fair there by any company of the 
 Country.'' 
 
 It would seem from this account that the 
 unanimity which had been brought about by General 
 Middleton's eloquence was only of short duration. 
 The explanation probably is that as soon as the 
 moral support of Middleton's brigade had been with- 
 
 ^ Fourth Report of the Historical MSS. Ccmmission^ 1 874, App., 
 p. 308. 
 
QUESTION OF SURRENDERING BARNSTAPLE. 325 
 
 drawn, and that something like a siege was threa- 
 tened, that part of the garrison which had been 
 left by Lord Roberts was disposed to capitulate, 
 in expectation of as favourable terms as the rest 
 of the Parliamentary Foot had obtained- I also 
 infer that this was not the view of the town 
 authorities or of Colonel Luttrell and Colonel 
 Bennet ; and that they, rather than submit to a 
 surrender, sought to draw off their own men from 
 the town, or at least were suspected of the inten- 
 tion. Their object, in that case, was probably to 
 throw themselves into Taunton, the nearest Parlia- 
 mentary garrison town. 
 
 Prust, in continuation of his letter, relates that 
 his informant, the Irish tenant of the Grenvilles, 
 did not see at Barnstaple ** many soldiers; only six 
 Collectors on their gates." The troopers may, of 
 course, have been out foraging, as was very likely ; 
 who or what the '' collectors " were I am unable 
 to explain; the *' gates " were perhaps those timber 
 barriers, constructed at the several entrances to the 
 town, with reference to which I have already offered 
 some conjectures. He saw *' about 30 ship guns lying 
 on the Key, many mounted in other places." This 
 statement will be recognized as having given us an 
 insight into the state of the fortifications during the 
 preceding period. He saw no ''guards about the 
 town, only one watchman at the bridge, who ques- 
 ti9ned him not." A picture in no uncertain colours 
 of doubt and irresolution on the part of the leaders. 
 The inhabitants were panic-stricken : ** the civil 
 townsmen miserably complain of their fear of sudden 
 
326 MAYOR RESOLVES TO HOLD OUT. 
 
 destruction/' and the prospect of having their sup- 
 plies cut off enraged them: ''the rabble are still 
 bold that command the country to store them with 
 all manner of provisions, setting a high proportion 
 on your Doctor and sending your honour's boat 
 with others to fetch down your hay in the 
 marshes/' — or such of it, we may perhaps venture 
 to add, as had not been appropriated by Middleton's 
 troopers. 
 
 Prust concludes with the information, which he 
 had obtained from a letter written by Sir John Gren- 
 ville (son of the late Sir Bevill), who was in the 
 King's army, that, as soon as the event of the assault 
 of Plymouth was seen, an army was to be sent to 
 Barnstaple. Whatever may have been the differences 
 between the civil authorities and the Parliamen- 
 tary officers who had come in with forces to 
 strengthen the garrison — and these I have only been 
 able to infer^the Mayor, Charles Peard, appears to 
 have ultimately had his way. He resolved to hold 
 out. Being short of ammunition, as we are aware, 
 he sent a detachment of Horse to Ilfracombe to 
 endeavour to obtain a supply from thence, with the 
 result, which is thus described in a contemporary 
 report, '' advertized out of the West/' by a London 
 diurnal : — 
 
 The Garison of Barstaple having resolved as before men- 
 tioned to stand it out against the King's forces, but being 
 most perfidiously betrayed by reason of the trechery of the 
 Governour of Melcomb- Castle \sic\ to whom the Com- 
 mander in chief of the Towne sending a partie of horse for 
 powder, they were not only denied it, but he turned his 
 
BARNSTAPLE INVESTED, 327 
 
 Ordnance against them, and the next day surrendered it to 
 the King's forces. ' 
 
 The betrayal of Barnstaple, as it was oddly called, 
 by the Governor of " Melcombe Castle," has been 
 often repeated without any question. But, obviously, 
 the garrison of Barnstaple would not have been 
 likely to send to Melcombe Regis in Dorsetshire 
 for assistance. A copyist or printer blundered, and 
 Ilfracombe Castle was meant. This is sufficiently 
 apparent from another Parliamentary diurnal of the 
 same date : — " The Governour sent a partee of Horse 
 to Coome-castle for powder," &C.2 Ilfracombe, 
 locally, is still 'Cooinbe. 
 
 On the following day, the 12th of September, 
 Barnstaple^ was invested by the troops of General 
 Goring, and summoned to surrender. 
 
 Ilfracombe Castle, with twenty pieces of ordnance, 
 as many barrels of gunpowder, and nearly two hun- 
 dred arms, fell at the same time into the hands of the 
 Royalists — surrendered, without a blow having been 
 struck, by the evidently treacherous commandant, 
 whose name has not been recorded, to his former 
 antagonist. Sir Francis Dodington.3 
 
 The estimate held in the highest Parliamentary 
 circles of the importance of Barnstaple as a fortified 
 position at this time may be gathered from the follow- 
 
 ' T/ie True Informer, No. 47, Sept. 21-28, 1644, King's Pam- 
 phlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. clxxiv. 
 
 Perfect Occurrences of Parliament, Sept. 20-27, 1644, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xiv. 
 
 3 Sir Edward Walker's Historical Discourses. The coincidence of 
 the surrender of Ilfracombe Castle to Sir F. Dodington, who had un- 
 
328 STRENGTH OF THE GARRISON. 
 
 ing extract. It will be seen that on the stand made 
 by the garrison even the future of the campaign was 
 considered in no small degree to depend : — 
 
 Intelligence from the West that the King's forces had 
 summoned Barnstable, where they had an absolute denyall, 
 and what execution was done there are no particulars, but a 
 Message was sent after the King's forces that they were 
 moving : that they were exceeding stiffe in the town and 
 would not yeeld ; and therefore there must be either a great 
 force left before it, or else to passe away and let it quite 
 alone. Upon which it is reported that expresse Charge 
 should be given to Storme the town, and spare none but put 
 all to the sword. It may please God that this may occa- 
 sion a stay of the King's forces, to give time for our forces 
 to march up towards Langport or Ilminster, &c.^ 
 
 The strength of the garrison of Barnstaple was 
 computed by outside intelligencers to be about nine 
 hundred men, which agrees pretty well with the esti- 
 mate that may be formed from the local data known 
 to us, as follows : Colonel Luttrell's companies (as 
 per Summary), 374; the town trained-band (pro- 
 bably) 100; Lord Roberts's three companies, 300 ; 
 and the incomplete levies for Colonel Bennet's regi- 
 ment of Militia, which, according to Mr. Prust, were 
 in the town at this time, and had doubtless been 
 thrown into it by the stress of circumstance since 
 
 successfully attacked it three weeks before, will be noticed. It is possible 
 that Sir Edward Walker may have confounded the two incidents. 
 Other accounts merely state that the fort was surrendered to General 
 Goring. 
 
 ^ Perfect Occurrences of Parlia77ient^ &c., No. 7, Sept. 20-27, 16^4, 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xiv. 
 
GEORGE GORING, 329 
 
 the catastrophe to the Parliamentary army in Corn- 
 wall, although not mentioned in the Summary, about 
 two hundred more. All these were Foot. Then, there 
 are to be added Essex's life-guard of one hundred 
 Horse and the two hundred Parliamentary Horse 
 who had taken refuge in the town, a reinforcement 
 which had been too recent for the intelligencers 
 to have known anything of; bringing up the whole 
 disposable force in the garrison to at least twelve 
 hundred men. 
 
 Considering the extraordinary demands which had 
 been so lately made upon the resources of the town 
 by the passing bodies of Parliamentary troops, it is 
 not surprising that the inhabitants, now strictly 
 invested, were alarmingly straitened for provisions. 
 This was a new experience, and the pressure in 
 consequence is sufficiently evident. 
 
 General George Goring, who, en the elevation of 
 his father shortly afterwards to the Earldom of 
 Norwich, became better known by the courtesy title 
 of Lord Goring — was an officer who succeeded more 
 than any other in the King's service in bringing dis- 
 credit upon the Royalist cause ; and Devonshire, un- 
 happily for that county, was the chief scene of his 
 unbridled military excesses. With a full share of the 
 superficial graces and accomplishments, the wit and 
 love of raillery, which characterized the typical 
 roistering Cavalier, he had, at the same time, more 
 ■than an average share of his profligacy and vices. 
 He was utterly unprincipled ; Eliot Warburton, 
 whose standard of personal honour was high, goes so 
 far as to call him '' scoundrel " and '' villain." As a 
 
330 GENERAL GORING AT RALEIGH, 
 
 commander he was freely censured by his friends for 
 his laxity and recklessness. As a mere soldier he 
 was not despicable; at Marston Moor, only a few 
 weeks before the time which we have reached, 
 he had routed the Scotch contingent which was 
 opposed to him. This is the character of the man — 
 not yet so notorious as he afterwards became — who 
 was now knocking at the gates of Barnstaple. 
 
 General Goring established his head-quarters at 
 Raleigh, the residence of Sir John Chichester, Bart., 
 an old mansion long ago destroyed, of which the 
 outlines of the foundations only are now traceable 
 on the turf. Surrounded by a small park, it stood on 
 an elevated plateau within a mile of Barnstaple on 
 its northern side. It looked down on the gray town 
 in the middle distance clustered around the lead- 
 covered spire of the parish church ; and beyond the 
 town, southward, might be seen the wide valley of the 
 Taw, with the hanging woods of Tawstock not far 
 distant. Sir John Chichester was a young man, and 
 had only a few months before, on attaining his 
 majority, succeeded to the family estates. He had 
 been created a baronet, in his minority, three years 
 earlier. 
 
 The Earl of Bath's house, at Tawstock, was at the 
 same time occupied by Goring's Horse, and thus, 
 both sides of the river being in the hands of 
 patrolling parties of the enemy, the town was cut 
 off from all communication with the country, and 
 effectually isolated. 
 
 Richard Pollard, ^ writing to the Countess of Bath 
 
 ^ A Richard Pollard of Langley, in the Parish of Yarnscombe, died 
 in 1659. 
 
SIR JOHN CHICHESTER, BART. 331 
 
 about this time, assures her that Sir Richard Douglas 
 (one of Goring's officers ?) " is willing to do any- 
 thing to preserve my lord's house and tenants from 
 the rudeness of the soldiers ; yet," says he, *' many 
 violences have been offered, and all by means of this 
 rebellious town of Barnstaple." Then, with slightly 
 malicious satisfaction he remarks: ** Sir John 
 Chichester, that hath heretofore smiled at others' 
 troubles, hath now had his share amongst us ; for 
 the General was quartered at his house, so as many 
 went there for orders; and his house never without 
 two or three hundred soldiers daily eating and 
 drinking there." ^ This is a realizable picture of 
 a country gentleman's house in the time of the 
 Civil War, and it was not uncommon. As for Goring 
 himself, it may be assumed that he found at Raleigh 
 ample scope for the indulgence of what Lord Claren- 
 don called his *' jovial exercises." While Cavalier 
 toasts went round and Cavalier songs resounded in 
 the old hall, the common troopers quaffed brown 
 October and Devonshire cider at the buttery-hatch. 
 
 There is no record, so far as I have been able to 
 discover, of any fighting. Goring had sufficient force 
 to effect a strict blockade. The same news-sheet 
 which gives 900 as the strength of the garrison 
 states, that it was '' strictly besieged with 9,000 of 
 the King's forces ; who threatned extream cruelties 
 to them if they yeilded not." ^ If this estimate of 
 
 ^ De la Warr MSS. Fotirth Report of the Historical Manicscri/ts 
 Commission, 1874, App., p. 308. 
 
 2 Perfect Occurre^tces of Parliament, &c., No. 7, Sept. 20-27, 1644, 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xiv. 
 
332 OFFER OF SURRENDER ON CONDITIONS. 
 
 the besiegers' force was anything more than a 
 mere alliteration it must have alluded to the King's 
 army which at that time was lying before Plymouth. 
 The strength of Goring's detachment is nowhere 
 mentioned. 
 
 On Friday, the 13th of September, the day 
 after the investment had taken i)lace, Symonds, 
 who was with the King's army, records in his diary— 
 '* Came newes to the leaguer that Barnstaple, a 
 garrison of the rebells in this county, of their yeild- 
 ing to his Majestie, leaving their armes, &c., and 
 marche away with colors, &c." ^ This entry was 
 premature. Parleying, however, had already taken 
 place, and an overture to treat had come out from 
 the Governor of the town. Being " in great Streights 
 for want of Ammunition and other Provisions," says 
 Sir Edward Walker, and knowing themselves "not 
 in a Condition to withstand a Siege ; yet to set the 
 best face on it, they offered to yield the Town on such 
 Conditions as they proposed, which were in general, 
 ' That the Town might have no Garrison put into it ; 
 That the Souldiers might march away to South- 
 ampton with all their Arms, Colours, and Drums : 
 That the Townsmen might have the Liberty of free 
 Trade: And that the true Protestant Religion should 
 be upheld, and no new Oaths imposed on them, but 
 such as are established by Act of Parliament.' 
 Which," remarks Sir Edward, *' I observe the rather 
 to show how miserably they are seduced, this 
 Article implying their Belief that His Majesty in- 
 
 / Diary^ Camden Society, p. 8l. 
 
CONDITIONS ACCEPTED, 333 
 
 tended to introduce another than the Protestant 
 Religion." ^ 
 
 It is apparent, I think, from the nature of the 
 propositions, that the overture came from the Cor- 
 poration — it was not a mere military convention that 
 was put forward. The inevitable religious clause 
 was a capacious proposition ; King Charles was 
 perfectly ready to give the required assurance ; but 
 whether it satisfied these " True Blades for Religion 
 and Liberties " is another matter. Words, we 
 know, are merely counters, and on what was meant 
 by the ** true Protestant religion ** more than half 
 of the controversy which then distracted England 
 turned. 
 
 " Now although these demands,'' continues Sir 
 Edward, who, it may be interesting to remember, is 
 writing under the King's eye, *' were high ; yet con- 
 sidering the time of the year, the Remoteness of the 
 Place, and other real Considerations not to engage 
 our Army to besiege it, His Majesty was pleased to 
 condescend to the Terms proposed, and to regain the 
 Allegiance of that Place with the granting those 
 Conditions." 2 
 
 Too much reHance need not be placed upon the 
 accuracy of the date in Symonds's Diary, but it is not 
 improbable that it was the submission of these 
 propositions to the King which gave rise to the 
 rumour in the camp of the surrender of Barnstaple. 
 The royal head-quarters were then at Widey Court. 
 The two armies, the King's and Prince Maurice's, 
 were threatening Plymouth without any result, and 
 
 ^ Historical Discourses, p. 86. 'bid., pp. 86, 87. 
 
334 SECOND SURRENDER OF BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 on the 14th, the attack was abandoned and the 
 assailants ''with drums beating and colors flying, 
 marched off, leaving the seige. . . . The rogues 
 followed the reare . . . little or no hurt, onely the 
 basest language"^ — which may be imagined; the 
 imprecatory vocabulary of the seventeenth century 
 being exceptionally rich. 
 
 The second surrender of Barnstaple took place on 
 the 17th of September, 1644, and the garrison 
 evacuated the town on the same day. The articles 
 of capitulation, of which there are several versions 
 extant, seem to have been substantially those which 
 follow : — 
 
 1. To march away with their Colours, Drums, Swords, 
 and all their Muskets, Arms, Bag and Baggage, And every 
 Musquetere 12 Shot. 
 
 2. That the Town shall be free from plunder, the Garrison 
 quit, and the Workes demolished and no Garrison made 
 there hereafter. 
 
 3. That they should march away with a safe convoy to 
 the Lord Generall to Portsmouth.^ 
 
 The garrison left behind them, according to Sir 
 Edward Walker, '' above fifty piece of Ordnance, 
 many Arms, but little Ammunition." 3 
 
 ^ Symoiids^s Diary, Camden Society, p. 82. 
 
 = Perfect Ocairrences, &c., No. 7, Sept. 20-27, i6z|4, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xiv. This surrender has been usually 
 called the surrender to General Goring ; but as the offer of capitulation 
 was referred to the King as commander-in-chief and accepted by him, 
 it cannot be wrong to adopt upon so high an authority, on such a point, 
 as the Garter King of Arms (Sir Edward Walker) the view which he 
 took of it, that it was a surrender to the King. 
 
 ^ Historical Discottrses^ pp. 86, 87. 
 
TO WN PL UNDERED. 335 
 
 What became of LuttrelFs and Bennet's men is 
 nowhere mentioned ; but it is probable that they 
 threw in their lot with the rest of the garrison and 
 marched out with them. Colonel Luttrell is stated 
 in the family pedigree to have been killed in action 
 in the same year. Colonel Bennet reappears as one 
 of the Commissioners on the part of Sir Thomas 
 Fairfax of the treaty for the surrender of Pendennis 
 Castle in August, 1646. Subsequently, he was 
 Governor of that fortress under the Commonwealth, 
 and one of Cromwell's Council of State. His corres- 
 pondence, chiefly of the Commonwealth period, is 
 among the MSS. in the Collection of the late Sir 
 Thomas Phillipps, Bart., now at Thirlestaine House, 
 Cheltenham. 
 
 The Parliamentary soldiers who marched out of 
 Barnstaple found their way to Portsmouth, the 
 articles with regard to them having been, it is said, 
 ''indifferently well kept." The day of the entry of 
 Goring's troopers into the town, if all be true, was 
 a disastrous one for the inhabitants. The Royalist 
 Horse were admittedly disorganized and out of 
 hand. Instead of performing the conditions, says 
 an authorized Parliamentary diurnal, — '' they have 
 broken them all, pillaged our men, plundered the 
 Town, exempted the Maior and imprisoned many 
 other of the Inhabitants."^ Whitelock, improving 
 upon the somewhat anomalous word in the foregoing 
 paragraph, states that the Mayor was '' executed." ^ 
 
 ^ A Perfect Diur^iail of some Passages in Parliament^ &c., Sept, 
 23-30, 1644, King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xiv. 
 2 Memonals, ed. 1 682, p. 1 00. 
 
336 THE SUMMARY, 
 
 This, however, was certainly not the case, as he is 
 known to have survived for several years. The other 
 information is much in want of confirmation, although 
 it no doubt contains some truth ; but on this scene 
 the local records throw no light whatever. 
 
 There is no reason to suppose that Goring's force 
 remained in Barnstaple more than a day or two after 
 these events took place. 
 
 The distinguished and select troop of Essex's life- 
 guards had entailed a further burden on the inhabi- 
 tants of Barnstaple, not only for their maintenance 
 during their brief visit, but for their travelling expenses 
 when they left. The items are duly entered in the 
 Summary : — 
 
 For quartering of Lord General Essex his 
 Life Guards and their Servants, in all 126, 
 from 6 to 17 Sepf 1644 jQ(i(^ 6 o 
 
 M 
 
 In Money paid the L'^ Ge' his Life Guards 
 at their departure 60 o o 
 
 We are now approaching the end of the valuable re- 
 cord of which, under the title of the " Summary," I have 
 from time to time made use. Its historical accuracy 
 is unimpeachable, and in no single instance (except 
 in the case of manifest errors of copyists) does it 
 show any inconsistency with facts which I have 
 derived from other and undoubtedly authentic sources. 
 The last item, in agreement with a practice which is 
 time-honoured, is made up of '' sundries," but this 
 is in no respect inferior to the others in interest or 
 importance. 
 
THE SUMMAR K 337 
 
 The Xepaire of our Bridge, the demolish- 
 ing of Houses and laying AVast of Land on 
 which the Fort Lyne and Intrenchments 
 were made, more than ... ... ... ;^3,ooo o 
 
 The sums of the several items, which it is not 
 necessary to recapitulate, amount altogether to the 
 grand total of upwards of ;^i6,ooo — equal to three or 
 four times that sum in money of the present time. 
 And this expenditure, it should be borne in mind, is 
 exclusive of all the weekly assessments, martial rates, 
 compulsory loans, and other exactions which were 
 made upon the town by the Royalists during their two 
 occupations, extending together over twice as long a 
 period as that covered by the Summary. It repre- 
 sented only what were considered claims on the 
 Long Parliament. What reception these claims met 
 with may be gathered from the language of the 
 Corporation, when, a few years later, they were 
 again pressing their 'Mittle bill" upon the attention 
 of the Rump — " there have been great somes of 
 money disbursed and lent for the service of the 
 Parliament by the inhabitants of this towne of 
 Barnestaple, of which hitherto no restitution hath 
 been made nor any satisfaccion given for the same.''^ 
 Their chances of obtaining any compensation what- 
 ever from Parliament had already become desperate, 
 when the Restoration of course finally extinguished 
 them. 
 
 ^ Records, Supploiietitary, No. 5. 
 
 2Z 
 
PART IV. 
 
 FROM THE SURRENDER OF BARNSTAPLE TO THE 
 KING TO ITS SURRENDER TO SIR THOMAS 
 FAIRFAX, GENERAL OF THE PARLIA- 
 MENTARY FORCES. 
 
 September 17, 1644 — April 14, 1646. 
 
 ON the same day on which the garrison of 
 Barnstaple marched out with drums beating, 
 colours flying, and the other honours of war. King 
 Charles, in advance of his army, after resting the 
 previous night at Okehampton, dined at Crediton, 
 and afterwards entered Exeter *^ in greater state 
 than ordinary," as became a monarch returning from 
 a successful expedition. The King's troops reached 
 Exeter in a miserable plight. ** I am well assured," 
 says Sir Edward Walker, who accompanied the 
 King, '' that of above 4,000 of the King's Army of 
 Foot and 4,500 of Prince Maurice's when they first 
 joined at Crediton, the first was at this time much 
 diminished, and the other not half that Number; 
 
THE KINGS ARMY LEA VES DE VONSHIRE. 339 
 
 Besides our Horse was much harassed, and discon- 
 tented for want of Pay.*' ^ The Commissioners of 
 the county for levying the King's martial rates were 
 forthwith obliged to make provision ; and before the 
 army could leave Devonshire ^^2,000 had to be 
 requisitioned, in money, ** to satisfie the Horse and 
 3,000 suits of Cloaths for the Foot, besides good 
 proportions of Shoes and Stockings." These sup- 
 plies were collected from the several *'good Towns " 
 — which, if not a pleasantry, may have meant the 
 larger towns — of the county. These proceedings 
 detained the army nearly a week. Goring's Horse 
 from Barnstaple joined in the mean time. The 
 whole of the King's forces then passed out of 
 Devonshire, going to Chard, to push back Waller 
 and Middleton, and ultimatelyj^ on the 27th of 
 October, to meet the combined Parliamentary 
 armies at the second battle of Newbury. This 
 battle was indecisive, and may be said to have 
 closed the campaign of 1644. 
 
 We are now reaching a period of the war in 
 which hostilities on the smaller scale were carried 
 on with increased asperity, and when the suffering 
 and distress of the people were correspondingly 
 aggravated. In Devonshire, this state of things 
 was accentuated by the tyranny and unscrupulous 
 exactions of exceptionally disreputable Royalist 
 commanders. The Parliamentary Committees had 
 not been slow to put in force all their powers to 
 wring money from their own adherents, as well as 
 from the estates of " delinquent " Royalists. The 
 
 ^ Historical Discourses^ p. Z^, 
 
340 SIR JOHN BERKELE K 
 
 turn of the Royalist Commissioners had now come. 
 Their weekly assessments fell upon an already im- 
 poverished people with '* damnable iteration;" and, 
 besides this, the country was harassed by the free 
 quarter imposed upon it by the Royalist Horse. 
 These made their excursions at will, and had 
 the whole county, with the solitary exception of 
 Plymouth, at their mercy. At Exeter, Sir John 
 Berkeley, who had been commissioned by the King 
 as '' Colonel-General of Devon and Cornwall, and 
 to command the whole forces of the two counties, as 
 well trained-bands as others," ruled as a viceroy. 
 Personally he is described as a man of parts, but of 
 no very high character. He is the ** Jack Berkeley" 
 of Queen Henrietta Maria's letters, and the *' My 
 dear Jack" of Sir Edward Hyde's — inferentially a 
 pleasant fellow. He is said to have spent at least 
 ;£*5o,ooo in the King's cause. ^ 
 
 It had been provided by the articles of capitulation 
 that no new garrison should be put into Barnstaple; 
 but the town was not long exempt, at all events, 
 from military occupation. Whether this was the 
 consequence or the cause of a rebellious spirit which 
 revived in the hearts of the Corporation is not clear. 
 Without supposing anything more seriously demon- 
 strative, it is not unlikely that the pressure of the 
 demands for money provoked a passive resistance 
 and some strong language, which led to arbitrary 
 measures on the part of the Royalist autocrat at 
 Exeter, and was a sufficient pretext for a hostile 
 
 ' He was afterwards made a peer, with the title of Baron Berkeley 
 of Stratton, by Charles II. 
 
BARNSTAPLE AGAIN OCCUPIED. 341 
 
 occupation of the town. For it is; I believe, to 
 this incident that we are to assign two or three 
 obscure items in the more fragmentary of the local 
 records which, otherwise, are incapable of expla- 
 nation. The Mayor and Corporation had evidently 
 been summoned by Sir John Berkeley to account 
 for some refractory conduct. This is alluded to, 
 although the nature of it is not explained, in an 
 exculpating document of the Corporation which has 
 survived. It is a formal appointment by the Mayor 
 and Corporation of deputies to appear at Exeter or 
 elsewhere to answer the charge, and is here re- 
 produced : — 
 
 To all Christian People to whom these psentes shall come. 
 Wee the Maior Aldermen and Burgesses of the Borough and 
 pishe of Barnestaple in the Countie of Devon send greetinge 
 in our Lord God everlastinge. Whereas dyvers untrue un- 
 just and scandalous aspersions and reportes have beene of 
 late and dayly are caste forth rumoured and reported of and 
 against the Corporacon of Barnestaple and the inhabitants 
 thereof which reportes have spredd far and wide and have 
 beene brought to the ears of dyvers men of place and emi- 
 nency to the great defamacon detriment and dammage of 
 the said Corporacon : Know ye therefore that wee the saide 
 Maior Aldermen and Burgesses of Barnestaple aforesaid 
 have deputed constituted appointed and authorysed and by 
 these psentes do depute constitute appoint and authoryse 
 our trustie and well beloved friend Thomas Matthews, 
 Robert Lane, [town-clerk], George Pooke [?] Richard Drewe, 
 John Sweete and Thomas Grede to be our lawfull and un- 
 doubted agentes and Solicitors for us and in our names and 
 steede and our behalfe to repaire unto the cittie of Exon or 
 elsewhere as shall be necessary and to declare and make 
 
342 DISTRESS OF THE CORPORATION. 
 
 knowne unto the Hon. Sir John Berkley knight Governor of 
 the said cittie of Exon and others his Majesties Commis- 
 sioners there and to all others to whom it shall apptaine our 
 innocense and guiltlessness of these crimes so unjustly and 
 scandalously charged upon us and by such instructions 
 proofes and demonstracons as we have given unto them or 
 by what of their owne knowledge they are able to testifie to 
 vindicate our reputacons ; and also to make knowne the 
 manifold wronges and injuries which of late have been and 
 dayly are done unto us and the greate usurpations and in- 
 trusions dayly offered unto us occasioned (as we conceive) 
 by the said scandalous reports contraury to our auncient 
 Charter of Liberties and late Articles of Immunities most 
 graciously by the King's most excellent Majestie confirmed 
 unto us [alluding to the articles of the capitulation ?] and of 
 the said wronges and injuries to crave redresse and repara- 
 tion and to execute and pforme all and whatsoever shalbe 
 necessarie to be done and pformed touching the premises 
 for and on our behalfe. We the said Maior and Aldermen 
 and Burgesses ratifyinge allowinge and confirminge all and 
 whatsoever the said Agentes shall lawfully doe or cause and 
 procure to be done in and about the premises. In testimony 
 whereof wee have caused the seale of the Incorporacon of 
 Barnestaple to be hereunto affixed the nynth day of 
 December in the twentieth yeare of the raigne of our 
 Soveraigne Lord Charles by the grace of God of England 
 Scotland France and Ireland Kinge defender of the faithe, &c. 
 
 Adam Lugge, Maior 
 Henry Mason 
 Thomas Horwood.^ 
 
 The Commissioners came to Barnstaple, however, 
 to institute the inquiry. Three of them only are 
 named, Sir Peter Ball (Recorder of Exeter), Sir 
 
 * Records^ No. xxxix. 
 
COMMISSIONERS A T BARNSTAPLE. 343 
 
 George Parry,i and Mr. Peter Sainthill (of Brad- 
 ninch). Of course they had to be suitably enter- 
 tained, although, it may be taken for granted, with 
 the reverse of a cheerful hospitality. It is not 
 uncommon to find trifling waifs floating down the 
 stream of time in such records as we are now 
 examining, when matters which seem to us of 
 weightier interest have sunk irretrievably to the 
 bottom. And so we have it recorded that there was 
 disbursed for this entertainment the sum of ^^3 2s. 3d., 
 and that there was " more paid out for wine, butter, 
 flour, spice and sugar to make a pasty, with the 
 cook and skulling wages, ^i.*' 2 Mr. Thomas Hor- 
 wood, when Mayor ten years afterwards, makes a 
 claim upon the borough funds for these disburse- 
 ments. His name, it will be observed, was appended 
 to the document relating to the inquiry; and he 
 appears to have been not only a prominent party in 
 the case, but to have been made a special victim, 
 having, at the request of the Corporation, surrendered 
 himself as a ** hostidge," and gone with others to 
 Exeter on this business, being '* out of purse " £^ in 
 consequence. This was apparently after the Com- 
 missioners had left and, presumably, given an adverse 
 report. But this was not the whole of his suffering. 
 A lively idea of the state of the town at that time, 
 when under military occupation, is obtained from 
 
 '^ ** Then so called," adds the record. He had been recently knighted. 
 He was a LL.D., and the Queen's Attorney ; Member of Parliament for 
 St. Mawes at the beginning of the Long Parliament, but "disabled " in 
 1644. I have not been able to ascertain what was the nature of his 
 personal connection with Devonshire, ^ Records ^ No. Ixix. 
 
344 MILITARY OPPRESSION, 
 
 another claim made by Mr. Richard Medford, a sub- 
 sequent Mayor, who alleges damages to himself when 
 he and the other emissaries went to Exeter, and a 
 promise was made ** that their houses should be kept 
 free from quartering of officers and soldiers, and in 
 case they should receive any loss or damage in their 
 goods by soldiers in their absence, satisfaction should 
 be made." ^ The claim of Mr. Horwood in these 
 circumstances is then specified. Notwithstanding 
 the safeguard, the house of Mr. Horwood, the very 
 same day that he rode away, was broken into and 
 filled with soldiers, who plundered and carried away 
 to the full value of 20 marks' worth of his proper 
 goods, which 20 marks then taken from him he 
 craves — ^^13 6s. 8d." ^ 
 
 It was in the midst of such military oppression as 
 that of which we here obtain a casual glimpse, that 
 the Corporation appear to have cast about for some 
 relief. No aid was to be expected from the forces 
 of the Parliament which were far away ; and, in their 
 utter helplessness, they petition their powerful neigh- 
 bour, the Earl of Bath, to use his good offices that 
 '' soldiers may not come in great numbers, and that 
 he will speak to the commanders to regulate their 
 conduct." ^ Not much apparently being gained by 
 this appeal, the Corporation resorted to the desperate 
 measure of obtaining relief by a bribe, and £50 was 
 offered and paid to Colonel John Gifford to relieve 
 the town of the presence of Colonel Games*s com- 
 
 ^ Records, No. Ixix. 2 Ibid, 
 
 3 Sackville MSS., Seve^ith Report of Historical MSS. Commission^ 
 App., p 259. 
 
SIR JOHN GREAVILLE. 345 
 
 pany of Horse, which lay in the town at free quarter 
 and at great charge on the inhabitants.^ 
 
 The disturbances in Barnstaple, whatever may 
 have been their precise meaning or importance, and 
 of this we have no distinct notion, appear at any rate 
 to have obtained some notoriety. In the collection 
 of MSS., formerly called the Rupert Correspondence, 
 there is an original letter written by Sir John Gren- 
 ville to Prince Maurice, in which, for his own pur- 
 poses, the writer refers to the then state of affairs at 
 Barnstaple ; and, as the letter is otherwise of con- 
 siderable local interest, I give a copy of it verbatim et 
 literatim : — - 
 
 May it please y' highnes 
 
 The great favour y"" highnes has donne mee, in sparing 
 y"" surgeon, has already almost recovered mee of my wounds. 
 
 ^ Records^ Supplementary^ No. 5 (l^st paragraph). Colonel John 
 Gifford, of Brightley, was himself one of the most oppressive of the 
 Royalist colonels, if the following allegation is to be trusted. When it 
 was known, in 1646, that he was about to compound with Parliament for 
 his delinquency, the ''well-affected" inhabitants of Chittlehampton (his 
 own parish) petitioned the Commissioners of Parliament for the County 
 of Devon that they might not be barred from redress against him, not- 
 withstanding such composition, they having been, " for their good offices 
 and coherence to Parliament," some driven from their habitations, others 
 deprived of goods and estates, and all miserably oppressed by Colonel 
 Gifford, " a violent and active enemy to the State, ... to the utter 
 ruin and overthrow of divers of them ; " he had extorted and unjustly 
 levied moneys by force front the Petitioners and many others "to the 
 sum of ;£"5,ooo or ;^6,ooo, and kept the same ; " — pray that they may 
 have reparation of their losses and damages out of his estate. This 
 petition is printed in extenso in Moore's Devonshire^ ii. 574. A richly- 
 bound bible and prayer-book (in one), given by Charles II. to John 
 Gifford, Esq., "in reward for the services of his father. Colonel John 
 Gifford, during the great Rebellion," was No. 1,120 in the Exhibition 
 of the Royal House of Stuart, in London, 1889. 
 
346 5//? JOHN GRENVILLE. 
 
 and for my health (the Phisitians tell mee) w^*" some repose 
 in y^ country will be in a condition good enough, soe y^ (I 
 hope) I shall be able to doe y' hi^hnes service againe, w'''' 
 is my chiefest ambition. It lies now in y' highnes power 
 greatly to obleige mee, & enable mee for y*" future to 
 serve y"" highnes w^^ a good recruite of souldiers, Barnestable 
 who can never keepe their fingers out of a rebellion, have 
 beene of late highly guilty in y^ kind, w""^ have made our 
 wise comissioners of Devon to thincke of placing a garrison 
 in y^ towne ; In a busines of this nature I knew unto none 
 I ought more fitly to addresse myselfe, then unto y' highnes, 
 and if y*" highnes thincke me worthy y^ goverm^ of this 
 towne, I doubt not but be very serviceable unto y"^ highnes 
 in this commaund. I have some interrest in y^ part of y^ 
 country in regard y^ toune lies soe neare my estate, and I 
 know I can be noe where in a better capacity of doing 
 y^ King service, then in this towne, because it stands in 
 y® midst of my tenants and acquaintance, and I'me confi- 
 dent (if y*" highnes vouchsafes mee this goverment and y^ 
 contribution of y^ north part of Devon for y^ maintenance 
 of my men) I will bring into y"" feild to march unto y*" highnes 
 next sumer a thousand men and leave a good garrison 
 behind in y*" towne, all w"^ souldiers I will be obleiged to pay 
 during y^ war. Thus much uppon these conditions I will 
 engadge myselfe to doe uppon mine honour, but I wholely 
 submitt myselfe unto y*" highnes and shall attend y' highnes 
 answer unto 
 
 y"" highnes most obedient servant 
 
 John Grenvill.^ 
 Bristoll, Decern. 23. 
 
 1644. 
 
 For his highnes Prince Maurice 
 
 These 
 
 ^ B. M. Add. MSS., No. 18,981, f. 340. Sir John Grenville, son of 
 Sir Bevill Grenville, already mentioned as with the King's army in 
 
SIR ALLEN APSLEY. 347 
 
 The wish of the youthful Cavalier (he was then 
 a little more than sixteen years of age only) was not 
 however to be gratified. The time was indeed ripe, 
 or considered to be so, for the formal imposition of a 
 garrison upon the refractory town of Barnstaple. A 
 garrison was established accordingly; and if he had 
 not already done so when Sir John Grenville wrote, 
 Sir John Berkeley appointed his own lieutenant, Sir 
 Allen Apsley, Governor of Barnstaple. 
 
 As Sir Allen Apsley's connection with Barnstaple 
 lasted for the remainder of the time during which 
 the town was in Royalist occupation, some notice of 
 his earlier history will be of interest. He was the 
 eldest son of another Sir Allen Apsley, who was 
 Lieutenant of the Tower of London in the reign of 
 James L, and officially, for a time, the gaoler of our 
 fellow West-countryman, Sir Walter Ralegh. The 
 Lieutenant's wife has a sympathetic claim upon the 
 regard of us Devonians, inasmuch as in kindness to 
 the illustrious prisoner she was, we are told, '* as a 
 mother." The Apsleys were a family of good posi- 
 tion. The children were highly educated, and Lucy, 
 who was the wife of Colonel John Hutchinson, 
 the Parliamentary Governor of Nottingham Castle, 
 wrote the memoirs of her husband, one of the most 
 charming biographies in the English language. 
 
 Cornwall. The allusion in the beginning of the letter is to his having 
 been dangerously wounded — by a sword-cut across the head — at the 
 recent (second) battle of Newbury. After the Restoration, he was 
 created Viscount Lansdowne and Earl of Bath (the latter title having 
 become extinct in the Bourchier family) by Charles II. He brought 
 from the King to the Houses of Parliament the famous historical docu- 
 ment called the Declaration of Breda. 
 
348 . SIR ALLEN APSLE V. 
 
 The younger Allen Apsley was born in the Tower 
 in 1616. As a boy he was noticed by the great Duke 
 of Buckingham— not the best influence, perhaps, 
 which could have been desired for the modelling of 
 his character. In due time he spent several years 
 as a student at the University of Oxford. With the 
 avenue of the Court open to him, he was one of 
 those who waited upon its patronage. Some envious 
 persons, it seems, had, at one time, made reflections 
 upon the young Apsley's loyalty, and we obtain thus 
 casually a slight allusion to his personal disposition 
 in a protest by his father, written with the rugged 
 orthography of an elderly gentleman of the period : 
 ** The poore boy is soe afflicted as hee p'testes to 
 God hee had rayther die instantly then live w^^^ his 
 Ma^^^s ill opinion. Hee is not xxiij^^^ : I doe not think 
 that ever hee medled with any thing seryous, his 
 witt lyinge in a contrary waye." ^ Like other young 
 military aspirants he served in the Netherlands and 
 won his spurs. He accompanied the King to Not- 
 tingham, at the outbreak of the Civil War, and 
 entering that town in command of a troop of Horse, 
 by an odd chance was quartered in the house imme- 
 diately adjoining that occupied by his Puritan sister, 
 Mrs. Hutchinson. 
 
 Sir Allen Apsley's first appearance in Devonshire, 
 so far as I have discovered, was twelve months later. 
 At that time, which was not long after the battle of 
 Stratton, Sir Ralph Hopton's army had marched 
 out of the county leaving some parties of Horse to 
 watch Exeter, which the Earl of Stamford was 
 
 ' Printed in Forster's Sir John Eliot ^ ii. 472. 
 
SIR ALLEN APSLEY. 349 
 
 holding for the Parliament These parties seem to 
 have expended their superfluous energy in harrying 
 the neighbouring country. An attack was made 
 upon Tiverton. Som.e of Colonel Were's regiment 
 of Foot lying there were surprised and dispersed, 
 having been betrayed, as Colonel Were alleged, by 
 the Mayor. What took place further is given by 
 Martin Dunsford, apparently from some local record : — 
 
 In the month of August, this year [1643], Sir Allen 
 Apsley and Major Buckingham came with a party of horse, 
 for King Charles the First, and attempted to enter the town 
 of Tiverton; they were resisted by the inhabitants some 
 time, by throwing stones &c., upon which the horsemen 
 fired upon the inhabitants ; the people, seeing some of their 
 party drop, fled ; in the pursuit one John Lock, a miller, 
 
 a 
 
 was taken prisoner, and hanged by the said troops, at the 
 sign of the White Horse, on the north side of Gold Street; 
 the officers and soldiers then plundered the town.^ 
 
 The incident gives us a notion of — to put it 
 mildly — Sir Allen's military vigour. A Royalist 
 garrison having been placed in Exeter on its sur- 
 render soon afterwards, Sir Allen became Lieutenant- 
 Governor of it under Sir John Berkeley, with whom 
 he appears to have been on an intimately friendly 
 footing. 
 
 We have seen that Sir Allen Apsley, in August 
 of this year (1644), had been detached, by Sir John 
 Berkeley with a force to relieve the besieged fort of 
 Appledore. It is probable, although it is nowhere 
 so stated, that when Barnstaple exhibited rebel- 
 
 ' Historical MeJiioirs of Tivert07i^ 1790, p. 1%^. 
 
350 TRAINED-BAND OF BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 lious symptoms, he was again sent into North Devon 
 to overawe the town which he remained to govern. 
 There was no ParHamentary force at that time 
 threatening Exeter, and Berkeley was therefore able 
 to spare a detachment to garrison Barnstaple, This 
 was the situation in the beginning of 1645. 
 
 One of the first acts of Sir Allen Apsley after he 
 was installed as Governor of Barnstaple was to 
 resuscitate the town trained-band. - Although he had 
 probably taken care to secure its efficiency for the 
 Royalist service, or, at all events, had considered it 
 less harmful if under his own authority than if left 
 even in a disembodied condition under the influence 
 of the Corporation, the customary form of the choice 
 of its Captain was scrupulously followed. A minute 
 of the Corporation, which is one of the few records of 
 this period that have been preserved, relates to this 
 proceeding, and is here given : — 
 
 29° die Januarii 16^14 [/.^., 1645]. 
 Memorandum. That the day & yeare abovesaid M"" 
 Maior the Aldermen & Common Counsell of the Town 
 were comanded & required by S' Allen Apsley to assemble 
 themselves together & to make choice of one amongst 
 themselves to be Captaine of the Trayned Band of the 
 Town «&: for the Towne of Barnstaple whoe thereuppon 
 beinge met together certaine men of the Comon Counsell 
 of the Towne were ppounded to stand uppon the eleccon 
 (viz.) W Lewis Palmer, M"^ John Downe, M"^ Thomas 
 Dennys & M'' Nicholas Cook & the eleccon beinge made 
 by Balls, after the manner of the Eleccon of the Maior of 
 the said Towne, the lott fell uppon M' Thomas Dennys whoe 
 then & there was chosen to be Captaine & so stands elected 
 & chosen Captaine. 
 
MR. THOMAS DENNIS, • \ 351 
 
 Then follow the names of eighteen members of 
 the Corporation as present, who were the electors.^ 
 
 The influence brought to bear on the election is 
 sufficiently apparent. This Mr. Thomas Dennis 
 was of Royalist proclivities. For his share in the 
 transaction he appears to have been never forgiven 
 by his brethren of the Parliamentary section of the 
 Corporation. Six years afterwards, under the 
 revived Puritan ascendency, after having been 
 actually chosen mayor, vengeance overtook him, 
 and he *' was prosecuted and ousted of his Mayoralty 
 for being chosen Captain of the Trained Bands, the 
 Town being then for the King when he was chosen 
 Captain.'* ^ 
 
 ' Harding MSS. The election by balls, which is recorded as *'an 
 ancient custome within the towne of Barnstaple used tyme out of mynd 
 to elect the Mayor and all other officers," was a method of Election by 
 ballot of a very peculiar kind which is minutely prescribed in one of 
 the bye-laws of the town, for which see Cribble's Me7norialSy p. 351. 
 
 ^ "Notes from the Journal of Richard Wood, Vicar of Fremington." 
 ChdiTiier^s Literary History of Barnstaple^ p. 121. (Spelling modernized). 
 By what process Mr. Dennis was '* ousted " does not appear. There is no 
 indication of the effect of it to be found in the list of Mayors given in 
 Gribble's Memorials^ from which it would be inferred that he served the 
 usual term of office in 165 1-2. Towards the end of his year, however, 
 party feeling seems to have run so high that the Burgesses had recourse to 
 the unusual step of appealing to Parliament, which would have been 
 scarcely necessary in the case if Mr. Dennis had already been "ousted." 
 Whitelock, under date September 30, 1652, notes that — '* Mr. Dennis 
 formerly of the King's party, being chosen Maior of Barnstaple, the 
 Townsmen petitioned against him, and an Act was committed disabling 
 such persons to be elected, or to be electors of any to publick Offices." 
 The Parliament was at that time nervously afraid of any revival of the 
 Royalist interest, and the result was that Mr. Dennis's case led to an 
 important measure being passed, within a fortnight (on the 12th 
 October), disabling ** Delinquents " from bearing any office or having a 
 vote in any election. ( Whitelock 's Meino7^ials^ ed. 1682, under those 
 dates.) 
 
352 BEHAVIOUR OF THE CAVALIERS. 
 
 In my collection there are two notices of the 
 internal affairs of Barnstaple at this time, when its 
 civil population was under the Cavalier regime, 
 which are of considerable interest. They are the 
 more so because such notices are and must be of 
 great rarity ; garrisoned as the town was, the oppor- 
 tunities of communicating with the outer world, 
 especially in a hostile temper, were precarious and 
 hazardous. These notices come, of course not 
 without some embellishment, through the usual 
 medium of the London diurnal, almost the only 
 means of publicity; but they have the unmistakable 
 stamp of their local origin. The following account 
 is printed under date of Saturday, Feb. 8 : — 
 
 This day there came newes from the West of the state of 
 Barnstable, which doth Certifie that the Cavaliers there are 
 very cruell to the Inhabitants, abusing them daily, (not 
 sparing the Maior of the towne himselfe with taunting 
 reproaches), presse and force men and youths to serve very 
 often, and in case that they offer to run away, as they do 
 familiarly [?] if they have but an opportunity, they will hang 
 up divers of them, which they have exercised on many in 
 those parts. The town of Barnstable, the enemie is 
 strengthening the works, and making the great fort larger 
 where (to the great grief of the town) they intend to nest 
 themselves.^ 
 
 The next occurs about seven weeks later, and adds 
 something to the story of the military tyranny which 
 prevailed : — 
 
 ^ Perfect Occurrences of Parliajucut^ &c., February 7-14, 1645, 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xv. 
 
SIR ALLEN APSLETS PROCEEDINGS, 353 
 
 And although there were Articles made with the in- 
 habitants of Barnstable, when it was surrendered to the 
 King's Forces, that it should not for the future be made a 
 Garrison, yet have they forced the towne to make a Garrison 
 of the castle, and thither doe they daily carrie the plunder 
 of the towne, using the people most barbarously and 
 cruelly, not permitting them so much as to have any con- 
 ference with godly Ministers about instructions for saving 
 their souls, &c.^ 
 
 Although the summary executions to which the 
 former of these passages refers w^ere doubtless 
 exaggerations, the arbitrary and oppressive authority 
 exercised over the civilian inhabitants by the new 
 Governor was such as to arouse the resistance of 
 the Corporation ; and there is to be found in their 
 accounts the charge for messengers sent to Exeter 
 to remonstrate with Sir John Berkeley against Sir 
 Allen Apsley and his brother, Colonel Apsley (af 
 whom we shall have more to say later), "for several 
 misdemeanours," they having committed eight of 
 the burgesses to prison.^ 
 
 From these passages certain facts may, I believe, 
 be inferred : — that Sir Allen Apsley had set to work 
 vigorously to restore the fortifications of the town ; 
 that the Great Fort was being converted into a sort 
 of citadel to hold a body of troops ; that the Castle 
 works were also being strengthened ; and that both 
 strongholds were being provisioned, equipped, and 
 made capable of withstanding a siege. We shall 
 presently learn what was the opinion of a competent 
 
 ^ The Generall Accou7it, &c., March 31, 1645, King's Pamplilets, 
 ' B. M., large 4tos, vol. xvi. ^ Records, No. Ixix. 
 
 24 
 
3 S4 P URITAN REFORMS, 
 
 observer as to the completed defences of Barnstaple 
 when he saw them two months later. 
 
 A digression is here necessary in order to describe, 
 which will be done very briefly, the general drift of 
 affairs at this time, and what led up to the final 
 campaign of this war — a campaign, the issue of 
 which, it is not too much to say, was practically 
 decided in North Devon. 
 
 The lull in the military operations of the two great 
 contending parties in the winter of 1644-45, was 
 diversified by political movements of considerable 
 moment. Of these, the incidents of the ever-present 
 religious controversy took inevitable precedence. 
 Twelve months previously, the famous Ordinance of 
 the Parliament for the demolition of ** monuments of 
 Superstition and Idolatry" had been partially carried 
 into effect. The estates of the bishops had been 
 sequestered. The Book of Common Prayer had been 
 prohibited in all churches within the limits of 
 the influence of Parliament, and the Directory had 
 taken its place. Church vestments and ceremonies 
 had been of course discarded. Maypoles, a 
 heathenish vanity, were to be taken down. There 
 should be '' no more cakes and ale." Christmas 
 Day, abolished as an unholy festival, happening 
 this year to coincide with the regular monthly 
 fast-day, the happy omen was hailed with grim 
 satisfaction by the Puritans — the feast was buried 
 in the fast, never, it was hoped, to rise again ; ^ 
 although the Parliamentary Scout complains that 
 
 ^ Edmund Calamy's Sermon before the House of Lords. 
 
TREA TV OF UXBRIDGE, 355 
 
 it " troubles the children and servants ; they lay 
 much to heart the loss of pies and plum-pottage." 
 In January, the Church received its severest shock 
 when Archbishop Laud, who had done so much to 
 provoke the troubles and dissensions of the time, was, 
 by a supreme act of Puritan vindictiveness, brought 
 out of prison and beheaded. 
 
 The political events of this interval were turning 
 points in the course of the war. Upon the King's 
 overture, negotiations for a treaty of peace were 
 again agreed to ; and, with due formalities, the Com- 
 .. missioners on either side met at Uxbridge and sat 
 for twenty days during the month of February. The 
 negotiations came to nothing. Even if the de- 
 mands of the Parliament for the suppression of 
 prelacy, supported by the Scotch irreconcilables, or 
 for the control of the Militia, supported by their 
 war party, the two chief points in dispute, could 
 have been accommodated, there were other minor 
 ones, not discussed, which would have been sufficient 
 probably to wreck the treaty. 
 
 By successive stages, a remarkable measure, the 
 *' Self-denying Ordinance," was being forwarded by 
 the Commons, and ultimately received the assent of 
 both Houses of Parliament. Whatever may have 
 been its ostensible motive, the Ordinance was in 
 reality an ingenious and, as it proved, successful 
 device for getting rid of inconvenient friends. It 
 originated with the thorough-going section of the 
 Commons, now in the ascendant, at the head of 
 which was Oliver Cromwell. This party, whether 
 or not the goal had yet dawned upon them, were on 
 
356 SELF-DENYING ORDINANCE. 
 
 the high road to the abolition of the monarchy and 
 unmitigated repubh'canism. They wished for a 
 vigorous prosecution of the war and its speedy con- 
 clusion in, of course, the way that suited their 
 uncompromising views. They believed that the 
 ParHamentary generals, especially the Earls of 
 Essex and Manchester, were prolonging the war, 
 after the fashion of the leisurely military operations 
 of the Netherlands, for the sake of its emolument 
 and distinction ; that they were too wealthy to risk 
 defeat and ruin ; and too anxious for a peace of their 
 own making and the honours which it would bring 
 them, to push what advantages they might obtain to 
 their due extremity. Two summers are over, cried 
 the ardent Puritans, and we are not saved ; our 
 victories, so gallantly gotten, have been put into a 
 bag with holes ! 
 
