Marston Moor Author(S): C
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Marston Moor Author(s): C. H. Firth Source: Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, Vol. 12 (1898), pp. 17-79 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Royal Historical Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3678059 Accessed: 26-06-2016 20:41 UTC Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Royal Historical Society, Cambridge University Press are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Transactions of the Royal Historical Society This content downloaded from 128.163.2.206 on Sun, 26 Jun 2016 20:41:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms MARSTON MOOR BY C. H. FIRTH, M.A. Read November 18 TIHE present paper is not an attempt to write a narrative of the battle of Marston Moor, but an attempt to solve certain questions connected with its history, and to state the evidence concerning them. I propose, therefore, to discuss in detail the four following subjects: The numbers and the composition of the Royalist and Parliamentary armies; the order in which the forces composing the two armies were drawn up on the battlefield; the tactics of Cromwell and the cavalry under his command during the battle; the nature and value of the authorities for the history of the battle. This investigation has led me to reject a view which is adopted in all modern accounts of the battle, and had been hitherto accepted by myself. The received view is that the infantry of the Parliamentary right wing was entirely routed, while a portion of the centre stood firm. The conclusion which a reconsideration of the evidence obliges me to adopt in this paper is exactly the opposite. The Parliamentary centre was entirely routed, but a portion of the infantry of the right wing held their ground until the cavalry and infantry of the left wing came to their relief, and turned a defeat into a victory. I The Numbers and Composition of the Royalist and Parliamentary Armies In a criticism of Mr. Gardiner's 'History of the Civil War,' published by Colonel Ross in the 'English Historical Review' for I890, the reviewer regretted that Mr. Gardiner had not N.S.-VOL. XII. C This content downloaded from 128.163.2.206 on Sun, 26 Jun 2016 20:41:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 18 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY more closely examined the question of the numbers engaged at Marston.'. Colonel Ross's own conclusion is that there was a great disparity between the forces of the Royalists and the Parliamentarians. 'The totals,' he says, 'seem to have been about 17,000 or I8,000 Cavaliers and 26,000 or 27,000 Roundheads.' A short examination of the component parts of the two armies seems to me to bear out the conclusion arrived at by Colonel Ross. The Royalist army at Marston Moor was made up of three different parts-(I) the army with which Rupert set out from Shrewsbury and entered Lancashire; (2) the army with which General Goring joined him during his march from Lancashire into Yorkshire; (3) the army under the Marquis of Newcastle besieged in York. Prince Rupert set out from Shrewsbury about May I6, and entered Lancashire, according to a Royalist narrative of his march, with 2,000 horse and 6,ooo foot.2 His infantry in- cluded his own regiment of foot (blue ?), which had marched from Bristol to join him; 3 the remains of the Irish foot defeated by Fairfax at Nantwich, consisting of the three regiments of Colonels Erneley, Gibson, and Warren, numbering about I,ooo men ;4 the regiments of Colonels Broughton and Tillier (green coats), whom Ormond had sent over from Ireland in January, numbering at least another I,ooo men; 5 Lord 1 April I890, p. 385. 2 See the narrative of Prince Rupert's march printed in the Appendix to this paper, p. 53. A letter from Arthur Trevor to Ormond, dated April 13, 1644, says that the Prince had then at Shrewsbury 5,000 foot and 3,000 horse (Carte's Life of Ormiond, vi. 87). Conflicting accounts of his numbers are given in Parliamentary reports. The usual estimate was 8,000 or Io,ooo men, and they were said to be mostly horse (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1644, pp. 187, i88, I92; Rushworth, v. 623; Lancashire Civil Was Tracts, Chetham Society, p. I87). 3 Report on the Duke of Portlaina s MSS., i. 170. Rupert's regiment was apparently the blue regiment mentioned in reports of the battle. See Phillips's Civil War in Wales, ii. I95. 