God’s FURY, England’s FIRE

by Braddick, Michael

  Disappointment at this outcome was probably part of the reason for the riot at Smithfield a week later. On 15 February a buyer refused to pay excise and tried to remove his livestock. When he was stopped a crowd gathered in his defence. It was dispersed but another crowd gathered later, burning down the excise house, and £80 or £100 was ‘scattered and purloined’. The later crowd was led by butchers, one of whom said that they would ‘bear down the excise by force’. There certainly was force – ‘many of the officers of the excise were beaten’ – but it was limited and focused. At least some of the money was scattered, not stolen, and it was the officers and their house that were attacked. The rioters also took the trouble to spoil the records kept by the officers. Clearly there was method in the violence.55

  The official response was again unyielding – measures were taken to punish the ringleaders and to police the market more effectively. Ordinances followed and included some measures to protect the poor – the excise was not to be levied on those receiving alms, or by poll except by consent, and local officeholders were given some powers to examine sub-commissioners suspected of abuse or corruption. But the main message was clear: Parliament would listen to complaints, but in the meantime ‘expect all persons whatsoever shall duly pay all sums imposed… by way of excise’. The excise house was rebuilt as a private dwelling so that future damage could be prosecuted as a felony. Newsbooks echoed the message – the excise was unavoidable until the army was disbanded. The Moderate Intelligencer went further:

  [the rioters] have made a rod for themselves; for had they been quiet, and paid excise, the soldiery might have been nulled and the cause taken away… whereas now, its probable the Parliament will be necessitated to keep an army to preserve themselves, those they employ and pay the debts of the kingdom.56

  As with the recreation days, therefore, there was no initial concession. Just as the Puritan calendar was crucial to the cultural aims of the Presbyterians, the excise was no less essential to their position, and preferable to a land tax. On 4 March it was the assessment that the Lords, an assembly of landholders, refused to renew.57 The winter of 1646/7 saw a resurgent royalism, associated with an attachment to tradition and hostility to the military and the administrative measures necessary to support it. This was not necessarily territory that belonged to Presbyterians. Nonetheless, their immediate prospects looked good. On 11 March one of William Lilly’s clients wanted to know ‘If Presbytery will continue any long time’.58

  The Smithfield riot may have had an indirect effect on parliamentary politics, galvanizing the campaign to disband the army. On the day of the riot a petition had been received from Suffolk calling for a Presbyterian settlement, the suppression of toleration and the disbandment of the army, and it was Presbyterians in Parliament who proposed, four days later, cuts in the number of horse and the disbandment of all infantry units not in garrisons. These moves to disband the army were quickly connected with the mobilization of new forces for service in Ireland. On 20 February a letter arrived from Dublin in which Ormond detailed his woes, including the refusal of the Dublin population to continue to support his troops. He was finally and unequivocally a discredited political force, and Dublin was now very vulnerable.59 With the Confederates in the ascendant a military response was imperative. Disbandment of the English forces became a means of releasing troops for Ireland, and easing the burdens on the English taxpayer.

  Although this was a virtuous circle it was being proposed by politicians hostile to the New Model Army. Within the New Model it was feared that arrears of pay would not be honoured, and a movement developed within the army to demand that soldiers would not be pressed to serve in Ireland without first receiving arrears for service already given, and that soldiers should be given indemnity from prosecution for actions taken in the service of Parliament. Indemnity was a serious issue – there is evidence from Yorkshire of a serious effort to bring soldiers to court after the war and that the prosecution rate for soldiers was considerably higher than for civilians. During the war many horses were taken and if this could be prosecuted as theft it might result in the death penalty – horse theft was one of the more serious crimes in rural England, and some of these cases rumbled on for years.60 Fears that indemnity and arrears would not be granted were well-grounded: the Presbyterian desire to disband, and to export, the army was at least in part politically motivated. It was certainly helpful that it achieved so many good things at once.61

  Discontent in the army in March 1647 prompted direct political intervention. It is clear that by March there were petitions circulating in the army which linked its material grievances to the political conflict. One even ranked the extirpation of ungodliness and the liberty of the subject above the preservation of the privileges of Parliament. At the same time divisions were emerging in London between the Presbyterian petitioning campaign and one launched by radical Independents – prominent among them Lilburne, Walwyn and Overton. During 1646, in the course of tussles with Colonel King, the Earl of Manchester, the court of Common Pleas and the House of Lords, Lilburne had appealed in print to fundamental principles: he should be tried by his peers; the House of Lords had no jurisdiction over him. This was a form of tyranny and his struggle became, in his own eyes and in the pamphlets of his supporters, the struggle of the English people for their liberties. In pamphlets stuffed with legal citations and precedents he launched an attack on the judicial authority of the House of Lords and appealed to the Commons for protection. He was in prison from August 1646 until the autumn of 1647 by the authority of the Lords, and for much of the time his appeal to the Commons was pending. In July 1646 Overton and Walwyn’s pamphlet A Remonstrance of Many Thousand Citizens had taken up Lilburne’s case as an example of a more general political problem, producing something resembling a political platform. It was in March 1647, however, that this process was completed, with the publication of the Large Petition. This made a strong case for popular sovereignty as a restraint on arbitrary power, the means by which Parliament could be called to account: Parliament ‘having its foundation in the free choice of the People’ and the end of all government being ‘the safety and freedom of the governed’. Contrasting the reforms of 1640–42 with recent threats to liberty, it blamed the latter on the authority of the Lords – a not very coded assertion of which House was the supreme authority. The petition was addressed to the Commons, and called on them to ‘be exceeding careful to preserve your just Authority from all prejudices of a Negative voice in any person or persons whatsoever, that may disable you, from making that happy return to your people which they justly expect’.62