 This idea had been rapidly developed after the last 
 battle of Newbury, the abortive results of which 
 were openly attributed to the lukewarmness of 
 the Earl of Manchester, the general. The Self- 
 denying Ordinance provided that no member of either 
 House of Parliament should retain any office of com- 
 mand, civil or military, during the war. The im- 
 mediate result of the measure was just what was 
 intended — Essex, Manchester, and many others of the 
 leading Parliamentary commanders who happened 
 to be in Parliament, laid down their commissions. 
 Every Peer was necessarily incapacitated. 
 
 The conspiracy was partly concocted under the 
 influence of religious faction. The Independent 
 sectaries, of which Cromwell and his friends were 
 
PARLIAMENTARY ARMY REMODELLED. 357 
 
 the shining lights, had become powerful, and Presby- 
 terianism, less on religious than on political grounds, 
 was already discredited. 
 
 Concurrently with this energetic movement, in the 
 beginning of the year 1645, a scheme was brought 
 forward for remodelling the Parliamentary Army in 
 order to the vigorous prosecution of the ensuing cam- 
 paign. So much was thought and spoken of with 
 regard to this " new modelling'* that the army itself 
 came to be popularly called the '* New Model." It 
 was to consist of 7,000 Horse and 14,000 Foot. Sir 
 Thomas Fairfax, an already distinguished soldier in 
 the Northern counties, who had defeated the most 
 powerful army which the King had possessed, at 
 Marston Moor the year before, and who had not the 
 disqualification of being in Parliament, was appointed 
 Commander-in-chief. With a remarkable inconsis- 
 tency revealing the internal working of the con- 
 spiracy (which it undoubtedly was), Oliver Cromwell, 
 who with the other Members of Parliament had 
 surrendered his commission, received a dispensation 
 from the effect of the Self-denying Ordinance, and 
 was appointed Lieutenant-General. Practically, he 
 was henceforth the ruling genius of the war on the 
 Parliamentary side. Philip Skippon was to be Major- 
 General. The new army was composed of the 
 veterans and picked men of the various forces which 
 had already fought for the Parliament ; and Cromwell 
 dispersed among the different regiments the highly 
 disciplined *' Ironsides," and the stern enthusiasts^ — 
 *' honest godly men," as he termed them — whom he 
 had himself drilled in carnal arms. With these 
 
358 GORING AND WALLER. 
 
 materials, and so leavened, the Army was formed 
 which brought the Civil War to the end of its first 
 period, destroyed the King, and ultimately dismissed 
 the Parliament itself by which the Force had been 
 created. 
 
 Meanwhile, the troops with which the King had to 
 meet this formidable concentration were widely dis- 
 tributed. Oxford was held by the Royal army com- 
 manded by Prince Rupert. Bristol was in the hands 
 of Lord Hopton, to whom Prince Maurice had re- 
 signed the nominal command of the Western army in 
 the previous December. Lord Goring, with the most 
 considerable force of all, occupied Somersetshire, and 
 was languidly besieging Taunton, then resolutely 
 defended by Colonel (afterwards the famous Admiral) 
 Robert Blake. In the earlier part of the winter, 
 Goring had been faced by Sir William Waller with 
 the remains of the old Parliamentary army in Wilt- 
 shire ; and the monotony of their winter quarters had 
 been relieved by frequent forays upon each other's 
 country, the beating up of each other's quarters, and 
 the exchange of prisoners and badinage. Then, as a 
 diversion, Goring was '* refreshing " at Exeter, spend- 
 ing three or four days there " in most scandalous 
 disorder " — his troopers plundering up to the gates 
 of the city.i The smaller garrisons in the West 
 that were held for the King, and the strengthening of 
 which was an object of solicitude, were Bridgwater, 
 Dartmouth, and Barnstaple. 
 
 Of the complicated and little-understood military 
 movements of this interval, it is only interesting in 
 
 ^ Clarendon's History of the Rebellion^ p, 579 b. 
 
GORING BEFORE TA UNTON, , 359 
 
 this place to remark their inveterate tendency to 
 gravitate towards the Western peninsula. Waller's 
 object, at the opening of the campaign of 1645, was 
 to advance into Devonshire for the purpose of re- 
 lieving Plymouth, still closely besieged by Sir 
 Richard Grenville ; but he was prevented by Lord 
 Goring. The King would have withdrawn from 
 Oxford and joined the Western army, on the per- 
 suasion of Goring, had not the intention been 
 frustrated by the skirmishing parties of Cromwell, 
 which at the time barred the way. 
 
 The month of April was well advanced before the 
 organization of the new-modelled army was com- 
 pleted. But in the mean time Cromwell had been 
 alarming the garrison of Oxford by making sharp 
 attacks on the neighbouring Royalist outposts. 
 Goring, who had been hastily called to the support of 
 the King at Oxford in this new emergency, having for 
 a time skirmished with Cromwell's force, returned to 
 his old position before Taunton to await the antici- 
 pated attack of the '* New Model." Fairfax's design 
 of relieving Taunton being modified by orders from 
 Parliament, he merely detached a part of his army for 
 that purpose, which failed to effect anything, and 
 went off as ordered to watch the movements of the 
 King, who was again taking the field. At this time 
 Goring's army was reinforced before Taunton by Sir 
 Richard Grenville, who, having been ordered up by 
 the King from before Plymouth, brought 800 Horse 
 and 2,200 Foot which, as Sheriff of Devon, he had 
 raised by the posse comitatus assembled at Exeter, 
 and there armed. 
 
36o PRINCE CHARLES. 
 
 After the failure of the negotiations for peace at 
 Uxbridge, the King, taking a despondent view of the 
 state of his affairs, recurred to a design of sending 
 away the Prince of Wales (afterwards Charles II.), 
 who had hitherto accompanied him in his campaigns, 
 to a place of safety. The design had been proposed 
 and debated in Council twelve months before, when 
 the Queen set out for the West, but had been laid 
 aside ; it was now carried into effect. Early in the 
 month of March, the Prince left Oxford, and the King 
 never saw him again. 
 
 The appointment of a Council for the Prince's 
 guidance, composed of some of the most trusted of 
 the King's personal advisers, implied some political 
 purpose besides the Prince's own convenience. Lord 
 Clarendon, who was himself one of them, tells us 
 that the purpose was that of composing by the 
 Prince's presence and authority, the factions and 
 animosities in the West ** which miserably infested 
 the King's service." 
 
 The Western Royalist Army, which was at this 
 time of the utmost strategical importance to the King's 
 plans, was supposed to be 14,000 strong, mostly Horse, 
 under the command of Lord Goring; but it was 
 notoriously in a state of demoralization from its own 
 license. The troopers were not only living every- 
 where at free quarter on the Somersetshire parishes, 
 but they *^ equally infested the borders of Dorset, 
 Somerset, and Devon by unheard-of rapine, without 
 applying themselves to any enterprise upon the 
 rebels." The *^ rebels" were the defenders of 
 Taunton. Lord Hopton, the actual General-in-chief 
 
PRINCE CHARLES, 361 
 
 in the West, could do nothing with Goring, who 
 resented his authority. Sir John Berkeley and Sir 
 Richard Grenville, besides having separate com- 
 mands, each pushing his own schemes, held com- 
 missions which overlapped each other. Thus a 
 plentiful crop of dissensions and jealousies had 
 sprung up, with which the Prince's Council was 
 about to find it no easy task to deal.^ 
 
 In order that the Prince might have the requisite 
 authority for the arrangement of these differences 
 and the restoration of order, he had received from the 
 King a commission, making him Generalissimo of 
 the whole of the Royalist armies. Remembering that 
 his Highness was not yet fifteen years of age, the 
 position is somewhat startling ; but it was of course 
 only nominal. The same remark applies to the 
 Prince's ostensible political precocity. Lord Claren- 
 don, who never allows us to forget that the real 
 oracle was the Prince's Council, invariably attributes 
 its resolutions, with courtly obsequiousness, to the 
 inspiration or sagacity of the Prince. As soon as 
 the Prince had reached Bristol, his Council took 
 upon itself the direction of the operations of the 
 Western army. 
 
 Towards the end of April, after he had been a 
 month at Bristol, the Prince with his Council went 
 to Bridgwater to meet the Commissioners of the 
 four Western Counties, and to discuss the project of 
 an Association which had been initiated by some 
 gentlemen of Somersetshire, for the organization of 
 the King's forces in those parts, and the raising of 
 
 * Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 579 a. 
 
362 THE PRINCES LE VIES, 
 
 new levies. The Prince had already, by anticipation, 
 received a commission as General of this Association, 
 which is known in history as the " One and All.'* 
 But as nothing, commensurate with its enthusiastic 
 pretensions, came of this scheme, only apparently 
 the raising of some local forces under the influence of 
 the Prince's name, it is unnecessary to pursue its 
 history further here. 
 
 Lord Clarendon, however, states that warrants 
 were actually issued for the raising of these levies, and 
 that the days for their rendezvous were appointed.^ 
 I am disposed to connect with these circumstances 
 the proceeding, otherwise unexplained, which is the 
 subject of one of the loose MSS. preserved among 
 the records of Barnstaple, and printed by Mr. 
 Chanter. The paper is without date and frag- 
 mentary, and apparently a portion of a letter 
 from Sir John Berkeley to Colonel Sir Allen 
 Apsley, the Governor of Barnstaple, relating to the 
 raising of part of a regiment in North Devon, and 
 giving further instructions to that effect. It is as 
 follows : — - 
 
 . . . You may use this proportion underneath written, 
 unless you finde the numbers of men to bee more super- 
 fluous in one parte than another. 
 
 For y'' Officers of Six Companys at lo in y^ 
 
 Company ... ... ... ... ... 60 
 
 From Barnestaple ... ... 54 
 
 From Biddiforde 60 
 
 From Appledor and Northam ... ... 20 
 
 ' History of the RebeIiio7t, p. 582 b. 
 
THE PRINCE'S LEVIES. 
 
 From Ilfarecomb 
 From Coomemartyne... 
 From Berrynaber 
 From Morthoe .^. 
 
 From Georgeham ..., 
 From Branton 
 From Westdowne 
 
 From Pilton 
 
 From Neweport 
 From Taustock 
 From Fremington 
 From Eastdowne 
 From Kentesbury 
 From Trenshoe 
 
 From Westly 
 
 From Horwoode ... 
 
 From Enstow ... 
 
 From Heanton Punchardon 
 
 363 
 
 24 
 24 
 24 
 18 
 18 
 
 36 
 12 
 
 26 
 
 12 
 
 24 
 
 26 
 
 14 
 
 IS 
 
 5 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 20 
 
 These are more than your proportion comes to, but use 
 your owne discretion therein.^ 
 
 On what principle this selection of parishes was 
 made it is not easy to see; it was probably quite 
 arbitrary. However, the total force thus marked for 
 impressment would have reached, including officers 
 (which must be taken to include what are now called 
 non-commissioned officers), nearly five hundred men 
 — a large contingent for only a score of North Devon 
 parishes, already depleted by previous levies, to supply. 
 How many were actually raised, or what became of 
 them if raised, there is nothing to show. Sir John 
 Berkeley's instructions probably remained a dead 
 letter. 
 
 * Records^ No. Ixxxi. 
 
364 EXACTIONS OF SIR RICHARD GRENVILLE, 
 
 The Devonshire Commissioners present at the 
 Conference were Sir Peter Ball, Sir George Parry, 
 Mr. Sainthill, and Mr. Modyford.^ These took occa- 
 sion to represent to the Prince the grievances of their 
 county, which may be summarized as a complaint of 
 the exactions of Sir Richard Grenville, who having 
 received half of the whole contributions of the county, 
 amounting to ^^1,100 weekly, besides other sums since 
 he began the blockade of Plymouth, had not only 
 not expended the same in the cause (implying that 
 he had appropriated the money to his own private 
 use), but, instead, had drawn arms and ammuni- 
 tion from their magazines, compelling the Commis- 
 sioners to supply him, and had failed to raise forces 
 as he had engaged to do. *^ He had received more 
 out of Devonshire for the blocking up of Plymouth 
 (having all Cornwall to himself likewise) than was 
 left for the garrisons of Exeter, Dartmouth, Barn- 
 stable, and Tiverton, and for the finishing those 
 fortifications, victualling the garrisons, providing 
 arms and ammunition," &c. They concluded by 
 animadverting upon the dissensions between Gren- 
 ville and Berkeley, which had already (they said) 
 led even to bloodshed.^ 
 
 The Prince having been prohibited by the King 
 from going farther westward, returned to Bristol on 
 
 * He was one of the sons of John Modyford, Mayor of Exeter in 
 1622. John Modyford had two sons, James and Thomas, who were 
 both made baronets after the Restoration, and both were, successively. 
 Governors of Jamaica. Sir James Modyford (probably the Commis- 
 sioner) married the daughter and eventual sole heiress of Sir Nicholas 
 Slanning, who fell at the siege of Bristol. 
 
 * IJislory of the Rebellion^ p. 584 . 
 
SIjR EDWARD HYDE, 365 
 
 the 30th of April. Sir Edward Hyde (afterwards 
 Earl of Clarendon, the historian), with two others 
 of the Prince's Council, Lords Capel and Colepepper, 
 went to Exeter for the purpose of investigating the 
 reasonable complaints of the Devonshire Commis- 
 sioners, and to reconcile, if it might be, the diffe- 
 rences between Sir Richard Grenville (who had been 
 wounded before Taunton, and was now invalided at 
 Exeter) and Sir John Berkeley. 
 
 While at Exeter, the Council were also em- 
 ployed in ordering forward supplies for the King's 
 forces. Writing from thence on the 21st of May to 
 Prince Rupert, Sir Edward Hyde says : — 
 
 Since I wrote, that is on Sunday morning last, [there] has 
 arrived at Dartmouth a ship with two hundred barrels of 
 powder, and at Falmouth there are great, very great quan- 
 tities of match and muskets and pistols arrived. I have 
 given directions for drawing a good proportion of all to 
 Bristol, by Barnstaple, and have likewise written to Charles 
 Gerrard to appoint some persons to receive his powder at 
 [a blank in copy — ? Bristol] from whence he may have it 
 at Swansea in one tide. I expect an answer from him to- 
 morrow night at Barnstaple, whither I go to give direction 
 for the constant transportation of all that ammunition which 
 I have directed to be sent thither, for I would not venture 
 too much at a time. 
 
 In a subsequent letter, he mentions two thousand 
 muskets, brought over by one Hadscome, and a 
 hundred barrels of powder, which had been sent 
 from Barnstaple to Bristol. This supply was pro- 
 bably the same which he was now going to Barn- 
 staple to get shipped. He adds : — • 
 
; 366 SIR E, HYDE AT BARNSTAPLE, 
 
 I hope to be at Bristol, or where the Prince is (I would 
 he were in these parts, for I hear the plague hath driven 
 him from Bristol,) within four days.^ 
 
 Carrying out the intention expressed in the fore- 
 going of these extracts, Sir Edward Hyde must have 
 ridden to Barnstaple from Exeter immediately after 
 dispatching that letter. On the 27th of May, six 
 days later, he is writing to Prince Rupert from Bath, 
 where he had arrived the previous night to rejoin 
 the Prince of Wales, who had, in fact, removed 
 thither on account of the sickness (supposed to have 
 been the plague) which had broken out in Bristol. 
 Hyde had gone from Barnstaple to Bristol by sea, a 
 passage which seems to have been a well-frequented 
 one in those days ; and it had its advantages at a 
 time when the inland route by Taunton and Bridg- 
 water was possibly blocked by hostile military parties. 
 The time of the year was propitious, but such as the 
 coasting craft of that day were, or, for that matter, 
 are now, the voyage cannot be deemed to have been 
 otherwise than a rough experience.^ 
 
 Whilst at Barnstaple, Sir Edward Hyde was of 
 course entertained by the Governor of the garrison, 
 Sir Allen Apsley. Familiar as he was with other 
 towns, Oxford, Reading, Bristol, and Exeter, the 
 defences of which had been extemporized during the 
 
 ^ Printed in Eliot Warburton's Prince Rttpert and the Cavaliers^ 
 iii. 95. 
 
 ^ The sailing-smack continued, however, to be an ordinary means of 
 passenger traffic between the North Devon ports and Bristol until it was 
 superseded by the *' steam-packet" in the fourth decade of the present 
 century. 
 
HIS ACCOUNT OF THE FORTIFICATIONS, 367 
 
 war, and were as efficient as anything of the kind 
 then to be seen in England, he was favourably 
 impressed by the completeness of the fortifications 
 of the North Devon town. He had already, it 
 seems, given his correspondent, Prince Rupert, an 
 account, partly from report only, of the Devonshire 
 garrisons ; now, he was able from actual observation 
 to describe what he had seen of Barnstaple as a 
 fortress, and of its condition to maintain itself: — 
 
 r 
 
 , I came the last night to this place, having been compelled 
 to take shipping at Barnstaple for Bristol ... if you have 
 not received a very particular account of all the Devonshire 
 garrisons, one very long letter of mine hath missed you : 
 but in truth, though I expected very much from Barnstaple, 
 it exceeded far even that expectation, and considering all 
 circumstances is the most miraculously fortified place that 
 I know, and I am confident is the best provided to receive 
 an enemy, especially in a magazine of victuals, of any town 
 in England. 
 
 Bath J this 2ph May, almost two in the morning?- 
 
 On the gth of May, Lord Goring left the King's 
 army, which two days before had marched out of 
 Oxford, and with three thousand Horse returned, as 
 already stated, to his old quarters about Taunton. 
 Shortly after, an important order from the King 
 reached the Prince of Wales's Council requiring 
 Goring forthwith to rejoin him with all the forces 
 that could be spared, and that the Prince should 
 stay at Dunster Castle. To this the Council re- 
 
 ' Printed in Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert and the Cavaliers, 
 ii. 92. 
 
368 THE PRINCE TO GO TO BARNSTAPLE, 
 
 plied at length, on the 24th of the same month, that 
 if the forces then before Taunton were withdrawn, 
 the whole county of Somerset would be in the 
 possession of the rebels within a few days, that the 
 garrisons in the West would be endangered, and 
 that Prince Charles could not be safely left in those 
 parts,^ The order was not obeyed ; and Goring 
 wrote to the King urging him to act only upon the 
 defensive until Taunton should be taken. The letter 
 was intercepted by Fairfax, and it was this, it is 
 stated, that induced the Parliamentary generals to 
 follow and attack the King before he could be joined 
 by the army from the West. Blake's obstinate 
 defence of Taunton thus deprived the King at a 
 critical time of Goring's help. 
 
 The Prince of Wales's withdrawal at this time 
 from Bristol has been alluded to. Dunster Castle, 
 being a strong fortress now garrisoned for the King, 
 had been pointed out by his Majesty's wishes as a 
 suitable refuge ; although at Court, as Lord Claren- 
 don intimates, it was presumably not known that the 
 plague which had driven the Prince from Bristol 
 "was as hot at Dunster town, just under the walls 
 of the castle." ^ In these circumstances, the his- 
 torian, with an effusiveness which indicates that, 
 inter alia, the attractions of Barnstaple still lingered 
 in his imagination, wrote — " No place was thought 
 so convenient for his residence as Barnstaple, a 
 pleasant town in the north part of Devonshire, well 
 
 ' Letter, Bodleian Library. Printed in Lister's Life of Clarendon, 
 iii- 10' ^ History of the Rebellion, p. 591 b. 
 
p. CHARLES ON HIS WA Y TO BARNSTAPLE. 369 
 
 fortified, with a good garrison in it, under the com- 
 mand of Sir Allen Apsley." ^ 
 
 It was *' about July this year," says Lady Fan- 
 shawe, in her delightful Memoirs, ** the plague in 
 creased so fast in Bristol, that the Prince and all his 
 retinue went to Barnstaple, which is one of the 
 finest towns in England." ^ Written long afterwards, 
 the month is incorrectly stated. It was on the ist 
 of June that the Prince left Bath, whither, as we have 
 seen, he had removed from Bristol. On the 2nd, he 
 was at Wells ; and on that day a meeting of five or 
 six thousand *' Clubmen," mostly armed, and all 
 angry, took place in a field near Castle Cary — men 
 who had risen in a neutral attitude and without any 
 predilection for this cause or that, to resist, as Lord 
 Clarendon admits, the " intolerable oppression, rapine 
 and violence exercised by the Lord Goring's Horse." 
 Deputies from the petitioners being received by the 
 Prince, laid their complaints before him with, of 
 course, assurance of their loyalty. To this a politic 
 reply was given, regretting the inevitable necessities 
 of war and generally recommending the petitioners 
 to pay up their contributions and enlist regularly in 
 the Prince's service. The pacification was only, as 
 might be expected, temporary. 
 
 On the following day, the 3rd of June, the Prince 
 was at Bridgwater — or was to have been. It is 
 probable that his stay there was a brief one, as the 
 Council had on the occasion of the Prince's pre- 
 
 ^ History of the Rebellion, p. 591 a, 
 
 2 Memoirs of Lady Fanshawe, wife of Sir Richard Fanshawe, Bart,, 
 &c, Written by Herself, 1830, p. 70. 
 
 ^5 
 
370 AT DUNSTER, 
 
 vious visit in April to contend with the '* folly and 
 petulancy" of Mrs. Wyndham, wife of Colonel 
 Edmond Wyndham, the Governor of the garrison. 
 It appears that she had been the Prince's wet-nurse; 
 the boy was naturally attached to her, and, it was 
 broadly suggested that Mrs. Wyndham, in the family 
 interests, indiscreetly endeavoured to make use of 
 her personal influence ; and, by speaking *' negli- 
 gently and scornfully of the Council," diverted the 
 young prince's mind from the serious business upon 
 which he was engaged.^ The journey was therefore 
 no doubt soon resumed, the Prince leaving Bridg- 
 water for Dunster Castle. 
 
 It is not precisely known how long the Prince 
 remained at the castle, but as the plague was then 
 rife in the little town which stood below the keep 
 it is not likely that his stay was for more than a day 
 or two. The only traces of the visit that remain 
 are the traditional " Prince's room," which is still 
 pointed out in the castle, and an entry in the ac- 
 counts of Minehead, the adjoining parish, of sundry 
 payments amounting to 14s. — *' Given the ringers in 
 beer at severall times when the prince and other 
 great men came to the town " — and a payment of 
 5s. 6d. "to the prince's footman which he claymed 
 as due to him to his fee." ^ Instances of this 
 system of compulsory vails have been already 
 noticed. Dunster Castle was at that time owned 
 by Colonel George Luttrell, in succession to his 
 father, Mr. Thomas Luttrell, who had defended it for 
 
 ^ Clarendon's History of the Rebellion^ p. 582 b. 
 ^ Savage's Bistory of Carhainpton^ p. 591. 
 
REACHES BARNSTAPLE,: 371 
 
 the Parliament at the commencement of the war and 
 had died in 1643. Since the surrender of the castle 
 to the Royalists, it had been occupied by a garrison 
 under the command of Colonel Francis Wyndham. 
 
 It must have been close upon the middle of June/ 
 when the Prince and his retinue continued their 
 journey to Barnstaple. It has been conjectured that 
 the cavalcade passed over Exmoor ; and this is not 
 improbable. The trackway through the red-deer 
 country, the wild moorland which has been so well 
 described in the pages of Blackmore, was then part 
 of the usual highway between Bristol and Barnstaple. 
 In the summer time it was probably even more prac- 
 ticable, as it certainly must have been more pleasant, 
 than the rough narrow lanes which skirted the moor. 
 
 The Prince was escorted by three troops of Horse 
 from Lord Hopton's garrison. The notabilities who 
 accompanied him were the Earl of Berkshire, his 
 governor — of whom Lord Clarendon makes the 
 sweeping remark that he was " of any who bore the 
 name of gentleman, the most unfit for that province, 
 or any other that required any proportion of wisdom 
 and understanding for the discharge of it ; " ^ 
 Brian Duppa, Bishop of Salisbury, the Prince's 
 tutor, a discreet and learned prelate — " a very hand- 
 some personage of a graceful deportment and of an 
 irreproachable life ; '' ^ Lord Hopton, whom we have 
 already had frequent opportunities of knowing ; 
 Lord Colepepper,3 nominally Master of the Rolls, a 
 
 ' History of the Rebellion^ p. 486 a. 
 
 2 Granger's Biographical History^ v. 5. 
 
 3 Also written Culpeper. 
 
372 THE PRINCE'S COUNCIL, 
 
 rough, hot-headed, uncourtly man, whose trenchant 
 and confident opinions were nevertheless held in 
 great favour by the King; Lord Capel, one of the 
 noblest and loveliest characters of the time, who 
 was subsequently executed after the surrender of 
 Colchester for his share in the insurrection against 
 the Parliament ; and Sir Edward Hyde, nominally 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer. These were the 
 members of the Prince's Council present with his 
 Highness. Here was also, in the character of mili- 
 tary adviser of the Council, the Earl of Brentford — 
 ** an experienced commander,'' says Sir Philip 
 Warwick, ** and a man of a naturall courage, and 
 purely a soldier." As Sir Patrick Ruthven he had 
 served with great distinction under Gustavus Adol- 
 phus and, as Lord Ruthven, he had commanded the 
 King's Horse at the battle of Edgehill. In a sub- 
 ordinate capacity was Mr. Richard Fanshawe, Sec- 
 retary to the Council, afterwards a baronet, a man 
 of some literary note and a poet ; in post-Restoration 
 days English ambassador to Spain. 
 
 The ladies who belonged to this distinguished 
 party appear, from Lady Fanshawe's account, to 
 have followed two days after the Prince — **for," 
 says she, "during all the time I was in the Court I 
 never journeyed but either before him or when he 
 was gone, nor ever saw him but at church, for it 
 was not in those days the fashion for honest women, 
 except they had business, to visit a man's Court." ^ 
 What is here alluded to was probably a piece of 
 etiquette derived from the French Court, and intro- 
 
 ' Memoirs of Lady Fanshawe^ p, 70. 
 
LAD V FANSHA WE'S MEMOIRS, 373 
 
 duced by Queen Henrietta Maria. The demureness 
 of the passage is amusing. When Mrs. Fanshawe 
 set out upon her travels she was barely twenty years 
 of age, and had been married to Mr. Fanshawe the 
 year before, when she was one of the crowd of 
 Royalist fugitives who then filled Oxford. Her 
 Memoirs were written long afterwards, after many 
 vicissitudes and when many things had been for- 
 gotten. It would be curious to ask if this was the 
 ** fine Mrs. Fanshawe,'' by her own account not long 
 since a '* hoyting girl," fond of the 'Virginals and 
 dancing," about whom a pestilent undergraduate of 
 Trinity College was taking notes — how that she and 
 her bosom friend, the beautiful Lady Isabella Thynne, 
 (to whom, playing on the lute, the poet Waller ad- 
 dressed a rhapsody) were wont to come to the 
 College chapel, mornings, ** halfe dressed like 
 Angells ; " and how old Dr. Kettle, the president, 
 somewhat coarsely, even for those days, rebuked 
 them for their levity.^ 
 
 Besides Mrs. Fanshawe, there were in the party 
 Lady Brentford, who had been taken prisoner in her 
 carriage by the Parliamentary troops after the 
 second battle of Newbury ; Lady Capel, wife of Lord 
 Capel, a lady of "great virtue and beauty," the 
 heiress of Cashiobury, and one of the most estimable 
 women of her time ; and her daughter, afterwards 
 Marchioness of Worcester. 
 
 The central personage was of course the Prince of 
 Wales, or Prince Charles as he was more commonly 
 
 ' Aubrey's Lives, 181 3, ii. 428. Mrs. Fanshawe is the " Lady Fen- 
 tham " of Mr. Shorthouse's Johji Inglesant ; see chap. ix. of that work. 
 
'' 374 PERSONAL DESCRIPTION OF P, CHARLES, 
 
 called, then a little more than fifteen years of age ; 
 a rather ill-favoured, dark-complexioned youth — 
 when an infant his own mother had on that account 
 been ashamed of him. Madame de Motteville has 
 given us his personal description, drawn from the 
 life a few months later, which, if appreciative, is 
 apparently not wanting in candour : " This prince 
 was very well shaped, his brown complexion agreed 
 well enough with his large bright black eyes, though 
 his mouth was exceedingly ugly, but his figure was 
 surpassingly fine. He was very tall for his age, and 
 carried himself with grace and dignity. His natural 
 tendency to wit and repartee was not noticed, for at 
 that time of his life he hesitated, and even stam- 
 mered, a defect observed in his father, Charles L, 
 and still more seriously in his uncle, Louis XHI." ^ 
 His tutor, the courtly Brian Duppa, called him the 
 "darling and little eye of this kingdom," and eulo- 
 gized his ** gentle and sweet disposition." Lord 
 Clarendon, generally profuse and notoriously admir- 
 able in his character-sketches, on the other hand, 
 refers to the Prince with the brevity and reserve 
 which the case and his sense of loyalty seem to have 
 imposed. 
 
 Lady Fanshawe does not say much of the life at 
 Barnstaple during her stay there. She was of the 
 quality and had the manner of the fine lady, and her 
 discretion, as we infer, kept her from knowing, or at 
 least telling us, anything of the affairs of the Prince's 
 Court. One of the pleasantest recollections of her 
 visit seems to have been associated with the mazzard 
 
 ■ Quoted in Miss Strickland's Queens of England, 1845, viii. 133. 
 
THE PRINCE AT BARNSTAPLE. 375 
 
 pie, then in season, which, **with their sort of cream," 
 was the best she had ever eaten. It is a combina- 
 tion which still commends itself to the gastronomic 
 critic. The town does not appear to have been at 
 that time in any straits; there were "all sorts of 
 good provision and accommodation." ^ 
 
 A tradition, which not improbably may be well 
 founded, points to a house near the southern end 
 of High Street, at the rear of that now occupied by 
 Mr. Kiell, and which is said to have formerly had a 
 garden in front of it abutting upon the street, as the 
 one in which the Prince lodged. The impecuniosity 
 of the Prince was such that, while at Bristol, he had 
 been dependent upon Lord Hopton's table for his 
 daily bread. During his stay at Barnstaple it has 
 become known that he became indebted to a respect- 
 able widow, Grace Beaple,^ at whose house he lodged 
 and who " dressed all his meat,'* not only for 
 domestic service, but also for the loan of money ; on 
 which account, it is alleged, she was afterwards 
 plundered by the Parliamentarians to the value of 
 two thousand pounds. After the Restoration, the 
 widow's claims were embodied in a petition to the 
 then King Charles IL, from Elizabeth Estmond, 
 her representative (Grace Beaple having in the 
 mean time died), and a warrant was issued for the 
 payment to her of 3^200, **in discharge of money 
 lent and service rendered to the King when at Barn- 
 staple, in the County of Devon." ^ 
 
 ' MeJiioirs of Lady Faftshawe, pp. 70, 71. 
 
 "" She had been the third wife of Richard Beaple, merchant, pre- 
 viously mentioned. 
 
 3 Calendar State Papers : Domestic— 1661-62^ P- 4i- 
 
376 THE PRINCE AT BARNSTAPLE, 
 
 Sir Edward Hyde appears to have been quartered 
 with Sir Allen Apsley, the Governor of the garrison. 
 The others of the Council were distributed among 
 the principal householders. The Fanshawes lodged 
 at Mr. Palmer's, a merchant — doubtless our old 
 friend who had surrendered the town in 1643. 
 
 From an unsavoury episode which Lord Clarendon 
 gives in his meagre account of the doings of the 
 Prince and his Court at Barnstaple, it may be 
 inferred that his Highness fell into questionable 
 company there. The Ethiopian does not change 
 his skin ; and the carefully veiled allusion is in keep- 
 ing with what the accomplished and high-minded 
 Marquess of Ormonde observed a few years later, and 
 referred to as the Prince's '* immoderate delight in 
 empty and effeminate and vulgar conversations." ^ 
 Gribble^ has given currency to another story, in 
 this case only traditional, and of the order ** scan- 
 dalous," which, considering the Prince's age, is on 
 the face of it rather improbable. It is an old sug- 
 gestion that the story was trumped up by some vain 
 creature who thought by this means to gild with 
 illusion the too obtrusive result of her frailty. It is 
 not unlikely, however, that it arose spontaneously 
 at a later period of relaxed morality, when the pro- 
 fligacy of Charles II. became a familiar topic. The 
 claim, if genuine, was too good not to have been 
 made the most of, and it was of the only sort which 
 the King responded to generously. 
 
 ' Lister's Life of Clarendon^ i. 433. 
 ^ Memorials^ p. 454. 
 
BATTLE OF NASEBY. 377 
 
 The battle of Naseby was fought on the 14th 
 of June. 
 
 As already stated, the King with his army took the 
 field on the 7th of May, unable to remain any longer 
 in Oxford exposed to the imminent danger of being be- 
 sieged there. He was joined by Prince Rupert and 
 Prince Maurice with their forces. So far as there 
 was any object connected with this expedition, it may 
 be described as pretty much a march into space. The 
 • ' immediate result, however, was the taking of several 
 petty fortified posts, the relief of Chester then besieged, 
 and the storming and capture of Leicester. In the 
 mean time the Parliament resolved that an attempt 
 should be made upon Oxford. Fairfax, who, it will 
 be remembered, had gone off to the relief of Taunton, 
 was hastily recalled for the purpose. The fall of 
 Leicester, however, which happened on the last day 
 of May, determined Fairfax and Cromwell, the as- 
 sociated commanders of the Parliamentary army, to 
 raise the siege and *' attend upon " the King's move- 
 ments. 
 
 The King's army, increased to about ten thou- 
 sand men, was at the same time in motion, march- 
 ing southward for the purpose of relieving Oxford. 
 It had advanced as far as Daventry, in Northamp- 
 tonshire, and a convoy of provisions had been suc- 
 cessfully thrown into the city, when, upon an alarm 
 from the outpost of the appearance of the enemy in 
 force, it fell back upon Market Harborough. On the 
 following morning the two armies met near the 
 village of Naseby, about five miles from that town. 
 The result of the famous battle, the details of which 
 
378 REJOICING A T BARNS TAPLE. 
 
 belong to general history, and in this relation require 
 no place, was the utter defeat of the Royalists. It 
 was the last battle in which the King was personally 
 engaged. Prince Rupert with some of the forces 
 threw himself into Bristol, and the King, with not 
 much more than a body-guard, found a temporary 
 refuge in Ragland Castle, where, in the midst of the 
 princely hospitalities of the Marquess of Worcester, 
 he strove to forget the distractions of the times and 
 the desperate condition of his cause. 
 
 " When the Prince came to Barnstable,'* says 
 Lord Clarendon, " he received the fatal news of the 
 battle of Naseby, by the noise and triumphs which 
 the rebels made in those parts for their victory, 
 without any particular information, or account from 
 Oxford, or any credible persons ; which left some 
 hope that it might not be true, at least not to that 
 degree that disaffected people reported it to be." ^ 
 Through that mysterious channel of communication 
 by which rumour travels, the event had become first 
 known to all except the members of the Prince's Court. 
 We are able by this to fix approximately the time 
 of the Prince's arrival as about the 15th of June ; 
 although there is nothing incompatible in Lord 
 Clarendon's statement with his having been there a 
 day or two earlier. We also learn that there was 
 still a considerable Parliamentary party in the town 
 bold enough to give vent to their sentiments. 
 
 There was now the more reason why the Council, 
 to whom the military affairs of the Royalists in the 
 
 ' History of the Rebellion, p. 593 b. 
 
PRINCE RUPERT A T BARNSTAPLE. 379 
 
 • 
 
 West had been entrusted, should bestir themselves 
 to retrieve, if possible, by the reconstruction of the 
 Western Army the disaster of Naseby. But the 
 jealousies and animosities — the '' intolerable pride 
 and incorrigible faction " — among the King's officers 
 in the West were still, as they continued to be until 
 the end, the insuperable difficulty. 
 
 Between the 25th of June, when we find him at 
 Hereford with the King,i and the ist of July, when 
 he dated a letter from Tiverton,^ Prince Rupert 
 contrived to visit his cousin the Prince of Wales at 
 Barnstaple, " to give him," Lord Clarendon says, 
 " an account of the ill posture he had left the King 
 in/* He is said to have crossed the Bristol Channel 
 and to have landed at Minehead. From Barnstaple 
 he proceeded to Lord Goring's quarters before 
 Taunton. 
 
 I find no authority for Gribble's statement {Me- 
 mortals, &c., p. 454) that Prince Maurice was also 
 at Barnstaple during Prince Charles's stay there. 
 Maurice was all the time at Worcester. 
 
 One of the tasks which the Prince's Council found 
 waiting for them at Barnstaple was that of dealing 
 with the factious and troublesome pretensions of the 
 irrepressible Sir Richard Grenville, who there waited 
 
 ■ ' Letter printed in Eliot WsLrhuiton^s Prince Ru^er^ and ^Ae Cavaliers^ 
 ill. 121. 
 
 . ^ Letter printed in ibid,^ iii. 124. By an error either of the original 
 or of the transcriber this is dated '* June 31st." The date which I have 
 substituted is the probably correct one. The address has been erased. 
 It seems to have been sent back to Barnstaple by the Prince's attache, 
 Arthur Trevor, addressed to one of the Prince of Wales's Council, . 
 pressing for some service to himself. The letter was lent to Warburton 
 by Lord John Fitzroy. 
 
38o SIR RICHARD G RENVILLE. 
 
 upon the Prince. From Sir Richard Grenvilles Narra- 
 tive of the proceedings of his Majesty's affairs in the West 
 of England since the defeat of the Earl of Essex at Lest- 
 withiel in Cornwall, A.D. 1645 [szc],^ which although 
 written in the third person was evidently penned by 
 Grenville himself or at his dictation, it appears that 
 he complained that a commission as chief commander 
 of the ** associated army," promised to him by the 
 Council when at Exeter, had not been sent to him. 
 This omission, his comment complacently runs, *' was 
 none of the weakest reasons why that associated army 
 was not raised." He also complained that Sir John 
 Berkeley, under his commission as "Colonel-General" 
 of Devonshire and Cornwall, had commanded the 
 Commissioners of these counties not to obey any of 
 Sir Richard Grenville*s orders. Here was an instance 
 of the conflict of authority, previously referred to, 
 which was already breaking up the strength of the 
 King's party in the West. Whatever these high- 
 mettled Cavaliers might have done if left to them- 
 selves to settle these punctilios as to precedence, 
 it is tolerably certain that the Council, although 
 acting in the Prince's name, could do but little 
 to smooth matters. One only of the military 
 competitors was pure and disinterested. While 
 others were standing each upon his own dignity. 
 Lord Hopton was declaring that, for his part, he 
 was ready to sacrifice his own honour in the service 
 of the Prince. 
 
 At about the same time in which Sir Richard 
 Grenville Was bringing his complaints to the Prince's 
 
 ' Printed in Carte's Letters^ i. 96. 
 
SIR RICHARD GRENVILLE. 381 
 
 Court at Barnstaple, but whether immediately before 
 or after is uncertain, he was using his position and 
 authority as Sheriff of Devon to raise the county 
 forces with the object of putting himself at their 
 head. The design is candidly avowed in the Narrativey 
 but it was frustrated, it seems, by the Commissioners. 
 The following is his own account although written 
 in the third person : — 
 
 Sir R. G. was desired by many of the gentry of Devorx 
 (as Sheriff) to command a general meeting of all the 
 inhabitants of Devon at Crediton, I'.e, 4 or 5 of the Chief 
 of every parish, to advise of speedy means to raise a 
 powerful army in the county for the defence and security of 
 the same against the enemy. , . . Some of the Commis- 
 sioners met at Crediton accordingly, and found there present 
 above 5,000 of the chief inhabitants of that county ; whose 
 propositions were, that if they might have Sir R. Grenville 
 for their Commander, and that none of their arms should 
 be taken again from them, nor they carried out of their 
 county without their own consents, that they would generally 
 provide themselves of arms and munition upon their own 
 charges towards the defence of the county against the 
 enemy ; and that such as would not join with them in the 
 same courses, should be taken and dealt with as enemies. 
 But the Commissioners denying them leave to choose their 
 own Commander, and by words giving the country great 
 distaste, made them depart very much discontented, and the 
 hopeful meeting to raise a great army became desperately 
 lost : which hastened the ruin of the West. 
 
 The proceeding, which seems to have been of the 
 nature stated in the Narrative, was considered a 
 highly reprehensible contempt of the Prince's 
 
382 SIR RICHARD GRENVILLE. 
 
 authority, and gave great umbrage to the Council. 
 It is scarcely necessary to remark that the descrip- 
 tion of the assemblage at Crediton was a mere 
 gasconade ; even four or five persons from every 
 parish in Devonshire would not have produced half 
 the number, and if the agricultural parishes only 
 were meant, as is more probable, the absurdity of 
 the estimate becomes more glaring; if there was no 
 intentional exaggeration, the subtraction of one or 
 even two final numerals from the ** 5,000" of the text 
 may be the more correct reading.^ 
 
 The violence and truculence of Sir Richard Gren- 
 ville's conduct had not however yet reached their 
 limit. After leaving the Prince, he, in no better 
 humour and without any commission, established 
 himself with his own Horse and Foot at Ottery St. 
 Mary and indulged in the most arbitrary excesses. 
 It was here that his quarrel with Sir John Berkeley 
 took its acutest form. He adopted a highly original 
 method of offence by ordering a ** warrant " to be 
 read in the churches of the district over which he 
 had assumed control — ** that all persons should bring 
 him an account of what moneys or goods had been 
 plundered from them by Sir John Berkeley or any 
 under him." ^ Such were the relations existing at that 
 time between the Royalist commanders in the West, 
 whilst the enemy was preparing for a vigorous march 
 upon them. The tradition which is said to exist 
 that children were hushed by their mothers with the 
 
 ^ There is an error twice made in the Narrative^ as printed; of the 
 year from which these transactions date. 
 
 - Clarendon's History of the Rebellion^ p. 598 b. 
 
BARNSTAPLE A POLITICAL FOCUS, . 383 
 
 threat of *' Grenville*s coming ! " is probably fabu- 
 lous ; but it is one of those accretions which show 
 how real was the wide-spread terror in common life 
 for which the excesses and cruelties of this un- 
 principled Cavalier were responsible. 
 
 Sir Richard Grenville's extraordinary proceedings 
 are detailed Avith considerable acrimony by Lord 
 Clarendon, who was his persistent, if virtuous, 
 enemy. Notwithstanding the affronts which the 
 Council received from Grenville, and which they 
 sharply retaliated upon him, eventually putting him 
 under arrest, he seems to have retained a place in 
 Prince Charles's esteem.^ This, however, is perhaps 
 not much in his favour. 
 
 The period of the Prince of Wales's stay at Barn- 
 staple was coincident with one of culminating 
 interest in the progress of the war. The history of 
 this short period is exceptionally enriched by a 
 copious epistolary correspondence in which many 
 allusions to Barnstaple occur, showing that much of 
 the plans and policy of the King's friends was 
 influenced from thence. Sir Edward Hyde, one of 
 the most active letter-writers of his time, besides 
 dealing with the higher matters of State, which 
 absorbed a great deal of his attention whilst at 
 Barnstaple, had to condescend continuously to 
 details of the supply of arms and ammunition. He 
 was in frequent correspondence with Sir Edward 
 Nicholas, the honest and devoted Secretary of State, 
 who was in constant communication with the King. 
 
 ^ Evelyn's Diary and Correspondence^ iv. 198. 
 
384 HYDE'S OPINION OF GORING. 
 
 A draft, or copy, partly in cipher, of one of Sir 
 Edward Hyde's letters, preserved in the Bodleian 
 Library, is of some interest to us for its allusions ; 
 and I shall make extracts from it, omitting passages 
 which have no direct concern with the present 
 relation. During the hottest periods of the Civil 
 War the chances of letters by the horse-posts 
 reaching their destination were precarious ; two out 
 of four of Nicholas's recent letters to Hyde had 
 miscarried, and several of Hyde's had not come 
 to Nicholas's hands. The letter from which the 
 following extracts are taken was sent by a special 
 messenger. Sir Edward Nicholas was then at Oxford. 
 After deploring the disaster of Naseby, the writer 
 expresses his confidence that the King may yet be 
 preserved by ** means which have been least looked 
 after," and inferentially by the Western forces, which, 
 it might be, were not so contemptible as they had 
 been reported. He then alludes to Goring's in- 
 fluence at the Court to the prejudice of the Prince's 
 Council : — 
 
 \Sir Edward Hyde to Sir Edward Nicholas^ 
 
 ... if you knew the arte and industry that hath been 
 used at Court to dishonour the Prince, oppress us, and to 
 frustrate all our endeavours, you would be sad at heart. 
 Trust me, if that had not been the Prince would by this 
 time have had the best army that hath been in England 
 since this rebellion. L^ Goring hath taken his pleasure of 
 us. I pray God hee doth not so too of the King. I had 
 noe mind to give him your cypher with me. You know the 
 
SIR E. HYDE ON THE SITUATION, 385 
 
 old way of opening letters, and I have noe minde he should 
 know my secrets. 
 
 In continuation, Sir Edward Hyde goes on to 
 matters of more local interest : — 
 
 The King hath sent for my L^ Culpepper and my selfe 
 to attend him at Hereford, but y® Prince is not wilHng to 
 spare us both, and soe I think it will come to his turne to 
 goe, and mine to stay here, though truely I had a very good 
 minde to y' journey. I believe my L"* Culpepper will goe 
 towards Hereford on Munday next, but sure he will not 
 stay long there. Wee could wish that the King would leave 
 P. Rupert to recruite that army, and himselfe come hither (at 
 least for some time) to prevent any mischieve by L'* Goring ; 
 and truely I thinke you will, maugre all these misfortunes, 
 have a good account of these parts. My L'^ Goring is still 
 before Taunton, and sure hath reduced those people to 
 great streights, and if they are not speedily releived, they 
 will bee his owne. His forces are above 5000 horse, and 
 sure hee can fight 5000 foote. S^ Rich. Grenvile is with 
 him, and Sir John Berkeley undertakes y^ worke before 
 Plymouth. The Prince hath setled the trayned bands 
 of Cornwall, and put good trusty gentlemen, and good 
 lieuteiit colonells and majors in y^ head of the severall regi- 
 ments. There will be a body of 6000 foote armed wthin 
 these ten dayes : the Prince intends himselfe to goe thither 
 ^ to take a view of them. If L"^ Goring had been as much 
 soldier as wee expected, that work had been done long 
 before this time ; but hee nothing but drinks and playes. 
 
 • ••••■ 
 
 I will keep your messenger here one day, and then I will 
 send another letter to you by him ; and if you doe not 
 heare often from mee, it shall not bee my fault, for indeed 
 I will write every day. 
 
 26 
 
386 BARNSTAPLE AS A REFUGE FOR THE KING. 
 
 This letter is dated, " Barnstaple, this 25 June," 
 and the following postscript, which is full of interest 
 to us, is added to it : — 
 
 The Prince is much delighted w*^ this place, and indeed 
 it is a very fine sweete towne as ever I saw.^ 
 
 It was not a mere passing thought that prompted 
 Sir Edward Hyde's wish that the King would rejoin 
 his son Prince Charles at Barnstaple. It occurs 
 again in the form of a regret, expressed in his 
 History of the Rebellion, that the King had not 
 repaired immediately after the battle of Naseby into 
 the West, where he had an army already formed, 
 and a people generally well devoted to his^ service, 
 and whither all his broken troops might have been 
 collected before the advance of the Parliamentary 
 army. We see, in the letter next quoted, that the 
 suggestion that the King should shelter himself at 
 Barnstaple with his son had been actually discussed 
 at his own quarters at Ragland Castle. It seems 
 at one time to have been so decided, for in a letter 
 written by his Majesty to Prince Rupert on the 5th 
 of July,2 he says: — ** I likewise desire your opinion 
 how soon I shall pass the water.*' This could 
 scarcely have meant anything else but passing from 
 Wales into Devonshire. But it was now too late, 
 and the opportunity had been lost. The Parlia- 
 mentary army was rapidly advancing towards 
 
 ^ Copy in the Bodleian Library. Printed in Lister's Li/e and 
 Administration of Edzvard First Earl of Clare7ido7i, &c., 1837, iii. 19. 
 
 - Printed in Eliot Warburton's P^'ince Rupert a7id the Cavaliers, iii. 
 131, where the letter is misdated "July I." 
 
BARNSTAPLE TO BE HELD, 387 
 
 Somersetshire. Barnstaple, however, the import- 
 ance of which in the estimation of the King's 
 military advisers at this juncture is sufficiently 
 apparent, was to be provisioned and maintained. 
 These resolutions are explained in the following 
 extracts from a letter written by Lord Digby, the 
 King's private Secretary, to Prince Rupert, from 
 Ragland Castle, July 13 : — 
 
 ... It is the unanimous, and as his Majesty conceives, 
 indisputable opinion, that, as the case stands in the West, 
 there is nothing else to be done but what General Goring 
 proposes : that is, to draw all the forces that persuasion and 
 the Prince of Wales's authority can prevail with, out of 
 Devonshire, Cornwall, and from before Plymouth, and to 
 join with Goring, wherewith he may be able to give them 
 [Fairfax's army] battle, or at least to defend the passes into 
 the heart of Devonshire, so as that the rebel army may be 
 wearied out and distressed for provisions, whilst we make the 
 greatest magazines we can in Exeter and Barnstaple ; the 
 latter of which places we shall take care to supply in the 
 best measure we can from this side of the water ; and to this 
 effect pressing letters are sending unto the Prince of Wales's 
 Council. . . . To the third point, which concerns the King's 
 own person, it is conceived that General Goring being now 
 so far retreated into Devonshire, and the enemy following, 
 it is not possible for any more forces from hence, or for any 
 of those on the other side not yet joined, to pass to him ; 
 and that for the King's person it cannot be conveyed thither 
 without infinite danger ; and that were that practicable, it 
 would be very imprudent to engage both his and his son's 
 person in the same corner upon such uncertainties before so 
 powerful an enemy, whereas probably, his person cannot 
 contribute much more to the strengthening of General 
 
388 PRINCE CHARLES LEAVES BARNSTAPLE, 
 
 Goring out of Devonshire and Cornwall than the Prince of 
 Wales's will do without him.^ 
 
 From the argumentative style of the latter part of 
 Lord Digby's letter it may be inferred, I think, that 
 Prince Rupert, after his visit to Barnstaple, had been 
 in favour of the original proposal that the King should 
 seek refuge there. But before this letter w^as written, 
 the Council of the Prince of Wales, alarmed by the 
 approach of the enemy then supposed to be aiming at 
 Exeter and threatening to cut off the Prince, had 
 already decided that North Devon was no longer a 
 safe place for his Highness. **The Prince," writes 
 Sir Edward Hyde, on the 8th of July, " intends on 
 Friday [the nth] to go for Cornwall,'' and on that 
 day he probably set out for Launceston ^ — it was 
 certainly before the 13th. . The defeat which Lord 
 Goring, in fact, sustained on the loth of July con- 
 firmed the desire of the Council to remove to safer 
 quarters. 
 
