The Flight of the King by the Same Author
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Digitized by the Internet Arciiive in 2011 witii funding from University of Toronto littp://www.archive.org/details/flightofkingfullOOfeaa nc^ THE FLIGHT OF THE KING BY THE SAME AUTHOR BEAUTIES OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY SECRET CHAMBERS AND HIDING-PLACES JAMES II. AND HIS WIVES ^^r HE FLIGHT OF THE KING A FULL TRUE AND PARTICULAR ACCOUNT OF THE MIRACULOUS ESCAPE OF HIS MOST SACRED MAJESTY KING CHARLES II. AFTER THE BATTLE OF WORCESTER ALLAN FEA AUTHOR OK "SKCRET CHAMBERS AND HIDING-PLACES," ETC. SECOND, AND REVISED EDITION WITH NUMEROUS SKETCHES AND PHOTOGRAPHS^BT 1 Ht AlQHt IMETHUEN \ CO. 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. LONDON First Published (by Mr. John Lane) . Febmary i8gj Second EdiHo?i, Revised . September igoS 3 A- I U ? " Antiquities or remnants of history, are, as teas said. Pictures of a Wreck ; in zuhich industrious persons by an exact and scrupulous diligence and observation, out of monu- mentSy names, zvords, traditions, private records and evidences, fragments of stories, passages of books that concern not story, and the like, do save and recover something from the deluge of timcy— Bacon. " There are fete episodes in the chronicles of real life tchich raise human nature so much in our otvn estimation as the story of the escape of Charles after the battle of Iforcester" Jesse's " Memoirs of the Stuarts." To The descendants of those loyal families who risked their lives and fortunes in preserving the following the life of their Sovereign^ pages are respectfully dedicated^ to perpetuate the fast fading recollection of their fidelity and the memory of the old spirit of loyalty in England INTRODUCTION WITH a purely historical aim in view, we have attempted in the following pages to illustrate the adventurous and romantic story of the escape of King Charles II. after the battle of Worcester, following step by step the hazardous journey from that city to the Sussex coast, and describing with pen and pencil the present condition or fate of the various houses which afforded the royal fugitive a safe asylum in the year 1651. With this object, the first part of our work is there- fore presented in the form of a tour taken in the present day ; the thread of the story being sustained throughout from various authentic and contemporary sources, and from family and local traditions not hitherto recorded in a collective form. The second part consists of five interesting pamphlets not included in Hughes's well-known and scholarly com- pilation, "The Boscobel Tracts," and will therefore form a supplement to that work. It will be as well for those readers who are not acquainted with the story of Charles II.'s escape, to peruse these Tracts first; X THE FLIGHT OF THE KING because, to avoid too much repetition, the " Historical Tour" (Part I.) does not pretend to embrace all the particulars of the king's adventures detailed in them, which are best read in their original form. The five Tracts are as follows: i. "A True Narrative and Relation of His Most Sacred ^lajesty's Miraculous Escape from Worcester, on the third of September 1651, till his arrival at Paris." ^ 2. ''A Summary of Occurrences from the Personal Testimony of Thomas Whitgreave and John Huddleston." 3. "An Extract ' from Dr. Bate's Elenchus . Motuuni Xuperorum in Anglia.'"' 4. "Captain Alford's Narrative." 5. "Colonel Counters Narrative." The first of these Tracts was mentioned by Hughes as unreliable ; but with the exception of one or two slight discrepancies, it is by far the most circumstantial record of the early part of the king's adventures, and in no way can it be classified with the erroneous account ot Danvers.- It is particularly interesting as being the first printed article upon the subject, and it was evidently used freely by Blount for his " Boscobel " (1660). generally recognised as the most accurate description of the king's adventures. Blount's accuracy, however, mav not o'o entirelv unchalleno'ed, tor in the " Kinofdom's IntelHufencer " for the vear 1662 we find the followino' ^ The same account is given in '• England's Triumph," Sec. 1660. -See Introduction to Hughes's "Boscobel Tracts." "A True Narrative," &c., is reprinted in the '• Harleian Miscellany," vol. iv., p. 441. INTRODUCTION xi announcement: "By express command from his Majesty, we are to acquaint the reader that a httle book named * Boscobel' (being a relation of his Majesty's happy and miraculous escape after the fight at Wor- cester), hath divers errors and mistakes in it. and [is] therefore not to be admitted as a true and perfect narrative of his Sacred Majesty's deliverance." ^ Tract 2," The Summary of Occurrences," by Thomas Whitgreave and John Huddleston. is similar to the Whitgreave Narrative, given in the " Boscobel Tracts," but contains a little additional matter, viz., some further particulars described by Father Huddleston.