  Here were some of the arguments of 1642 – the supremacy of the representative of the people and the refusal to allow a Negative Voice against that representative – taken to a new, and more socially levelling, conclusion. This was not resistance of Parliament to the King, but of citizens to an aristocratic ‘interest’. Similarly, this represented an escalation of the practice of petitioning. During the period 1640–42 pressure had been applied to Parliament by people petitioning on behalf of counties, boroughs or particular interest groups. The Levellers were developing the habit of petitioning on behalf of people of a particular opinion: ‘many thousands, earnestly desiring the glory of God, the freedom of the commonwealth and the peace of all men’. Ultimately, they were to petition on behalf of ‘the people’: a significant, and radical, escalation in the rhetoric of petitions.63

  Parliament was extremely hostile to the Large Petition. On 15 March, as the work of circulating and collecting signatures had begun, it was turned over to the Commons. It was voted a ‘seditious paper’ and two days later the Mayor of London asked the Lords to suppress it. In response a paper was submitted to the Committee for the Suppression of Unlicensed Printing, arguing that it was a genuine petition. As this was heard, Nicholas Tew spoke out strongly in favour of being allowed to petition, and was arrested. This resulted in a violent altercation and the committee ordered the room to be cleared. When it
s order was disobeyed Sir Philip Stapleton grabbed Major Tulidah by the throat and threw him out. The following day, 19 March, the House approved the committal of Tew and sent Tulidah to join him. On 20 March, Walwyn petitioned again, for the release of Tulidah and Tew, and for recognition of the right to petition Parliament as an essential freedom. Tulidah was released on bail about a week later, but Tew remained in prison. Finally, on 20 May, Walwyn submitted a third petition, this time for the release of Tew and for the right to present the Large Petition. In response Parliament ordered the burning of all three petitions.64 The possibility of an alliance therefore emerged between the increasingly politicized army and radical Independents in the City: refusal of the right to petition and a bullying response to political opposition no doubt cemented the connection.65

  But the organization of the army’s campaign came from within the army – it was not a creature of any civilian movement.66 The officers massaged the initiatives within the army into a politically acceptable form and on 21 March received a parliamentary deputation at Saffron Walden. Rather than simply accede to disbandment the commanders also wanted clarification about which regiments would stay in England and so forth and, in particular, what guarantees were on offer in relation to arrears and indemnity. There were divisions – not all officers endorsed all the questions that were put to the delegation – but it was clearly an exercise in assertiveness. There were hardliners among the officers, such as Robert and Thomas Hammond, Robert Lilburne (John’s brother), John Okey, Thomas Pride and Henry Ireton. It is clear though that others in the army were more conciliatory, willing to trust Parliament, and were amenable when the parliamentary commissioners expressed concern about a petition. It is certainly true that there is very little sign of incipient mutiny in March. But the parliamentary commissioners got hold of a copy of the petition, as well as piles of an inflammatory tract (A Warning for all the Counties of England) published clandestinely in London, and they returned to London unnerved.67

  Even the five moderate demands put by the army caused outrage at Westminster and on 27 March anti-army measures were taken. Money must have been part of the reason for their reluctance, but not all. In any case, refusal to pay up set them on a collision course. The revelation on 29 March of letters which showed that the agitation within the army was continuing led to parliamentary attacks on Cromwell and a declaration, sneaked through while the Independents were out of the House, which condemned the ‘mutiny’, and referred to the army as ‘enemies of the state and disturbers of the peace’. Hurriedly penned by Holles, late in the evening, this was the notorious ‘declaration of dislike’ which acted as a permanent impediment to building trust between the New Model and Parliament. Army officers were summoned to the House to explain events at Saffron Walden and denied having secured signatures to the petition by force. In the course of the arguments Holles challenged Ireton to a duel.68

  By the time another parliamentary delegation was despatched to discuss disbandment on 12 April the army had been enraged by a petitioning campaign in Essex for disbandment. Promoted through the pulpits, it was the second such campaign and it prompted a printed reply. A New Found Strategem… to destroy the Army, which Thomason noted had been ‘scattered abroad in the army when the commissioners were sent from Parliament to disband them’, floated the idea that the army, not Parliament, was the safeguard of liberty and property. In this there was clearly the possibility of common cause with John Lilburne, whose prosecution and imprisonment by the Lords had led him to identify that institution as tyrannous. The pamphlet coincided with a revival of the condemned petition, at the initiative of men in Ireton’s regiment, with the intention of sending it up with two members of every troop, despite the threat of imprisonment. This initiative may be the first sign of a new, formal, political organization in the army – the election of ‘agitators’.69