 It was at Barnstaple that the Prince of Wales 
 must have received the pathetic and deeply interest- 
 ing letter written to him by his father from Hereford 
 on the 23rd of June. Revealing the King's utter dejec- 
 tedness after the fatal battle of Naseby and a certain 
 heroic obstinacy of despair, this historical letter 
 shows the unhappy Charles clinging to the lofty ideas 
 of the kingly prerogative which in all his difficulties 
 
 ^ Printed in Eliot Warburton's Pri7ice Riipei't aiidthe Cavaliers^ iii. 141. 
 
 * On the loth he was at Appledore. In the parish register of 
 Northam the following contemporary note has been made : — "Prince 
 Charles was at Appledore in Northam the tenth day of July, anno 
 Domini 1645." (For this I am indebted to the Rev. M. D. Dimond- 
 Churchward.) It is possible, although not probable, that the Prince 
 took shipping there for Cornwall. 
 
THE KINGS LETTER TO PRINCE CHARLES. 389 
 
 he persistently thought it his sacred duty to hand on 
 unimpaired to his descendants. The letter, which 
 was of a kind to sadden the last days of the young 
 Prince's stay in Barnstaple, is worth reproducing : — 
 
 Charles, 
 
 My late misfortunes remember me to command you 
 that which I hope you shall never have occasion to obey ; it 
 is this : if I should at any time be taken prisoner by the 
 rebels, I command you (upon my blessing) never to yield 
 to any conditions that are dishonourable, unsafe for your 
 person, or derogatory to regal authority, upon any considera- 
 tions whatsoever, though it were for the saving of my life ; 
 which in such a case, I am most confident, is in greatest 
 security by your constant resolution, and not a whit the 
 more in danger for their threatening, unless thereby you 
 should yield to their desires. But let their resolutions be 
 never so barbarous, the saving of my life by complying with 
 them would make me end my days in torture and disquiet of 
 mind, not giving you my blessing, and cursing all the rest 
 who are consenting to it. But your constancy will make me 
 die cheerfully, praising God for giving me so gallant a son, 
 and heaping my blessing on you ; which you may be confi- 
 dent (in such a case) will light on you. I charge you to 
 keep this letter still safe by you, until you shall have cause to 
 use it ; and then, and not till then, to shew it to all your 
 Council ; it being my command to them, as well as to you ; 
 whom I pray God to make as prosperously glorious as any of 
 the predecessors ever were of . . 
 
 Your loving father, 
 
 Charles R.^ 
 
 ■ We have seen army after army of one or the oth^r 
 of the contending factions entering Devonshire, eat-- 
 
 ' Printed in Clarendon's History of the Rebellion^ p. 633. 
 
390 SPRIGGBS ENGLAND'S RECOVERY. 
 
 ing up its resources, and harassing the people by 
 exactions and military pressure in every form. Once 
 more the shadow is approaching— this time of the 
 best-disciplined and most formidable and resolute 
 army that had yet taken the field. It will be desir- 
 able before we come to the story of its contact with 
 Barnstaple to describe briefly its onward march. 
 North Devon, it will be remembered, was at that 
 time practically under the foot of Lord Goring, whose 
 forces scattered on the border between Devon and 
 Somerset, were nominally besieging Taunton, which 
 was held by Colonel Robert Blake for the Parlia- 
 ment. Of Sir Richard Grenville's movements in the 
 independent capacity which he affected, enough has 
 been said. He was not where he would have been of 
 use to the Royalist cause, and generally was making 
 trouble elsewhere where he was not wanted. 
 
 For this part of our story there is fortunately no 
 occasion to disturb the dust of old documents — at 
 least, so far as the details of the Parliamentary 
 army's operations are concerned. They have been 
 preserved for us in the contemporary record of Joshua 
 Sprigge, M.A. — the work known as Ayiglia Rediviva ; 
 England's Recovery : Being the History of the 
 Motions, Actions, and Successes of the Army under 
 the immediate conduct of his Excellency Sir Thomas 
 Fairfax, Kt., Captain-General of all the Parliament's 
 Forces in England. This was first printed in the 
 year 1647, immediately after the events described. 
 Sprigge was a chaplain in Fairfax's army, and accom- 
 panied it throughout the campaign; for a Puritan, 
 his manner is not immoderately enthusiastic, and his 
 
FAIRFAX AFTER NASEBY, 391 
 
 historical work is generally held to be authentic. 
 The contemporaneous movements of the Royalist 
 army which confronted that of Fairfax when he 
 reached Devonshire are to be learnt from other 
 sources ; but Lord Clarendon, who had no love for 
 the two prominent Royalist generals who were 
 responsible chiefly for the final disasters which 
 attended the King's forces in the West, has left a 
 curtailed and probably somewhat biassed account of 
 their proceedings. 
 
 After the rout of Naseby, the army of the Parlia- 
 ment pursued its advantage and recovered the town 
 of Leicester, which was only a few miles from the 
 field of battle. The prisoners, the colours, and the 
 spoil, including the cabinet of the King's letters, 
 which proved so damaging to his cause, were sent 
 under guard to London. The threatened conjunction 
 between Goring's army and the King's had been 
 averted. Fairfax, who had been apprised by inter- 
 cepted letters of the disposition and strength of 
 Goring's army lying about Taunton, then resolved to 
 turn southward to attack it, after joining General 
 Massey,^ who, with a brigade of 3,000 Horse, had 
 been left on the borders of Dorsetshire to watch 
 the movements of Goring's largely superior 
 forces. 
 
 By steady marches Fairfax's army reached Salis- 
 bury Plain on the ist of July, and was drawn up 
 in battalia at the rendezvous, which Sprigge, ap- 
 parently unimpressed by the grandest prehistoric 
 
 * He who had defended the city of Gloucester successfully against 
 King Charles in person until relieved by the Earl of Essex's army. 
 
392 THE CLUBMEN, 
 
 monument on English soil, mentions incidentally as 
 '* a place called Stonage/' 
 
 Fairfax's movements were here somewhat em- 
 barrassed by the appearance in the field of a threat- 
 ening body of ** Clubmen." Something has already 
 been said of them, and of their assertion of them- 
 selves when Prince Charles first entered Somerset- 
 shire. The instigators of the movement were the 
 small squires and yeomen, whose ideas did not 
 extend very far beyond their own acres. They were 
 of the same type as the angry farmer who warns 
 off the surveyors in that famous sketch by Leech m 
 the time of the railway mania of 1845. Finding 
 themselves harassed, their stock seized, and their 
 crops damaged, alike by both the contending parties, 
 their neutral frame of mind was like Mercutio's, 
 when he uttered his famous impartial malediction. 
 They had the larger influence with their dependents 
 which prevailed in those da3^s, and therefore were 
 able to collect a considerable, but of course un- 
 disciplined and rudely armed, body of rustics. These 
 wore white *' inkle-strings " (tape) in their hats to 
 distinguish themselves, and some gifted bucolic 
 rhymster, in a moment of inspiration, had composed 
 for their banners this couplet — 
 
 " If you offer to plunder or take our cattle. 
 Be assured we will bid you battle." 
 
 These disturbances seem to have been confined 
 at first to the counties of Wilts, Dorset, and Somer- 
 set. It was thought that there was danger of their 
 spreading over the country and adding to the 
 
. FAIRFAX AND GORING. 393 
 
 difficulties of the Parliament. Fairfax endeavoured 
 to reason with the leaders temperately ; but as this 
 was ineffective, his lieutenant-general, Cromwell, at 
 length met the Clubmen on Hambledon Hill, near 
 Blandford Forum, in Dorsetshire, where some four 
 thousand of them had taken up a position. He was 
 not the man to stand any nonsense of this sort, and 
 on the first overt act of hostility attacked and dis- 
 persed them in his thorough-going fashion. They 
 did not again appear in any organized body, but, 
 as we shall see, cropped up afterwards, sporadically, 
 in North Devon. ^ 
 
 The approach of the Parliamentary army com- 
 pelled Goring to concentrate his forces; and Taunton 
 was ipso facto relieved, after a siege, lasting many 
 weeks, during which the town had been gallantly 
 defended by Blake. Goring's army was little in- 
 ferior in strength to that of Fairfax. Cromwell 
 believed that Goring ^' stood upon the advantage of 
 strong passes, staying until the rest of his recruits 
 came up to his Army, with a resolution not to en- 
 gage until Grenvile and Prince Charles his men were 
 come up to him."^ This however, was an over- 
 estimate of his antagonist's prudence. The Royalists 
 may be said to have been engaged in the dangerous 
 operation of (to use an Americanism) swopping 
 
 ' No writer of that period has taken the trouble to explain why the 
 "Clubmen " were so designated. It would appear, however, from an 
 expression used by Sprigge, to the effect that their own clubs ought to be 
 used to beat reason into them, that they were not so called, as has 
 been sometimes supposed, from their having had some sort of orga- 
 nization as a club, but because they were mostly armed with clubs. 
 
 2 Carlyle's Cromwell, ed. 1857, iii. 397 (appendix). 
 
394 GORING AND GRENVILLE, 
 
 horses while crossing a stream. Goring had only a 
 few days before written a complaining letter to the 
 King, asking to be relieved of his command.^ He 
 was now writing to Lord Colepepper at Barnstaple 
 that he had resolved to draw out all his forces to 
 Chard, not having sufficient to oppose Massey, who 
 was at Dorchester, and leave Taunton secure — that 
 he objected to the commission of Marshal of the field 
 given to Grenville by the Prince at Barnstaple, as 
 Lord Wentworth had had promise of command 
 under him — and that he wished Grenville might not 
 come to the army until the difficulty of command 
 was clear.2 Such were the punctilios which occupied 
 the attention of the Royalists in the presence of the 
 enemy. Grenville, on the other hand, who ought to 
 have supported Goring, but remained in fact at Ottery 
 St. Mary, carrying out the high-handed proceedings 
 on his own account which have been alluded to, 
 was writing ** a very insolent letter " to the Prince 
 of Wales*s Council, sending back the commission 
 which the Prince had given him. A force had been 
 hastily dispatched from Barnstaple to his assistance, 
 but after a day's march had been recalled, as it 
 seems to have occurred to the Prince's Council, that 
 in the imminent prospect of Fairfax's advance, it 
 would be necessary rather to strengthen Barnstaple, 
 where the Prince then was.^ 
 
 ^ This letter, or rather a fragment of it, has been printed by Eliot 
 Warburton (Prince Rupert and the Cavaliers^ iii. 215-6), but is mis- 
 placed and misdated in that work. The correct date undoubtedly is 
 June 25, 1645. 
 
 "" Letter of 29th of June, 1645, printed in Lister's Life of Clarendofty 
 iii. 22. ^ Clarendon's History of the Rebellion.^ pp. 596-7. 
 
BA TTLE OF LANGPOR T, 395 
 
 After various manoeuvres of the two opposing 
 armies in the south-eastern part of Somersetshire, 
 Goring was brought to action on the loth of July, 
 near Langport, and completely defeated with heavy 
 loss. Fourteen hundred prisoners and twelve 
 hundred horses fell into the possession of the vic- 
 torious Parliamentarians, Cromwell took a con- 
 spicuous part in this important engagement, and in 
 the pursuit which followed. His own animated 
 description of the battle has been repeatedly 
 printed.^ 
 
 The departure of Prince Charles and his Council 
 from Barnstaple took place a day or two after this 
 disaster to the royal arms. It had been previously 
 decided upon, as we know, and had been doubtless 
 precipitated by the near approach of the Parlia- 
 mentary army which threatened the Prince's security 
 in North Devon. 
 
 The proceedings of Sir Thomas Fairfax's army 
 during the next three months and until it entered 
 Devonshire were of the greatest moment in con- 
 nection with the progress of the Civil War; and it 
 may be said that the eyes of the whole kingdom were 
 concentrated upon them. But they can be only 
 shortly described here. Meanwhile, I shall follow, 
 for the present, the shattered forces of the Royalist 
 army. 
 
 On the day after the battle of Langport Lord 
 Goring reached Dunster Castle, and in the security 
 
 ' Carlyle's Cromwell, iii., Appendix, 397 ; Sanford's Studies and 
 llhtstrations of the Great Rebellion^ p. 625. 
 
396 GORING DEFEA TED, 
 
 of that fortress wrote at night to Lord Digby, for 
 the King's information, an account of his reverse. 
 In his estimate, the extent of his losses was of course 
 minimized, and it varied very considerably from that 
 given by Cromwell on the other side. He admitted, 
 however, the serious effect of the disaster, " for," he 
 writes, ** there is so great a terror and dejection 
 amongst our men, that I am confident, at this point, 
 they could not be brought to fight against half jtheir 
 number.'* He supposed that he had thep w;ith him 
 between three and four thousand Foot and some 
 two thousand five hundred Horse ; most of the 
 Western Horse, by which Sir Richard Grenville's 
 contingent was probably meant, had gone home of 
 their own accord. His belief was that Fairfax would 
 follow him with the whole Parliamentary army, but 
 that if all the Royalist forces from before Plymouth 
 and those scattered in Cornwall and Devon could 
 be drawn together, Fairfax might be successfully re- 
 sisted, otherwise that these men ought to be put into 
 garrisons. But he hopes **these counties are so loyal 
 and honest that they will unite all their force and 
 power to oppose these villains." Finally, he hints 
 that he has '* a way propounded of getting an army 
 very quickly, which appears very probable." What 
 this was is not revealed. The letter is dated from 
 ** Dunster, July 12, 1645, i at morning, Saturday." ^ 
 Lord Goring with, according to his own estimate, 
 six thousand Horse and Foot — the remains of the 
 army which so lately had been looked upon as the 
 
 ' Printed in Eliot Warburton's Prince Rupert and the Cavaliers^ 
 ill. 137- 
 
GORING' S RE TREA T. 397 
 
 main stay of King Charles's cause — continued his 
 retreat from Dunster and he himself reached Barn- 
 staple, which Prince Charles and his retinue had just 
 left, on the 13th of July, The Clubmen as soon as 
 they had seen which was the stronger side, arranged 
 themselves accordingly, and these country-people 
 hung upon the retreating Royalists, " knocking all 
 stragglers or wearied soldiers on the head." Goring, 
 in a sullen humour, seems to have spent some days 
 at Barnstaple, giving himself " his usual licence of 
 drinking," and vituperating the King as well as the 
 Prince's Council and all their works J 
 
 Lord Goring's beaten, disorganized, and mutinous 
 army, whose bad reputation had preceded it, was 
 quartered in the district around Barnstaple ; the 
 Horse, says Lord Clarendon, " committing such in- 
 tolerable insolences and disorders as alienated the 
 hearts of those who were best affected to the King's 
 service." 2 This admission of the too candid friend 
 is amply confirmed. Richard Baxter, the eminent 
 divine, who was with Fairfax's army, says in his 
 autobiography that when they followed Lord Goring 
 westward they found that his soldiers, many of whom 
 were foreigners, of all the armies of the King were 
 most hated by the people for their incredible profane- 
 ness and their unmerciful plundering. The foreign 
 
 * Clarendon's History of the Rebellion^ p. 596 a. Sir Richard 
 Bulstrode, who was present during this retreat, says that the shattered 
 troops of Goring's army left Dunster on the right (going therefore by 
 way of Dulverton and South Molton), and made little or no stop until 
 they came to Torrington, where they quartered, and after some days 
 inarched towards Barnstaple {Me??ioirSi 1721, p. 140). 
 
 2 Ibid.y p. 596 b. 
 
398 GORING IN NORTH DEVON 
 
 element in Goring's force was a French brigade, 
 consisting of three regiments of Horse, under the 
 command of a Colonel Laplander 
 
 So far as is now apparent, Lord Goring had 
 selected the fortified position of Barnstaple as a 
 rendezvous for what remained of his army, and as a 
 basis for his future operations, offensive or defensive, 
 as occasion might require. He was not sure how 
 soon the Parliamentary generals would be upon him. 
 In the intervals of his carouses it was therefore de- 
 sirable for him to take advantage of the respite, as 
 he himself called it, to recruit his broken forces. 
 A contemporary diurnal briefly mentions that he 
 had secured two hundred barrels of gunpowder in the 
 Castle of Barnstaple, made a few additional works 
 there, and imposed a new oath on the inhabitants 
 which had driven divers of them away.^ 
 
 Another diurnal, of July 23-29, reports that " when 
 Goring was at Ilfordcombe [which must have been 
 at about this time] he prest three barques to go 
 to Wales for men from the King, to come over to 
 strengthen him."^ This, probably, is a key to the 
 meaning of the profound scheme which Goring 
 alluded to in his letter to Digby. The King was 
 at this time at Ragland Castle, vainly flattering 
 himself that a fresh body of troops in Wales would 
 rise up at his bidding. Goring may have thought 
 that if this reinforcement were landed in North 
 
 ' The Modei-ate Intelligencer^ No. 24, August 7-15, 1645, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxx. 
 
 "= Perfect Passages ^ &c., King's Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. 
 xvii. 
 
CORING IN NOR TH DE VON 399 
 
 Devon he might be able to make a successful stand 
 there against the forces of Fairfax. But the course 
 of events soon dispelled any such hopes, if they were 
 ever entertained. He was already discovering that 
 his own forces, especially of Foot, from want of pay 
 and their utter disorganization, were rapidly melting 
 away. 
 
 The letter of Goring's which I shall here introduce 
 was written from Bideford a few days later. The 
 " differences" between the commanders of the Western 
 army again crop up in this letter, and an indication 
 appears of the rapprochement between Goring and 
 Grenville which Lord Clarendon mentions. But it 
 was soon terminated by a curt letter, in which 
 Grenville told Goring that " he would have no more 
 to do with him.'' 
 
 [Lord Goring to Lord Colepepper?[ 
 
 My Lord, 
 
 I have desired Mr Paramour to let y** L^ know in what 
 necessity these forces are for want of money, especially the 
 officers both of horse and foot I have a great desire to 
 reforme both, but it cannot be done without some pay to 
 them. Most of S" Richard Grenviles men are gone away : 
 some say he has sent for them \ and the differences encrease 
 dayly betweene him and S*" John Berkly. If the Prince doe 
 not interpose his authority speedily all will goe to wrack ; 
 and if there be not a course taken that all the souldiers may 
 have pay as well as some wee shall never keep the rest in 
 obedience. I doe believe if wee tooke the best course to 
 reconcile these differences, and to overcome these difficultyes, 
 wee might keepe Devonshyre and Cornwall, though all the 
 rest of the kingdom were united agaynst us, for which end 
 
400 GORING IN NORTH DEVON 
 
 I should be very glad to have a speedy meeting with some 
 
 of y"" L^^ now the rebbels give us this respite. They are 
 
 before Bridgwater. 
 
 I am 
 
 yr Lqpps ipost humble serv*, 
 
 Bidiford, i8 July. George Goring.^ 
 
 From the date of the foregoing letter until the 
 middle of August Goring's Foot, reduced to about 
 1,300, occupied Torrington. His Horse, still num- 
 bering, it was estimated, about 3,000, in a loose and 
 disorderly state, w^ere quartered all over the country 
 between that town and South Molton. The parish 
 register of Torrington contains several entries of the 
 burial of soldiers during this period. One of these, 
 in August, is as follows : — 
 
 Henry Boose a soldyer who was hangd att the Pillory 
 for mutuny a lancashire man was buried y^ xi^* day. 
 
 Goring appears to have been the guest of Mr. Henry 
 Rolle at Stevenstone, from which place several of 
 his letters at this time are dated. The next letter 
 which I shall insert is one from Lord Colepepper, 
 giving an account of the prospects which the Prince's 
 Council had of reinforcing the army from Cornwall. 
 Goring, it seems, had been recently at Launceston. 
 Barnstaple, as the magazine from which supplies of 
 ammunition were to be drawn, is alluded to : — 
 
 \Lord Colepepper to Lord Goring?^ 
 MyL^ 
 
 The last night late I receaved yo^ L^^ of the same day, 
 
 ^ Original in the Bodleian Library. Printed in Lister's Life of 
 Clarendon^ iii. 23. 
 
I f 
 
 GORING ON HIS PROSPECTS. 401 
 
 w^^ much treble that y° foote are lessened to so small a number 
 as 1300, and that y^ officers license their men. All possible 
 diligence is and shall be used here to gett up as many of 
 the runawayes as may be. Tochinge the want of men in 
 the Devonshire garisons, the Prince desireth y' L^ to doe 
 therein uppon informacon of their condition, and of the 
 mocon of the enemy, as y"" L^ shall thinke best. Wee cannot 
 make any certaine judgm^ of what may be relyed uppon 
 from this county until after the generall rendezvous, w^^ is 
 to be on Thursday next, when y' L^ shall have a particular 
 account of the fullness of the apparence, only the gentlemen 
 seem very forward in the service, and hopefuU to bringe up 
 full numbers. Concerninge the leade, y"^ L^ will please to 
 remember the conclusion made thereupon when y' L^ parted 
 hence, w*"*" was that y"" L^ would endeav' to send horses for 
 fowre tunns of it from Barnstable, and to have it made 
 from mouldes from Exeter. Our magazins of victualls fill 
 remarkably well. This is all I have to trouble y' L^ w*^ for 
 the present ; being, my L^, 
 
 V L^^ most humble serv' 
 
 Lanceston, 28 July, 1645. J. C. 
 
 The Prince intendeth to send speedily to the King, by 
 w""*" opportunity any dispatches from y' L^ to Court may be 
 conveyed, if y"" L^ thinks fitt' 
 
 On the same day Goring is wanting to Lord 
 Colepepper, and giving no very sanguine report of 
 the condition of his forces : he thinks it not likely 
 that Sir Richard Grenville will contribute much to 
 the levies they expect out of Cornwall and Devon- 
 shire ; the old Cornish slip away daily ; he sees no 
 probability of getting a considerable body together 
 
 ' Original in the Bodleian Library. Printed in Lister's Clarendon, 
 iii. 25. 
 
 27 
 
402 GORING OVERRUNS NORTH DEVON. 
 
 that will fight, in the poverty and distractions they 
 are now in ; thinks he has two thousand Horse and 
 Foot that will hold out as long as they have victuals 
 and ammunition, and wishes to be advised where to 
 dispose these men. *' Providing for the worst will 
 not disapoynt the best " (a proverbial maxim which 
 may be worth preservation).^ 
 
 Meanwhile, during these harvest months, almost 
 the whole of North Devon was overrun by Goring's 
 rascally troopers, and the people were harassed by his 
 arbitrary measures for raising reinforcements of Foot. 
 In all the small towns, on the market-days, drums 
 were beaten up and proclamations were read summon- 
 ing recruits, but apparently with but little success. 
 The Clubmenwere simultaneouslyholdingthreatening 
 meetings in the characteristic temper of an angry 
 neutrality. The following is a specimen of one of 
 Goring's warrants issued at Okehampton : — 
 
 Whereas an Army of Rebells are come into the West, to 
 rob and plunder his Majesties good subjects, these are to 
 require you in the King's name, that you raise all such as 
 are able to beare Armes for the defence of your owne 
 Country-mens estates and lives, and to oppose all Theeves, 
 Plunderers, and Rebells, and let them be in readiness to 
 appeare at a generall Rendezvous to be appoynted by me, 
 where they shall be mustered, and receive Armes from 
 Exeter ; that so you may be the more able to defend your 
 selves and Countrey.^ 
 
 ^ Goring to Colepepper, 2Sth of July. Original in the Bodleian 
 Library. Printed in Lister's Life of Clarendoii^ iii. 24. 
 
 - Perfect Occurreyices, &c., July 25-Aug. I, 1645, King's Pam- 
 phlets, B. i\L, large 4tos, vol. xvii. 
 
HIS EXCESSES. 403 
 
 The diurnal in which this is printed assumed it to 
 be a summons to the Clubmen to take up arms on 
 the Royalist side. It is possible that Goring may 
 have attempted, as he had done in Somersetshire, to 
 coquet with these malcontents; but their leaning 
 was now very decidedly to the other side, and the 
 document is more probably one of Goring's peremp- 
 tory warrants to the constables of the surrounding 
 parishes to impress men by the method then usual. 
 
 The Prince with his Council remained at Laun- 
 ceston. Arthur Trevor, who was there in August, 
 wrote to the Marquess of Ormonde : *' Goring's army 
 is broken and all his men in disorder. He hates the 
 Council here and I find plainly there is no love lost.* 
 In short, the war is at an end in the West ; each one 
 looks for a ship, and nothing more." ^ Besides the 
 divisions amongst the chief officers, which Secretary 
 Nicholas gave amongst the reasons why the King's 
 affairs in the West were at this time in such a hope- 
 less condition, the country " was so disaffected," he 
 declared, " by reason of the soldiers rapine and op- 
 pression as y® country rises against them whensoever 
 they come into any place not in a body, and the 
 countrey is soe wasted as it cannot feede them when 
 they lye together in a body."^ At the same time, 
 the Royalist Commissioners at Exeter were pressing 
 all from whom money could be wrung for the weekly 
 martial rates, and, to mitigate these excesses, 
 agreeing to double the assessments if Goring would 
 restrain his men. We have Lord Clarendon's 
 
 ' Carte's Life of Ormonde, 1736, App., iii. 422. 
 
 2 Nicholas Correspondence, Evelyn's Diary, Sec, iv. 180, 
 
404 GORING' S PROCLAMATION, 
 
 authority for stating tliat he appropriated the money 
 to his own purposes, but did nothing to abate the 
 disorders.^ 
 
 With the ostensible object of putting down the 
 increasing obstructiveness or aggression of the Club- 
 men, Goring, in September, issued a proclamation 
 which throws some additional light upon the cha- 
 racter of this curious association. The proclaimer's 
 style runs : " George Lord Goring, Generall of all His 
 Majesties Forces of Horse, that are, or shall be 
 raised in the Kingdom of England and Dominion of 
 Wales, and Lieutenant-Generall to His Highesse 
 Prince Rupert of this Western Army." The fol- 
 lowing is an abstract of the document : — Whereas 
 divers Inhabitants of this County and Somerset, 
 under pretence of securing themselves from the 
 plundering of the soldiers, have assembled in a 
 tumultuous manner, &c. ; that if any such violence 
 has been used it hath not been tolerated by the 
 principal officers, &c. (a time-honoured palliative) ; 
 requires all persons that lately under the name of 
 Clubmen have taken up arms or assisted the enemy 
 or opposed His Majesty's Forces in the levying of 
 the usual rates, contributions or provisions for His 
 Majesty's Army or Garrisons, to submit and bring 
 in their arms either into this Army or into any of 
 His Majesty's Forts or Garrisons nearest to them 
 within two days ; will proceed against such persons 
 as enemies to the Good and Peace of these Counties 
 who shall adhere to the enemy, or assist them with 
 any kind of Provisions or Supplies, or refuse to obey 
 
 * History of the Rebellion^ p. 607 h. 
 
RO YA LISTS CONCENTRA TE AT TIVER TON, 405 
 
 ■ 
 
 all such warrants as shall be sent them from the 
 Commanders of His Majesty's Armies or Garrisons, 
 or forsake any of their Houses upon the approach of 
 His Majesty's Forces, &c. This proclamation is 
 dated ** at Exon, the 20 day of September, 1645." ^ 
 
 Meanwhile, Lord Colepepper, who was again at 
 Barnstaple, writing from thence to Lord Digby, the 
 King's Secretary, on the i8th September, submitted 
 that if Goring waited until Fairfax came up all his 
 Horse would be lost, and urged that the only thing 
 left for him was to break at once through the 
 Parliamentary Army.^ 
 
 At this time, all the forces that could be got 
 together were concentrated about Tiverton. Sir 
 Richard Grenville had used to the utmost his 
 authority as Sheriff of Devon to raise reinforcements 
 uf Foot, but without much effect. He himself, in one 
 of his erratic moods, was absent in Cornwall, and 
 chafing between Goring and the Prince's Council. 
 Of his four Cornish regiments which had been under 
 his command in Devonshire, his own, Tremaine's, 
 and the two Arundells', there were not above two 
 hundred left, the rest having run from their colours ; 
 and of other Cornishmen not above one hundred and 
 fifty came to the muster at Crediton. They were, 
 in fact, again standing upon their right of refusal to 
 be drawn away from their own county.^ 
 
 ' One of the original broadsides, beautifully printed, is in the Library 
 of the British Museum. King's Pamphlets, Broadsides, vol. iv. 
 
 2 Calendar of Clarendon State Papers^ No. 1962. 
 
 3 Letter from Lord Colepepper to the Prince's Council. Exeter, 
 28th Sept., 1645. Original in the Bodleian Library. Printed in 
 Lister's Clarendo7i^ iii. 26-29. 
 
4o6 FAIRFAX'S PROCEEDINGS. 
 
 If this were a general narrative of the Civil War^ 
 a due sense of proportion would require that a con- 
 siderable space should here be given to an account 
 of the proceedings of the Parliamentary army, under 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax, during the three months which 
 elapsed from the time of the battle of Langport until 
 the army entered Devonshire. This remarkable 
 series of " leaguers, storms, onslaughts and outfalls," 
 which Sprigge has described in detail, led up to the 
 subsequent operations in North Devon, and, so far, 
 has an interest in connection with this relation; but 
 it can only be briefly outlined. 
 
 Lord Goring's army having been for the time dis- 
 posed of, Fairfax invested Bridgwater which was 
 thought by the Royalists to be impregnable. After 
 much deliberation, winding up with two stimulating 
 sermons on the Lord's Day previously by Mr. Peters 
 and Mr. Bowles, it was stormed early in the morning 
 of Monday the 21st July, when the outer town was 
 taken and burnt during the fray. On the 23rd, Sir 
 Edmond Wyndham, the governor, surrendered with 
 his garrison of about one thousand men. Many of 
 Essex's old troops were in Fairfax's army, and these 
 on their first contact with the Western men seem to 
 have been mindful of their reverse of the previous 
 year; for Sprigge, in an otherwise enigmatical passage, 
 takes credit for their forbearance to the prisoners, 
 " in regard our souldiers had suffered so much and 
 Cornwal was so near."^ Sherborne Castle, a strong 
 moated fortress, the accumulated work of centuries, 
 had long been an offence to the Parliament. It 
 
 ' Aiiglia Rediviva, ed. 1647, p. 74; ed. 1854, p. 77. 
 
BRISTOL STORMED AND TAKEN, 407 
 
 belonged to the Earl of Bristol, but was now stoutly 
 held by Sir Lewis Dives and a resolute garrison. 
 After a fortnight's siege and sap, a breach having 
 been effected, the castle was stormed and taken on 
 the 15th of August, It was suspected that probably 
 either Prince Rupert, who had three thousand dis- 
 posable Horse and Foot in Bristol, would now attempt 
 to succour Goring in Devonshire, or that Goring 
 would break through with his Horse and join Rupert ; 
 and therefore it was much debated whether the 
 main body of the army should next advance farther 
 West or attempt the reduction of Bristol. The 
 latter was the enterprise decided upon ; but Massey's 
 brigade of Horse was left in the neighbourhood of 
 Taunton to watch Goring and fall upon his flank if 
 he should make a forward movement. Bristol was 
 consequently invested on the 22nd of August. It 
 was weakly defended. The occasion was not one for 
 the display of Rupert's proverbial talent for attack, 
 and he had lost the moral support of enthusiasm for 
 his cause ; he believed that after the battle of Naseby 
 the chances of his uncle's success in this war had 
 evaporated. After various parleyings, without result, 
 the city was assaulted on all sides on the loth of 
 September, when Rupert surrendered this important 
 stronghold. The army of the Parliament having 
 achieved this great success had still, before turning 
 to the West, to reduce the many isolated fortified 
 places which, says Sprigge, using a forcible, if in- 
 elegant, metaphor, " like vipers in the bowels, 
 infested the midland parts" and obstructed com- 
 munication between London and the West. This 
 
4o8 FAIRFAX ENTERS DEVONSHIRE, 
 
 work was accomplished by detached brigades. One 
 of these under the command of Lieutenant-General 
 Oliver Cromwell, after reducing Devizes and Win- 
 chester, besieged and took Basing House, the 
 magnificent fortress-mansion of the Marquess of 
 Winchester, the storming, sacking, and destruction 
 of which have left an indelible mark upon Enghsh 
 history. 
 
 The main body of the army, in the mean time, was 
 marching from Bi:istol by easy stages on a circuitous 
 line through Wiltshire and Dorsetshire towards the 
 eastern border of Devonshire. This route had 
 probably been adopted as being through a country 
 more capable of sustaining the troops who, in con- 
 sequence of their being without money, had to 
 subsist by taking free quarter on the march. The 
 army of Fairfax reached Chard on the 6th of 
 October, and remained there a week, during which 
 time the expected convoy of treasure for the pay of 
 the troops came in. On Monday, the 13th, the 
 army resumed its march, and advanced to Ax- 
 minster. 
 
 It will now be necessary to revert to the dis- 
 positions made by the Royalists to meet this new 
 but not unexpected invasion of the county of Devon. 
 
 Lord Goring's head-quarters had been at Tiverton 
 in the beginning of September. In a letter to the 
 Prince's Council, dated from Exeter the 28th of the 
 month. Lord Colepepper writes : — 
 
 Goring finding Tiverton no safe quarters for the body of 
 his foot intended to quarter them at Culhampton [CuUomp- 
 

 GORING S POSITION, ' 409 
 
 ton] & Bradninch, possessing two strong houses towards 
 Ottery & Lyme and one in the north of Devon, and to lay 
 his horse behind the foot until he may be strengthened 
 with more foot and enabled to advance.^ 
 
 Goring's centre was, in fact, pushed forward at 
 this time to Cullompton, where he made some 
 attempt to fortify the east side of the town and the 
 church. His head-quarters were at Thorverton. Of 
 the "two strong houses" which he occupied on his 
 right, Poltimore, the mansion of the Parliamen- 
 tarian, Sir John Bampfield, was certainly one ; 
 Columb-John was probably the other. His fortified 
 outpost on the left in the north of Devon was 
 Eggesford House, belonging to Lord Chichester, a 
 Royalist. This was of course the old house close to 
 the church, which was taken down early in the last 
 century when it came into the possession of Mr. 
 Fellowes. The house which replaced it has been 
 since destroyed. 
 
 A few days later, when Fairfax's advance from the 
 east was not to be doubted, Lord Goring, writing 
 from Exeter to Lord Colepepper, who had returned 
 to the Prince at Launceston, was apparently full of 
 determination to resist. In this letter the jealousies 
 among the Royalist commanders are again conspic- 
 uously brought to the front : — 
 
 My Lord, 
 
 S' John Berkley will give y' L^ a full account of the 
 enemys advance, and of our condition heere. I cannot con- 
 
 ' Original in Bodleian Library. Printed in Lister's Clarendon^ iii 
 26-9. 
 
4IO EXETER, 
 
 elude certainly that Fayrfax is so neare us, but because the 
 intelligence comes soe many wayes, wee are very busy 
 providing for them, according to the resolution was taken 
 at our first expectation of them, and I am very confident 
 they shall neyther hurt Exeter nor us. S"^ Richard Green- 
 vile distracts us extreamly, but when the Prince will be 
 pleased to enable me I hope eyther to bring him into better 
 order, or keepe him from doeing any hurt. I shall not 
 fayle to acquainte y"" L^ with what comes in the know- 
 ledge of 
 
 V LP' most humble servant, 
 
 4 Oct. 9 o'clock. Exeter George Goring.^ 
 
 For the Right Hon^^ The L'* 
 Culpeper at Launston. 
 
 Exeter had a garrison of its own, consisting at 
 this time of about i,ooo Horse and 4,000 Foot, 
 under the command of Sir John Berkeley. It is 
 stated that among the provisions for the resistance 
 of the city to Fairfax's expected attack the '^ most 
 part of three parishes,*' presumably in the suburbs, 
 were burnt by Goring's orders " to make the rest 
 more tenable-''^' It is to this that the allusion in 
 his letter possibly refers. 
 
 Goring's activity was spasmodic. At this time the 
 monotony of his usual proceedings was varied by a 
 daring exploit. In the night of the 13th of October, 
 on which day Fairfax's advanced posts were pushed 
 beyond Axminster, Lords Goring, Wentworth, and 
 Miller with a party of Horse, estimated by Sprigge as 
 
 ' Original in the Bodleian Library. Printed in Lister's Clarendon^ 
 iii. 32. 
 
 ^ Whitelock's Memorials, ed. 1682, p. 185. Sprigge mentions this 
 as having been done on the 27th of October, i.e.^ after Goring had left 
 the city {Aitglia Rediviva, ed. 1647, p. 150 ; ed. 1854, p. 161). 
 
TIVERTON, 411 
 
 about 1,500 in number, which had been occupying 
 and overrunning the country about Ottery St. Mary, 
 made a rapid dash through Honiton, and struck in 
 between Fairfax's outposts and his main quarters. 
 Although rumours of the intended attack seem to 
 have preceded it, a village which Mr. Davidson ^ thinks 
 must have been Membury, was surprised. The 
 Cavaliers took about sixty prisoners in the skirmish, 
 and then made off as rapidly as they had come. 
 
 On the 14th, the whole of Fairfax's army ad- 
 vanced to Honiton, and on the following day to 
 Cullompton, which was at once evacuated by 
 Goring's troops, who had established themselves 
 there. These having retired in the direction of 
 Tiverton, although it does not appear that they 
 halted there, Massey, with his brigade of Horse and 
 also a brigade of Foot, was sent after them and 
 ordered to seize that town. 
 
 Tiverton was not, in the proper sense, a fortified 
 town ; but its castle, together with the fine parish 
 church, on the north side of which it stood, separated 
 from the churchyard only by the castle-moat, had 
 been put into a state of defence. Tiverton Castle had 
 been originally a mediaeval fortress. Its western face 
 rested on the edge of a scarped cliff, at the foot of 
 which flowed the river Exe. Its defensive walls 
 enclosed a quadrangular area of about an acre in 
 extent; but the eastern front had been replaced in 
 the reign of Elizabeth by a fortified house built by 
 Roger Giffard. A plate in Martin Dunsford's 
 Historical Memoirs of the Town and Parish of Tiverton 
 
 ^ Axminster during the Civil WaVy '^' 19' 
 
412 TIVERTON CASTLE ASSA ULTED 
 
 (1790) represents the castle-buildings as they stood, 
 probably but little altered since the time of the Civil 
 War, in the year 1730. The large square gate- 
 tower, the conspicuous feature in the east front, is said 
 to have been since lowered, and it is now apparently 
 a storey shorter than it is represented to be in 
 Dunsford's plate. The tower gateway, formed by a 
 Tudor arch, was entered by a drawbridge, hereafter 
 particularly mentioned, which crossed the moat, now 
 filled up. This fortress was held by Sir Gilbert 
 Talbot and a small garrison, consisting of a few 
 Horse and about two hundred Foot. Sir Gilbert 
 Talbot was not a Devonshire man ; he had been 
 ambassador to the Venetian Republic, and for some 
 time was in high favour at the Court of King Charles. 
 He appears was to have added some outworks which 
 covered the eastern front of the castle and enclosed 
 the churchyard. Packs of wool were used in the 
 defence of the church itself. 
 
 General Massey immediately assaulted the works, 
 and, according to Sir Gilbert Talbot's statement,^ 
 was repulsed. Fairfax himself then came upon 
 the scene, and batteries were thrown up by his 
 direction. In the afternoon of Sunday, the 19th of 
 October, fire was opened generally on the Royalist 
 defences. 
 
 The army of Sir Thomas Fairfax appears to have 
 been attended on this campaign by the probably not 
 always welcome company of civil Commissioners, 
 instructed by Parliament to assist the general with 
 their local knowledge, and to report, from time to 
 
 ^ Printed in Harding's History of Tiverton^ ii., Appendix, 40. 
 
AND TAKEN. 413 
 
 time, the proceedings of the army for the information 
 of the two Houses. Two of these Commissioners, 
 representing Devonshire, were Sir John Bampfield 
 and Sir Samuel Rolle, who have already been 
 noticed. The others, Mr. Francis Buller and Mr. 
 Anthony Nicoll, represented Cornwall. All were 
 themselves trusted Members of Parliament. The 
 letter of these gentlemen, reporting the capture of 
 Tiverton and some other particulars, is of much 
 interest, and will best describe the incident : — 
 
 The Coihiitee with S"" Thomas Fairfax at Tiverton to 
 
 the Speaker, 
 
 S*" — In obedience to your Command we came to the Army 
 at Beminster & from thence advanced with them to Chard 
 the Next Day, where they remained some days in Expecta- 
 tion of the Recruits & Money for the Army, & of Money 
 for Major Gen" Massey's party. We advanced thence to 
 Lunnington [Honiton] , from whence before our advance 
 the Enemy retreated near Exon, till which time they 
 plundered all the Country of Cattle ; from Lunnington 
 [Honiton] we advanced to Collamton on Thursday [Sprigge 
 says Wednesday] , on which day Maj' Gen^' Massey's party 
 came before Tiverton Castle & Summoned it, but received 
 a refusall of Obeying : our Noble Gen" having notice of it 
 came on Fryday with a Part of his Army hither, the 
 Residue he sent to Bradnidge [Bradninch] . Yesterday 
 about 2 of the Clock afternoon, some batteries being 
 made, & all things being ready for Storming, for which 
 the Soldiers with much chearfulness prepared themselves : 
 The Gen" for the Sparing of blood, with the advice of the 
 Council of war, resolved to Send them a Second Summons, 
 which was Written & Signed, & parties drawn out, who 
 were ready with their scaling ladders to Storm, if a deniall 
 
414 TIVERTON CHURCH. 
 
 were returned, but at that Instant it pleased God So to 
 direct our Shot, that it cut the Chain of their drawbridge, 
 which Instantly fell down, & the Soldiers spirits were 
 Such that they presently, without order given, entred their 
 Works, the Enemies hearts failed, & we became Suddenly 
 Masters of the Church & Castle & their Strong & Regular 
 works in which they confided; We took the Govern"" S' 
 Gilbert Talbott & 204 officers & Soldiers (of which You 
 have here Inclosed a hst) 4 great Gunns, 30 barrels of 
 Powder with other arms which cannot be particularized, 
 they being dispersed, We lost not a Man in the Storming, 
 nor put any to the Sword. 
 
 Sir Gilbert Talbot states that his Horse v^ere 
 mutinous, and that an important post was betrayed 
 by Major Sadler, a renegade from the Parliamentary 
 side, who, in fact, was afterwards executed at Exeter 
 for this act of treachery. Vicars, the fanatic, on the 
 other hand, had no doubt that the cannon-shot which 
 broke the chain of the drawbridge was miraculously 
 directed by the hand of God. 
 
 Whatever injury may have been done to the 
 church seems to have been confined to the north 
 side of it. The statement in every edition of 
 Murray's Handbook for Devon and Cornwall that 
 the '* chapel and monuments of the Courtenays 
 were destroyed " is incorrect ; the curious monu- 
 ments, at least, had certainly disappeared before 
 the time of Tristram Risdon, who wrote not later 
 than in 1630. The elaborate sculptures of Green- 
 way's chapel on the south side of the church escaped 
 untouched. But the iconoclasm of the Puritans was 
 in danger of being aroused, after the struggle, by the 
 discovery of a certain "crucifix" in a wall which 
 
FAIRFAX'S PROSPECTS. 415 
 
 the Cavaliers had built for the strengthening of the 
 porch — an incident of awful significance which 
 General Massey duly reported to his superiors. 
 
 The Commissioners go on to describe the condi- 
 tion of Fairfax's army and its want of money. The 
 principle of paying for what was taken had been laid 
 down at starting ; but it had not been always 
 possible to act upon it. The country into which 
 the army had now advanced had been already 
 stripped by the Royalists, and there would be 
 little for the army to subsist upon. They conclude 
 with some camp rumours, which are of much in- 
 terest in connection with this relation. 
 
 Goring is retreated to Chidleigh, what he Intends we 
 know not : our Industrious & Vigilant Gen" pitying the 
 condition of the Country, who cry for his Assistance, & 
 Intending Nothing More than the Speeding of the Work, 
 & the Active Maj'' Massey resolves this day to advance in 
 one body towards Goring, who is Strong, & we cannot 
 Divide the Army, Unless Lieuten' Gen" Cromwell come 
 up with his Party, with which its hoped they may divide, 
 & the More Speedily finish the worke in the West, without 
 which the Whole Army Must follow Goring, or run a 
 great hazard : the Prince, Hopton, & Greenvill being entred 
 Devon with 4000 foot, & 1500 horse, as we are Informed, 
 we thought it our Duty to present these to you, & leave it 
 to your further consideration : we remain S' 
 
 Your most humble Servants 
 
 J. Bampfield Fran. Puller. 
 20 8bris Sam. Rolle Anth. Nicoll.^ 
 
 from Tiverton 
 
 1645 
 
 ^ Bishop Burnet's Collection, printed in Notes and Queries, 6th 
 Series, vii. 23. 
 
4i6 A TRUE AND STRANGE RELATION 
 
 . It was immediately after the success of the Parlia- 
 mentarians at Tiverton that the popular feeling with 
 regard to the two reprobates Goring and Grenville 
 found vent in a curious tract, emanating, it would 
 now be thought, from the very low intellectual stratum 
 that supplies the pabulum of street ballads, which, 
 whether a mere superstitious farrago or dijeu d* esprit, 
 is worth noticing here. Its title is all that I can give, 
 and it will probably be deemed sufficient : — 
 
 A true and strange Relation of a Boy who was entertained 
 by the Devill to be servant to him with the consent of his 
 Father about Crediton in the West And how the Devill 
 carried him up in the aire, and shewed him the torments 
 of Hell, and some of the Cavaliers there, and what prepara- 
 tion there was made for Goring and Grenville against they 
 came. Also how the Cavaliers went to robbe a Carrier, and 
 how the Carrier and his Horses turned themselves into 
 flames of fire, &c. London, Printed by J. H. 1645. 
 
 The King, since the battle of Naseby, had never 
 abandoned the expectation, or at least the hope, that 
 Goring would be able to break through the Parlia- 
 mentary forces in Somersetshire and join him. By 
 this means he anticipated that an army considerable 
 enough again to take the field, with prospect of suc- 
 cessful action against his enemies, might be formed. 
 The Prince and his Council, when at Exeter in 
 September, encouraged the scheme. On the 29th 
 of September the King was writing to Colepepper 
 confirming his views, and urging that Goring " must 
 break through to Oxford with his Horse, and from 
 thence, if he can, find me out wheresoever he shall 
 
GORING RETIRES BEFORE FAIRFAX. 417 
 
 understand I shall be ; " but adding in a postscript, 
 ''for lord Goring's business, though I wish it, I 
 cannot say it is absolutely practicable/' ^ But what- 
 ever Goring's own motives may have been — and his 
 fidelity to the cause of King Charles was freely im- 
 peached — he had evidently no appetite for such an 
 enterprise. While Fairfax's army was advancing 
 from Honiton to Cullompton, and when some active 
 service might have been done, Goring drew out the 
 thousand Horse from Exeter, and retreated with 
 the whole of his force to Chudleigh, quartering it 
 upon the country lying between that place and 
 Ashburton and Totnes. This proceeding was in 
 direct contravention of the plan of the Prince's 
 Council, which, as settled, was to make a stand 
 with all the available Horse and Foot at Tiverton, 
 and there to risk a battle with Fairfax's army. 
 With that object Sir Richard Grenville, with his 
 three regiments of old Cornish Foot, had already 
 reached Okehampton, which he *' barricaded," re- 
 maining there, as it turned out, until the end of 
 November. It was at this time that he propounded^ 
 the notable scheme of cutting ''a deep trench from 
 Barnstaple to the south sea for the space of nearly 
 forty miles ; by which, he said, he would defend all 
 Cornwall and so much of Devon against the world." ^ 
 
 ^ Letter in Clarendon's History of the Rebeilio7t, p. 608^. In a letter 
 to Secretary Nicholas, of three days' later date, the King writes : " I 
 have commanded him to break through " (Evelyn's Diaiy and Cor re - 
 sJ)omle?ue, iii. 162). 
 
 2 Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, p. 610 a. Lord Lansdowne, 
 in his Vindication of Sir Richard Grenville, remarks upon this : " Is 
 there anything new or strange in defending a Country by Entrench- 
 
 28 
 
4i8 FAIRFAX INVESTS EXETER. 
 
 A few days later, the Prince is writing to Lord 
 Goring; understands that he has retired from 
 Exeter to join other forces to resist the enemy; 
 with reference to the usual dispute about prece- 
 dence — has sent direction to Sir Richard Grenville 
 to receive orders from his lordship, and desires that 
 there be good intelligence and correspondence pre- 
 served between them. Probably supposing that 
 nothing more can be done with these refractory 
 generals, he goes on the morrow to Liskeard, there 
 to await events. This letter is dated *' Launceston, 
 the 23rd of October." ^ 
 
 The movements of Fairfax's army for several days 
 after the reduction of Tiverton Castle were of a 
 vacillating character. It was finally determined that 
 no immediate advance in pursuit of the Royalists 
 was desirable, and that the siege of Exeter, or, if 
 that were not feasible, its investment, should be 
 first undertaken. An attempt w^as consequently 
 made to march round by Newton St. Cyres and 
 occupy Alphington, on the southern side of the 
 city ; but it was defeated by the extreme wetness 
 of the weather and the badness of the roads. On 
 the 24th of October, at Crediton, Oliver Cromwell, 
 in advance of his well-seasoned troops, the spoilers 
 of Basing House, rejoined the head-quarters. 
 
 ments ? Is not the Practice as old as Julius Caesar, and mentioned by 
 himself in his Commentaries of the War with the ancient Gauls ? Was 
 it not thus that the modern Gauls in our own Times defended the 
 French Flanders ? " ( Works of the Right Ho7ioiirahle George Granville^ 
 Lord Lansdow7ie, London, 1732, i. 531). This was in reply to Lord 
 Clarendon's ridicule. 
 ' Draught, Bodleian Library. Printed in Lister's Clarendon , iii. 34. 
 
FORTIFIED POSTS ESTABLISHED, 419 
 
 In the biographies of Cromwell there is almost a 
 blank during the next two months. There is no 
 doubt however, that, as Lieutenant-General, he was 
 with the army, although Sprigge does not mention 
 him by name, throughout the campaign in Devon- 
 shire and Cornwall. 
 
 The result of these movements was for the time 
 limited to the straitening of Exeter, on its eastern 
 side ; and a chain of entrenched posts was con- 
 structed, extending from Stoke Canon to Topsham, 
 which covered the roads entering Exeter and pre- 
 vented supplies coming into the city from that 
 part of the county. The main body of the army 
 was established at Ottery St. Mary, where it 
 remained for a month. Most of the men were 
 without shoes or stockings, and there was much 
 sickness and mortality among them. Early in 
 December the army was transferred to Tiverton and 
 Crediton. 
 
 A wet autumn was followed, as is usually the 
 case, by a period of very cold weather. From the 
 beginning of December until the middle of January, 
 the country was covered with snow, and a severe 
 frost had set in. Notwithstanding the difficulties 
 which the rigour of the season interposed, the in- 
 vestment of Exeter was extended during the month 
 of December to its western side. Powderham Castle.^ 
 
 ^ Sir V^illiam Courtenay, whose seat it was, being a minor, does not 
 figure in the transaction. He married in his minority the daughter of 
 Sir William Waller, the Parliamentary General, and granddaughter 
 and eventual heiress of Sir Richard Reynell, of Forde. 
 
