Chapter IV: Part 4

It was high time for action. In Ireland the Royalists, the Catholics, and even the Presbyterians, were uniting against the Parliament. The Scotch, under the lead of Hamilton and the Presbyterian Royalists, declared for the King; the English Presbyterians were for him to the extent that they were against the army; and throughout England the Cavaliers were arming for an uprising. Dark indeed seemed the peril. It had taken four years for the English Presbyterians, the Scotch, and the New Model, the army of the Independents, to conquer the Royalists, and now the New Model was pitted single-handed against the Scotch and the Royalists, while the Presbyterians were at best lukewarm. Nevertheless, exactly as in the French Revolution, the victory lay with the Mountain when it was brought face to face not only with hostile parties in France but with the rest of armed Europe, so now the fierce energy of the New Model, with the greatest of Englishmen at its head, was destined to prove too much for its foes. The grim Ironsides rallied to their cause with the devotion of fanatics, and the well-ordered discipline of splendid soldiers. With fierce exhortations and sermons, with internal searchings of spirit, with outpourings of prayer, they made ready for battle, and in each dark Puritan heart welled the determination not only to put down armed resistance, but to take the last great vengeance upon the King, the cause of the blood-guiltiness.

John Milton.

From the drawing in crayon by Faithorne at Bayfordbury.

By permission of William Clinton-Baker, Esq., J.P.
]

In April, 1648, the Second Civil War broke out. The gentry of Wales were a unit for the King, and the commonalty followed them. The Cavaliers rose in force in the North, and the Scotch prepared to send a formidable army across the border to their aid; and there were Royalist outbreaks everywhere, even in the southern and eastern counties. Berwick, Carlyle, Chester, Pembroke, Colchester, were seized and held for the King. The Presbyterians of London were in commotion; the Presbyterians in Parliament itself were half-hearted and divided; but the Independents and the army had no doubts. Fairfax marched into Kent and Essex, and, after some hard fighting, trampled under foot the insurrection. One Parliamentary Colonel whipped the Welsh at St. Fagan’s; another crushed out a Royalist rising in Lancashire; General Lambert was sent to the North, where Sir Marmaduke Langdale—Oliver’s old foe at Naseby—had raised Yorkshire for the King. Oliver himself marched to the siege of Pembroke, which, owing to lack of cannon, he could not take until July 11th. This ended the Welsh War. The risings in the south and centre had been thoroughly stamped out; the fleet, which had partially revolted, was for the most part brought back to loyalty; and there remained only to deal with the Northern Royalists and the Scotch army under the Duke of Hamilton, which had by this time crossed the border.

The composition of Hamilton’s army and the history of events in both Scotland and Ireland at this moment, are alike sufficient to show the tangle in which politics then were—the kaleidoscopic changes in the relations of factions and parties, and the seeming minuteness of the points of difference over which these same parties waged ferocious and resolute war. Hamilton’s cavalry was commanded by Munro, who had come over from Ulster to take part in the invasion of England. Munro and the Scotch Presbyterians of Ulster had, during the years immediately succeeding the great Irish uprising, been the formidable and merciless opponents of the Irish of the North. But when the English Civil War was fairly on, the English Royalists in Ireland—Episcopalians and Catholics alike—gradually lost their animosity toward their Irish foes, in their greater animosity toward the Puritans, and finally the Presbyterians followed suit. This resulted in the release of Munro and a large part of the Presbyterian force in Ulster, who went to the aid of Hamilton. Hamilton’s own government was Presbyterian and ostentatiously devoted to the Covenant. It is very difficult for a modern observer to see any essential point of difference, either in their attitude toward the Covenant, toward the King, or toward England; between the party that at the moment controlled Scotland, and the party which was soon to drive it out of power. Yet the bitterness between them was intense. The bulk of the Presbyterian ministers, and the fiercest and most intense Presbyterian zealots, hated Hamilton and his fellows with mortal hatred, and were only waiting their chance to rise against them.

Cromwell advanced to the encounter with entire confidence, and sternly anxious to get at his foes. He was a thorough Englishman at a time when, to the thorough Englishman, the Scotch were classed with other aliens. Bitterly though he hated the Royalists, he yet acknowledged them as fellow-countrymen; but he made no such acknowledgment in the case of the Scots. He explained that he preferred the Cavalier interest to the Scottish interest, just as he preferred the Scottish to the Irish; and he now moved against enemies whom he regarded not merely as enemies to his cause, but as enemies to his country.

There seemed every reason for the Scots to be confident. Even with their help the Parliamentarians had been able to put down the Royalists only at the cost of four years of hard fighting; and now the Scotch and the Royalists were to act together. They were to be pitted against Cromwell, the best Parliamentary commander, to be sure; but the Scotch had done at least as well as the average of the allies at the victory of Marston Moor, and still had in mind the memory of their easy successes against their English foes in the two Bishops’ Wars.

The great victories of the Parliamentary army had hitherto been won when the odds in numbers were in their favor; now, they were about to fight with the odds over two to one against them. Hamilton’s army was about 21,000 strong, including 3,000 Yorkshire Royalists under Langdale. Cromwell had only some 9,000 men; but the great bulk of them were veterans, who under his leadership had become the finest soldiers of the age.

