Memoirs of a Cavalier<br />A Military Journal of the Wars in Germany, and the Wars in England.<br />, Daniel Defoe [phonics books TXT] 📗

However, they defended the bridge, as I have said, and opposed our passage. I was this day in the van, and our forlorn having entered Huntingdon without any great resistance till they came to the bridge, finding it barricaded, they sent me word; I caused the troops to halt, and rode up to the forlorn, to view the countenance of the enemy, and found by the posture they had put themselves in, that they resolved to sell us the passage as dear as they could.

I sent to the king for some dragoons, and gave him account of what I observed of the enemy, and that I judged them to be 1000 men; for I could not particularly see their numbers. Accordingly the king ordered 500 dragoons to attack the bridge, commanded by a major; the enemy had 200 musketeers placed on the bridge, their barricade served them for a breastwork on the front, and the low walls on the bridge served to secure their flanks. Two bodies of their foot were placed on the opposite banks of the river, and a reserve stood in the highway on the rear. The number of their men could not have been better ordered, and they wanted not courage answerable to the conduct of the party. They were commanded by one Bennet, a resolute officer, who stood in the front of his men on the bridge with a pike in his hand.

Before we began to fall on, the king ordered to view the river, to see if it was nowhere passable, or any boat to be had; but the river being not fordable, and the boats all secured on the other side, the attack was resolved on, and the dragoons fell on with extraordinary bravery. The foot defended themselves obstinately, and beat off our dragoons twice, and though Bennet was killed upon the spot, and after him his lieutenant, yet their officers relieving them with fresh men, they would certainly have beat us all off, had not a venturous fellow, one of our dragoons, thrown himself into the river, swam over, and, in the midst of a shower of musket-bullets, cut the rope which tied a great flat-bottom boat, and brought her over. With the help of this boat, I got over 100 troopers first, and then their horses, and then 200 more without their horses; and with this party fell in with one of the small bodies of foot that were posted on that side, and having routed them, and after them the reserve which stood on the road, I made up to the other party. They stood their ground, and having rallied the runaways of both the other parties, charged me with their pikes, and brought me to a retreat; but by this time the king had sent over 300 men more, and they coming up to me, the foot retreated. Those on the bridge finding how 'twas, and having no supplies sent them, as before, fainted, and fled; and the dragoons rushing forward, most of them were killed; about 150 of the enemy were killed, of which all the officers at the bridge, the rest run away.

The town suffered for it, for our men left them little of anything they could carry. Here we halted and raised contributions, took money of the country and of the open towns, to exempt them from plunder. Twice we faced the town of Cambridge, and several of our officers advised his Majesty to storm it. But having no foot, and but 1200 dragoons, wiser heads diverted him from it, and leaving Cambridge on the left, we marched to Woburn, in Bedfordshire, and our parties raised money all over the country quite into Hertfordshire, within five miles of St Alban's.

The swiftness of our march, and uncertainty which way we intended, prevented all possible preparation to oppose us, and we met with no party able to make head against us. From Woburn the king went through Buckingham to Oxford; some of our men straggling in the villages for plunder, were often picked up by the enemy. But in all this long march we did not lose 200 men, got an incredible booty, and brought six waggons laden with money, besides 2000 horses and 3000 head of cattle, into Oxford. From Oxford his Majesty moves again into Gloucestershire, having left about 1500 of his horse at Oxford to scour the country, and raise contributions, which they did as far as Reading.

Sir Thomas Fairfax was returned from taking Bridgewater, and was sat down before Bristol, in which Prince Rupert commanded with a strong garrison, 2500 foot and 1000 horse. We had not force enough to attempt anything there. But the Scots, who lay still before Hereford, were afraid of us, having before parted with all their horse under Lieutenant-General Leslie, and but ill stored with provisions; and if we came on their backs, were in a fair way to be starved, or made to buy their provisions at the price of their blood.

His Majesty was sensible of this, and had we had but ten regiments of foot, would certainly have fought the Scots. But we had no foot, or so few as was not worth while to march them. However, the king marched to Worcester, and the Scots, apprehending they should be blocked up, immediately raised the siege, pretending it was to go help their brethren in Scotland, and away they marched northwards.

We picked up some of their stragglers, but they were so poor, had been so ill paid, and so harassed at the siege, that they had neither money nor clothes; and the poor soldiers fed upon apples and roots, and ate the very green corn as it grew in the fields, which reduced them to a very sorry condition of health, for they died like people infected with the plague.

'Twas now debated whether we should yet march for Scotland, but two things prevented—(1.) The plague was broke out there, and multitudes died of it, which made the king backward, and the men more backward. (2.) The Marquis of Montrose, having routed a whole brigade of Leslie's best horse, and carried all before him, wrote to his Majesty that he did not now want assistance, but was in hopes in a few days to send a body of foot into England to his Majesty's assistance. This over-confidence of his was his ruin; for, on the contrary, had he earnestly pressed the king to have marched, and fallen in with his horse, the king had done it, and been absolutely master of Scotland in a fortnight's time; but Montrose was too confident, and defied them all, till at last they got their forces together, and Leslie with his horse out of England, and worsted him in two or three encounters, and then never left him till they drove him out of Scotland.

