THE COMING OF WILLIAM OF ORANGE (1688).
Source.—From Burnet's History of His Own Times, pp. 286-293. Abridged edition, 1841.
Torbay was thought the best place for the fleet to lie in, and it was proposed to land the army as near as possible; but when it was perceived next morning, that we had overrun it, and had nowhere to go now but to Plymouth, where we could promise ourselves no favourable reception, the Admiral began to give up all for lost, till the wind abating, and turning to the south, with a soft and gentle gale carried the whole fleet into Torbay in the space of four hours.
The foot immediately went on shore, the horse were next day landed, and the artillery and heavy baggage sent to Topsham, the seaport of Exeter, where the Prince intended to stay some time, both to refresh his men and to give the country an opportunity to declare its affections. When the Prince entered Exeter, the Bishop and Dean ran away, the clergy stood off, the magistrates were fearful, and it was full a week before any gentlemen of the country joined him, though they saw every day persons of condition coming in to him—among the first of whom was Lord Colchester, eldest son to the Earl of Rivers, Lord Wharton, Lord Abingdon, and Mr. Russell, Lord Russell's brother.
Seymour was then Recorder of Exeter. He joined the Prince, with several other gentlemen of quality and estate, and gave the good advice of having an association signed by all who come in, as the only means to prevent desertion, and to secure them entirely to the Prince's party.
The heads of the university of Oxford sent Dr. Finch, son to the Earl of Winchelsea, then made Warden of All Souls College, to assure the Prince that they would declare for him, inviting him at the same time to come to Oxford, and to accept of their plate if he needed it. A sudden turn from those principles which they carried so high not many years before! But all this was but a small accession.
The King came down to Salisbury, and sent his troops twenty miles farther; whereupon the Prince, leaving Devonshire and Exeter under Seymour's government, with a small garrison and the heavy artillery under Colonel Gibson, who was made Deputy Governor as to the military part, advanced with his army; and understanding that some officers of note (Lord Cornbury, Colonel Langston, and others) designed to come over and bring their men with them, but that they could not depend on their subalterns, he ordered a body of his men to advance, and favour their revolt. The parties were within two miles of one another, when the whisper ran about that they were betrayed, which put them in such confusion that many rode back, though one whole regiment, and about a hundred besides, came over in a body, which gave great encouragement to the Prince's party, and (as it was managed by the flatterers) was made an instance to the King of his army's fidelity to him, since those who attempted to lead their regiments away were forced to do it by stratagem, which, as soon as they perceived, they deserted their leaders and came back.
But all this would not pacify the King's uneasy mind. His spirits sank, his blood was in such a fermentation that it gushed out of his nose several times a day, and with this hurry of thought and dejection of mind all things about him began to put on a gloomy aspect. The spies that he sent out took his money, but never returned to bring him any information; so that he knew nothing but what common report told him, which magnified the number of his enemies, and made him believe the Prince was coming upon him before he had moved from Exeter. The city of London, he heard, was unquiet; the Earls of Devonshire and Danby and Lord Lumley were drawing great bodies of men in Yorkshire; the Lord Delamere had a regiment in Cheshire; York and Newcastle had declared for the Prince; and the bulk of the nation did so evidently discover their inclinations for him, that the King saw he had nothing to trust to but his army; and the army, he began to fear, was not to be relied on. In conclusion, when he heard that Lord Churchill and the Duke of Grafton (who was one of King Charles's sons by the Duchess of Cleveland), and the most gallant of all he had, were gone to the Prince, and soon after that Prince George, the Duke of Ormond, and the Lord Drumlanrig, eldest son to the Duke of Queensberry, had forsaken him, he was quite confounded, and not knowing whom to depend on any longer, or what further designs might be against him, he instantly went to London.
The Princess Anne, when she heard of the King's return, was so struck with the apprehension of his displeasure, and what possibly might be the consequence of it, that she persuaded Lady Churchill to prevail with the Bishop of London to carry them both off. The Bishop, as it was agreed, received them about midnight at the back-stairs, and carried them to the Earl of Dorset's, where they were furnished with what they wanted, and so conducted them to Northampton, where that Earl soon provided a body of horse to serve the Princess as her guard; and not long after a small army was formed about her, which, according to their desire, was commanded by the Bishop of London.
