until, in the fading summer evening, Cromwell had almost circled the
Royalist army, and came to their left wing, where he saw the Royalist
horse charging the right flank of the Scots and harrying the routed
Yorkshire foot. Immediately he reformed his thoroughly trained squadrons
almost on the same ground where Goring’s horse stood at the beginning of
the battle, and fronting the same way. The foot of the Association
formed beside them, and just before nightfall the Puritan cavalry and
infantry made their final charge. Goring’s troopers were returning from
their pursuit; Lucas’s men were recoiling from their last charge, in
which Lucas himself had been captured. They were scattered like chaff by
the shock of the steel-clad Cromwellian troopers, riding boot to boot;
and the remaining Royalist foot shared the same fate. The battle was
over just as night fell, stopping all pursuit. But there was little need
of pursuit. As at Waterloo, the very obstinacy with which the fight had
been waged made the overthrow all the more complete when at last it
came. Night went down on a scene of wild confusion, with thousands of
fugitives from both armies streaming off the field through the darkness;
for the disaster to the right wing of the Parliamentary army had
resulted not only in the rout of all the Yorkshire men and half of the
Scotch, but also in the three Parliamentary commanding generals, Leven,
Manchester, and Lord Fairfax, being swept off in the mass of fugitives.
The fight had been won by Cromwell, not only by the valor, coolness,
keen insight, and power of control over his men, which he had showed in
the battle itself, but by the two years of careful preparation and drill
which had tempered the splendid weapons he used so well.
This was the first great victory of the war; but it produced no decisive
effect; for there was no one general to take advantage of it. York fell;
but little else resulted from the triumph. Fairfax, Manchester, and
Leven all separated to pursue various unimportant objects. They left
Rupert time to recruit his shattered forces. They did not march south to
help Essex, who was opposed to the King in person. Essex blundered
badly, and when he marched into Cornwall was out-manœuvred and
surrounded, and finally had to surrender all his infantry. Before this
the King had already beaten the Parliamentary general, Waller, at
Copredy Bridge, the defeat of the Parliamentarians being turned into
disaster by the conduct of the London trained-bands, who, after two
years of battle, were still mere militia, insubordinate and prone to
desert. It was not with such stuff that victory over the Royalists could
be obtained. Mere militia who will not submit to rigid discipline cannot
be made the equals of regulars by no matter how many years of desultory
fighting. In the War of the American Revolution it was the
Continentals—the regulars of Washington, Wayne, and Greene—who finally
won the victory, while even to the very end of the struggle the ordinary
militia proved utterly unable to face the red-coats. So in the English
Civil War, it was the carefully drilled and trained horse and foot of
the Eastern Association, and not the disorderly London trained-bands,
who overthrew the King’s men. Cromwell had developed his troops just as
Grant and Lee, Sherman and Johnston long afterward developed theirs. It
is only under exceptional conditions, and with wholly exceptional
populations, that it is possible to forego such careful drilling and
training.
One great reason for the failures of the Parliamentary forces was that
their leading generals no longer greatly cared for success. They were
Presbyterians, who believed in the Parliament, but who also believed in
the throne. They hated the Independents quite as much as they hated the
Episcopalians, and felt a growing distrust of Cromwell, who in religious
matters was the leader of the Independents, and who had announced that
if he met the King in battle he would kill him as quickly as he would
kill anyone else. Essex was no more capable of putting a finish to the
war than McClellan was capable of overthrowing the Confederacy. The one,
like the other, had to make room for sterner and more resolute men.
The Committee of both Kingdoms struggled in vain to get their generals
to accomplish something. At Newbury—where one indecisive battle had
already been fought—they got together an army nearly double the strength
of the King’s: with no result save that another indecisive battle was
fought, on October 29, 1644. It was evident that there had to be a
complete change in the management of the war if a victory was to be
achieved. Accordingly Cromwell once more turned from the field to the
House of Commons.
