Right hand holding a truncheon.
A NATIVE of Devonshire. When a youth of seventeen he became involved in some local quarrel, where, says the Biographie Universelle, ‘par excès d’amour filial, il maltraita le sous-Sheriff d’Exeter.’ He was sent to sea, and served at one time under the Duke of Buckingham. In 1629 he entered an English regiment in Holland, where he studied the art of war with great diligence, and was remarkable for his steadiness of conduct, and the discipline he maintained among the soldiers, treating them at the same time with uniform kindness. In 1639 he returned to England; and in Charles I.’s disastrous expedition to Scotland, Monck displayed great skill in command of the artillery, though productive of no good results. He then went to Ireland on promotion, where he did considerable service, and was made Governor of Dublin; but the Parliament intervening, he was suspended from the office; and on the conclusion of a treaty (by the King’s command) with the Irish rebels, he once more returned to England.
On his arrival he found that doubts of his fidelity had been implanted in Charles’s mind, but on joining him at Oxford, he completely cleared himself, was promoted, and ordered to relieve Sandwich, where he was taken prisoner by the Roundheads and sent to the Tower. During the two years of his captivity Monck steadily refused all overtures made to him by the Protector, and occupied his leisure hours in making notes on military and political subjects. Cromwell entertained a high opinion of his soldier-like qualities, and offered him the alternative of prolonged imprisonment or a command to put down the Irish rebels under O’Neill. Monck accepted the latter, but was ill supported by the Government at home, so much so that he was reluctantly compelled to sign a truce with the insurgents. For this he was called to account on his return to England, but he was too useful that Cromwell should afford to quarrel with him again; and so he was despatched to Scotland, where he did much service. The Protector at the time was well aware of the General’s loyal proclivities, and wrote to him shortly before his death: ‘There be those that tell me there is a certain cunning fellow in Scotland called General Monck, who is said to lie in wait there to introduce Charles Stuart. I pray you to use your diligence to apprehend him and send him up to me.’
The share which Monck took in the Restoration is too well known to be repeated here. Charles called him his father, gave him the Garter, created him Baron Monck, Earl of Torrington, and Duke of Albemarle, and appointed him Lieutenant-General of the forces of the United Kingdom, with a large income.
In 1653 he married or acknowledged his marriage with Anne, daughter of John Clarges, who had long resided under his roof,—‘a lady,’ says Guizot, ‘whose manners were more vulgar and less simple than those of her husband, and who was the laughing-stock of a witty and satirical Court.’
The French historian speaks disparagingly of the great General, but in the time of the plague, when the King and Ministers left London, the Duke remained to watch over the necessities of the wretched inhabitants, to save families from pillage, and to alleviate the sufferings of the poor. He was afloat when the fire occurred, and the general cry was: ‘Ah, if old George had been here, this would not have happened.’
He died in his sixty-second year, leaving an enormous fortune to his spendthrift son Christopher, and was buried in Westminster Abbey with great splendour, Charles II. attending the funeral. Guizot says: ‘C’etoit un homme capable de grandes choses, quoiqu’il n’eut pas de grandeur dans l’âme.’ His jealousy of his noble comrade Lord Sandwich seems to bear out the French historian’s opinion in some measure. In his last illness he was much occupied in the arrangement of the alliance of his surviving son Christopher (the death of the elder had been a terrible blow to him) with the heiress of the wealthy Duke of Newcastle. His death was peaceful: he expired in his arm-chair without a groan.