The little village of Threlkeld is situated at the foot of
Blencathra about four miles from Keswick, on the highroad from
that town to Penrith. The old hall has long been in a state of
dilapidation, the only habitable part having been for years
converted into a farm house. Some faint traces of the moat are
said to be yet discernible. This was one of the residences of Sir
Lancelot Threlkeld, a powerful knight in the reign of Henry the
Seventh, step-father to the Shepherd Lord. His son, the last Sir
Lancelot, was wont to say that he had "three noble houses--one for
pleasure, Crosby in Westmorland, where he had a park full of deer;
one for profit and warmth, wherein to reside during winter, namely,
Yanwath, near Penrith; and the third, Threlkeld, on the edge of
the vale of Keswick, well stocked with tenants to go with him to
the wars." Sir Lancelot is said to have been a man of a kind and
generous disposition, who had either taken the side of the White
Rose in the great national quarrel, or at least had not compromised
himself to a ruinous extent on the other side; and has long had
the reputation of having afforded a retreat to the Shepherd Lord
Clifford, on the utter ruin of his house, after the crushing of the
Red Rose at Towton, when the Baron (his late father) was attained
in parliament, and all his lands were seized by the crown.
The Cliffords, Lords of Westmorland, afterwards Earls of
Cumberland, were a family of great power and princely possessions,
who for many generations occupied a position in the North West
of England, similar to that held by the Percies, Earls of
Northumberland, in the north-east.
Their blood was perhaps the most illustrious in the land. Descended
from Rollo first Duke of Normandy, by alliances in marriage it
intermingled with that of William the Lion, King of Scotland, and
with that of several of the Sovereigns of England.
Their territorial possessions corresponded with their illustrious
birth. These comprised their most ancient stronghold, Clifford
Castle, on the Wye, in Herefordshire; the lordship of the barony of
Westmorland, including the seigniories and Castles of Brougham and
Appleby; Skipton Castle in the West Riding of Yorkshire, with its
numerous townships, and important forest and manorial rights, their
most princely, and apparently favourite residence; and the Hall and
estates of Lonsborrow in the same County.
The Cliffords are said to be sprung from an uncle of William the
Conqueror. The father of William had a younger brother, whose
third son, Richard Fitz-Pontz, married the daughter and heiress
of Ralph de Toni, of Clifford Castle, in Herefordshire. Their
second son, Walter, succeeding to his mother's estates, assumed
the name of Clifford, and was the father of the Fair Rosamond, the
famous mistress of King Henry the Second. He died in 1176. His
great-grandson, Roger de Clifford acquired the inheritance of the
Veteriponts or Viponts, Lords of Brougham Castle in Westmorland, by
his marriage with one of the co-heiresses of Robert de Vipont, the
last of that race. It was their son Robert who was first summoned
to sit in parliament, by a writ dated the 29th of December, 1299,
as the Lord Clifford.
The Cliffords were a warlike race, and engaged in all the contests
of the time. For many generations the chiefs of their house figure
as distinguished soldiers and captains; and most of them died on
the field of battle.
Roger, the father of the first lord, was renowned in the wars of
Henry III. and of Edward I., and was killed in a skirmish with the
Welsh in the Isle of Anglesey, on St. Leonard's day, 1283.
His son Robert, the first Lord Clifford, a favourite and companion
in arms of Edward I., was one of the guardians of Edward II. when
a minor, and Lord High Admiral in that monarch's reign. He fell at
the battle of Bannockburn, in 1314.
Roger, his son, the second lord, was engaged in the Earl of
Lancaster's insurrection, and had done much to deserve political
martyrdom in that rebellious age: but a feeling of humanity, such
as is seldom read of in civil wars, and especially in those times,
saved him from execution, when he was taken prisoner with Lancaster
and the rest of his associates. He had received so many wounds in
the battle (of Borough bridge), that he could not be brought before
the judge for the summary trial, which would have sent him to the
hurdle and the gallows. Being looked upon, therefore, as a dying
man, he was respited from the course of law: time enough elapsed,
while he continued in this state, for the heat of resentment to
abate, and Edward of Carnarvon, who, though a weak and most
misguided prince, was not a cruel one, spared his life; an act of
mercy which was the more graceful, because Clifford had insulted
the royal authority in a manner less likely to be forgiven than his
braving it in arms. A pursuivant had served a writ upon him in the
Barons' Chamber, and he made the man eat the wax wherewith the writ
was signed, "in contempt, as it were, of the said King."