Hamilton moved slowly south toward Preston, his army scattered in a long line, Langdale at the head, and Munro bringing up the rear. Cromwell abandoned his heavy baggage-train that it might not encumber his movements; Lambert joined him, and he marched with fiery speed to strike his foes. The Scotch, confident in their numbers, and ignorant of the movements of their speedy antagonist, advanced in loose order. On August 17th Cromwell struck their army; by which time Hamilton’s straggling march had resulted in Langdale’s taking position to cover its left flank. The Scotch were partially aware of their danger and were uneasily trying to concentrate. Langdale was left to bear the shock of the first attack single-handed. Cromwell appreciated, as well as any commander that ever lived, the vital element of time; the need for taking full advantage of what the moment brought forth. His headlong march had resulted in some of his soldiers lagging behind the others, but he had gained what he wanted; he had surprised his foes when they were unprepared to use their superiority of force, and he dashed at them as soon as his foremost men came up, determined to destroy them in detail. Langdale made a stiff fight, and owing to the character of the country—the fields were small, and the fences strong and high—the cavalry was not able to do much, so that the decisive fighting was done by the infantry, which was not usually the case in these wars. The struggle took place about four miles from Preston, near which town, but south of the river Ribble, the bulk of the Scotch foot were gathered.

For four hours Langdale’s men clung to their hedges and buildings, regiment after regiment of the Cromwellians fighting to dislodge them. Says Cromwell: “Our men fought with incredible valor and resolution ... often coming to push of Pike, and to close Fire, and always making the Enemy to recoil ... the Enemy making, though he was still worsted, very stiff and sturdy resistance. Colonel Dean’s and Colonel Pride’s, outwinging the enemy, could not come to so much share of the Action ... the Enemy shogging down toward the Bridge, and keeping almost all in reserve that so he might bring fresh commands often to fight.”

The Scotch sent some men and ammunition to Langdale, but made no serious effort to help him, and continued their march. At last he was overpowered and driven into the town. As soon as his men were dislodged from the hedges and enclosures, the Cromwellian horse fell furiously upon them, utterly routing and scattering them; at the same time, the Cromwellian foot, pushing forward, drove back the Scotch foot, which had been posted near the bridge to secure a passage for Langdale across the Ribble, and cut off the fugitives from the rest of the army.

The Ironsides thundered into the streets of Preston at the heels of Langdale and the flying remnants of his forces. Hamilton led one or two charges, and for a moment checked the pursuit, but it was now too late to retrieve matters, and soon afterward the whole of his army was again in panic rout. The beaten cavalry fled north, goaded by the Cromwellian sword, until they reached the rear guard under Munro. Most of the Yorkshire and Scotch infantry north of the Ribble were killed, captured, or scattered; a few only escaped to the Scotch army south of the Ribble by swimming across it.

The day thus ended with the defeat of part of the Scotch forces, who lost in killed or captured, 5,000 men, besides those who were dispersed. Moreover, the Scotch army was cut in two; Munro being to the north, separated from all the rest, who, under Hamilton, were completely cut off from their base in Scotland. Sending a few troops to harry the flying horsemen, Cromwell turned to deal with the Scotch main army, which was even yet more numerous than his own. But the Scotch were cowed by the success of Cromwell’s utterly unexpected attack. The soldiers had lost confidence in their leaders, and they were cut off from their own country, and, therefore, from all hope of supplies. A council of war was held that night, and the retreat was continued. The fagged-out Cromwellians followed and harassed them. The horse, under Colonel Thornhaugh, rode into their rear ranks and bothered and detained them, though at cost of the life of the Colonel, who was shot in one of the fierce struggles. Again and again the Scotch stood, but each time to be beaten; the last stand being made at Winwick church, under a “little spark in a blue bonnet” who himself was slain. Here they lined the hedges with musketeers, and filled the lane with their pikemen, and hours went by before the Puritans, under Pride, finally pushed their charge home, and gained possession of the place which had been held so stubbornly. Both sides were utterly worn out, and it was impossible to urge the pursuit as rapidly and strongly as Cromwell hoped. Finally, leaving Lambert to deal with the shattered fragments of Hamilton’s command, Cromwell turned north and followed Munro.

The Death Warrant of King Charles I.

Signed by Oliver Cromwell and other members of the council. From the
original in the library of the House of Lords.
]

The victory was overwhelming. Two thousand Scotch and Royalists had been slain, and 10,000 were captured; more than Cromwell’s whole force. Almost all the generals were taken; Hamilton was afterward beheaded. The fate of the captured rank and file was hard. Throughout the First Civil War, the common soldiers, when taken, had either been exchanged or released, or often enough had enlisted on the side of the victors; but the Puritan generals and those behind them were in no mood to take a merciful view of men whom they regarded as wanton offenders, whether they were Scotchmen or Englishmen. The captives of Preston battle were sold into slavery; some being sent to the Virginia planters, and others to the Venetian Government, for galley slaves. When the Puritans could act thus toward their fellow-Englishmen, and toward the Scotch Presbyterians who were so nearly of their own creed, there is small cause for wonder in the treatment afterward accorded the Irish. It was a merciless age, the age of Tilly and Wallenstein, and we cannot judge its great men by the canons of to-day.

