The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans to the Accession of King George the Fifth Part 25

While the question was yet in debate, an event happened to hasten the departure of Charles from the Hague. Dr. Dorislaus, a native of Holland, but formerly a professor of Gresham College, and recently employed to draw the charge against the king, arrived as envoy from the parliament to the States.[a] That very evening, while he sat at supper in the inn, six gentlemen with drawn swords entered the room, dragged him from his chair, and murdered him on the floor.[2] Though the a.s.sa.s.sins were suffered to escape, it was soon known that they were Scotsmen, most of them followers of Montrose; and Charles, antic.i.p.ating the demand of justice from the English parliament, gave his final answer to the commissioners, that he was, and always had been, ready to provide for the security of their religion, the union between the kingdoms, and the internal peace and prosperity of Scotland; but that their other demands were irreconcilable with his conscience, his liberty, and his honour.[b] They

[Footnote 1: Clar. iii. 287-292. Baillie, ii. 333. Carte, Letters, i.

238-263. In addition to the covenant, the commissioners required the banishment of Montrose, from which they were induced to recede, and the limitation of the king's followers to one hundred persons.--Carte, Letters, i. 264, 265, 266, 268, 271.]

[Footnote 2: Clarendon, iii. 293. Whitelock, 401. Journals, May 10. The parliament settled two hundred pounds per annum on the son, and gave five hundred pounds to each of the daughters of Dorislaus.--Ib. May 16. Two hundred and fifty pounds was given towards his funeral.--Council Book, May 11.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. May 3.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. May 19.]

acknowledged that he was their king; it was, therefore, their duty to obey, maintain, and defend him; and the performance of this duty he should expect from the committee of estates, the a.s.sembly of the kirk, and the whole nation of Scotland. They departed with this unsatisfactory answer; and Charles, leaving the United Provinces, hastened to St. Germain in France, to visit the queen his mother, with the intention of repairing, after a short stay, to the army of the royalists in Ireland.[1]

That the reader may understand the state of Ireland, he must look back to the period when the despair or patriotism of Ormond surrendered to the parliament the capital of that kingdom.[a] The nuncio, Rinuccini, had then seated himself in the chair of the president of the supreme council at Kilkenny; but his administration was soon marked by disasters, which enabled his rivals to undermine and subvert his authority.[b] The Catholic army of Leinster, under Preston, was defeated on Dungan Hill by Jones, the governor of Dublin, and that of Munster, under the Viscount Taafe, at Clontarf, by the Lord Inchiquin.[2][c] To Rinuccini

[Footnote 1: Balfour, iii. 405; and the Proceedings of the Commissioners of the Church and Kingdoms of Scotland with his Majestie at the Hague.

Edinburgh, printed by Evan Tyler, 1649.]

[Footnote 2: Rushworth, 833, 916. In the battle of Dungan Hill, at the first charge the Commander of the Irish cavalry was slain: his men immediately fled; the infantry repelled several charges, and retired into a bog, where they offered to capitulate. Colonel Flower said he had no authority to grant quarter, but at the same time ordered his men to stand to their arms, and preserved the lives of the earl of Westmeath, Lieutenant-General Bryne, and several officers and soldiers who repaired to his colours. "In the mean time the Scotch colonel Tichburn, and Colonel Moor, of Bankhall's regiments, without mercy put the rest to the sword."

