'Sunday, March 11th, 1655, in the City of Salisbury, about midnight, there occurs a thing worth noting. Salisbury was awakened from its slumbers by a real advent of Cavaliers. Sir John Wagstaff, "a jolly knight" of those parts, once a Royalist Colonel: he, with Squire, or Major Penruddock, "a gentleman of fair fortune," Squire, or Major Grove, and about two hundred others, did actually rendezvous in arms about the Big Steeple, that Sunday night, and ring a loud alarm in those parts. It was Assize time; the Judges had arrived the day before. Wagstaff seizes the Judges in their beds, seizes the High Sheriff, and otherwise makes night hideous;—proposes on the morrow to hang the Judges, as a useful warning; but is overruled by Penruddock and the rest. He orders the High Sheriff to proclaim King Charles; High Sheriff will not, not though you hang him; Town-crier will not, not even though you hang him. The Insurrection does not spread in Salisbury, it would seem. The Insurrection quits Salisbury on Monday night, marches with all speed towards Cornwall, hoping for better luck there. Marches;—but Captain Unton Crook marches also in the rear of it; marches swiftly, fiercely; overtakes it at South Molton in Devonshire, "on Wednesday about ten at night," and there, in a few minutes, put an end to it. We took Penruddock, Grove, and long lists of others; Wagstaff unluckily escaped ... and this Royalist conflagration, which should have blazed all over England, is entirely damped out. Indeed so prompt and complete is the extinction, thankless people begin to say there had never been anything considerable to extinguish. Had they stood in the middle of it,—had they seen the nocturnal rendezvous at Marston Moor, seen what Shrewsbury, what Rufford Abbey, what North Wales in general, would have grown to on the morrow,—in that case, thinks the Lord Protector, not without some indignation, they had known!—Carlyle's 'Cromwell,' vol. iv. pp. 129, 130.
If Carlyle had been more heedful he might have taken the hint furnished by those 'thankless people.' Men are not usually thankless if preserved from a real and obvious danger. Carlyle, however, thought that he knew more about those transactions than the men who might have witnessed them; and so we will accept his somewhat incautious invitation, and our readers, if they choose to do so, shall perceive, perhaps, 'not without some indignation,' what the Lord Protector 'had known' about the insurrection of March 1655; they shall, to a certain extent at least, regard that event from his point of view. And to enable them to do so as promptly as possible, they may be at once informed, that the Protector himself admitted the Earl of Rochester, Sir John Wagstaff, and their associates into England, in order that they might, in his behalf, play the part of the conspirator. The circumstance being appreciated, the Protector's position becomes quite clear. It is obvious that he wished his subjects to believe, in common with his historians, that England was, during the opening months of 1655, 'from end to end of it, ripe for an explosion.'
Taking then for granted, upon Cromwell's own showing, that he wanted an insurrection, the assistance toward that end on which he could rely, and the obstacles that stood in his way, must be considered. The assistance which Cromwell had at hand, lay in the little band of courtiers who hung in penury, and vexation of heart, round Charles II. Wanderers on the Continent, in total ignorance of English opinion, acutely sensible of their own discomfort, raging against their great Tormentor, the King's 'over sea' counsellors were, by irritation and by 'zeal, made so blind,' that they were 'soon persuaded of good success' in any possible attempt to overthrow the Protector.[30] The chief hindrance to Cromwell's projected insurrection was his palpable prosperity. It was notorious during the winter and spring of the year 1655, that he had appeased discontent among his soldiery; had quieted, in prison, Harrison, Wildman, and the leaders of the Anabaptists; that the Levellers were reduced to inaction; and that therefore the Royalists were powerless. And for this reason. Every Englishman, even the most 'Wildrake' among the Cavaliers, knew full well, that they, unassisted, could not for a moment stand before Cromwell's armies; and they knew equally well, that if the King landed on our shores, at the head of a foreign army, all England would meet him with passionate resistance. Even at the best, the most confident Royalists knew that a young man, nurtured by a popish mother, and amidst papists, would not be readily accepted as our King.
