by Simon Parke
‘I trust you, your majesty, let us be clear,’ said Hammond, backing down, ‘but there are some who do not.’
‘Suspicion suits no one. It can make you ill, I am told.’
‘They wish me to sack Legge and certain other members of your household.’
‘Who wishes this?’
‘Parliament. They call them delinquents for helping you to escape.’
‘You are no delinquent for saving the life of the king; you should be knighted!’
The thought had crossed Hammond’s mind. ‘I have told them as much, your majesty – without talk of a knighthood – and resisted their call.’
‘Then that is the end of the matter.’
A pause.
‘It is not quite the end, your majesty.’
‘It is surely the end, for you are the governor of this island; and I am the king.’
‘Only now the army demand the same; Fairfax and Ireton press me on the matter.’
‘Fairfax and Ireton? Now there is an ill-matched pair . . . in agreement only on the size of Cromwell’s wart!’
It was true they were cut from a different cloth. Both had been soldiers against the king in war; but Fairfax the gentler towards him in peace, wanting no more trouble now – just a return to how things were, with due compromise all round.
‘Even so . . .’ This was difficult for Hammond.
‘You buckle like a coward at their request.’
‘No, again I stand firm.’
Charles’ eyebrows rose in surprise. ‘Good man, good man. And you will be rewarded, of course, this goes without saying. I can quite see you as an earl of the realm.’
And with the conversation concluded, Charles withdrew to make plans for his escape. Now he had reached agreement with the Scots, he must make his way to France and await developments. The French and the Scots would work together to restore him to his throne.
*
Meanwhile, Firebrace waited for him in his quarters.
‘The boat is ready, your majesty. And there is no time to be wasted.’
Matters were proceeding at great pace, and providentially so. Charles had written to Henrietta, asking that she arrange a French ship to be ready at Southampton. Firebrace informed him that the ship was now ready, so he must leave tonight.
‘I will leave the castle in a relaxed fashion, as if taking an evening stroll,’ he said.
‘Yes, sire.’
‘I’ll need my riding boots.’
‘They are here, sire.’
Firebrace knelt down to ease them on to the sweating royal feet. He was excited to be part of such momentous events – the release of the king from captivity. He had thought of nothing else all day, but had chopped logs for the king’s fireplace, to pretend normality. He always felt better for chopping logs, it calmed his mind. He’d even taken to chopping logs for Colonel Hammond, who’d asked him one day to fill his grate as well. Firebrace believed that only good could come from keeping well with the governor, that such connection would serve the king’s cause. And so he chopped wood for both, and found Hammond an easy man to like, despite being the enemy. They discovered a shared interest in the art of duelling, particularly with the fine-bladed Italian rapier. And so sometimes, as Firebrace stacked logs in Hammond’s study, they would discuss footwork, guards, attacks, defences and counter-attacks, which was a pleasing way to pass the time.
The soldiers, however, were less kind and would sometimes mock his chopping.
‘It’ll be the king’s head next!’ they shouted amiably and Firebrace would laugh. Little did they know how soon the king would be away from their clumsy care, and would not need these logs where he was going. He’d heard it was warmer in France.
‘And now we must hurry,’ said Charles – as if Firebrace didn’t know this, for he’d been hurrying all day in his mind. With the king leading, they walked together down the worn stone stairs, making for the gatehouse, from where they would proceed towards the sea. But before entering the courtyard, Charles glanced out through the narrow window at the weathervane.
‘The wind is not kind,’ he said, pausing.
‘Please hurry, sire.’ He did not understand why Charles was delaying.
‘But the wind,’ said Charles. ‘It is unfavourable.’
‘The wind can turn.’
‘This wind will not take us to France.’
‘The wind can change, sire. A westerly is more usual; there will be a westerly tonight when you need it. This wind need not detain us now.’
‘No, we must perhaps wait awhile. I sense this.’
‘We must leave, your majesty.’
‘We will calm ourselves for a moment; this is the wiser path.’
Firebrace was not for calming, for the king knew nothing about wise paths.
‘There can be no calm until you are safe in France, sire. Then we shall be calm, and find the peace that eludes us now.’
‘We will wait . . . wait, watch and allow the weathervane to change. Walk with me in a casual fashion in the courtyard, where we will take the evening air.’
‘This is no time for strolling, sire, I really think—’
‘There is a season for everything.’
And so they arrived in the courtyard, pretending calm . . . but stepped into unusual activity around the castle gate, where Hammond could be seen dismounting and hurling orders, like the soldier he’d once been. He was a disturbed man and not the one Charles had left just an hour ago. And then the wooden gates across the inner entrance to the courtyard swung heavily shut and a doubled guard appeared – younger men he had not seen before, men who did not hobble and wheeze.
‘I will not need my riding boots,’ said the king. ‘France must wait. There will be another time.’