In November he rose in Parliament and denounced Manchester as utterly
inefficient; and then turned his onslaught from an attack on one man
into a general move against all the hitherto leaders of the army. On
December 9th he addressed the House in one of his characteristic
speeches, rugged in form, but instinct with the man’s eager, strong
personality, fiery earnestness and hard common-sense. He pointed out,
not all the truth—for that was not politic—but the evident truth that it
was not wise to have leaders who both served in Parliament and also
commanded in the army. The result was the passage of the Self-denying
Ordinance, by which all members of either of the Houses were required to
resign their commands; so that, at a stroke, the Presbyterian and
Parliamentary leaders were removed from their control of the forces. Two
months afterward it was decreed that the forces of the Commonwealth
should be reorganized on the “New Model.” For the short-time service and
militia levy system there was substituted the New Model; that is, the
plan under which in the Eastern Association the Ironsides had been
raised to such a pitch of efficiency was extended to include the whole
army. Sir Thomas Fairfax was put in command, but so evident was it to
everyone that Cromwell was the real master-mind of the Parliamentary
armies that the Self-denying Ordinance was not enforced as far as he was
concerned, and he was retained, nominally as second, but in reality as
chief, in command. This was not only a victory for the radical military
party, but a victory for the Independents over the Presbyterians. The
Independent strength was in the army, and they now had their own
leaders.
During the period of reorganization of the army the war lagged along in
its usual fashion, with Rupert as much to the fore as ever; and to the
Royalists it merely seemed that their adversaries had gotten at odds,
and that the great noblemen, the experienced leaders, had been driven
from their leadership. Their hopes were high, especially as in Scotland
affairs had taken a sudden and most unexpected turn in their favor.
Immediately after Marston Moor Montrose had begun his wonderful year of
crowded life. Recognizing the extraordinary military qualities of the
Celtic clansmen of the Highlands, he had stirred them to revolt, and had
proved himself a master of war by a succession of startling victories
which finally put almost all Scotland at his feet. One would have to
examine the campaigns of Forrest to find any parallel for what he did.
Because of his feats he has been compared to Cromwell, but his fights
were on so much smaller a scale that the comparison is no more possible
than it would be possible to compare Forrest with Grant or Lee.
It is a noteworthy fact that the two soldier types which emerged from
the English Civil War as victorious over all others were the Cromwellian
Ironside and the Scotch Highlander. The intense religious and patriotic
fervor and hard common-sense of the one was in the other supplanted by a
mere wild love of fighting for fighting’s sake. It may be questioned
which was most formidable in battle, but in a campaign there was no
comparison whatsoever between them; and once his other foes were
vanquished, the Cromwellian soldier had not the slightest difficulty in
holding down the Highlander.
The victories of Montrose, the feats of Rupert, and the failures of the
Parliamentarians since Marston Moor gave Charles every feeling of
confidence, when, on June 14, 1645, he led his army against the New
Model at Naseby. As usual in these battles, it is not possible to state
the exact numbers, but it would appear that, as at Marston Moor, the
Royalists troops were outnumbered, being about 10,000 as against 14,000
in the Parliamentary army. Fairfax commanded for the Parliament, and the
King was present in person. As usual, the infantry on each side was in
the centre. On the right wing of the Parliamentarians Cromwell led his
horse, while Ireton had the horse of the left. Rupert commanded the
cavalry on the right wing of the Royalists, and Sir Marmaduke Langdale
that of the left. Thus Rupert was not, as at Marston Moor, pitted
against Cromwell; and anyone except Cromwell he could beat. Ireton was a
stout soldier, but he and his cavalry were completely overthrown; then,
according to their usual custom, Rupert’s Cavaliers followed the
headlong flight of their opponents in an equally headlong pursuit.
Meanwhile, in the centre, the foot crashed together and fought with
savage obstinacy on equal terms. As at Marston Moor, the fight was
decided solely by Cromwell. He overthrew the Royalist horse as he always
overthrew them, and he kept his men in hand as he always kept them.
Leaving a sufficient force to watch the broken hostile squadrons, he
wheeled the remainder and fell on the Royalist infantry in flank and
rear. For a moment, King Charles, stirred by a noble impulse, led
forward his horse guards to do or die; but the Earl of Carnworth seized
his bridle and stopped him, saying: “Will you go upon your death?” Had
the King been indeed a king, as ready to stake his own life for his
kingdom as he was to stake the lives of others, it would have gone hard
with the man who sought to halt him, for in such a case no man is
stopped by another unless he himself is more than willing; but Charles
faltered, the moment passed, and his army was overthrown in wild ruin.
