Rupert, Prince Palatine

by Eva Scott

The unfortunate Fiennes was very severely censured for the loss of the city, which, it was maintained, was so strongly fortified that it should have been impregnable. The truth was that the garrison had been totally insufficient for the defence; but Fiennes remained under a cloud until later events justified him in the eyes of the Parliament.

Among the Royalists at Oxford the joy over this important success was marred by the dissensions of the victorious generals. The Princes had never been on cordial terms with Lord Hertford, the General of all the Western forces. Hertford was a constitutional Royalist, who served the King from a strict sense of duty, and from no love of war. He was of a grave, studious and peace-loving nature, and Maurice's appointment as his lieutenant-general had not brought satisfaction to either. Maurice had begun by despising Hertford for a "civilian". And Hertford had resented both the Prince's tendency to assume to himself "more than became a Lieutenant-General," and his interference in civil affairs which he did not understand. The arrival of Rupert on the scene did not make for peace. Maurice complained bitterly to Rupert, and the elder brother violently espoused the cause of the younger. The spark thus lighted flamed forth over the Governorship of Bristol.[[38]] Hertford, as said above, commanded all the Western Counties, and he considered, with some justice, that Rupert ought to have consulted him, before concluding the terms of surrender with Fiennes. In revenge for the slight put upon him, he appointed Sir Ralph Hopton Governor of Bristol, without a word on the subject to the Prince. Rupert, who considered the city won by his prowess as was in truth the case, was wildly indignant. He would not oppose another officer to the gallant Hopton, but he demanded the Governorship of the King for himself. The King, ignorant of Hertford's action, readily granted his nephew's request. Rupert then offered the post to Hopton as his lieutenant. Hopton, anxious for peace, willingly accepted the arrangement, and Hertford resented Hopton's compliance with the Prince as an injury to himself. The affair became a party question. The courtiers, "towards whom the Prince did not live with any condescension," sided with Hertford.[[39]] The King really believed his nephew's claims to be just; and the army vehemently supported its beloved Prince. Finally, the King was forced to come to Bristol in order to allay the storm which he had so unwittingly raised. On the flattering pretext of requiring Hertford's counsel and company in his own army, he detached him from that of the West; and on Rupert's suggestion he made Maurice a full general. The contending officers were silenced; but the breaches in the army were widened, and feeling embittered.[[40]]

The tactics to be next followed were hotly disputed. The Court faction was anxious to unite the two armies, but,—for other reasons than the important one that Maurice, in that case, could have been only a colonel,—Rupert prevailed against this counsel. Maurice was therefore ordered to march with foot and cannon after Lord Carnarvon, who was besieging Dorchester. It was said by the Court that, had Maurice marched more slowly, Carnarvon would have succeeded better. For Maurice "was thought to incline so wholly to the soldier, that he neglected any consideration of the country."[[41]] Fear of him roused the people of the country to active opposition. The licence of his soldiers—though admitted even by Clarendon to have been "reported greater than it was"—alienated the county, and Carnarvon took the Prince's conduct "so ill" that he threw up his commission and returned to Oxford.[[42]] Maurice thus left to labour alone, took Exeter and Weymouth, over the governorship of which he had a second quarrel with Hertford, who, though absent, was still nominally Lord Lieutenant of the western counties; on this occasion the King favoured Hertford, who triumphed accordingly. In October Maurice took Dartmouth, but effected little else of importance. Handicapped by a long and dangerous attack of influenza—"the new disease,"[[43]] it was called then—he besieged Lyme and Plymouth for months without success, and lost a good deal of reputation in the process.

