CROMWELL AND MARSTON MOOR.

Otago Witness, Issue 2401, 8 March 1900, Page 59

CROMWELL AND MARSTON MOOR.

It has been said that the two armies that stood face to face at Marston (July 2, 1644) were tlie largest masses of men that had met as foes on English ground since the Wars of the Roses. *Tke Royalist, force counted 17,000 or 18,000 men, the Parliamentarians and the Scotch allies 26,000 or 27,000, or nearly half as many again. The Whole were about twice as many as were engaged at- Edgehill. In a generation that, like our own, is much given to worship of size, people may make light of battles where armies of only a few thousand men were engaged. Yet Tre may as well remember that Napoleon entered Italy in 1796 with only 30,000 men under arms. At Arcola and at Rivoli he had not over 15,000 in the field, and even at Marengo he had not twice as many. In the great campaign of 1631-32, in the Thirty Years' War, the Imperialists were 24,000 foot and 13.000 horse, while the Swedes were 28,000 foot and 9000 horse. As the forces engaged at Marston were the most numerous, so the battle was the bloodiest in the civil war. It was also the most singular, for the runaways were as many on one side as on the other, and the three victorious generals were all of them fugitives from the field. The two armies faced each other, as usual, in two parallel lines, the foot in the centre, and the horse on the wings. A wide ditch.- with a hedge on its southern side, divided them. . . . So for -some five hours the two hosts, with colours flying and match burning, looked each other in the face. It was a showery sunimer afternoon. Few of the common soldiers had eaten more than the quantity of a penny loaf from Tuesday "to Saturday morning ; nor had they any beer, nor more water than they could find in ditches and places trampled into puddle by the horses' feet. The Parliamentarians in the standing corn, hungry and wet. beguiled the time in singing hymns. " You can imagine." says an eye-witness, '" the courage, spirit, and resolution that was taken up on both sides ; for we looked, and no doubt they also, upon this fight as the losing or

gaming the garland. . . . Who gave the sign for the general engagement we do not know, and it is even likely that no sign as the result of a deliberate and concerted plan was ever given at all. '' Surely,"' says the scout-master, " had two such annies, drawn up so close one to fne other, being on both wings within musket-shot, departed without fighting, I think it would have been as great a wonder as hath been seen in England."' The strain could not be controlled, and the hounds broke from the leash. Horse and foot moved down the hill, "like so many thick clouds." Ciomwell, on the Parliamentary left, charged Rupert with the greatest resolution that ever was seen. It was the first time that these two great leaders of horse had ever met in direct shock, -and it was here that Rupert gave to -Oliver the brave nickname of Ironside. As it happened, this was also one of the rare occasions when Oliver's cavalry suffered a check. He received a wound in the ntck, and his force fell slowly back. David Leslie, with his Scotch troopers, was luckily at hand, and charging forward together, they fell upon Rupert's right flank. This diversion enabled Oliver to order his retreating' men" to face about. Such a manoeuvre, say the soldiers, is one of the nicest in the whole range of tactics, and bears witness to the discipline and flexibility of Cromwell's fpvcf, like a delicate-mouthed charger, with a coiirummate rider. With Leslie's aid they put Rupert and his cavalry to rout. "' Cromwell's own division," says the scout-master, " had a* hard pull of it, for they were charged by Rupert's bravest men both in front and in flank. They stood at the sword's point a pretty while hacking one another; but at last he broke through them, scattering them like a little dust." This clone, the foot of their own win.: charging by their side, they scattered the Royalists as fast as they charged them, slashing them down as they went. Tlk horse carried the whole field or tho Ipu before them, thinking that the victory was theirs, and that " nothing was to be done but to kill and take prisoners." It was admitted by Cromwell's keenest partisan that Leslie's chase of the broken forces of Rupert, making a rally impossible, was what left Cromwell free to hold his men compact and ready for another charge.

Before 10 o'clock all was over, and the Royalists, beaten from the field, were hi full retreat. Rumours of the early defeat of the Parliamentarians got wind, and bells rang, and bonfires blazed for three or four days in half the Royalist quarters in England. . . . More than 4000 brave

men lay that night under the sunimer moon-, gory and stark upon the field. More than. 3000 of them a few hours before had gone£ into the fight shouting, " For God and thel King!" met by the hoarse counter-shoutß from the Parliamentarians, " God with? us !" So confident were each that Divine* 1 favour were on their side. .. . 01<F Leven, the general in command, had beenf swept off in flight by his own men, and had the satisfaction or the mortification of learning, just as he was getting into bed] that he had won the day. Cromw.ell's o~.vii references to the battle are comprised in three or four sentences : "It had till the evidences of an absolute victory, obtained by the Lord's blessing, on the godly parly principp/lly. We never charged, but W3 routed the en"emy. The left wing, which I commanded, being our own horse, saving a few Scoio on our rear, beat all the Prince's horse, and God made them stubble to our swords. We charged their regiments of foot with our horse, and routed all we charged. I believe of 20,000 the Prince hath not 4000 left. Give glory, all the glory, to God." If the Scots are not to be. included in the ,godly party, Cromwell's story cannot quite pass inustei\ Without dwelling on the question how much their stubborn valour under Bailiie and Lumsden ngjinst the Royalist iissaultss of the centre had to do \rith the triumphant restilt, to describe a force nearly one-third as large ?s '" a few Scots in our rear ' must be set down as curiously loose. If one thing is more clear than another amid the obscurities ot" Marston, ifc is that Leslie's flank attack on Rupert while the Ironsides "were falling back was the key to the decisive events thar followed. Strong even in great natures is the bias of political antagonism, and especially strong if that be backed, as it may have been here, by a very lively international antipathy. The only plea, to be made is that Oliver was not Avriting an official despatch, but a hurried private letter, ir which fulness of detail was noi to be looked for. When full justice has been done to the valour of the Scots, glory enough was left for Cromwell ; and so, when the party dispute was over, the public opinion of the time pronounced, — Mr John Morley, in the Century Magazine.