They amounted to between three and four thousand men.--Belling's History of the late Warre in Ireland, MS. ii. 95. I mention this instance to show that Cromwell did not introduce the practice of ma.s.sacre. He followed his predecessors, whose avowed object it was to exterminate the natives.]]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. July.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. August 2.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1649. Nov. 13.]

himself these misfortunes appeared as benefits, for he distrusted Preston and Taafe on account of their attachment to Ormond; and their depression served to exalt his friend and protector, Owen Roe O'Neil, the leader of the men of Ulster. But from such beginnings the nation at large antic.i.p.ated a succession of similar calamities; his adversaries obtained a majority in the general a.s.sembly; and the nuncio, after a declaration that he advanced no claim to temporal authority, prudently avoided a forced abdication, by offering to resign his office.[a] A new council, consisting, in equal number, of men chosen out of the two parties, was appointed; and the marquess of Antrim, the Lord Muskerry, and Geoffrey Brown, were despatched to the queen mother, and her son Charles, to solicit a.s.sistance in money and arms, and to request that the prince would either come and reside in Ireland, or appoint a Catholic lieutenant in his place.[b] Antrim hoped to obtain this high office for himself; but his colleagues were instructed to oppose his pretensions and to acquiesce in the re-appointment of the marquess of Ormond.[1]

During the absence of these envoys, the Lord Inchiquin unexpectedly declared, with his army, in favour of the king against the parliament, and instantly proposed an armistice to the confederate Catholics, as friends to the royal cause. By some the overture was indignantly rejected. Inchiquin, they said, had been their most bitter enemy; he had made it his delight to shed the blood of Irishmen, and to pollute and destroy their altars.

Besides, what pledge could be

[Footnote 1: Philopater Irenaeus, 50-60. Castlehaven, Memoirs, 83.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1648. Jan. 4]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1648. Feb. 27]

given for the fidelity of a man who, by repeatedly changing sides, had already shown that he would always accommodate his conscience to his interest? It were better to march against him now that he was without allies; and, when he should be subdued, Jones with the parliamentary army would necessarily fall. To this reasoning it was replied, that the expedition would require time and money; that provision for the free exercise of religion might be made in the articles; and that, at a moment when the Catholics solicited a reconciliation with the king, they could not in honour destroy those who drew the sword in his favour. In defiance of the remonstrances made by Rinuccini and eight of the bishops, the treaty proceeded;[a] and the nuncio believing, or pretending to believe, that he was a prisoner in Kilkenny, escaped in the night over the wall of the city, and was received at Maryborough with open arms by his friend O'Neil.[b] The council of the Catholics agreed to the armistice, and sought by repeated messages to remove the objections of the nuncio.[c] But zeal or resentment urged him to exceed his powers.[d] He condemned the treaty, excommunicated its abettors, and placed under an interdict the towns in which it should be admitted. But his spiritual weapons were of little avail. The council, with fourteen bishops, appealed from his censures; the forces under Taafe, Clanricard, and Preston, sent back his messengers;[e] and, on the departure of O'Neil, he repaired to the town of Galway, where he was sure of the support of the people, though in opposition to the sense of the mayor and the merchants. As a last effort, he summoned a national synod at Galway;[f]

but the council protested against it; Clanricard surrounded the town with his army; and

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1648. April 27.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1648. May 9.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1648. May 22.]

[Sidenote d: A.D. 1648. May 27.]

[Sidenote e: A.D. 1648. May 31.]

[Sidenote f: A.D. 1648. Sept. 1.]

the inhabitants, opening the gates, made their submission.[1]

War was now openly declared between the two parties. On the one hand, Jones in Dublin, and Monk in Ulster, concluded truces with O'Neil, that he might be in a better condition to oppose the common enemy; on the other, Inchiquin joined with Preston to support the authority of the council against O'Neil. Inroads were reciprocally made; towns were taken and retaken; and large armies were repeatedly brought in face of each other.

The council, however, began to a.s.sume a bolder tone:[a] they proclaimed O'Neil a rebel and traitor; and, on the tardy arrival of Ormond with the commission of lord-lieutenant, sent to Rinuccini himself an order to quit the kingdom,[b] with the information that they had accused him to the pope of certain high crimes and misdemeanors.[2]

[Footnote 1: See Desiderata Cur. Hib. ii. 511; Carte, ii. 20, 31-36; Belling, in his MS. History of the late War in Ireland, part iv. 1-40. He has inserted most of the papers which pa.s.sed between the parties in this work. See also Philopater Irenaeus, i. 60, 86; ii. 90, 94; Walsh, History and Vindication, App. 33-40; Ponce, 90.]