420 CO UNTR V HO USES SEIZED. 
 
 a Royalist post which had helped to command the 
 river, was attempted unsuccessfully. It had been 
 strengthened by a detachment thrown into it from 
 Exeter, and it remained in the hands of its defenders. 
 But several isolated country houses, suitable for being 
 garrisoned for the purpose of blockading the city, were 
 seized and occupied. Great Fulford was taken by 
 Colonel Okey and a party of dragoons. A short defence 
 seems to have been made by Sir Francis Fulford 
 and his servants ; the remains of a small earth- 
 \vork, from which tradition says that the house 
 was battered by artillery, are still pointed out in 
 the park.^ Lord Chichester's house at Eggesford, 
 which had been occupied and made one of Lord 
 Goring's outposts, was also taken by the same party 
 on the i8th of December. The dragoons, apparently 
 by surprise, *' got between their sentinel and guard 
 at my lord of Chichester's house." The result of the 
 assault which followed was that the commandant 
 of the little garrison, described as *'the eldest Capt. 
 of Cleveland's Brigade," after being ** wounded very 
 sore," was taken prisoner with his Lieutenant, a 
 Cornet and six troopers.^ Sprigge makes the number 
 rather larger, and adds that nineteen horses were 
 also taken. Canonteign, a fine Elizabethan house, 
 in the Teign valley, which belonged to Mr. Davye, 
 
 ^ Sir Francis Fulford's eldest son had been killed before Exeter, in 
 August, 1643. There is at Great Fulford a full-length portrait of 
 Charles 1., attributed to Van Dyck, which is said to have been given 
 by Charles II. in acknowledgment of the services of the Fulfords to 
 the royal cause. 
 
 = Moderate Intelligencer^ No 42, Dec. 18-25, '1645, King's Pamph- 
 lets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxxxvii. 
 
EXETER STRAITENED. 421 
 
 and still stands, was next seized and occupied. A 
 party of Royalist Horse, from one of their neighbour- 
 ing posts, attacked the place before daybreak on the 
 following morning. The loop-holes made in the 
 great oaken entrance-door of the house when it was 
 prepared for defence are yet visible. The assailants, 
 who had burnt the outbuildings, were beaten off by 
 Captain Wogan, commanding the small party of 
 Okey's dragoons, after a fight which lasted for 
 more than four hours. Ashton, the house of Sir 
 George Chudleigh, in the same neighbourhood, 
 was also occupied shortly afterwards. Exeter 
 was thus enclosed, by the end of December, within 
 a ring of fortified posts. Yet no attempt seems 
 to have been made by the garrison of the city 
 to interfere with these operations. The citizens, 
 however, as time went on, were reduced to distress. 
 The allusion of Thomas Fuller, who was one of the 
 beleaguered, to the grateful welcome that was given 
 to the phenomenon of an extraordinary concourse of 
 larks, which visited the southern purlieus of the city, 
 and were captured by thousands, implies this ; and 
 Lord Clarendon mentions that there was an *' im- 
 portunate calling for relief from Exeter.*' 
 
 It will now be desirable to revert to the prepara- 
 tions that were being made, on the other side, to 
 meet the advance westward of the Parliamentary 
 army. At the end of November, Lord Goring, after 
 an ineffectual attempt to open a separate negotiation 
 with Sir Thomas Fairfax, the object of which is 
 only obscurely hinted at, suddenly, on the pretence 
 
422 GORING LEA VES ENGLAND, 
 
 that both armies were going into winter quarters, 
 and that his health required attention, abandoned 
 his command and embarked at Dartmouth for 
 France. I The truth seems to have been that 
 jealousy of his rivals, intolerance of the authority 
 of the Prince of Wales's Council, and disappointed 
 ambition, overpowered his loyalty, if that indeed was 
 not open to suspicion. He left the country amid the 
 execrations of the people, whom he had harassed 
 and pillaged. 
 
 As George Lord Goring returned to England no 
 more, it may be as well to give briefly his subsequent 
 history. He took service in the Spanish Army, in the 
 Netherlands, and afterwards in Spain, where he is 
 said to have ultimatelv assumed the cowl, as a friar, 
 and to have died (it may be charitably concluded in 
 the odour of sanctity), during the lifetime of his 
 father, the Earl of Norwich.^ 
 
 The defection of Lord Goring was undoubtedly 
 a relief to the able men who were administering what 
 was now nominally the Prince of Wales's Army. But 
 new difficulties arose from the inveterate jealousies 
 of the commanders. Sir Richard Grenville, about 
 the end of November, withdrew his force from 
 Okehampton, and retired into Cornwall, in defiance 
 of orders to the contrary. Lord Wentworth,3 upon 
 
 ' His letter to the Prince of Wales of Nov. 20, announcing this 
 intention, is among the Clarendon MSS. in the Bodleian Library, No. 
 2033. 
 
 ^ Collins's Peerage^ ed. 1812, xix. 459. 
 
 3 Thomas Lord Wentworth, of Nettlested, was eldest son of Thomas 
 first Earl of Cleveland, He had been summoned to Parliament in his 
 father's barony in 1640. Lord Clarendon does not give him a favour- 
 
PRINCE CHARLES IN CORNWALL. 423 
 
 whom the command of Goring's Horse had de- 
 volved, and who was established at Ashburton — 
 his troopers distributed among the surrounding vil- 
 lages, opposed an imperious, refractory, and offensive 
 temper to the Prince's Council. The young Prince, 
 who was of course only a puppet, was led hither 
 and thither by the supposed exigencies of the moment. 
 He had been staying for a time at Truro, and 
 giving countenance and encouragement by the magic 
 influence of Royalty to the levies which were being 
 made in his name throughout Cornwall ; for it 
 was on the well-tried Cornish Militia and trained 
 bands — loyal to a man — that the Prince had to rely 
 in this crisis to make up the number of Foot propor- 
 tionate, as was thought indispensably necessary, to 
 his strong body of Horse. The exclusively Cornish 
 character, however, of the Royalist army of the 
 West, which was noticed in the earliest period of 
 the war, no longer existed. Devonshire levies now 
 formed part, but apparently only a small part, of 
 the Prince's force of Foot. Sir Richard Grenville 
 by his authority as Sheriff of Devon had, as we 
 have seen, pressed some into the service, and Lord 
 Goring, by his system of terrorism, others ; but 
 they had found no ready or willing response from 
 the old trained soldiers of the county, whose pre- 
 dilection, if they had any at all, was generally for 
 the Parliament. 
 
 able character, and alludes to his '* after-dinner " temper. He was, 
 in short, a typical Cavalier. His daughter Henrietta Maria, who 
 became Baroness Wentworth in her own right, was the mistress of the 
 Duke of Monmouth. 
 
424 APPEAL FOR A '' BENEVOLENCEP 
 
 The members of the Prince's Council were at this 
 time occupied in providing for the equipment and 
 victualling of the army. We have seen Sir Edward 
 Hyde condescending to details of armiS and ammu- 
 nition ; and Lord Capel, as we learn from his corres- 
 pondence, was investigating the problems, how much 
 biscuit a given number of sacks of flour ought to 
 produce, and how many packhorses were necessary 
 to carry the biscuit to the army. The veteran Earl 
 of Brentford was the military adviser. 
 
 Money, too, was of course needed. The Prince 
 had been drawing what could be got from the 
 revenue of his Duchy of Cornwall. The assessment 
 of martial rates by his Commissioners, both in 
 Cornwall and in Devon, never ceased so long as a 
 Royalist trooper lingered in a district. As a further 
 resource there were the Royalist gentry, on whom 
 the old expedient of exacting a *' benevolence " 
 could be tried. I am able to give a specimen of this 
 form of appeal taken from the original : — 
 
 T/^~^\^^^W^5^^T -^^^^ ^^^ hearty Co7?i7nendaiions^ We 
 Wi^'^^Vfx^^Wi have yet forborn, since our coming 
 ^^^{^^^oV^ into these parts, to desire any extra- 
 ^W^^ ^l^}\^^^^ ordinary supply from any persons 
 y^ W- i;\ I "A v^^ towards the defence of that County, 
 \Sj^^\^^kS&\ ^g^^i^st the Invasion of the Enemy, 
 ^^4v-^^^fe^^ being in truth so sensible of the great 
 
 pressures it hath already suffered, that 
 we hoped rather to have eased them of those burthens 
 voluntarily submitted to, out of their great Zeal' and 
 Affection to the Service of our Royall Father, then to have 
 invited them to undergo new. But taking notice that the 
 
THE LETTER. 425 
 
 continuance of this unhappy Warre draws with it many 
 inevitable charges of provisions of Ammunition and other 
 necessaries for the Armies and Garrisons, and defence of 
 the Frontiers of that County, and that the season of the 
 yeer, is Hke, by Gods blessing, to give you opportunity in a 
 good degree, to provide for your future security, and it 
 being evident that no expedient can more advance a Peace 
 (for the procurement whereof We have offered Our media- 
 tion, and shall pursue all means to effect it with Our utmost 
 power and endeavours) then an evidence that We are like, 
 by an Union and good Affection of those two most 
 Western Counties, to defend those and Our self against the 
 fury of Invaders, We cannot but expect a cheerfull con- 
 currence from all persons well affected to the publique 
 Peace, the Security of this County, or to Us, (who shall not 
 forget the alacrity they shall expresse herein) to what We 
 shall propose to that purpose ; and therefore We have 
 resolved to try the affections of severall well disposed 
 persons for the loan of such moderate summes of Money, 
 which in this necessitous time may be agreeable to their 
 abihties, and yet being multiplied by the number of the 
 Lenders, may, in a good degree, support the extraordinary 
 charges of that County : Amongst those We have thought 
 fit to desire you (who it may be may find a more extra- 
 ordinary Obligation upon yourself, to expresse your affection 
 to this County, and to the Service of your Royall Father) to 
 lend unto Us, the Summe of Twentie pounds and that you 
 pay the same within six dayes after the receipt of these Our 
 Letters, to George Kendall of the City of Exeier, Gentle- 
 man, whom We have appointed to be Treasurer of these 
 Moneys thus borrowed, or to such whom he shall appoint 
 to receive the same ; And that you may be sure that these 
 Moneys shall be issued to no other use, then the pubhque 
 Service, as Victualling and Fortifying the Garrisons, buying 
 of Arms and Ammunition, and the like; We have ap- 
 
426 PRINCE CHARLES'S ARMY, 
 
 pointed the said Treasurer to dispose of all Moneys which 
 shall be paid to him in such manner as he shall from time 
 to time receive directions from the Commissioners, or any 
 three of them, and not otherwise. And as We shall take 
 your readinesse to gratifie Us herein, as a great Testimony 
 of your Affection to Peace and Us ; So We doubt not, you 
 will not give Us cause, by your refasall, to suspect either, 
 and to proceed accordingly. And so We bid you heartily 
 farewell. 
 
 Given at Our Court at Launceston the 2. day of October, 
 1645. 
 
 Charles P. 
 By his highness Comaund 
 in Councell 
 
 Rig. Fanshawe. 
 Jo. Bury Esq'. 
 
 Endorsed — For John Bury of Bury in Lapford 
 Esqr. Sealed with impressed stamp — the Prince's 
 arms surrounded by the legend Carolus D. G. Mag. 
 BritannicB princeps. Foolscap sheet. The words 
 " Twentie pounds," the signature, counter-signature, 
 and address, are in MS.^ 
 
 From Truro the Prince returned into Devonshire 
 at the end of December, and fixed his Court at 
 Tavistock. From thence he paid a visit to Totnes 
 and Dartmouth. The purpose of these movements 
 was the organization of a plan of campaign for 
 opposing Fairfax's army and relieving Exeter. 
 
 Early in January, the military plans of the 
 Prince's Council were brought to a further stage of 
 development. By this time 2,400 of the Cornish 
 
 ^ The original is in the possession of Mrs. Russell, widow of the 
 late Richard Bury Russell, Esq. 
 
FIRST ONSLA UGHT OF CROMWELL, 427 
 
 trained bands had come in at Tavistock. Grenville's 
 three old regiments, numbering 800 men altogether, 
 had been pushed forward under Major-General 
 Molesworth, and again occupied Okehampton ; these 
 were supported by a brigade of Horse. There were 
 800 Foot, under Wentworth, in the South Hams ; 
 1,500 more were expected out of Exeter; and the 
 Governor of Barnstaple had promised 500.^ These 
 made up altogether 6,000 Foot. The Horse were 
 estimated to be 5,000. These forces constituted, on 
 paper, a respectable army, not inferior in numerical 
 strength to that of Fairfax. The difficulty of course 
 was to get them together for combined action. 
 Totnes was selected as the principal base of opera- 
 tions, where the Foot from Tavistock were to join 
 Wentworth's Horse. The forces from Okehampton 
 and Barnstaple were apparently to make a diversion 
 on the left or to combine with the main body, as 
 might be found expedient. The Prince was to 
 command in person ; and it was no doubt thought 
 that his presence would add lustre to a military 
 programme, which, if successful, would prove a 
 turning-point in the course of the war. 
 
 It is not too much to say that the first sharp 
 onslaught of the advanced guard of Fairfax's army 
 hopelessly dissipated this scheme ; and the incident 
 owes a certain dramatic completeness to the 
 accidental fact that the stroke was inflicted by Oliver 
 Cromwell. 
 
 Communication with Exeter, it would seem, was 
 still possible ; for a Proclamation by the Prince was 
 
 ^ Clarendon, History of the Rebellion^ pp. 613-4. 
 
428 PRINCE CHARLES'S PROCLAMATION. 
 
 at this time issued from thence (if the imprint is to 
 be trusted), of which the following is a copy, taken 
 from one of the original broadsides in the Library 
 of the British Museum : — 
 
 By His Htghnesse, the Prince of Great Britain^ Duke of 
 Cornwall and Albany^ Highest Captain Generall of all His 
 Majesties Forces raised and to he raised within the Kingdom 
 of England^ Dominion of Wales and Town of Berwick^ &^c, 
 
 A PROCLAMATION, For all persons within our 
 Quarters in the County of Devon, able to bear Arms, not 
 being otherwise imployed by His Highnesse, or dispenced 
 withall, to attend His Highnesse now advancing in Person 
 to meet the Rebels. As also for a Generall Supplication to 
 be made in all Churches of Devon and Exeter, on Sunday 
 the 4 of January, for Gods blessing on His Highnesse, 
 and his Forces. 
 
 HEREAS, upon the motion of the Enemy on this 
 side Exeter, We have resolved in Our own Person 
 to repair to Our Army, & to that End We resolve 
 with all possible expedition to advance with Our Forces, 
 hoping, by the blessing of God to expell the Enemy from 
 this County. We have thought fit to publish and declare 
 this Our resolution, desiring and requiring all Loyall and 
 able men of what degree or quality soever within Our 
 Quarters in that County as well those of the Trained-Bands, 
 as all others able to bear Arms, who are not otherwise 
 imployed or dispenced with by Us, to repair to Us very 
 speedily in person, to Our assistance, with such Arms as 
 they can bring ; And We must professe that We shall impute 
 the absence of any person, not so imployed or dispenced 
 with as aforesaid, to want of Loyalty, or want of Courage, 
 both which at so important a time, and upon so important 
 
PARLIAMENT INDIGNANT, 429 
 
 an occasion, We hold equally odious. And for the pro- 
 curing a blessing from God upon this Our first enterprize, 
 which We undertake for his Service, and for the procuring a 
 blessed Peace upon this miserable Kingdom, towards the 
 which Our entreaties and earnest desires of mediation have 
 been rejected, We desire that on Sunday next a generall 
 Supplication may be made in all the Churches within Our 
 Quarters, for Gods blessing upon Us and Our Forces, in- 
 tending also to see the like Supplication solemnly made by 
 the whole Army, when We shall have drawn it into a body. 
 And the High-Sherifife of Devon is to cause this Our Decla- 
 ration and Proclamation to be speedily publisht in all 
 Market-Towns & Publike Meetings in Our Quarters there, 
 and read in all the Churches & Chappels within the said 
 County, We having directed the like to be done in Our 
 Dutchy of Cornwall, and hereby likewise directing the like 
 to be done in the City of Exeter. 
 
 Charles P. 
 Given at our Court at 
 Tavistoke the 29 of Decemb. 
 1645. 
 
 By His Highnesse Command in Councell. 
 
 Rich: Fanshawe. 
 
 Imprinted at Exeter by Robert Barker, and John Bill, 
 Printers to the Kings most Excellent Majesty. 1645.^ 
 
 Figuratively, the back of the Parliament was set 
 up by this manifesto. As soon as the document 
 became know^n at Westminster '*the House [of 
 Commons] appointed a day to consider of this busi- 
 ness of the Prince." ^ 
 
 ^ The essential part, from the word *' Whereas," is printed in black 
 letter in the original. ^ Whitelock's Memorials, p. 193. 
 
430 THE BARNSTAPLE WORKS STRENGTHENED, 
 
 On the morning after the supplications of the 
 Church for the success of the Prince's arms had been 
 offered up — it may almost be said before their echoes 
 had died away — " a private consultation was had *' at 
 the Parliamentary head-quarters, Sprigge informs us, 
 *' and divers Officers of the Army sought councel of 
 Heaven that day (keeping it as a private day of 
 humiliation) in answer whereto, God inclined their 
 hearts to resolve of an Advance.'' ^ 
 
 Before resuming an account of the proceedings of 
 the opposing armies, I shall return to the affairs of 
 Barnstaple which we left, it will be remembered, in 
 the middle of July when Lord Goring, with his 
 broken forces, for a time found refuge in the town 
 after his defeat at Langport. 
 
 In the account given in the earlier part of this 
 narrative it has been seen how the Works originally 
 intended for the defence of Barnstaple were gradually 
 developed under the Corporation regime. Sir Edward 
 Hyde's remarkably emphatic praise of the fortifica- 
 tions in the month of May, in this year (1645), will 
 have enabled us to form some idea of the actual 
 fortress, if it may be so called, which Sir Allen 
 Apsley was holding for the King. In July, the town 
 had been deemed by the King and his advisers so 
 safe that it had been resolved to form there a great 
 magazine which should be supplied from South 
 Wales for the support of Goring's army — almost in 
 anticipation, it would seem, of the reverse which 
 
 / Anglia Rediviva^ ed. 1647, p. 163 ; ed. 1854, p. 176. 
 
CL UBMEN IN NORTH DE VON. 43 1 
 
 actually happened to it.^ The design, so far as the 
 sending of supplies from Wales was concerned, was 
 probably interrupted by the appearance at about the 
 same time of a Parliamentaiy squadron in the Bristol 
 Channel. The threatening advance of Fairfax's army 
 in August was a sufficient reason, however, for the 
 measures apparently taken by Sir Allen Apsley for 
 still further strengthening the defences of the town. 
 There is a warrant among the Clarendon State 
 Papers in the Bodleian Library, directed by Sir 
 Edward Hyde, on the 21st of August, to Cadwallader 
 Jones, Collector-General of Customs, for the delivery 
 of ;£^5oo worth of wool to George Potter for the use 
 of Sir Allen Apsley, Governor of Barnstaple.^ At the 
 then price of wool this quantity would be equal to 
 between fifty and sixty packs of the ordinary size, or 
 of 240 lbs. each. The use of packs of wool for defen- 
 sive purposes was not uncommon during the war. 
 The wool appears to have been part of a cargo out of 
 the Fame of London lying at Dartmouth, the sale of 
 which realized ^^4,000 ; but how the RoyaHsts 
 became possessed of it is nowhere mentioned. 3 
 
 But a more immediate danger seems to have im- 
 pended. The antagonism of the Clubmen, which 
 Lord Goring had vainly tried to quell, naturally 
 spread like wildfire, and the garrison of Barnstaple 
 incurred its resentment. The King's forces, says a 
 Parliamentary diurnal, which were placed in the town 
 
 ^ Lord Digby's letter to Prince Rupert. Eliot Warburton's Pruue 
 Rupe7i; and the Cavaliers^ iii. 141. 
 ' * Calendar of Clarendon State Papers, 'Ho. 1 941' 
 
 3 Ibid,^ No. 1994. 
 
432 GARRISON OF BARNSTAPLE DISTRESSED, 
 
 contrary to stipulation, were "wronging honest people 
 and plundering them." The Clubmen of Ashford and 
 Southmolton (a singular conjunction) are mentioned 
 as the ringleaders. They declared for the Parliament, 
 encountered the Royalists, " killed the Governor of 
 Barnstaple, Sir Leven [sic] Apsley, and divers of his 
 party,'' ^ and blocked up the town. Whatever may 
 be the real version of this affair, and further light 
 upon it is wanting, it is certain that Sir Allen 
 Apsley did not meet the fate which is described. 
 Lord Colepepper, who was at Barnstaple and wrote 
 from thence on the i8th of September, made no 
 allusion to the incident. However, something ex- 
 ceptional must have taken place which affected the 
 Royalist force holding Barnstaple, irrespective of the 
 general stress of the war which pervaded the whole 
 county, for, writing from Launceston to Lord 
 Goring on the 25th of October, Prince Charles 
 desires that in consequence of the distressed state of 
 the garrison of Barnstaple, the twelve weeks' con- 
 tribution for that Hundred may be suspended for the 
 present. ^ This, it may be said, is rather paradoxical. 
 It is certainly not quite clear how the garrison would 
 benefit by the relaxation of the pressure upon the 
 inhabitants of the Hundred who, so far as we know, 
 were unfriendly and even, as there is the foregoing 
 incident to show, actively hostile to it. 
 
 Those, if there are any, who may have hesitated 
 to credit the thoroughness with which Barnstaple 
 
 ' Whitelock's Memorials^ under date Sept. 19, 1645. 
 ^ Calenda}' of Clarendoti State Papers ^ No, 2001, Rough draught, i. 
 283. 
 
DEMOLITION OF HOUSES AT BARNSTAPLE. 433 
 
 was fortified, will have found perhaps some little 
 difficulty in accepting the item of the Summary, 
 quoted some way back, which refers to the " demo- 
 lishing of houses." I am now able to place in 
 this juxtaposition a story from Mrs. Hutchinson's 
 Memoirs, relating to her brother's connection with 
 Barnstaple, which incidentally corroborates the 
 statement. It appears that Sir Allen Apsley, after he 
 had quitted Barnstaple, was sued by an inhabitant,, 
 whom Mrs. Hutchinson describes as a '' wicked 
 woman who had the worst and the smoothest 
 tongue that ever her sex made use of to mischief,'" 
 for the damage which she had sustained by Sir 
 Allen having pulled down her house when fortifying: 
 the town. The lady, whose name is not mentioned, 
 pursued him with a malignity described as '' veno- 
 mous and devilish " (from which we may see how 
 a gentle Puritan could use strong language on 
 occasion), and by a course of conduct for which,. 
 if Mrs. Hutchinson's meaning is rightly appre- 
 hended, these expressions can scarcely be said to be- 
 undeserved. Sir Allen's answer to the suit was« 
 sufficiently simple — that the house was pulled 
 down before he was Governor of the place. ^ As^ 
 there was a doubt on this vital point, it seems by 
 implication that the case was not a solitary one^ 
 and that the destruction of other houses involved 
 the cause of the doubt. The houses were most 
 probably suburban, were not included within the 
 lines of defence, and were demolished to prevent 
 their becoming shelter for the enemy. 
 
 ^ Mejuoirs^ &c., ed. 18 10, ii. 184-6. 
 
 29 
 
434 PILTON CHURCH TOWER. 
 
 One of the few tangible local evidences of the 
 effects of the Civil War, which survive in North 
 Devon, is an interesting one associated with the 
 church tower of Pilton. Connected with Barn- 
 staple by a short bridge, which spanned the deep 
 narrow bed of the North Yeo, and a long causeway 
 across an intervening marsh, Pilton was almost 
 a suburb of the town, and consequently partook in 
 some degree of its fortunes during the war. The 
 village climbed the slope of a slight eminence, on 
 the summit of which stood the parish church. It 
 was on the northern side of the town of Barnstaple, 
 the side least open to attack, and although too 
 distant to be included within the line of fortification, 
 might have been considered either a defensive out- 
 post of the garrison, or, in the possible contingency 
 of its being occupied by an enemy, a source of con- 
 siderable annoyance. 
 
 The tower of Pilton church is a plain quad- 
 rangular structure, without buttresses. It is of 
 unusually large dimensions, being about 24 feet 
 square. The upper stage, which is about 35 feet, 
 or nearly one half, of the whole height of the present 
 tower, shows still the evidence of its being of newer 
 work than the lower part ; and the original struc- 
 ture to that extent was destroyed during the war.^ 
 For fifty years afterwards, the stump of the 
 tower, scarcelv visible above the roof of the 
 church, remained a monument of a troublous 
 
 ' There is a tradition that the original tower was a stage higher than 
 the present one, which, considering the proportions of the structure, is 
 not unlikely to be well founded. 
 
PIL TON CHURCH TO WER, 43 5 
 
 time. Over the doorway of the south porch of 
 the church, there is a stone tablet with the 
 following inscription referring to the re-construc- 
 tion of the tower : — - 
 
 The Tower of this Parish be- 
 ing by force of Arms pul'd 
 down in y* late unhappy 
 Civel Wars Anno Dom 1646 
 was Rebuilt 1696. 
 
 W™ Downe Esq-", 
 Christo"" Lethbridge Gen*. 
 John Avery. 
 John Rogers. 
 W'" Langdon- 
 George Lee. 
 Church- Wardens. 
 Rob' Nutting M' Builder. 
 
 Upon this record Gribble, the author of the 
 Memorials of Barnstaple, makes the following comment 
 — puerile, I cannot help thinking, as it stands, but 
 still more so in the light which it is now possible 
 to throw upon the circumstances — "The idea of 
 a massive and lofty stone tower having been pulled 
 down as above expressed, is quite ludicrous, especi- 
 ally as the party to whom the act has always been 
 (and no doubt justly) attributed, had a powerful 
 battery at their command, by which they could, 
 without any laborious exertion, accomplish their 
 mischievous purpose. Why this church was so 
 much injured does not appear, but it requires no 
 great stretch of fancy to imagine Fairfax's soldiery, 
 
436 PIL TON CHURCH TO WER. 
 
 in the sheer wantonness of power, and without any 
 particular motive, levelling their artillery at the 
 tower, merely because it happened to stand a 
 conspicuous mark within range of their shot." 
 
 Dr. Oliver follows Gribble. His bias naturally 
 leaning to this suggestion of Puritan malignity, that 
 accomplished antiquary with a singular want of 
 caution states, as a fact, that the tower and church 
 were wantonly cannonaded by Fairfax's soldiery.^ 
 
 In the same note from which I have quoted, 
 Gribble further says : *' A great part of the body 
 of the church was also destroyed, but has never 
 been replaced ; portions of the walls still remain at 
 nearly their original height." This extraordinary 
 statement is unintelligible. Taken literally, it 
 would mean that at the time when Gribble wrote 
 the church was a ruin — which certainly a few 
 persons now living might be able to dispute from 
 actual personal knowledge. There is, in short, no 
 evidence whatever that the *' body of the church" 
 was injured. 2 What misled Gribble, probably, were 
 the remains of the conventual buildings attached to 
 the church, which were partially destroyed at the 
 time of the suppression of the monasteries. 
 
 In the preceding page of the Memorials, Gribble, 
 
 ^ Ecclesiastical Antiquities in Devon^ iii. 36. 
 
 = Part of the roof of the chancel, however, had been broken down, 
 or its woodwork had fallen into decay, and it seems to have been 
 replaced when the tower was rebuilt. By an uncommon arrangement 
 the north wall of the chancel is formed for part of its length by the 
 tower itself. The tower, in fact, is much older than the parish church 
 which it now serves, and stood at the west end of the original Priory 
 church long since destroyed. 
 
PILTON CHURCH TOWER, 437 
 
 in an imperfect, not to say absurd, account of the 
 Great Fort, hazards the conjecture that " it was, 
 without doubt, from this spot that the church at 
 Pilton was cannonaded." ^ The finding of a cannon- 
 ball in the churchyard of Pilton some years ago 
 was of course, popularly, a confirmation of the tra- 
 dition even to a detail. 
 
 Now the distance of the tower from the Great 
 Fort, measured on the ordnance map, is nearly 
 seven furlongs — say, 1,500 yards. The longest 
 point blank range {ix,, at which a shot would be 
 likely to strike with any battering effect) of any gun 
 of the period, as given in Captain Smith's table,^ 
 was that of the demi-culverin or nine-pounder, and 
 that was thirty-nine score paces, which, giving a 
 pace the liberal allowance of a yard in length, are 
 equal to about 780 yards, or only a little more than 
 half the distance from the fort to the tower. The 
 physical objection to the story seems conclusive. 
 There are not wanting what I may call moral im- 
 probabilities also. To anticipate a little — the Great 
 Fort was, as a matter of fact, the last position 
 surrendered by the Royalist garrison of Barnstaple. 
 It is implied by the tradition that the guns of 
 the fort were then, when everything was in the 
 hands of the Parliamentarians, turned upon the 
 inoffensive and undemonstrative tower ! I do not 
 think that this was characteristic of the temper 
 of Fairfax's troops, and it was as far as possible 
 
 ^ Memorials, pp. 460, 461. 
 
 * The Accidence, &c., by Captain John Smith. Works by Arber, 
 p- 801. 
 
4 38 PIL TON CHURCH BELLS. 
 
 from what we know of the practice of their eminent 
 commander. He, however, was not present. 
 
 A different tradition relating to the demoHtion of 
 the tower more probably contains, although in a misty 
 and distorted form, the elements of the truth; for 
 the communication of it to me I have been in- 
 debted to Mr. Townshend M. Hall, F.G.S., whose 
 profound interest in everything appertaining to the 
 parochial history of Pilton is well known. It is, 
 that the tower was pulled down — presumably by the 
 garrison of Barnstaple — to get rid of the annoyance 
 which the town suffered from a battery mounted 
 upon it. It was not at all an uncommon practice to 
 place guns, the small four or five-pounders of the 
 period, in such a position. 
 
 The fate of the church bells of Pilton is inseparable 
 from that of the stage of the tower in which they were 
 of course hung, and is of collateral interest. We know 
 that according to an Inventory, taken in the year 1553, 
 Pilton had at that time five bells. ^ In the year 1712, 
 sixteen years after the tower had been restored, six 
 new bells were cast by Abraham Rudhall of Gloucester, 
 and hung. The original set of five had therefore 
 disappeared at some intermediate time. Mr. Hall, 
 referring to these, informs me that where '' the old 
 monastic bells went, no one knows." 
 
 I believe that I shall be able to throw some 
 interesting light upon the actual facts. The authors 
 of the inscription on the church porch of Pilton 
 doubtless knew what they were inditing. " Quite 
 
 ' *' Church Bells of Devon," by the Rev. H. T. Ellacombe, Trans. 
 Exeter Dioc. Arch. Society, 2nd Series, i. 
 
GRIBBLE REVISED. 439 
 
 ludicrous/' as the idea was to Mr. Gribble, the tower 
 was, it appears, literally ^zJ/^^ down — not, however, 
 he would have been perhaps disappointed to learn, by 
 the playful Roundheads, but by the Cavaliers, and 
 some time before the first of Fairfax's soldiers had 
 come within sight of the garrison of Barnstaple. 
 
 Among the Clarendon MSS. in the Bodleian 
 Library there is an original letter, written from Barn- 
 staple, by Sir Allen Apsley to Sir Edward Hyde, then 
 at Truro, dated the 20th of December, 1645. It is 
 probably a portion, only, of a correspondence which 
 had been kept up between them since their meet- 
 ing at Barnstaple in the preceding June. Sir Allen 
 alludes to his brother James Apsley having been sent 
 by him into Cornwall — to Bodmin it appears — and 
 that he had executed some commission relating to 
 the bells. There was a family of noted bell-founders 
 of the name of Pennington at Bodmin in the seven- 
 teenth century. But Sir Allen had occasion for their 
 services to cast, not bells, but something better 
 suited for his present purpose. The bells to which 
 he referred were evidently destined to be converted 
 into cannon or mortar-pieces ; for he goes on to say 
 that he need not much trouble himself to send into 
 France for mortar-pieces, as the guns which he has 
 (or will then have ?) will be sufficient for the defence 
 of the town. With apparently some qualms of con- 
 science he then says that '* the bells " should remain 
 still in their places, but that he is forced to pull down 
 the steeple. The " steeple " could have been none other 
 than that of Pilton. Although the word steeple, in 
 Devonshire, popularly means a spire, it is well known 
 
440 SIR ALLEN APSLEVS LETTER, 
 
 that in the common language of most parts of Eng- 
 land in the seventeenth century a tower, with or 
 without a spire surmounting it, was a steeple. I 
 believe no other tower in North Devon was taken 
 down or destroyed in the time of the Civil War ; and 
 this was almost the only one which can be said to 
 have been within the reach of the garrison. The 
 demolition of the tower and the appropriation of the 
 bells must have taken place soon after this letter was 
 written — probably, in agreement with the date stated 
 in the inscription on the church porch, in January, 
 or very early in the year, 1646. What Sir Allen's 
 motive was in taking down the tower is not so 
 obvious, and can only be conjectured. As already 
 surmised, the building was beyond the line of his 
 legitimate defences. The most probable supposition 
 is that, in the expectation of being besieged, he 
 thought it prudent to deprive the enemy of the 
 opportunity of planting artillery on the elevated 
 position (then so much approved by artillerists) 
 which the tower offered, and from thence of attacking 
 the Castle Works, which would have been within 
 range. 
 
 As there are other matters in this interesting docu- 
 ment which relate to the present subject, I shall here 
 print it entire : — 
 
 Barnestaple 20 Decern, 1645. 
 Sir 
 
 you haue in two Lres commended my brother for an 
 
 excellent sollicitor, I am sure the last time he was in Come- 
 
 wall, he did very litle of the businesse I sent him for, except 
 
 that of the bells, w^^ should remaine still in their places, but 
 
S/R ALLEN APS LEY'S LETTER, 441 
 
 that I am forced to pull downe the steeple, for I need not 
 much trouble my selfe to send into ffrance for mortar peices, 
 theis Gunnes I haue will defend mee, as long as the Cornish 
 will doe you. I thought I should haue receaued a certaine 
 assurance from you, of twenty thousand french to be here 
 precisely by the first of March, and by the same time as 
 many Irish on the other side if the peace had been con- 
 cluded, if not, my Lord of Ormond and his Army, and 
 deferred the conquering of that foolish Nation till wee had 
 more leisure, with theis forty thousand men might haue 
 made an End of the Warrs and haue confounded all theis 
 Rebells, w*"^ I beleive is more then the Cornish can bring 
 to passe against the Parliament, for soe the King now calls 
 them, as you may pceave by this inclosed MeiTiond sent 
 mee yesterday from their Army ; you haue made my brother 
 madd with the thought of gaine he is to haue att sea, and is 
 nowe very earnest with mee to write to you to pcure a 
 Warrant from the Prince to give him authority to seize vpon 
 any ship fitt for his purpose, and a Licence to robb att Sea, 
 w*"^ would be very necessary they haueing now stopped all 
 our ships in Wales, soe that wee shalbe shortly vndonne for 
 want of coales did not Sir Samuell RoUes his woods growe 
 so neere vs. Sir I haue almost lost my thumbe by the 
 locke of a fowleing peice but I hope my naile will excuse it, 
 and though I cannot write my selfe you shall not want theis 
 importunities from 
 
 your most humble 
 
 servant 
 
 A. Apsley.^ 
 
 For the right honorable Sir 
 Edward Hide Chancellor 
 of the Exchequer. 
 
 The allusion to the external aid v^hich the Royalists 
 
 ^ Clarendon State Papers, Bodleian Library, No. 2052. 
 
442 JAMES APSLEY. 
 
 at this time were buoying themselves up with the 
 hope of obtaining, will be understood by students 
 of the general history of the Civil War. The King 
 was calculating upon the accession to his forces of 
 20,000 of the Irish rebels, as the result of the famous 
 treaty made with them by the Earl of Glamorgan,^ 
 and was hoping to obtain shipping from Holland to 
 bring them over. Lord Jermyn, who was with 
 Queen Henrietta Maria in France, had held out 
 hopes of raising a French force of 5,000 men, which 
 the King so far reckoned upon that he designed its 
 landing in Kent, where he proposed to join it, and 
 fixed the marching route afterwards ; and Lord 
 Goring was reported to have promised to send 6,000 
 ** captive Spaniards " from France to reinforce the 
 Prince's army in the West. 
 
 ** My brother " was James Apsley, who has already 
 been mentioned in a previous page as obnoxious to 
 the worthy Corporation of Barnstaple. Perhaps he 
 had been bred a sailor ; at all events, he had the 
 nautical proclivities and the taste for adventure 
 which are implied by Sir Allen's candid reference to 
 his ardour and to the sort of employment which he 
 coveted. James Apsley was apparently a vatirien. 
 If this reference shows him pretty much in the 
 character of a filibuster, in his later career he figures 
 as a desperado, making a ruffianly attempt to murder 
 St. John, the Parliamentary Ambassador in Holland. 
 
 The glimpses that are obtained of the internal 
 
 ' For an elaborate exposition of this obscure transaction see article 
 in the English Historical Revinv^ No. 8, October, 1887, by Dr. S. R. 
 Gardiner. 
 
SIR SAMUEL ROLLERS WOODS, 443 
 
 condition of Barnstaple during the latter months of 
 t. the year 1645, are of much interest. In October, 
 the county of Glamorgan had declared for the 
 Parliament ; a Parliamentary squadron was in pos- 
 session of the Bristol Channel. The ordinary coal 
 supply was therefore cut off, and the inhabitants, in 
 an early and exceptionally severe winter, were in 
 danger of suffering from want of fuel. It is not quite 
 certain where the woods of Sir Samuel Rolle — who, 
 being a Parliamentarian, and one of the traitors pro- 
 claimed by the King, was doubtless considered by 
 the Governor of the garrison a fair subject for spolia- 
 tion — ^were situated. It has been suggested to me, 
 on the best authority, that the estate of Pottington, 
 still part of the possessions of the Rolle family, 
 within half a mile of the town, and easily accessible 
 from it by land or water, may, at that time, have 
 been covered wholly or partly with wood. Although 
 I confess that this does not seem to me to fix unim- 
 peachably the precise locality of '* Sir Samuel Rolles 
 his woods," it is the best suggestion that I have 
 been able to obtain. Further information, which 
 might have thrown other light upon the point, has 
 been, for some reason, withheld. 
 
 Following up his brother's application on his 
 behalf, James Apsley himself wrote on the same day 
 to Sir Edward Hyde, then at Truro, a letter, also 
 preserved in the Bodleian Library, which I here 
 insert : — 
 
 Decern, 20. 1645. 
 
 Deare S"" 
 
 When I was last at Bodman you weare pleased to 
 
444 JAMES APS LEY'S LETTER. 
 
 tell me that if I woulde you woulde procure mee a commis- 
 sion for the settinge out my shippe as a man of warre upon 
 these coastes. I durst then desier nothinge beinge utterly 
 unacquainted w'*" these seas, but havinge since converst w*^*" 
 the masters and shippe-carpenters they all putt mee in 
 greate hopes that if I canne gett my shippe and two friggotts 
 to attende her I may easily intercept many of the Bristow 
 marchants, therefore S' if y" shall thinke fittinge I may have 
 a commission for the settinge forth what shippinge I have or 
 canne gett as men of warre in the kinges service w**" power 
 to make prize of all such marchant men and others as 
 belonge to any of the rebells harbours, and if alsoe y" please 
 to thinke it convenient that I may have a warrant for the 
 pressinge of some friggot either here or at Dartmouth that 
 are not already in his ma^^' service (for the attending of this 
 greate shippe) I payinge any marchionable rates for her, or 
 freightinge her accordinge to the kinges rates, I shall give 
 order for my shippe speedily to be brought about, and my 
 coale to be converted into such a friggott or little shippe as 
 may be most convenient for our present necessitys, the 
 reason that makes me trouble y" in this businesse is because 
 the rogues at Swansy have stopped all our coale barques, 
 and to have liberty of beinge revenged on such raskells 
 though it bee the most pleasingest thinge canne happen to 
 mee yett the expectation of such prizes as may bee 
 beneficiall to his highnesse makes this so much desired by 
 
 Deare S*" 
 y most humble servant 
 
 J. Apsley.^ 
 ffor the right hon^'^ 
 
 S' Edwarde Hide 
 
 Chacellor of 
 
 the Excheq^ 
 
 Whether or not the Prince gave the coveted com- 
 
 ^ Clarendon State Papers ^ Bodleian Library, No. 2051. 
 
REPORTED CONDITION OF BARNSTAPLE. 445 
 
 mission is unknown and unimportant ; there was but 
 a brief time left, at all events, in which it could 
 possibly be acted upon. I think it may be inferred 
 from a passage in the letter that Apsley's ship was 
 at that time lying in Dartmouth Harbour; and he 
 speaks of having her " brought about," in the way 
 which the relative geographical positions of the two 
 ports would naturally suggest. < 
 
 In the face of these indications of the activity of 
 the Governor of the garrison of Barnstaple in perfect- 
 ing his defences, and of his confidence, somewhat 
 qualified as it may be, in his ability to hold the 
 town, it is strange to find such an item of intelligence 
 as the following. It has been copied, but without 
 any reference to its source, and inserted with some 
 other ** Antiquarian Notes " in the North Devon 
 journal ;^ but I have traced it to the Moderate 
 Intelligencer, a Parliamentary news-sheet of February 
 12-18, 1646,2 and I give it here chiefly as an example 
 of the untrustworthy character of much of the news 
 circulating at that time : — 
 
 Barnstaple works are so fallen down that the Guns many 
 of them are in the Ditches, and cannot be repaired untill 
 Spring ; not above 500 in the Town and Castle. 
 
 If this was really the condition of the fortress which 
 soon afterwards defied for more than two months 
 some of the ablest of the Parliamentary commanders, 
 the circumstance considerably enlarges our estimate 
 
 ' In December, 1881 ; contributed by " C. C." 
 * King'f Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxlvi. 
 
 
 ::y 
 
446 STATE OF THE GARRISON. 
 
 of the personal heroism of the defenders of Barn- 
 staple during the last weeks of the Royalist occupa- 
 tion. But the statement is entirely uncorroborated, 
 and is so inconsistent with what is otherwise known, 
 that I do not hesitate to dismiss it as a weak in- 
 vention of the enemy. The Governor's measures of 
 defence, on the contrary, show anything but the 
 laxity implied. One of his acts, of which all local 
 tradition has been long lost, was at this time to break 
 down one or more of the arches of the bridge across 
 the Taw at Barnstaple, cutting off at will the com- 
 munication from the opposite bank of the river. 
 The fact is mentioned by several contemporary news- 
 writers.^ The restoration of the fabric after the war 
 is briefly set down as *Uhe Repaire of our Bridge " 
 in the last miscellaneous item of the Summary. 
 There is no precise account of the numerical 
 strength of the garrison during this period ; but 
 Lord Clarendon, who had the best means of know- 
 ing, states that 500 men had been promised by the 
 Governor towards the force proposed for the relief 
 of Exeter, and we have other accounts of 500 Foot 
 having been actually detached from the garrison on 
 a special expedition presently to be mentioned ; it is 
 also evident that there must have been, over and 
 above that number, a sufficient margin for the 
 security of the town. From 800 to 1,000 may 
 be taken therefore as the probable strength of the 
 
 ^ The Copie of another Letter^ &c., from W. C. [William Clarke], 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxliii. The Kingdom'' s 
 WceJzly Intelligencer^ Jan. 27-Feb. 3, 1646, ibil., vol. ccxliv. Perfect 
 Occitrrences of Parliament^ No. 6, week ending Feb. 6, 1646, ibid. 
 vol. ccxliv. 
 
FAIRFAX'S ARMY, 447 
 
 garrison, and this was composed of both Horse and 
 Foot.i 
 
 The meagre accounts that I have been able to give 
 of the affairs of Barnstaple during the latter months 
 of the year 1645 leave, I am aware, much to be 
 desired. The local records are with reference to 
 this period an absolute blank. The Parliamentary 
 news-writers had little to report of the internal 
 affairs of a fortified town, held by the enemy, and 
 from which no communication was likely to come 
 out to them. What they did report is to be 
 cautiously accepted. For the reason also that the 
 garrison was now cut off from the centre of Royalist 
 information which still existed at Oxford, no mention 
 of Barnstaple and its fortunes is to be found in the 
 pages of the Mercurius Aulicus or other emanations 
 from the press in the university city. 
 
 I must now revert to the proceedings of Sir 
 Thomas Fairfax's army, in order to show in their 
 due sequence the events with which the fate of 
 Barnstaple, as it turned out, was so intimately 
 connected. 
 
 In the beginning of January, 1646, the relative 
 positions of the two armies, it will be remembered, 
 were broadly these : The main body of Fairfax's 
 forces was at Tiverton, with detached garrisons 
 
 ' It would seem that Barnstaple was still a recognized magazine of 
 arms. One of the reports published at about this time is : — *' From 
 Barnstable they have sent all the spare arms they have to Launson to 
 arm the Cornish "—z.^. , for the Prince's service. [Moderate Intel- 
 ligencer, Jan. 1-8, 1646, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, 
 vol. ccxxxix.) 
 
448 RO YALIST HORSE IN NORTH DE VON 
 
 holding posts on both sides of the Exe. The 
 Royalist army was now grouped in two divisions 
 separated by Dartmoor ; the one, principally of 
 Horse, occupying the country between the Dart and 
 the Teign ; the other, consisting of both Horse and 
 Foot, lying partly at and about Okehampton and 
 partly at Tavistock, where Prince Charles himself was 
 collecting all the loose contributions of men, money, 
 and supplies which could be obtained from the country 
 in his rear. During the latter half of the month of 
 December the central portion of North Devon had 
 been practically at the mercy of the Royalist Horse. 
 They had " guards " at Newnham Bridge and Kes- 
 ham Bridge on the river Taw; and the villages of 
 Roborough, Ashreigney, Burrington, Atherington, 
 and High Bickington were occupied by the troopers. 
 Not only were the soldiers living at free quarter, but by 
 equally summary exactions they extorted money and 
 supplies from the whole district within their power. 
 ''They demand," says one who writes from the spot, 
 '' 200/. of Moulton [South Molton] to be paid to the 
 Garrison of Barnstable as this day, besides great 
 store of provisions both to that place and the 
 Army." ^ The following extract is from one of the 
 peremptory warrants of Colonel Charles Fowkes, 
 issued Dec. 28, to the High Constables of the 
 Hundred of Witheridge, for the immediate raising 
 of one month's contribution for the use of the Army; 
 it illustrates the method : — 
 
 ' Moderate Intelligencer, Y^o. d,i,V><tz. 18-25, 1645, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxxxvii. 
 
AFFAIR AT BOW. 449 
 
 ' I can give your Constables but three dayes time after the 
 date hereof for the raysing of the money, and whosoever I 
 shall find negligent in the service or unwilling to pay his 
 rate, I shall severely punish him, or she \sic\^ and leave 
 them to the mercy of the common souldiers.^ 
 
 On Thursday, the 8th of January, the Parlia- 
 mentary army moved out of Tiverton, w^here its 
 head-quarters had been for more than a month, and 
 marched as far as Crediton. At the same time, 
 Colonel Sir Hardress Waller,^ who had been pre- 
 viously occupying Crediton, advanced with tw^o regi- 
 ments of Foot and executed a feint tov^ards Oke- 
 hampton. At Bow he came into collision with a 
 cavalry outpost of the Royalists' which he defeated, 
 after a sharp engagement, taking sixty prisoners. 
 
 On the same day, a detachment of the Plymouth 
 regiment of Horse 3 vv^as sent apparently to make a 
 reconnaissance farther West, and '^near Barnstaple" 
 succeeded in beating up the quarters of a party of 
 Sir Allen Apsley's Horse. This party seems to have 
 been posted at New Bridge 4 the lowest available 
 
 ^ Perfect Passages, &c., No. ^'i,, Dec. 31 [i645]-Jan. 6, 1646, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxxxviii. 
 
 ^ He was a cousin of the more eminent Sir William Waller. After- 
 wards, one of the regicides. 
 
 3 The Plymouth regiment, perhaps originally raised in South Devon, 
 had no connection at this particular time with the town of Plymouth, 
 as from its designation might be supposed. Its Colonel was Sir Francis 
 Drake, the second baronet, grand-nephew of the Admiral. It belonged 
 to Sir William Waller's old army, and was part of the surplus forces 
 drafted off for service in the West under Sir Thomas Fairfax when the 
 new model army was organized in the spring of 1645. (See Sprigge's 
 preliminary account of the state of the kingdom in his Anglia Rediviva^ 
 ed. 1647, also ed. 1854, p. xiii.) 
 
 ^ There are the foundations of two previous New Bridges visible in 
 
 30 
 
450 AFFAIR AT NEW BRIDGE. 
 
 passage of the river Taw, now that the bridge at 
 Barnstaple had been broken down. Sprigge makes 
 no mention of this affair in the body of his work, 
 but it occurs in the '' Table of the Motion and Action 
 of the Army," &c., appended at the end. The result 
 is there stated to have been that 80 prisoners with 
 their horses, 100 arms, and two colours were taken 
 from Sir Allen Apsley's party. Another account 
 which I have recovered gives some additional de- 
 tails, and differs in the number of prisoners taken: — 
 
 A party of horse of about 70 of Sir Francis Drake's 
 Regiment, a Phoenix sprung out of the ashes of that 
 myrrour of his time, old Sir Francis Drake, and as zealous 
 a lover of his Nation, who pursues the steps of honour by 
 Land for his Countries good as his predecessor did by Sea ; 
 this party of horse commanded by Col. Chuffin : The same 
 party of horse at Tauten [Bishop's Tawton] near Barn- 
 stable took 80 horse, 2 Colours, i Captaine, i Lieutenant, 
 26 Troopers, with much Baggage, without the losse of a 
 man ; this so alarm'd Barnstable, that they were possest 
 that more forces were comming to storm them suddenly, 
 which caused some of the enemies forces from about 
 Dartmouth to draw to the securing of that Town.^ 
 
 This extract is of considerable interest, irre- 
 spectively of its present connection. Allusions to 
 our great Devonian, the Elizabethan hero, Francis 
 Drake, are not common in the literature of the 
 seventeenth century. 
 
 the bed of the river lower down the stream, a short distance from the 
 present structure (which is modern). The writer remembers seeing 
 them often in old pleasant boating days on the Taw. 
 
 ^ The Kingdouis Weekly Intelligencer^ No. 136, Jan. 20-27, 1646, 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxliii. 
 
FAIRFAX'S ADVANCE, 451 
 
 It would appear that in consequence of the loss 
 sustained in this outpost affair, the garrison of 
 Barnstaple was reinforced ; but I have not found 
 any confirmation of the statement to that effect. 
 
 A brief description of the ensuing operations of 
 the Parliamentary army in South Devon is necessary, 
 in order to show how it came to pass that the forces 
 of Prince Charles were compelled to change front 
 and fall back upon North Devon. 
 