He was the first Lord Clifford that was attainted of treason.
His lands and honours were restored in the first year of Edward
III., but he survived the restoration only a few weeks, dying in
the flower of his age, unmarried; but leaving "some base children
behind him, whom he had by a mean woman who was called Julian of
the Bower, for whom he built a little house hard by Whinfell, and
called it Julian's Bower, the lower foundation of which standeth,
and is yet to be seen," said the compiler of the family records,
an hundred and fifty years ago, "though all the walls be down long
since. And it is thought that the love which this Roger bore to
this Julian kept him from marrying any other woman."
Roger de Clifford was succeeded in his titles and estates by his
brother Robert, the third baron, who married Isabella de Berkeley,
sister to Thomas, Lord Berkeley, of Berkeley Castle; in which
Castle, two years after it had rung with "shrieks of death," when
the tragedy of Edward II. was brought to its dreadful catastrophe
there, the marriage was performed.
This Robert lived a country life, and "nothing is mentioned of
him in the wars," except that he once accompanied an army into
Scotland. It is, however, related of him, that when Edward Baliol
was driven from Scotland, the exiled king was "right honourably
received by him in Westmorland, and entertained in his Castles of
Brougham, Appleby, and Pendragon;" in acknowledgement for which
hospitality Baliol, if he might at any time recover the kingdom of
Scotland out of his adversaries' hands, made him a grant of Douglas
Dale, which had been granted to his grandfather who fell in Wales.
The Hart's Horn Tree in Whinfell Park, well known in tradition, and
in hunters' tales, owes its celebrity to this visit. He died in
1340.
Robert, his son, fourth lord, fought by the side of Edward the
Black Prince at the memorable battles of Cressy and Poictiers.
Roger, his brother, the fifth lord, styled "one of the wisest and
gallantest of the Cliffords," also served in the wars in France and
Scotland, in the reign of Edward III.
Thomas, his son, sixth lord Clifford, one of the most chivalrous
knights of his time, overcame, in a memorable passage of arms, the
famous French knight, "le Sire de Burjisande," and, at the age of
thirty, was killed in the battle at Spruce in Germany.
John, his son, the seventh lord, a Knight of the Garter, carried
with him to the French wars three knights, forty-seven esquires,
and one hundred and fifty archers. He fought under the banner of
Henry V. at the battle of Agincourt, attended him at the sieges
Harfleur and Cherbourg, and was eventually slain, at the age of
thirty-three, at the siege of Meaux in France.
Thomas, his son, eighth lord Clifford, described as "a chief
commander in France," was grandson on his mother's side to the
celebrated Hotspur, Harry Percy, and gained renown by the daring
and ingenious stratagem which he planned and successfully executed
for taking the town of Pontoise, near Paris, in 1438. The English
had lain for some time before the town, with little prospect of
reducing it, when a heavy fall of snow suggested to Lord Clifford
the means of effecting its capture. Arraying himself and his
followers with white tunics over their armour, he concealed
them during the night close to the walls of the town, which at
daybreak he surprised and carried by storm. Two years afterwards
he valiantly defended the town of Pontoise against the armies of
France, headed by Charles VII. in person.
In the Wars of the Roses they were not less prominent. The last
mentioned Thomas, though nearly allied by blood to the house of
York, took part with his unfortunate sovereign, Henry VI., and
fell on the 22nd of May, 1455, at the first battle of St. Albans,
receiving his death-blow from the hands of Richard Duke of York, at
the age of forty.