This was the first time that Cromwell had actually been in supreme command in a great victory, and too much praise cannot be accorded him for his hardihood, energy, and skill. The speed of his motions and his prompt decision had rendered it possible for him to strike home at his adversary in the flank, and to eat him up piecemeal. During three days of incessant marching and fighting he halted only to do battle or to take the rest absolutely needed; and at the end of that time the enemy’s foot had been killed, captured, or dispersed to the last man, and his horse was a beaten rabble, flying toward the border.

The battle of Preston put an end to the Second Civil War. Colchester capitulated to Fairfax immediately afterward. The part of the fleet that had revolted had come back under Prince Charles and Rupert, to coöperate with the risen Royalists, but could do nothing; most of the ships in time returned to their allegiance to the Parliament. The indomitable Rupert, with seven ships, kept the sea and made a long cruise, which finally degenerated into mere buccaneering. Blake, whom the Parliament made Admiral, pursued him, captured most of his ships, and finally forced him to take refuge in France. In Scotland, Argyle and the Presbyterian ministers—the Kirk party—on the news of Hamilton’s overthrow, promptly rose in the so-called Whigamore raid. Munro fell back, plundering right and left until he crossed the border.

Cromwell’s exertions had been so severe that he could not follow the flying Royalists with his usual rapidity. The army had been long without pay; they had not a penny with which to get their horses shod, and so many horses had been slain and were lamed or done out that a large number of the troopers were on foot, and the others could hardly spur their jaded mounts into a trot. Munro was not only a ruthless plunderer, but a hard fighter, and on his arrival in Scotland Argyle felt doubtful as to his capacity to cope with him, and sent to Cromwell for assistance. Cromwell promptly invaded Scotland, being careful to pose as the ally of Argyle and the Kirk, and therefore the true friend of the Scottish nation. According to his custom, he rigorously suppressed plundering. All resistance withered away before him. He was received at Edinburgh as a powerful and honored ally, and before he recrossed the border the Scotch were again avowed supporters, for the time being at least, of the Parliament.

The enemy in arms had been defeated. It remained to deal with the Parliament and the Presbyterian party. Some had been active for the King; most had been lukewarm; the victory had been a victory for the army, and therefore for the Independents. Neither Cromwell nor the army was of a temper to refrain from finishing matters. Before the struggle was decided Cromwell had written Fairfax: “I pray God teach this nation and those that are over us ... what the mind of God may be in all this, and what our duty is. Surely it is not that the poor, godly people of this Kingdom should still be made the object of wrath and anger, nor that our God would have our necks under a yoke of bondage. For these things that have lately come to pass have been the wonderful works of God, breaking the rod of the oppressor.”

He was not in the least a doctrinaire Republican or Parliamentarian; he believed as little in the divine right of majorities as in the divine right of kings. Neither would he have admitted such a right as existing in an army, or, as yet, in himself. But it was impossible to stand still. He had to act with some party, though with none was he in entire accord; for one was hostile, another hopelessly undecided, the third prone to extreme measures and representing only a minority in the nation. He could only act with the last, and yet this meant an overturn of the recognized governmental authorities. Whether he would or not, he had to proceed along the path of revolution.

The Presbyterians—the men who controlled Parliament—were halting between two burdens. They would not push far enough against the King to make the Revolution a success, or to put a permanent end to despotism; and they would not eat their past words and deeds by turning wholly to his support. The King himself was obstinately bent on keeping the supreme power in his hands and setting the people under his feet, whatever he might promise; and this was the attitude of the large Royalist and Episcopalian party, which had showed, in supporting him, either that it cared little for liberty and eagerly championed a servility which it misnamed loyalty, or else that it feared disorder more than tyranny.

On the other hand, the determined foes of Absolutism, the armed Independents, were even more cut off from the bulk of the nation by their good qualities than by their shortcomings. Their advocacy of toleration for every creed, their desire for legal reform, and their strong democratic tendencies, all put them so far in advance of the rest of the nation as to be completely out of touch with it; and they offended it even more than their harshness and narrowness, and the behavior of the bands of fantastic enthusiasts in their ranks. Moreover, the sincerity of their convictions, at a time when the practical application of belief in the rule of the majority was entirely new and strange, drove them to rely on their strong right arms, instead of upon the votes of a people which was mainly hostile or apathetic. When Cromwell acted with them, heedless of what the majority might think, he was making ready for a time when he might choose in turn to disregard the majority within their own ranks.

Though neither Cromwell nor the Independents believed in the abstract in employing the army as an instrument of government, they were face to face with a condition of affairs in which, partly because of their own shortcomings, but very much more because of the shortcomings of their antagonists, they were driven to adopt this as the only possible course. Doubtless Cromwell was still acting as he sincerely believed the interests of the nation demanded. In the complex tissue of motives which go to determine a man’s deeds it is rarely possible to say that there is not some, and mayhap even a strong, element of self-interest and of desire for personal aggrandizement; yet Cromwell’s conduct toward the King goes to show that he would gladly have saved him had not the behavior of this typical Stuart been such as to render it impossible for an upright and far-seeing friend of English liberty longer to remain his ally.