Rupert came back and reformed his men, but when Cromwell charged home
with horse and foot the Royalist troopers never waited the onslaught.
There was plenty of light for pursuit now, and Cromwell showed yet
another trait of the great commanders by the unsparing energy with which
he followed his foe to complete the wreck. For twelve miles the
Parliamentary horse kept touch with the flying foe. The King’s army was
hopelessly shattered; from half to two-thirds of their number were slain
or captured. The Parliamentary losses were also heavy; a thousand of
their men were killed or wounded. Ireton had been wounded, and Skippon,
the Parliamentary major-general of foot. Fairfax, who had behaved with
his usual gallantry, had had his helmet knocked off in the hand-to-hand
fighting. The victory was Cromwell’s.
[Illustration:
The City Walls of York, with the Cathedral in the Distance.
]
So decisive was the overthrow that it practically ended the war. For a
moment the King had hopes of what Montrose would do; but when Montrose
came out of the Highlands he found that the clansmen would not march
beside him for a long campaign; at Philiphaugh he was overwhelmed by
numbers, and the Royalist party in Scotland disappeared with his
overthrow. Fairfax whipped Goring and captured Bristol. Cromwell took
Winchester, where he dealt severely with certain of his troopers who had
been plundering. He then stormed Basing House, an immense fortified
pile, the property of the Catholic Marquis of Winchester. Again and
again the Parliamentary generals had attempted to take the place, but
had always been beaten. Cromwell would not be denied; after three days’
battering with his guns, and an evening spent in prayer and in reading
the 115th Psalm, he stormed it with a rush, and the splendid castle, its
rooms and galleries filled with all the treasures of art, was left a
blackened and blood-stained ruin. After this it was in vain that the
Royalist troops strove to make head against their foes. If they stood in
the open they were beaten; castle after castle, and fortified
manor-house after manor-house, were battered down or stormed by Cromwell
and his comrades; and in the spring of 1646 the King surrendered himself
to the Scotch army.
III
THE SECOND CIVIL WAR AND THE DEATH OF THE KING
When the stout old Royalist, Sir Jacob Astley, was overcome and
surrendered, he exclaimed, as he gave up his sword: “Now you have done
your work and may go play, unless you fall out among yourselves!” It
very soon became evident that the victors would fall out among
themselves. Any revolutionary movement must be carried through by
parties whose aims are so different, or whose feelings and interests are
so divergent, that there is great difficulty in the victors coming to a
working agreement to conserve the fruits of their victory. Not only the
leaders, but more especially their followers—that is, the mass of the
people—must possess great moderation and good sense for this to be
possible. Otherwise, after much warfare of factions, some strong man, a
Cromwell or a Napoleon, is forced or forces himself to the front and
saves the factions from destroying one another by laying his iron hand
on all.
In the middle of the seventeenth century the English people, accustomed
for many generations to look to the monarch as their real ruler, began
to tumble into chaos when they wrenched themselves free from the
ingrained hereditary habit which had made loyalty to the King and
orderly government convertible terms. They were not yet fit to govern
themselves unaided; such fitness is not a God-given, natural right, but
comes to a race only through the slow growth of centuries, and then only
to those races which possess an immense reserve fund of strength,
common-sense, and morality. The English of the middle of the seventeenth
century were very much farther advanced along the road than were the
French at the end of the eighteenth. They had no such dreadful wrongs to
avenge as had the French people, and they indulged in no such
bloodthirsty antics among themselves. But they had by no means attained
to that power of compromise which they showed forty years later in the
Revolution of 1688, or which was displayed by their blood-kin and
political heirs, the American victors in the struggles of 1776 and 1861.
In the English Revolution that placed William on the throne, in the
American Revolution, and in the American Civil War, the victors passed
through periods of great danger when it seemed possible that the fruits
of their victory might be thrown away. They did not suffer the fate of
the victors of 1648, chiefly because of the growth of the spirit of
tolerance, of the capacity for compromise, which enabled them in part to
ignore their own differences, and in part to abide by a peaceful
settlement of them.