John, his son, the next and ninth lord, called from his complexion
the Black-faced Clifford, thirsting to revenge the fate of his
father, perpetrated that memorable act of cruelty, which for
centuries has excited indignation and tears, the murder of the
young Earl of Rutland, brother of Edward IV., in the pursuit after
the battle of Wakefield, on the 30th December, 1460. The latter,
whilst being withdrawn from the field by his attendant chaplain
and schoolmaster, a priest, called Sir Robert Aspall, was espied
by Lord Clifford; and being recognised by means of his apparel,
"dismayed, had not a word to speak, but kneeled on his knees
imploring mercy and desiring grace, both with holding up his hands
and making dolorous countenance, for his speech was gone for fear.
'Save him,' said his chaplain, 'for he is a prince's son, and
peradventure may do you good hereafter.' With that word, the Lord
Clifford marked him and said, 'By God's blood, thy father slew
mine, and so will I do thee and all thy kin;' and with that word
stuck the earl to the heart with his dagger, and bade his chaplain
bear the earl's mother and brother word what he had done and said."
The murder in cold blood of this unarmed boy, for he was only
twelve or at most seventeen years old, while supplicating for his
life, was not the only atrocity committed by Lord Clifford on
that eventful day. "This cruel Clifford and deadly blood-supper,"
writes the old chronicler, "not content with this homicide or
child-killing, came to the place where the dead corpse of the Duke
of York lay, and caused his head to be stricken off, and set on it
a crown of paper, and so fixed it on a pole and presented it to
the queen, not lying far from the field, in great spite and much
derision, saying, 'Madam, your war is done; here is your king's
ransom;' at which present was much joy and great rejoicing."
Lord Clifford fought at the second battle of St. Albans, on the
17th of February, 1461. It was in his tent, after the Lancastrians
had won the victory, that the unfortunate Henry VI. once more
embraced his consort Margaret of Anjou, and their beloved child.
Lord Clifford is usually represented as having been slain at the
battle of Towton. He fell, however, in a hard fought conflict
which preceded that engagement by a few hours, at a spot called
Dittingale, situated in a small valley between Towton and
Scarthingwell, struck in the throat by a headless arrow, discharged
from behind a hedge.
A small chapel on the banks of the Aire formerly marked the spot
where lay the remains of John Lord Clifford, as well as those of
his cousin, Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, who perished later
in the day upon Towton Field, on the 29th of March, 1461.
For nearly a quarter of a century from this time, the name of
Clifford remained an attainted one; their castles and seigniories
passed into the hands of strangers and enemies. The barony of
Westmorland was conferred by Edward IV. upon his brother Richard
Duke of Gloucester; the castle and manor of Skipton he bestowed, in
the first instance, upon Sir William Stanley; but in the fifteenth
year of his reign he transferred them to his "dear brother," which
lordly appanage he retained till his death on Bosworth Field.[1]
The young widow left by the Black-faced Clifford, was Margaret
daughter and sole heiress of Henry de Bromflete, Baron de Vesci.
She had borne her husband three children, two sons and a daughter,
now attainted by parliament, deprived of their honours and
inheritance, and their persons and lives in hourly jeopardy from
the strict search which was being made for them. The seat of her
father at Lonsborrow in Yorkshire, surrounded by a wild district,
offered a retreat from their enemies; and thither, as soon as the
fate of her lord was communicated to her, driven from the stately
halls of Skipton and Appleby, of which she had ceased to be
mistress, flew the young widow with her hunted children, and saved
them from the rage of the victorious party by concealment.
Henry, the elder son, at the period of their flight to Lonsborrow
was only seven years old. He was there placed by his mother, in the
neighbourhood where she lived, with a shepherd who had married one
of her inferior servants, an attendant on his nurse, to be brought
up in no better condition than the shepherd's own children. The
strict inquiry which had been made after them, and the subsequent
examination of their mother respecting them, at length led to the
conclusion that they had been conveyed beyond the sea, whither in
truth the younger boy had been sent, into the Netherlands, and
not long after died there. The daughter grew up to womanhood, and
became the wife of Sir Robert Aske, from whom descended the Askes
of Yorkshire, and the Lord Fairfax of Denton in the same county.
