Proceeding westward towards the Bristol Channel, the low and marshy
plain of Sedgemoor is reached. Much of it is reclaimed from the sea, and
here and there the surface is broken by isolated knolls, there being
some two hundred square miles of this region, with the range of Polden
Hills extending through it and rising in some places three hundred feet
high. In earlier times this was an exact reproduction of the
Cambridgeshire fenland, and then, we are told,
"The flood of the Severn Sea flowed over half the plain,
And a hundred capes, with huts and trees, above the flood remain;
'Tis water here and water there, and the lordly Parrett's way
Hath never a trace on its pathless face, as in the former day."
It is changed now, being thoroughly drained, but in the days of the
Saxons the river Parrett was the frontier of Wessex, and one of its
districts sheltered Alfred from the first onset of the Danish invasion
when he retreated to the fastnesses of the Isle of Athelney. In the
epoch of the Normans and in the Civil War there was fighting all along
the Parrett. After the defeat at Naseby the Royalists, under Lord
Goring, on July 10, 1645, met their foes on the bank of the Parrett,
near Langport, were defeated and put to flight, losing fourteen thousand
prisoners, and the king's troops never made a stand afterwards.
Bridgwater is a quiet town of about twelve thousand people on the
Parrett, a half dozen miles from the sea, and in its churchyard reposes
Oldmixon, who was made collector of customs here as a reward for his
abusive writings, in the course of which he virulently attacked Pope.
The poet retorted by giving Oldmixon a prominent place in the _Dunciad_,
where at a diving-match in the putrid waters of Fleet Ditch, which
"rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to the Thames," the heroes are
bidden to "prove who best can dash through thick and thin, and who the
most in love of dirt excel." And thus the Bridgwater collector:
"In naked majesty Oldmixon stands,
And Milo-like surveys his arms and hands,
Then sighing thus, 'And am I now threescore?
And why ye gods should two and two make four?'
He said, and climbed a stranded lighter's height.
Shot to the black abyss, and plunged downright."
In the Market Inn at Bridgwater Admiral Blake was born, who never held a
naval command until past the age of fifty, and then triumphed over the
Dutch and the Spaniards, disputing Van Tromp's right to hoist a broom at
his masthead, and burned the Spanish fleet in the harbor of Santa Cruz.
He was buried in Westminster Abbey, but Charles II. ejected his bones.
Bridgwater is now chiefly noted for its bath bricks, made of a mixture
of clay and sand deposited near there by the tidal currents.
[Illustration: SEDGEMOOR, FROM COCK HILL.]
[Illustration: WESTON ZOYLAND CHURCH.]
It was from the Bridgwater church tower that the unfortunate son of
Charles II. and Lucy Walters, who had been proclaimed "King Monmouth,"
looked out upon the grassy plains towards the eastward before venturing
the last contest for the kingdom. This view is over Sedgemoor, the scene
of the last fight deserving the name of a battle that has been fought on
British ground. It is a long tract of morass lying between the foot of
the Polden Hills and the Parrett River, but with a fringe of somewhat
higher ground along the latter, where are Weston Zoyland, Chedzoy, and
Middlezoy, each a hamlet clustering around its old church, that at
Weston Zoyland being surmounted by an attractive square tower over one
hundred feet high. Monmouth had been proclaimed king by the mayor and
corporation of Bridgwater June 21, 1685, but had been checked at Bath,
and fell back again to Bridgwater, where his army was encamped on the
Castle Field. He had been three weeks in the kingdom without marked
success, and the royal army was closing in upon him. Four thousand
troops under Lord Feversham marched westward, and on the Sunday evening
of July 5th, when Monmouth looked out from the tower, had encamped upon
Sedgemoor about three miles from Bridgwater. Monmouth had seven thousand
men to oppose them, but his forces were mostly undisciplined and badly
armed, some having only scythes fastened on poles. The moor was then
partly reclaimed and intersected by trenches, and Feversham's
headquarters was at Weston Zoyland, where the royal cavalry were
encamped, with the other troops at Middlezoy and Chedzoy beyond.
