As is well known, the Reformation was not the popular event in England that it was in Scotland, and the introduction of the Book of Common Prayer in lieu of the Mass was the torch which, in 1549, set the western shires—Cornwall, and Somerset, and Devon—in a blaze. The opposition, started at Sampford Courtenay by a pair of simple villagers, soon came to include leaders of the stamp of Sir Thomas Pomeroy and Sir Humphry Arundel, who barricaded Crediton, the rendezvous of their party. The interests of the Crown were befriended by Sir Peter and Sir Gawen Carew, who, though utterly unscrupulous and barbarous in their methods of warfare, failed to arrest the insurrection. Presently no fewer than ten thousand rebels commenced the investment of Exeter. At this serious juncture, the Lord Lieutenant of the county (Lord Russell) took the helm of affairs, and ultimately raised the siege, the city in the meantime being reduced to terrible straits through famine. But the rebels suffered, too. In all, four thousand peasants fell in the Western Rising. A dramatic episode was the execution of the Vicar of St. Thomas, who was hanged in full canonicals on his church, where his corpse remained suspended till the reign of Edward’s successor, when the Roman Catholics regained, for a season, the upper hand.
The geographical position of Devonshire suggests, what is also the fact, that the county had a considerable share in the colonization of the Western Hemisphere. The first port in Devon to send out ships to America for the purpose of establishing settlements was Dartmouth. In this enterprise, Humphry and Adrian Gilbert, who were half-brothers of Sir Walter Raleigh, and whose seat, Greenway, was close to Dartmouth, took the lead. The pioneer expedition, which took place in 1579, was productive of no result; but in 1583, Humphry Gilbert seized Newfoundland, the present inhabitants of which are largely of Devon ancestry. This navigator, though brave and skilful, rests under an ugly imputation which we must all hope is baseless. According to some, he proposed to Queen Elizabeth the perfidious destruction of the foreign fishing fleets which had long made the island their station. During his homeward voyage Humphry was drowned, and the manner of his death is depicted in an old ballad:—
He sat upon the deck;
The book was in his hand.
“Do not fear; Heaven is as near
By water as by land.”
Adrian Gilbert interested himself in the discovery of the North-West Passage, but neither of the brothers did much more than secure for Dartmouth a principal share in the Newfoundland trade, for many and many a year one of the chief props of Devon commerce.
Of far greater practical significance, as a centre of maritime adventure, was Plymouth. Hence sprang William Hawkins, the first of his nation to sail a ship in the Southern Seas. Hence sprang his more famous son, Sir John Hawkins, the first Englishman that ever entered the Bay of Mexico, and who spent the bribes of Philip of Spain in defensive preparations against that tyrant’s fleet. Here was organized the Plymouth Company founded for the colonization of North Virginia after the failure of Sir Walter Raleigh (who, like Sir Humphry Gilbert, had made Plymouth his base) to form a settlement. The efforts of the Plymouth Company were at first not very felicitous, but in 1620 it received a new charter, and although its schemes were absurdly ambitious, and fell ludicrously short of realization, and although it was administered for private ends rather than in a large spirit of enlightened patriotism, still the mere existence of the company must have tended to promote the flow of men and money to the new plantations beyond the seas.
In the Great Civil War, the towns generally were in favour of the Parliament, but Exeter, on which city Elizabeth had conferred the proud motto Semper fidelis, appears to have been Royalist in sympathy. As, however, the Earl of Bedford, the Lord Lieutenant, held it for the opposite party, it was besieged by Prince Maurice, to whom it surrendered in September, 1643. In April, 1646, it was recovered by the Roundheads, but ere this many interesting events had come to pass. In May, 1644, Queen Henrietta Maria had arrived in the city, and there, on June 16th, was born the Princess Henrietta Anne, afterwards Duchess of Orleans. Just at this moment, the Earl of Essex made his appearance, and the Queen was fain to escape alone, leaving her infant in the charge of Lady Moreton and Sir John Berkeley, who arranged for her christening in the font of Exeter Cathedral. Her portrait by Sir Peter Lely, which adorns the Guildhall, was the gift of Charles II., who, in 1671, thus testified his appreciation of the city’s good services. The donor himself had been the guest of the Corporation in July, 1644, when his royal father had received from the civic authorities a present of five hundred pounds.
Looking further afield, Devonshire was the theatre of many stirring events in that fratricidal struggle. It was in 1642 that the High Sheriff, Sir Edmund Fortescue, of Fallapit, at the instigation of Sir Ralph Hopton, called out the posse comitatus, and so precipitated a conflict. Sir Ralph himself, with the aid of Sir Nicholas Slanning, assembled a force of some two or three thousand men, with which he captured first Tavistock, and then Plympton, afterwards joining Fortescue at Modbury, where a mixed army of trained bands and levies was soon in being. The next proceeding was to have been an attack on Plymouth, but Colonel Ruthven, the commandant of that town, sent out five hundred horse, which, after a feint at Tavistock, dashed through Ivybridge, and delivered a sudden assault on Modbury. In a moment all was over. Exclaiming, “The troopers are come!” the trained bands fled in confusion, while the rest of the army, who knew nothing about soldiering and had no love for the cause, went after them, save for a few friends of the Sheriff, who helped him to defend the mansion of Mr. Champernowne. When this was fired, the movement collapsed, and the Roundheads, who had lost but one man, effected a good haul of county notabilities, including the High Sheriff, John Fortescue, Sir Edmund Seymour, and his eldest son, Edmund Seymour, M.P., Colonel Henry Champernowne, Arthur Basset, and Thomas Shipcote, the Clerk of the Peace. About a score of these worthies of Devon were placed on board ship at Dartmouth, and transported to London.