 On the 9th of January, the main body of Fairfax's 
 army resumed its advance in the direction of 
 Moreton Hampstead, a brigade of Horse and Foot, 
 under the command of Lieutenant-General Oliver 
 Cromwell, being detached in advance, on the left, 
 towards Bovey Tracey, which the scouts had re- 
 ported to be occupied by a strong party of the 
 enemy's Horse. After the early darkness of the 
 January evening had set in, Cromwell surprised and 
 fell upon this detachment, part of Lord Wentworth's 
 brigade, in the little town, capturing between three 
 and four hundred horses, which were in the stables, 
 and several colours. A few of the Royalist soldiers 
 were killed and others were taken prisoners ; but most 
 of them escaped on foot in the direction of Ashburton, 
 taking refuge for a time in Ilsington church, which 
 had been previously fortified, only to be speedily 
 dislodged. Meanwhile, Fairfax with the remainder 
 of his forces had reached Moreton Hampstead. By 
 reason of the frozen snow which covered the ground, 
 part of the train of ammunition carriages could be 
 got no farther than Great Fulford. On the following 
 day, the loth, in '' extreme bitter cold " weather, as 
 
452 DARTMOUTH, 
 
 Sprigge remarks, the whole army rendezvoused' on 
 Bovey Heathfield, and then marched to Ashburton, 
 from which the remainder of Wentworth's Brigade 
 was beaten out, and his Horse, which it took 
 little to demoralize, retreated in great confusion 
 towards Tavistock, communicating panic on the 
 way to Sir John Digby's force then blockading Ply- 
 mouth. 
 
 The seaport town of Dartmouth was at that time 
 held by a strong Royalist garrison, the Governor 
 of which was Sir Hugh Pollard, who had taken so 
 prominent a part in the transactions of the earlier 
 period of the war in North Devon. The defences of 
 Dartmouth had been considerably strengthened and 
 increased after the capture of the place by Prince 
 Maurice in October, 1643, since which time it had 
 remained in the possession of the Royalists. A large 
 detached earth-work on the height of Gallantry Bower, 
 and another smaller one on that of Kingswear, with 
 the mediaeval castles at the entrance of the harbour, 
 commanded the roadstead. Around Townstal church 
 and on Mount Boon were other works covering the 
 landward side of the town, which was otherwise 
 defended by a circuit of breastwork. Altogether 
 these fortifications mounted at least a hundred 
 guns, and were held by upwards of a thousand 
 men. 
 
 Dartmouth, deprived of the support of an army in 
 the field, invited attack ; and as a strategic position, 
 opening communication with the sea, it was an 
 object of the Parliamentarians to obtain possession 
 of it. Although it was impossible from the state of 
 
DAR TMO UTH STORMED, 4S1 
 
 the roads to bring up any artillery, Fairfax, on the 
 nth of January, summoned the garrison and recon- 
 noitred the defences. A few days were given to 
 the necessary preparations, and to enable Captain 
 Batten, with a squadron of the Parliamentary ships 
 in the Channel, to co-operate. In the night of 
 Sunday, the i8th, after, as usual, Mr. Hugh Peters 
 had in a vigorous and trenchant discourse " exhorted 
 the soldiers to their duty," Dartmouth was stormed. 
 Some men belonging to the town, who knew the 
 weak places in the defences, had been brought up 
 from Plymouth to direct the storming parties. 
 The town seems to have been carried by a rush 
 with scarcely any loss to the assailants. It does not 
 appear that the ships made any attempt upon the 
 seaward forts, but two hundred sailors were landed 
 and took part in the assault. Sir Henry Cary, 
 who occupied Kingswear Fort, obtained favourable 
 conditions on surrender, and was allowed to march 
 away with his regiment.^ Sir Hugh Pollard, who 
 was wounded whilst in a boat in the harbour, still 
 held Dartmouth Castle and Gallantry Bower, but on 
 the following day capitulated, and for the second, if 
 not third, time became a prisoner to the Parliament.^ 
 Two men-of-war lying in the harbour were captured. 
 One of these, of 200 tons burthen and carrying 12 
 guns, is stated to have belonged to the Governor of 
 
 ^ Sir Henry Cary, of Cockington. In Vivian's pedigree of the 
 Cary family he is stated to have ** alienated Cockington in his zeal for 
 Royalty." 
 
 = He survived the Restoration, and became Comptroller of the House- 
 hold to Charles H. 
 
454 EXETER SUMMONED, 
 
 Barnstaple. This was undoubtedly James Apsley's 
 ship, which, as we have seen, not a month before, 
 he was intending to bring round. The schemes 
 of this enterprising young Cavalier were therefore 
 nipped in the bud, and his man-of-war passes out 
 of history. 
 
 After this success, which Sir Thomas Fairfax, in 
 his dispatch to the House of Lords, described with 
 the peculiar Puritanical fervour now so difficult to 
 understand — and he was not an extreme Puritan — 
 as " a sweet mercy of God," the army returned to 
 Totnes.^ 
 
 Sprigge mentions that at Totnes a '' consultation 
 was held about Barnstable," from which it would 
 appear that the reduction of the stronghold in North 
 Devon was already considered strategically desirable; 
 but the immediate resolution taken by Sir Thomas 
 Fairfax was the resumption of the siege of Exeter. 
 On Monday, the 2Sth of January, in pursuance of 
 this resolution, the army was marched to Chudleigh, 
 where for the next fortnight the General established 
 his head-quarters. Powderham Castle had surren- 
 dered to Colonel Hammond, the Parliamentary officer, 
 on the 24th. 
 
 Exeter was summoned on the 27th of January, and 
 some parleying took place ; but Sir John Berkeley, 
 
 ^ There came in here, in answer to Fairfax's warrants, about three 
 thousand men, out of whom a regiment of vohmteers was raised and 
 incorporated with the ParHamentary army (Sprigge's Anglia Rediviva, 
 ed. 1647, p. 176, ed. 1854, p. 185). Its Colonel, Fowel, afterwards 
 succeeded his father as Sir John P'owel, Bart., of Fowelscombe, 
 Ugborough. He married a daughter of Sir John Chichester, of 
 Hall. 
 
THREA TENING MO VEMENTS 45 5 
 
 the Governor of the garrison, having been promised 
 early relief by Prince Charles, held out no prospect 
 of his surrendering. Preparations were therefore 
 ordered by Fairfax for an assault. While these were 
 in progress, however, the work was arrested by 
 disquieting news from North Devon of a movement 
 of the Prince's army towards Barnstaple and, simul- 
 taneously, from Dorsetshire, of another body of 
 Royalist Horse advancing from Oxford, and it was 
 of the utmost importance that their junction with 
 each other should be prevented. ' Upon this intelli- 
 gence, Fairfax detached Colonel Cook with three 
 regiments of Horse of Massey's Brigade to watch 
 the enemy in North Devon; but, a few days later, 
 this detachment was recalled and sent in the opposite 
 direction to check the threatened approach of the 
 Oxford Horse, which however turned out to be 
 little more than a scare. While this marching and 
 countermarching was going on, the Royalist forces 
 were spreading over North Devon, and to their 
 transactions there it will be convenient again to 
 turn. 
 
 The well-known work of Joshua Sprigge is pro- 
 fessedly the history *' of the Motions, Actions, and 
 Successes of the Army under the immediate conduct 
 of his Excellency Sir Thomas Fairfax, Kt." So far, 
 the author, who accompanied the army, is an invalu- 
 able guide to the history of this campaign. By an 
 equally favourable chance a more famous historian 
 was taking notes at the same time in the opposite 
 camp. It is now desirable io glean from the pages 
 
456 PRINCE CHARLES'S ARMY CHANGES FRONT, 
 
 of Lord Clarendon what was the state of prepared- 
 ness of the Prince of Wales's army in the present 
 altered circumstances. 
 
 Lord Wentworth's Horse and Foot, retiring in the 
 greatest disorder after the shocks that they had 
 received at Bovey and Ashburton, made their way 
 by the southern skirts of Dartmoor to Tavistock, at 
 that time Prince Charles's head-quarters. The pro- 
 bability, which soon became a certainty, that Totnes 
 was already in the possession of Fairfax, and the 
 hopelessness of any attempt to recover the lost 
 ground, finally disposed of the plan of an advance in 
 that direction. So grave was the position considered, 
 that Tavistock was not thought to be safe quarters 
 for the Prince, and he was advised to retreat to 
 Launceston, whither consequently he withdrew with 
 the Foot, many of whom, being Cornishmen, were 
 already deserting. The whole of the Royalist Horse 
 remained on the Devonshire side of the Tamar, their 
 quarters extending to Holsworthy and Okehampton. 
 With regard to the persistent jealousies among the 
 commanders. Lord Clarendon sarcastically remarks 
 that ** there were now drawn together in one action 
 against the enemy " the separate forces of Went- 
 worth, Grenville, and Digby, not one of whom 
 acknowledged the superiority of either of the others. 
 As for the subordinate ranks, his disclosure, if 
 candid, is perhaps attributable to a certain bitterness 
 with which he afterwards reviewed this exacerbating 
 crisis in the affairs of his party ; it was, he says, " a 
 dissolute, undisciplined, wicked, beaten army ; . . . 
 both officer and soldier were desirous to take any 
 
RO YALIST POSTS IN NORTH DEVON 457 
 
 occasion and to find any excuse to lay down their 
 arms." I This was probably true enough, and it 
 illustrates the temper which characterized the sub- 
 sequent proceedings of the demoralized parties of 
 Royalist Horse which, until the middle of February, 
 pervaded North Devon, harassing the already much- 
 distracted people by their exactions and rapine. 
 Their erratic movements are to be traced, not 
 without considerable difficulty, by the aid of the 
 contemporary intelligencers. 
 
 On Sunday, the nth of January, there had been 
 a rendezvous of the Prince's Horse appointed at 
 Bradbury Castle, a prehistoric earth-work between 
 Okehampton and Holsworthy, from which is obtained 
 a magnificent view over the greater part of North 
 Devon reaching to the blue hills of Exmoor in the 
 distance. There, the more devoted of the Cavaliers 
 might well have thought now lay the path of honour 
 and loyalty — the way to the King ! Some of this 
 party pushed forward to Torrington, where, on the 
 15th, there were "neare one thousand Horse . . . with 
 billets to quarter thereabouts, but they returned back 
 westward to Monkleigh, Bradworthy, Sutcombe and 
 parishes adjoining." 2 Some of those left behind in 
 Torrington seem to have been a mere rabble, as they 
 were cleared out of the town by the Mayor with the 
 assistance of some half-score musketeers sent to him 
 for the purpose by Captain Chester, one of Sir Allen 
 
 * History of the Rebellion, p. 619 ^. 
 
 2 A Continuation of Certai7i Speciall and Remarkable Passages, &c. , 
 No. 19, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxliii. 
 
458 CLUBMEN. 
 
 Apsley's officers apparently quartered with a Foot 
 company at Bideford.^ 
 
 On the i6th, the remainder of Wentworth's Horse 
 (still occasionally called '' Goring's " in the contem- 
 porary accounts), which had effected a disorderly 
 retreat after the affair at Ashburton on the loth, 
 came up and occupied Holsworthy. These were the 
 brigades of Lords Cleveland and Colepepper and what 
 was left of Lord Wentworth's own brigade. They 
 established themselves in the neighbouring villages, 
 posting strong guards at ** High Bainton, Goulden 
 Inn, Waggoner Bridge and Higher Gosh " — places 
 which possibly may be still identified.^ In these 
 quarters they remained for a week or more, eating 
 up the produce of the district and committing the 
 greatest excesses. *^ The Towne of Holsworthy," 
 says one correspondent, ^' is almost ruined by their 
 plunder, quarter, and fiering their Household-stuffe." 3 
 Another says " they have murthered five Country 
 men in their houses." 4 The latter piece of intelli- 
 gence may have been an exaggeration. However, 
 the license which ensued was sufficiently exasperating 
 to call up another apparition of Clubmen, who, in 
 this remote district, from the parishes of Hartland, 
 Woolfardisworthy, Parkham, Clovelly, Morwenstow, 
 and Kilkhampton, to the number of 700, it is stated, 
 
 ^ Perfect Occurrences^ 8cc., week ending January 30, 1646, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxliii. 
 
 ^ Perfect Passages, &c., Jan. 21-27, 1646, ibid. "High Bainton" 
 is of course High Heanton, now by Post -official authority " Highamp- 
 ton." 
 
 3 The Copie of a^iother Letter y &c., King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 
 4tos, vol. ccxliii. 
 
 4 The Moderate Intelligeiicer, No. 47, Jan. 22-29, 1646, ibid. 
 
RO YALIST HORSE IN NORTH DEVON, 459 
 
 were in armed resistance, encouraged thereto by- 
 Colonel Gary (of Clovelly), a Cavalier.^ 
 
 *' They say they must break through to the King 
 whatsoever hazard they run," is the report more 
 than once made by the Parliamentary scouts. By 
 the end of the month of January, Cleveland's brigade 
 had moved farther east.^ Its advanced guard of a 
 hundred Horse was holding Hansford Bridge, over 
 which the road from Burrington to Chulmleigh 
 crossed the Taw, and were demanding from the 
 latter town a contribution of ten pounds a day, one 
 half in money and the other half in provisions. 
 A party of Barnstaple Horse was on guard at 
 Brightley {ix., Umberleigh) Bridge, a few miles 
 lower down the stream — '* The country people in 
 those parts do make grievous complaints of the 
 enemies souldiers' cruelties." 3 Colonel Fookes (or 
 Fowkes), already mentioned, lay with three hun- 
 dred Horse at Brightley (Colonel Gifford's house). 
 He had extracted ^^200 from Chulmleigh. The 
 head-quarters were at **the Lord of Bathes house at 
 
 ' Perfect Occurrences^ No 5, week ending 30 Jan. 1646, King's Pam- 
 phlets, B.M., small 4tos, vol. ccxliii. It may have been at this time that 
 a son of Sir Peter Osborne, of Chicksands, Bart., was mortally wounded 
 — " killed at Hartland in some skirmish of which no trace remains " — 
 mentioned in the memoir prefixed to the charming letters of his sister 
 Dorothy recently published. The young soldier seems to have found a 
 friend in Nicholas Monk, the rector of Kilkhampton and brother of the 
 more famous George Monk, afterwards Duke of Albemarle [Letters from 
 Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Tefnple, 1652-54. Edited by Edward 
 Abbot Parry). 
 
 ^ *' Captayne James Linge " was buried January 30 at Buckland Brewer 
 — Parish Register. (For this I am indebted to the Rev. J. Ingle Dredge.) 
 
 3 The Kingdom^ s Weekly Intelligencer^ No. 137, Jan. 27-Feb. 3, 
 1646, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxliv. 
 
46o AFFAIR A T BURRINGTON, 
 
 N. Tavestock "— one of the metamorphoses to which, 
 the word Tawstock has been subjected.^ 
 
 On the ist of February, a party of Sir Francis 
 Drake's Plymouth regiment, which seems to have 
 been still on outpost duty in the neighbourhood, 
 under the command of Major Stephens, fell upon the 
 Royalist Horse at Burrington, taking an officer and 
 all the troopers, variously stated as from twenty to 
 forty in number, prisoners.^ The indefatigable cor- 
 respondent who signed himself " W. C", which 
 stood for William Clarke, one of the two clerks of 
 Mr. John Rushworth, Secretary to Sir Thomas Fair- 
 fax, writing from the Parliamentary head-quarters at 
 Chudleigh on the following day, sends in addition 
 to an account of the skirmish, further particulars 
 which are of some interest to us : — 
 
 I found the West country indeed craggy, and the people 
 and entertainment for the most part crabbed . . . this 
 morning we have certain Advertisement that they plundered 
 in Chimleigh yesterday the worth of Five hundred pounds, 
 and returned to their quarters, there were not above three 
 or four hundred of them, and they were gone by the morn- 
 ing. Barstaple horse have contracted their Quarters into 
 Newport neer the Town, having left Tauton their former 
 Quarters ; for Goring's horse have advanced their Quarters 
 East as far as Brauton [? Bratton Fleming] and Bray ; they 
 returned yesterday morning into North-Tavestock, Alschot, 
 
 ' Mercurius Civicus^ No. 141, Jan. 29-Feb. 4, r^U, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxliv. 
 
 ^ Sprigge's Anglia Rediviva^ ed. 1647, p. 181, ed. 1854, p. 189. 
 The Khigdom^s Weekly hitelligencer^ No. 138, Feb. 3-10, 1646, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxlvi. 
 
LORD HOPTON TAKES COMMAND, 461 
 
 and keep a Guard at Newbridge over the River-Tau, three 
 miles on this side Barstaple, they have also placed a Guard 
 at Wlnckley Beacon, and they were (as this day) to receive 
 at Sunbridge [Swimbridge] and the parishes adjoyning, six 
 weeks pay, and afterwards the proportion of a weeks pay 
 every day. , . ."V 
 
 Chidley, Feb. 2. 1645 [/>., 1646]. 
 
 Some of these movements w^ere probably mere 
 foraging expeditions. The Royalist troopers paid 
 for nothing and consequently had to go farther and 
 farther for supplies, and the country which had been 
 swept by Goring in September and October was not 
 likely to have much left for the next comers. 
 
 The settlement of the various questions arising 
 out of the jealousies and personal rivalries of the 
 Royalist commanders was a difficult task which fell 
 upon the Prince of Wales's Council at Launceston, 
 It was finally in this wise : Lord Hopton, himself 
 one of the Council, the high-minded, disinterested, 
 and irreproachable Cavalier, who had already done 
 great, if not always brilliant, service in the royal 
 cause, was induced to take the command in chief of 
 ^the- Prince's army. By the Prince's orders, Lord 
 Wentworth was to command the Horse, Sir Richard 
 .Grenville all the Foot, and Lord Capel the Prince's 
 Guards, all under Lord Hopton. Even this arrange- 
 ment was not felicitous. Wentworth demurred, but 
 ultimately yielded. Grenville refused to act as sub- 
 ordinate to any one, and was in consequence put 
 
 ^ Sir Thomas Fairfax's Proceedings^ &c. . . . The Prince'' s Horse 
 forced back towards Barnstable, &c., London : Printed for Matthew 
 Walbank, Feb. 9, 1645 [1646], King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, 
 vol. ccxlvi. 
 
462 SIR RICHARD GRENVILLE. 
 
 under arrest in Launceston Castle; a proceeding 
 which Lord Clarendon thought it necessary to justify 
 at large in his History of the Rebellion, 
 
 As Sir Richard Grenville, than whom there was 
 no more remarkable character of the period, in 
 Devonshire, disappears at this point from the scene 
 of his various misdeeds, I may here in a few words 
 complete his story. According to his own account,^ 
 a warrant was actually signed for consigning him as 
 a prisoner to Barnstaple ; but as the course of events 
 rendered this impracticable, his destination was 
 altered to St. Michael's Mount, from whence he was 
 shortly afterwards allowed to convey himself to the 
 Continent. Sir Edward Hyde, writing in his retire- 
 ment at Jersey to Sir Edward Nicholas, a few months 
 afterwards, commented on the incident of Grenville's 
 arrest as follows : — ** For the imprysoning of S^ 
 Richard Grenvile (who is most unworthy of y^ repu- 
 tacon he had) we were absolutely necessitated to 
 it. . . . We had no reason to believe his interest in 
 y"' county soe great; neither in truth was it ; but y^ 
 genall indisposicon w''^ at y^ time possessed men 
 was very apparent, when those very men who 
 complayned against him and seemed to despise 
 him, tooke occasion to grumble at his removal!." ^ 
 The observation at the close will not surprise any 
 one who has lived long enough to have experienced 
 this peculiar form of the perversity of human nature. 
 Sir Richard Grenville was so odious to the Parlia- 
 
 ' **Sir Richard Grenville's Narrative of the Proceedings of his 
 Majesty's affairs in the West of England," &c., Carte's Letters, i. 96. 
 "" Clarendon MSS. Printed in Lister's Life of Clarendon^ iii. 38. 
 
PRINCE CHARLES AND THE CHURCH. 463 
 
 ment that he was afterwards expressly named as one 
 of the seven proposed to be excluded from pardon in 
 the treaty at Newport ; and, under the Protectorate, 
 in a secret article of a treaty with France for the 
 mutual exclusion from the two countries of certain 
 obnoxious persons, he was one of twenty so indicated. 
 He died in exile in the year 1658. '' He lies buried 
 in a church at Ghent, with this inscription only 
 upon a plain stone : — 
 
 Sir Richard Granville, 
 The King's General in the West." ^ 
 
 In all his campaigns, whether in garrison or in 
 the field. King Charles had never intermitted the 
 observance of the offices of the Church of England 
 and respect for its hierarchy. The Council of the 
 Prince of Wales, even under the stress of the cir- 
 cumstances which now involved them, appear to 
 have religiously followed the illustrious example. 
 The following missive, sent at this time to the 
 Vicar of Okehampton, has survived : — 
 
 ' *' A Vindication of Sir Richard Granville, General in the West for 
 King Charles the First, from the Misrepresentations of the Earl of 
 Clarendon, and the reverend Mr. Archdeacon Echard" in The Ge7iuine 
 Works in Verse and Prose of the Right Ho7iourable George Granville Lord 
 Lansdowne^ London, 1732. Lord Lansdowne, who was Sir Richard 
 Grenville's grand-nephew, is responsible for the change in the mode of 
 spelling the family name. The inscription was obviously written by 
 Lord Lansdowne himself. The church in which the monumental stone 
 was placed has not been identified, and I have been informed by a 
 correspondent at Ghent that nothing is now known of it there. It was 
 Lord Lansdowne who erected the sumptuous monument in Kilkhamp- 
 ton church to his grandfather, Sir Bevill Grenville, and also the 
 memorial on the battle-field of Stratton, to the inscription on which I 
 have already adverted. 
 
464 HOPTON RESOLVED TO ADVANCE. 
 
 After our hearty comendacons Whereas we shall all- 
 wayes endeavor and shall esteeme it y^ greatest ornament 
 and support of our Court and Campe to have about Us y^ 
 most Vertuous and able men of all Professions and Con- 
 dicons, but especially of Divines, by whose good examples 
 and preaching y^ rest may be reformed and made better. 
 These are therefore (being informed that you are a Grave, 
 Learned, and Orthodoxe Divine) to desire & require you 
 for y^ purpose aforesaid to give yo"" attendance upon Vs for 
 some tyme, after which we shall dismisse you to yo"" other 
 occasions. And so we bid yo"" heartily Farewell. Given 
 at Our Court at Lanceston y^ i^^ of February, 1645 [/.<?., 
 1646]. 
 
 Charles P.^ 
 To M'' Richard Mervin, 
 
 Batchelo'^ in Divinity, 
 
 at Okehampton or elsewhere. 
 
 " Certain Prayers fitted to Severall occasions To 
 be used in his Majesties Armies and Garrisons. 
 Published by His Highnesse Command " — had been 
 printed in Exeter somewhat earlier. 
 
 Notwithstanding that the plans of Prince Charles's 
 Council had been further disconcerted by the sudden 
 fall of Dartmouth on the i8th of January, the re- 
 solution, to which Lord Hopton adhered, of advancing 
 from Launceston with all the forces that could be 
 collected for the relief of Exeter, w^as confirmed ; 
 and the remainder of the month was devoted 
 to preparations for carrying the resolution into 
 effect. 
 
 ^ Devonshire Notes a7id Notelets, by Sir W. R, Drake, p. 2. Mr. 
 Mervin was afterwards (1660) Chancellor of Exeter Cathedral, in 1661 
 Rector of Heanton Punchardon and a D.D., and died in 1669. 
 
DUNSTER CASTLE RELIEVED. 465 
 
 But before those preparations were matured a 
 detached expedition was undertaken which is not 
 the least interesting of the military transactions of 
 this period in North Devon. *' During my stay at 
 Launceston/' Lord Hopton states in his own narra- 
 tive, " I sent a party with a good considerable relief 
 to Dunster Castle, commanded by Col. Finch, who 
 performed it very well." ^ Dunster Castle was 
 then held by a Royalist garrison under Colonel 
 Francis Wyndham, who subsequently assisted 
 Charles the Second in his escape after the battle 
 of Worcester. Since the beginning of January 
 the castle had been closely besieged by Colonel 
 Robert Blake, who had been set free, since his pro- 
 tracted and brilliant defence of Taunton, for other 
 services to the cause of the Parliament. Blake had 
 undermined and endeavoured to blow up the walls of 
 the fortress, but without success. A highly apocryphal 
 story which first appeared in the Gentleman's Maga- 
 zine, 1823, pt. i. p. 494, relates to this period. It is 
 stated that the Parliamentarians threatened to ex- 
 pose Colonel Wyndham's mother, whom they had in 
 their power, to the guns of the castle unless the 
 garrison yielded ; which threat both mother and son 
 piously and patriotically derided. The garrison, was 
 reduced to the greatest straits when the party of 
 some one thousand five hundred Horse and Foot, 
 convoying ammunition and live stock, was detailed 
 by Lord Hopton to its relief. It appears that five 
 hundred of these troops were drawn from the garrison 
 
 ' *'Lord Hopton's Relation of the Proceedings in the West of Eng- 
 land," &c., Carte's Z^//^?'j, i. 110. 
 
 31 
 
466 D UNS TER CASTLE RE LIE VED. . 
 
 of Barnstaple. I In a letter written at Fairfax's head- 
 quarters on the 26th of January, from which I have 
 already quoted, Mr. William Clarke reports that 
 *' Collonel Finche's Regiment is drawne Northward 
 toward Bediford and Barnstable." The design was 
 of course not suspected ; but we may gather from 
 this piece of intelligence that the detachment was 
 then on its way from Launceston to Barnstaple 
 where it was to be reinforced as otherwise appears. 
 Whether the convoy then proceeded by the more direct 
 and safer route across Exmoor, or by way of South 
 Molton and Dulverton, is not apparent. It was an 
 adventurous undertaking ; but the interval had been 
 opportunely taken of the withdrawal of Colonel 
 Cook's brigade, and nothing more formidable than 
 the weak Plymouth regiment was in that part of 
 North Devon, and this appears to have been eluded. 
 On the approach of the relieving force Blake was 
 obliged to draw off, and the garrison of the castle 
 was successfully relieved -and revictualled on the 
 5th of February. Blake skirmished with the rear 
 of Finch's party as they retired and then renewed 
 the blockade. On the news of this successful exploit 
 reaching the Parliamentary head-quarters on the 
 same day, orders were promptly sent recalling 
 Colonel Cook from Dorsetshire. ^ 
 
 ^ " There was but 800 Horse that went to relieve Dunster and 500 
 Fijot which were of Barnstaple" {The Moderate Intelligencer^ No. 50, 
 Feb. 12-18, 1646, King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxlvi.). 
 Several of the news-writers mention the return of this contingent to 
 Barnstaple. 
 
 ' **Lord Hopton's Relation." Sprigge's Anglia Rediviva, ed. 1647, 
 
PRINCE CHARLES'S ARMY. 467 
 
 It was not until the first week of February that 
 the Foot regiments of Prince Charles's army were in 
 marching order — if marching order it may be termed, 
 when expected reinforcements and supplies were 
 still wanting and sufficient transport could not be 
 obtained. Launceston had been plundered of all its 
 provisions, and for ammunition the lead had been 
 stripped froni the cTiurch and town-hall.^ The fol- 
 lowing is an abstract of Lord Hopton's own state- 
 ment of the fighting strength of the army of which 
 he had assumed the command, made from his own 
 " Relation " :— 
 
 Foot 
 
 Of Guards about ... ... ... ... 240 
 
 General Digby's broken regiment about... 500 
 
 Cornish regiments that were under Sir 
 
 Richard Grenville, about 550 
 
 Col. Slaughter's and Col. Wise's regiments, 
 
 about ... ... .'.. ... ••• 400 
 
 The train-bands of Cornwall ''shrunk to 
 nothing in effect, there remaining with 
 me only Sir Chichester Wrey, Col. 
 Richard Arundel, and Col. Jonathan 
 Trelawney, with about 150 men between 
 the three" 150 
 
 1,840 
 
 "These were all the Foot I had." 
 
 p. 181 ; ed. 1854, p. 190. *' Siege and Surrender of Dunster Castle, 
 1645-6," by Emanuel Gxttn,' Arc hcEO logical Journal, xxxvii. 386. 
 ^ Nehemiah Wallington's Historical Notices, ii. 275. 
 
468 LORD HOPTON'S PLANS. 
 
 Horse, 
 
 The Princess Guards, " a very handsome 
 body of men and very exact upon duty " 
 (commanded by Lord Capel), about ... 800 
 
 Lord Wentworth's (late Goring's) ] not 
 exact upon duty, "which was indeed 
 one great cause of our misfortune," ac- 
 counted about ... ... ... ... 2,500 
 
 3»3oo 
 
 Artillery, 
 
 « None." 
 
 Total of all arms ... 5,140 
 
 The actual numbers were probably understated. 
 Sir Edvi^ard Hyde w^ho, it may be supposed, was in 
 possession of good information, writing to the Queen 
 in the middle of February, informed her that Lords 
 Hopton and Capel had with them 6,800 Horse and 
 Foot.^ The truth probably lies between the two esti- 
 mates. The demoralized condition of the Royalist 
 forces apparent in Lord Hopton's statement, it is 
 now almost needless to say, was chiejfly owing to those 
 dissensions among the commanding officers which 
 had become chronic and which the Prince's Council, 
 to all appearance, had rather aggravated than 
 appeased. These dissensions had, in Hopton's 
 words, " bred a general unwieldiness amongst them 
 both officers and soldiers." The Prince's Council, 
 evidently thinking that matters had reached that pass 
 when now or never something should be done, urged 
 
 ' Calendar of Clarendon State Papers^ i. 303. 
 
BARNSTAPLE THE SUPPOSED AIM, 469 
 
 an immediate advance. As it was not considered 
 safe in the circumstances for the Prince to accom- 
 pany the army, he removed from Launceston to 
 Truro. 
 
 Lord Hopton, with the Foot, left Launceston on 
 the 6th of February and marched to Stratton, 
 Nearly three years before he had led another Royalist 
 army — then an enthusiastic one — over the same 
 ground. Whether or not the Prince's horse-guards 
 (under Lord Capel), of whose action no mention 
 has been made, accompanied the Foot is not 
 stated. Wentworth's Horse, by estimate the major 
 part of the Prince's army, were already, as we 
 have seen, occupying the country between Hols- 
 worthy and Barnstaple with advanced posts as far 
 east as Chulmleigh. 
 
 The military considerations which induced Lord 
 Hopton to adopt a circuitous route to Exeter when 
 the direct road through Okehampton lay open to him 
 are not quite obvious. His own avowed object was 
 to get between Barnstaple and the enemy. Sir 
 Thomas Fairfax, on the other hand, divined, it seems 
 correctly, that Hopton's intention was to secure 
 Barnstaple as a basis for subsequent operations for 
 the relief of Exeter and to cover the landing of 
 supplies from Ireland or Wales ** so much the 
 forwarder towards the East." ^ Each of these dis- 
 tinguished commanders was therefore under the 
 impression that his opponent was aiming at Barn- 
 staple. 
 
 ' Sprigge's Anglia Rediviva^ ed. 1647, p. 189; ed. 1854, p. 198. 
 
470 SIR ALLEN APS LEY'S MANDATE, 
 
 We know that Sir Allen Apsley had promised a 
 contingent from his garrison of 500 men for the 
 Prince's army. He was now endeavouring to sweep 
 into his stronghold supplies and contributions of 
 money for its purposes from the surrounding country. 
 The following is a copy of his mandate to one of the 
 Hundreds, with the significant and well-understood 
 threat in case of non-compliance in its tail : — 
 
 Whereas I have received expresse order and command 
 from his Highnesse Prince Charles, for the leavying and 
 collecting of the weekly rates of your Hundred of South- 
 Moulton, which I am to imploy for the buying and making 
 of provisions for the use and supply of his Highnesse his 
 Army, and have straight charge given me from his Highnesse 
 to effect this with all speed I can ; I do hereby therefore 
 require you forthwith to issue forth your Warrants to all the 
 petty Constables of your Hundred straightly charging them 
 that they faile not to collect and bring three weekes contribu- 
 tion of their severall Parishes in money or wheat, which they 
 are to pay and deliver in to William Gouldesborough, at the 
 Fort of Barnstaple, by Munday next at the furthest ; and 
 if any of your Parishes shall faile in the payment and full 
 performance hereof by the time appointed, they must expect 
 to have a party of my Lord Gorings Horse sent to them 
 for the bringing in of the same. Given under my hand at 
 Barnstaple this 8 of February, 1646. 
 
 Allen Apsley.^ 
 
 To the High Constable of the Hundred 
 of South-Moulton. 
 
 •v 
 
 The motive of the advance by way of Barnstaple 
 being assumed, it is still not easy to understand 
 
 ' Perfect Passages, &c., No. 69, Feb. II-18, 1646, King's Tamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxlvi. 
 
HOPTON'S ADVANCE TO TORRINGTON. 471 
 
 the meaning of the divergent direction of Lord 
 Hopton's first day*s march to Stratton. The ex- 
 planation from his own account, if to the ordinary 
 perception inadequate, is at least curious: **We 
 moved to Stratton with scarce half of our ammuni- 
 tion, materials or provisions ; hoping that our 
 advance would facilitate that business in the country 
 [county, i,e,, Cornwall] so that the rest would come 
 speedily after us. But that hope failing, the like 
 opinion of the Sheriff and Gentlemen of Cornwall 
 that the country would supply us willingly, being 
 march'd out of it, carried us to Torrington the loth 
 of the same month." ^ The Cornish people were, 
 in fact, anxious to get rid of their friends ; after the 
 Royalist Horse had crossed the Tamar they fortified 
 the bridges to prevent their return.^ To obtain 
 supplies from a country not yet made altogether a 
 desert was probably the primary object of the day's 
 march. It was reported that Hopton's troops 
 escorted from Stratton *' much cattle and sheep 
 which, with salt and other provisions that were to 
 come from Barnstaple, were for the relief of 
 Exeter." 3 
 
 The Royalist troops are stated to have made a 
 forced march from Stratton to Torrington, ** being 
 eighteen large miles" in one day. This was the 
 loth of February. Having occupied Torrington, 
 Lord Hopton determined to remain there until his 
 
 ' " Relation of the Proceedings," &c., Carfe's Letters, i. no. 
 
 2 Perfect Passages, &c., Jan. 21-27, 1646, King's Pamphlets, B. M. 
 small 4tos, vol. ccxliii. 
 
 3 Sprigge's Atiglia Rediviva, ed. 1647, p. 182; ed. 1854, p. 192. 
 
472 TORRINGTON OCCUPIED, 
 
 expected reinforcements of men and supplies of pro- 
 visions had come up, and to hold it; although it does 
 not appear that he had much reason at that time to 
 apprehend any immediate attack. The Foot were 
 distributed in the town, and the Horse, as they 
 came in to the rendezvous, were disposed in the 
 outskirts and neighbouring villages. Major-General 
 Webb was quartered at Huntshaw and Lord Went- 
 worth at Wear-Giffard, Mr. Fortescue's house. Two 
 or three days later, warning came that the Parlia- 
 mentary forces were on the move ; and measures 
 of defence were taken, by entrenching and barricad- 
 ing the approaches, by making *' little fastnesses '* 
 — whatever that may mean — (according to the 
 account of Sir Richard Bulstrode, who was present), 
 and by felling trees across the roads, to obstruct 
 access to the town. ** All the ovens were made hot 
 to dry the match which had got wet." ^ 
 
 We left the head-quarters of the Parliamentary 
 army at Chudleigh, at a time when distracting cir- 
 cumstances compelled the postponement of any 
 further attempt upon Exeter by way of assault. As 
 one of the issues of that distraction, it had already 
 been in contemplation to send a detachment into 
 North Devon for the *' straightning '* of Barn- 
 staple, to obtain " better conveniency of quarter," 
 and to suppress there the parties of the enemy's 
 Horse which '* miserably oppressed the country." ^ 
 
 ^ The Moderate Intelligencer, No. 50, Feb. 12-18, 1646, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxlvi. 
 
 "^ Sprigge's Anglia Rediviva, ed. 1647, p. 182 ; ed. 1854, pp. 190-1. 
 
MARCH OF THE PARLIAMENTARY ARMY, 473 
 
 It was now resolved to continue the blockade of 
 Exeter, and to draw the bulk of the forces towards 
 Crediton — ** with purpose [writes Sir Thomas Fair- 
 fax to. Mr. Speaker Lenthal] to advance into the 
 North of Devonshire also, either by the taking of 
 Barnstable, or by blocking of it up, and raising a 
 Force in that wel-affected corner to keep it in, so as 
 having all cleer or made fast behind me, I might the 
 better follow the remaining Field-Forces of the 
 Enemy into Cornwal." ^ 
 
 Just at this time, intercepted letters from Lord 
 Wentworth to Sir John Berkeley, the Governor of 
 Exeter, revealed Lord Hopton^s intended movement. 
 The Parliamentary generals at once resolved to 
 advance into North Devon without delay ; and, con- 
 sequently, leaving Sir Hardress Waller to watch the 
 blockade of Exeter, Fairfax and Cromwell broke up 
 their head-quarters at Chudleigh on the loth of 
 February, the very day on which Hopton reached 
 Torrington, and marched with the army to Crediton. 
 It does not appear from Sir Thomas Fairfax's letter 
 that he was at that time aware that Lord Hopton had 
 left Launceston.2 
 
 ' Letter printed in Sprigge's Anglia Rediviva^ ed. 1647* p- 188 ; 
 ed. 1854, p. 197-203. 
 
 "^ Colonel Edward Wogan, in his " Proceedings of the New-moulded 
 Army," &c., printed in Carte's Letters (i. 126), throws a further and a 
 rather different light upon this crisis. He states that it had been already 
 agreed that the (Parliamentary) Army should go into winter quarters ; 
 that this had been actually done — most of the Horse sent back into 
 Somersetshire, the Foot placed about Chudleigh and Crediton, and 
 General Massey's Brigade placed about Barnstaple. He adds that all 
 this was changed by the General's receipt of an important letter from a 
 concealed source, pointing out that there were great divisions in the 
 King's Army in Cornwall, that the Prince's Council were divided, that 
 
474 CHULMLEIGH OCCUPIED, 
 
 On Saturday, the 14th of February, the Parlia- 
 mentary army, forming a flying column, the whole of 
 the baggage train being left at Crediton and nothing 
 in the way of ammunition being taken but what could 
 be carried on pack-horses, was again on the march, 
 and on the same day reached Chulmleigh. Here the 
 position of the enemy in force at Torrington seems 
 to have been first learnt, 
 
 Chulmleigh, a country town of the smallest class 
 consisting of not many more than a hundred houses, 
 stands on the summit of a ridge of high ground, 
 along which then passed the only high road from 
 Exeter and Crediton to Barnstaple, and remains 
 probably but little changed since the seventeenth 
 century. In shape it is like the heraldic mill-rind, 
 the centre being a small market -square scarcely 
 large enough for the muster of five hundred men. 
 This was not the first time, as we have seen, that 
 its serenity was disturbed by the passage of military 
 forces, nor had it been exempt from military exac- 
 tions. To such an army as that which now invaded 
 it the quarters offered must have been scanty enough. 
 The spacious parish church was doubtless filled with 
 soldiers, as was customary during the war, who 
 lighted their watch-fires on the floor. The few great 
 houses in the immediate neighbourhood of the town 
 — CoUiton, the old manor-house, still standing, of 
 the Bury family; Affeton Castle, now in ruins, the 
 
 the Prince himself intended privately to leave the kingdom, and that if 
 the Army " would advance speedily and take the present advantage they 
 might have by reason of those distractions, he [Fairfax] might without 
 doubt have his desire.'* 
 
CHULMLEIGH^ 475 
 
 ancient seat of the Stukeleys ; King's Nympton, the 
 house of Sir Hugh Pollard, and Eggesford, the house 
 of Lord Chichester, both since destroyed — were pro- 
 bably occupied, and their resources requisitioned by 
 the horse-soldiery. The rector, Master Christopher 
 Baitson, A.M., who was a *' malignant " minister, of 
 course kept aloof — he was afterwards sequestered for 
 having refused the Covenant, and because he had 
 harboured and armed the King's soldiers.^ On that 
 Sunday on which Fairfax's troops occupied Chulm- 
 leigh, the cherished afternoon discourse, we may be 
 sure, was held forth by Hugh Peters, the Puritan 
 zealot and jocular preacher, who attended the army. 
 He it was who once said to his hearers, as the sand 
 of the hour-glass at his elbow ran low, " I know you 
 are good fellows; stay and take the other glass ! "^ 
 
 Those who are so disposed may, without any 
 daring stretch of the imagination, realize to the 
 mind's eye a group of remarkable men, all con- 
 spicuous in the political history of their country 
 within the next few years, who now, grim and 
 earnest in the business to which they had set their 
 hands, had gathered in the darkening shadows of 
 evening in that country church to catch the words 
 of the zealous preacher. There, highest in military 
 rank, although twelve years younger than Cromwell 
 his lieutenant-general, was Fairfax — tall of stature, 
 with features dark and strongly marked, and cheek 
 showing an ugly scar got at Marston Moor. Of his 
 
 ' Walker's Sujferings of the Clergy^ pt. ii. p. 192. 
 2 Peters is thought by Dr. S. R. Gardiner to have been a much 
 maligned man (Notes a>id Queries, 7th Series, iv. 394). 
 
476 CHULMLEIGH. 
 
 personal characteristics Whitelock has left us a 
 striking description — *^a person of as meek and 
 humble carriage as ever I saw in great imployment 
 ... in action in the Field, I have seen him so highly 
 transported that scarce any one durst speak a v^ord 
 to him, and he would seem more like a man dis- 
 tracted and furious than of his ordinary mildness 
 and so far different temper." ^ There was Cromwell, 
 second in command, whose more familiar personality 
 needs no description here ; Okey, colonel of dragoons, 
 afterwards notorious as a " root and branch " man, 
 or irreconcilable republican ; Ireton, an able and dis- 
 tinguished man, soon to be Cromwell's son-in-law ; 
 and Lambert, Fleetwood, and Harrison, also Crom- 
 well's confederates. Of these, Lambert died in a De- 
 vonshire prison, and Okey, Harrison, and the preacher 
 himself were, as regicides and " sons of Belial," hanged 
 and quartered at Tyburn after the Restoration. 
 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax's force consisted, according to 
 the best authorities, of — 
 
 5 Regiments of Horse about 3,ooo 
 
 Dragoons „ 500 
 
 7 Regiments of Foot „ 6,000 
 
 Total 9>5oo 
 
 Besides this force, there were yet to come up the 
 1,500 Horse and dragoons of Massey's Brigade 
 under Colonel Cook who had been hurriedly re- 
 called from Dorsetshire. These were detailed to 
 
 ^ Memorials^ ed. 1682, p. 210. 
 
FAIRFAX'S A D VANCE, ^77 
 
 block up Barnstaple, whilst the operations of the 
 main body were being carried on against the enemy. ; 
 
 On that Sunday, the 15th of February, the army 
 had in the morning marched out two miles from 
 Chulmleigh; but the weather being very wet, the 
 ways bad, and the bridges, which had been broken 
 down by the enemy, unrestored, Fairfax determined 
 to make no further advance that day. The General's 
 own regiment and two hundred Horse were sent for- 
 ward, however, three or four miles by apparently two 
 different roads to " amuse " the enemy. One party 
 fell in with and defeated an advanced guard of the 
 Royalists at Burrington, Lieut. -Colonel Dundas, a 
 former deserter from the Parliamentary side, being 
 severely wounded and taken prisoner. He remained 
 for some time pending his recovery in the village of 
 Ashreigney, on parole. The remainder of the army 
 returned to Chulmleigh. 
 
 It was at this point of time that Sir Thomas Fair- 
 fax, writing to the Speaker of the House of Commons, 
 entered into several considerations which he thought 
 discouraged him from going on ; — the superiority of 
 the enemy in Horse, the possible continuance of wet 
 weather, which would render the firearms useless for 
 attack or defence, and the want of shelter for his 
 troops, in that inclement season, and of forage for 
 his horses, while the enemy were better provided 
 and had the country secure at their back. Besides 
 these drawbacks, there would be the absorption of 
 a considerable part of his force in the blockade of 
 Barnstaple. *' Yet, on the other side," he wrote, 
 ** finding that by reason of the barrennesse and long 
 
478 FAIRFAX'S ADVANCE, 
 
 exhausting of our Quarters behind us, we could 
 neither keep our Horse so close together as to lye 
 safe so neer the Enemy, nor indeed find subsistence 
 for the Army, either where we were, or in any other 
 Quarters more backward, where we could lye, so as 
 to secure the siege of Excester from reliefe, and upon 
 all considerations conceiving the affaires of the King- 
 dome did require us, and God by all did call us, [here 
 we may imagine Cromwell to have interjected an 
 approval] to make a present attempt upon the 
 Enemy ; Wee resolved to goe on, to try what God 
 would doe for us, and trust him for weather, sub- 
 sistence and all things." ^ 
 
 In this pious frame of mind resolution was at 
 once taken by the Parliamentary General. Colonel 
 Cook's Horse and dragoons were to advance 
 towards Barnstaple ; and on Monday, the i6th, 
 drums were beating in Chulmleigh at four o'clock 
 in the morning, and the army was moving off by 
 the road which runs down a sloping spur of the 
 hill on which Chulmleigh stands, and across the 
 meadows in the valley of the Taw to Kesham Bridge, 
 which, being then probably as now a timber tressle- 
 bridge of very primitive construction, had been easily 
 restored. At seven o'clock, as day was dawning, 
 Fairfax's forces were drawn up in order of battle 
 on Beaford Moor, be3'ond the village of Ashreigney. 
 Much of the country about here is still unenclosed. 
 I take this as the precise spot on which the troops 
 deployed, as Sprigge states that it was *' five miles 
 short of Torrington," and Fairfax himself that it 
 
 ^ Letter in Sprigge's Anglia Rediviva, ed. 1647, p. 189; ed. 1854, p. 199. 
 
STEVENSTONE. ;. . 479 
 
 was within six miles of the enemy. From this 
 spot two narrow roads, both leading to Torrington, 
 diverged— the one to the right passing through the 
 village of Roborough, and the other to the left 
 through that of Beaford. It was by the former 
 that apparently the army mainly advanced. The 
 weather, which had hitherto been persistently wet, 
 suddenly cleared up at the moment when the march 
 was resumed. 
 
 The advanced guard, or " forlorn," of Horse 
 about the middle of the day reached Stevenstone, 
 about two miles from Torrington, the seat of the 
 elder branch of the Rolle family, then, represented 
 by Mr. Henry Rolle. It was the same " right fair 
 house of bryke'* of Tudor architecture, built in the 
 reign bf Henry VIII. , which Leland the antiquary 
 had seen and described nearly a century before. 
 Some faint attempt had been made to fortify the 
 place, and it was occupied by, it was supposed, 
 about two hundred of the Royalist dragoons, who, 
 on the approach of a selected party sent forward to 
 attack the position, evacuated it, and were followed 
 and harassed by the Parliamentary Horse to within 
 a short distance of the town of Torrington. By five 
 o'clock most of the army had reached Stevenstone, 
 and were drawn up, Horse and Foot, in the deer-park. 
 The road thence to Torrington for about a mile 
 makes a slight descent, then becomes level, the 
 ground falling away on either side, and within half 
 a mile of Torringto'n rises slightly until it enters 
 the town. Two long streets, Well Street and Calf 
 Street, running almqst parallel to each other from 
 
48o BATTLE OF TORRINGTON, 
 
 the centre of the town eastward, terminate within a 
 few yards of each other where they are connected at 
 . right angles by a short cross-road. Calf Street, the 
 more northerly of the two, is the continuation of the 
 road from Stevenstone. Whether or not precisely 
 the same topographical conditions existed at that 
 time, it was apparently hereabout that the Royalist 
 defences, hereafter described as the barricadoes, were 
 met with, 
 
 A "forlorn" of Foot was now sent forward half- 
 way between Stevenstone and the town, where they 
 lined the hedges to cover the retreat of the Horse 
 in case they should have been drawn too far. The 
 Royalist Foot, simultaneously, advanced and occupied 
 the closes for about a quarter of a mile beyond the 
 town, '* and so the men faced one another within 
 half musket-shot for about two hours, exchanging 
 coarse language, and bullets now and then.'' The 
 enemy showing a more threatening front, Colonel 
 Hammond was sent from Stevenstone with a strong 
 detachment of three regiments of Foot and some 
 more Horse to support or bring off the *' forlorns." 
 It was then growing dark. The Royalist Foot began 
 to withdraw within the town defences ; a pause 
 ensued ; and it was thought that nothing further 
 would be attempted that night. Thus terminated 
 what may be called the first period of the fight. 
 
 Already, in the imminent prospect of a general 
 action, the pass-word was given out to the Parlia- 
 mentary Army — Emmanuel God with tcs ; and every 
 man was to put a sprig" of furze in his hat. The 
 Royalists' word was — We are with yon; and their 
 
BATTLE OF TORRINGTON, 481 
 
 distinctive mark a handkerchief tied about the right 
 arm. Their word and signal being early betrayed, 
 the Parliamentarians took a second pass-word, 
 which was Truth, and adopted a *' hand-carchier " or 
 white mark on their hats.^ These distinctive badges 
 were not unusual, as many of the men on both sides 
 were notoriously dressed and equipped alike in 
 leather doublet and pot head-piece. 
 
 The story of the Battle of Torrington, coloured by 
 the striking effects incident to a night-attack, has 
 too much local interest associated with it not to 
 demand a large place in any detailed account of the 
 Civil War as it affected Devonshire. On wider 
 grounds the battle is historically remarkable as the 
 decisive one of the- final campaign in the West, 
 which ruined the cause of King Charles.^ 
 
 * A Letter from a Gentleman in his Excellency'* s Arviy^ King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., large 4tos, vol. xxi. 
 
 ^ The literature of the Battle of Torrington is exceptionally copioii*^. 
 
 We have, firstly, the rare advantage of possessing narratives of the 
 
 action written by the commanders in chief on both sides. Sir Thomas 
 
 Fairfax's account is contained in his letter to the Speaker of the House of 
 
 Commons, printed in Sprigge's^w^/z^ Rediviva^ ed. 1647, p. 187; ed. 1854, 
 
 p. 197. Lord Hopton's is part of his *' Relation of the Proceedings in the 
 
 West of England," &c., printed in Carte's Collection of Origiiial Letters 
 
 and Papers, &c., 1739, i. 109. Besides these, which may be termed 
 
 official descriptions of tjie battle, we have Sprigge's own account; 
 
 Rushworth's letter to the Speaker, printed in the Sixth Report of the 
 
 historical iMSS. Commission, p. 100 ; and a graphic narrative by an 
 
 officer on the Parliamentary side, Colonel Wogan, then a captain in 
 
 Okey's dragoons, contained in his ** Proceedings of the New-moulded 
 
 Army," &c., also printed in Carte's Lettei-s, &c., i. 126. In these 
 
 contemporary accounts there are the usual discrepancies, chiefly as to 
 
 time, which are to be found in almost all different descriptions of 
 
 battles ; but I have found no great difficulty in compiling from them 
 
 my own story. Of modern accounts of the battle that I have seen, there 
 
 3^ 
 
482 BATTLE OF TORRINGTON, 
 
 It will now be desirable to turn to Lord Hopton's 
 narrative of what was happening on the other side. 
 
 It appears that during the previous week a Royalist 
 detachment of 500 Horse and dragoons had occupied 
 the village of Roborough, with an advanced guard at 
 Burrington, another village three miles from Chulm- 
 leigh. On the first intelligence of the presence of 
 Fairfax in force at Chulmleigh, which Lord Hopton 
 states was brought to him by a young lieutenant and 
 a few troopers who had been '' out that way without 
 leave a-plundering," the guard was ordered to with- 
 draw. It has been seen that it came into collision with 
 Fairfax's Horse, before the withdrawal was completely 
 effected, on the Sunday. The main body made good 
 its retreat to Torrington, leaving the dragoons of 
 the party at Stevenstone to protect its rear. To 
 their assistance 300 musketeers were sent out from 
 the town, who held their assailants in check until 
 darkness set in, when they were withdrawn. This 
 brings us to the same point of time at which we 
 left the account of the proceedings of the Parlia- 
 mentarians. 
 