When the high born shepherd boy was about his fourteenth year,
his grandfather, Lord de Vesci being dead, and his mother having
become the wife of Sir Lancelot Threlkeld, a rumour again arose and
reached the court that the young Lord Clifford was alive; whereupon
his mother, with the connivance and assistance of her husband, had
the shepherd with whom she had placed her son, removed with his
wife and family from Yorkshire to the more mountainous country
of Cumberland. In that wild and remote region, the persecuted
boy was "kept as a shepherd sometimes at Threlkeld amongst his
step-father's kindred, and sometimes upon the borders of Scotland,
where they took land purposely for those shepherds who had the
custody of him, where many times his step-father came purposely to
visit him, and sometimes his mother, though very secretly."
In this obscurity the heir of the Cliffords passed the remainder
of his boyhood, all his youth, and his early manhood; haunting, in
the pursuit of pastoral occupations, the lofty moorland wastes at
the foot of Blencathra, or musing in the solitude of the stupendous
heights of that "Peak of Witches;" at other times, ranging amid the
lonesome glens of Skiddaw Forest, or on the bleak heath-clad hills
of Caldbeck and Carrock.
Thus being of necessity nurtured much in solitude, and, habited in
rustic garb, bred up to man's estate among the simple dalesmen, to
whom, as well as to himself, his rank and station were unknown, he
was reared in so great ignorance that he could neither read nor
write; for his parents durst not have him instructed in any kind
of learning, lest by it his birth should be discovered; and when
subsequently he was restored to his title and estates, and took his
place among his peers, he never attained to higher proficiency in
the art of writing than barely enabled him to sign his name.
One of the first acts of Henry VII. was to restore the lowly
Clifford to his birthright and to all that had been possessed by
his noble ancestors. And his mother, who did not die till the year
1493, lived to see him thus suddenly exalted from a poor shepherd
into a rich and powerful lord, at the age of one and thirty.
In his retirement he had acquired great astronomical knowledge,
watching, like the Chaldeans of old time, the stars by night
upon the mountains, as is current from tradition in the village
and neighbourhood of Threlkeld at this day. And when, on his
restoration to his estates and honours, he had become a great
builder and repaired several of his castles, he resided chiefly at
Barden Tower, in Yorkshire, to be near the Priory of Bolton; "to
the end that he might have opportunity to converse with some of
the canons of that house, as it is said, who were well versed in
astronomy; unto which study having a singular affection (perhaps
in regard to his solitary shepherd's life, which gave him time for
contemplation,) he fitted himself with diverse instruments for use
therein."
Whitaker, in like manner, represents the restored lord as having
brought to his new position "the manners and education of a
shepherd," and as being "at this time, almost, if not altogether,
illiterate." But it is added that he was "far from deficient in
natural understanding, and, what strongly marks an ingenuous mind
in a state of recent elevation, depressed by a consciousness of
his own deficiencies." If it was on this account, as we are also
told, that he retired to the solitude of Barden, where he seems to
have enlarged the tower out of a common keeper's lodge, he found
in it a retreat equally favourable to taste, to instruction, and
to devotion. The narrow limits of his residence show that he had
learned to despise the pomp of greatness, and that a small train of
servants could suffice him, who had lived to the age of thirty a
servant himself.
Whitaker suspects Lord Clifford, however, "to have been sometimes
occupied in a more visionary pursuit, and probably in the same
company," namely, the canons of Bolton, from having found among the
family evidences two manuscripts on the subject of Alchemy, which
may almost certainly be referred to the age in which he lived. If
these were originally deposited with the MSS. of the Cliffords, it
might have been for the use of this nobleman. If they were brought
from Bolton at the Dissolution, they must have been the work of
those canons with whom he almost exclusively conversed.
In these peaceful employments Lord Clifford spent the whole
reign of Henry VII., and the first years of that of his son. His
descendant the Countess of Pembroke describes him as a plain man,
who lived for the most part a country life, and came seldom either
to court or London, excepting when called to Parliament, on which
occasion he behaved himself like a wise and good English nobleman.
But in the year 1513, when almost sixty years old, he was appointed
to a principal command over the army which fought at Flodden, and
showed that the military genius of the family had neither been
chilled in him by age, nor extinguished by habits of peace.