In accordance with Rupert's scheme of campaign, the King should now have pushed on with the main army to London. But to render this plan successful it was necessary that Newcastle should sweep down from the North, and Maurice or Hopton, come to meet him from the West; the strength of local feeling prevented any such resolute and united action. Newcastle's northern troops would not leave their own counties exposed to hostile garrisons and hostile armies, in order to assist the King in a distant part of the country. In the same way the men of Cornwall and Devon refused to quit their own territory, and for the King to push on alone to London was absolutely useless. He was therefore forced to fall back on the old plan of conquering the country piecemeal, town by town, village by village; and accordingly, August 10th, he laid siege to Gloucester. Massey, then governor of Gloucester, had once served under Legge, and now sent word to him that he would surrender the city to the King, but not to Rupert. This message was the chief cause of the siege that followed; but Massey, either from inability or change of purpose, did not keep his engagement. Rupert held aloof from the siege altogether. No doubt he was disappointed at the rejection of his own more sweeping measures, and when he found that he would not even be allowed to assault the town, he declined to command at all. He could not, however, resist lingering about the trenches in a private capacity, and while so doing, had several very narrow escapes from shots and stones.[[44]]

After a fruitless siege the King was forced to retire before Essex, who advanced with a large force to the relief of Gloucester. On his way Essex surprised and took Cirencester; the King then moved after him, but—owing to his neglect of Rupert's warning, as the Prince's partisans asserted; or to Rupert's neglect of Byron's warning, as that officer declared—he was out-manoeuvred. Some confusion there certainly was. Rupert had mustered his troops on Broadway Down, but, though he waited till nightfall, he received no news from the King; and at last he set out in person to seek him. In the window of a farm-house he perceived a light, and, advancing cautiously, he looked in. There sat the King quietly playing at piquet with Lord Percy, while Lord Forth looked on. The Prince burst in upon them, crying indignantly that his men had been in the saddle for hours, and that Essex must be overtaken before he could join with Waller. Percy and Forth offered objections, but Rupert carried the day, and dashed off as impetuously as he had come, taking with him George Lisle and a regiment of musketeers. Marching night and day, "with indefatigable pains," he overtook and defeated Essex on Aldbourn Chase.[[45]] Essex retreated to Hungerford; but though defeated he was by no means crushed. He was still strong enough to fight, and, as his provisions were running short, his only hope lay in immediate victory. This Rupert knew, and for once in his life he preferred discretion to valour, and counselled passive resistance. If the King would be content to hold the roads between Essex and London, hunger and mutiny would speedily ruin the army of the Parliament. On September 20th, a part of the royal army occupied the road through the Kennet valley; Rupert with most of the cavalry held the road over Newbury Wash. But the lanes to the right were insufficiently secured, and Essex, spurred on by dire necessity, succeeded in gaining the slopes above the Kennet valley. Thus he commanded the whole position; and the first battle of Newbury proved the first great disaster for the Cavaliers. The surprised Royalists, seeing their enemies above them, charged up the hill to retrieve the ground, and the conflict raged long, with great loss. On the left, where Rupert lay, impatience proved nearly as fatal as neglect had done on the right. Instead of waiting to attack Essex's main army as it filed through the lanes, the Prince dashed off to the open ground of Enborne Heath, where Essex's reserves were strongly guarded by enclosures. There he charged and scattered some Parliamentary horse, but on the London trained bands he could make no impression, until the approach of some Royalist infantry caused them to retreat in good order. Whitelocke relates a personal encounter which took place between Rupert and Sir Philip Stapleton in this battle. This officer of the Parliament, "desiring to cope singly with the Prince, rode up, all alone, to the troop of horse, at the head of which Rupert was standing with Digby and some other officers. Sir Philip looked carefully from one to the other until his eyes rested upon Rupert, whom he knew; then he deliberately fired in the Prince's face. The shot took no effect, and Sir Philip, turning his horse, rode quietly back to his own men, followed by a volley of shots from the indignant Royalists.[[46]] For hours the fight continued; a series of isolated struggles took place in various fields, and when night fell the King's ammunition failed, and he retreated to Newbury, leaving Essex's way to London open. The advantage therefore was to the Parliament, though Essex could not claim a great victory. Also the King's loss had been immense, and among the fallen were Falkland, Sunderland, and the gallant Carnarvon. What could be done to retrieve the Royalist fortunes Rupert did. Rallying such men as were not utterly exhausted, he followed Essex closely, through the night,—surprised him, with some effect, and threw his rear into confusion. But, on September the 22nd, Essex entered Reading; and on the next day, Rupert returned with the King to Oxford.[[47]]