 Lord Hopton, says the historian of the Rebellion, 
 knowing, amidst all his discouragements, that he 
 had little hope except in the result of a battle, was 
 content to abide the issue of an assault in a position 
 naturally strong and capable of being held against a 
 superior force. The situation of Torrington has been 
 already described. On the southern side of the town 
 
 is none better than the one contained in Mr P. Q. Karkeek's able 
 paper on " Fairfax ia the West " in the Tra^isactions of the Devonshire 
 Association^ ^\\\. 1 1 7. 
 
BATTLE OF TORRINGTON, 483 
 
 was a steep declivity, with the river Torridge at its 
 foot, which made it practically unassailable from 
 that direction. It was from the east that it was 
 most accessible to attack, and from that quarter the 
 anticipated onslaught was now to be met. The 
 Royalist Foot were therefore distributed to their 
 posts along the line of defences constructed on that 
 side, and in reserve within the town. Cleveland's ^ 
 and Wentworth's cavalry were disposed on the 
 commons, on the north side of the town ; the 
 Prince's guards, commanded by Lord Capel, on the 
 Town Common, on the west side. Two hundred 
 Horse were in the streets, detailed in parties of 
 forty each, to the support of the Foot. Lord 
 Hopton had at his elbow Sir John Digby, who was 
 familiar with the ground — the same Cavalier who, 
 a little more than two years before, had signally 
 discomfited the Parliamentarians of Barnstaple and 
 Bideford on the commons. 
 
 It has been impossible to arrive at anything more 
 than an approximate estimate of the relative 
 strength of the two armies. But while the Horse 
 seems to have been about equal numerically, the 
 Royalists were certainly inferior in Foot, and these, 
 mostly Cornishmen, were not the men who had 
 fought their way up the hill at Stratton, contested 
 w^ith Waller's London trained-bands for the field 
 of Lansdown, and stormed Bristol ; but either new 
 and untrustworthy levies or the remains of dis- 
 organized regiments. Fairfax's Foot, on the other 
 hand, were veterans who, if they had flinched before 
 
 * The Earl of Cleveland was Lord Wentworth s father. 
 
484 BATTLE OF TORRINGTON, 
 
 the flower of the King's army at Naseby, had since 
 won their laurels in an unbroken series of successful 
 encounters. Of the comparative quality of the 
 Horse enough has already been said or implied. 
 On the one side, conspicuously, were CromwelFs 
 disciplined " Ironsides " ; while on the other the 
 Royal Horse, although individually brave, and they 
 were mostly Englishmen too, were notoriously 
 demoralized and out of the control of their leaders. 
 
 The advanced party of Fairfax's army, which now 
 lay watching the Royalist defences, consisted, 
 according to the narrative of Colonel Wogan, who 
 was present, of i,ooo musketeers, 500 Horse, and 
 500 dragoons ; they were ordered to make good their 
 ground until the morning. Sir Thomas Fairfax 
 had fixed his head-quarters at Stevenstone. Later 
 in the evening, we may assume after supper, he and 
 his lieutenant-general, Oliver Cromwell, went to 
 visit the outposts, when all was still ; and detecting 
 what they believed to be symptoms of a movement 
 within the town as of a retreat, sent a few dragoons 
 to steal up to the barricades and make an observa- 
 tion. These reached the ** turnpike," ^ and were 
 received, to their surprise, by a sharp volley of 
 musketry. The rest of the dragoons — accounted 
 
 ' This was probably only a moveable barrier across the road enter- 
 ing the town. Bailey, however, describes a more elaborate con- 
 trivance as the military turnpike — '* a spar of wood about fourteen feet 
 long and about eight inches in diameter, cut in the form of a hexagon, 
 every side being bored full of holes, through which short pikes are run 
 about six feet long pointed with iron, which standing out every way 
 being set in a breach are of use to stop an enemy's entrance into a 
 camp" {Dictionariu77i Britannicum^^^ 1736}. 
 
BATTLE OF TORRINGTON, 485 
 
 ^^ the smartest men of the army — upon this, went on 
 to the support of their comrades, and the Foot, 
 without waiting for orders, followed. It was now, 
 reconciling as well as may be the conflicting 
 accounts as to time, about nine o'clock, and the 
 hght was becoming general ; the Parliamentarians 
 gave way, and were driven back into the enclosures 
 from which they had emerged. Fairfax, seeing the 
 critical position, brought up more forces, leaving 
 orders with Lieutenant-General Cromwell to second 
 him with the remainder. 
 
 Here, in the enclosures, within six fields from the 
 town, as Rushworth states with precision, the fight 
 went on for about two hours. The Royalists were 
 at length outflanked by their assailants and beaten 
 from hedge to hedge — **each hedge a bulwark" 
 for them. The barricades were then forced, after 
 a desperate struggle, the defenders disputing the 
 passages with pikes and the butt-ends of their 
 muskets. Having gained an entrance into the town, 
 the Parliamentarians were twice repulsed by the 
 
 . Royalist Horse, and almost driven out again, had not 
 Colonel Hammond, with a handful of officers and 
 soldiers, held the barricades and gained time to 
 rally the men ; and Major Stephens coming up with 
 a forlorn hope of Horse again forced a passage.^ 
 This, according to the Parliamentary accounts, was 
 the decisive moment. 
 
 Lord Hopton who, accompanied by Major-General 
 
 ' The forlorn hope of Horse in those days, strange as we should 
 think it now, was an ordinary feature of a storm (Major Walford's 
 Pa7'lia7nentary Generals of the Great Civil War), 
 
486 BATTLE OF TORRINGTON. 
 
 Sir John Digby, was at this time riding from post 
 to post encouraging his men, happened to be in the 
 main street (which I take to be Calf Street) as 
 Fairfax's men forced their way in. His troopers 
 already retiring involved him in the melee; Digby's 
 horse was killed under him, and Hopton himself was 
 wounded in the face by a pike-thrust, and his horse, 
 after bringing him off to the door of his lodging, fell 
 dead. 
 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax, with the main body of his 
 Horse, now entered and occupied the market-place, 
 an inconsiderable area in the centre of the town. 
 The Foot had already begun to plunder.^ 
 
 Having obtained a remount. Lord Hopton had 
 ridden off to Lord Cleveland's brigade of Horse 
 stationed in reserve on the north side of the town 
 and ordered them up ; but on his way back most of 
 his infantry were met running away over the lines, 
 and he in vain endeavoured to rally them. The 
 cavalry led by Sir John Digby then charged up to 
 the barricades which were in the hands of the enemy, 
 but could get no farther without the help of the Foot 
 who were shifting for themselves. It was at this 
 instant, according to Lord Hopton's own ** Rela- 
 tion," that the catastrophe happened which sig- 
 nalized the storming of Torrington.^ Fifty, or as 
 other accounts state, eighty barrels of the Royalists' 
 gunpowder, which had been stored, according to a 
 prevailing custom during the war, in the parish 
 
 ' Wogan is the only authority for this statement. 
 =" Sprigge puts it a little later— after the Royalists had evacuated the 
 town. (Attglia Redivivaj ed. 1647, p. 186; ed. 1854, p. 196). 
 
ROUT OF HOP TON'S ARMY. 487 
 
 church, blew up with a terrible explosion. Two 
 hundred prisoners who had been taken by the Par- 
 liamentarians during the assault, and who had been 
 temporarily secured in the church, with their guard 
 of about twenty men posted in the churchyard, were 
 blown into the air with the fragments of the building. 
 The surrounding houses were wrecked, and most of 
 the windows in the town were blown in ; *' the walls 
 of the church all fell and dispersed abroad, there 
 standing not above the height of six or seven foot." 
 One who was a spectator of the scene writes : *' The 
 blowing up of the church was the most terriblest 
 sight that ever I beheld.'' ^ 
 
 The retreat of the Royalist Foot became a rout. 
 The Horse which were in the town, defending their 
 rear from repeated attacks, retired by way of Mill 
 Street, a long steep street which runs diagonally 
 down the declivity on the south side of the town to 
 Taddyport Bridge, over which most of them escaped;' 
 but the remainder of the Horse went off over the 
 town commons on the west side to Rothern Bridge, a 
 mile lower down the stream, ^ or forded the river at 
 different places. The Prince's foot-guards who held 
 the Castle Green are stated to have been the last to . 
 abandon the town, and they must have got away 
 with comparative ease by streaming down the steep 
 
 ' Letters printed in A Fuller Relation of Sir Thomas Fairfaxes 
 Routing all the Kings Armies in the JVest, &.C., King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxlviii. 
 
 ^ In Leland's time these appear to have been called ** South bridge "' 
 and **West bridge" respectively; the former (Taddyport) bridge, of 
 three arches appears to survive, although the original structure is con- 
 cealed by modern work. 
 
488 OLIVER CROMWELL, 
 
 slope at their rear where no cavalry could possibly 
 follow them. 
 
 Rushworth, who wrote his hurried dispatch to the 
 Speaker of the House of Commons at five o'clock in 
 the morning, states that Sir John Digby's last ineffec- 
 tual charge was made after the explosion, the precise 
 time of which he fixes at a little before eleven o'clock ; 
 and that this charge being repulsed the rout became 
 general. 
 
 At daylight, all the Royalist Foot had disappeared. 
 The Horse, retreating with less disorder. Lord 
 Hopton himself bringing up the rear, had, by diffe- 
 rent ways, gone off in the direction of Bideford and 
 Buckland Brewer. The pursuit was soon abandoned. 
 
 Both Lord Hopton, in his '* Relation," and Lord 
 Clarendon, in his History of the Rebellion, severely 
 condemn the cowardice and ** baseness" of the 
 Royalist troops. But the charge is not consistent 
 with the impression of the witnesses on the other 
 side ; for Sir Thomas Fairfax calls the assault " a 
 hotter service than any storm this army hath before 
 been upon " ^ — in a campaign which included the 
 storming of Bristol and of Basing House. 
 
 It may be remarked that no prominence has been 
 given by the historian of the campaign to the pre- 
 sence of Oliver Cromwell at the storming of Torring- 
 ton. Sprigge, as a matter of fact, does not mention 
 him by name, but only as "the lieutenant-general." 
 It is a curious fact, not noticed by any com- 
 mentator, that Cromwell's four months' dispensa- 
 tion from disqualification for military service under 
 
 ^ Letter in Sprigge *s^;^^//^ Rediviva^ ed. 1647, p. 192 ; ed. 1854, p. 202. 
 
OLIVER CROMWELL. 489 
 
 the *' Self-denying Ordinance," which had been 
 granted to him by the Parliament, expired on the 
 day after the battle. Carlyle has little to say about 
 Cromweirs part in this campaign in the West, and 
 his researches have not turned up any of Cromwell's 
 letters during the campaign subsequent to the one of 
 the 17th of October, written from Salisbury, in 
 which the writer implies that he is hastening to join 
 Fairfax.^ In the opening scene of the assault of 
 Torrington, the action of this great soldier, whose 
 genius it was to miss no opportunity of striking hard, 
 is present. There was less room for the display of 
 his customary ardour afterwards ; the assault was 
 won by the Foot, and neither Hopton's nor Crom- 
 well's Horse were of much use in narrow ways and 
 amongst high enclosures in the darkness of a 
 February night. ^ 
 
 ' Oliver Cromweirs Letters and Speeches, by Thomas Carlyle, 
 passim. 
 
 ^ I have used the word "darkness" conventionally. A Parliamen- 
 tarian, in a letter printed in the tract, A Fuller Relation, &c., from 
 vhich I have already quoted, wrote: *' About ten a clock at night by 
 the light of the moon we fell upon them.'* In a book of Chi-onograms 
 by Mr. James Hilton, F.S.A., there is an extract made from a rare 
 tract entitled Chro7iometi'a memorabiliiim rerum, &c., printed at Cam- 
 bridge in the year 1646, and relating to the civil wars in England 
 which I here give, not as a specimen of this form of wasted ingenuity, 
 but for its reference to the point. It is as follows : — 
 
 LVCe bis oCtaVa febrVI, LVnaqVe rVbentI, 
 regaLes fVerVnt DIspersI CLaDe reCentl. =1646. 
 
 (The date is obtained by adding up the total sum of the figures repre- 
 sented by the large Capital letters or Roman numerals.) The lines are 
 translated by Mr. Hilton : — 
 
 "On the twice eighth day of February and at full moon the royal 
 forces were scattered with fresh slaughter. " 
 
490 BLOWING-UP OF TORRINGTON CHURCH, 
 
 No accurate estimate of the number of the killed 
 in this action is possible. Sprigge vaguely states 
 that two hundred of the Royalist army were slain 
 besides those who perished by the explosion. The 
 Parliamentary party admit the loss of only a few. 
 The parish register records in a comprehensive 
 note: — '* There have bin buried the i6th 17th i8th 
 19th and 20th 21th Dayes 63 soldyers." Those 
 buried on the i6th had probably fallen in one of the 
 outpost affairs previous to the battle which took 
 place on that day,^ 
 
 The blowing-up of Torrington church was be- 
 lieved at the time to have been a wilful act. 
 Sprigge's circumstantial account is that it was done 
 by ** a desperate villaine, one Watts, whom the 
 Enemy had hired with thirty pounds for that pur- 
 pose, as he himselfe confessed the next day, when 
 he was pul'd out from under the rubbish and 
 timber." ^ It is, of course, conceivable that Lord 
 
 It is not for me to question the meaning given to the word '* rubenti'' ; 
 but, computed by the lunation tables in Sir Harris Nicolas's Chronology 
 of History^ and also by the incidence of Easter-day in that year, the 
 moon on the i6th of Februaiy, 1646 (Old Style), was just entering her 
 second quarter. There must have been some moonlight therefore up 
 to about eleven o'clock, but little or none afterwards. 
 
 ^ In the nave of Langtree church is a grave-stone on which is an 
 inscription to the memory of "John Fraine who was slain at Great 
 Torrington . . . Anno Dom 1646." Grace, the widow of '* Major 
 Fraine," who appears to have survived him more than fifty-seven years, 
 was buried underneath the same stone. I am indebted for this note to 
 the Rev. J. Ingle Dredge. 
 
 = Anglia Rediviva, ed. 1647, p. 186 ; ed. 1854, p. 196. That this theory 
 was adopted by the Parliament there is no doubt. Although the House of 
 Commons referred to a Committee on the 30th of June, 1647, the ques- 
 tion of *' reedifying the church of Torrington " (Whitelock's Mefnorials)^ 
 nothing apparently came of the reference, for in the following year 
 
BLOWING-UP OF TORRINGTON CHURCH, 491 
 
 Hopton had given instructions that, in the event 
 of a retreat becoming necessary, the gunpowder 
 stored in the church should be destroyed rather 
 than that it should fall into the hands of the 
 enemy. This would have been only one of the 
 exigencies of war. But it is utterly improbable 
 that he should have given an order to fire the 
 magazine, knowing — and in any case it is not 
 likely that he did know — that many of his own 
 men were prisoners within the building. The 
 character of the man precludes such a belief. On 
 the whole, the catastrophe was more likely to have 
 been accidental. Such explosions, arising from the 
 loose storage of gunpowder, were not rare, and Lord 
 Hopton himself had been terribly injured by one in 
 the open field after the battle of Lansdown in 1643. 
 
 But religious capital was to be made out of the 
 catastrophe, which v/as the bewildering climax of 
 the storming of Torrington, and a warning to be 
 drawn from it to the confusion of ritualists for all 
 time. To the sensitive minds of the Puritans it was 
 a " hellish plot " against his Excellency Sir Thomas 
 Fairfax. In one of the circumstances of the explo- 
 sion a refreshing miracle was discovered, by implica- 
 tion, and forthwith formally certified. A copy of this 
 remarkable certificate occurs in an " Epistle Dedi- 
 catory " prefixed to a work entitled The Discovery 
 Of the Wonderfull preservation of his Excellencie Sir 
 Thomas Fairfax^ &c., by its author, John Heydon, 
 
 both Houses ordered a Grant to the Mayor, &c., for a General Collec- 
 tion throughout England and Wales for the reparation of the church, 
 reciting that the magazine of gunpowder had been fired by the enemy. 
 
492 A MIRACLE. 
 
 Minister of the Gospel, which is in reality a long- 
 winded and totally irrelevant essay called ** Some 
 Gospel Truths Catechistically laid down, explained 
 and vindicated." ^ It is as follows : — 
 
 We whose names are here subscribed do testifie, that 
 when the Publick place of Gods worship was blown up by 
 a hellish plot, and his Excellency was wonderfully preserved, 
 there fell out by Divine Providence, that which we look 
 upon as mira non inirabilia^ viz. though both the Books of 
 Common Prayer were blown up or burnt, yet the blessed 
 Bible was preserved and not obliterated, although it were 
 blown away ; and also the Library, and the books, together 
 with the Records of the Town were wonderfully preserved : 
 I do testifie, John Voysey Maior. We also testifie, Richard 
 Gay J William White Capt. John Ward, Henry Semor 
 Schoolmaster, and Joh7t Heydon Minister of the Gospel. 
 
 Lest the gist of this precious example of super- 
 stition and bigotry should escape the reader, it may 
 be as well to explain that the Book of Common 
 Prayer, as a rag of Popery, had been just abolished 
 by an Ordinance of Parliament.^ 
 
 Although the victory of Torrington was not at 
 first recognized as so important as it afterwards 
 
 ^ London : Printed by M. Simmons, 1647. The Rev. J. Ingle 
 Dredge informs me that the treatise was issued in the same year 
 with a long alternative title beginning Ma7is batmes &^ Gods goothies 
 or some Gospel truths laid doiun, &c. This was probably the original 
 title-page, the other being afterwards substituted when the incident at 
 Torrington had suggested a more "taking " one. 
 
 - By the Ordinance of 23rd of August, 1645. The penalty for using 
 the Book of Common Prayer, even "in any private place or Family," 
 was, for the first offence, ;^5 ; for the second, £\o\ for the third, one 
 whole year's imprisonment without bail or mainprize (Rushworth's 
 CollectiojiSy vi. 205). 
 
RETREAT OF THE ROYALIST HORSE. 493 
 
 turned out to be — much less decisive, as it really 
 was — by order of Parliament the 15th of March 
 was set apart as a day of solemn thanksgiving in 
 London for the *' great mercy," and two sermons 
 were preached in St. Margaret's Church on the 
 occasion. As a complement to this it may be 
 mentioned that Theophilus Powell, A.M., the vicar 
 of Torrington, was turned out of his living chiefly 
 for a sermon on i Pet. ii. 17 : " Fear God. Honour 
 the king." ^ 
 
 It was the Protector, if I am not mistaken, who 
 first introduced the practice of naming the national 
 ships-of-war after famous victories ; and so in due 
 time with the Newbury^ the Marston Moor, and the 
 Naseby — probably old ships renamed, as they were 
 again renamed at the Restoration — the Torrington, 
 of fifty-four guns, appeared in the Navy-list of the 
 Commonwealth. 
 
 Tradition says that the retreating Royalists made 
 a stand at Henbury, an ancient British hill-fort in 
 the parish of Buckland Brewer. This, however, is 
 erroneous; the immediate pursuit was not carried very 
 far. Lord Hopton himself states in his '' Relation " 
 that he brought off the Horse safe to the borders of 
 Cornwall on the morning of Tuesday, the day after 
 the battle, and most of the Foot had dispersed. It 
 is stated that cannon-balls have been found near 
 Henbury Fort ; but unfortunately for this part of the 
 tradition neither of the two armies had any artillery. 
 There were apparently many straggling parties which 
 made off by different ways, and one of these seems 
 
 ' Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy^ pt. ii. 329. 
 
494 1^0 YALIST FOO T DISPERSED. 
 
 to have got into Barnstaple. The general disorder 
 and confusion of Hopton's retreat will, however, be 
 best read in the following extract from a graphic and 
 locally interesting letter written, in the midst of the 
 events described, by *' W. C," ix,^ William Clarke, 
 one of Mr. Rushworth's clerks : — 
 
 . . . On Tuesday last [Feb. 17] the remaining party of 
 the enemy took up guides to Holsworthy, and intended 
 to quarter there and Lutcombe [Sutcombe] and Putford, 
 and to drive their cattell into Cornwall. Hopton was then 
 with them, but none of the foote then come up to them, 
 they then resolved to stay at Holsworthy to gather as many 
 foot as they could, and the better to hinder our pursuite 
 to pull downe Woodford Bridge over Touridge, betweene 
 Newton and Milton, where many of their horse were, many 
 straggling parties went towards Biddiford and Barnstable in 
 great hast, and affrightment : The 400 foote which are all 
 they have left (as before with x\rmes), Tuesday by breake 
 of day passed over Beddiford bridge in the way to Kilk- 
 hampton and Stratton : another party of their horse, with 
 whom the Lord Capell w^as cut in the head, passed over at a 
 Ford and went a blind e way for Stratton with his company, 
 there was two considerable persons carried in horse-litters 
 growning and crying out for paine but not knowing who 
 they were : Those which came that day from Hetherley 
 [Hatherleigh] say, that they met many stragling foot by two 
 or three in a company, who said they were going to their 
 own homes, they likewise met many straglers of their horse 
 which posted up and downe in great haste and feare : But 
 the cheife body of their horse are gone to Launceston, where 
 the Lord Hopton is to meet them. They generally blamiC 
 the Cornish foote, saying, that if they had stood to it, it had 
 beene a more bloudy bout, and that the Cornish were glad 
 we came against that Towne, that they might have an occa- 
 
PARLIAMENTARY ARMY AT TORRINGTON. 495 
 
 sion to go into their own Countrey. Hopton is certainly 
 wounded and had his horse shot under him, staying with 
 the last to bring up the Reere.' 
 
 This letter, which is dated the i8th of February, 
 refers to events which could not possibly have hap- 
 pened earlier than on the preceding day, the date 
 of which I have interpolated. *' Tuesday last," the 
 reference made to it, is an expression which leads 
 to an inference that the letter was probably written 
 somewhat later. 
 
 On that same Tuesday, the day after the storming 
 of Torrington, Fairfax had, it appears, detached some 
 regiments of Horse and Foot with the object of 
 following up and harassing the retreating enemy as 
 far as Holsworthy. But the Royalist Horse were 
 found to have already quitted that place, and to 
 have gone into Cornwall, and the Cornish Foot had 
 made their way, it was supposed, back to their own 
 county. Many of the straggling foot-soldiers, mostly 
 Devonshire men, came in and enlisted themselves 
 in the Parliamentary army, professing that they had 
 only awaited an opportunity of doing so. The war 
 had produced a plentiful supply of this class of 
 mercenary soldiers. The prisoners who did not care 
 to take service were discharged with a small gratuity 
 to take them to their homes. Fairfax then deter- 
 mined to give his army a few days' rest at Torring- 
 ton after their ** unseasonable marches, miserable 
 quarters, and hard duty ; " and it was again, Sprigge 
 says, *' a time of extreme wet weather." 
 
 ' Printed in A more Full Relation of the coiitimied successes of His 
 Excelle7icy Sir Tho7iias Fairfax, &c., London, 1645 [1646], King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccxlix. 
 
496 BARNSTAPLE RECONNOITERED. 
 
 It will be remembered that while the advance of 
 the Parliamentary army from Chulmleigh was taking 
 place the detachment of Massey's Brigade, under 
 Colonel Cook, was watching Barnstaple, in order to 
 prevent any co-operation of the garrison with Lord 
 Hopton's army. It is presumable that the force 
 under Cook (all we know of whom from Sprigge is 
 that he was " a gentleman of much temper and reso- 
 lution "), consisting of 1,500 Horse and dragoons, 
 loosely occupied the neighbouring villages to the 
 south and east of the town. The question how to 
 deal with Barnstaple was now a pressing one; and 
 Commissary-General Ireton was sent with a re- 
 connoitring party to '' view it " and ascertain 
 what available quarters there were for completely 
 blockading it. This was probably not Ireton's 
 first view of Barnstaple ; he had been a gentle- 
 man-trooper in Lord Essex's life-guard, and may 
 have been shut up there when the town was besieged 
 by Goring. As one result of this reconnaissance, 
 a regiment of Foot and some Horse were sent to 
 seize and occupy the Earl of Bath's house at Taw- 
 stock, which Fairfax thought would be the means of 
 effectually keeping in the garrison on that side — in 
 other words, securing the left bank of the Taw : and 
 he intimates that he ** shall try what will be done 
 upon it otherwayes whilest the Army takes a little 
 rest hereabouts." ^ 
 
 If it had appeared that Barnstaple could then have 
 been taken by a coiip-de-main it seems obvious that 
 
 ^ Letter to the Speaker of the House of Commons, printed in 
 Sprigge's A7iglia Redivivay ed. 1647, p. 187 ; ed. 1854, p. 202. 
 
BARNSTAPLE BLOCKADED, 497 
 
 Fairfax would not have wasted this interval, nor have 
 submitted to the necessity of leaving a considerable 
 body of his Horse behind him when the pursuit of 
 Hopton's retreating forces, still more than a match for 
 him numerically in that arm, was of such importance 
 to the completeness of his victory. The inference 
 suggested is that Barnstaple was too well defended 
 to be attacked with any prospect of immediate suc- 
 cess even by the effective and elated army which now 
 lay within a dozen miles of it. Such, at least, is my 
 reading of the evidence. It was after writing the 
 letter to the Speaker from which a quotation 
 has just been made, that Fairfax decided at a 
 council of war at the head-quarters, on the 20th of 
 February, that the siege of Barnstaple was not to be 
 pressed further at that time. Exeter and Barnstaple 
 were in the same category. The destruction of the 
 enemy in the field was of more immediate conse- 
 quence and would, it was considered, of itself lead to 
 the surrender of those places if they had not in the 
 mean time been starved out by a strict blockade. 
 Besides, a prompt advance into Cornwall was desir- 
 able to anticipate the landing of reinforcements 
 which the Royalists were expecting from France. 
 This expectation was not wholly baseless, as it was 
 well known that Queen Henrietta Maria and Lord 
 Jermyn were straining every diplomatic nerve to 
 obtain the help of a French contingent. Meanwhile, 
 a disposition of forces was made for the investment 
 of Barnstaple ; and, this corner of Devonshire being 
 considered '' well-affected " to Parliament, it was 
 sanguinely hoped that a regiment might be raised in 
 
498 HOP TON 'S RE TREA T CONTINUED. 
 
 it to assist in the blockade. What success resulted 
 from the effort is not stated. With regard to what 
 was going on within the lines of Barnstaple during 
 this crisis there is absolutely nothing whatever at 
 
 present known. 
 
 On Monday, the 23rd of February, the whole of 
 Fairfax's army was in motion and advancing to 
 Holsworthy. As a finale to the series of events at 
 Torrington, Hugh Peters, on the previous Saturday, 
 had held forth from a balcony in the market-place 
 to the soldiers and country people, and, it is said, 
 *' much impressed their hearts." 
 
 Lord Hopton, in the mean time, had been collect- 
 ing all that could be got together of his scattered Foot, 
 to the number of about a thousand — the rest having 
 '' run home." His still considerable body of Horse 
 had kept to their colours. The Summer-leaze, an open 
 down, now sacred to the seaside visitors who resort 
 to Bude, was their rendezvous. A fortuitous course of 
 circumstances had brought Lord Hopton once more to 
 the foot of the hill from which, three years before, 
 he, with Bevill Grenville, Slanning, and Trevanion, 
 since fallen in King Charles's cause, had driven the 
 Parliamentarians of Devonshire. In this crisis the 
 Prince of Wales, by his Council, was writing to the 
 Cornish gentry individually — ■" Haste, haste, for your 
 life ! " — urging them to get speedily up to the army 
 '* all the trayned men, stragling souldgers and others " 
 who were *^ expected to advance upon this occasion." ^ 
 
 The limitations of this work will not allow me to 
 
 ^ Letter of Feb. 24 in Polwhele's Traditions and Recollections^ i. 20. 
 
CAPITULATION OF HOPTON'S ARMY, 499 
 
 follow in detail the subsequent and disastrous retreat 
 of Hopton's army. Sir John Digby was left with a 
 body of Horse to protect the rear and bear the brunt 
 of the steady and skilful advance of Fairfax and 
 Cromwell. A short conflict which took place at the 
 passage of North Tamerton Bridge was the last 
 serious effort of resistance. Before the end of the 
 month all was virtually over. The whole of Hopton's 
 remaining force was retiring in disorder upon Bodmin 
 by way of Camelford and Launceston. One whole 
 regiment of Foot, Colonel Edgcumbe's, had already 
 surrendered to the enemy. Fairfax had taken 
 especial precautions to prevent the Royalist Horse, 
 still estimated to number four or five thousand, from 
 breaking through ; and had sent back orders to 
 Colonel Cook, who was investing Barnstaple, to 
 exercise the utmost vigilance in meeting the case 
 if they should do so and take that direction. On 
 the 5th of March, Fairfax was in a position to in- 
 vite Lord Hopton in polite terms to a surrender. 
 Some days elapsed, during which, while many of 
 the Royalists made ill-organized efforts to break 
 through, and some sharp skirmishes took place, 
 others — officers as well as privates — were making 
 their own terms ; but, still retiring, until Truro 
 was reached, they were inexorably closed in by 
 the enemy. In the result, on the 14th of March, 
 a treaty was finally concluded, by which the whole 
 of Lord Hopton's army surrendered and was dis- 
 banded. 
 
 Meanwhile, Prince Charles had sought more security 
 in the fine old circular castle of Henry the Eighth's 
 
.\ •il'. . 
 
 500 ESCAPE OF PRINCE CHARLES, 
 
 time which crowned, as it still crowns, the height of 
 Pendennis, and was held by the venerable Colonel 
 John Arundell, of Trerice, and a Royalist garrison. 
 On the 2nd of March, when news came that his 
 army was retiring from Bodmin and that the enemy, 
 in the words of Lord Clarendon, were '' marching 
 furiously after," there was reasonable apprehension 
 of the Prince's safety in the minds of his Council, 
 and Mr. Fanshawe was despatched to Lord Hopton's 
 quarters for advice in the circumstances. Sir Edward 
 Hyde had gone to Pendennis some days before to 
 have a frigate provisioned in readiness for the Prince's 
 escape. There was no doubt of the critical position in 
 which the Prince was placed ; that same night he 
 embarked from the secret water-port of the castle 
 and, on the 4th, landed at one of the Isles of Scilly. ^ 
 He was accompanied by the Earl of Berkshire, Lord 
 Colepepper and Sir Edward Hyde ; and not long 
 afterwards Lords Hopton and Capel joined the 
 refugees. After a stay of nearly six weeks at St, 
 Mary's, where they were much straitened for want of 
 necessary provisions, the party transferred them- 
 selves to Jersey. 
 
 This may be a convenient place to notice, paren- 
 thetically, the sequel of the lives of the two distin- 
 guished Cavaliers who were by their actions the 
 least open to animadversion of all those who, during 
 the war, with the variety of temper which we 
 have seen, fought for the King's cause in North 
 Devon. 
 
 ^ Letter of Sir Edward Hyde in Carte's Life of James ^ Duke of 
 Ormonde^ \'J'^^i iii. 450. 
 
SIR JOHN DIGB V, '501 
 
 Lord Hopton, who in his exile drew much solace 
 from the intimate friendship and companionship of 
 Sir Edward Hyde, died at Bruges in the year 1652 — 
 " without any issue/' says Lloyd in his Memoires, &c., 
 " besides those of his soul, his great thoughts, and 
 greater actions." Such a panegyric leaves but little 
 to be said. It does not appear that Lord Hopton took 
 any part in the enterprises of the Royalist refugees, 
 after the King's death, which brought about what is 
 called the Second Civil War. 
 
 Sir John Digby, who, from his having twice come 
 before Barnstaple in a hostile character, has a 
 peculiar interest for us, went also with Prince 
 Charles into exile. Peacock, in the Army Lists of the 
 Roundheads and Cavaliers,^ erroneously supposes that 
 he returned to England and was the Sir John Digby 
 who was present in Pontefract Castle when it sur- 
 rendered to the Parliament in March, 1649. It is a 
 curious fact that there were three, if not four, con- 
 temporary Sir John Digbys during the Civil War; and 
 there is scarcely a writer who has not, when the oc- 
 casion arose, hopelessly confounded them in some way 
 one with another. The Sir John Digby with whom 
 we are concerned was the second son of the historic 
 Earl of Bristol, and consequently brother of George 
 Lord Digby, the subtle, clever, and not irreproachable 
 Secretary of State to Charles the First. John Digby 
 was born in 1618; of Magdalene College, Oxford, 
 1634. He came into Devonshire with Sir Ralph 
 Hopton at the beginning of the war as Captain of a 
 
 * Second Edition, 1874, p. 13. 
 
502 5/i? JOHN DIGB Y, 
 
 troop of Horse which he had himself raised. As 
 Colonel he commanded the Royalist Horse at the 
 battle of Stratton, in May, 1643 ; repelled an attack 
 of the Parliamentary forces of North Devon at 
 Torrington in the following August, and received 
 the consequent capitulation of Barnstaple. He was 
 at times in command before Plymouth during the 
 long siege, and received there a severe wound in the 
 eye from a rapier ; unsuccessfully attacked Barn- 
 staple after its revolt to the Parliament in 1644 ; was 
 knighted, and as Major-General held command under 
 Lord Hopton at the final battle of Torrington. The 
 close of his career illustrates the destitution to which 
 many of the adherents of the Stuarts were reduced. 
 It is as strange as that of Lord Goring who ended 
 his life as a monk, or as that of Goring's fellow 
 reprobate, Sir Ffancis Dodington, who, as an exile 
 in France, maintained himself by selling English 
 knives and buckles.^ After having for some time at- 
 tended the Court of Prince Charles, this hcau sabreuVy 
 we are told, "retired to Pontoise [near Paris], entered 
 himself among the religious there, became a secular 
 priest, said mass daily to the English nuns, and died 
 there after the Restoration." ^ 
 
 With regard to Fairfaxes campaign in Devonshire 
 and Cornwall, the military critic thinks it ''not too 
 much to say that its strategical plan would have 
 reflected honour on any general, and that its con- 
 ductor, whether Fairfax or Cromwell was the real 
 chief, was a man of the first rank among skilful 
 
 •' Collinson's Somersetshire^ iii. 519. 
 
 ^ QQ\\vci%\ Peerage of E7iglandy ed. 1779, viii. 252. 
 
 « « 4 4 
 
BLOCKADE OF BARNSTAPLE. 503 
 
 soldiers." ^ The pacification was accomplished with 
 remarkable consideration for the defeated Royalists, 
 and was a great political success. 
 
 Leaving the fortresses of Pendennis and St. 
 Michaers Mount to be reduced at leisure, the army 
 returned eastward, by way of Launceston and 
 Okehampton. Fairfax himself visited Plymouth by 
 the way, where he was received with great rejoicing 
 and a salute of 300 guns. The long and harassing 
 siege was at length brought to an end. The army 
 remained one night at Okehampton and left it on 
 the 2Qth of March, which was Easter day, reaching 
 Crediton and occupying that town and the neigh- 
 bouring villages the same night. 
 
 Fairfax, on his advance from Torrington in 
 pursuit of Hopton's beaten army, had left Colonel 
 Cook with 1,000 Horse and 500 Foot to block up 
 Barnstaple, The new levy which was expected to 
 be raised in the district probably never put in an 
 appearance. The policy of the Parliamentary 
 General, it has been sufficiently apparent, was a 
 waiting one with regard to this business ; the same 
 treatment was being applied to Exeter. It had 
 been held that in either case nothing was to be 
 gained by an expenditure of life on an assault ; that 
 the surrender of these places was only a question of 
 time ; and that meanwhile there was no occasion for 
 hurry. It might be questioned, on the other hand, 
 whether the investing forces would be altogether 
 
 ' Major N. L. Walford, R.A., The Parliamentary Generals of the 
 Great Civil War^ p. 162. 
 
504 BLAKE BEFORE BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 content to sit entirely inactive in these circum-/ 
 stances. There is no indication, however, that Sir 
 Hardress Waller, who had been left before Exeter, 
 made any attempt upon that city ; and I have failed 
 to discover that during the five weeks, counting from 
 the beginning of the blockade of Barnstaple, 
 Colonel Cook, although with a force superior in 
 number to that of the besieged, and knowing that 
 there was a friendly population within the town, 
 made any attempt upon the place. At all events, 
 the intelligencers, whose attention was absorbed by 
 the more stirring interest of the campaign then 
 coming to its last throes in Cornwall, and the war- 
 correspondents, so to speak, who were with the 
 army, have left us no information whatever. The 
 garrison and the inhabitants, however, during this 
 time must have been more and more straitened and 
 distressed by the want of provisions ; and desultory 
 sallies and skirmishes were, it seems, the result. It 
 is to be remembered that Cook's force consisted 
 principally of cavalry, andjthat he had been ordered 
 to be vigilantly on his guard to prevent any of the 
 enemy's Horse, which might elude the pursuit, from 
 attempting to escape back through North Devon. 
 This duty may have left him but little oppor- 
 tunity of attempting anything serious against 
 Barnstaple. 
 
 The sequel of the defence of Barnstaple was not, 
 however, to be much longer delayed. About the 
 25th or 26th of March, the blockading force was 
 strengthened by the accession of Colonel Robert 
 Blake with his regiment, temporarily detached from 
 
AN ASSAULT. 505 
 
 the besieging force before Dunster Castle. '' Letters 
 from the West," reports the Moderate Intelligencer, 
 under the date March 28, '* tell us . . . Colonel 
 Blake is come before Barnstaple having left country- 
 men before Dunster Castle." ^ The immediate 
 effect of this reinforcement was an assault upon, 
 apparently, some point in the line of entrenchments 
 which enclosed the town. A faint rumour of this 
 affair reached Columb-John, Fairfax's head-quarters, 
 on the 31st, and was commented upon by the cor- 
 respondent " W. C," in a letter published by order 
 of Parliament, from which the following is an 
 extract : — 
 
 Munday March 30, we stayed at Crediton, had intelli- 
 gence of the Enemies resolutions in Bar7istaple^ to quit the 
 Towne and betake themselves to the Great Fort and Castle, 
 which probably before this time is effected : And the speech 
 is That upon the coming of Colonell Blake with his 
 Regiment from Dunster^ about two daies since, they left the 
 Towne, onely some few for a Guard, which our men beate 
 off, killed seven, with the losse of foure; the Skirmish is 
 certain, but whether our men are in possession I cannot 
 yet assure you, we having as yet received no Letters thereof. 
 
 The writer continues with an amusing reference 
 to our bloodthirsty acquaintance, James Apsley, who' 
 had been fretting all this while within the lines of 
 Barnstaple : — " It is generally believed that Sir Allen 
 Apsley is willing to surrender the Towne, Fort and 
 
 ' No. 56, March 26-April 2, 1646, King's Parnphlets, B. M., 
 small 4tos, vol. ccliv. 
 
 ^yk^k^kykyk^''' 
 
5o6 BLAKE'S ATTEMPT. 
 
 Castle, but that his desperate Brother swears he 
 will cut him to peeces if he offers to surrender the 
 Castle/' I 
 
 I am the more careful to indicate the source 
 of this information, because it is the only actual 
 report that I have discovered of this attack upon 
 Barnstaple. It is abundantly evident that no actual 
 lodgment was effected, and the town, dominated as 
 it was by the Castle and the Great Fort, would not 
 probably have been tenable if there had been. 
 Another correspondent at head-quarters, who wrote 
 a few days later, confirms this, giving expressly the 
 reason : — *' Barnstable ... is made very strong, for 
 there is a Castle at one end of the Towne, and an 
 exceeding strong Fort on the other ; so that the 
 Towne is not to be entred untill one or both the 
 other be reduced." ^ 
 
 Whatever may have been Blake's part in this 
 assault it is clear enough that it was practically a 
 failure, and no impression had been made upon the 
 real defences of Barnstaple. It will be remembered 
 that the Governor had long before made provision 
 for the contingency of the withdrawal of the 
 garrison within the Castle and Fort. None of 
 Blake's biographers has mentioned his engagement 
 in this particular service. There is a passage in 
 Pepys's Diary in which Pepys gives us a short 
 
 ^ Printed in the tract Sir Thojuas Fairfaxes Letter^ &c., published 
 by order of Parliament, London, 6 April, 1646, King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. ccliv. 
 
 = Letter of " N. J.," printed in the tract, The Agreement for the 
 Surrender of the City of Exeter^ &c., King's Pamphlets, B. I\L, small 
 4tos, vol. cclvi. 
 
IMPERFECT DETAILS OF THE SIEGE, 507 
 
 dissertation by Mr. Coventry, an acute observer 
 of mankind for v^hose opinions the Diarist had a 
 marked respect, on the two different kinds of valour 
 — active and passive — in which it is remarked that 
 Blake's was wholly of the latter lynd. It is doubtful 
 if this judgment is borne out by the after-career of 
 the Admiral; but, be this as it may, the unex- 
 plained failure of Blake's action before Barnstaple is 
 certainly not the least interesting discovery made in 
 the researches for this work. 
 
 Fairfax had reached Okehampton, on the 27th 
 of March, a little in advance of his army, which 
 came up on the following day. From Okehampton 
 Colonel Sheffield's regiment of ' Horse and seven 
 companies of Major-General Skippon's regiment, 
 under Lieutenant-Colonel Ashfield, were detached on 
 the 28th, without any delay therefore, "to assist at 
 the blocking up of Barnstaple." ^ The main body 
 of the army continued its march to Crediton. The 
 investment of Exeter was completed, and the 
 Governor, Sir John Berkeley, on a summons from 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax, at once agreed to a treaty, with 
 a view to a surrender, on the ist of April. 
 
 I can find but few details of what took place 
 around Barnstaple during the next ten days, after 
 ,the coming in of the further reinforcement to the 
 ranks of the besiegers ; but some considerable events 
 were happening, which are mentioned with provok- 
 ing brevity in the contemporary notices. On one of 
 
 ' Skippon himself had not yet rejoined the army, the veteran not 
 having recovered from wounds received at Naseby. 
 
5o8 SALL V FROM THE GARRISON, 
 
 these days there was a sally from the town, the 
 result of which is stated to have been that forty of 
 the garrison were taken prisoners.^ Ilfraconibe Castle, 
 which, it may be presumed, had been occupied by a 
 small Royalist garrison since its capture by General 
 Goring in 1644, was stormed and taken by Colonel 
 Sheffield, the party being led on by '' Lieutenant- 
 Colonel Harris." 2 The man-of-war fitted out by the 
 Corporation of Barnstaple at the beginning of the 
 troubles, and which had successively passed into the 
 power of the possessors of the town for the time 
 being, was captured at sea by one of Admiral Penn's 
 squadron — ''Captain Plunket's ship [she was the 
 Discovery^ hired merchantman of 34 guns,] hath 
 taken a small Man-of-War with six guns of 
 Barnstaple.'' 3 
 
 The siege of Barnstaple, which had already lasted 
 five weeks, had been, so far, little more than a 
 blockade ; and now there was no longer any reason 
 why it should not be pressed to extremity. There 
 is not a word said, however, of the employment of 
 artillery against the works ; although a long course 
 
 ^ The Moderate Intelligencer^ No. 58, King's Pamphlets, B. M., 
 small 4tos, vol. cclvii. 
 
 - Several Letters to the Hon. William LenthaU Rsq.y Speaker^ &c., 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cclvii. There was no 
 officer of the name of Harris in Fairfax's army ; probably Hamsoii — 
 Thomas Harrison, the fanatic, who acted afterwards in the famous 
 historical scene of the Dismissal of the Rump Parliament ; con- 
 demned and executed as a regicide after the Restoration. The 
 President of the United States of America (1889) is said to be a lineal 
 descendant of his. 
 
 3 Xhe Kingdom'' s Weekly Intelligencer ^ April 7-13, 1 646, King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cclvii. 
 
CAPITULA TION OF EXE TER. 509 
 
 of the contemporary news-literature leads me to be 
 cautious in inferring that no artillery was therefore 
 used. There had been ample time in the interval for 
 bringing up some of the field-guns which we know had 
 been in action at Tiverton, which had been too late to 
 .be of service at the taking of Dartmouth, and which 
 had been left behind when the army advanced from 
 Crediton to Chulmleigh. Of siege-guns, in the modern 
 sense, there does not appear to have been any with 
 the army at the time. The Comptroller of the 
 Ordnance, Captain Richard Deane, had returned 
 with the General from Cornwall ; and it may be 
 conjectured that to him would now be assigned the 
 direction of the operations against the defences of 
 Barnstaple ; he had served within the town, and had 
 the advantage of personally knowing their reverse 
 side.^ There are supposed traces of entrenched 
 approaches on the rising slope a little to the east 
 of the Great Fort, and of apparently a two-gun 
 battery fronting it, indicative, it may be, of a pre- 
 pared attack on that formidable work. But we 
 know at present so little of the actual details of this 
 or, indeed, of any stage of the siege, that it would be 
 rash to form from the foregoing data even a notion 
 of what took place ; and there is no localized tradition 
 whatever to help us. 
 
 Several days were occupied in settling the articles 
 of the capitulation of Exeter, which were ultimately 
 signed on the 9th, and the city was to be given up 
 on the 13th, the Monday following. The surrender 
 seems to have been a foregone conclusion ; for Secre- 
 
 ' See p. 280. 
 
5IO FAIRFAX BEFORE BARNSTAPLE. 
 
 tary Nicholas, writing to the Marquess of Ormonde 
 on the 26th of March (five days, therefore, before 
 Fairfax's summons was received), says — *' Pendennis 
 Castle and Barnstaple are the only holds we now 
 have in the West ; and it cannot be expected we 
 should have them long, there being no visible relief 
 for them in this kingdom.'' ^ 
 
 To make the best use of the intervening time, and 
 doubtless calculating upon the effect which Sir John 
 Berkeley's surrender would have upon the resolution 
 of Sir Allen Apsley, Fairfax, accompanied by his Secre- 
 tary, Mr. Rushworth, came from his head-quarters 
 at Tiverton to the leaguer before Barnstaple on the 
 evening of Friday the loth of April. *' I am going," 
 he had written to his father Lord Fairfax on the pre- 
 ceding day, '* to Barnstable, which, I have good 
 hopes, will come in on a summons. Then the 
 western war, I trust in the Lord, is finished."^ 
 
 On the same evening, Fairfax sent in his summons 
 to the garrison and, says Sprigge, *' received a civill 
 Answer from the Governour, inclining to a Treaty 
 which began the next day, and held all that day, and 
 part of the day following." 3 The progress of the 
 treaty does not seem to have been so rapid as the 
 impatience of the General desired. Moreover, he 
 was anxious, it appears, to return to be present at 
 the evacuation of Exeter on the following Monday. 
 The treaty '' held dispute till Sunday " the 12th, with 
 
 ^ Carte's Life of Ormojide^ iii. 453. 
 
 ^ Bell's Meiiiorials of the Civil War, i. 290. 
 
 3 Anglia Rediviva^ ed. 1647, P- 243 ; ed. 1854, p. 250. 
 
SURRENDER OF BARNSTAPLE. 5 1 1 
 
 the result thus described in a contemporary letter 
 written from Tiverton on the following day : — 
 
 . . . And then the Generall being resolved not to loose time, 
 sent in a summons to Sir Allen Apsley the Governour, with 
 a Copy of the Articles whereupon Exeter was surrendred, 
 requiring the speedy rendition of Barnstable on the same 
 tearmes, or else to let them know that he would admit no 
 more delayes, but forthwith fall on, which he was resolved 
 to do, if the Governour had not sent an Answer of satisfac- 
 tion. But there was an agreement made that night. [The 
 Articles, the writer explains, are the same, with some obvious 
 exceptions, as those of Exeter.] So Barnstable surrenders 
 tomorrow [the 14th], they are to deliver up the Towne and 
 Castle with all therein, according as is exprest in the afore- 
 said Articles^ and to remaine in the fort only, and after eight 
 dayes, they are to surrender the fort also, and for perform- 
 ance of these articles, they are to give hostages immediatly, 
 any two, whomsoever the Generalls Excellency shall make 
 choyce of, the Governour and Deputy Governour only 
 excepted, and they are to have liberty to send to Oxford to 
 know His Majesties pleasure, [a customary hollow device to 
 save the honour of the garrison], and have an answer if it 
 may bee within the eight dayes, for they are to remaine 
 there no longer in the Fort, and for those who are to march 
 away when they doe goe, I believe they will not much exceed 
 one hundred." ^ 
 
 I infer from the small number of the garrison 
 that was expected by the writer of this account to 
 retire, for a stipulated period of respite, to their last 
 stronghold the Great Fort, that this remnant was 
 
 ^ From a letter printed in Barnstable agreed to be Surrendred, 
 London : Printed for Matthew Walbancke at Grays-Inn-Gate, 16 April, 
 1646. A tract in my own possession. 
 
512 ARTICLES OF CAPITULA TIOJST, 
 
 composed of the Cavalier officers and soldiers who 
 had originally come from other parts of the kingdom ; 
 it can scarcely have meant the whole of the garrison. 
 Those who were Devonians or Cornishmen, and 
 possibly others as well, doubtless elected to be then 
 and there disbanded, or to take service in the Parlia- 
 mentary army. 
 
 Many spurious copies of the Articles of the last 
 surrender of Barnstaple are to be met with in the 
 contemporary literature. I am able to give this 
 historical document in its genuine form : — 
 
 Articles of Agreement hetweene Sir Thomas Fairfax Knight^ 
 Generall of the Farlia7?ients Ar7ny, and Sir Allen Apsley 
 Knight^ Governour of the Garrison of Barnstaple, as 
 followeth : — 
 
 I. 
 
 That all Officers and Souldiers, without exception of any 
 persons whatsoever, and all other persons within the Garri- 
 son and Forts, may have leave to march forth both Horse 
 and Foot, with their compleat Arms, flying Colours, Matches 
 lighted, with their Muskets laden, and twelve shot apiece in 
 their Bandaliers, with the like proportion to the Troopers, for 
 their Carbines, and PistoUs, to any Garrison in England, 
 where His Majesty shall bee in person, and that they shall 
 have a safe Conduct to the same and free quarter in their 
 March, and be not forced to march above ten miles a day. 
 
 II. 
 
 That in case they shal not be received by the King, they 
 shall have free leave to passe quietly to their owne homes. 
 
ARTICLES OF CAPJTULA TION, 5 1 3 
 
 III. 
 
 That no Gentlemen, Clergiemen, Officers, Citizens, or 
 Souldiers, or other persons comprized within these Articles, 
 shall bee questioned or accountable for any Act past, or by 
 them done, or by any other by their procurement, relating 
 unto the unhappy differences between His Majestie, and the 
 Parliament, they submitting themselves to reasonable and 
 moderate Composition for their estates, which the Generall 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax shall really endeavour with the Parlia- 
 ment, that it shall not exceed two yeares value of any man's 
 reall estate respectively, and for personall according to the 
 ordinary rule, not exceeding the proportion aforesaid, which 
 .Composition being made they shall have indemnity for their 
 persons, and injoy their estates and all other immunities. 
 
 IV. 
 