March 1648
A few weeks later – time slowed, accelerated and slowed here – Hammond sat alone in his study. The candles flickered as he wrote in the hand of a broken man. Disappointed hope is a terrible thing and this day he had seen it die; seen the laughing and smug faces of the departing Scottish commissioners – an inscrutable triumph writ across their bearded chops. He had seen also the resigned weariness of the negotiators of parliament. There would be no agreement with the Commons of England. Parliament had been tricked, sent away with nothing; there was no question about that.
And so he picked up his quill, dipped it in black ink and began to write to the speaker of the House of Lords.
Col. Robert Hammond
Governor of the Isle of Wight
Carisbrooke Castle
13 March 1648
My lord, this day I was in the presence of the king when he communicated to the commissioners of parliament his answer to the bills and propositions lately presented to him; and for which we had such high hopes. But these are now a deflated thing, and finding matters contrary to my wishes and expectations, I believe it my duty to take stricter care of the king’s person, who daily becomes less plain in his dealings with us.
In particular, I have decided to remove all from about him – his excessive household – that are not here by authority of parliament. Let him feel the chill of our resolve in this and other matters.
By the blessing of God, I shall omit nothing in my service of parliament, in relation to this dangerous trust. But yet, my lord, I must humbly beg of you – for I know it is impossible to secure the king here for long – that his person may be removed from this island as soon as is possible. It does not go well with us to have him here. And if this be not possible, I ask then that I may be discharged from my employment, it being a great burden upon my soul and quite insupportable to me.
Yours in faithful trust,
Robert Hammond
*
The king was furious when Hammond told him on their morning walk.
‘Ten of your household are to go, y
our majesty. It has been decided.’
Charles looked at the list of departures. ‘You appear not to like servants with a Scots accent.’
‘It is not the accent that offends, but those who imagine themselves to be postmen.’
‘Is it you they trouble? Or Farmer Cromwell?’
Hammond thought this impertinent. ‘They trouble us all.’
‘The Venetian ambassador says Mr Cromwell can produce tears at a moment’s notice. I merely wondered if he’d been crying in your ear?’
‘It has been decided, sire.’ Hammond would not be drawn.
‘And such a plain man, don’t you think?’ continued Charles. ‘In the manner of his dress, I mean – which appears the creation of a poor country tailor. No signs of a meeting with elegance in that man.’
Charles looked out to sea, small but imperious.
‘You seem not to like the lieutenant-general today, sire.’
‘I like him well enough . . . for a farmer.’
‘And lately a soldier, who defeated your armies soundly.’
Charles ignored that. ‘No, I merely question what has changed, Colonel? For I thought we agreed my household would remain as it was.’
‘We did not agree, your majesty. I stated my intention that it would.’
‘When you imagined yourself in charge of this castle.’
‘I am in charge of this castle.’ Now Hammond was bristling.
‘And is it true that he loses his temper quite horribly?’ asked Charles. ‘I hear Mr Cromwell has an exceedingly fiery temper, which is most unsuitable – to have no control over one’s temper. Wouldn’t you agree?’
‘This path leads nowhere, your majesty.’
‘I suppose with seven sisters – he had seven sisters, I believe – one would learn to cry . . . otherwise one might stand out rather.’
Charles could not countenance crying. His brother Henry laughed at him if he cried – just as he’d laugh now at the tears of the farmer.
‘You seem too interested in this man, sire. Does he haunt you?’
‘I think rather he haunts you, Colonel, with dark messages.’
‘My intention has altered, that is all; and that is the end of the matter.’
Charles smiled with mockery. ‘Your intentions change like the weathervane.’
‘As do your own, sire. Is it the wind from the north we should most fear now? I hear you like it the best.’
They walked a little in silence along the castle’s outer wall. Hammond felt strangely calm in this contest . . . a surprising equal to this man who had once brought on nerves and deference; and Charles walked with a little difficulty up the hills, his legs not strong.
‘I did not regard you as a weak man, Hammond,’ he said, pausing to look out towards the sea. ‘Really I did not, quite the opposite in fact; I spoke highly of you. But this is a monstrous violation of the king’s prerogative. I do not believe that too strong a wording.’
But the decision was made. Hammond could be stubborn as well, and later that day, Legge – one of those destined to leave – bid farewell to his master.
‘My work goes on, sire,’ he said with a solemn bow. He did not know what work that was or what future awaited him, for he had no employment – a king’s man since the war, and a soldier during it. He had lost touch with the civil life, though he’d worked for the Wilshere family when younger. They might take him back.
‘You will not go unrewarded,’ said Charles solemnly, king to subject, though he hardly meant it. He would not think much of Legge or his well-being in the coming months.
*
The evicted servants, a disgruntled band, travelled to Newport by horse; there they settled down in an inn and ordered ale, and rabbit and carrot pie. They spoke much of injustice and their fears for the king’s safety, with little regard for who overheard them . . . which may not have served the king’s cause.
For in the same inn that night was Captain John Burley, formerly of the navy (before it turned traitor and Roundhead), and before that, a royalist soldier. With much grievance stored in his soul, he was not a man to be pushed around, and when he heard the stories of these servants, evicted so harshly, he was much stirred. How dare they sack the king’s household? And when, dear God, would these intolerable behaviours cease? He, for one, would not tolerate such treatment of Good King Charles. It was time to act, and he called a young servant.