Parliament had no sooner been relieved by the action of the army from all danger from the King’s adherents, than in September it proceeded to open negotiations with the King. These negotiations in effect aimed at the destruction of the army by uniting Parliament and King against it; among other things, they expressly excluded any toleration for the sects which made up the strength of the army. It would have been inexcusable folly for the men who had won the victory to submit to such action. The army, headed by Ireton, demanded a purge of the House which would rid it of the members so treacherous to the interests of the nation. Ireton and his followers then laid before Fairfax a remonstrance, which included a demand that the King should be brought to justice for the “treason,” “blood,” and “mischief” of which he had been guilty. Fairfax opposed this and carried the army with him in favor of a substitute which merely requested the King to assent to a constitutional plan which would have limited his powers precisely as those of Queen Victoria are now limited, and would have made the Constitution of England what it now is. A more moderate proposal was never made by victorious revolutionists, and it shows conclusively that the fault was not with Cromwell and his followers when they were forced to overturn the King and the Parliament. But Charles promptly rejected the proposals and thereby signed his own death-warrant. He had just sought, in Cromwell’s words, “to vassalize us to a foreign nation,” and now, after having twice plunged England into Civil War, and shown himself eager to submit her to the power of the alien, he obstinately refused a plan which would not merely have left him unpunished, but would have given him all the power of a constitutional monarch; a power greater than that which the House of Orange at that time enjoyed in Holland.

The House of Commons stood firm in its position, and against the position of the army, which thereupon marched into London; and on December 6th, Colonel Pride carried through the famous “Pride’s Purge.” He stood with a military guard at the door of the House, and turned back or arrested the members who had voted for a continuation of the negotiations with the the King. This was, of course, a purely revolutionary measure, with no warrant, save as Ireton and Harrison—the Republican generals—had said, “the height of necessity to save the Kingdom from a new War.” It was but the second step; the all-important one had been taken long before, when the army first marched into London to see that the Parliament did its liking.

Pride’s Purge.

Colonel Pride, who commanded the guard stationed in the lobby of the
House, had in his hand a list on which were the names of certain
members, while Lord Grey, of Groby, himself a member of the House,
stood at his side, ready to point out to him the members in
question. As each one of these approached the door of the House he
was turned back.
]

Cromwell still strove to save the King’s life. Through the exertions of Ireton a small majority of the army council resolved for mercy, and made a last effort to conclude a treaty with the King; but the King would not listen to them, and he thus put it out of their power any longer to delay his fate. On January 1, 1649, the House of Commons resolved to try him for treason to the kingdom. The Lords refused to pass the ordinance, whereupon the House of Commons decided to disregard them and to act on its own authority. On January 6th it erected a High Court of Justice for the trial of the King, on the ground that he had wickedly endeavored to subvert the people’s rights, had levied war against them, and when he had been spared had again raised new commotions in order to enslave and destroy the nation. Cromwell had finally thrown his doubts to the winds, and he supported the resolution with all his vigor. When the legality of the action was questioned, he retorted: “I tell you we will cut off his head with the crown upon it!” The grim Puritan leaders were at last to have their will on “the man of blood.” On the 27th, sentence of death was passed upon the King, and on January 30, 1649, he was beheaded on the scaffold in front of Whitehall, meeting his death with firm dignity.

Justice was certainly done, and until the death-penalty is abolished for all malefactors, we need waste scant sympathy on the man who so hated the upholders of freedom that his vengeance against Eliot could be satisfied only with Eliot’s death; who so utterly lacked loyalty that he signed the death-warrant of Strafford when Strafford had merely done his bidding; who had made the blood of Englishmen flow like water, to establish his right to rule as he saw best over their lives and property; and who, with incurable duplicity, incurable double-dealing, had sought to turn the generosity of his victorious foes to their own hurt.

Any man who has ever had anything to do with the infliction of the death-penalty, or indeed with any form of punishment, knows that there are sentimental beings so constituted that their sympathies are always most keenly aroused on behalf of the offender who pays the penalty for a deed of peculiar atrocity. The explanation probably is that the more conspicuous the crime, the more their attention is arrested, and the more acute their manifestations of sympathy become. At the time when the great bulk even of civilized mankind believed in the right of a king, not merely to rule, but to oppress, the action of the Puritans struck horror throughout Europe. Even Republican Holland was stirred to condemnation, and as the King was the symbol of the State, and as custom dies hard, generations passed during which the great majority of good and loyal, but not particularly far-sighted or deep-thinking men, spoke with intense sympathy of Charles, and with the most sincere horror of the regicides, especially Cromwell. This feeling was most natural then. It may be admitted to be natural in certain Englishmen, even at the present day. But what shall we say of Americans who now take the same view; who erect stained-glass windows in a Philadelphia church to the memory of the “Royal Martyr,” or in New York or Boston hold absurd festivals in his praise?

The best men in England approved the execution of the King, not only as a work of necessity, but as right on moral grounds. Two weeks after the execution, Milton—perhaps the loftiest soul in the whole Puritan party, full though it was of lofty souls—wrote his pamphlet justifying the right of the nation to depose, or, if need be, execute, tyrants and wicked kings. His arguments never have been, and never can be, successfully controverted on grounds of justice and morality. There is room for greater question on the ground of expediency. Some of the ablest historians and politicians have argued that the execution was a mistake, as making the King a martyr, and as transferring to his son, Charles II., all the loyalty that had been his, while the hatred and distrust could not be transferred. Yet, it certainly seems that even on the score of expediency, Cromwell and the regicides were right and that the event justified their judgment. While Charles was alive there could have been no peace in any event; and during Cromwell’s lifetime Charles II. could gain no foothold in England—for there was never a member of the House of Stuart that could stand in battle or in council before the stern Lord of the English Commonwealth. If in later years great Oliver could only have managed to agree with the bulk of liberty-loving Englishmen on some system of government by law, it is not probable that the memory of the King’s death would have prevented the perpetuation of such a government.