[Footnote 2: The charge may be seen in Philopater Iren. i. 150-160; Clarendon, viii. 68. Oxford, 1726. It is evident that the conduct of Rinuccini in breaking the first peace was not only reprehensible in itself, but productive of the most calamitous consequences both to the cause of royalty and the civil and religious interests of the Irish Catholics. The following is the ground on which he attempts to justify himself. Laying it down as an undeniable truth that the Irish people had as good a right to the establishment of their religion in their native country, as the Covenanters in Scotland, or the Presbyterians in England, he maintains that it was his duty to make this the great object of his proceedings. When the peace was concluded, Charles was a prisoner in the hands of the Scots, who had solemnly sworn to abolish the Catholic religion; and the English royalists had been subdued by the parliament, which by repeated votes and declarations had bound itself to extirpate the Irish race, and parcel out the island among foreign adventurers. Now there was no human probability that Charles would ever be restored to his throne, but on such conditions as the parliament and the Scots should prescribe; and that, on their demand, he would, after some struggle, sacrifice the Irish Catholics, was plain from what had pa.s.sed in his different negotiations with the parliament, from his disavowal of Glamorgan's commission, and from the obstinacy with which his lieutenant, Ormond, had opposed the claims of the confederates. Hence he inferred that a peace, which left the establishment of religion to the subsequent determination of the king, afforded no security, but, on the contrary, was an abandonment of the cause for which the Catholics had a.s.sociated; and that it therefore became him, holding the situation which he did, to oppose it by every means in his power.--MS.

narrative of Rinuccini's proceedings, written to be delivered to the pope; and Ponce, 271.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1648. Sept. 3.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1648. Oct. 19.]

But he continued to issue his mandates in defiance of their orders and threats; nor was it till after the new pacification between Charles and the confederates had been published, and the execution of the king had fixed the public opinion on the pernicious result of his counsels,[a] that shame and apprehension drove him from Ireland to France,[b] whence, after a few months, he was recalled to Rome.

The negotiation between Ormond and the Catholics had continued for three months;[c] in January the danger which threatened the royal person induced the latter to recede from their claims, and trust to the future grat.i.tude and honour of their sovereign. They engaged to maintain at their own expense an army of seventeen thousand five hundred men, to be employed against the common enemy; and the king, on his part, consented that the free exercise of the Catholic wors.h.i.+p should be permitted; that twelve commissioners of trust appointed by the a.s.sembly should aid the lord-lieutenant in the internal administration; that the Court of Wards and several other grievances should be abolished; that a parliament should be called as soon as the majority of commissioners might deem it expedient, and in that parliament the persecuting laws on the subject of religion, with others injurious to the trade and commerce

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Jan. 17.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. Jan. 30.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1649. Feb. 23.]

of Ireland, should be repealed, and the independence of the Irish on the English parliament should be established.[1]

The royal interest was now predominant in Ireland. The fleet under Prince Rupert rode triumphant off the coast; the parliamentary commanders, Jones in Dublin, Monk in Belfast, and Coote in Londonderry, were almost confined within the limits of their respective garrisons; and Inchiquin in Munster, the Scottish regiments in Ulster, and the great body of the Catholics adhering to the supreme council, had proclaimed the king, and acknowledged the authority of his lieutenant. It was during this favourable state of things that Charles received and accepted the invitation of Ormond;[a] but his voyage was necessarily delayed through want of money, and his ardour was repeatedly checked by the artful insinuation of some among his counsellors, who secretly feared that, if he were once at the head of a Catholic army, he would listen to the demands of the Catholics for the establishment of their religion.[2] On the contrary, to the leaders in London, the danger of losing Ireland became a source of the most perplexing solicitude. The office of lord lieutenant was offered to Cromwell.[b] He affected to hesitate; at his request two officers from each corps received orders to meet him at Whitehall, and seek the Lord in prayer;[c] and, after a delay of two weeks, he condescended to submit his shoulders to the burthen, because he had now learned that it was the will of Heaven.[3][d]

Hi demands,

[Footnote 1: Phil. Iren. i. 166. Walsh, App. 43-64. Whitelock, 391. Charles approved and promised to observe this peace.--Carte's Letters, ii. 367.]