- The account in Tract ^. j^iven bv Dr. Georii^e Bate, M.D. (formerly physician to Charles I.), was, as he states, "delivered from the king's own mouth." and it is therefore interesting to compare this with Charles's narrative of his adventures, dictated to Samuel Pepys eighteen years afterwards.'' The original MS. of the King's narrative (as we shall hereafter term it, to dis- ' The king's own copy of Blount's '' Boscobel," from the library of Barton Hall, Bury St. Edmunds, was sold recently July 2, 1896) at Sotheby's for ;^'i4 15s. Stronj^ doubts may be entertained as to the authorship of " Boscobel," for Dr. Nash, in his " History of Worcester- " shire," mentions a letter wherein Thomas Blount denies it : How the " world," he says, comes to be so kind as to give it to me, I know not ; but whatever merit it may have ... I do not choose to usurp it. I scorn to take the fame of another's productions: so if the same opinion prevails amongst my friends in your part of the world. I desire you to contradict it, for I do not so much as know the author of the piece." -Hughes seems to infer that the Whitgreave "Narrative" was printed first of all in the Rctrospcctivi' A\i'/V;i' (1826 , but it was published in the GciitUtuan's Magazine thirty-seven years before. See Gentlemati's Magazine, June, 1789, vol. lix., p. 592. ^ October 3 and 5, 1680. xii THE FLIGHT OF THE KING tinofuish it from his earlier accounts of his adventures H is preserved in the Pepysian Library at Magdalene College, Cambridge, and is written in cypher similar to the world-famed " Diary." It was printed for the first time in 1766, by Sir David Dalrymple (Lord Hailes), by permission of Dr. Sandby, Master of Magdalene, some fifty-nine years anterior to the deciphering of the diary by Lord Braybrooke. A few months after Charles II. had dictated at Newmarket this account of his flight, his brother James wrote to Pepys for a transcript, promising that no copies should be taken of it.^ The letter he received in answer is worthy of note, and ought to have found a place in " the preface of Dalrymple's work : For what your Royal Highness is pleased to command from me," says Pepys, "touching the Worcester Paper, my covetousness of rendering it as perfect as the memory of any of the survivors (interested in any part of that memorable story) can enable me to make it, has led me into so many distant inquiries relating thereto, as have kept me out of a capacity of putting it together as I would, and it ought, ^ Viz., The account of his adventures as related to the Queen-mother and Court in Paris, upon his arrival there in 1651, and that described on the quarter-deck of the Naseby [rechristened The Charles] in crossing to Dover, May 23, 1660. See Harleian MSS., British Museum, No. 991, Fol. go; Pepys's Diary; Parliamentary History, &c. (N.B. The particulars of his escape, given by the king while Cromwell was in power, must be taken with caution, because naturally his lips were in a great measure sealed for fear he might jeopardise the lives of those in England to whom he owed his safety ; indeed, some of his statements were no doubt calculated to mislead his enemies.) "^ Letter from the Duke of York to Pepys, Edinburgh, May 21, 1681. See Pepys's " Correspondence." " INTRODUCTION xiii and shall be. as soon as ever I can possess myself of all I the memorials am in expectation of towards it : which I shall also, for your Royal Highness's satisfaction, use my utmost endeavours in the hastening- ; begging your Royal Highness in the meantime to receive this transcript of what I took from his Majesty's own mouth, with a considerable addition I have since obtained to it in writing from Colonel Philips, suitiible to what I am promised, and daily look for from Father Hurleston [sic].' Tract 4, Captain Alford's story, is from the Tanner Collection of Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, and appeared for the first time in print in Cary's " Memorials of the Great Civil War," 1842. Though this account contains many errors — the author, a merchant, and after- wards Mayor of Lyme Regis, being abroad at the time of the king's unsuccessful expedition to Charmouth— it is too interesting a document to be ignored. "Colonel Counter's Narrative,'' Tract 5, is un- doubtedly one of the most valuable of all the accounts of the flight of the king. The original manuscript of this, now in the British Museum, was found in a secret drawer of an old bureau.