Writing from Worcester (September 26th), Wharton complains of the barbarity practised by the cavaliers—relating how they stripped, stabbed, and slashed the dead, and then states that on Sabbath morning, his fellow-soldiers entered a vault of the college where his Excellency was to hear a sermon, and found secreted there eleven barrels of gunpowder and a pot of bullets. It is added that his Excellency prohibited any soldier to plunder churches or private houses under pain of death. In another communication, (dated September 30th), after an interesting account of the situation, buildings, and curiosities of the city, he paints its moral and spiritual condition, in most frightful colours, as so vile, and the country so base, so papistical, so atheistical, and abominable that it resembled Sodom, and was the very emblem of Gomorrah, and doubtless worse than either Algiers or Malta, a very den of thieves, and a refuge for all the hell-hounds in the country. Though the citizens cried peccavi their practical motto was iterum faciam; but they only did as they were taught by Dr. Prideaux, lately made bishop, and by other popish priests, who had all run away.
1642, October.
Respecting Hereford, he remarks, October the 7th, "On Sabbath day, about the time of morning prayer, we went to the minster, where the pipes played and the puppets sang so sweetly, that some of our soldiers could not forbear dancing in the holy quire, whereat the Baalists were sore displeased. The anthem ended, they fell to prayer, and prayed devoutly for the King and the bishops, and one of our soldiers with a loud voice said, 'What! never a bit for the Parliament,' which offended them much more. Not satisfied with this human service we went to divine, and, passing by, found shops open and men at work, to whom we gave some plain dehortations, and went to hear Mr. Sedgwick, who gave us two famous sermons, which much affected the poor inhabitants, who wondering, said they never heard the like before, and I believe them. The Lord move your hearts to commiserate their distress, and to send them some faithful and painful minister, for the revenues of the college will maintain many of them. I have sent you the gods of the cavaliers enclosed, they are pillage taken from Sir William Russel, of which I never yet got the worth of one farthing."
The writer of these letters was a stern Puritan, with an almost equal hatred of Prelacy and Popery, and also a fierce Iconoclast, with not an atom of regard for what is æsthetical in worship—tearing up surplices as the rags of the mother of harlots, and looking with grim satisfaction on altar rails crackling in the fire as so much superstitious refuse and defilement swept out of the Church of God, and meet only to be destroyed.
Contemporary with these epistles is one from a minister at Berwick, which presents to us another illustration of what happened in those times, by revealing to us his secret troubles—thus indicating the violence of feeling prevalent amongst the Roman Catholics of the wild Border Country, towards zealous apostles of Puritanism: "Never had I more need of your prayers than at present: the Papists are very insolent, use me most basely by railing on me, &c. But especially the Scottish fugitives, Mr. Sideserfe and his adherents, are so exasperated against me for my fidelity, that there is no small fear of my life and safety. One in his cups said yesterday, that they would not be satisfied until they had my life; but I say with the apostle, my life is not dear unto me, that I may finish my course with joy and fulfil the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus. They rail upon the Parliament, and threaten to send for a troop of horse to fetch me from Berwick, but my times are in the Lord's hands. I have one hundred pounds in London: I would the Parliament had it for and towards the defence of the kingdom, if it would be accepted. The Lord maintain His own cause, go out with His armies, and make a good end for us, for I know your prayers will not be wanting."[312]
As the Parliamentary soldiers were marching up and down the country, after the fashion described in Nehemiah Wharton's letters, Royalists were working out their will in another kind of lawless way. They had no psalm-singing or prayer, they built no pulpits in market-places, and if they did not retaliate upon conventicles the puritan treatment of parish churches, it was simply because conventicles did not exist, or were not within their reach. Royalist excesses were of another order. Whitelocke, describing the plunder of his own house, tells us that the enemy consumed whatever they could find, lighted their pipes with his MSS., carried away his title deeds, littered their horses with his wheat sheaves, broke down his park pales, killed his deer, broke open his trunks and chests, cut his beds and let out the feathers, and seized his coach and horses. In a word, they committed "all the mischief and spoil that malice and enmity could provoke barbarous mercenaries to commit."[313]
Battle of Edgehill.
1642, October.
The first serious conflict between the two armies happened at Edgehill, on Sunday, October the 23rd. The Puritan forces were marching to worship at Keynton church, when news reached them of the enemy being only two miles distant. Upon hearing this, they proceeded that morning—as the autumnal tints dyed the landscape—to a broad field at the hill foot, called the Vale of the Red Horse, where, as they took up their position, the Royalists came down and arranged their forces in front of them. Amongst the cavaliers rode Sir Jacob Astley, whose prayer and charge were so characteristic of the bluff piety of the best of that class, "O Lord, Thou knowest how busy I must be this day. If I forget Thee do not forget me. March on, boys!" Then began the rush of pikes, the crack of musketry, and the roar of cannon, which lasted till dark. Richard Baxter was preaching that day at Alcester, and heard the tumult of the distant fight. Some fugitives ran into the town, startling and alarming the inhabitants with the news, that the Parliament had been defeated; but early next morning other messengers relieved the panic-stricken inhabitants by the assurance that while Prince Rupert's men were plundering the waggons of Lord Essex's routed wing, the main body with the right wing had prevailed and won the day. The preacher walked over to the spot next morning, and found the Parliamentary General in possession of the field.[314]
The battle decided nothing, but it nourished the hopes of Parliament. A few days afterwards, the House of Lords ordered the Lord Mayor of London to summon a Common Hall at five o'clock, when a committee of peers and commons met the citizens, and amidst the gathering shadows of the afternoon, told the eagerly-listening crowd the story of the fight; Lord Say and Sele closing his speech with the exhortation, "Up and be doing, and the Lord be with you."[315]