Immediately after his final escape from the custody of Captain Wilson, the Earl of Rochester 'found Mr. Morton, who carries on their trade there, ready to come, with some account of his business.'[40] If Morton had been a true Royalist, in momentary fear for himself, and for the success of an insurrection that was to overthrow the Protector, would he have risked a meeting with the Earl of Dover, in a place where he had been twice arrested, instead of awaiting his arrival in the security of London? Such a strange course arouses strong suspicion that Morton was the Protector's emissary referred to by Col. Cromwell; and assuredly a Mr. Morton is mentioned to Thurloe, by one of his continental agents, as a friend, and fellow sham-Royalist, who might assist him in enticing some of the King's retinue into projects, such as the 'murther of H. H. the Protector.'[41]
Nor was Mr. Morton the only agent busy in doing all he could 'to ripen the design of a general rising.' During January and February, 1655, messengers passed to and fro through the Northern and Western districts of England to prepare the way for the Earl of Rochester and his associates, who spread abroad rumours that the 'Levellers were to be aiding and abetting the Cavaliers,' and that on the 8th of March, a general rising would take place. Two men can be traced who thus prepared Wiltshire for insurrection, one of whom was the chief instigator of Wagstaff's rising at Salisbury.
Both of them were obscure men, not known in that part of England. An unnamed emissary came from Yorkshire, passing through London, to Dorsetshire, taking, on the way, the house, near Lewes, of Col. Bishop, a Leveller, one of the Wildman faction.[42] The other, Mr. Douthwaite, reached Wiltshire from Somersetshire. This circumstance, of itself, aroused suspicion; and he was asked why, if the revolt, as he asserted, was to be throughout all England, he did not choose Somersetshire, instead of Wiltshire, for the scene of action. The reason he gave for that choice had in it a strong dash of unreality. His motive was, he declared, because 'if he did any mischief, or killed anybody,' he preferred to do mischief 'among strangers, where he was not known.' So unsatisfactory was his demeanour, that a recruit, whom he endeavoured to cajole, refused to join the conspiracy, declaring that 'he was confident this was a plot of my Lord Protector's own devising, and that he had some of his own agents in it.' And as, during that winter, the Dorsetshire Cavaliers had 'whispered that the plot' then 'so loudly talked on at Court, is nothing but a trick of the great Oliver's,' this idea seems to have been prevalent in the West of England. Some such whisper, undoubtedly, had a marked influence on the Wiltshire revolt. Not a single landowner of importance went out with Wagstaff. Though he had been told off by the King expressly for that service, no Royalist of eminent position answered the King's call. They, also, doubtless suspected Douthwaite, an unknown, low-class stranger, who took upon himself to summon them to arms against the Protector. And Douthwaite was undoubtedly the chief instigator of that attempt, 'the very principal verb' in the affair: a very capable witness, Major Butler, so described him. In itself this was a suspicious circumstance. And another reason may be urged for deeming that Cromwell, and not the King, was served by Douthwaite. Like a shady witness, he proved too much. Antedating the event by at least three weeks, he asserted in February, that Charles had left Cologne for the Dutch coast, 'for an opportunity to sail for England.' This was a startling piece of news, and most arousing to a hearty Royalist: and the King did take that step on the 4th of March. But it is noteworthy that a foreknowledge of the King's movements, which was undoubtedly possessed by Cromwell and Thurloe in London, should have been so speedily communicated to Douthwaite, in the depths of Somersetshire.[43]
Whilst England was thus being prepared for the coming insurrection, the Earl of Rochester went to London, where, although soldiers were stationed at the ends of the streets, and extra precautions taken against the Royalists, 'he consulted,' as Clarendon observes, 'with great freedom with the King's friends.' Nor were he and his comrades hindered from traversing England, and passing on into Wiltshire and Yorkshire, that they might head the intended rendezvous of the Royalists on Salisbury Plain and Marston Moor; the very places, it should be remembered, that rumour had designated for a gathering of the Levellers. Cromwell was powerless: he dared not touch the men he had passed into England: the object for which he had admitted them must be fulfilled, even to the end.
That the end, which Cromwell desired, followed the lines indicated by his master hand, might be anticipated. But he could not allow the project to become too real; a necessity that rather stood in his way. His power of creating the semblance of an actual insurrection was limited. Of the 'hidden works,' all over England, which he attributed to the Royalists, but one mine actually exploded, one nearly went off, and the rest remained dormant. The tameness of that shadowy meeting on Marston Moor evidently caused Cromwell much vexation. As his dupes refused to exhibit themselves, and as not a soldier was near at hand, paragraphs in the News Letters, 'some pistols scattered' on the heath, and 'a led horse, with a velvet saddle,' were all the proofs that Cromwell could show that aught had happened on Marston Moor, during the night of the 8th of March. Nor could he solemnize the event, as he desired, by the appearance on the scaffold of a single Yorkshireman.