At this time there was a foolish ballad went about, treating the Papists, and chiefly the Irish, in a ridiculous manner, which made an impression on the army, and thence on the whole country, not to be imagined but by those who saw it; and a bold man adventured to publish in the Prince's name another Declaration, setting forth the desperate designs of the Papists, and the great danger the nation was in by their means, and requiring all persons to turn them out of their employments, to secure all strong places, and to do their utmost in order to execute the laws, and bring all things again into their proper channel. The paper was penned with a good spirit, though none ever claimed the merit of it, and no doubt being made but that it was published by the Prince's direction, it set everything to work, and put the rabble and apprentices to pulling down mass-houses and doing many irregular actions.
When the King saw himself thus forsaken, not only by those whom he had trusted and favoured most, but even by his own children, the army in the last distraction, the country on every side revolting, and the city in an ungovernable fermentation, he called a general meeting of all the Privy Councillors and Peers in town to ask their advice and what was fit to be done. The general advice was that he should send commissioners to the Prince to treat with him, which, though sore against the King's inclination, the dejection he was in and the desperate state of his affairs made him consent to. The persons appointed were the Marquis of Halifax, the Earl of Nottingham, and the Lord Godolphin; and when they had waited on the Prince at Hungerford, desiring to know what it was that he demanded, after a day's consultation with those who were about him, he returned answer "that he desired a Parliament might be presently called, and no one continued in any employment who would not qualify himself according to law; that the Tower of London might be put in the keeping of the City, and the fleet and all strong places in the hands of Protestants; that the armies on both sides might not, while the Parliament was sitting, come within twenty miles of London; that a proportion of the revenue might be set apart for the payment of the Prince's army, and himself allowed to come to London with the same number of guards that the King had."
These were the Prince's demands, which, when the King read, he owned more moderate than he expected; but before they came to his hands he had engaged himself in other resolutions. The priests and all violent Papists, who saw that a treaty with the Prince would not only ruin their whole design, but expose them as a mark and sacrifice to the malice of their enemies, persuaded the Queen that she would certainly be impeached, that witnesses would be set up against her and her son, and that nothing but violence could be expected. With these suggestions they wrought upon her fear so far, that she not only resolved to go to France herself, and take the child with her, but prevailed with the King likewise to follow her in a few days. The Queen went down to Portsmouth, and from thence in a man-of-war went over to France, taking along with her the midwife and those who were concerned in her son's birth, who not long after were all so disposed of that it never could be yet learned what became of them; and on the 10th of December, about three in the morning, the King went away in disguise with Sir Edward Hales, whose servant he pretended to be. They passed the river, throwing the Great Seal into it, which was afterwards found by a fisherman near Vauxhall, and in a miserable fisher-boat, which Hales had provided to carry them over to France, when, not having gone far, some fishermen of Feversham, who were watching for priests and such other delinquents as they fancied were making their escape, came up to them, and knowing Sir Edward Hales, took both the King and him, and brought them to Feversham.
It was strange that a great King, who had a good army and a strong fleet, should choose rather to abandon all than either try his fate with that part of the army that stood firm to him, or stay and see the issue of Parliament. This was variously imputed to his want of courage, his consciousness of guilt, or the advice of those about him; but so it was that his deserting in this manner, and leaving them to be pillaged by an army that he had ordered to be disbanded without pay, was thought the forfeiture of his right, and the expiration of his reign; and with this notion I now proceed to relate what passed in the Interregnum (though under the same title still) until the throne, which was then left vacant, came to be filled.
When it was noised about town that the King was gone, the apprentices and rabble, supposing the priests had persuaded him to it, broke out again with fresh fury upon all suspected houses, and did much havoc in many places. They met with Jeffreys as he was making his escape in disguise, and he being known by some of them, was insulted with all the scorn and rudeness that malice could invent, and after some hour's tossing about, was carried to the Lord Mayor to be committed to the Tower, which Lord Lucas had now seized, and in it declared for the Prince.
The Lord Mayor was so struck with the terror of the rude populace, and with the disgrace of a man who had made all people tremble before him, that he fell into fits of which he died soon after; but to prevent all future disorders in the City, he called a meeting of the Privy Councillors and Peers at the Guildhall, who all agreed to send an invitation to the Prince, desiring him to come and take the government of the nation into his hands until a Parliament should meet and reduce all things to a proper settlement.