  Shortly afterwards eight cavalry regiments in East Anglia elected agitators to represent them in seeking redress, and a number of infantry regiments followed suit in May. There has been controversy about this term – it lacked some of its modern connotations and using that term rather than one of the contemporary alternatives (adjutator or agent) is perhaps misleading to the modern ear. In origin the agitators seem to have been representing the army’s professional concerns, not acting as the armed wing of London Independency, or the incipient Leveller movement. There was a lot of suspicion about these connections at the time, and many historians have been tempted to see it that way subsequently, but there is no direct evidence of connections between the agitators and London radicals.70 Important as it is to be clear about the limits of their role, however, it is also important to recognize the significance of this development. Formal consultation was taking place about the response of the army to its political masters. Whether it was primarily a consultation about immediate concerns rather than partisan political matters, the appointment (and recognition) of agitators was a significant step towards the creation of an independent political body. There was a risk, soon realized, that this might weaken the power of the military command, if agitators began to make decisions of their own.

  By mid-April the army was alive with militancy. Troops were heard referring to their foes as tyrants and Lilburne’s books were apparently quoted ‘as statute law’. The possibility of an alliance with civilian radicals was openly mooted.71 This reinforced the attractions of an agreement between the army and the King against Parliament, and between Independents and the King against Presbyterians. Later in the summer Jeremy Taylor, a former favourite of Laud’s, published The Liberty of Prophesying, which argued for a latitudinarian church, in which there was freedom of expression for opinions which did not undermine religion or morality. Although he did not embrace sectarianism as a benefit to the discovery of truth, he believed that ‘matters spiritual should not be restrained by punishments corporal’. The King did not approve, but the line was one that might promote an alliance against Presbyterian intolerance. David Jenkins, a Welsh judge, had been thrown into prison for publishing a pamphlet which argued that the rule of law was inseparable from the rule of the King. In prison in September he was apparently able to find common ground with John Lilburne, then much exercised about the issue of parliamentary tyranny, and impressed by the possibility that the King might be a protection against it.72 In April this possible alliance lay behind an approach from the army to Charles to take refuge in its ranks so that he could be restored to his honour and power. It was repudiated at army headquarters but it had still been possible for the Earl of Pembroke to allege that the New Model contained 7,000 Cavaliers seeking to restore the King to his throne.73 These were strange days, when the New Model saw hope in the King rather than its master, when the possibility of such an alliance became a reason for disbandment and when former darlings of Laudianism spoke in favour of freedom of religious expression.

  Despite the growing ferment in the army and the City, Holles and Stapleton were able to press on with disbandment at Westminster. Plans were made for a force with infantry under the command of Philip Skippon and the horse under Edward Massey. From the start arrears of pay had been used as a bargaining counter – those who agreed to disband would be paid them, those who signed up for Ireland would be paid arrears and a month in advance. There had been some difficulty in getting officers to agree to serve, and it seems that many more men would have enlisted under Fairfax and Cromwell. Fairfax, in fact, did not obstruct the work of the commissioners who came to promote disbandment and enlistment, and the initiative was really defeated by the mood within the rank and file. At root it was a matter of trust – the Covenanters had been paid their money, but Parliament was using it as a bargaining counter in the case of its own army.74

  A further element in the increasingly tense political atmosphere was a Presbyterian coup in the City of London, in which control of the militia was put in reliably Presbyterian hands. London’s ‘covenant-engaged’ householders – those who held firm to a vision of a Presbyterian model for fu
rther reformation – sought to recruit the powers of government to their cause, which was best served by those trying to dissolve the armies, and this alliance lay behind a concerted attempt to take control of City institutions. In April the power to nominate to the militia was given back to the City authorities (it had been taken over by Parliament in 1643) and at the same time the militias of the relatively down-market and disorderly suburbs were integrated with the City militia. This was in return for a loan of £200,000 for the Irish expedition, but also cemented an alliance between Presbyterians in the City and Parliament, an alliance that was now, potentially, supported by 18,000 armed men. This had been an important part of the context for A New Found Strategem, and for the election of agitators.75

  By late April a dangerous conjunction was approaching. The Presbyterians in Parliament were increasingly confident about denying arrears and calling men from the New Model to the bar for publishing, authoring or distributing inflammatory tracts. At the same time, within the New Model, agitators provided a ready means by which resentment at this treatment could be transformed into mobilization, and a form of mobilization that could put organized pressure on the officers. A kind of paper war was developing, akin to that in 1642. The army called for the retraction of charges made in the parliamentary declarations, not least the claim that they were ‘enemies of the state and disturbers of the public peace’, and in September compiled a Book of Declarations, rather like that assembled by Husbands in the spring of 1643.76 Control of key institutions in the City had created a power base for a party and there was a renewal of Scottish interest in English affairs. The Covenanters” army had established complete control following the defeat of Alastair McColla in the Highlands, and was remodelled under the command of David Leslie, a supporter of Argyll. Amidst growing alarm at the rise of the New Model in England the possibility of renewed Scottish intervention was mooted.77