He survived the battle of Flodden ten years, and died April 23rd,
1523, aged about 70; having by his last will appointed his body
to be interred at Shap, if he died in Westmorland; or at Bolton,
if he died in Yorkshire. "I shall endeavour," says Whitaker, "to
appropriate to him a tomb, vault, and chantry, in the choir of
the Church of Bolton, as I should be sorry to believe that he was
deposited, when dead, at a distance from the place which in his
life time he loved so well." There exists no memorial of his
place of burial. The broken floors and desecrated vaults of Shap
and Bolton afford no trace or record of his tomb. It is probable,
however, that in one of these sanctuaries he was laid to rest among
the ashes of his illustrious kindred.
The vault at Skipton Church was prepared for the remains of his
immediate descendants. Thither, with three of their wives, and a
youthful scion of their house, the boy Lord Francis, were borne
in succession the five Earls of Cumberland of his name; when this
their tomb finally closed over the line of Clifford: the lady
Anne choosing rather to lie beside "her beloved mother," in the
sepulchre which she had erected for herself at Appleby, than with
her martial ancestors at Skipton.
Having thus been wonderfully preserved--says a writer whose
words have often been quoted in these pages--and after twenty
years of secretness and seclusion, having been restored in blood
and honours, to his barony, his lands, and his castles; he, the
Shepherd Lord, came forth upon the world with a mind in advance of
the age, a spirit of knowledge, of goodness, and of light, such as
was rarely seen in that time of ignorance and superstition; averse
to courtly pomp, delighting himself chiefly in country pursuits,
in repairing his castles, and in learned intercourse with such
literate persons as he could find. He was the wisest of his race,
and falling upon more peaceful times, was enabled to indulge in the
studies and thoughtful dispositions which his early misfortunes
had induced and cultured. Throughout a long life he remained one,
whose precious example, though it had but few imitators, and even
exposed him to be regarded with dread, as dealing in the occult
sciences, and leagued with beings that mortal man ought not to
know, was nevertheless so far appreciated by his less enlightened
countrymen, that his image was always linked in their memories and
affections with whatever was great and ennobling, and caused him to
be recorded to this, our day, by the endearing appellation of the
"Good Lord Clifford."
This nobleman was twice married,--first to Anne, daughter of
Sir John St. John of Bletsoe, cousin-germain to King Henry the
Seventh, by whom he had two sons and five daughters. Lady Clifford
was a woman of great goodness and piety, who lived for the most
part a country life in her husband's castles in the North, during
the twenty-one years she remained his wife. His second wife was
Florence, daughter of Henry Pudsey, of Bolton, in Yorkshire,
Esquire, grandson of Sir Ralph Pudsey, the faithful protector
of Henry the Sixth after the overthrow of the Lancastrian cause
at Hexham. By her he had two or three sons, and one daughter,
Dorothy, who became the wife of Sir Hugh Lowther, of Lowther, in
Westmorland, and from whom the Earls of Lonsdale are descended.
It is said that, towards the end of the first Lady Clifford's
life, her husband was unkind to her, and he had two or three base
children by another woman.
Lord Clifford was unfortunate in having great unkindness and
estrangement between himself and his oldest son Henry. Early habits
of friendship, on the part of the latter, with King Henry VIII.
and a strong passion for parade and greatness, seem to have robbed
his heart of filial affection. The pure simplicity and unequivocal
openness of his father's manners had long been an offence to his
pride; but the old man's alliance with Florence Pudsey provoked his
irreconcilable aversion. By his follies and vices, also, the latter
years of his father were sorely disturbed. That wild and dissolute
young nobleman, attaching himself to a troop of roystering
followers, led a bandit's life, oppressed the lieges, harassed the
religious houses, beat the tenants, and forced the inhabitants of
whole villages to take sanctuary in their churches. He afterwards
reformed, and was employed in all the armies sent into Scotland by
Henry the Seventh and his successor, where he ever behaved himself
nobly and valiantly; and subsequently became one of the most
eminent men of his time, and within two years after his father's
death, having been through life a personal friend and favourite
of Henry the Eighth, was elevated by that partial monarch to the
dignity of Earl of Cumberland, which title he held till his decease
in 1542. It has been conjectured, but on no sufficient grounds,
that he was the hero of the ballad of "The Nut-Brown Maid."