 That no Oath, Covenant, Protestation, or Subscription 
 (relating thereunto) shall be imposed upon any person what- 
 soever comprized within these articles, but only such as shall 
 bind all persons aforesaid, not to beare armes against the 
 Parhament of England now sitting at Westminster ; nor 
 wilfully do any act prejudiciall unto their affaires, whilst they 
 remaine in their Quarters, except the persons aforesaid shall 
 first render themselves unto the Parliament, who shall cause 
 them to be secured, if they think fit. 
 
 V. 
 
 That all persons comprized in these Articles shall have leave 
 to continue in the Parliaments quarters for the space of foure 
 months, or to go beyond Sea at any time in the said space 
 of foure months, with such goods as they have now in their 
 possession, both parties engaging themselves as before. 
 
 34 
 
514 ARTICLES OF CAPITULATION. 
 
 VI. 
 
 That any Officers, or others comprized in these Articles, 
 not exceeding the number of eight persons, shall have free 
 leave to go to Oxford, or to any other place where the King 
 shall be, and to returne to their owne homes at any time, or 
 where else they please. 
 
 % 
 
 VII. 
 
 That all goods now in possession, or of right belonging to 
 any within the Garrison, may have a free protection for their 
 safetie, and leave either to send them beyond the Seas, or to 
 any place within the Kingdome, within three months after 
 the surrender of the same. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 That the towne be not plundred, or fired, and that both 
 they, and all other persons comprized within these articles, 
 shall enjoy the benefit of such articles as were granted by 
 the Generall to them at Exon. 
 
 IX. 
 
 That such goods as shall be remaining in either of the 
 Forts at the surrender thereof, which belong to any in the 
 towne, shall be restored to the severall Owners. 
 
 X. 
 
 That such Prisoners of ours, belonging to the Garrison, 
 which have been taken since the beginning of the Siege, 
 may be forthwith released, and enjoy the benefit of these 
 articles. 
 
 XI. 
 
 That the Castle and towne, with all the Ordnance, 
 ammunition, and other warlike provisions therein, be 
 
ARTICLES OF CAPITULA TION. 5 1 5 
 
 surrendred to Sir Thomas Fairfax, Generall of the 
 Parliaments Army, or to whom he shall appoynt, on 
 Tuesday the 14 of this instant April. 
 
 XII. 
 
 That the Fort with the Ordnance, ammunition, spare 
 armes, and all other warlike provisions therein, be sur- 
 rendred to Sir Thomas Fairfax, Generall of the Parlia- 
 ments Army, or to whom he shall appoynt, on Munday 
 the 20 of this Instant, by twelve of the clock at Noone. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 That there be a Cessation of armes. during these eight 
 dayes following \ the Souldiers of both sides continuing 
 within the limits agreed between Sir Allen Apsley, and 
 Lieutenant-Colonell Ashfield : and that such Souldiers as 
 shall come away during the eight dayes, shall not be 
 entertained, but may be sent back againe. 
 
 XIV. 
 That the sick and wounded Souldiers belonging to Sir 
 Allen Apsley, may have libertie to continue in their 
 Quarters at Barnstaple, till they recover their health, 
 care being taken for them on that behalfe, and then to 
 have Passes to returne to their Colours, or to their 
 homes, at their choyce.^ 
 
 Such, then, so far as I have been able to recover 
 the details, were the last siege and surrender of 
 Barnstaple. The result in a military sense was 
 
 ' Four strong Castles taken by the Parliaments Forces^ &c. **The 
 copie of the Articles for the surrender of Barnstaple." London: 
 Printed for Matthew Walbancke at Grayes Inn Gate, April 27, 1646. 
 King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cclviii. 
 
Si6 SEQUEL OF THE SURRENDER, 
 
 perhaps inglorious, but it was doubtless heartily 
 welcomed by the inhabitants who, during the block- 
 ade had been necessarily subjected to privations of 
 which no account has survived. On Tuesday the 
 14th of April, the Castle and town were duly given 
 up. Sir Allen Apsley and the remnant of the 
 garrison continued in the Great Fort, according to 
 the Articles, until the following Tuesday, when (as 
 nothing to the contrary is recorded) they may be 
 assumed to have passed out of it with the full cre- 
 dentials of an honourable capitulation. Colonel 
 Sheffield had been left behind by the General to see 
 the Articles performed. 
 
 In the tabular statement at the end of Sprigge's 
 book, which as I have already had occasion to 
 remark contains some particulars which do not 
 occur in the body of the work, the siege is repre- 
 sented as having lasted thirty days. If the com- 
 mencement of the blockade was the commencement 
 of the siege it must be taken from the 20th of 
 February, according to Sprigge's own statement ; 
 and from that date to the time of the surrender are 
 to be reckoned forty-nine days. If Sprigge made 
 the tabulated record advisedly, it must mean that 
 nearly three weeks had elapsed before Colonel Cook 
 seriously invested Barnstaple, and the blockade 
 became a formal siege. In the same ** Table " the 
 number of '' slain '* of the garrison is put as " zo:' 
 If we add to this return the usual proportion of 
 wounded, a considerable amount of fighting, first 
 and last, is indicated for which the scanty details 
 of the siege have certainly not prepared us. Further- 
 
THANKSGIVING, 517 
 
 more this record states that thirty-five pieces of 
 ordnance and four hundred arms were taken. 
 
 While the treaty for the surrender of Barnstaple 
 was going on, Sir Thomas Fairfax stayed at Taw- 
 stock House, the Earl of Bath's residence, from 
 which after the surrender he duly wrote to the 
 Parliament a letter, so far as I am aware not 
 preserved, reporting the event. The House of 
 Commons showed its sense of the importance 
 of the news and the gratification with which it 
 was received by ordering '* That Mr. Standish who 
 brought the Letter concerning the Rendition of 
 Barnstaple from the General shall have one hundred 
 pounds bestowed upon him for his Pains." ^ 
 
 The surrender of Barnstaple practically finished 
 the campaign in the West, and released the army of 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax for the final operations which 
 brought this war to a close. Two isolated forts in 
 Cornwall and Devon respectively — Pendennis Castle 
 and Fort Charles, at Salcombe — alone continued to 
 hold out, and small detachments were left to reduce 
 them at leisure. The completion of a brilliant 
 series of military successes was received everywhere 
 with exultation by the Parliamentary party. The 
 goal which promised so much for freedom when in 
 anticipation, but which proved such a Dead-Sea 
 apple when realized, was not far off. In the river 
 Shannon, Admiral Penn, who was operating there 
 with a squadron against the Irish rebels, was noting 
 in his diary that Captain Southwood in a small 
 frigate came in and *' told us that Exeter and 
 
 ^ Journals of the House of Commons ^ 15° Aprilis, 1646, iv. 510. 
 
5i8 POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 Barnstaple were taken together with divers other 
 places : for which good news God make us thank- 
 ful ! '' I The i2th of May was set apart by Parlia- 
 ment as a day of Solemn Thanksgiving for the 
 regaining and " taking in '* of several garrisons — 
 Barnstaple and Ilfracombe being bracketed with 
 others in the category. At St. Margaret's Church, 
 Westminster, the Rev. Sam. Torshel preached 
 before the House of Commons. His sermon on 
 the text— Righteousness exalteth a Nation — a tedious, 
 diffuse, judaical rhapsody, in which there was the 
 least possible allusion to the particular occasion, 
 was printed under the title of The Palace of Justice 
 opened and set to view, and may still be read by the 
 curious. One act of ^* righteousness*' which the 
 Puritan divine meekly suggested to his Honourable 
 hearers in the hour of their triumph was that they 
 should not spare the sword in their dealings with 
 the prostrate Royalists ! 
 
 Here the limit which I have set to this relation 
 bids me stop. But, before concluding, there are 
 some occurrences, subsequent in point of time but 
 connected, in whatever may be their interest, with 
 what has gone before, which may be noticed by way 
 of postscript. 
 
 Before the end of the month in which Barnstaple 
 reverted to the Parliament, King Charles was a 
 fugitive. A few months later he was a prisoner 
 in the power of that army which in Devonshire and 
 
 " Memorials of Sir W, Penn, 1833, i. 177. 
 
BARNSTAPLE DISGARRISONED, 5 1 9 
 
 Cornwall had swept away his last means of resisting 
 the popular rebellion. Rival factions, such as in- 
 evitably rise to the surface of a successful revolution, 
 contended for predominance. The moderate section 
 of the Parliament, content with the ground which 
 had been won in the cause of the people's liberties, 
 were "secluded" and suppressed by a junto which, 
 after condemning the King to the executioner's 
 block, paved the way for a military and, what was 
 worse, a fanatical despotism. In March, 1649, ^^e 
 Town Clerk of Barnstaple had to read at the High 
 Cross the proclamation which declared that kingly 
 government in England was dissolved. 
 
 No garrison, or if any a very small one, seems to 
 have been left in Barnstaple when the Parliamentary 
 forces retired ; although one Major Roberts, of whom 
 nothing is known, is stated to have been temporarily 
 appointed Governor.^ In the following February, by 
 a resolution of the House of Commons, the town was 
 to be " disgarrisoned and the works slighted." ^ 
 
 Sir Allen Apsley went to Nottingham, and for a 
 time was the guest of his Puritan sister and her 
 husband, Colonel John Hutchinson, the governor of 
 the Parliamentary garrison of that town. There, by 
 a singular chance, he again met his former opponent, 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax, who visited Nottingham, and 
 was on terms of friendly intercourse with the 
 Hutchinsons. Sir Allen did not lose his connection 
 with Devonshire. Probably, during the time when 
 
 ' Sir Thomas Fairfax s Further Proceedings in the West, &c., King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cclvij. 
 ""Jaurnals of the House of Commons, 25° Februarii, 1646 \i.e., 1647], 
 
 V. xcviii. 
 
52Q S/J^ ALLEN APSLEY. 
 
 he was Lieutenant-Governor of Exeter, he had had 
 leisure for the softer passions. It must have been 
 not long after his surrender of Barnstaple that he 
 married Elizabeth, the only daughter and heiress of 
 John Peter, Esq. (who died in 1643), of Bowhay, in 
 the parish of Exminster. After the Restoration, Sir 
 Allen held the office of Falconer to the King, a 
 sinecure which has lately, by its unjustifiable vitality, 
 provoked discussion. He was also Almoner to the 
 Duke of York, and M.P. for Thetford in 1661. He 
 died in 1683, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. 
 A little time before his death he published a long 
 poem, entitled. Order and Disorder^ being Meditations 
 on the Creation and Fall, which has long since passed 
 into oblivion. Catherine, the granddaughter and 
 ultimate heiress of Sir Allen Apsley and his Devon- 
 shire wife, married her cousin Allen, first Lord 
 Bathurst. From them descended the Lord Chan- 
 cellor Bathurst, who built the well-known Apsley 
 House, at Hyde Park Corner, and the present Earl 
 Bathurst, whose second title is Baron Apsley. One 
 of the daughters of the first Lord and Lady Bathurst 
 became the wife of Mr. Buller of Downes, Devon, 
 and was the mother of the celebrated Judge Buller. 
 The pacification of Devonshire brought into active 
 operation the standing Committee of the county for 
 the sequestration, under the powers given by suc- 
 cessive ordinances of Parliament, of the estates, 
 real and personal, of those Royalists who, by a large 
 and comprehensive definition, came under the de- 
 nomination of " Delinquents." It included all who 
 had been in arms or had raised or contributed money 
 
SEQ UES TRA TION, 521 
 
 or other aid against the Parhament, or had injured 
 any who had willingly yielded obedience to the 
 Parliament; all who had joined in any oath or 
 association, or imposed or levied any tax or assess- 
 ment towards the maintenance of any forces, against 
 the Parliament. Afterwards, it was extended to 
 those who voluntarily absented themselves from 
 their usual places of abode, dwelling, trade, offices, or 
 employment, and had gone to any of the King's 
 armies or forces raised without the consent of Parlia- 
 ment, and to those who fraudulently should embezzle, 
 conceal, or convey away their goods, money, or 
 estate. The Committee of sequestrators, which in 
 Devonshire consisted mostly of gentry of the highest 
 standing in the county, had the largest powers to 
 seize the lands, rents, &c., of the delinquents and 
 debts due to them, and to sell their goods. They 
 were to allow not more than one-fifth for the main- 
 tenance of the wives and children. Papists, without 
 exception, were to surrender two-thirds of their 
 estates. These powers were at first carried out 
 apparently with less zeal than was expected by the 
 Parliament, and repeated instructions were issued 
 to stimulate the activity of the Committees. It is 
 generally thought that the gentry, so long as they 
 were predominant on the Committees, felt some 
 reluctance to interfere with the landed property of 
 their neighbours notwithstanding their political dif- 
 ferences. But the actual work was soon relegated 
 to less scrupulous agents of a lower class. The 
 changes which took place in consequence of these 
 political confiscations in the holdings of a large 
 
522 SEQ UESTRA TION, 
 
 portion of the landed property of the kingdom, and 
 in the means and ultimate social position of its 
 owners, were enormous. All these transactions 
 were controlled by a Central Committee of Lords 
 and Commons sitting permanently at Goldsmiths' 
 Hall, London, whose records are still preserved- The 
 option was allowed of compounding for estates thus 
 sequestered ; and this composition, when effected, 
 was generally at two years' purchase; in other words, 
 by the payment of a lump sum equal to two years' 
 rental. Those who were disposed to believe in the 
 permanency of the new order of government, and 
 despaired of any relief from the incubus which sat 
 upon their lands, accepted the alternative, and 
 with much trouble to themselves had to go person- 
 ally to London and submit to an inquisitorial inspec- 
 tion of their rent-rolls, family settlements, and so 
 forth, by the Central Committee. It is understood 
 that these proceedings were carried out with an 
 affected regard to justice and legality ; and certainly 
 the papers which exist show an attention to form 
 and detail which may be termed bureaucratic. The 
 composition was in reality an enormous fine, and is 
 often called a fine. An avenue was left open for an 
 appeal to the clemency of the Parliament, as we 
 gather from one of the articles of the surrender of 
 Barnstaple. A well-known little book, printed in 
 the year 1655, professes to contain a Catalogue of the 
 Lords, KnightSy and Gentlemen, that have Compounded 
 for their Estates. This is not a complete list, but it is 
 the only one available without much special research. 
 Very few of the landowners of North Devon appear 
 
COLONEL ARTHUR BASSET. 523 
 
 in this list ; their names may be of interest to some 
 one, and I append them with the amount of composi- 
 tions which they paid respectively. 
 
 Bath Henry, Earl of 693 o 9 
 
 Basset Arth. of Underseigh [Umberleigh] 1,321 6 6 
 
 Choi well William, Alwington .. . ... 180 
 
 Carew Thos. Studley, Esq. ... ... 750 
 
 Courtney John of MoUand, Esq. ... 750 
 
 Cary Tho. of Torrington ... ... 20 
 
 Cotton Edward, Shobroo [Shobroke] Cler 288 
 Cutnie Archer, Bampton, Gent. ... 83 10 
 
 Chic[h]ester Henry, Bittadon ... 7.18 
 
 Cary Robert, Clovelly ... ... 25 o 4 
 
 Davy John, Barington [Burrington ?] . . . 20 
 
 Gilford John of Brightly, Esq. ... 1,136 
 
 Hancock Joh. Combmartin, Esq. ... 420 
 
 Jermyn John, Werkley [Warkleigh'?] Gent 112 
 Milton William, Sheep wash, Gent. ... 76 10 
 
 Muncke Thomas, Portlinch [Potheridge ?] 
 
 Esq. ... ... ... ♦.. 300 
 
 Pine Edward of East-down ... ... [a blank] 
 
 Pointz Edward Junior, Barnstable ... 45 
 
 Stukely Thomas, Affton, Gent ... 300 . 
 
 Sydenham Sir Ralphe, Youlston ... 500 
 
 Smith Richard, Torrington, Merchant 176 
 
 Slowly John, Fremington, Gent. ... 138 
 
 Yeo George, Huish, Esq 327 5 
 
 The occurrence of the name of Colonel Arthur Bas- 
 set (or, as he wrote his own name, Bassett) in this 
 list suggests an inquiry into the statement made by 
 Prince, the author of the Worthies ofDevon,tha.t he was 
 " made governour of Barnstaple for the King,'* ^ and 
 
 » Ed. 1810, p. 53. 
 
524 COLONEL ARTHUR BASSET. 
 
 implying (although there is some ambiguity in this 
 part of the paragraph) that he held the post at the 
 time of the final surrender of the town to Fairfax. 
 Gribble {Memorials of Barnstaple^ p. 456), adopting 
 from an unmentioned and, to him, unknown narrator 
 a passage which turns out to be a mere garbled 
 extract from Prince, assumes that this was so. The 
 Rev. Thomas Moore, in the biographical portion of his 
 History of Devonshire (ii. 508), referring to Colonel 
 Basset, states categorically that ** at the commence- 
 ment of the Civil War, having joined the royal party, 
 he was made Colonel in the King's army and Gover- 
 nor of Barnstaple ; " thus carrying the ambiguity 
 a little further. After considerable research I am 
 bound to say that I have not found a single particle 
 of evidence that Colonel Basset was, at any time. 
 Governor of Barnstaple; whereas the evidence to the 
 contrary is all but conclusive. Both Gribble and Moore 
 were betrayed, in my judgment, into unwarrantable 
 glosses of the ambiguous statement made by Prince. 
 Neither, at the commencement nor at the end of the 
 Civil War could Colonel Basset have held the post 
 of Governor of Barnstaple. For, in the first place, 
 in the twelve months after the town was first gar- 
 risoned it was never for a moment in the hands of 
 the Royalist party; and, that being so, it is almost 
 unnecessary to remark that Colonel Basset was for 
 a great portion of that time a prisoner in London. 
 In the second place, for many months down to the 
 final surrender of the town to Fairfax, not only is it 
 matter of history that Sir Allen Apsley was the 
 governor, but, as shown by Colonel Basset's own 
 
THE CLERGY. 525 
 
 composition papers,^ he was shut up in Exeter and 
 afterwards claimed the benefit of the articles of the 
 capitulation of Exeter — not of Barnstaple. The 
 petitioner in those curious and interesting docu- 
 ments had to recite his own ** delinquency '* ; and 
 although Colonel Basset admitted that he was 
 ** Commissioner (amongst others) for the county of 
 Devon, on his Majesty's behalf, in raising forces 
 against the forces of the Parliament/' he made no 
 mention, which he would probably have done, of his 
 having been governor of a fortified town for the King. 
 
 It rests therefore on the unsupported and bare 
 statement made by Prince whether or not Colonel 
 Basset was actually — it could have been only 
 for a very brief time — governor during any in- 
 termediate period when Barnstaple was in the 
 Royalists' occupation, and of this, as I have said, 
 there is no evidence whatever. It is a fact that after 
 the Restoration, Colonel Basset, who was of course 
 associated to some extent with Barnstaple by his 
 property and near residence, besides being one of its 
 magistrates, was commandant of the trained-band of 
 the town, and this may have misled the author of the 
 WoYthies. Colonel Arthur Basset, of Heanton Court, 
 has been frequently confounded with Sir Arthur 
 Basset of the Cornish branch of the family, who was 
 also engaged on the King's side in the Civil War. 
 
 The greatest sufferers, perhaps, from the wholesale 
 confiscations made by the now dominant party in the 
 State were the contumacious clergy. Those who 
 accepted the Covenant and conformed to the Presb} - 
 
 ' Royalist Compositions, Record Office, 2ncl Series, xxxvi. 363-381. 
 
526 REV. MARTIN BLAKE, 
 
 terian formula were generally able to retain their 
 livings, and these were probably the majority. Those 
 who did not were ejected. A fifth of the income was 
 reserved for the maintenance of the family of the 
 ejected minister, although not always paid by the 
 Puritan preacher who supplanted him. A well- 
 known work was compiled with great industry in 
 the beginning of the eighteenth century by the Rev. 
 John Walker, M.A., Rector of St. Mary Major, 
 Exeter, giving an account of the sufferings of these 
 ejected clergy during and after the Civil War, and 
 the victims in Devonshire occupy naturally a large 
 place. It was not so much for his doctrinal per- 
 versities, for he was not a High Churchman,^ as for 
 his political delinquency, that the Rev. Martin 
 Blake, B.D., Vicar of Barnstaple, came under the 
 heavy hand of the Committee. Martin Blake is 
 best known to the present generation by the 
 curious and elaborate monument, now in the south 
 chancel aisle of the parish church, which, in the 
 midst of trouble — *' utrimque coarctatus,'^ as the 
 allusion to himself in the pathetic inscription has it 
 — he raised to the memory of a beloved son and four 
 other children. Besides a sermon which he printed 
 after the Restoration, Blake, during the military 
 occupation of Barnstaple in 1645, and in the midst 
 of the distractions of the time, found opportunity to 
 print in London a treatise on one of the subjects 
 over which the divines of those days consumed their 
 
 ^ He had had scruples about taking the oath imposed by the Con- 
 vocation in 1640. See his letter in the Tanner MSS., Bodleian Library, 
 Ixv. 199. 
 
REV. MARTIN BLAKE, 527 
 
 midnight oil.' Throughout the whole of the period 
 over which this relation has extended his name has 
 not once occurred, and it might be inferred that he 
 took no active part whatever in local affairs. No 
 sooner, however, was the Parliamentary authority 
 re-established than it was remembered that he had 
 used his influence to procure the surrender of the 
 town to Prince Maurice (in 1643), and that, being 
 (as it was supposed) a native of Plymouth, he had 
 written to the authorities there, counselling them to 
 submit to the King's authority, and offering his own 
 services for that end. In Walker's Sufferings is a 
 long account of the persecution to which Blake 
 was now subjected. Of this I can only give an 
 abstract. Blake's greatest enemy was one Tooker, 
 whom he had befriended. Alas ! for the credit of 
 human nature, that this sequence should seem so 
 familiar. This man ** solicited " a petition against 
 him, the main accusation in which was the Ply- 
 mouth letter. Blake was summoned to answer it 
 
 * The Great Question so 77121 ch ijtsisted on by so7ne Touching 
 Scandalous Christians as yet not legally convicted ; whether or no they 
 may be lawfully cuimitted by the Minister, or co77i77iunicated with by 
 the people at the Lord's Tahle. The Affi7'TJiative 7naintained by way of 
 Answer to a Discourse of Mr. B. Coxe. By Martin Blake, B.D., 
 and V. of B., in Devon, in the behalfe of himself and his Parishioners 
 whom Mr. B. Coxe hath secretly laboured to draw them into the con- 
 trary opinion. London : printed for the Author, &c., 1645. King's 
 Pamphlets, B. M. , small 4tos, vol. ccxxv. Mr. B. Coxe was the 
 stipendiary Lecturer of the Corporation. The tractate had been 
 written, Blake says in his preface, and a copy delivered to Mr. Coxe 
 before the outbreak of the war. The printing was delayed by a "small 
 parcell of Copy by negligence of the Printer being lost ; the Author 
 dwelling farre distant and the waies so troublesome, it could not sooner 
 bee supplied." 
 
528 REV, MARTIN BLAKE, 
 
 before the Grand Committee for the West in 
 London, in May, 1646. A counter petition was got 
 up at Barnstaple in Blake's favour. Tooker's 
 petition was then, somehow, dropped, and Blake 
 was ordered to appear before the Committee at 
 Exeter, whither he repaired, accompanied by several 
 of the town, who brought another petition on his 
 behalf, signed by the Corporation and a majority of 
 the inhabitants — almost the whole town. He was 
 now charged, in yet another petition, that he was 
 an enemy to godliness; had betrayed Barnstaple to 
 the King and endeavoured the same at Plymouth ; 
 and that the good people of Barnstaple could receive 
 no comfort or benefit by his ministry. Sir Hardress 
 Waller, a Puritan, then commanding in Devonshire, 
 wrote to the Committee in Blake's favour, declaring 
 that he had received spiritual comfort from him, and 
 had observed his great zeal to God's people, and 
 assuring the Committee that Blake was singularly 
 gifted and truly and powerfully godly. Notwith- 
 standing this testimonial, Blake was voted a delin- 
 quent and suspended, and the town was without a 
 minister for the next twelve months. In the mean 
 time '*a great and pestilential sickness brake out in 
 the town." Blake had retired into the country. 
 The town then ** renew their instances " to the 
 Committee, representing their double misery for 
 want of a minister at such a season, and suggest 
 that no one would then come into such an infected 
 place, but that their old minister would gladly 
 return. The reply was that Mr. Blake was not to 
 preach any more in Barnstaple. In 1647, his sus- 
 
REV. MARTIN BLAKE, 529 
 
 pension was by some means cancelled ; upon which 
 he was recalled, and resumed his ministry for 
 the next eight years — not however without " the 
 cumbrance of a factious Lecturer one Hanmer, 
 whom they thrust upon him and with whom he was 
 forced to bear, lest they should a second time get 
 him dispossessed of his living, as they did after- 
 wards, notwithstanding his compliance " — which 
 probably implies that he had taken the Covenant 
 This ** factious '* lecturer was the Rev. Jonathan 
 Hanmer, a native of Barnstaple, and at that time 
 vicar of the adjoining parish of Bishop's Tawton, 
 from which living he was ejected by the Act of 
 Uniformity in 1662. Although therefore, obviously, 
 a strong Puritan, and afterwards, in fact, the founder 
 of a Nonconformist congregation, it is asserted by 
 Gribble that, so far from Mr. Hanmer being 
 obnoxious to Mr. Blake, ** these two amiable men 
 lived on terms of the greatest harmony." ^ About 
 the year 1655, when the Episcopal clergy were again 
 subjected to persecution, Blake was once more 
 inhibited from preaching, and afterwards dispos- 
 sessed of his living; Nathaniel Mather, a Noncon- 
 formist, who had graduated at Harvard College, 
 New England, being installed in his place.^ In 
 1657, Blake went to London to seek redress, and 
 obtained an order from Cromwell to continue in 
 possession of his vicarage until the Law should try 
 
 ' Memorials^ p. 502. 
 
 = He was an elder brother of Increase Mather, the eminent Puritan 
 divine of New England and a voluminous writer, and was himself a 
 theologian of some note. He went to Holland at the Restoration, and 
 left no record at Barnstaple. 
 
 35 
 
530 THE PLAGUE,. 
 
 his case. Notwithstanding which, it seems that a 
 party of Horse was sent to dispossess him, broke 
 open his house — " even that vicarage house which 
 he had at great charge built anew from the ground '' 
 — and hurried him a prisoner to Exeter in a very 
 bitter, stormy winter's day. He refused to resign, 
 insisting that he had not been sequestered, was 
 dismissed and returned to his family — ** but so much 
 weakened with travel and sorrow that he came home 
 in a very sickly condition and was never repossessed 
 of his vicarage until the Restoration." ^ 
 
 So much — and perhaps too much — of Martin 
 Blake. His case is no doubt a typical one, and at 
 least is of some local interest. He lived as vicar 
 of Barnstaple for thirteen years after his final re- 
 instatement, and died in 1673. The vicarage-house, 
 mentioned in the foregoing account of his troubles 
 as having been built by him, is still standing ; it has 
 apparently been subjected to but little alteration, 
 and has been occupied by the successive vicars down 
 to the present time. 
 
 After War — Pestilence. The last Royalist soldier 
 had scarcely left Barnstaple when the plague broke 
 out in the town, and the ill-fated inhabitants were 
 overwhelmed by a calamity compared with which 
 the worst sufferings of the siege were insignificant. 
 The visitation was not peculiar to Barnstaple, nor 
 was it the first of its kind. The year 1646, however, 
 was a plague-year of exceptional severity. Most of 
 the towns in Devonshire were infected, and through- 
 
 ' Sufferings of the Clergy, &c., by the Rev. John Walker, M.A., 
 1 7 14, pt. ii. p. 194. 
 
THE PLAGUE. 531 
 
 out the summer.the epidemic prevailed over the greater 
 part of England. In London, in July, there v^as the 
 customary order issued for the shutting-up of the 
 houses of those infected, and the red cross and pious 
 deprecation, '* Lord, have mercy upon us ! " were 
 painted on the front doors. The Rev. Richard 
 Wood's '* Journal " notices that " the great plague," 
 as he calls it, began in Barnstaple in April. ^ Another 
 notice, quoted by Gribble, is that the " great sick- 
 ness " began in May.^ In the month of September, 
 the election of the Mayor took place in the open air, 
 presumably to avoid the danger of infection which 
 the assembly of a number of persons in the Guildhall 
 would have caused. In the County Sessions at 
 Exeter the magistrates ordered that ** the Town of 
 Barnstaple being infected with the plague, none of 
 the inhabitants were to be entertained in any of the 
 neighbouring parishes ; if they do, to be bound to 
 the sessions and their houses shut up." ^ It is strange 
 that a calamity of such dimensions as this seems to 
 have been should have left so slight a record behind 
 it. The parish register of burials is silent, not 
 having been kept between April, 1643, and July, 
 1647. But a record quoted by Gribble, as usual 
 without any reference, states that 1,500 died of the 
 plague — out of a population of between four and five 
 thousand. Incredible as this may seem, it is quite 
 supported by a more certainly accredited fact. The 
 population of the suburban parish of Pilton could 
 
 ' Chanter's Literary History of Barnstaple y p. 120. 
 ^ Memorials of Barnstaple ^ p. 630, 
 ? Haraing MSS. 
 
532 THE PLAGUE. 
 
 scarcely have numbered more than i,ooo at that 
 time ; the register of the parish has this special 
 entry in the year 1646 : — 
 
 Moreover there dyed in the Plague and Pestilence thi^ 
 year theis following 
 
 [Here follow 276 names.] 
 
 - Moreover there dyed at the Pesthouse Fourteene psonses 
 whose names are not here inscribed. 
 
 With reference to this period, a remarkable tract 
 with an obviously religious, or rather sectarian, pur- 
 pose is extant. It is now only redeemed by its local 
 allusions from its vulgarity and worthlessness, which 
 are those of a halfpenny street-ballad ; yet it was 
 printed in London, and doubtless had a considerable 
 circulation, as it seems to have reached a second 
 edition. From a manuscript note in the copy in the 
 Library of the British Museum ^ it appears to have 
 been issued just before August in the year of the plague. 
 The title runs as follows : '' Five Wonders scene in 
 England, Two at Barnstable^ one at Kirkham, one 
 in Cornwall, one in Little Britain in London. In all 
 which places Whereby Gods Judgements are miractdously 
 seene upon some. Severall Miraculous Accidents have 
 hapned to the Amazement of all those that have 
 beene eye-witnesses thereof. The second impression 
 with additions, and Certificate from those who were eye 
 witnesses thereof. Published according to Order. London. 
 Printedby J. C. 1646." 
 
 ^ King's Pamphlets, B. M., small 4tos, vol. cclxxiii. 
 
THE PLAGUE, 533 
 
 Wonder No. i is thus certified : — 
 
 A Copie of a Paper which came from Exeter^ inclosed in 
 a Letter to an Eminent Ofificer of that Garrison (a very 
 honest Godly man) now in London. 
 
 That the Sicknesse being for a long time very tedious in 
 Barnstable^ some honest people met together twice a weeke, 
 to pray the Lord for the removing of his hand of Visitation 
 from the Towne, some disturbed them, and crying out they 
 were INBE PENDANTS, Saying they were the cause of 
 the Plague being amongst them, threatning to turne them 
 out of their Towne, this did not disharten the honest 
 people, but they continued still in prayer, and divers of the 
 other people went from the house (where they had abused 
 them, throwing stones and railing on them) to their owne 
 dwellings, and immediately fell sick of the Plague, and they 
 and all their families dyed of the Plague within one weeke, 
 which causeth most of the people of the Towne, to speake 
 well of the honest partie, and to take notice of the hand 
 of God on the other. And which is to be observed, not 
 one family of those railed against had not, neither hath as 
 yet, had any sicknesse amongst them, though it hath been 
 on each hand next dore to them. 
 
 Wonder No. 2, a revolting incident of the plague, 
 but no wonder at all, is unfit for reproduction. The 
 w^riter continues: ''And all this is justified by the 
 Deputie governour of Barnstable, besides the confirma- 
 tion of 'many more honest people of that Town, So say 
 the Letters from Exeter {which is all I can say of 
 it).'' The anti-climax of this concluding passage 
 
 amusing. 
 
 In this year, 1646, the House of Commons having 
 become considerably attenuated by the repeated 
 
534 CLAIMS OF THE TOWN. 
 
 ejections of the less thorough-going republicans, 
 many new members, nicknamed '* Recruiters," were 
 called up by not very regular processes of election. 
 The vacancies in the representation of the borough 
 of Barnstaple caused by George Peard's death and 
 Richard Ferris's disablement were then filled up — 
 the former by Major-General Philip Skippon ; the 
 latter by a native of the town, John Doddridge, a 
 nephew of Judge Doddridge, and afterwards Re- 
 corder of Bristol and Barnstaple. 
 
 It would seem that in 1647, when the distresses 
 caused by the plague may be supposed to have been 
 somewhat alleviated, the Corporation of Barnstaple 
 were laying before the House of Commons their 
 claim to the reimbursement of the costs to which 
 they had been put for the fortification of the town, 
 and for which both Houses of Parliament had 
 solemnly given their indemnity. It was probably 
 at this time that the *'Summarie of Disbursements," 
 which I have found so useful in its historical ap- 
 plication, was prepared. The issue of the business, 
 so far as is known, is summed up in the following 
 Order of the House of Commons : — 
 
 
 
 25° Januarii 1647 [^'•^•, 1648]. Ordered That M"^ W"* 
 Palmer, late Mayor of Barnstable, be referred to the Com- 
 mittee for taking the Accompts of the whole Kingdom; to 
 audit, state, and certify the Accompts of the Town.^ 
 
 This did not go very far in the way of a satis- 
 faction of the claims of the Corporation, and, as has 
 
 * Journals of the House of Commons^ v. 442. 
 
FREE QUARTER. 535 
 
 been already stated, they were apparently never even 
 compounded for. 
 
 The few Parliamentary troops maintained in 
 Devonshire after the pacification were under the 
 command of Sir Hardress Waller, whose head- 
 quarters were at Exeter. An outlying detachment, 
 under a lieutenant, was quartered for a time at 
 Barnstaple and appears to have been the cause 
 of a great deal of annoyance there. In April, 1648, 
 in reference to a complaint made to Parliament of 
 these proceedings, whatever they were, the General 
 was promptly requested to send for the lieutenant 
 " who with his Souldiers took Free Quarter about 
 Barnstaple and to examine the business and do 
 Justice to the Country." In the result of this affair, 
 ** the House passed a new Ordinance for taking 
 away Free Quarter " ^ — a grievance which, ap- 
 parently, since the termination of hostilities, had 
 been the subject of reiterated complaint from the 
 *' well-affected" in various parts of the country. 
 There is an item in the Records which is explained 
 by this transaction : " Paid Tucker for expenses 
 of a horse in a journey to Exon about the taking 
 off the troops, los. iid."^ 
 
 The year 1648 was marked by the reactionary dis- 
 turbances which ushered in what is usually called 
 the Second Civil War. There was a rising of 
 Royalists in Pembrokeshire, which Cromwell went 
 down and with some difficulty suppressed. Another 
 was the Kent insurrection, led by the Earl of 
 Norwich (father of Lord Goring), Lord Capel, and 
 
 ^ Whitelock's Memorials, ed. 16S2, p. 301. == No. Ixvii. 
 
536 TROOPS FOR IRELAND. 
 
 Sir Charles Lucas, who threw themselves into Col- 
 chester, where, after a terrible siege, they surren- 
 dered to the forces of the Commonwealth. ^ For the 
 part taken in this affair, Lord Capel, whose previous 
 career in the West we have partly followed, was sub- 
 sequently beheaded in Palace Yard. A more for- 
 midable affair was the revolt of the Scots and their 
 coalition with the northern Royalists under the 
 Duke of Hamilton. Hurrying to the scene from 
 Wales, Cromwell defeated and dispersed them in 
 the sanguinary battle and rout of Preston. 
 
 The King was all this while a close prisoner in 
 Carisbrook Castle. The hope of the moderate 
 section of the Parliament that an accommodation 
 with him was still possible, fructified in yet another 
 treaty which, like all the others, came to nothing. 
 The person of the King was now a stumbling-block 
 to Cromwell and the army. Even from Devonshire, 
 petitions went up, signed by the inhabitants — 
 gentlemen, ministers, &c., desiring justice upon the 
 principal ** Causers of the War." The meaning of 
 this movement was clear, and the inevitable sequel 
 was seen in the following January on the scaffold in 
 front of Whitehall. 
 
 In the following year the turn of the Irish 
 Royalists came. Barnstaple was one of the ports 
 selected for the embarkation of troops for this san- 
 guinary campaign. One Major Walters of Barn- 
 staple, of whom little appears to be known, but 
 who was afterwards one of the Members for the 
 borough in the last Parliament of the Common- 
 wealth, contracted to carry over five hundred. 
 
COMMEMORA TION, 537 
 
 recruits ; he raising, marching, and transporting 
 them to the waterside at his own charge, and with- 
 out disorder or free-quartering. As he was paid the 
 money, it is to be presumed that he executed his 
 part of the contract.' It is not mentioned whether 
 or not the men were enlisted in North Devon ; but 
 that seems to be the obvious inference. The news 
 of the terrible assault and capture of Tredah, or 
 Drogheda, in which the whole garrison of some two 
 thousand men were put to the sword — one of the 
 ''marvellous great mercies" vouchsafed to Crom- 
 well's army — was received at Barnstaple with 
 effusive rejoicing.* 
 
 In this year, 1650, there occurs in the Memorials 
 of Bulstrode Whitelock a paragraph, being a report 
 of current news, which refers to what was probably 
 the first commemoration at Barnstaple of the great 
 Deliverance of the ist of July. Without the explana- 
 tion from local history the paragraph would be 
 unintelligible : — 
 
 1650, July 2. From Barnstable of a design to destroy 
 all the Parliament Party in that Town and thereabouts pre- 
 vented by small means through the Mercy of God, was this 
 day celebrated with great Solemnity.3 
 
 '' Paid for 75 pounds of powder used on the ist 
 July £^ " — is an item of the expenditure of the 
 Corporation on this occasion.4 
 
 r 
 
 » Calendar of State Papers : Domestic— \(i<Py p. 264. ' 
 
 * Records, No. Ixviii. 
 
 3 Memorials, ed. 1682, p. 447. ^ Records, No. Ixviii, 
 
538 WAGSTAFF'S INSURRECTION. 
 
 I do not find, either in general history or in the^^ 
 local records, any other notice of moment relating" 
 to Barnstaple and its people during the Interregnum. 
 
 In the year 1655, there was a sudden but transient 
 flurry in North Devon caused by one of the many 
 petty Royalist insurrections which troubled the 
 Cromwellian Government. Sir Joseph Wagstaff, 
 Colonel John Penruddock, and Major Hugh Grove, 
 Cavaliers and gentlemen of fortune and position, 
 with several others, in Wiltshire, surprised Salis- 
 bury, and declared for Charles the Second. The 
 success of the rising was never for a moment 
 probable. The insurgents made off on the first 
 appearance of the Protector's troopers, entered 
 Devonshire, and were finally brought to bay at 
 South Molton. ' -^ 
 
 The fight which ensued has not, so far as I am 
 aware, been described by any local writer, and is 
 comparatively little known ; although, as it were, 
 only an after-clap of the great Civil War it is of 
 so much local interest that an account of it, written 
 by the actual commandant of the Commonwealth 
 soldiers, may be appropriately inserted here. It is 
 contained in two letters, printed in pamphlet form ; 
 the first of these, written in the very heat of the 
 business by Captain Unton Crook, the officer men- 
 tioned, is as follows : — 
 
 Yesterday morning, being Tuesday, I marched with my 
 Troop to Huninton, being fifteen miles Eastward from 
 Exon, with intention to stop the Enemy from coming 
 further Westward ; but gaining intelligence that they were 
 
 sWt-' 
 
 
FIGHT AT SOUTH MOLTON, . 539 
 
 come that way, and that they would be too strong for me, I 
 made my retreat to Exon ; the next morning I understood 
 that they were in their march for Cornwal, and in order 
 thereunto they were come to CoUumpton, within ten 
 Miles of Exon, I heard they were much tyred, and their 
 number two hundred, and therefore imagined that if they 
 should gain Cornwal, it might be much prejudicial ; I was 
 resolved to hazard all that was dear to me rather than let 
 them have their End, and therfore marched towards Col- 
 lumpton with only my own Troop,, I had no more for this 
 Service, but when I came near that place, I understood 
 they were marched to Tiverton, whither I pursued them 
 with all speed, but there mist them also, but received 
 Information that from thence they were gone to South- 
 molton, twelve miles further, still in order for Cornwal ; 
 thither I resolved to follow them ; they took up their 
 quarters about seven of the Clock this night, and by the 
 good providence of God directing and assisting me, I beat 
 up their Quarters about ten of the Clock \ they disputed 
 it very much with me in the Houses for more than two 
 hours firing very hot out of the windows ; they shot seven 
 or eight of my men, but none I hope mortally wounded, 
 they shot many of my Horses also; but, my Lord, we 
 broke open many Houses ; some of them yielded to mercy; 
 I promised them I would use my endeavours to intercede 
 for their lives, I have taken most of their Horses, about 
 fifty Prisoners, amongst whom are Penruddock, Jones, and 
 Grove, who commanded those Horse, each of them having 
 a Troop. Wagstaff I fear is escaped, he was with them, but 
 at present I cannot find him, yet hope to catch him as soon 
 as Daylight appears. I will raise the Country to apprehend 
 such Straglers, which for want of having Dragoons narrowlie 
 escaped me. My Lord, they are all broken and routed, 
 and I desire the Lord may have the glorie. I beseech your 
 Highness to pardon this unpolisht account, I can hardly 
 
540 FIGHT A T SOUTH MOLTON, 
 
 indeed write, being so wearie with extream dutie, but I 
 hope by the next to send your Highness a more perfect 
 one, and a List of the Prisoners, many of them, I suppose 
 being very considerable. Colonel Shapcot of this County 
 was pleased to march with me at the beating up of their 
 Quarters, and hath shewed himself wonderfull ready, in 
 every respect, to preserve the Peace of this County. My 
 Lord, I remain. 
 
 May it please your Highness, 
 
 Your most obedient and most humble servant, 
 
 Unton Crook. ^ 
 From South Moulton 
 
 March 15. 1654 \i.e. 1655] a.bout 
 
 two or three a clock in 
 
 the morning. 
 
 The second letter confirms and completes the 
 story as told by Captain Crook : — 
 
 I gave your Highness last night an account how far I had 
 pursued the Enemy that came out of Wiltshire into Devon ; 
 I sent your Highness the numbers of them, which I con- 
 ceived to be two hundred ; It pleased my good God so to 
 strengthen & direct me, that although I had none but my 
 own Troop which was not 60 that about ten a clock at night 
 I fell into their quarters at a Town called South Molton, in 
 the County of Devon ; I took, after four hours dispute with 
 them in the Town, some 60 Prisoners, neer one hundred 
 forty horse and arms. Wagstaff himself escaped, and I 
 cannot yet find him, although I am still sending after him ; 
 
 ^ A Letter to His HigJmess the Lord Protector Ffom Captain Unton 
 Crooke, Sigfiifying the total Defeat of the Cavaliers in the West, under 
 the Command of Sir Joseph Wagstaffe. Published by His Highness 
 special Commandment. London, Printed by Henry Hills and John 
 Field, Printers to His Highness, 1654 \i.e., 1655]. King's Pamphlets, 
 B. M., small 4tos, vol. dcxxxvij. 
 
INSURRECTION SUPPRESSED. 541 
 
 this party of them was divided into three Troops, Colonel 
 Penruddock commanded one of them, and was to make it 
 a Regiment, Colonel Groves commanded another, and was 
 to compleat it to a Regiment, Col. Jones the third and was 
 to do the like ; these 3 Gentlemen are of Wiltshire, and men 
 of Estates. One of Sir Edward Clarks Sons was with them, 
 he was to be Major to Penruddock, the Prisoners tell me 
 that we killed him. I have brought all the Prisoners to 
 Exon, and have delivered them over to the High Sheriff, 
 who has put them into the High Gaol. Your Highness may 
 be confident this Party is totally broken, there is not four 
 men in a Company got away 3 the Country surprize some of 
 them hourly, the Maior of South Moulton, being with me in 
 the Streets was shot in the body, but like to do well. I have 
 nine or ten of my Troop wounded, I remain 
 
 Your Highness most obedient 
 
 Servant, 
 
 Unton Crook.^ 
 
 Ik. 
 
 Exon Mar. 16. 1654 \t,e. 1655]. 
 
 The insurrection against the de facto government 
 had collapsed. Penruddock and Grove were arrested, 
 tried at Exeter by Special Commission, and beheaded 
 in the Castle yard. Others of the confederates were 
 hanged at Heavitree. 
 
 It was this plot, in which a great number of 
 Royalists were believed at the time to be implicated, 
 that called from the Protector, in one of his speeches 
 to the House of Commons, the exclamation — '* I 
 think England cannot be safe unless Malignants be 
 carried far away ! '' ^ What followed was the insti- 
 tution of the domination by Major-Generals of dis- 
 
 ^ A Second Letter, &c., King's Pamphlets, B.M., small 4tos, vol. 
 
 dcxxxvij. 
 
 * Carlyle's Oliver CromwelPs Letters and Speeches, iii. 171. 
 
542 DURING THE COMMONWEALTH. 
 
 tricts, decimation of the property of the Royalists, 
 and other acts of despotic power. 
 
 There is but the slightest of clues to the domestic 
 history of Barnstaple and its people during the reign 
 of the saints. The affairs of the Corporation seem to 
 have resumed their former course. It is a mistake to 
 suppose that the revolution ^yas a democratic one in 
 the sense in which we now use that word. The govern- 
 ment of the town went on as before and, so far as we 
 know, in the same hands. To say nothing of the 
 dreadful visitation of the plague which again broke 
 out, but in a less severe form, in 1650, the task of 
 recuperating the heavy losses of the four years of 
 military occupation, from which probably no inha- 
 bitant escaped, was a powerful soporific. The com- 
 mercial prosperity of the town did not revive during 
 the remainder of the century. Yet the march of 
 events was followed with interest if not with eager- 
 ness by the large majority of the inhabitants who 
 held the popular Parliamentarian views — now so 
 utterly perverted. Cromwell's victory over the Scots 
 at Dunbar was duly celebrated by the ringing of bells 
 on the day of thanksgiving. The " crowning mercy" 
 of Worcester was celebrated by shooting off the 
 great guns and by bull-baiting, whilst two thousand 
 Scotch prisoners were rotting in the London prisons. 
 At the solemn Proclamation of the Lord Protector as 
 ** Chief Magistrate of the Nations,'' in July, 1657, 
 99 lbs. of gunpowder were joyously fired away at a 
 cost of -£^. 8s. 6d.; and a feast, at which salmon and 
 wine conspicuously co-operated, was given to the 
 Captains, Commanders and Captains of Foot and 
 
CONCLUSION. 543 
 
 Horse on the occasion, costing the sum of ^3. 5s. od. ; 
 from which it incidentally appears that a military 
 force was still kept up in the town. But why the 
 bull-ring, which, it is generally supposed, had been 
 put down — not because the sport was cruel to the bull, 
 but because it was an amusement to the people — was 
 swept and garnished for the occasion, is not so clear. 
 It seems to have heralded an approaching reaction. 
 In the following year, after the death of the Great 
 Protector, trumpeters were proclaiming the Lord 
 Richard attended by the usual expenditure of gun- 
 powder for the great guns, wine for the Maistei's, and 
 beer and tobacco again for the soldiers.^ 
 
 So far we have seen no indication of any particular 
 change in the popular sentiment of the people of 
 Barnstaple during the years of the Commonwealth. 
 The old landmarks were undisturbed ; the old tradi- 
 tions were not cut adrift. The mayors, with one 
 exception, that of Mr. Dennis, and he, as already 
 mentioned, was factiously opposed for his loyalty, 
 were of the same political complexion as before. 
 Nor are there signs of any disruption on religious 
 grounds, for, if such evidence is of any weight, we 
 find that at this very time were erected the most 
 assertive of the ornate monuments in the parish 
 church — and these were memorials of eminent 
 townsmen who were both Puritans and Parlia- 
 mentarians. The Restoration of the Monarchy, not 
 an unmixed blessing as we know, was the national 
 reaction ; and it was doubtless hailed with as much 
 enthusiasm at Barnstaple as elsewhere. The pre- 
 
 ^ Records^ Nos. Ixviii.-lxix. 
 
544 CONCLUSION. 
 
 dominant sentiment of the Corporation had ap- 
 parently changed with the times ; in no other way 
 can the fact be accounted for, that the dull, impene- 
 trable, but sufficiently sagacious, author of the 
 Restoration, George Monk, Duke of Albemarle, a 
 North Devonian of whom North Devon had little 
 reason to be proud, was elected High Steward of the 
 ancient Borough. 
 
 THE END 
 
INDEX. 
 
 -♦o«- 
 
 AcLAND, Colonel John, 17, dj, 
 and n., 105, 107, 165, (Sir John, 
 Bart.), 292 
 
 Albemarle, Duke of, 544 
 
 Alverdiscott, 460 
 
 Ammunition, cost of, 121 ; ordered 
 by Parliament for Barnstaple, 322 
 
 "Answer" to Earl of Bath's "De- 
 claration," 70 
 
 Appledore Fort, surrender of, 206, 
 217 n. \ 297-300 ; assaulted, 299 ; 
 besieged, ib, ; relieved, 300 
 
 Apsley, Sir Allen, relieves Appledore 
 Fort, 299 ; 347-50 ; appointed 
 Governor of Barnstaple, 347 ; 
 embodies trained band, 350 ; his 
 proceedings, 353 ; ordered to raise 
 levy for Prince Charles, 362 ; 366, 
 430 ; reported killed, 432 ; sued, 
 433 ; pulls down tower, 439 ; takes 
 bells, ib. \ his letter to Sir E. 
 Hyde, 440 ; defeated at New 
 Bridge, 450 ; mandate to Hundred 
 of South Molton, 470 ; his reply to 
 Fairfax, 510 ; surrenders Barn- 
 staple, 511 ; retires to Great Fort, 
 516 ; subsequent history of, 519-20 
 
 James, 353, 442 ; his letter to 
 
 36 
 
 Sir E. Hyde, 443 ; his ship, 445, 
 454 ; his threat, 505 
 
 Armistice agreed upon, 142 ; mis- 
 represented, 142 n. 
 