Carlyle’s mind is often warped; his vision often dim; but there are times when he speaks like an inspired seer, and never more so than when dealing with the execution of the Stuart King: “This action of the English Regicides did in effect strike a damp like death through the heart of Flunkyism universally in this world. Whereof Flunkyism, Cant, Cloth-Worship, or whatever ugly name it have, has gone about incurably sick ever since; and is now at length, in these generations, very rapidly dying. The like of which action will not be needed for a thousand years again.... Thus ends the Second Civil War. In Regicide; in a Commonwealth, and Keepers of the Liberties of England. In punishment of delinquents; in abolition of Cobwebs—if it be possible in a Government of Heroism and Veracity; at lowest of Anti-Flunkyism, Anti-Cant, and the _endeavor_ after Heroism and Veracity.”

Interior of Westminster Hall.

Where Parliament sat and where King Charles I. was tried and
sentenced.
]

IV
THE IRISH AND SCOTCH WARS

The successful Revolutionary party now enacted that the people of England and of all the dominions and territories thereunto belonging were constituted and established as a Commonwealth, or Free State, to be governed by the representatives of the people in Parliament and by whomsoever the Parliament should appoint as officers and ministers; the King and the House of Lords being both abolished. No provision was at first made by which any man should lawfully be recognized as chief in the new Commonwealth; but, as a matter of fact, there was one man, and one man only, who had to be acknowledged, however unwillingly, as master and leader. There were many upright and able civil servants; many high-minded and fervent reformers; many grim and good captains: but waist-high above them all rose the mighty and strenuous figure of Oliver Cromwell. It may well be that, hitherto, personal ambition had played an entirely subordinate part in all his actions. Now, in the turmoil of the Revolution, in the whirlpool of currents which none but the strongest man could breast, he became ever more and more conscious of his own great powers—powers which he knew were shared by no other man. With the sense of power came the overmastering desire to seize and wield it.

The first thing he had to do was to stop the Revolution where it was. In every such Revolution some of the original adherents of the movement drop off at each stage, feeling that it has gone too far; and at every halt the extremists insist on further progress. As stage succeeds stage, these extremists become a constantly diminishing body, and the irritation and alarm of the growing remainder increase. If the movement is not checked at the right moment by the good sense and moderation of the people themselves, or if some master-spirit does not appear, the extremists carry it ever farther forward until it provokes the most violent reaction; and when the master-spirit does stop it, he has to guard against both the men who think it has gone too far, and the men who think it has not gone far enough.

The extreme Levellers, the extreme Republicans, and, above all, the fierce and moody fanatics who sought after an impossible, and for the matter of that a highly undesirable, realization of their ideal of God’s kingdom on this earth—all these, together with the mere men of unsettled minds and the believers in what we now call communism, socialism, and nihilism, were darkly threatening the new government.

Men arose who called themselves prophets of new social and religious dispensations; and every wild theory found its fanatic advocates, ready at any moment to turn from advocacy to action. In the name of political and social liberty, some demanded that all men should be made free and equal by abolishing money and houses, living in tents, and dividing all food and clothing alike. In the name of religious reform others took to riding naked in the market-place, “for a sign”; to shouting for the advent of King Jesus; or to breaking up church services by noisy controversies with the preachers. The extreme Anabaptist and Quaker agitators were overshadowed by fantastic figures whose followers hailed them as incarnations of the Most High.

Black trouble gloomed without. The Commonwealth had not a friend in Europe. In the British Isles Scotland declared for Charles II. as the King, not only of Scotland, but of Great Britain. In Ireland but a couple of towns were held for the Parliament.

It was to the reconquest of Ireland that the Commonwealth first addressed itself, and naturally Cromwell was chosen for the work. He was given the rank of Lieutenant-General; but before he started he had to deal with dangerous mutinies and uprisings in the army. The religious sectaries and political levellers, who had given to the army the fiery zeal that made it irresistible by Parliament or King, English Royalists or Scotch Covenanter, had also been infected with a spirit peculiarly liable to catch flame from such agitations as were going on roundabout. Here and there, in regiment after regiment, were sudden upliftings of the banner of revolt in the name of every kind of human freedom, and often of some fierce religious doctrine quite incompatible with human freedom. Cromwell acted with his usual terrible energy, scattered the mutineers, shot the ringleaders, and reduced army and kingdom alike to obedience and order. Then he made ready for the invasion of Ireland.

The predominant motives for the various mutinies in the army, offer sufficient proof of its utter unlikeness to any other army. At the outset of the civil wars the Ironsides were simply volunteers of the very highest type; not wholly unlike, at least in moral qualities, some of those belated Cromwellians—the Boers of to-day. They did not take up soldiering as a profession, but primarily to achieve certain definite moral objects. Of course, as the force gradually grew into a permanent body, it changed in some respects; but the old spirit remained strong. The soldiers became in a sense regulars; but they bore no resemblance to regulars of the ordinary type—to regulars such as served under Turenne or Marlborough, Frederick the Great or Wellington. If in Grant’s army a very large number of the men, including almost all the forceful, natural leaders, had been of the stamp of Ossawatomie Brown, we should have had an army much like Cromwell’s. Such an army might usually be a power for good and sometimes a power for evil; but under all circumstances, when controlled by a master hand, it was certain to show itself one of the most formidable weapons ever forged in the workshop of human passion and purpose.