He sent, for that purpose, to York as Judges, Baron Thorpe, Mr. Justice Newdigate, and Mr. Serjeant Hutton; but they refused to obey his bidding. They declined to try upon a capital charge the men that had been arrested by the Protector's informers, not in arms nor on horseback, nor even on the highway, but in their own houses. The judges were doubtful 'whether in point of law,' a possible midnight ride could be declared by them 'to be treason.' It was in vain that Colonel Lilbourne used 'diligence' to 'pick up such as are right,' to serve on the jury. The judges even left York altogether, objecting that due notice, under which they could try that 'great affair,' had not been given.
Pressure was renewed upon Newdigate and Hutton; they were despatched back to York, to undertake the trial of the Marston Moor prisoners. Cromwell's law officer, however, found them at Doncaster, on their return to London, and in a very contrary state of mind. They again refused to act; and they based their refusal on an objection, which affected not those prisoners alone, but all Cromwell's prisoners. They asserted, evidently reckoning on Baron Thorpe's concurrence, that they could not, as judges, put in force the Ordinance, by which Cromwell had adapted the Statute Law of England to meet the crime of high treason against himself, because it was of no validity! They thus anticipated, in the most unpleasant way, Mr. Coney's refusal to pay taxes imposed, not by an Act of Parliament, but by an 'Ordinance.' Cromwell was forced to yield; the Yorkshiremen preserved their lives, but not their liberty or their estates; and almost immediately, 'Judges Thorpe and Newdigate were put out of their places, for not observing the Protector's pleasure in all his commands.'[44]
Cromwell's 'pleasure' was, however, served by Mr. Serjeant Glyn and Mr. Recorder Steele, and by the jurymen, 'such as were right,' over whom they presided, in the trial of the Salisbury insurgents. Those poor dupes pleaded what may be termed, Baron Thorpe's plea. They argued that their indictment was not founded on an Act of Parliament, and that 'there can be no treason by an Ordinance.' They urged that a sentence pronounced by the Serjeant and the Recorder, who were mere 'pleaders, servants to the Lord Protector,' would be illegal; and they asserted their right to be tried by Baron Thorpe, 'a sworn judge.' The prisoners, who could not be convicted of high treason, were condemned to death as horse stealers. They vainly pleaded, that to requisition a horse for a warlike enterprise was not felony, and that 'the country knew we did not intend to steal,' but acted 'as the soldiers did now at London, and elsewhere, who came against us.'[45] About fourteen of those poor fellows were put to death, with Grove and Penruddock; and seventy were sold into West Indian slavery. Accordingly Cromwell was able, as Thurloe exulted, to prove 'that the Plot was real,' as 'the persons were real,' who, in consequence, lost their lives, or were condemned to lifelong misery.
Thus Cromwell, by a deliberate course of fraud, compassed the death of men, who might otherwise have lived void of offence against his government. He next proceeded to delude all his subjects by means of the sham conspiracy by which he had ensnared his victims on to the scaffold. This development in Cromwell's course of deception brings us back to the ordinary path of history. Every historical text-book mentions that Cromwell, within a few months after the Insurrection of March 1655, subjected England to the authority, almost unlimited, of twelve Major-Generals. To each one a separate province was allotted, with power to imprison, fine, or sell as slaves, all that he might select. The Major-Generals also were directed by Cromwell to pay themselves, and the soldiers under them, by the levy of a tax of ten per cent. on the incomes of all but the poorest Royalists, which he imposed for that purpose. As historians have believed in the reality of the Insurrection of March 1655, they hold that Cromwell, therefore, 'found himself compelled to divide England into districts, over which he set Major-Generals,' and to inflict upon the Royalists the tax, 'known by the name of the Decimation.' Yet, curiously enough, these hearty believers in Cromwell have ignored that solemn confirmation of their opinion, which he addressed to his subjects, namely, the 'Declaration of his Highness, by the advice of his Council, showing the Reasons of their Proceedings for Securing the Peace of the Commonwealth, upon occasion of the late Insurrection and Rebellion,—October 31, 1655.'
Than this document, no more admirable illustration could be given of the manner in which Cromwell carried on his Protectorate. By that 'Declaration' he engrafts into his policy the deception he had practised on the Royalists, and adapts it to the benefit of the whole nation, by a description of the pious uses to which it could be applied. And for our purposes this document is especially convenient, for, whilst it proves what Cromwell wished his people to believe about the Insurrection, it enables us to disprove throughout the statements that he makes. But before we can reach that portion of our disclosure, the operative clauses of the 'Declaration' must be dealt with. It commences with a justificatory recital of the misdeeds of the Royalists. As God, Cromwell argues, 'by His gracious dispensation,' had 'subjected' the Royalists 'to the power of those whom they had designed to enslave and ruin,' 'the Parliament's party' might, Cromwell asserts, have 'extirpated those men, with designs of possessing their Estates and Fortunes.' Their conquerors, however, refrained themselves, 'it having pleased God in his providence, so to order things;' and the Royalists were allowed to live and 'enjoy their freedom, and have equal protection in their persons and estates, with the rest of the Nation.' But what return, the Protector declares, has been made by the Malignants for the lenity thus extended to them? 'The actings of that party' proves that 'neither the dispensations of God, nor kindness of men, would work upon them;' that 'they were implacable in their malice and revenge'; and he cites 'the late Insurrection and Rebellion,' 'as the greatest and most dangerous' of all 'their hidden works of darkness.'