“No, I will not endure the laughter of the Court,” said Newcastle,[112] when, on the following morning, Rupert asked him to make an effort to recruit his forces. “I will go to Holland.”

“And I will rally my men!” said Rupert.

Before we blame Newcastle for deserting the King’s service and leaving England without his permission, we ought to remember that he was in a position widely different from that of most defeated Generals. He had been publicly proclaimed a traitor by the Parliament. When any indemnity had been proposed he had been specially excepted from it by name. If he fell into the hands of the enemy, the Tower and the block were almost inevitable; although, if he had been taken prisoner in such a great battle as that of Marston Moor, there is just a bare, but unlikely, possibility that he might have been liberated in an exchange of prisoners.

The most important evidence in his favour is a letter from Charles I, dated 28 November, 1644, that is about four months after Newcastle had fled the country; for, if the King excused his conduct, no one else had a right to complain.

The Duchess says, that before leaving York Newcastle had asked Rupert “to give this true and just report of him to his Majesty, that he had behaved himself like an honest man, a Gentleman, and a Loyal subject. Which request the Prince having granted, my Lord took his leave; and being conducted by a Troop of Horse, and a Troop of Dragoons to Scarborough went to Sea, and took shipping for Hamborough; the Gentry of the Country, who also came to take their leaves of My Lord, being much troubled at his departure, and speaking very honourably of him, as surely they had no reason to the contrary.”

Quite true, in the main; but something said by Sir Hugh Cholmley in his private memoirs[114] has a bearing upon his last remark. “After the battle of Hess Moor, the Marquis of Newcastle came to Scarborough, and lodged at my house two days, till I had furnished him with a ship to go beyond sea; at his departure, he thanked me for my entertainment, and told me ‘he had some fear I should have stayed [stopped] him’; which I suppose he conceived would be some countenance to his: my answer was ‘I wish he could stay; that if he had committed an error, I knew my duty so well, I was not to call him to account, but obey, he being my general; that for my own part, though the place was in no defensible posture, I meant not to surrender till I heard from the King, or was forced to it’.” This was a broad hint to Newcastle as to Cholmley’s opinion of his conduct in flying from the country.

In continuing her story, the Duchess says that Newcastle, when “preparing for his journey, asked his Steward How Much Money he had left? Who answer’d, That he had but 90£. My Lord not being at all startled at so small a Summ, although his present design required much more, was resolved too seek his Fortune, even with that little; ... he embarqued with his Company, and arrived in four days time to the said City, which was on the 8th of July, 1644.”

Half a dozen lords, a bishop, and a good many of his relations and friends, including his brother and two sons, sailed with Newcastle.

“But before My Lord landed at Hamborough his eldest Son Charles, Lord Mansfield, fell sick of the Small Pox, and not long after his younger Son, Henry, now Earl of Ogle, fell likewise dangerously ill of the Measels; but it pleased God that they both happily recovered.”

Here is some news of Newcastle after he had been only a few days in Holland.[115]“John Constable to his father, Sir Henry, Viscount Dunbar, Amsterdam. ... For the news that is here stirring, first Prince Rupert is here mightily condemned for his rashness, but the Marquis of Newcastle much more for coming away.”

[116]“John Constable to his father, Sir Henry, Viscount Dunbar (Rotterdam).... The Marquis of Newcastle is still at Hamburgh in poor condition; both his sons have had the measles; I believe he now repents his folly.”

Luckily for Newcastle, much of the blame which was due to him was thrown upon Ethyn. Clarendon says:[117] “The strange manner of the Prince’s coming, and undeliberately throwing himself and all the King’s hopes into that sudden and unnecessary engagement, by which all the force the Marquis had raised, and with so many difficulties preserved, was in a moment cast away and destroyed, so transported him with passion and despair that he could not think of beginning the work again and involving himself in the same undelightful condition of life, from which he might now be free. He hoped his past meritorious actions might outweigh his present abandoning the thought of future actions and so, without farther consideration, he transported himself out of the Kingdom, and took with him General King” (Ethyn); “upon whom they who were content to spare the Marquis, poured out all the reproaches of infidelity, treason, and conjunction with his country-men (the Scots),” an accusation which Clarendon declares to have been “without the least foundation”.

In the next paragraph Clarendon says that “the loss of England,” which soon followed, made the loss of York comparatively little spoken of, and that Newcastle’s patient endurance of his subsequent losses “so perfectly reconciled all good men to him, that they rather observed what he had done and suffered for the King and for his country, without inquiring what he had omitted to do”.

Henrietta Maria remained a steadfast friend to Newcastle, even when he had fled from his country and from her husband’s service. I “shall assure you,” she wrote to him from Paris (20 Nov., 1644), “of the continuance of my esteem for you, not being so unjust as to forget past services upon a present misfortune. And therefore believe that I shall always continue to give proofs of what I tell you, and you will see how I shall behave, and with what truth I am, Your very good, and affectionate friend,

“Henrietta Maria R.” [118]

---

Of what happened to the remains of Newcastle’s army at York, Heath tells us:—[119]

“The victor enemy being come again before York, summoned the city again: they had used before their utmost endeavours, by mines and assaults, (in one whereof they lost nearly one thousand men, and were beaten off) to have entered; to which the Governor returned answer, that he was no whit dismayed with their present success; yet nevertheless on equal conditions he would come to a treaty and surrender; which in nineteen days after the battle was concluded on.” The garrison was allowed to “march out according to the honourable custom of war”.

