Britain- 



1643. 

 Successes 

 iif the roy- 

 alists. 



Siege of 

 Gloucester, 



which is 

 relieved 



by Essex. 



Battle at 

 Newbury. 

 Sept. y.\ 



Campaign 

 'in tlie 

 north. 



Siege of 

 'Unit 



BRIT 



rection from which they had been repulsed, brought 

 on the battle of Stratton, where the parliamentary 

 forces were again attacked by the Cornish royalists, 

 and completely routed. This victorious army, join- 

 ed by the Marquis of Hertford, and by Prince Ru- 

 pert with a reinforcement of cavalry, soon after 

 foiieht a pitched battle near Bath, with the army of 

 Waller, without decisive advantage on either side ; 

 but, on the 13th of the same month, they routed and 

 dispersed Waller's whole forces at Roundaway, and 

 drove him into Bristol with only a few horse. That 

 city yielded in a few days to Prince Rupert by capi- 

 tulation, though not until the attempt to take it by 

 storm had cost the royalist 500 men. The king, at 

 this period, joined the camp at Bristol ; and so im- 

 portant were all the advantages he had gained by the 

 defeat of Fairfax in the north, of Waller in the west, 

 the retreat of E^sex, and the reduction of Bristol, 

 that a fair opportunity presented of advancing to- 

 wards a distracted capital. But the parliament was 

 preserved by the destiny which ever attended Charles, 

 whose arms were diverted, by an impulse of sudden 

 indignation, to the siege of Gloucester. The ap- 

 proaches to that town were baffled by the skilful de- 

 fence of Massey. A general assault was repelled by 

 the desperate enthusiasm of the garrison and city, 

 which was reduced, however, to extreme necessity, 

 when it was relieved by Essex. His return was op- 

 posed by Charles at Newbury, where a battle was 

 fought with desperate and steady valour on both 

 sides. Essex's horse were several times broken by 

 the king's, but his infantry kept in firm array, and, 

 besides giving their fire, presented an invincible ram- 

 part of pikes against the furious shock of Prince 

 Rupert and the gentry of the royal cavalry. Night 

 put an end to the action, but left the victory unde- 

 cided. On the side of Charles, but already disgust- 

 ed at the royal cause, fell the virtuous Lord Falk- 

 land. Essex next morning proceeded on his march 

 to London, and, though he had gained no victory, 

 obtained the approbation of parliament. 



In the north, during the summer, the Marquis of 

 Newcastle was opposed by Sir Thomas, son of Lord 

 Fairfax, and Oliver Cromwell, two officers who were 

 at this time rising fast into distinction. But the ad- 

 vantages which were gained by the former at Wake- 

 lield, in defeating and making a prisoner General 

 Goring, and by the latter at Gainsborough over 

 General Cavendish, who fell in the action, were 

 more than compensated by the route of Lord Fair- 

 fax at Atherton Moor, (on the 31st of July) and the 

 dispersion of his whole army. After this victory, the 

 Marquis of Newcastle sat down before Hull with an 

 army of 15,000 men, but, being beat off by a sally 

 of the garrison, he suffered so much that he thought 

 proper to raise the siege. About the Bame time 

 Manchester had advanced from the eastern associated 

 ounties, and joined Cromwell ; and young Fairfax 

 ebtained a considerable victory over the royalists at 

 Home Castle, where the conduct and gallantry of 

 the two rising associates were eminently displayed. 

 Though fortune thus balanced her favours, the king's 

 partywere still superior in the north ; and, had 

 aot the garrison of Hull kept Yorkshire in awe, 

 :hey might have joined their forces with those in the 



AIN. 



south. The drawn battle of Newbury put an end 

 to the campaign of 1613, by obliging both parties to 

 retire into winter quarters. 



While the king's arms were, unhappily for his own 

 cause, diverted from London against Gloucester, the 

 parliament was not without alarm from divisions in 

 the metropolis itself. Distinguished as the war had 

 been, most honourably for the English name, by 

 mutual clemency in the field, it was not possible for 

 the new government to maintain itself, without ar- 

 resting numbers of those who were convicted or sus- 

 pected of royalty ; and we need not wonder that the 

 jails were full, and the very ships in the river con- 

 verted into prisons. But the zeal of the followers 

 of parliament was not universal. Waller, already 

 mentioned in the wars, an elegant poet, an eloquent 

 speaker in parliament, and a man of great influence 

 from his persuasive address, was induced, either by 

 treachery, or disgust at his party, to project an assc 

 ciation in the city for refusing the parhamentary 

 taxes, and obtaining peace with the king. The en- 

 sign was detected. Tomkins, the brother-in-law of 

 the poet, and Chaloner, the friend of Tomkins, suf- 

 fered death, while Waller saved his own life by con- 

 fessions not much to his honour, and his sentence 

 was at last changed to a tine of L. 10,000. 



As Scotland could not be indifferent to the issue 

 of the present contest, so neither party could be in- 

 different to the prospect of her aid. When hosti 

 had first commenced in England, offers of mediation, 

 which had before been advanced, were renewed I 

 the Scottish council, and by the commissioners whon 

 the late Scottish parliament had appointed as conser- 

 vators of peace between the two countries, of whom 

 a body proceeded to Oxford. But the royalists re- 

 fused them a passport to London to try their media 

 tion with the English parliament; they refused them 

 a parliament in Scotland, and dismissed them wttl 

 indignation. 



Instead of a triennial parliament, which could 

 be anticipated in Scotland, a convention of estates 

 was summoned by the council and conservators of the 

 peace. The object of their assembling was soon an- 

 nounced by their impatient expectation of commis- 

 sioners from England. These arrived from the Eng- 

 lish parliament in the June of 1613, when the state 

 of the republican arms made it necessary to implore 

 the fraternal aid of the Scots. The commissioner 

 chiefly trusted among them was Vane, a man who, 

 in an age distinguished for active talents, had no equal 

 in eloquence, address, and dissimulation. By his 

 persuasion, was framed at Edinburgh, that solemn 

 leasue and covenant, which effaced all former protes- 

 tations and vows taken in both kingdoms, and long 

 maintained its credit and authority. In this covenant, 

 the subscribers, besides engaging mutually to defend 

 each other against all opponents, bound themselves 

 to endeavour, without respect of persons, the extir- 

 pation of popery and prelacy, superstition, heresy, 

 schism, and profaneness, to maintain the rights and 

 privileges of parliaments, together with the 1 

 authority, and to bring to justice all incendumet and 

 malignant*. The subscribers of the covenant vowed 

 also "to preserve the reformed religion, as established 

 in the chursh of Scotland ; but, by the artifice 



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