The Works of Thomas Carlyle/Volume 6/Letter 50
The Ports are all ordered to be shut; embargo laid on ships. Read in the Commons Journals again ‘Saturday 13th Nov. Colonel Whalley was called in; and made a particular Relation of all the circumstances concerning the King’s going away from Hampton Court. He did likewise deliver-in a Letter directed unto him from Lieutenant-General Cromwell, concerning some rumours and reports of some design of danger to the person and life of the King: The which was read. Ordered, That Colonel Whalley do put in writing the said Relation, and set his hand to it; and That he do leave a Copy of the said Letter from Lieutenant-General Cromwell.’[1]
Colonel Whalley’s Relation exists; and a much fuller Relation and pair of Relations concerning this Flight and what preceded and followed it, as viewed from the Royalist side, by two parties to the business, exist:[2] none of which shall concern us here. Lieutenant-General Cromwell’s Letter to Whalley also exists; a short insignificant Note: here it is, fished from the Dust-Abysses, which refuse to disclose the other. Whalley is ‘Cousin Whalley’ as we may remember; Aunt Frances’s and the Squire of Kerton’s Son,—a Nottinghamshire man.[3]
“FOR MY BELOVED COUSIN, COLONEL WHALLEY, AT HAMPTON COURT: THESE”
Dear Cos. Whalley,—There are rumours abroad of some intended attempt on his Majesty’s person. Therefore I pray have a care of your guards. If any such thing should be done, it would be accounted a most horrid act. * * * Yours,
See, among the Old Pamphlets, Letters to the like effect from Royalist Parties: also a Letter of thanks from the King to Whalley;—ending with a desire, ‘to send the black-gray bitch to the Duke of Richmond,’ on the part of his Majesty: Letters from etc., Letters to etc., in great quantities.[5] For us here this brief notice of one Letter shall suffice:
‘Monday 15th November 1647. Letter from Colonel Robert Hammond, Governor of the Isle of Wight, Cowes, 13° Novembris, signifying that the King is come into the Isle of Wight.’[6] The King, after a night and a day of riding, saw not well whither else to go. He delivered himself to Robert Hammond;[7] came into the Isle of Wight. Robert Hammond is ordered to keep him strictly within Carisbrook Castle and the adjoining grounds, in a vigilant though altogether respectful manner.
This same ‘Monday’ when Hammond’s Letter arrives in London is the day of the mutinous Rendezvous ‘in Corkbush Field, between Hertford and Ware’;[8] where Cromwell and the General Officers had to front the Levelling Principle, in a most dangerous manner, and trample it out or be trampled out by it on the spot. Eleven Mutineers are ordered from the ranks; tried by Court-Martial on the Field; three of them condemned to be shot;—throw dice for their life, and one is shot, there and then. The name of him is Arnald; long memorable among the Levellers. A very dangerous Review service!—Head-quarters now change to Windsor.
- ↑ Commons Journals, v. 358.
- ↑ Berkley’s Memoirs (printed, London, 1699); Ashburnham’s Narrative (printed, London, 1830);—which require to be sifted, and contrasted with each other and with third parties, by whoever is still curious on this matter; each of these Narratives being properly a Pleading, intended to clear the Writer of all blame, in the first place.
- ↑ See antea, p. 26, note.
- ↑ King’s Pamphlets, small 4to, no. 347, § 15, p. 7.
- ↑ Parliamentary History, xvi. 324-30.
- ↑ Commons Journals, in die (v. 359).
- ↑ Berkley’s and Ashburnbam’s Narratives.
- ↑ Rushworth, vii. 875.