While his Majesty stayed at Worcester, several messengers came to him from Cheshire for relief, being exceedingly straitened by the forces of the Parliament; in order to which the king marched, but Shrewsbury being in the enemy's hands, he was obliged to go round by Ludlow, where he was joined by some foot out of Wales. I took this opportunity to ask his Majesty's leave to go by Shrewsbury to my father's, and, taking only two servants, I left the army two days before they marched.

This was the most unsoldier-like action that ever I was guilty of, to go out of the army to pay a visit when a time of action was just at hand; and, though I protest I had not the least intimation, no, not from my own thoughts, that the army would engage, at least before they came to Chester, before which I intended to meet them, yet it looked so ill, so like an excuse or a sham of cowardice, or disaffection to the cause and to my master's interest, or something I know not what, that I could not bear to think of it, nor never had the heart to see the king's face after it.

From Ludlow the king marched to relieve Chester. Poyntz, who commanded the Parliament's forces, follows the king, with design to join with the forces before Chester, under Colonel Jones, before the king could come up. To that end Poyntz passes through Shrewsbury the day that the king marched from Ludlow; yet the king's forces got the start of him, and forced him to engage. Had the king engaged him but three hours sooner, and consequently farther off from Chester, he had ruined him, for Poyntz's men, not able to stand the shock of the king's horse, gave ground, and would in half-an-hour more have been beaten out of the field; but Colonel Jones, with a strong party from the camp, which was within two miles; comes up in the heat of the action, falls on in the king's rear, and turned the scale of the day. The body was, after an obstinate fight, defeated, and a great many gentlemen of quality killed and taken prisoners. The Earl of Lichfield was of the number of the former, and sixty-seven officers of the latter, with 1000 others. The king, with about 500 horse, got into Chester, and from thence into Wales, whither all that could get away made up to him as fast as they could, but in a bad condition.

This was the last stroke they struck; the rest of the war was nothing but taking all his garrisons from him one by one, till they finished the war with the captivating his person, and then, for want of other business, fell to fighting with one another.

I was quite disconsolate at the news of this last action, and the more because I was not there. My regiment wholly dispersed, my lieutenant-colonel, a gentleman of a good family, and a near relation to my mother, was prisoner, my major and three captains killed, and most of the rest prisoners.

The king, hopeless of any considerable party in Wales, Bristol being surrendered, sends for Prince Rupert and Prince Maurice, who came to him. With them, and the Lord Digby, Sir Marmaduke Langdale, and a great train of gentlemen, his Majesty marches to Newark again, leaves 1000 horse with Sir William Vaughan to attempt the relief of Chester, in doing whereof he was routed the second time by Jones and his men, and entirely dispersed.

The chief strength the king had in these parts was at Newark, and the Parliament were very earnest with the Scots to march southward and to lay siege to Newark; and while the Parliament pressed them to it, and they sat still and delayed it, several heats began, and some ill blood between them, which afterwards broke out into open war. The English reproached the Scots with pretending to help them, and really hindering their affairs. The Scots returned that they came to fight for them, and are left to be starved, and can neither get money nor clothes. At last they came to this, the Scots will come to the siege if the Parliament will send them money, but not before. However, as people sooner agree in doing ill than in doing well, they came to terms, and the Scots came with their whole army to the siege of Newark.

The king, foreseeing the siege, calls his friends about him, tells them he sees his circumstances are such that they can help him but little, nor he protect them, and advises them to separate. The Lord Digby, with Sir Marmaduke Langdale, with a strong body of horse, attempt to get into Scotland to join with Montrose, who was still in the Highlands, though reduced to a low ebb, but these gentlemen are fallen upon on every side and routed, and at last, being totally broken and dispersed, they fly to the Earl of Derby's protection in the Isle of Man.

Prince Rupert, Prince Maurice, Colonel Gerard, and above 400 gentlemen, all officers of horse, lay their commissions down, and seizing upon Wootton House for a retreat, make proposals to the Parliament to leave the kingdom, upon their parole not to return again in arms against the Parliament, which was accepted, though afterwards the prince declined it. I sent my man post to the prince to be included in this treaty, and for leave for all that would accept of like conditions, but they had given in the list of their names, and could not alter it.

This was a sad time. The poor remains of the king's fortunes went everywhere to wreck. Every garrison of the enemy was full of the Cavalier prisoners, and every garrison the king had was beset with enemies, either blocked up or besieged. Goring and the Lord Hopton were the only remainders of the king's forces which kept in a body, and Fairfax was pushing them with all imaginable vigour