The First Book 29 



before Lincoln \ and there he entered with his army without 

 great difficulty, and placed also a garrison in it, and raised 

 a considerable army, both horse, foot, and dragoons, for the 

 preservation of that county, and put them under commanders, 

 and constituted a person of honour 2 Commander-in-Chief 

 with intention to march towards the South, which, if it had 

 taken effect, would doubtless have made an end of that war 3 . 

 But he being daily importuned by the nobility and gentry of 

 Yorkshire, to return into that county, especially upon the 

 persuasions of the Commander-in-Chief of the forces left 

 there, who acquainted my Lord that the enemy grew so 

 strong every day, being got together in Kingston-upon-Hull, 

 and annoying that country, that his forces were not able to 

 bear up against them ; alleging withal, that my Lord would 



1 Lord Willoughby on surrendering Gainsborough marched to Lincoln. ' But see- 

 ing an impossibility that Cromwell should time enough recruit his beaten and distracted 

 forces, or that he could receive any seasonable supplies from London, on the first news 

 that the Earl of Newcastle was coming towards him, he forsook the place, and made 

 what haste he could to Boston.' — -Mercurius Aulicus, August 10. Willoughby writes 

 to Cromwell from Boston on August 5 : ' Since the business of Gainsborough, the hearts 

 of our men have been so deaded that we have lost most of them by running away, so 

 that we were forced to leave Lincoln upon a sudden ; and if I had not done it, then I 

 should have been left alone in it.' — Carlyle's Cromwell, i, p. 140. 



Lincoln was recaptured by Manchester on October 20, 1643, evacuated by the Par- 

 liamentary forces in March 1644, after the relief of Newark by Prince Rupert, and sur- 

 rendered again to Manchester on May 6, 1644. 



2 The Lord Widdrington. 



3 The King repeatedly desired Newcastle to march southwards. The Queen writes 

 to Newcastle, on the 18th June, that the King 'had sent me a letter to command 

 you absolutely to march to him, but I do not send it you, since I have taken a resolution 

 with you that you remain ' (Letters, p. 219) ; and again, on August 13 she writes : ' He 

 had written me to send you word to go into Suffolk, Norfolk, or Huntingdonshire. I 

 answered him that you were a better judge than he of that, and that I should not do 

 it. The truth is, that they envy your army ' (Letters, p. 225). Sir Philip Warwick 

 was sent by the King to persuade Newcastle to march south, apparently about the 

 end of July. ' But I found him very averse to this, and perceived, that he apprehended 

 nothing more, than to be joined to the King's Army, or to serve under Prince Rupert ; 

 for he designed himself to be the man that should turn the scale, and to be a self-sub- 

 sisting and distinct army, wherever he was. Yet he told me that when he could quit 

 Yorkshire, and leave it in a condition to defend itself against the before-mentioned 

 enemies in it (which the Yorkshire men would not have been unwilling to have adven- 

 tured, if he had left them in some measure their own forces, and marched with his own 

 more northerly army; for they knew the Parliament would command Fairfax after 

 him), he would march through Lincolnshire, and recruit himself there, and so over the 

 Washes into Norfolk, and Suffolk, and the associated counties ; which had been a noble 

 design.' This march into Lincolnshire was Newcastle's first step towards carrying 

 out this design. ' He took in Gainsborough and Lincoln ', says Sir T. Fairfax, ' and 

 intended to take in Boston, which was the key of the associated counties ; for his orders 

 (which I have seen) were to go into Essex, and block up London on that side. Having 

 laid a great while still, and being now strong enough for those forces which remained 

 in the country, we sent out a good party to make an attempt upon Stamford Bridge, 

 near York. But the enemy upon the alarm fled thither, which put them also in such 

 a fear, that they sent earnestly to my Lord of Newcastle to desire him to return, or the 

 country would again be lost. Upon this he returned again into Yorkshire, and not 

 long after came to besiege Hull.' — Short Manorial, Maseres' Tracts, i, 431. Mr. S. R. 

 Gardiner discusses the question of Newcastle's motives in a criticism of the earlier edition 

 of this book — English Historical Review, 1887, p. 172. 