If there was still a sufficient garrison at York to hold out for nineteen days—and there is nothing to show that it could not have held out longer—was Newcastle justified in deserting it? True, there was no prospect of any adequate force coming to his relief; and, in any terms of surrender, he, as a proclaimed traitor, might not have been allowed to march out, a free man, either with or without the honours of war. On the other hand, if he had held York, what honour would have been his in the case of the success of the King’s army in the South and the total defeat of the army of the Parliament, a contingency which, at that time, was still apparently possible, and would have been rendered more probable if a large portion of the army of the Parliament had been occupied in the siege of York.

To sympathisers with Newcastle, it may be consoling to reflect that recriminations and reproaches for neglect of duty or courage, at or after the battle of Marston Moor, were not confined to the Royalist side, as both Rushworth and Clarendon bear witness. Manchester and Cromwell disliked each other; and another General, Crawford, a bitter enemy of Cromwell, pretended that Cromwell, after receiving a very slight wound in the neck given accidentally by one of his own men, at the beginning of the battle of Marston Moor, had made it an excuse to escape from the field until the fighting was practically over.[120] Cromwell seized opportunities of bringing counter-charges against both Crawford and Manchester, accusing the latter of disaffection to the Parliamentary cause.

Welbeck, Newcastle’s home, received a visit from the enemy, about a month after its owner had sailed from England. The guest shall tell his own story:—[121]

“Edward Earl of Manchester to the Committee of both Kingdoms. ... Upon my coming near Welbeck, I sent a summons to the place and they with great civility sent to parley with me. The next day, Friday, they rendered the house to me upon composition. I was willing to give them large terms, because I was not in a condition to besiege a place so well fortified as that was. I therefore gave the officers and soldiers liberty to march out with all their arms and colours flying; but when I came to take possession of the house most of the soldiers came to me to lay down their arms, desiring tickets of me to return to their own homes, the which I granted them, so as I had 350 muskets in the house, 50 horse arms, 11 pieces of cannon great and small, whereof the Governor had liberty to carry away one: I had likewise 20 barrels of powder and a ton of match. The house I preserved entire, and put a garrison into it of Notts men, until I know your Lordship’s resolutions whether you will have it slighted or no. The place is very regularly fortified; and the Marquis of Newcastle’s daughters and the rest of his children and family are in it, unto whom I have engaged myself for their quiet abode there, and to intercede to the Parliament for a complete maintenance for them; in the which I beseech your Lordships that they may have your favour and furtherance.”

Manchester seems not only to have “engaged” himself for the quiet abode of Newcastle’s children in the home at Welbeck, but eventually to have left it ungarrisoned by Parliamentary troops; for, some thirteen months later, Welbeck entertained a very different visitor, in the person of the King himself. Charles went there under most depressing circumstances. There was no banquet costing £5000 awaiting him there now, nor a masque of welcome written by Ben Jonson. The total defeat of his army in the North at Marston Moor had recently been followed by as complete a defeat by Cromwell of his army further South at Naseby, when his baggage was captured and his compromising letters to and from the Queen and the Irish rebels were seized and published by the Parliament. Newcastle’s late General, Goring, had been defeated by Fairfax at Langport; and Rupert had surrendered Bristol to the enemy. The last battle fought in the open field on behalf of the King was lost at Rowton, near Chester, on 23 September.

Charles’s only hope now lay in succour by Montrose, whose only hope, again, lay in succour from the King. Wandering from place to place, Charles, Clarendon tells us,[122] “had made haste from Ludlow, that the Scottish army might no more be able to interrupt him; and with very little rest, passed through Shropshire, and Derbyshire, till he came to Welbeck, a house of the Marquis of Newcastle in Nottinghamshire, then a garrison for his Majesty; where he refreshed himself and his troops, two days”. But what a contrast must such gloomy refreshment have been to the magnificent hospitality which he had received there on two former occasions.

This was probably one of the saddest visits ever paid to Welbeck. The Governor of Newark and the Royalist gentry of Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire, and Yorkshire waited upon the King during his short visit at Newcastle’s home. At first it was decided that Charles should proceed direct to Scotland and join Montrose; but afterwards it was thought better that he should take up his quarters at Doncaster and raise troops in Yorkshire. However, it is no part of our duty to follow the footsteps of that ill-fated King.

Here is a pathetic letter from Newcastle to the Prince of Wales:—[123]

After describing the rest of his journey, she says:—

Upon this seeing of Newcastle by one of the Maids of Honour to Her Majesty a good deal depended, and it will be best to deal with the matter in a fresh chapter.