In England, by 1688, the Cromwellian movement had itself educated even
those who most sincerely believed that they abhorred it; and there was a
far less servile spirit toward James II. than toward Charles I. There
was less fanatical intolerance of one another among the elements that
had combined to put William on the throne; and William, otherwise by no
means as great a man as Cromwell, was yet far more willing to accept
working compromises, and more content to let Parliament go its own way,
even when that way was not the wisest. After the American Revolution
Washington’s greatness of character, sound common-sense, and entirely
disinterested patriotism, made him a bulwark both against anarchy and
against despotism coming in the name of a safeguard against anarchy; and
the people were fit for self-government, adding to their fierce jealousy
of tyranny a reluctant and by no means whole-hearted, but genuine,
admission that it could be averted only by coming to an agreement among
themselves. Washington would not let his officers try to make him
Dictator, nor allow the Continental Army to march against the weak
Congress which distrusted it, was ungrateful to it, and refused to
provide for it. Unlike Cromwell, he saw that the safety of the people
lay in working out their own salvation, even though they showed much
wrong-headedness and blindness, not merely to morality, but to their own
interests; and, in the long run, the people justified this trust.
But Cromwell never wanted the people to decide for themselves, unless
they decided in the way that he thought right; and, on the other hand,
the difficulty with the people was even greater; for they had neither
the desire for freedom, the moderation in using freedom, nor the
toleration of differences of opinion, which the American colonists had
developed by the end of the following century. At the close of, and
after, the American Civil War the differences of opinion and belief
among the victors were such as would inevitably have produced further
fighting in Cromwell’s time. The Northern Democrats were anxious to
combine politically with the defeated Southerners, and to reinstate, as
nearly as might be, the old ante-bellum conditions—that is, to prepare
for another Civil War. The Republican Party itself showed signs of a
deep division between the Extremists and Moderates, while there were all
sorts of violent little factions, just as there were Anabaptists and
Fifth Monarchy men in Cromwell’s time. The Garrison or disunion
Abolitionists, for instance, had formed just such a faction, and had
seen their cause triumph, not through, but in spite of, their own
efforts. If the Abolitionists of the Wendell Phillips type, instead of
seeking to compass Lincoln’s defeat for the Presidency in 1864 by
peaceful means, had threatened armed agitation; if, instead of trying to
elect McClellan or Seymour at the polls, the Northern Democrats had
taken the field with the former at their head; if the Republicans had
first crushed them by force of arms, and then had fought among
themselves until the extreme radical element got the upper hand,
installed Grant as perpetual President and dissolved Congress when it
became evident that the Democrats and moderate Republicans combined
would outnumber the radicals—we should have had a very fair analogy to
what happened in the Cromwellian era.
In such a case, moreover, be it remembered that the fault would have
lain less with the perpetual President than with the people whose
defects called him into being. Cromwell did not stand on the lofty plane
of Washington; but, morally, he was infinitely and beyond all comparison
above the class of utterly selfish and unscrupulous usurpers, of whom
Napoleon is the greatest representative. At the close of the first Civil
War there is no reason to suppose that he had any ambition inconsistent
with the highest good of his country, or any thought of making himself
paramount. To all outward seeming, his efforts were conscientiously
directed to securing the fruits of the victory for liberty, while at the
same time securing stability in the government. Unfortunately, in coming
to an agreement among men, no moderation or wisdom on the part of any
one man will suffice. Something of these qualities must be possessed by
all parties to the agreement. The incurable treachery of King Charles
rendered it hopeless to work with him; and the utter inability of
Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Roman Catholics, and indeed of all parties
and all creeds to act on the live-and-let-live principle, rendered a
really free government almost unworkable at the moment. How little
Cromwell yet thought of striving for a kingly position is shown by his
conduct in his social relations, notably by the marriages of his
children, who at this time sought their mates in families of his own
rank. The only one of these marriages with which we need concern
ourselves is that of his daughter, Bridget, to Ireton, a good soldier
and able politician, who was devoted to Cromwell, and was on very close
and intimate terms with him.