 Arms and equipment of soldiers, 
 19-25 
 
 Artillery, 119 ; Fairfax's, 509 
 
 Arundell, Captain, 105 
 
 Ensign James, 151 
 
 Colonel John, of Trerice, 92, 
 
 93. 500 
 Ashburnham, Colonel William, 131 
 
 and n.^ 181 
 
 Ashburton, 452 
 
 Ashfield, Lieut.-Colonel, 507 
 
 Ashreigney, 448, 477 
 
 Ash ton taken, 421 
 
 Association of Devon and Cornwall, 
 
 23s 
 Atherington, 448 
 
 AvetonGiffard, 130; bridge seized, 131 
 
 Awberry, Christopher, 105 
 
 Bailey-meadow, Barnstaple, 52 
 Baitson, Christopher, 475 
 Baker, George, 83 
 
 James, 83 
 
 Ball, Sir Peter, 237, 342, 364 
 
546 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Bamfield, Sir John, 124, 413 
 Barnstable (New England town), 2 
 Barnstaple, maritime enterprise and 
 colonial associations of, i, 2 ; its 
 merchants, 3 ; its topography and 
 description of, 3-6 ; population of, 
 6 ; municipal government of, 7 ; 
 ship-money at, 8-12 ; its municipal 
 records, 9 n, ; trained band of, 
 17-19 ; Corporation of, 34 ; Par- 
 liamentary feehng in, 34, 35 ; 
 resolution to fortify, 49 ; natural 
 defences of, 50 ; origin of Castle 
 of, ib. ; garrisoned, 72 ; its fortifi- 
 cations, ib. ; financial difficulties 
 of, 78 ; its garrison reinforced, 
 104 ; expedition from, 107 ; rate 
 for cost of fortifications of, 109 ; 
 Great Fort of, m ; petition to 
 Parliament by, ib. ; vote of Parlia- 
 ment for its defence, ib. ; con- 
 tingent from, 125 ; troops sent into 
 Cornwall from, 145 ; contingent 
 from, 148 ; sailors from, 149 ; 
 obstruction to fortification of, 162 ; 
 warrant of Earl of Stamford con- 
 cerning, ib. ; ordinance of Parlia- 
 ment concerning, 164 ; sends 
 supplies to Parliamentary army, 
 167 ; garrison of, takes the field, 
 191 ; expedition to Cornwall from, 
 193 ; expedition to South Molton 
 from, ib. ; menaced by Colonel 
 Digby, 195 ; its troops attack 
 Digby, at Torrington, 196 ; defeat 
 of its troops, 202 ; sends help to 
 Bideford, 206 ; prepares to resist 
 Digby, 207 ; cost of additional 
 defences of, 208 ; after Torrington 
 fight, 211 ; negotiation for sur- 
 render of, 212 ; reply of Corpora- 
 tion of, to Prince Maurice, 215 ; 
 surrender of, 216 ; its expenditure 
 on defences to the surrender, 219 ; 
 its works slighted, 228 ; disturb- 
 ances at, 238, 239 ; demands ot 
 
 Prince Maurice upon, 239; Royalist 
 excesses at, 241 ; occupied by 
 Prince Maurice, ib. ; design to 
 recover, 254 ; revolt of, 258 ; 
 assaulted by Colonel Digby, 261 ; 
 fight at, 263 ; repulse of Digby at, 
 265 ; occupied by Lord Roberts, 
 302 ; civil government of, super- 
 seded, ib, ; defences of, neglected, 
 303; occupied by Lieut .-General 
 Middleton, 313 ; Great Fair of, 
 324 ; invested by General Goring, 
 327 ; strength of its garrison, 328 ; 
 blockaded, 331 ; its offer to sur- 
 render, 332 ; its conditions accepted 
 by King Charles, 333 ; second sur- 
 render of, 334 ; plundered, 335 ; 
 occupied, 341 ; garrisoned, 347 ; 
 Sir Allen Apsley appointed 
 governor, ib. ; Prince Charles 
 arrives at, 371 ; a political focus, 
 383 ; its works strengthened, 430 ; 
 alleged fall of its works, 445 ; 
 garrison of, in Jan., 1646, 446 ; 
 its bridge broken down, ib. ; a 
 magazine of arms, 447 n. ; con- 
 sultation about, 454 ; sends party 
 to relief of Dunster Castle, 466 ; 
 the aim of both Hopton and 
 Fairfax, 469 ; Fairfax's design of 
 taking, 473 ; reconnoitred, 496 ; 
 invested, 497 ; blockaded, 503, 
 504 ; assaulted by Colonel Robert 
 Blake, 505 ; Castle and Great Fort 
 of, 506 ; siege of, 507, 508 ; sally 
 from, 508 ; supposed traces of 
 attack at, 509 ; summoned by 
 Fairfax, 510 ; last surrender of, 
 ib. ; duration of siege of, 516 ; 
 Great Fort of, evacuated, ih. ; 
 Thanksgiving for fall of, 518 ; dis- 
 garrisoned and works slighted, 
 519 ; plague at, 530-33 ; rejoicings 
 at, 542, 543 
 Barnstaple Horse, the, 104, 196, 203, 
 459, 460 
 
INDEX, 
 
 547 
 
 Barnstaple Water, 298 
 
 Baskerville, Captain, 127 
 
 Basset, Colonel Arthur, 64, 6j, 98, 
 
 523-5 
 
 Francis, 157, 180, 254 
 
 Captain James, 151 
 
 Colonel Thomas, 170 
 
 Bastable (New England town), 3 
 Bath, Edward, Earl of, 60 
 
 Henry, Earl of, 58-71 ; a 
 
 Delinquent, 63 ; his "Declaration," 
 69 ; arrested and committed to the 
 Tower, 71 ; 106 ; his horses seized, 
 301 
 
 William, Earl of, 15, 59 
 
 Bay ley, George, 98 
 
 Beaford Moor, 478 
 
 Beaple, Grace, 375 
 
 Richard, ir. 35, 79, 81, 83 
 
 Bedford, Earl of, 46, 55, 73, 74 
 
 Bells of Pilton, 438 
 
 Benevolence, a, 424 
 
 Bennet, Robert, 57 ; (Captain), 104, 
 196, 219 ; (Colonel), 293, 335 
 
 Benson, Captain, 125 
 
 Berkeley, Sir John, 127, 129, 170 ; 
 at Battle of Stratton, 173 ; 180, 
 192, 240, 249 ; his letter to Prince 
 Rupert, 314 ; his skirmish with 
 Essex's Horse, 315 ; 340, 361, 410 
 
 Berkshire, Earl of, 371, 500 
 
 Bideford, 109 ; contingent from, 
 126 ; plot to fire, 143, 144 ; 
 menaced, 195 ; sends force to 
 attack Digby, 196 ; force repulsed, 
 202 ; siege of, 206 ; described, 
 207 ; defences of, ib. \ surrendered, 
 217 and n. ; garrison of, 297 
 
 Blake, Martin, 12, 29, 526-30 
 
 Colonel Robert, 221, 295, 358, 
 
 390 ; besieges Dunster Castle, 465, 
 466 ; comes before Barnstaple, 
 504 ; failure of his assault, 507 
 Book of Common Prayer, 354, 492 
 Bovey Tracey, surprise of Royalists 
 at, 451 
 
 Bow, King Charles at, 295 ; fight at, 
 
 449 
 
 Bradbury Castle, 457 " 
 
 Bradninch, King Charles at, 295 
 
 Bradworthy, 457 
 
 Brat ton Fleming, 460 
 
 Brentford, Earl of, 372 
 
 Brentor, 319 
 
 Bridestowe, 151 
 
 Bridge, Barnstaple, broken down, 446 
 
 Bridge Feoffees, Barnstaple, 183 ^ 
 
 Brightley occupied, 459 
 
 Bull-baiting, 543 
 
 Bulstrode, Sir Richard, 397 7i. 
 
 Burn Downs, 170 
 
 Burrington, 448 ; affair at, 460 ; skir- 
 mish at, 477 ; Royalist guard at, 
 482 
 
 Bury, John, letter of Prince Charles 
 to, 424 
 
 Calmady, Sir Shilston, 124, 186 
 Capel, Lord, 365, 372, 424, 461, 483, 
 
 500, 535 
 
 Lady, 373 
 
 Capitulations of Barnstaple, Articles 
 
 of the, 334, 512 
 Cary, Sir Henry, of Cockington, 453- 
 
 and n. 
 
 Colonel, of Clovelly, 459 
 
 Castle, Barnstaple, 50, 51, 1 15-18 ; 
 
 fortification of, 119, 511, 514 ; given' 
 
 up, 516 
 Castle mound, the, at Barnstaple, 117 
 Catholics (Roman), raid upon in N. 
 
 Devon, 33 
 Cavaliers, behaviour of, at Barnstaple, 
 
 352' 
 
 Chagford, 126 ; skirmish at, 127 ; ex- 
 tract from parish register of, 129 
 
 Champernowne family, 98, 134 
 
 Mr., 131 
 
 Charles L, King, 121 ; his letter to 
 SirR. Hopton, 158 ; tradition of, at 
 Stratton, 178 ; his letter to Inhabi- 
 tants of Cornwall referred to, ib. ; 
 
548 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 extract from his letter to Prince 
 Maurice, 222 ; his pardon to Barn- 
 staple referred to, 223 ; advances 
 into Devonshire, 294 ; enters Corn- 
 wall, 296 ; his return to Exeter, 
 338 ; leaves Devonshire, 339 ; pro- 
 ject of his going to Barnstaple dis- 
 cussed, 387 ; his letter to Prince 
 Charles, 389 
 
 Charles, Prince, leaves Oxford, 360 ; 
 made Generahssimo, 361 ; leaves 
 Bath, 369 ; at Dunster, 370 ; at 
 Barnstaple, 371 ; personal descrip- 
 tion of, 373, 374 ; his lodgings at 
 Barnstaple, 375 ; his conduct, 376 ; 
 receives letter from the King, 388 ; 
 at Appledore, 388 ft. ; his departure 
 from Barnstaple, 395 ; at Launces- 
 
 • ton, 403 ; demands a benevolence, 
 424 ; at Tavistock, 426 ; procla- 
 mation of, 428 ; his letter to Mr. 
 Mervin, 464 ; his army, 455, 467, 
 468 ; removes to Truro, 469 ; appeals 
 to Cornish gentry, 498 ; escapes 
 from Pendennis Castle, 500 
 
 Cheriton Bishop, 320 
 
 Chichester, of Arlington, 33 
 
 Sir John, Bart., 330, 331 
 
 Sir John (of Hall), 71, 454 n. 
 
 Lord, 61, 62^, 409, 420 
 
 Sir Robert [temp. Jac. I.), 14 
 
 Chittlehampton, 76 
 
 Chronogram on Battle of Torrington, 
 489 n. 
 
 Chudleigh, 417, 454 
 
 Chudleigh, Sir George, Bart., 45, 54, 
 
 92, 124, 133, 166, T.'J'J, 186 
 
 James (Colonel), 104, 146-77 ; 
 
 (Major - General), occupies Oke- 
 hampton, 147 ; 151 ; at Battle of 
 Stratton, 172, 173 ; taken prisoner, 
 173 ; his defection, 176 ; 182, 219 ; 
 his death, 233 
 Chudleigh Fort, Bideford, 147, 207 
 Chulmleigh, exaction on, 459 ; 
 plundered, 460 ; occupied, 474 ; a 
 
 Sunday at, 475 ; advance of Fair- 
 fax from, 477, 478 
 Church plate, Barnstaple, 82 
 Clarendon, Earl of, on Sourton Down 
 fight, 162 ; on Chudleigh 's con- 
 duct, 176 ; his opinion of Prince 
 Charles's army, 456 ; his History 
 quoted, passim 
 Clergy, sufferings of the, 525 
 Cleveland's brigade, 458, 459 
 Clovelly, 458, 459 
 
 Clubmen, 125, 130, 369, 392, 393 ; 
 origin of name of, 393 n, ; in N. 
 Devon, 397. 402, 431, 432, 458 
 Coals, dearth of, at Barnstaple, 443 
 Colepepper, Lord, 365, 371 ; his letter 
 to Lord Goring quoted, 400 ; 405, 
 408 ; at Barnstaple, 432 ; his brigade, 
 
 458 ; 500 
 
 Columb John, 189, 409 
 
 Commission of Array, 58, 62, 64, 65 ^., 
 
 66-9 
 Commissioners, 124, 342, 343, 361, 
 
 364, 403, 412, 413, 415 
 Committee of Sequestrations, 521 
 ■ of the Four Associated Counties 
 
 for the King, 237 
 
 of Both Kingdoms, 249 
 
 Common Prayer Book, 354, 492 
 
 and n. 
 Commonwealth, during the, 542 
 Compounders, 522, 523 
 Contributions, weekly, in Devon, 
 
 236 
 Cook, Colonel, 455, 466, 476, 478 ; 
 
 invests Barnstaple, 496-99 
 Cooke, Nicholas, 83 
 " Cornish and Devonshire Men's 
 
 Oath," 235 
 Cornish fortify bridges on Tamar, 471 
 Cornwall, military resources of, 91 
 Corporation of Barnstaple, in 1642, 
 
 83 ; their reply to Prince Maurice, 
 
 215 ; their claim on Parliament, 337; 
 
 refractory, 340 ; appoint deputies 
 
 to defend them, 341, 342 ; appeal 
 
 
INDEX. 
 
 549 
 
 to Earl of Rath, 344 ; bribe Colonel 
 GifiFord, ib, \ claims of, referred, 
 
 534; 542 
 
 Corporation plate, Barnstaple, 81 
 Cotton, Edward, Archdeacon, 166 
 Council of Prince Charles, 360, 367, 
 
 379. 383 
 of war at Barnstaple, 84, 182 
 
 Courtenay, of MoUand, 33 
 
 Sir William, 419 and n. 
 
 monuments at Tiverton, 414 
 
 Covenant, the, 233 
 
 Crediton, 287, 295, 315, 405, 449 
 
 Cromwell, Oliver, 232, 355, 357, 359, 
 395, 408 ; at Crediton, 418 ; 419, 
 451, 476 ; at Torrington, 484, 488, 
 
 489 ; . 541 ^ 
 
 Crook, Captain Unton, his narrative, 
 
 538-41 
 Cullompton, 409 
 
 Culpeper, see Colepepper 
 
 Curry, Penfound, 53, 125 
 
 C. (W.). [WilUam Clarke], his letters 
 
 quoted, 460, 494, 505 
 
 Dartmouth, defence of, 226, 233 ; 
 
 capitulation of, 233 ; 452, 453 ; 
 
 stormed, ib. 
 Davy, Sir John, Bart., 124 
 Deane, Captain, 280 
 
 Captain Richard, 280 «., 509 
 
 '* Declaration," the Earl of Bath's, 
 
 69 
 Defences, ancient, of Barnstaple, 49- 
 
 52 
 Delbridge, Nicholas, 10 
 
 ♦ Richard, 12 
 
 Delinquents, 520 ; sequestration of, 
 
 231, 247 
 Deliverance of July i, 1644, 265-68, 
 271 ; commemorated, 537 
 . Dennis, Thomas, 83, 351 and «. 
 Devon and Cornwall opposed, 93 
 Devonshire, petitions from, 45 ; as- 
 sessment of, 123; army, its remnant. 
 191 ; regiments of, at Battle of 
 
 Cheriton, 249 ; approaches to, 294 ; 
 petition from, in 1648, 536 
 Digby, John, 73, 74 ; (Colonel), 170, 
 192, 19s ; occupies Torrington, 195 ; 
 his forces at, 198, 199 ; besieges 
 Bideford, 206 ; before Barnstaple, 
 di8 ; occupies Barnstaple, 224 ; 
 entertained, ib. ; compels Corpora- 
 tion to dismantle works, 227 ; 252 ; 
 his assault of Barnstaple, 261 ; en- 
 gaged in street-fight, 264 ; is re- 
 pulsed, ib ; (Sir John), 483 ; at 
 Battle of Torrington, 486 ; protects 
 retreat of Hopton's army, 499 ; 
 confounded with others of same 
 name, 501 ; his exile, ib. ; bio- 
 graphical sketch of, 501, 502 
 
 Lord, on Essex and Waller's 
 
 strategy, 251 ; his letter to Prince 
 Rupert quoted, 387 
 
 Dirge, a Puritan, on the fall of Barn- 
 staple, 221 
 
 Dissensions among the King's officers, 
 360, 361, 379 
 
 Doddridge. John, 534 
 
 Pentecost, 35, 79, 83 
 
 Richard, 81 
 
 Dodington, Sir Francis, 306-14 ; his 
 character, 306, 307 ; retreats before 
 Middleton, 307 ; at Ilfracombe, 
 ib. ; assaults Ilfracombe, 309 ; is 
 repulsed, 310 ; defeats party of 
 Essex's Horse, 313 ; 327 ; his desti- 
 tution, 502 
 
 Dorrington, see DODINGTON . 
 
 Downe, John, 83 
 
 Lewis, 83 
 
 Nicholas, 10 
 
 Downing, Captain, 155 
 Doyley, Captain, 315 
 Dragooner. or dragoon, the, 23 
 Drake, Sir Francis {temp. Eliz.), 45° 
 • Sir Francis, 124, 186 ; his regi- 
 ment, 450, 460 
 
 Captain Thomas, 149. 153, 155. 
 
 157 and n. 
 
5 so 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Dunsford's Memoirs of Tiverton 
 
 quoted, 411 
 Dunster, Plague at, 368 
 Dunster Castle, 74, 88 ; surrendered, 
 
 189 ; 368, 370, 371, 395 ; relieved, 
 
 465 
 Duppa, Brian, 371 
 
 Edgcumbe, Colonel, his regiment 
 
 surrenders, 499 
 Eg^esford House, fortified, 409 ; 
 
 taken by assault, 420 
 Entrenchments of Barnstaple, 114, 115 
 Essex, Earl of, 55, 85, 248 ; relieves 
 
 Lyme Regis, 252 ; receives news at 
 
 CuUompton of Barnstaple fight, 
 
 272 ; extract from his letter to 
 Committee of Both Kingdoms, ib. ; 
 sends party to relief of Barnstaple, 
 
 273 ; his letter on How^ard's fate, 
 277 ; advances to the Tamar, 292 ; 
 his letter to the Parliament quoted, 
 304 ; his march into Cornwall, 
 311 ; at Lostwithiel, ib, ; his Horse 
 break through, ib, ; his Foot sur- 
 render, 312 ; his Horse defeated by 
 Dodington, 313 ; his Horse take 
 refuge in Barnstaple and Crediton, 
 314 ; his life-guards enter Barn- 
 staple, 315 ; his Horse escape over 
 Exmoor, 317 ; cost of his life- 
 guards' maintenance in Barnstaple, 
 
 336 ; 356 
 
 Estmond, Elizabeth, her claim on 
 
 Charles H., 375 
 Etiquette at Prince Charles's Court, 
 
 374 
 Exeter, declares for Parliament, 94 ; 
 
 besieged, 95 ; tracts relating to, ib,, 
 
 229 ; fight outside the walls of, 96 ; 
 
 summoned, 100 ; sally from, ib. ; 
 
 123 ; blockaded, 192 ; invested by 
 
 Prince Maurice, 210 ; capitulations 
 
 of, 226, 509 ; King Charles at, 295, 
 
 338 ; its garrison, 410 ; its suburbs 
 
 burnt, ib. \ invested, 418 ; posts 
 
 established around, 419 ; besieged 
 by Fairfax, 454 
 Exmoor, 317, 371 
 
 Fairfax, Sir Thomas, 357, 377, 
 390, 391, 406 ; at Axminster, 408 ; 
 at Honiton, 411 ; at Ottery St. 
 Mary, 419 ; at Tiverton, ib. ; at 
 Crediton, 473 ; at Chulmleigh, 474 ; 
 personal description of, 475 ; his 
 letter to the Speaker quoted, 477 ; 
 reviews army on Beaford Moor, 
 478 ; at Stevenstone, 484 ; at Battle 
 of Torrington, 480-86 ; advances 
 to Holsworthy, 49$ ; in Cornwall, 
 499 ; invites Lord Hopton to sur- 
 render, zb. ; returns to Devonshire, 
 503 ; at Okehampton, 507 ; de- 
 taches force to Barnstaple, ib. ; 
 goes to Barnstaple, 510; summons 
 Barnstaple, ib. ; his letter to Par- 
 liament referred to, 517 
 
 Fanshawe, Mrs. , her Alemoirs quoted, 
 369-75 ; her account of Barnstaple, 
 369 ; at Barnstaple, 372-5 ; at Ox- 
 ford, 373; "Lady Fentham'' of 
 John Inglesant, 373 n, 
 
 Richard, 372 
 
 Fenton, Captain, 155 
 Ferris, Richard, 35, 39, 79, 83 
 Finch, Colonel, 465, 466 
 Fisher's Down, 197 
 
 Fitzford stormed and taken, 292 
 
 " Five Wonders," &c., a tract, 532, 
 
 533 
 Fleetwood (Colonel), 476 
 Flete, 135, 193 
 Fookes, Colonel, 448, 459 
 Forced march, Hopton's, 471 
 Fort, the Great, Barnstaple, 113, 114, 
 
 116, 228, 437, 470, 506, 509, 511, 
 
 515 ; given up, 516 
 Fortescue, Sir Edmund, 98, 99 and 
 
 w., 232 ; (Colonel), 292 
 Sir Faithful, 290 
 
 Hugh {ievip. Eliz,), 14 
 
INDEX. 
 
 11^ 
 
 Fortescue, Hugh, 124, 182 and n,, 
 184, 186 
 
 Fortifications of Barnstaple, 54, 72, 
 78, 84, 109-21, 162-5, 207, 208, 
 218, 227, 228, 263, 303, 325, 334, 
 
 337. 353, 367. 398, 431. 433. 445. 
 446, 505-16, 519. See Castle ; 
 Fort, the Great 
 Fowel, Sir Edmond, 124, 186 
 
 Colonel John, 454 n, 
 
 Fowkes, see Fookes 
 Fraine, John, 490 n. 
 
 Freeman, Captain, commands Barn- 
 staple Horse, 104 ; at Battle of 
 Stratton, 167 ; taken prisoner, 179 ; 
 at Torrington fight, 196-203 ; his 
 reception at Barnstaple, 204 ; 219, 
 222 
 
 French brigade in Goring's army, 398 
 
 Frye, William, 186 
 
 Fulford, Sir Francis, 420 
 
 Colonel Thomas, 165 
 
 Fulfords of Great Fulford, 420 n. 
 
 Games, Colonel, 344 
 
 Gardiner, Dr. S. R. and his History 
 
 of the Great Civil War, 174 «. 
 Gates of Barnstaple Castle, 118 
 Gay, Anthony, 83 
 Gifford, Colonel John, 64, ^t, 106, 
 
 107, 166, 190 n,, 345 n, 
 Godolphin, Sidney, 128, 129 
 
 Colonel WiUiam, 170 
 
 Gold, Captain, 155, 157 
 
 Golden Inn, 458 
 
 Common, James, 83 
 
 Gorges, Sir Ferdinand©, 17 
 
 Goring, General, in pursuit of Essex's 
 
 Horse, 312 ; his letter from Oke- 
 hampton referred to, 314 ; at 
 Tiverton, 321 ; summons Barn- 
 staple to surrender, 327 ; his cha- 
 racter, 329 ; at Raleigh, 330 ; 
 enters Barnstaple, 335 ; rejoins the 
 King's army, 339 ; (Lord), 358, 
 359-^3. 369. 384. 390 ; his army, 
 
 393 ; 394 ; abstract of his letter to 
 Lord Colepepper, 394 ; defeated at 
 Langport, 395 ; abstract of his 
 letter from Dunster Castle, 396 ; his 
 retreat, ib. ; at Barnstaple, 397 ; 
 occupies and strengthens Barn- 
 stapl^, 398 ; at Ilfracombe, 398 ; 
 his letter to Lord Colepepper, 399 ; 
 his army disorganized, 397-9 ; at 
 Torrington, 400 ; abstract of his 
 letter to Lord Colepepper, 401 ; 
 issues warrant at Okehampton, 
 402 ; beats up for recruits in North 
 Devon, ib. \ his excesses, 403 ; his 
 proclamation, 404 ; occupies Cul- 
 lompton, 409 ; his letter to Lord 
 Colepepper quoted, ib. ; attacks 
 Fairfax's outposts, 410 ; evacuates 
 CuUompton, 411 ; draws out Horse 
 from Exeter, 417 ; retires before 
 Fairfax, ib. ; attempts to open 
 negotiations with Fairfax, 421 ; 
 leaves England, 422 ; his subse- 
 quent^history, ib, 
 
 Gould, see Gold 
 
 Great Fort, see FoRT, the Great 
 
 Great Fulford taken, 420 
 
 Green, Emanuel, his " Siege and 
 
 Surrender of Dunster Castle," 
 
 quoted, 88 
 
 Grenville, Sir Bernard, 91 
 
 Sir Bevill, 70, 89-94, 96, 104-9, 
 
 131 ; his letter to his wife quoted, 
 
 132 ; 142 ; his regiment, 144, 151, 
 156 ; 170 ; at Battle of Stratton, 
 
 death of, at Lansdown, 
 
 173-6 ; 
 190 
 — Sir 
 
 John, 326 ; his letter to 
 Prince Maurice, 345 ; 346 n. 
 
 — Sir Richard [iemp .YXiz.\ 19, 88, 
 
 89 
 
 — Sir Richard, Bart., 289 ; his 
 
 protestation to Parliament, ib. ; his 
 perfidy, ib. ; deserts to the King, 
 290 ; denounced and gibbeted, 291 ; 
 goes to the West, ib. ; seizes Earl 
 
552 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 of Bath's horses, 301 ; 359, 361 ; 
 waits upon Prince Charles at Barn- 
 staple, 379 ; 364, 365, 380 ; his 
 •'Narrative,'' 380; raises forces, 
 381 ; at Ottery St. Mary, 382 ; 
 musters at Crediton, 381, 382 ; his 
 conduct, 382 ; 394, 401, 405 ; his 
 notable scheme, 417 ; occupies Oke- 
 hampton, 417 ; 422, 461 ; is arrested, 
 462 ; proscribed by Parliament, ih. ; 
 his exile and death, 463 ; Vindica- 
 tion of, 463 n. 
 Gribble's Memorials of Barnstaple, 9, 
 79, 201 n. ; corrected, 379 ; cited, 
 
 435. 436- 524 ; revised, 439 
 Grove, Major Hugh, 538, 541 
 Gunpowder shipped at Barnstaple, 
 
 " 365 - 
 
 Guns, number of, mounted at Barn- 
 staple, 120 ; how obtained, 120 ; 
 lying on the quay, 325 ; 517 
 
 Hals, Cornish antiquary, quoted, 
 
 292 n, 
 Hamilton, Sir James, his regiment, 
 
 192 
 Hanaps, Corporation, 81 
 Hanmer, Jonathan, 529 
 Hansford Bridge, 459 
 Hardaway Head, Barnstaple, 114 ;7. 
 Harris, Richard, 10, 82, 83 
 Harrison, Major Thomas, 476, 508 
 
 Hartland, 458 
 Hatch, of Aller, 106 
 Hatherleigh Moor, fight on, 313 
 Hawley, Sir Francis, 73, 74 
 Hele, John, 237 
 
 Sir Thomas, Bart., 135 
 
 Henbury Fort, 493 
 
 Henrietta Maria, Queen, 44, 250, 252, 
 
 253. 254 
 Hertford, Marquess of, 64, 72, 73, 
 
 i88 
 Heydon, John, his work quoted, 491 
 High Bickihgton, 448 
 
 High Bray, 460 • ; 
 
 High Hampton, 458 
 
 High Steward of Barnstaple, 544 
 
 Higher Gosh, 458 
 
 Hollamore, Thomas, 106 
 
 Holsworthy, 458, 495 
 
 Honiton, 411 
 
 Hopton, Sir Ralph, 72, 74 ; marches 
 across N. Devon, 75, 76 ; 84, 90-2 ; '?-'" 
 re-enters Devonshire, 94 ; 95, 96, •■ • 
 99-105, 107 ; declared traitor by 
 Parhament, 122 ; 131 ; before Ply- 
 mouth, 133 ; 142 ; accused of 
 treachery, 143 ; at Launceston, 
 147 ; 158, 189 ; advances to Strat- 
 ton, 169'; at Battle of Stratton, 
 170 ; his peerage, 178 ; issues letter 
 of marque, 180 ; (Lord), 249, 360, 
 371, 380 ; takes command of Prince 
 Charles's army, 461 ; 464 ; sends 
 relief to Dunster Castle, 465 ; his 
 march to Stratton, 469 ; occupies 
 Torrington, 471 ; at Battle of Tor- 
 rington, 485-91 ; his army routed, 
 487 ; his retreat, 488 ; 491, 498 ; 
 surrender of, 499 ; 500 ; his exile and 
 death, 501 
 
 Horse, the Devonshire, at Battle of 
 Roundaway Down, 191 
 
 Horse, the Royalist, in N. Devon, 
 457 ; at Torrington, 484 ; retreat of, 
 into Cornwall, 493-5 ; 498, 499 
 
 Horsebridge, 292 and n. 
 
 Horse-posts, 384 
 
 Horwood, Alexander, 83, 182 
 
 Thomas, 35, 83, 343 
 
 Howard, Lieutenant, taken prisoner, 
 273 ; his crime, ib. ; doubt as to his 
 name, 274, 275 ; hanged at High 
 Cross, 275 
 
 • Colonel, his regiment, 192 
 
 Huntshaw, 472 
 
 Hutchinson, Mrs. Lucy, 347; her 
 Memoirs of Colonel Hutchinson 
 quoted, 433 
 
 Hyde, Sir Edward, 365 ; his letters to 
 
INDEX. 
 
 553 
 
 Prince Rupert, quoted, ib., 367; 
 at Barnstaple, 366 ; 372, 376 ; 
 again at Barnstaple, 383 ; his letter 
 to Sir E. Nicholas, quoted, 384 ; 
 his opinion of Goring, ib. ; wishes 
 the King to come to Barnstaple, 
 385 ; 424, 500 
 Hyword's narrative, abstract of, 101 
 
 ILFRACOMBE, 308 ; fight at, 309 ; 
 extract from parish register of, 310 ; 
 barques pressed at, 398 
 
 Castle, 308 ; assaulted, 309 ; 
 
 Governor of, turns his guns on 
 Mayor of Barnstaple, 327 ; sur- 
 rendered, 2<5. ; stormed and taken, 
 508 
 
 Ireton (Henry), 315 ; (Commissary- 
 General), sent to reconnoitre Barn- 
 staple, 496 
 
 Irish troops landed, 244, 267 
 
 • ' Ironsides, ' ' Cromwell's, 484 
 
 John Inglesant cited, 121 
 
 Jones, Cadwallader, warrant to, 431 
 
 Keep of Barnstaple Castle, 51, 116 
 Kesham Bridge, 448, 478 
 Kilkhampton , 458 
 Kingsbridge, 130 
 
 Lambert (John), 476. 
 
 Lane, William, 131 
 
 Lansdowne, Lord, 176; on Sir Richard 
 
 Grenville, 417 n, ; his Vindication^ 
 
 &c., quoted, 463 n. 
 Laplande, Colonel, 398 
 Launceston, 90, 91 ; fight before, 
 
 J49, 150 : King Charles at, 296 ; 
 
 Prince Charles at, 456 ; plundered, 
 
 467 
 Lecturers, 27 
 Letter of marque, 180 
 Letters, miscarriage of, 384 
 Levy in N. Devon for '^One and 
 
 All " Association, 362 
 
 Life-guards, Essex's, enter Barnstaple, 
 
 Lifton, 149 
 
 Lloyd's Memoires quoted, 501 
 Lord-Lieutenants appointed by Par- 
 liament, 46 
 Ludlow, Edmund, 315 
 Luttrell, Colonel George, 370 
 
 Captain John, 155 ; (Colonel), 
 
 his letter to Bennet, 255 and n. ; 
 commands troops at the assault of 
 Appledore Fort, 299 ; charges of 
 his regiment to Barnstaple, 303 ; 
 
 325. 335 
 
 Thomas, of Dunster Castle, 74, 
 
 87, 370 
 Lugg, Adam, 83 
 Lysons's Devonshire cited, 269 
 
 Malborough, 236 
 
 Man-of-war set forth by Barnstaple, 
 119 ; captured, 508 
 
 Martyn, Sir Nicholas, 55, 124, 186 
 
 Martyn, Theodore, 223 
 
 Massey, Colonel, 209 ; (Major- 
 General), 391 ; assaults Tiverton 
 Castle, 412 ; his brigade, 407, 476 
 
 Masson, Henry, 83, 182 
 
 Mather, Nathaniel, 529 and n. 
 
 Matthews, Thomas, 83 
 
 Maurice, Prince, advance of, 188 and 
 n. ; before Lyme Regis, 209 ; his 
 propositions to Barnstaple, 212 ; his 
 letter to the Mayor and Corpora- 
 tion, 213 ; summons Dartmouth, 
 232 ; threatens Barnstaple, 239 ; 
 before Plymouth, 240 ; abandons 
 siege of Plymouth, 241 ; his pre- 
 text for occupying Barnstaple, ib. ; 
 besieges Lyme Regis, 243 ; retires 
 to Exeter, 252 ; withdraws part of 
 garrison of Barnstaple, 254 ; his 
 army at Crediton, 295 ; 377, 379 
 
 Mayor's contribution to the defences 
 of Barnstaple, 53 
 
 Mazzard pie, 374 
 
554 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Medford, Richard, 344 
 
 Meldon Down, 159 
 
 Members of Parliament for Barn- 
 staple, new, 534 
 
 Membury, 411 
 
 Memorials ofBarfistaple, see Gribble. 
 
 Merivale, J. H., his article in Retro- 
 spective Review cited, 124 
 
 Mervin, Rev. Richard, Prince Charles's 
 letter to, 464 
 
 Meyrick's regiment, 133, 150 
 
 Middleton, Major -General John, 
 ordered to Essex's relief, 305 ; 
 encounters Dodington, ib. ; enters 
 Devonshire, 306 ; occupies Barn- 
 staple, 312 ; his critical position, 
 315 ; leaves Barnstaple, 316 ; his 
 Horse escape over Exmoor, 317 ; 
 his subsequent career, 318 n. 
 
 Mile, the popular, 136 n. 
 
 Military organization, 13 
 
 Militia, 14-7 ; constitution and dis- 
 cipline of, 15 n, ; control of, 
 assumed by Parliament, 47 ; of 
 Devonshire, 124 ; levies, 166 
 
 Miller, Lord, 410 
 
 Minehead, Royalists at, 73, 74 ; Irish 
 regiment landed at, 234 ; Sir F. 
 Dodington at, 306 ; extract from 
 parish register of, 370 
 
 Miracle, alleged, at Torrington, 492 
 
 Modbury, 98, 129, 133 ; Battle of, 
 135-8 ; memorials of Battle of, 139, 
 140 ; extract from churchwarden's 
 accounts of, 140 ; Court House, 141 
 
 Modyford, Mr,, 364 and ?i. 
 
 Mohun, Lord, 131, 158, 170, 180 
 
 Molesworth, Major-General, 427 
 
 Money, value of, 80 
 
 Money and plate lent, 80 
 
 Monk, George, Duke of Albemarle, 
 
 544 
 Nicholas, 459 n. 
 
 Monkleigh, 457 
 
 "Monuments of Superstition and 
 Idolatry," 354 
 
 Monuments in parish church of Barn- 
 staple. 281, 543 
 
 Moore's History of Devonshire, cited, 
 269 ; quoted, 524 
 
 Morwenstow, 458 
 
 Moulton, Captain, 256 and n. 
 
 Murray's Handbook for Devon, error 
 in, 414 
 
 Musketeer, the, 21 
 
 Mutiny of N. Devon soldiers, 31 
 
 Naseby, news of, at Barnstaple, 378 
 Needham, Captain, 280 
 Negotiations for cessation of arms, 
 
 143 
 New Bridge, fight at, 449, 450 ; 461 
 Newbridge, 292 
 Newcond (?), Captain, 67 
 Newcourt, John, 67 n, 
 Newnham Bridge, 448 
 Nicholas, Sir Edward, his letters 
 
 quoted, 403, 510 
 NicoU, Anthony, 413 
 North Tamerton Bridge, fight at, 499 
 Northcote, Sir John, Bart., 55, 124, 
 
 126, 145, 186 
 Norwood Common, 197 
 Nottle, William, 83, 182, 183 
 N. (W.), Barum, letter of, 156 
 
 Oaths and Protestations, 238 
 
 Okehampton, 147 ; rendezvous at, 
 166 ; King Charles at, 295 ; 320 ; 
 occupied, 417 ; Fairfax at, 503 
 
 Okey, Colonel, his dragoons, 420 ; 
 476 
 
 Oliver, Dr., quoted, 436 
 
 " One and All " Association, the, 362 
 
 Ordinance of Parliament for raising 
 Money, Plate, and Horse, 103 ; for 
 indemnifying those who fortified 
 Barnstaple, 164; for sequestering 
 estates, 185 ; for raising money, 
 186 ; for taking off free-quarter, 535 
 
 Ordnance of Barnstaple dismounted, 
 228 ; taken, 334, 517 
 
 Osborne, Sir Peter, his son, 459 «. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 555 
 
 Ottery St. Mary. Sir R. Grenville at. 
 382 ; Sir T. Fairfax at, 419 
 
 Paige, Gilbert, 35, 83 
 
 Palmer, Lewis, 83 
 
 William, 10, 83, 182, 224, 376, 
 
 534 
 Pardon, the, of King Charles to 
 
 Barhstaple, described, 224 
 
 Parish register of Barnstaple, extracts 
 from the, 266, 531 
 
 Parkham, 458 
 
 Parliament, meeting of the Long» 41 ; 
 Agents of the, in Devonshire, 54, 
 71 ; appeal of, for money and plate, 
 122 ; forces of, in Devonshire, 123 ; 
 order of, for ammunition for Barn- 
 staple,' 322 ; see Ordinance 
 
 Parliamentary Committee of Devon- 
 shire, 57 ; letter of, 76 ; 99, and n. 
 
 Parry, Sir George, 342, 364 
 
 Parties, comparative state of, 231, 
 
 243 
 Paulet, Captain, his attempt upon 
 
 Barnstaple, 87 
 Peacock's Aivny Lists corrected, 501 
 Peard, Charles, 83, 238, 241, 242, 326 
 
 George, senr., 36. 81 
 
 George, 13, 35-9 ; in Parliament, 
 
 36-8 ; Recorder, 39:78, 84, 93, no, 
 
 182, 184, 212 ; lampooned, 230 ; 
 
 one of the sequestrators, 231 ; 238 ; 
 
 "a son of perdition," 239; to be 
 
 rendered up, 239 ; imprisoned, 242 ; 
 
 his illness, 242 ; his death, 281 ; his 
 
 epitaph, 282 
 
 John, 35, 36 
 
 Julian, 12 
 
 Roger, 83 
 
 Pendennis Castle, Prince Charleses 
 
 escape from, 500 
 Penn, Admiral, on fall of Barnstaple, 
 
 Penrose, John, 10, 8i, 225 
 Penruddock, Colonel, 538, 541 
 Peter, Elizabeth, 520 
 
 Peters, Hugh, 453, 475, 498 
 
 Pikeman, the, 20 ' 
 
 Pi 1 ton, 434 ; church tower of, 434-40 * 
 
 church bells of, 438 ; deaths by 
 
 plague at, 532 ; extract from parish 
 
 register of, ib. 
 Pirates, Algerine, 249 
 Plague, the, at Dunster, 370 ; in 1646, 
 
 530 ; deaths by, at Barnstaple, 531 ; 
 
 deaths by, at Pilton, 532 
 Plate, the Barnstaple Corporation, 81 ; 
 
 the Barnstaple church, 82 
 Plundering, 96, 189 
 Plunket's ship, 508 
 Plymouth, 94, 123 ; expedition to 
 
 relieve, 125 ; 131, 140, 141, 186, 193, 
 
 240, 241, 334 
 Plymouth Regiment, the, 449 and n. ; 
 
 460 
 Pole, Sir John, 77, 124, 133, 186 
 Pollard, Sir Hugh, Bart., 63, 67, 71, 
 
 74, 106, 452, 453 
 
 Sir Lewis, Bart., 17 , 
 
 Richard, his letter quoted, 331 
 
 of Horwood, 106 
 
 of Filleigh, 106 
 
 Polston Bridge, 149, 150, 296 
 
 Poltimore, 409 
 
 Popish recusants, persecution of, 246 
 
 Potter, George, 431 
 
 Poughill church, 178 
 
 Powderham Castle, 419, 454 
 
 Powell, Theophilus, 493 
 
 Prayers used in Prince Charles's 
 
 army, 464 
 Prideaux, Edmund, 186 
 
 Sir Peter, 77, 124 
 
 Prince of Wales, see Charles, Prince 
 Prince's Worthies of Devon quoted, 523 
 Prisoners (Devonshire) sent to Lon- 
 don, 99 
 Proclamation, Lord Goring's, 404 ; 
 
 Prince Charles's, 428 
 Protestation, in 1641, 32 ; Agreement 
 
 to a. 235 ; by the two Associated 
 
 Counties, 238 
 
556 
 
 INDEX, 
 
 Prust, H., his letter quoted, 323-6 
 Public faith as a security, 247 
 Puritan reforms, 354 
 Puritanism, 25-31, 245, 246 
 Pym, Alexander, 100, 155 
 
 Raleigh occupied, 330 
 
 Rattenbury, John, his journal quoted, 
 i59> 253, 296 ; entertains Kin^ 
 Charles, 295 
 
 " Recruiters," 534 
 
 Redoubts, part of fortifications of 
 Barnstaple, 72 ; plucked down, 228 
 
 Reformado captains, 166 
 
 Religion, the true Protestant, 332 
 
 Remembrance Book, the, 52 
 
 Risdon, of Parkham, 33 
 
 Road, an ancient, 114 
 
 Robartes, see Roberts 
 
 Roberts, Lord, occupies Barnstaple, 
 273 ; entertainment of his troops, 
 279 ; leaves a detachment, 280 ; his 
 letter to Colonel Bennet, 293 
 
 Major, temporary Governor of 
 
 Barnstaple, 519 
 
 Thomas, his diary quoted, 189, 
 
 253 
 Roborough, 448 ; Royalist post at, 
 
 482 
 Rolle, Henry, 400, 479 
 Sir Samuel, 55, 104, 124, 183, 
 
 186, 219, 413 ; his woods, 443 
 Roscorrock, Captain Edward, 301 
 Rothern Bridge, 487 
 Roundaway Down, Devonshire Horse 
 
 at, 191 
 Rous, Francis, 186 
 
 ' John, his Diary quoted, 120 
 
 Royalist Commissioners, exactions of, 
 
 in Devonshire, 339, 340 
 Royalist insurrection suppressed in N. 
 
 Devon, 538 
 Rupert, Prince, at Barnstaple, 379 
 Rushworth (John), cited, 488 
 Ruthen, Colonel William, 92, 98, 
 
 103, 123 
 
 Sadler, Major, treachery and execu- 
 tion of, 414 
 
 Sainthill, Peter, 295, 343, 364 
 
 Savery, Robert, 124, 186 
 
 Scene, remarkable, after Battle of 
 Stratton, 175 
 
 Scotch War of 1640, 30 
 
 Second Civil War, 535 
 
 Self-denying Ordinance, 355 
 
 Sequestrations, Committee of, 186, 
 520 
 
 Sermons, afternoon, 27 
 
 Seymour, Sir Edward, Bart. , 98 
 
 Edward, 98, 232 
 
 Shapcote, — , Clerk of the Peace, 98 
 
 Sheffield, Colonel, 507, 508, 516 
 
 Ship-money, 8-13 
 
 Ships, Barnstaple, armed, 119 
 
 Shot, great and small, 121 
 
 Siege of Barnstaple by Fairfax, dura- 
 tion of, 516 ; losses of the garrison 
 during^, ib. 
 
 Siege-works, supposed traces of, at 
 Barnstaple, 509 
 
 Skellum, origin of the word, 291 n. 
 
 Skippon, Major -General Philip, 
 capitulates, 312 ; his march back 
 with Essex's Foot, 318-20 ; eulogy 
 on, 320; 357 ; his regiment at Oke- 
 hampton, 507 ; M.P. for Barnstaple, 
 
 534 
 Slanning, Sir Nicholas, 92, 93, 99 ; at 
 
 Modbury, 132, 134 ; 139 ; at Sourton 
 
 Down fight, 158 ; at Battle of 
 
 Stratton, 170 
 
 Sourton Down, 152 ; fight at, 152-9 ; 
 extraordinary circum.stances attend- 
 ing the fight at, 160 
 
 South Gate, Barnstaple, 52, 114 «. 
 
 South Molton, 65 ; tumult at, de- 
 scribed, 66 ; Mayor of, 106 ; demand 
 on, 448 ; insurgents overtaken at, 
 538 ; conflict at, 539-41 ; Mayor of, 
 wounded, 541 
 
 Southcot, Sir Popham, 67 and n. 
 
 Sowden Lane, Barnstaple, 114 n. 
 
INDEX, 
 
 111 
 
 Speaker's Letter, the, 84 
 
 Spooner, Captain, 280 
 
 Sprigge, Joshua, his Anglia Rediviva 
 described, 390 ; cited, 516 
 
 Stamford, Earl of, 102, 123, 128, 132 ; 
 warrant of, relating to fortification 
 of Barnstaple, 162 ; 166, 168 ; at 
 Battle of Stratton, 177 ; Lord 
 Clarendon's opinion of, ib. \ at 
 Barnstaple, 179 ; besieged in Exeter, 
 210 
 
 Stamford Hill, 171 
 
 Standish, — , bearer of Fairfax's 
 letter to Pariiament, 517 
 
 Stapylton, Sir Philip, 304, 315 
 
 Staynings, John, at Battle of Mod- 
 bury, 140 
 
 Stephens, Major, 460 
 
 Stevenson, Colonel, 182 and n, 
 
 Stevenstone, 400, 479, 482 
 
 Stolliford Hill, 136 ; position on, 138 
 
 Stonypark, Okehampton, entrench- 
 ments at, 148 
 
 Stow, 88 
 
 Stratton, Parliamentary army at, 167 ; 
 described, 169 ; Battle of, 169-78 ; 
 the battle-field of, 178 ; memorials 
 of the battle, ib. ; Hopton's second 
 march to, 469 
 
 Strode, William, 146 
 
 Summary of Disbursements, the, 79 ; 
 quoted, 80, 104, 109, 115 ; its 
 accuracy, 116; quoted, 119, 121, 
 142, 167, 191, 203, 206, 218, 219, 
 265, 279, 280, 303, 336, 337 ; total 
 of the, 337 ; referred to, 534 
 
 Summer-leaze, rendezvous at, 498 
 
 Sutcombe, 457 
 
 Sydenham, Sir Ralph, 6j and n.^ 70, 
 
 .74 
 
 Symonds, Richard, his Diary quoted, 
 
 319, 332 • 
 Swede's feathers, 154 n, 
 Swimbridge, 461 
 
 Taddyport Bridge, 487 
 
 Talbot, Sir Gilbert, 412, 414 
 
 Tavistock, armistice of, 143 ; skirmish 
 near, 313 ; Prince Charles at, 426, 
 456 
 
 Tawstock, 59, 60, 70, 71, 106 ; occu- 
 pied, 330, 459, 496 ; Fairfax at, 
 
 517 
 
 Taxation, Parliamentary, 185 
 
 Thorverton, 409 
 
 " Three Crowns " at Chagford, 129 
 
 Tiverton, 320 ; attack upon, 349 ; 
 Goring's forces at, 405 1410 ; Parlia- 
 mentary army at, 449 
 
 Castle, 411 ; attacked, 412 ; 
 
 account of the taking of 413 
 church, 411 
 
 Toleration, religious, 25 
 Topsham defended, 192 
 Torrington, occupied, 105 ; extracts 
 from parish register of, 105, 106, 
 
 204, 205, 400, 490 ; 107 ; attacked, 
 108 ; occupied by Digby, 195 ; 
 described, 197, 478, 480 ; fight at, 
 200-2 ; 482, 483 ; occupied by 
 Goring, 400 ; Royalist Horse at, 
 457 ; occupied by Hopton, 471 ; 
 fortified, 472 ; Battle of, 480-6 ; 
 church blown up, 486 ; references 
 to destruction of church of, 490 and 
 n. ; 491 ; Thanksgiving for victory 
 
 of. 493 
 Torrington fight, date of, discussed, 
 
 205, 206 
 
 Torrington, ship named, 493 
 Torshel, Rev. S., his sermon, 518 
 Totnes, 126, 129, 130 
 Treaty between Devon and Cornwall, 
 
 143 
 Trevanion, of Carhayes, 92 
 
 — — Colonel John, at Modbury, 132, 
 
 134 ; 139 ; at Stratton, 170 
 
 Trevillian, Captain, 104, 219 
 
 Trevor, Arthur, his letters quoted, 
 
 239» 403 
 Trobridge, George, 124, 186 
 
 Trooper, the, 22 
 
558 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Troops, Commonwealth, free quarter- 
 ing of, at Barnstaple, 535 ; raised 
 in N. Devon for Ireland, 536 
 
 •• True and Strange Relation," a, 416 
 
 Trynder, John, 29 
 
 Tucker, Walter, 83 
 
 Umberleigh Bridge, 76, 459 
 Upton, Arthur, 124, 186 
 
 Vicars (John), Puritan writer, 152 ; 
 his description of Sourton Down 
 fight, 152-6 ; his enthusiasm, 159 ; 
 quoted, 226 
 
 Vivian, Sir Richard, 93 
 
 Volunteers, 24 
 
 Waggoner Bridge, 458 
 Wagstaff's insurrection, 538-41 
 Waldon, John, 186 
 Walker, Sir Edward, his Historical 
 
 Discourses quoted, 300 ; 300 n.\ on 
 
 state of Barnstaple, 321 
 Walker's Sufferings of ike Clergy 
 
 quoted, 526-9 
 Waller, Sir Hardress, 449, 528, 535 
 Sir WiUiam, 137, 187, 188, 190, 
 
 249, 250, 290, 305, 316, 358, 359 
 Wallington, Nehemiah, his Historical 
 
 Notices quoted, 229 
 Walrond, Henry, 124, 186 
 Walters, Major (George), $-^6 
 Warburton, Eliot, his Pri?ice Rupert 
 
 and the Cavaliers, obligations to, 
 
 78 ; error in, ib. \ ^2. n, \ cited, 244, 
 
 329 
 Warwick, Earl of, his attempt to 
 relieve Exeter, 192 ; 210 
 
 Watch and Ward, 53 
 
 Watkins, Rev. John, his Essay to- 
 wards a History of Bideford cited, 
 33, 205 ; quoted, 196, 297 
 
 Wear Giffard, 182 «., 472 
 
 Wells, skirmish of Devonshire Horse 
 near, 190 
 
 Wentworth, Lord, 394, 410, 422 and 
 «., 461, 473 
 
 Were, Colonel John, of Halberton, 
 first to raise regiment for Parlia- 
 ment in Devon, 93, 124 ; his 
 Apologie quoted, 177 n. ; his regi- 
 
 - ment, 319 ; goes over to the King, 
 
 i^' ; 349 
 
 John (of Silvertpn?), 237 
 
 Westcomb, Justinian, 83 
 
 Westcote's View of Devonshire, 69 
 
 "Western Wonder," a, 161 
 
 Wilson, Henry, 175 
 
 Windmill Hill, Launceston, 149 
 
 Winkleigh Beacon, 461 
 
 Winter, severe, of 1645-6, 419 
 
 Wogan, Captain, 421 ; (Colonel), 473 
 
 Wool for defence of Barnstaple, 431 
 
 Woolfardisworthy, 458 
 
 Works, Barnstaple, cost of, 115 
 
 Worth, Henry, 124, 186 
 
 Worth s History of Devonshire cited, 
 
 269 
 Wyndham, Colonel Edmond, 370, 
 
 406 
 
 Colonel Francis, 371, 465 
 
 Mrs., 370 
 
 Yeo, — , 107, 186 
 
 "York," Earl of Bath's horse, 301, 
 302 
 
UNWIN BROTHERS, 
 CHILWORTH AND LONDON.