A history of England

by Charles Oman

NASEBY
1645.

1645. Battle of Naseby.—The Midlands lost to Charles.

Next spring the "New-Model" was sent out to try its fortune against the Cavaliers. The king had led his army northward to restore the fortunes of his party in the valley of the Trent, where Newark was now his most advanced post. On his way he stormed the important Parliamentary town of Leicester, but his progress was then stayed by the news of the approach of Fairfax. Despising the "New-Model," the Cavaliers turned fiercely to attack it, though the royal host was the smaller by several thousands. They seem to have put only 9000 men into the field against 13,000. Charles and Fairfax met at Naseby, in Northamptonshire, and there fought out the decisive battle of the first civil war. Once more it was Rupert who lost the day, and Cromwell who won it. The prince, with the right wing of the royal horse, routed his immediate opponents, and rode off the field in reckless pursuit of them. But on the king's left Cromwell and his Ironsides broke to pieces the Cavaliers of the North, and then steadied their ranks and rode against the flank of the Royalist infantry. Charles sent in his reserve to aid his flagging centre, and prepared to charge himself at the head of his body-guard. "Will you go to your death?" cried the Earl of Carnwath, who seized the royal rein, and turned his master out of the press. Charles yielded, and rode back. Far better would it have been for him and for England if he had gone on to make his end among the pikes. Cromwell's charge settled the day; the Royalist foot were ridden down or captured; the wrecks of the horse joined the late-returning Rupert, and escorted their master back to Oxford (June 14, 1645).

Charles a fugitive.—Career of Montrose.

Naseby decided the fate of the war. The king could never raise another army in the Midlands. His whole infantry force was gone, and for the next eight months he rode helplessly about the shires with 2000 or 3000 horse, vainly trying to elude his pursuers and scrape together a new body of foot. His only hope was in an ally who had arisen in Scotland. James Graham, Marquis of Montrose, a Scottish peer who had grown discontented with the Covenant, had raised the royal standard in the Highlands in the preceding year. He was a born leader of men, and, though at first followed by a mere handful of wild clansmen, soon made his power felt in the war. After routing two small armies in the north-east, he turned upon Argyleshire, and almost extirpated the whole Covenanting clan of the Campbells at Inverlochy (January, 1645). Then, descending upon the Lowlands, he cut to pieces a large army at Kilsyth (August 15), seized Glasgow, and mastered the greater part of Scotland. Charles resolved on joining him, and trusted to turn the fate of the war by his aid. But Montrose's Highland levies melted home to stow away their plunder, and he was left at the head of a comparatively small force for the moment. Then Leslie led back across the Tweed the Scottish army which had been serving in England, and surprised and routed Montrose at Philiphaugh (September, 1645).

1645-6. End of the war in the West.

There was no further hope for Charles from Scotland, and his sole remaining army, the force in the West, under Hopton and Goring, was also doomed. After Naseby, Fairfax led the "New-Model" into Somersetshire, beat Goring at Langport, and captured Bristol (September, 1645). The Royalists were driven westward towards the Land's End. In the next spring Fairfax followed them, took Exeter, beat Hopton at Torrington, and steadily drove the wrecks of the enemy onward till their back was to the Cornish sea. Escape was impossible, and the king's army of the West laid down its arms (March, 1646).

Charles gives himself up to the Scots.

The king had now lost all hope, and when the Roundhead armies began to muster for the siege of Oxford, his last stronghold, he took a desperate measure. He thought that the Scottish Covenanters were less bitterly hostile to him than the English Parliamentary party, and resolved to give himself up to them rather than to his English subjects. Slipping out of Oxford in disguise, he rode to the Scottish camp at Newark, and there surrendered himself (April, 1646). He was not without hope that he might yet save his crown by coming to terms with his subjects; for he had an overweening belief in his own power of diplomacy, and did not understand how deeply his old evasions and intrigues had shaken men's confidence in his plighted word. Yet he had his better side; he sincerely believed in his own good intentions and his hereditary rights, and there were two things which he would never give up under any pressure—his crown and his adherence to the Church of England.

The Scots deliver him to the Parliament.