In addition to the members of this distinguished family who have
already been enumerated as attaining to great personal distinction,
may be named George, the third of the five Earls of Cumberland, the
favourite of Queen Elizabeth, called the "Great Sea-faring Lord
Clifford," an accomplished courtier as well as naval hero,[2] one
of those to whom England is indebted for her proud title of "the
Ocean Queen." And lastly, his daughter, the Lady Anne Clifford,
Countess of Dorset, Pembroke, and Montgomery, of famous memory, one
of the most celebrated women of her time.
About three miles from Threlkeld, the ancient home of Sir Lancelot
Threlkeld and his noble step-son, stands as the eastern barrier of
the Blencathra group of mountains, that part of it which is known
as Souter Fell; whose irregular and precipitous summit, everywhere
difficult of access, rises to a height of about 2,500 feet. It is
on the south of Bowscale Fell, leaning westward from the Hesketh
and Carlisle road, by which its eastern base is skirted. This
mountain is celebrated in local history as having several times
been the scene of those singular aerial phenomena known as mirages.
A tradition of a spectral army having been seen marching over these
mountains had long been current in the neighbourhood, and this
remarkable exhibition was actually witnessed in the years 1735,
1737, and 1745, by several independent parties of the dalesmen;
and, as may well be supposed, excited much attention in the north
of England, and long formed a subject of superstitious fear and
wonder in the surrounding district. A sight so strange as that of
the whole side of the mountain appearing covered with troops, both
infantry and cavalry, who after going through regular military
evolutions for more than an hour, defiled off in good order, and
disappeared over a precipitous ridge on the summit, was sure to
be the subject of much speculation and enquiry. Many persons at
a distance hearing of the phenomenon, proceeded to the places
where it was witnessed, purposely to examine the spectators who
asserted the fact, and who continued positive in their assertions
as to the appearances. Amongst others, one of the contributors
to Hutchinson's History of Cumberland went to inquire into the
subject; and the following is the account of the information he
obtained, given in his own words.
"On Midsummer Eve 1735, William Lancaster's servant related that
he saw the east side of Souter Fell, towards the top, covered with
a regular marching army for above an hour together; he said they
consisted of distinct bodies of troops, which appeared to proceed
from an eminence in the north end, and marched over a nitch in the
top, but as no other person in the neighbourhood had seen the like,
he was discredited and laughed at.
"Two years after, on Midsummer Eve also, betwixt the hours of
eight and nine, William Lancaster himself imagined that several
gentlemen were following their horses at a distance, as if they had
been hunting, and taking them for such, paid no regard to it, till
about ten minutes after, again turning his head to the place, they
appeared to be mounted, and a vast army following, five in rank,
crowding over at the same place, where the servant said he saw them
two years before. He then called his family, who all agreed in
the same opinion; and what was most extraordinary, he frequently
observed that some one of the five would quit the rank, and seem to
stand in a fronting posture, as if he was observing and regulating
the order of their march, or taking account of the numbers, and
after some time appeared to return full gallop to the station he
had left, which they never failed to do as often as they quitted
their lines, and the figure that did so was one of the middlemost
men in the rank. As it grew later they seemed more regardless of
discipline, and rather had the appearance of people riding from
a market, than an army, though they continued crowding on, and
marching off, as long as they had light to see them.
"This phenomenon was no more seen till the Midsummer Eve, which
preceded the rebellion, when they were determined to call more
families to witness this sight, and accordingly went to Wiltonhill
and Souther Fell-side, till they convened about twenty-six persons,
who all affirm that they saw the same appearance, but not conducted
with the usual regularity as the preceding ones, having the
likeness of carriages interspersed; however it did not appear to be
less real, for some of the company were so affected with it as in
the morning to climb the mountain, through an idle expectation of
finding horse shoes, after so numerous an army, but they saw not a
vestige or print of a foot.
