ENGLISH GARRISON OF GUERNSEY. 77 



resolved that the soldiers should be billetted on the most 

 wealthy inhabitants of the parishes for their maintenance, 

 and at the same time authorised a tax to be raised for 

 two months' pay, should no money be received from England 

 during the current month.* The people, we are told, 

 " looked sourly '" on their saviours I This is not to be 

 wondpred at under the circumstances, for even when the wind 

 changed, money did not come over very freely, and when at 

 length peace was made with France in the spring of 1629, 

 after the second abortive attempt to relieve La Rochelle, the 

 king owed the island nearly £1,400 for money advanced 

 to pay the soldiers,! which was still unpaid when the Civil 

 War broke out a few years later. On the proclamation of 

 peace the peo[)le of Guernsey eagerly clamoured to be 

 relieved of the burden of tlie soldiers who were no longer 

 required, and in com])liance with their request orders were 

 given by the Council, on the loth May, 15'^U, for ships 

 to be sent to the island to embark and convey them to Flush- 

 ing for service in the Low Countries. This service was very 

 un]:)opular with the trooj^s, for we learn that many of the 

 soldiers fled to Normandy, while others hid themselves among 

 the rocks to escape it.J At the same time it was ordered 

 that " the standmg garrison in Castle Cornett, within the 

 Isles of Garnesey shall bee upheld and maintained as it hath 

 bin in former times." § 



Of the garrison who held out against the Parliament- 

 arians in Castle Cornet for nearly nine years under Sir Peter 

 Osborne, Sir Baldwin Wake, and lastly under Captain 

 Burgess, it is hardly necessary to say much, so fully has this 

 period been described by Mr. Tupper, in his History of 

 (juernsey, and his Chronicles of Castle Cornet. He states 

 that it is doubtful whether Sir Peter Osborne ever had more 

 than 80 to 100 soldiers of all ranks at any time under his 

 command. Under Sir Baldwin Wake, in December, 1646, 

 the garrison, according to Chevalier, amounted to 99 men, 

 while we learn from Le Roy that the number was reduced to 

 fifty-five when the castle surrendered in 16oL|| This un- 

 daunted little band endured the hardships of the long siege, 

 exposed day and night to attack from the batteries on shore, 

 dependent for supplies on such boats from Jersey as could 

 evade the watclifulness of their enemies on dark nights, not 

 only ably replying to their enemies' batteries by an equally 



* Actes des Etats p. 105. t Do., p. 153. 



X Domestic Calendar State Papers. Dom : Car: I. Vol. CLXVIII,, p. 569. 



§ Actes des Etats, p. 153. 



II Tupper, Hist. Guernsey, 2nd Ed., pp. 280-28'. 



