A HISTORY OF SURREY 



the coast.' But Gibraltar was not a port whence England would be 

 attacked, and the expedition proved to be against Portugal. 



On lo November 1580 the Council sent long instructions to the 

 Lord Lieutentant, the Lord Admiral, to the effect that all neighbouring 

 Princes were at war, and that these wars were carried on by much larger 

 forces than formerly. He and his deputies were consequently to make 

 a careful inspection of weapons in the county, to cause deficiencies to 

 be made good, to prepare lists of horses available for war, and to make 

 a new assessment of horses and armour due from men for their estates. 

 They were specially to provide for properly equipped demi-lances and 

 light horse, the latter apparently were to carry pistols.'' On 8 June 

 1587, 150 men were ordered to be pressed for service in the Low 

 Countries.^ The levies raised against the Armada, and in the years 

 preceding it, from the breaking out of open war in 1585, have been 

 dealt with in the Political History.* The total number of men who 

 were supposed to be assembled, in the county and with the armies at 

 Tilbury and Stratford in 1588, amounted to about 6,600 foot and 260 

 horse, not far removed from the computed levies of 1575, most of these 

 however were insufficiently armed. The musketry was nearly all sent 

 to the armies in Essex, where there were 1,000 Infantry under Leicester 

 at Tilbury, and 500 under Lord Hunsdon at Stratford, Scarcely half 

 of these had firearms, and the remainder of the supposed ' armed men ' 

 had only 32 calivers among 377 men, mostly archers. How the re- 

 maining levies called out in the county were armed, we can only 

 conjecture, but they could scarcely have had more than bows and bills. 

 With the armies were 8 lances, 90 light horse and 29 servants of the 

 gentlemen armed with petronels or carbines. One hundred and 

 twenty light horse were also at Croydon.'* The light horsemen had 

 been substituted for demi-lances, but were more heavily armed and 

 mounted, in some cases at least, than the ordinary light-horsemen. 

 They were if possible to have ' saddles after the fashion of the largest 

 northern light horseman,' a jack, that is, a leathern doublet with iron 

 plates, or a cuirass, or ' Almaine rivet,' a kind of body armour, and a 

 burgonet or a scull cap. No offensive weapons are prescribed except 

 ' a case of dagges ' in the pommel of the saddle, which means pistols 

 in holsters. These were the recommendations of the Council for the 

 arms of the light horse issued on i March 1584.* But it does not fol- 

 low that the 120 horse at Croydon in 1588 were so well equipped. 

 The total force in 1588 and its disposition, 8 lances, 90 light horse* 

 and 1,500 infantry with the armies in Essex, three bodies of 836 

 infantry at Godstone, Reigate and Dorking respectively, and 2,500 



* r.C.ff. Surr. i. 391. 

 of Ji^J^L'/of lt'val?^/°- U-f^—lX-uch mutilated, especially at the interesting point 



» Ibid. vi. 48. * y,C.H. Surr. i. 378-92. 



5 Harl. MS. No. 168. A return of the armed men in Anril i -Rs M^» 

 ..5"^ in^ntr, and ,38 horse there enumerated seem' TC.""^! .f „, i^ W' irE^ex'"^"'' ^' '''' 



« Loseley MS. vi. 57 ; Manning and Bray, Hist, of Surr. i. 665. 



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