"William Lancaster, indeed, told me, that he never concluded they
were real beings, because of the impracticability of a march over
the precipices, where they seemed to come on; that the night was
extremely serene; that horse and man, upon strict looking at,
appeared to be but one being, rather than two distinct ones; that
they were nothing like any clouds or vapours, which he had ever
perceived elsewhere; that their number was incredible, for they
filled lengthways near half a mile, and continued so in a swift
march for above an hour, and much longer he thinks if night had
kept off."
The writer adds,--"This whole story has so much the air of a
romance, that it seemed fitter for _Amadis de Gaul_, or _Glenvilles
System of Witches_, than the repository of the learned; but as the
country was full of it, I only give it verbatim from the original
relation of a people, that could have no end in imposing upon their
fellow-creatures, and are of good repute in the place where they
live."
Not less circumstantial is the account of this remarkable
phenomenon gathered from the same sources by Mr. James Clarke,
the intelligent author of the Survey of the Lakes; and which
account, he says, "perhaps can scarcely be paralleled by history,
or reconciled to probability; such, however, is the evidence we
have of it," he continues, "that I cannot help relating it, and
then my readers must judge for themselves. I shall give it nearly
in the words of Mr. Lancaster of _Blakehills_, from whom I had the
account; and whose veracity, even were it not supported by many
concurrent testimonies, I could fully rely upon. The story is as
follows:
"On the 23rd of June 1744 (Qu. 45?), his father's servant, Daniel
Stricket (who now lives under Skiddaw, and is an auctioneer),
about half past seven in the evening was walking a little above
the house. Looking round him he saw a troop of men on horseback
riding on _Souther Fell-side_, (a place so steep that an horse
can scarcely travel on it at all,) in pretty close ranks and at a
brisk walk. Stricket looked earnestly at them some time before he
durst venture to acquaint any one with what he saw, as he had the
year before made himself ridiculous by a visionary story, which I
beg leave here also to relate: He was at that time servant to John
Wren of _Wiltonhill_, the next house to _Blakehills_, and sitting
one evening after supper at the door along with his master, they
saw a man with a dog pursuing some horses along Souther Fell-side;
and they seemed to run at an amazing pace, till they got out of
sight at the low end of the Fell. This made them resolve to go
next morning to the place to pick up the shoes which they thought
these horses must have lost in galloping at such a furious rate;
they expected likewise to see prodigious grazes from the feet of
these horses on the steep side of the mountain, and to find the
man lying dead, as they were sure he run so fast that he must
kill himself. Accordingly they went, but, to their great surprise,
found not a shoe, nor even a single vestige of any horse having
been there, much less did they find the man lying dead as they
had expected. This story they some time concealed; at length,
however, they ventured to tell it, and were (as might be expected)
heartily laughed at. Stricket, conscious of his former ridiculous
error, observed these aerial troops some time before he ventured to
mention what he saw; at length, fully satisfied that what he saw
was real, he went into the house, and told Mr. Lancaster he had
something curious to show him. Mr. Lancaster asked him what it was,
adding, "I suppose some bonefire," (for it was then, and still is
a custom, for the shepherds, on the evening before St. John's day,
to light bonefires, and vie with each other in having the largest.)
Stricket told him, if he would walk with him to the end of the
house he would show him what it was. They then went together,
and before Stricket spoke or pointed to the place, Mr. Lancaster
himself discovered the phenomenon, and said to Stricket, "Is that
what thou hast to show me?" "Yes, Master," replied Stricket: "Do
you think you see as I do?" They found they did see alike, so they
went and alarmed the family, who all came, and all saw this strange
phenomenon.
"These visionary horsemen seemed to come from the lowest part of
Souther Fell, and became visible first at a place called KNOTT:
they then moved in regular troops along the side of the Fell, till
they came opposite _Blakehills_, when they went over the mountain:
thus they described a kind of curvilineal path upon the side of the
Fell, and both their first and last appearance were bounded by the
top of the mountain.