Rupert's star was paling, and his successes were well-nigh at an end. The King had hoped much from the Queen's coming and had begged her to reconcile Rupert with Percy, Wilmot and others. But Henrietta, once so kind to her nephew, now bitterly opposed him. She believed—or professed to believe—that he had formed a deliberate plan to destroy her influence with her husband. Perhaps the idea was not altogether without foundation; undoubtedly Rupert's common-sense showed him the folly of much of the Queen's conduct; and he was not the man to tolerate the interference of a woman in matters military. During the siege of Bristol, Henrietta had taken offence at what she considered Rupert's neglect of herself. "I hope your successes in arms will not make you forget your civility to ladies," Percy had written to the Prince. "This I say from a discourse the Queen made to me this night, wherein she told me she had not received one letter from you since you went, though you had writ many."[[48]] Percy's interference was not calculated to improve the state of affairs; and the siege of Gloucester excited Henrietta's jealousy yet more. She was eager for the advance on London, and she could not be made to understand that it was impossible, in existing circumstances. Rupert, as we have seen, was anxious for the very same thing, but he saw its impracticability and yielded to necessity. Because he so yielded, the Queen chose to consider him as the instigator of the siege of Gloucester, and she angrily declared that the King preferred his nephew's advice to that of his wife. Had he done so, it would but have shown his common-sense; but he hastened to Oxford to appease her indignation and soothe her jealousy as best he could. Then occurred the first open breach between Henrietta and Rupert. At this very juncture, three Puritan peers, Bedford, Clare, and Holland, had quitted the Parliament, and sought to be reconciled with the King. Henrietta received them with contempt. Rupert had more sense; he perceived the wisdom of conciliation, and brought the three peers to kiss his uncle's hand. The Queen's anger at this was loud and long; and henceforth the struggle of Prince versus Queen raged openly in Oxford.[[49]] The King was torn in two between them; he adored his wife, and he believed in his nephew. When actually at his uncle's side Rupert could usually gain a hearing, but once away, he had no security that the plan agreed upon but a few hours before would not be supplanted by some wild scheme emanating from the Queen, or from Digby.[[50]] At the Court the Queen's views were in the ascendant. Percy, Wilmot and Ashburnham threw in their lot with the Prince's enemies, and, as the two last had control of all supplies of ammunition and money respectively, Rupert experienced great difficulty in obtaining the barest necessities for his forces. Wilmot and Goring were able to raise a faction hostile to the Prince, within the army itself, and it was at this period that Arthur Trevor compared the "contrariety of opinions" to the contending elements. "The army is much divided," he wrote to Lord Ormonde, "and the Prince at true distance with many of the officers of horse; which hath much danger in it, out of this, that I find many gallant men willing to get governments and to sit down, or to get employments at large, and so be out of the way. In short, my lord, there must be a better understanding among our great horsemen, or else they may shortly shut the stable door."[[51]]

Rupert did not spare his indignation. He quarrelled freely with Percy, by letter. He left Digby's epistles unanswered,[[52]] and he slighted Wilmot. He accused the King of treating without his knowledge; which, said his distracted uncle, was a "damnable ley."[[53]] The truth was that the French Ambassador had proposed to ascertain what terms the Parliament might be likely to offer, and the King had consented to his so doing. Richmond hastened to explain matters to the Prince. "I should have told you before," he concluded, "but I forgot it; and but little knowledge is lost by it. It was ever my opinion that nothing would come of it, and so it remains still for anything I can hear, and I converse sometimes with good company."[[54]] But Rupert was not easily appeased; the supposed treaty was but one grievance among many, and ere long a letter from Digby had raised a new storm. The patient Duke as usual received his fiery cousin's complaints, and again took up his pen to pacify him. "Upon the receipt of your letter," he wrote, "perceiving that, from a hint taken of a letter from Lord Digby, you were in doubt that, in Oxford, there might be wrong judgments made of you and of your business, I made it my diligence to clear with the King, who answers the same for the Queen.... Considering the jealousy might have grown from some doubtful expressions in the letter you mention, I spoke with the party, (i.e. Digby) who seemed much grieved at it, and assured me he writ only the advice of such intelligence as was brought hither, and for information to make use of as you best could upon the place. Yesterday one brought me your commission to peruse.... I looked it well over, and I think it is well drawn."[[55]] The last sentence shows that Richmond did not confine his services to mediating between the Prince and his enemies, but watched over his cousin's more material interests with anxious care.