The Prince was at Abingdon when the news of the King's desertion and the City's disorder met him, and upon this it was proposed that he should make all imaginable haste to London; but some were against it, because, though there had been but two small actions, one at Winkinton, in Dorsetshire, and the other at Reading, during the whole campaign, in neither of which the King's forces gave them much reason to dread them, yet there were so many of the disbanded soldiers scattered along the road, all the way to London, that it was thought unsafe for the Prince to advance faster than his troops could march before him, which delay was attended with very bad consequences. When the people of Feversham understood that it was the King they had in their custody, they changed their rough usage into all the respect they could possibly pay him. The country came in, and were moved with this astonishing instance of all worldly greatness, that he who had ruled three kingdoms, and might have been arbiter of all Europe, was now found in such mean hands, and in so low an equipage; and when the news was brought to London, all the indignation that was formerly conceived against him was turned into pity and compassion. The Privy Council upon this occasion met, and agreed to have the King sent for. The Earl of Feversham went with the coaches and guards to bring him back. In his passage through the City he was welcomed by great numbers with loud acclamations of joy, and at his coming to Whitehall had a numerous Court; but when he came to reflect on the state of his affairs, he found them in so ruinous a condition, that there was no possibility of making any stand; and therefore he sent the Earl of Feversham (but without demanding a pass) to Windsor, to desire the Prince to come to St. James's and consult with him the best means of settling the nation.
The Prince had some reason to take this procedure of the Council amiss, after they had invited him to take the government into his own hands; and because the Earl of Feversham had commanded the army against him, and was now come without a passport, it was thought advisable to put him in arrest. The tender point was how to dispose of the King's person; and when some proposed rougher methods, such as keeping him in prison or sending him to Breda, at least until the nation was settled, the Prince would not consent to it; for he was for no violence or compulsion upon him, though he held it necessary for their mutual quiet and safety that he should remove from London.
When this was resolved on, the Lords Halifax, Shrewsbury and Delamere were appointed to go and order the English guards to be drawn off, and sent into country quarters, while Count Solms with the Dutch was to come and take all the posts about Court. The thing was executed without resistance, but not without murmuring, and it was near midnight before all was settled, when the lords sent notice to the King that they had a message to deliver to him. They told him "the necessity of affairs required that the Prince should come presently to London, and they thought it would conduce both to the safety of the King's person and the quiet of the City to have him retire to some house out of town, and they named Ham; adding that he should be attended with a guard, but only to secure his person, and not give him any disturbance." When the lords had delivered their message they withdrew; but the King sent immediately after them to know if the Prince would permit him to go to Rochester. It was soon seen that the intent of this was to forward his escape, and therefore the Prince willingly consented to it; and as the King next day went out of town, the Prince came through the park privately to St. James's which disgusted many who had stood some time in the wet to see him. The next day all the bishops in town (except the Archbishop, who had once agreed to do it), the clergy of London, and the several companies of the City came to welcome him, and express a great deal of joy for the deliverance wrought by his means. As the Prince took notice of Serjeant Maynard's great age, and how he had outlived all the men of the law, he answered he had liked to have outlived the law itself, had not his Highness come over to their relief.
When compliments were over, the first thing that came under consultation was how to settle the nation. The lawyers were of opinion that the Prince might declare himself King, as Henry VII. had done, and then call a Parliament, which would be a legal assembly; but their notion in this was so contrary to the Prince's Declaration, and so liable to give offence, that it could not be admitted. Upon this the Prince called together all the peers and members of the three late Parliaments that were in town, together with some of the citizens of London, desiring their advice in the present conjuncture. They agreed in an address to him that he would write missive letters round the nation, in such manner as the writs were issued out, for sending up representatives, and that in the meantime he would be pleased to take the administration of the government into his hands.
While these things were carrying on in London, the King at Rochester was left in full liberty, and had all the respect paid to him that he could wish. Most of the Dutch guards that attended him happened to be Papists; and when he went to Mass they went with him, and joined very reverently in the devotion; whereupon, being asked how they could serve in an expedition that was intended to destroy their own religion, one of them answered briskly that his soul was God's, but his sword was the Prince of Orange's. The King continued there a week, and many who were zealous for his interest went to him, and desired him to stay and see the result. But while he was distracted between his own inclinations and his friends' importunities, a letter came from the Queen reminding him of his promise, and upbraiding him for not performing it, which determined his purpose; and on the last day of this memorable year he went from Rochester very secretly, and got safely into France, leaving a paper on his table, wherein he reproached the nation for forsaking him, and promised that, though he was going to seek for foreign aid to restore him to his throne, yet he would make no use of it either to overthrow the established religion or the laws of the land.