asked Rupert eagerly of a prisoner whom chance threw into his hands an hour or two before Marston Moor, and a couple of months after the battle a parliamentary newspaper mentions Cromwell by the nickname of ‘Ironside; for that title was given him by Prince Rupert after his defeat near York’ (Mercurius Civicus, 16–26 Sept. 1644; Gardiner, Great Civil War, i. 449). The name Ironside or Ironsides speedily became popular with the army, and was in later times extended from the commander to his troopers.
But Cromwell was now something more than a mere military leader. The last few months had made him the head of a political party also. As early as April 1644 Baillie distinguishes him by the title of ‘the great independent’ (Baillie, Letters, ii. 153). In his government of the Isle of Ely Cromwell, while he suppressed the choral service of the cathedral as ‘unedifying and offensive’ (Carlyle, Letter xix.), had allowed his soldiers and their ministers the largest license of preaching and worship. ‘It is become a mere Amsterdam,’ complained an incensed presbyterian (Manchester’s Quarrel with Cromwell, 73).
In Manchester’s councils also Cromwell had used the great influence his position gave him on behalf of the independents. ‘Manchester himself,’ writes Baillie, ‘a sweet, meek man, permitted his lieutenant-general Cromwell to guide all the army at his pleasure; the man is a very wise and active head, universally well beloved, as religious and stout; being a known independent, the most of the soldiers who loved new ways put themselves under his command’ (Letters, ii. 229). Even Cromwell’s influence was hardly sufficient to protect them. In December 1643 a presbyterian colonel at Lincoln imprisoned a number of Cromwell’s troopers for attending a conventicle. In March 1644 Major-general Crawford cashiered a lieutenant-colonel on the ground that he was an anabaptist. ‘Admit he be,’ wrote Cromwell, ‘shall that render him incapable to serve the public ? Sir, the state in choosing men to serve it takes no notice of their opinions; if they be willing faithfully to serve it, that satisfies’ (Carlyle, Letter xx.) Manchester’s army was split into two factions—the presbyterians headed by Crawford, the independents headed by Cromwell, struggling with each other for the guidance of their commander. A political difference between Cromwell and Manchester seems to have decided the contest in favour of Crawford. In June, while the combined armies were besieging York, Vane appeared in the camp on a secret mission from the committee of both kingdoms to gain the consent of the generals to a plan for the actual or virtual deposition of Charles as the necessary preliminary of a satisfactory settlement. All three refused, but Leven and the Scots are mentioned as specially hostile to the proposal. ‘Though no actual evidence exists on the subject, it is in the highest degree probable that Cromwell was won over to Vane’s side, and that his quarrel with the Scots and with Manchester as the supporter of the Scots dates from these discussions outside the walls of York’ (Gardiner, History of the Great Civil War, i. 432). Manchester’s inactivity during the two months which followed the capture of York still further alienated Cromwell from him. Believing that if Crawford’s evil influence were removed Manchester’s inactivity and the dissensions of the army would be ended, he demanded Crawford’s removal. Manchester and his two subordinates came to London in September 1644 to lay the case before the committee of both kingdoms. At first Cromwell peremptorily demanded Crawford’s dismissal, and threatened that his colonels would lay down their arms if this were refused; but he speedily recognised that he had gone too far, and changed his tactics. Abandoning the personal attack on Crawford, he devoted himself to the attainment of the aims which had caused the quarrel. From Manchester he obtained a declaration of his resolution to push on with all speed against the common enemy. From the House of Commons he secured the appointment of a committee ‘to consider the means of uniting presbyterians and independents, and, in case that cannot be done, to endeavour the finding out some way how far tender consciences, who cannot in all things submit to the common rule which shall be established, may be borne with according to the word and as may stand with the public peace’ (13 Sept. 1644; Gardiner, History of the Great Civil War, i. 482). This, though hardly, as Baillie terms it, ‘really an act of parliament for the toleration of the sectaries,’ was the most important step towards toleration taken since the war began.
At the second battle of Newbury in the following month Cromwell was one of the commanders of the division which was sent to storm Prince Maurice’s entrenchments at Speen, on the west of the king’s position, while Manchester was to attack it on its northern face at Shaw House. But Manchester delayed his attack till an hour and a half after the other force was engaged, wasted the results of their successes, and effected nothing himself. The same slowness or incapacity marked his movements before and after the battle, and Cromwell, putting to-