[Footnote 2: Carte, Letters, i. 258, 262.]

[Footnote 3: Journals, March 30. Whitelock, 389, 391, 392.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. March 29.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. March 15.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1649. March 23.]

[Sidenote d: A.D. 1649. March 29.]

however, were so numerous, the preparations to be made so extensive, that it was necessary to have recourse in the interval to other expedients for the preservation of the forces and places which still admitted the authority of the parliament. One of these was to allure to the cause of the Independents the Catholics of the two kingdoms; for which purpose, the sentiments of Sir Kenelm Digby and Sir John Winter were sounded,[a] and conferences were held, through the agency of the Spanish amba.s.sador, with O'Reilly and Quin, two Irish ecclesiastics.[b] It was proposed that toleration should be granted for the exercise of the Catholic wors.h.i.+p, without any penal disqualifications, and that the Catholics in return should disclaim the temporal pretensions of the pope, and maintain ten thousand men for the service of the commonwealth.

In aid of this project, Digby, Winter, and the Abbe Montague were suffered to come to England under the pretence of compounding for their estates; and the celebrated Thomas White, a secular clergyman, published a work ent.i.tled "The Grounds of Obedience and Government," to show that the people may be released from their obedience to the civil magistrate by his misconduct; and that, when he is once deposed (whether justly or unjustly makes no difference), it may be for the common interest to acquiesce in his removal, rather than attempt his restoration.

That this doctrine was satisfactory to the men in power, cannot be doubted; but they had so often reproached the late king with a coalition with the papists, that they dared not to make the experiment, and after some time, to blind perhaps the eyes of the people, severe votes were pa.s.sed against

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. March.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. April.]

Digby, Montague, and Winter, and orders were given for the apprehension of priests and Jesuits.[1]

In Ireland an attempt was made to fortify the parliamentary party with the friendly aid of O'Neil.[a] That chieftain had received proposals from Ormond, but his jealousy of the commissioners of trusts, his former adversaries, provoked him to break off the treaty with the lord lieutenant,[b] and to send a messenger of his own with a tender of his services to Charles.[c] Immediately the earl of Castlehaven, by order of Ormond, attacked and reduced his garrisons of Maryborough and Athy;[d] and O'Neil, in revenge, listened to the suggestions of Monk, who had retired before the superior force of the Scottish royalists from Belfast to Dundalk.[e] A cessation of hostilities was concluded for three months;[f]

and the proposals of the Irish chieftain, modified by Monk, were transmitted to England for the ratification of parliament. By the "grandees" it was thought imprudent to submit them to an examination, which would make them public; but the answer returned satisfied the contracting parties:[g] Monk supplied O'Neil with ammunition, and O'Neil undertook to intercept the communication between the Scottish regiments of the north and the grand army under Ormond in the heart of the kingdom.[2]

[Footnote 1: On this obscure subject may be consulted Walker, ii. 150; Carte's Collection of Letters, i. 216, 219, 221, 222, 224, 267, 272, 297; ii. 363, 364; and the Journals, Aug. 31.]

[Footnote 2: O'Neil demanded liberty of conscience for himself, his followers, and their posterity; the undisturbed possession of their lands, as long as they remained faithful to the parliament; and, in return for his services, the restoration of his ancestor's estate, or an equivalent. (See both his draft, and the corrected copy by Monk, in Philop. Iren. i. 191, and in Walker, ii. 233-238.) His agent, on his arrival in London, was asked by the grandees why he applied to them, and refused to treat with Ormond.