32 THE BATTLE OF EDGEHILL January Sir Edward Stradling, 1 and Sir Thomas Lunsford. 1 There are thus twelve regiments present at Edgehill, and there may possibly have been more whose services remained un- chronicled, since Charles had nineteen three weeks after the battle. 2 Deducting for desertion the same proportion from the royalists as from the parliamentarians, Charles would have slightly less than 9,500 foot. He had also about 2,500 horse and from 1,200 to 1,500 dragoons. As regards numbers the two armies were thus not unevenly matched, but the parliamentarians were much better equipped. They had the supplies in the Tower, brought thither from Hull, which had been the magazine for the Scots war, and the muni- tions which Henrietta Maria dispatched to her husband from Holland but which were captured at sea. 3 Charles, however, had to depend on private stores and the weapons of the militia, when he could seize them. These resources proved rather inadequate. Clarendon, writing of Edgehill, states that the foot (all but three or four hundred who marched without any weapon but a cudgel) 4 were armed with muskets and bags for their powder, and pikes ; but in the whole body there was not one pikeman had a corslet, and very few musketeers who had swords. He adds that ' there were many companies of the common soldiers who had scarce eaten bread in eight and forty hours '. As for the horse, the officers had their full desire if they were able to procure old backs and breasts and pots, 5 with pistols or carbines for their two or three front ranks, and swords for the rest ; themselves (and some soldiers by their examples) having gotten, besides their pistols and swords, a short pole-axe. 6 According to the same writer Charles's artillery train ' was but mean ' and badly supplied. Essex, on the other hand, had ample artillery, but only half of it arrived on the battlefield in time. 7 The next step is to consider how the two armies were drawn up. It is clear that the parliamentarians were in two lines. On their extreme right were some dragoons. Then came three regiments of horse, of which two, Balfour's and Stapleton's, were in the front, and Feilding's in the rear. Next were the infantry, ' most of them a good space behind the horse, when we began to 1 Captured by the parliamentarians (Clarendon, vi. 94 ; Carte, I. ii ; and parlia- mentary authorities). 2 At least he issued a warrant for the payment of nineteen. Below, p. 43. 3 Gardiner, Great Civil War, i. 36-7. 4 Bulstrode (Memoirs, 75, 85-6) mentions 'hundreds of Welchmen ' who 'had no arms but pitchforks, and such like tools, and many only with good cudgels '. 5 A light headpiece (C. H. Firth, Cromwell's Army, p. 118.) 6 History, vi. 73, 83. 7 Firth, pp. 152-3