But one chance, therefore, remained to the Royalists, both at home and abroad: and that was the possibility that Anabaptist fanaticism and army discontent might unite together against the Protector. If that could be reckoned on, and if a rising of the Royalists, all over England, could be timed so as to explode, when the Levellers broke into action, that would offer a chance indeed, especially if some of the mutineers could be won over to the King. That chance was, at this season, wholly denied to the Royalists. The King's most trusted English advisers, the Council styled 'The Sealed Knot,' repeatedly warned him during January 1655, that 'since no rising of the Army is to be hoped for, any rising of the King's party would only be to their destruction.'[31]
To a person who desired to stimulate an insurrection against the Protector the course was therefore clear. He must act on the impatient credulity of those who shared in their King's exile. Far from the scene of action, they might be persuaded that the Anabaptists and the discontented soldiers had leagued together, and that the warnings of the 'Sealed Knot' might be set at naught. Charles was thus acted upon. As the wicked King of Israel was lured on to his destruction by the cry of false prophets bidding him to go up and prosper, the King was persuaded to disregard his best counsellors, to believe that 30,000 Royalists were armed and ready to join in an organized revolt, so skilfully planned that it would break out, at one moment, all over England, with the co-operation of the Levellers, and of a portion of Cromwell's army. Charles was also assured, that if he would but fix the day, the insurrection would immediately take place.
The King was hard to persuade; young as he was, his sagacity was not wanting. He long remained incredulous: he did not believe the 'expresses' which reached him 'every day' from England: he felt sure that those zealous emissaries were deceived. More messengers accordingly crossed the water: they were confident that 'the rising would be general, and many places seized upon, and some declare for the King which were in the hands of the army, for they still pretended, and did believe, "that a part of the army would declare against Cromwell, at least, though not for the King."'
Those messengers, however, would promise nothing, if Charles did not, when the Earl of Rochester and his associates started for England, approve the reality of the plot, by stationing himself on the sea coast, that he might 'quickly put himself into the head of the Army, which would be ready to receive him.' And he was warned that this was his last chance, and that 'if he neglected that opportunity,' his followers would desert him, as one hopelessly apathetic. Besides these threats, the persons, who dispatched those messengers from England, resorted to other means to force Charles into the enterprise. They appointed the day for the outbreak: he was not able 'to send orders to contradict it:' so he felt constrained, 'with little noise,' to quit Cologne for Middleburg, to await there the summons to England.
Whilst Charles was being thus cajoled, the bright anticipations of his companions were suddenly saddened. In the midst of their preparations, Cromwell arrested several noted Royalists in London: it was obvious that he had discovered 'the design.' But that dark cloud had its silver lining; it was even converted into an augury of success. The conspirators at Cologne were 'cheered by letters' from their colleagues in England, assuring them 'that none of their particular friends at the intended sea-ports were known.'
Clarendon, and his associates, little knew how much was known by Cromwell. He afterwards repeated in public, almost word for word, 'all those particulars' which these 'expresses' 'communicated in confidence' to the Royal Court 'to let them know in how happy condition the King's affairs were in England;' he was forewarned of the very day when Charles would 'with little noise' quit Cologne for Middleburg 'ten days before he did stir;' and if so, even Clarendon would have perceived, that the Protector felt quite assured about the safety of his sea-ports.[32]
That the project proved in the end, as Charles expected at the beginning, a weak and improbable attempt, Clarendon admits, and that they had been befooled; but he maintained, to the end, that those messengers were 'very honest men, and sent by those who were such.' Clarendon's opinion is not so indisputable, but that it may be questioned. The utter failure of the promises that those messengers held out, might have aroused his doubt as to their good faith. Who was it then that instructed those false prophets? So improbable were the expectations which they urged upon Charles, that it is impossible to credit any true Royalist with the creation of those false hopes: to dispel them, the King's wisest English advisers did their utmost. Those encouragements then must have been the counsels of false friends. And who could be, as we shall prove, a warmer, or a falser friend to the enterprise of March 1655, than Cromwell?