The religious element entered into everything Cromwell did, mixing
curiously with his hard common-sense and practical appreciation of
worldly benefits. It appears in all his letters and speeches. Such a
letter as he wrote to the Speaker of the House after the storming of
Bristol, is in thought and manner more akin to the writings of some old
Hebrew prophet than to those of any conqueror before or after Cromwell’s
time. It is saturated, not merely with biblical phraseology, but with
biblical feeling, all the glory being ascribed to God, and the army
claiming as their sole honor that God had vouchsafed to use them in his
service, and that by faith and prayer they had obtained the favor of the
Most High. It is impossible for a fair-minded and earnest man to read
Cromwell’s letters and reports after action, and the prayers he made and
the psalms he chose to read and to give out before action, and to doubt
the intensity of the man’s religious fervor. In our day such utterances
would be hypocritical. Almost the only modern generals in whom they
would have been the sincere expression of inward belief were Stonewall
Jackson and Gordon; and the times had changed so utterly that even they
could not possibly give utterance to them as Cromwell did. But in
Cromwell’s time the most earnest Puritans thought as he did, and
expressed their thoughts as he did. That such expression should lend
itself very readily to hypocrisy was inevitable; indeed, it was perhaps
inevitable that the habitual use of such expression should breed
somewhat of hypocrisy in almost any user. The incessant employment by
Cromwell and his comrades of the word “saints,” to distinguish
themselves and those who thought like them, is particularly
objectionable in its offensive self-consciousness.
In this letter about the taking of Bristol Cromwell touches upon the
religious differences which were the great causes of division among the
victors. He writes:
“Presbyterians, Independents, all have here the same spirit of faith and
prayer; the same presence and answer; they agree here; have no names of
difference; pity it is it should be otherwise anywhere.... And for
brethren in things of the mind we look for no compulsion but that of
light and reason.”
Cromwell strove earnestly to bring about harmony between the
Independents of the New Model army and the Presbyterians, who were
dominant in Parliament. Even in that day there were in private life men
of high character and great intellect who believed in true religious
liberty, men who stood far ahead of Cromwell; but Cromwell was equally
far ahead of all the men who then had any real control in public life;
so far ahead, indeed, that he could not get any considerable body of
public opinion abreast of him.
The Ironsides, the cavalry of Cromwell, stood as the extreme
representatives of the spirit which actuated the army. The great bulk of
them were men of intense political and religious convictions. However,
many even of the cavalry, and a large majority of the rank and file of
the infantry, were of the ordinary military type, men of no particular
convictions, a considerable number, indeed, having been enlisted from
among the captured armies and garrisons of the King himself. Under the
ties of discipline and comradeship, such men were sure to follow with
entire fidelity the masterful spirits among the officers and in their
own ranks; and all these masterful spirits were devoted to Cromwell as
the great leader who had given them victory. They were even more devoted
to their conceptions of religious and political liberty, and were
resolutely bent on striking down the King who embodied, in their minds,
the principles of religious and political oppression. These men had
broken entirely with the past, and were no longer overawed by the name
of hereditary power. “What,” they asked, “were the Lords of England but
William the Conqueror’s Colonels, or the Barons but his Majors, or the
Knights but his Captains?”
They believed they were indeed the Lord’s chosen people, and that upon
them, as conquerors, there devolved the duty of safeguarding the
interests of religion and of the Commonwealth. They wished to strike
down the Bishops as well as the King; and though most of them were
Congregationalists or Baptists, they had already begun to develop plenty
of men whose Christianity was of the most heterodox form, or who boldly
announced that they had a right to profess any creed, Christian or
otherwise, if they so desired. Together with their iron discipline as an
army went wide liberty of thought and discussion on all outside
matters—religious and political alike—when they were not in the ranks.
There were preachers who served with sombre fidelity as privates, but
who were fanatical inciters of Republican enthusiasm in every leisure
hour, haranguing and exhorting their fellow-soldiers about every
political or religious wrong.
[Illustration:
King Charles I.
From the replica at the Dresden Gallery, by Sir Peter Lely.
]