"Frequently the last, or last but one, in a troop, (always either
the one or the other,) would leave his place, gallop to the front,
and then take the same pace with the rest, a _regular, swift
walk_: these changes happened to every troop, (for many troops
appeared,) and oftener than once or twice, yet not at all times
alike. The spectators saw, _all alike_, the same changes, and at
the same time, as they discovered by asking each other questions
as any change took place. Nor was this wonderful phenomenon seen
at Blakehills only, it was seen by _every_ person at _every
cottage_ within the distance of a mile; neither was it confined to
a momentary view, for from the time that Stricket first observed
it, the appearance must have lasted at least two hours and a half,
viz. from half past seven, till the night coming on prevented the
farther view; nor yet was the distance such as could impose rude
resemblances on the eyes of credulity: _Blakehills_ lay not half
a mile from the place where this astonishing appearance _seemed_
to be, and many other places where it was likewise seen are still
nearer."
This account is attested by the signatures of William Lancaster and
Daniel Stricket, and dated the 21st day of July 1785.
"Thus I have given," continues Mr. Clark, "the best account I can
procure of this wonderful appearance; let others determine what
it was. This country, like every other where cultivation has been
lately introduced, abounds in the _aniles fabellæ_ of fairies,
ghosts, and apparitions; but these are never even _fabled_ to
have been seen by more than one or two persons at a time, and the
view is always said to be momentary. Speed tells of something
indeed similar to this as preceding a dreadful intestine war. Can
something of this nature have given rise to Ossian's grand and
awful mythology? or, finally, Is there any impiety in supposing, as
this happened immediately before that rebellion which was intended
to subvert the liberty, the law, and the religion of England; that
though immediate prophecies have ceased, these visionary beings
might be directed to warn mankind of approaching _tumults_? In
short, it is difficult to say what it was, or what it was not."
Sir David Brewster, in his work on _Natural Magic_, after quoting
this narrative from Mr. James Clark, which he describes as "one of
the most interesting accounts of aerial spectres with which we are
acquainted," continues--"These extraordinary sights were received
not only with distrust, but with absolute incredulity. They were
not even honoured with a place in the records of natural phenomena,
and the philosophers of the day were neither in possession of
analagous facts, nor were they acquainted with those principles
of atmospherical refraction upon which they depend. The strange
phenomena, indeed, of the _Fata Morgana_, or the _Castles of the
Fairy Mor-Morgana_, had been long before observed, and had been
described by Kircher, in the 17th century, but they presented
nothing so mysterious as the aerial troopers of Souter Fell; and
the general characters of the two phenomena were so unlike, that
even a philosopher might have been excused for ascribing them to
different causes."
The accepted explanation of this appearance now is, that on the
evenings in question, the rebel Scotch troops were performing their
military evolutions on the west coast of Scotland, and that by
some peculiar refraction of the atmosphere their movements were
reflected on this mountain. Phenomena similar to these were seen
near Stockton-on-the-Forest, in Yorkshire, in 1792; in Harrogate,
on June 28th, 1812; and near St. Neot's, in Huntingdonshire, in
1820. Tradition also records the tramp of armies over Helvellyn, on
the eve of the battle of Marston Moor. To these may be added the
appearance of the Spectre of the Brocken in the Hartz Mountains;
and an instance mentioned by Hutchinson, that in the spring of the
year 1707, early on a serene still morning, two persons who were
walking from one village to another in Leicestershire, observed a
like appearance of an army marching along, till, going behind a
great hill, it disappeared. The forms of pikes and carbines were
distinguishable, the march was not entirely in one direction, but
was at first like the junction of two armies, and the meeting of
generals.
Aerial phenomena of a like nature are recorded by Livy, Josephus,
and Suetonius; and a passage in Sacred History seems to refer to a
similar circumstance. See Judges ix. 36.
Many in this country considered these appearances as ominous of the
great waste of blood spilt by Britain in her wars with America and
France. Shakespeare says, in _Julius Cæsar_,
"When these prodigies
Do so conjointly meet, let not men say,
---- ----they are natural;
For, I believe, they are portentous things
Unto the climate that they point upon."