Monmouth saw that their divisions were somewhat separated, and that his
only hope was a night-attack. At midnight he started, marching his army
by a circuitous route to the royal camp, strict silence being observed
and not a drum beaten or a shot fired. Three ditches had to be crossed
to reach the camp, two of which Monmouth knew of, but he was
unfortunately ignorant of the third, called the Bussex Rhine, behind
which the camp had been made. A fog came down over the moor; the first
ditch was crossed successfully, but the guide missing his way caused
some confusion before the second was reached, during which a pistol was
discharged that aroused a sentinel, who rode off and gave the alarm. As
the royal drums beat to arms Monmouth rapidly advanced, when he suddenly
found himself checked by the Bussex Rhine, behind which the royal army
was forming in line of battle in the fog. "For whom are you?" demanded a
royal officer. "For the king," replied a voice from the rebel cavalry.
"For what king?" was demanded. The answer was a shout for "King
Monmouth," mingled with Cromwell's old war-cry of "God with us!"
Immediately the royal troops replied with a terrific volley of musketry
that sent the rebel cavalry flying in all directions. Monmouth, then
coming up with the infantry, was startled to find the broad ditch in
front of him. His troops halted on the edge, and for three quarters of
an hour the opposing forces fired volleys at each other across the
ditch. But the end was not far off. John Churchill was a subordinate in
the royal army and formed its line of battle, thus indicating the future
triumphs of the Duke of Marlborough. Then the royal cavalry came up, and
in a few minutes the rebels were routed, and Monmouth, seeing all was
lost, rode from the field. His foot-soldiers, with their scythes and
butt-ends of muskets, made a gallant stand, fighting like old soldiers,
though their ammunition was all gone. To conquer them the artillery were
brought up, for which service the Bishop of Winchester loaned his
coach-horses. The cannon were ill served, but routed the rebels, and
then the infantry poured over the ditch and put them to flight. The king
lost three hundred killed and wounded; the rebel loss was at least a
thousand slain, while there was little mercy for the survivors. The sun
rose over a field of carnage, with the king's cavalry hacking and hewing
among their fleeing foes. Monmouth, with one or two followers, was by
this time far away among the hills, but was afterwards captured in the
New Forest, and ended his life on the scaffold. The Sedgemoor carnage
went on all the morning; the fugitives poured into Bridgwater with the
pursuers at their heels; five hundred prisoners were crowded into Weston
Zoyland Church, and the next day a long row of gibbets appeared on the
road between the town and the church. Bridgwater suffered under a reign
of terror from Colonel Kirke and his "Lambs," who put a hundred
prisoners to death during the week following the battle, and treated the
others with great cruelty. Then Judge Jeffreys came there to execute
judicial tortures, and by his harsh and terrible administration of the
law, and his horrible cruelties and injustice, gained the reputation
that has ever since been execrated.
Six miles south-east of Bridgwater is the Isle of Athelney, a peninsula
in the marsh between the Parrett and the Tone. Here King Alfred sought
refuge from the Danes until he could get time to mature the plans that
ultimately drove them from his kingdom. It was while here that the
incident of the burned cakes occurred. The king was disguised as a
peasant, and, living in a swineherd's cottage, performed various menial
offices. The good wife left him in charge of some cakes that were
baking, with instructions to turn them at the proper time. His mind
wandered in thought and he forgot his trust. The good wife returned,
found the cakes burning, and the guest dreaming by the fireside; she
lost her temper, and expressed a decided opinion about the lazy lout who
was ready enough to eat, but less ready to work. In the seventeenth
century there was found in the marshes here a jewel that Alfred had
lost: it is of gold and enamel, bearing words signifying, "Alfred had me
wrought." The following spring (878) he sallied forth, defeated the
Danes in Wiltshire, and captured their king Guthram, who was afterwards
baptized near Athelney by the name of AEthelstan; they still show his
baptismal font in Aller Church, near by.
[Illustration: THE ISLE OF ATHELNEY.]