4 Lord Byron, writing to Rupert on April 4, stated that these three regiments would make up over I,000 men. See also Phillips's Civil War in Wales, ii. I3I, 133- 5 Phillips's Civil War in Wales, ii. 125, I37. With Tillier and Broughton came Sir William Vaughan and four troops of horse. This content downloaded from 128.163.2.206 on Sun, 26 Jun 2016 20:41:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms MARSTON MOOR I9 Byron's regiment from Chester, and a number of troops collected from the garrisons of Wales and the Marches.' In Lancashire, it is agreed by the reports of both parties that he considerably increased his numbers, and several regiments raised in that county appear in his plan of battle (for instance, the regiments of Colonel Chisenall and the two regiments of Sir Thomas Tildesley).2 In Lancashire he was also joined by Lord Goring with a force which the narrator of Rupert's march estimates at 5,000 horse and 800 foot.3 This force was made up of some 2,000 cavalry under Sir Charles Lucas, whom Newcastle had sent out of York at the beginning of the blockade,4 and of a miscellaneous body of horse collected by Goring from Lincolnshire, Newark, Leicestershire, Derbyshire, and the northern midlands in general. Parliamentary accounts substantially agree with this estimate of Goring's forces.5 See Byron's letters to Rupert, April 4 and May 5, 1644, Rupert MSS. 2 See the narrative of Rupert's march on p. 54, and A Discourse of the Civil War in Lancashire, ed. by W. Beamont for the Chetham Society, p. 53. 3 See narrative of Rupert's march, p. 54. 4 Life of the Duke of Newcastle, p. 7I, ed. I886; Tenth Report of the Historical MSS. Comm. i. 53 (Papers of the Earl of Eglinton). 5 On April 10 George Goring had been despatched from Oxford (accompanied by the regiment of Colonel Evers) to take command of any forces that could he got together for Newcastle's assistance. Goring bore the title of general of all the horse north of Trent, and established his headquarters at Newark about April 26, where he collected all the cavalry he could from Lincolnshire and Nottingham- shire (Rupert MSS.). Newcastle's horse joined Goring's at or about Mansfield, who 'together with them made up about Ioo troops.' On May 5 they recrossed the Trent, and endeavoured to interrupt Manchester's attack on Newark. Cromwell's and Manchester's horse drove them off, and forced them to recross the river. 'The enemy,' says Ashe's Relation, ' had above go colours, which we esteemed 4,000, and themselves accounted 6,ooo horse' (Ashe's Intelligence from the Earl of Manchester's Army, Nos. I and 2). They then retired into Leicestershire, and Goring wrote to Rupert from Brookesby on May io urging the Prince to join him and relieve York. On May 25 the Committee of Both Kingdoms wrote to Manchester that Lord Newcastle's horse that had come out of York had recruited themselves to a great strength, raised at least I,ooo horse, and now were 3,000 horse and dragoons, and lying near Uttoxeter, in Staffordshire. On May 31 Newcastle's horse were said to be upon the frontiers of Yorkshire, between Woodhead and Stockport, with 3,000 horse and Ioo foot (Cal. State Papers, Dom. I644, pp. 171, I77, 188; cf. Micro- chronicon, June 20 and 25, 1644). Goring himself, about the end of May, marched C 2 This content downloaded from 128.163.2.206 on Sun, 26 Jun 2016 20:41:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 20 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY Adding Goring's force to the force brought by Rupert into Lancashire, and assuming that the new recruits and new regiments raised in Lancashire compensated for the losses sustained at Bolton, Liverpool, and other sieges, we get a total of 7,000 horse and 6,800 foot. This agrees pretty closely with the statement made by Sir Robert Byron, the Royalist Governor of Liverpool, in a letter to Ormond written just after Rupert started for York. 'The Prince,' he says, ' marched from hence with an army of 6,ooo foot and 7,000 horse.' Rupert expected to be joined at Skipton by the Westmorland forces, but their numbers fell short of his ex- pectation. Lord Goring, who was with Rupert's vanguard, and was quartered at Skipton, wrote to the Prince on June 25,2 saying that the Westmorland and Cumberland troops had just joined, but that they came to not more than a thousand men; adding, ' The rest that your Highness ordered are promised to follow, but they are slow.' It may therefore be regarded as established that the relieving army with which Rupert advanced to York amounted to 14,000 men at the least, of whom about half were cavalry; it may possibly have amounted to I5,000, if some of the other detachments on their way from the north joined him during his advance.