Matters in Ireland were in a perfect welter of confusion. Eight years had elapsed since the original rising of the native Irish. A murderous and butcherly warfare had been carried on throughout these years, but not along the lines of original division. On the contrary, when Cromwell landed, there had been a complete shifting of the parties to the contest, every faction having in turn fought every other faction, and, more extraordinary still, having at some time or other joined its religious foes in attacking a rival faction of its own creed. The original rising was in Ulster, and was aimed at the English and Scotch settlers who had been planted under James in the lands from which the Irish had been evicted. These “plantations” under James, not to speak of the scourge of Wentworth under Charles, were on a par with the whole conduct of the English toward Ireland for generations, and gave as ample a justification for the uprising as in the Netherlands the Spaniards had given the Dutch. From the stand-point of the Irish, the war was simply the most righteous of wars—for hearthstone, for Church, and for country.

This first uprising was one of Celtic Catholics. In the Pale and elsewhere, here and there throughout Ireland, were large numbers of Old-English Catholics; these, unlike the Celts, did not wish separation from England, but did wish complete religious liberty for themselves, and, if possible, Catholic supremacy. The Episcopalian and Royalist English throughout Ireland, under the lead of the Earl of Ormond, favored the King. The Puritan oligarchy of Dublin favored the Parliament, and were in touch with the Scotch Presbyterians of Ulster. The rising began to spread from Ulster southward. The Catholics of the Pale were at first loyal to the King, but the Protestant leaders, in striking back at the insurgents, harried friend and foe alike, until the Pale joined with Ulster. After this, all Ireland revolted. Only a few fortified and garrisoned towns were held for the English.

Violent alterations of policy and of fortune followed. Under the lead of the Roman Catholic clergy the revolt was consolidated. Unswerving loyalty to the King was proclaimed, war was denounced against the Puritans, and the re-establishment of Roman Catholicism as the State religion of Ireland was demanded. On the Puritan side the lords justices in Dublin nominally acknowledged the King’s authority, but really stood for the Parliament and hampered Ormond, who, while a stanch Protestant, was an ardent Royalist. Ormond gained one or two victories over the insurgents in spite of the way in which the lords justices interfered with him. Charles created him marquis, and he took command of the English interest, drove out the lords justices, and concluded a truce for one year with the Catholic party, in September, 1643. They gave Charles a free contribution of £30,000, and sent over some Irish troops to aid Montrose and the other Royalist leaders in Scotland, besides setting Ormond free to transfer part of his forces to the King in England. But Munro and the Ulster Scotch refused to recognize the armistice, took the Covenant, and declared against the King; while, in the south, certain Protestant sea-coast towns, under the lead of Lord Inchiquin, followed suit and acknowledged the Parliament. Months of tortuous negotiations followed, King Charles showing the same readiness in promise, and utter indifference in performance, while dealing with the Irish as while dealing with the English. The treachery of the King was made manifest by the discovery of his secret treaty with the Irish, when Sligo was captured.

Meanwhile, the Papal nuncio, an Italian, had arrived, and exhorted the Irish to refuse any peace with the King except on the basis of the complete reinstatement of the Catholic Church. He roused what would now be called the ultramontanes against the moderate Catholic party which was acting with Ormond. Their wrangles caused a fatal delay, for by the time the moderates triumphed the King had been made a prisoner. Their treaty of peace with the King was not signed till September, 1645, and it amounted to nothing, for the adherents of the Parliament rejected it on the one side, and the extreme Catholic party, the utterly intolerant and fanatical Catholics, under the nuncio, refused to be bound by it on the other. In the north the Irish were led by Owen O’Neil, a member of the great Ulster house of that name, and under him they had beaten Munro and the Scotch. He now hurried to the support of the nuncio. The moderate Catholic leaders and Ormond fled to Dublin at his approach, and he was joined, after some hesitation, by Preston, the leader of the Irish forces in the south. In 1647, Ormond, at his wits’ end, handed over Dublin to the agents of the Parliament, and joined the Royalist refugees in France.

This for a moment eliminated the Royalists, and left the party of the nuncio, the party of the bigots and intolerant extremists, supreme among the Irish. But when Jones, the Puritan leader, marched out of Dublin and defeated Preston, while in the south Lord Inchiquin won some butchering victories, the party of the moderates again raised its head. Then there was a new and bewildering turn of the kaleidoscope. Inchiquin suddenly became offended with the Parliament, made overtures to Preston, and then to Ormond. A coalition was formed between the Royalist Protestants in Munster and the moderate Catholics. The nuncio threatened the moderates with excommunication and interdict, and fled to O’Neil’s camp. Preston and Inchiquin joined forces and marched against O’Neil, so that civil war broke out among the insurgents themselves.

