The “Mayflower” Stone on Plymouth Quay
During the retreat to Spain a second Armada vessel, the hospital-ship St Peter the Great, was driven ashore in Hope Cove; and the pulpit of St James's church, Exeter, and the timber roof of Tiverton School were, it is believed, made of wood either from this ship or from the Capitana.
It was not until this period that Plymouth came into prominence as a naval station. A special tax was levied on the pilchard fishery to provide money for the fortifications, and a leat or water-course was constructed with the primary object, it is said, of supplying fresh water for the royal ships.
A memorable event in James I's reign was the sailing of the Mayflower. Preceded by another ship called the Speedwell she set sail from Leyden in the autumn of 1620, having on board a number of Puritan refugees bent on finding in North America the religious freedom denied to them in England. The two vessels having met at Southampton and put into Dartmouth, were finally driven back by stress of weather into Plymouth, whence—her consort having proved unseaworthy—the Mayflower alone continued the voyage, ultimately landing her 101 exiles at Plymouth, Massachusetts, which, however, had received its name five years before.
In the Civil War between Charles I and the Parliament, few counties saw more fighting than Devonshire. The fighting consisted, however, not of pitched battles, but of sieges and attacks on fortified positions; which, indeed, was characteristic of the whole war, in whatever part of the country it was waged. Every Devonshire town of importance, a great number of villages, many castles, manor-houses, and even churches played a part in the struggle.
As a whole, the towns, with the exception of Exeter, sympathised with the Parliament, while the rural districts, encouraged by the great landowners, were mainly for the king. The royal forces were, however, numerous in Devonshire; Goring's army, in 1642, was 6000 strong; and although fortune wavered, and although towns were taken and retaken, there came a time, before the arrival of Fairfax and the New Model Army, when the royal standard flew from nearly every important town in Devon, Somerset, and Cornwall. There was one conspicuous exception. The party of the people never lost its hold on Plymouth, which, at a cost of 8000 lives, or more than the entire population of the town, withstood a blockade lasting from 1642 to 1646, together with many desperate attacks by Hopton, Prince Maurice, and the King himself, enduring altogether a longer siege than any other town in England.
Exeter was early seized for the Parliament, but the majority of the citizens were Royalists, and the city, which was regarded as one of the strongest Cavalier holds in the west, was soon retaken by Prince Maurice. Queen Henrietta was there in 1644, and there King Charles's youngest daughter, afterwards Duchess of Orleans, was born. When Fairfax retook the town in 1646 he allowed the garrison to march out with all the honours of war.
That year saw the final ruin of the Royal cause in the west, and the dispersal of the only army which, although little better than a mob, still kept the field for the King.
One of the most important, and at the same time most fiercely-contested Parliamentary victories, was the storming of the town of Torrington by Fairfax, at midnight, in the winter of 1646. After the battle, the church, which had been used by the king's troops (as also was Exeter cathedral) as a powder-magazine, was blown up, and 200 Royalist prisoners who had been confined in it and many of their guards were killed. The loss of Torrington was the death-blow of the Royal cause in Devon. All that a brave man could do, Hopton did. But the county was sick of the Royalists and their methods. The people had learnt that the well-disciplined troops of Fairfax were not mere robbers, like the ruffians of Grenville and Goring; and after Torrington the Royal army melted away.
The last place in the county to hold out for the King except Lundy, where there was no fighting, but which did not surrender until 1647, was Clifton Castle, or Fort Charles, near Salcombe. After enduring a blockade and siege of four months, with the trifling loss of one man killed and one wounded, the besieged were granted the same terms as the garrisons of Exeter and Barnstaple, and marched out with matches lighted, drums beating, and colours flying.