‘Go fetch the town drum, boy! And let us save the king!’
On receiving the drum, quickly acquired from the mayor’s lodgings, he had it beaten loudly in the streets of Newport, shouting, ‘For God, the king and the people!’ And he gained a following, though mainly of women and children with little else to do. No men in Newport followed him – a disappointment, for he desired the overthrow of all forces against the king and he needed the men. The mayor, however, was horrified and asked him to give the drum back.
‘What are you doing with my drum?’ he asked when he caught up with Captain Burley.
‘Calling the town to arms, Mayor!’
‘Are you mad in the head, sir?’
‘For God, the king and the people!’ shouted Burley.
‘I want my drum back.’
‘When the king is free from bondage, and only then, shall the drum be returned!’
Captain Burley was done with this appeasing of evil. And rumours of insurrection were quick to take wing, causing panic among the king’s gaolers. Captain Basket of Cowes Castle took time away from Edward to alert the navy in the Solent to be watchful.
‘Watch for those damn Dutch ships!’
There were Dutch ships anchored nearby and they’d been causing concern; but while nothing came of it and the drum beat stopped, two hundred additional soldiers of the New Model Army arrived on the island soon after.
‘Burley tried for treason and hanged in Winchester,’ was printed on a flier and distributed around Newport to deter others. Hammond felt this to be an overreaction. The man was an idiot only, but you couldn’t be too careful these days. ‘Every wedge is thin at its beginning,’ was the wisdom of the court.
‘The only man to be executed for beating a drum,’ Hammond said to Captain Basket.
But the captain had no qualms with the punishment. ‘You do not beat a drum for God and the king, when God and the king are opposed.’
Hammond did not mention Edward.
April 1648
‘When did it change, Oliver?’
‘I have known in my soul since Putney; but sometimes I have forgotten, for perhaps I wished it were not so. This is what Wood thinks.’
‘What does it matter what Wood thinks? He is a louse.’
‘A louse with keen eyes.’
Elizabeth and Oliver lay in the four-poster, with the curtains up, winter now passed. It was the time before sleep, for musing and reflection, when the candle flickers and the day is done. Such moments took Oliver back to the battlefield tents, scattered across England, when the guns quietened and the horses grazed, and he would write letters to Elizabeth by candlelight: ‘You are dearer to me than any creature, let that suffice,’ he’d said. And he didn’t know it, but Elizabeth had kept that one, somewhere in a drawer. For a long time, he’d even carried a line of hers, written to him before Marston Moor: ‘Truly my life is but half a life in your absence.’ In that moment, he had wanted to walk from Yorkshire to Ely to be with her; and yes, he was angry that the king had kept him from his wife . . . though he could be angry with her when she pressed, as she did now.
‘And what did you forget?’
‘That the king deceives; that the king always deceives. He is bloody and inconstant in word.’
Elizabeth snorted. ‘He fights for his life, Oliver. It is what any man would do . . . it’s what you have done.’
‘His life is not in danger, Elizabeth, it never has been.�
�� He was so weary of this conversation. ‘But his integrity is; he does not deserve restoration.’
‘You think you deserve more reverence from the king?’
It was not really an answer. They lay in silence a while.
‘I have not told you,’ said Oliver, sitting up. He was hurt by her words and now pushed the pillow behind him as a cushion against the headboard.
‘You have not told me what?’
‘Though no doubt you will brush it away as if nothing, and find in it a new way to praise Charles.’
‘Of what do you speak, Oliver?’
‘We were close to agreement last November, the king and I.’
‘I am aware.’
‘Very close. We offered him religious toleration, unlike either the Scots or parliament. So he could have kept his beloved bishops; and really, that is the most of what he wishes. He clings to his bishops most of all . . . and then we received news.’
‘What sort of news? You tell a slow story and I will soon be asleep.’
‘An army spy in the king’s bedchamber told us that on the same day the king spoke with Henry and me, he wrote also to Henrietta.’
‘So?’
‘We were informed that the letter would be sewn into a saddle; and that this saddle would be brought to the Blue Boar Inn at Holborn at ten o’clock that night. The messenger would then ride on the saddle to Dover, where people waited, who knew what to do.’
‘And you believed this?’
‘Henry and I travelled to the Blue Boar, dressed as troopers.’
‘I should like to have seen that.’
‘And on arrival at the inn, we went inside and sat with our beer; it was Morning Dew, a sweet ale, as I remember.’ He remembered good ale. ‘But we left a watch outside, to give warning of the courier’s arrival.’
‘And no one recognized these two “troopers”?’
‘A busy place does not question. And then, at ten, the man with the saddle arrived, so we rose, went out with drawn swords and approached the courier. We told him everyone was being searched, to put him at ease; but told him that as he looked honest, we’d just search his saddle. And this we did, taking it inside and cutting it open.’