Colonel Jones, the victor over Preston, felt doubtful of his own troops, who included a number of Royalists, and, extraordinary to relate, he actually made terms with the nuncio and O’Neil as against the Protestant Royalists and moderate Catholics—the Ultramontanes so hating the moderate Catholics that they preferred to come to terms with the Puritans. Ormond now came over from France to head the moderates, the party of the Royalist Catholics and Protestants. Peace was declared between Ormond and the Supreme Council of Dublin in the King’s name.

But hardly had peace been declared when news arrived of the King’s execution. Ormond proclaimed Charles II., at Cork; most of the Irish outside of Ulster united under him, and Munro and the Scotch Presbyterians joined him. The nuncio fled the country in despair. The rupture between the Presbyterians and Independents was complete, and the Scotch became the open enemies of the English. They began the siege of Derry, which Coote held for the Parliament. At the same time they confronted O’Neil and the Ulster Irish, who were acting in alliance with Monk, who held Dundalk for the Parliament by order of Colonel Jones. Inchiquin captured Drogheda for the Confederates. Monk’s garrison mutinied, and he had to surrender Dundalk. Ormond began the siege of Dublin, but was routed by Jones, one of the sturdiest of the many sturdy Puritan fighters. Meanwhile, the Puritan Parliament had disavowed the alliance with O’Neil and the Ulster Irish, and the latter were thus forced into the arms of Ormond, who found himself at the head of all the Irish and English Catholics, of the Scotch Presbyterians in Ulster, and of the Royalist Protestants elsewhere in Ireland. It was at this time that Cromwell landed.

The exact condition of affairs in Ireland should be carefully borne in mind, because it is often alleged, in excuse of Cromwell’s merciless massacres, that he was acting with the same justification that the English had when they put down the Indian Mutiny with righteous and proper severity. Without a doubt, Cromwell and most Englishmen felt this way; and in the case of the average Englishman, who could not be expected to understand the faction-fighting, the feeling was justifiable. But it was Cromwell’s business to know what the parties had been doing. As a matter of fact, the wrong of the original Ulster massacre, which itself avenged prior wrongs by the invaders, had been overlaid by countless other massacres committed by English and Irish alike, during the intervening years; and the very men against whom this original wrong had been committed were now fighting side by side with the wrong-doers, against Cromwell and the Puritans. Moreover, for some time the Parliamentarians had been in close alliance with these same wrong-doers against the moderate Irish, who were not implicated in the massacres in question, and against the Royalist Protestants, some of whom had suffered from the massacres and others of whom had helped avenge them. The troops against whom Cromwell was to fight were in part Protestant and English, these being mixed in with the Catholics and Irish; and at the moment the chief Royalist leaders in Ireland included quite as many English, Scotch, and Irish Protestants, as they did Irish Catholics.

Cromwell recked but little of nice distinctions between the different stripes of Royalists and Catholics when, in August, 1649, he landed in Dublin, the only place in Ireland, save Derry, which still held out for the Parliament. He brought with him the pick of his troops and soon had at Dublin some 10,000 foot and 5,000 horse. They were excellently disciplined; they included the Ironsides, the veterans of the New Model—grim Puritans for the most part, inflamed with the most bitter hatred against Catholics, Irish, and Royalists. They had been welded into one formidable mass by Cromwell’s rigid discipline, and yet were all aflame with religious and political enthusiasm. There could not be gathered in all Ireland an army capable of meeting in the open field that iron soldiery, under such a leader as Cromwell; and this the Irish chiefs well knew.

Cromwell, therefore, had to deal with a numerous and individually brave but badly disciplined enemy, formidable in guerilla warfare, because theirs was a wild country of mountain and bog, and resolute in defence of their walled towns, but not otherwise to be feared by such troops as the Ironsides. His first care was to put an end to the plundering and licentiousness which had hitherto marked the English no less than the Irish armies. He completely stopped outrages upon the peasantry and non-combatants generally, besides protecting all who lived quietly in their homes.

In September he marched against Drogheda, into which Ormond had thrown 3,000 picked men, largely English, under Sir Arthur Aston. Cromwell had with him some 8,000 men when he sat down to attack it. He brought up a siege-train, beating back the sallies of the garrison with ease, and meanwhile maintaining his strict discipline, and putting down pillage by the summary process of hanging the plunderers.

When his batteries were ready he summoned the Governor to surrender, but the summons was refused. For two days the guns kept up their fire, and then in the afternoon the assault was delivered. The defenders met the stormers in the breaches; the fight was hot and stiff; the English were once repulsed, but came forward again and carried the breach only to be once more driven out by a fierce rally.

When Cromwell saw his men driven down the breach, he placed himself at the head of the reserve, and in person led it with the rallied men of the broken regiments, back to the breach. This time the stormers would not be denied. They carried the breach, the church—which was strongly held by the Irish—and finally the palisaded intrenchments of Mill Mount, in which Sir Arthur Aston had taken refuge. The horse followed close behind the foot, and speedily cleared the streets of the hostile cavalry and infantry. The victorious Puritans pressed on and a terrible slaughter followed. Cromwell forbade them to spare any that were in arms in the town, and they put to the sword over 2,000 men. Nearly 1,000 were killed in the great Church of St. Peter’s. “All the priests found,” says Cromwell, “were knocked on the head promiscuously but two, both of whom were killed next day.” Sir Arthur Aston, Verney, the son of the King’s standard-bearer at Edgehill, and all the officers were put to the sword. Two towers held out until next day, when they submitted; their officers were “knocked on the head,” says Cromwell. One tower fought hard; there every tenth man of the soldiers was killed; the rest, and all the soldiers in the other tower, were shipped to the white slavery of the Barbadoes. Of the assailants, about a hundred were slain and several hundred wounded.