During all this time Rupert was not very far distant from Oxford. He had taken Bedford, and recaptured Cirencester, and would have held Newport Pagnell, thus cutting London off from the north; but during his absence in Bedfordshire, orders from Oxford drew off Louis Dyves whom he had left in charge at Newport Pagnell, and the place was seized by Essex. In the same way Vavasour's scheme for blockading Gloucester was ruined. "Sir, I am now in a good way, if no alteration come from Court,"[[56]] he wrote early in December. But the vexatious "alteration" came, and his plan failed. Hastings lamented that his lack of arms made "the service I ought to do the King very difficult;"[[57]] and everywhere despondency prevailed. "The truth is," wrote Ralph Hopton from Alresford, "the duty of this service here would be insupportable, were it not in this cause, where there is so great a necessity of prevailing through all difficulties, or of suffering them to prevail, which cannot be thought of in good English."[[58]]

Throughout the winter the usual mass of petitions, complaints, accusations, and remonstrances poured in upon the Prince. Among them, "Ye humble Remonstrance of Captain John Ball" deserves notice as a curiosity. This gentleman stated that he had, out of pure loyalty and with exceeding difficulty, raised 34 horses, 48 men, 12 carabines, 12 cases of pistols, 6 muskets, and 20 new saddles for the King's service. This done, he had gone to Oxford to obtain the King's commission to serve under Sir Henry Bard. During his absence, Sir Charles Blount, by order of Sir Jacob Astley then in command at Reading, had broken into his stables at Pangbourne and carried off both horses and equipments.[[59]] To this accusation old Sir Jacob responded with his wonted quaint directness: "As conserninge one yt calls himselfe Capne Balle, yt hath complayned unto yr Highnes yt I hav tacken awaie his horsses from him; this is the trewth. He hath livede near this towne ever since I came heather, and had gotten, not above, 12 men togeather, and himselfe. He had so plundered and oppressed the pepell, payinge contributions as the Marquess of Winchester and my Lord Hopton complayned extreamly of him. He went under my name, wtch he used falcesly, as givinge out he did it by my warrant. Off this he gott faierly, and so promised to give no more cause of complaynt. Now, ever since, he hath continewed his ould coures (courses), in soe extreame a waie, as he, and his wife, and his sone, and 10 or 12 horsses he hath, to geather spoyles the peepell, plunders them, and tackes violently their goodes from them."[[60]]

As a climax to all Rupert's other anxieties came the severe illness of Maurice, who was engaged at the siege of Plymouth. All the autumn he had been suffering from a low fever, which was in fact the modern influenza. So serious was his condition that his mother, in Holland, declined an invitation to the Court of Orange, on the grounds that she expected hourly to hear of Maurice's death.[[61]] More than once reports that he was actually dead gained credence, and the doctors who sent frequent bulletins to Rupert, would not answer for their patient's recovery, "by reason that the disease is very dangerous, and fraudulent." But by October 17th they were able to send a hopeful report. Maurice had slept better, the delirium had left him, and he had recognised Dr. Harvey—the discoverer of the circulation of the blood. When given the King's message of sympathy he had shown "an humble, thankful sense thereof." And on receiving Rupert's messages, "he seemed very glad to hear of and from your Highness."[[62]] A relapse was feared, but Maurice recovered steadily, though very slowly. In November he was anxious to join his forces before Plymouth, but had to give up the attempt, and the siege suffered from his absence. "Your brother resolved to have removed hence nearer towards Plymouth, upon Monday, but upon tryal finds himself too weak for the journey," wrote Sir Richard Cave, an old friend of the Palatines, to Rupert. "I dare boldly say that, had he been with the army, the army and the town had been at a nearer distance before now. Your brother presents his respects to your Highness, but says he is not able yet to write letters with his own hand."[[63]]