Magdalen Tower, Drogheda.

On the right may be seen the ruins of St. Sunday’s Gate.
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Said Cromwell: “We put to the sword the whole number of the defendants.... This hath been a marvellous great mercy. I wish that all honest hearts may give glory of this to God alone, to whom indeed the praise of this mercy belongs.... I am persuaded that this is a righteous judgment of God upon these barbarous wretches who have imbrued their hands in so much innocent blood, and that it will tend to prevent the effusion of blood for the future, which are the satisfactory grounds to such actions, which otherwise cannot but work remorse and regret. The officers and soldiers of this garrison were the flower of their army.”

Cromwell’s defenders say simply that he acted from a fervent belief in the righteousness of what he was doing, and, further, that the terrible vengeance he took here and at Wexford upon all who withstood him in arms cowed the Irish and prevented further resistance. Neither defence is tenable. If on the ground of their sincerity the deeds of Cromwell and his soldiers at Drogheda and Wexford can be defended, then we cannot refuse the same defence to Philip and Alva and their soldiers in the Netherlands. Of course, we must always remember that under Cromwell there was no burning at the stake, no dreadful torture in cold blood; and, therefore, at his worst, he rises in degree above Philip and Alva. But in kind, his deeds in Ireland were the same as theirs in the Netherlands; and though the Puritan soldiers were guiltless of the hideous licentiousness shown by the Spaniards, or by the armies of Tilly and Wallenstein, yet the merciless butchery of the entire garrisons and of all the priests—accompanied by the slaughter of other non-combatants, in at least some cases—leave Drogheda and Wexford as black and terrible stains on Cromwell’s character. Nor is there any justification for them on the ground that they put a stop to resistance. The war lingered on for two or three years in spite of them; and in any event the outcome was inevitable. It does not seem to have been hastened in any way by this display of savagery. There had been many such butcheries during the war, before Cromwell came to Ireland, without in any way hastening the end. Cromwell and his lieutenants put down the insurrection and established order because they gained such sweeping victories, not because Cromwell made merciless use of his first victories. It was the fighting of the Puritan troops in the battle itself which won, and not their ferocity after the battle; and it was Cromwell who not merely gave free rein to this ferocity, but inspired it. Seemingly quarter would have been freely given had it not been for his commands. Neither in morals nor in policy were these slaughters justifiable. Moreover, it must be remembered that the men slaughtered were entirely guiltless of the original massacres in Ulster.

Immediately after Drogheda, Cromwell sent forces to Dundalk, which was held by the Irish, and to Trim, which was held by the Scotch; but the garrisons deserted both places at the approach of the Cromwellians. In October, Cromwell himself advanced on Wexford and stormed the town. Very little resistance was made, but some 2,000 of the defenders were put to the sword. This time the soldiers needed no order with reference to refusing quarter; they acted of their own accord, and many of the townspeople suffered with the garrison. Practically, the town was depopulated, not one in twenty of the inhabitants being left.

Then Cromwell moved to Ross. In spite of the slaughter which he made in the towns he stormed, he exercised such strict discipline over his army in the field, and paid with such rigid punctuality for all supplies which the country people brought in, that they flocked to him as they feared to do to their own armies, and in consequence his troops were better fed and able to march more rapidly than was the case with the Irish. He soon took Ross, allowing the garrison to march out with the honors of war, and gave protection to the inhabitants. When asked to guarantee freedom of religion he responded: “For that which you mention concerning liberty of conscience, I meddle not with any man’s conscience. But, if by liberty of conscience, you mean liberty to exercise the mass, I judge it best to use plain dealing, and to let you know, where the Parliament of England have power, that will not be allowed of.”

St. Lawrence’s Gate, Drogheda.
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Three months after he landed, Cromwell had possession of almost all the eastern coast. One of the remarkable features of his campaign had been the way in which he had used the army and the fleet in combination. He used his admirals just as he had used his generals and colonels, and they played a very important part in the operations against Wexford and Ross, and in securing the surrender of both. When he moved away from the coast his task was very difficult; there were no roads, the country had been harried into a wilderness, and was studded with castles and fortified towns, every one held by an Irish garrison. Ormond and O’Neil were in the field with a more numerous force than his; and though they dared not fight a pitched battle, they threatened his detachments. The service was very wearing, and in December Cromwell went into winter quarters, the weather being bad, and his men decimated by fever. The triumphs won by his terrible soldiership rendered the conquest of the whole island only a question of time.

Having now a little leisure, Cromwell published, for the benefit of the Irish, a “Declaration,” as an answer to a polemic issued in form of a manifesto at Kilkenny by the high Irish ecclesiastics. In this Declaration, which is very curious reading, he exhorted the Irish to submit, and answered at great length the arguments of their religious leaders, with all the zeal, ingenuity, and acrimony of an eager theological disputant, and with an evident and burning sincerity to which many theological disputants do not attain. The religious side of his campaigns was always very strong in his mind, and no Puritan preacher more dearly loved setting forth the justification of his religious views, or answering the arguments of his religious opponents, whether Catholics or Covenanters.