The Works of Thomas Carlyle/Volume 6/Winceby Fight
Lincolnshire, which has now become one of the Associated Seven,[1] and is still much overrun by Newarkers and Northern Papists, shall at last be delivered.
Hull siege still continues, with obstinate sally and onslaught; on the other hand, Lynn siege, which the Earl of Manchester was busy in, has prosperously ended; and the Earl himself, with his foot regiments, is now also here; united, in loose quarters, with Cromwell and Fairfax, in the Boston region, and able probably to undertake somewhat. Cromwell and Fairfax with the horse, we perceive, have still the brunt of the work to do. Here, after much marching and skirmishing, is an account of Winceby Fight, their chief exploit in those parts, which cleared the country of the Newarkers, General Kings, and renegade Sir John Hendersons;—as recorded by loud-spoken Vicars. In spite of brevity we must copy the Narrative. Cromwell himself was nearer death in this action than ever in any other; the victory too made its due figure, and ‘appeared in the world.’
Winceby, a small upland hamlet, in the Wolds, not among the Fens, of Lincolnshire, is some five miles west of Horncastle. The confused memory of this Fight is still fresh there; the Lane along which the chase went bears ever since the name of ‘Slash Lane,’ and poor Tradition maunders about it as she can. Hear Vicars, a poor human soul zealously prophesying as if through the organs of an ass,—in a not mendacious, yet loud-spoken, exaggerative, more or less asinine manner:[2]
* * * ‘All that night,’ Tuesday 10th October 1643, ‘we were drawing our horse to the appointed rendezvous; and the next morning, being Wednesday, my Lord’ Manchester ‘gave order that the whole force, both horse and foot, should be drawn up to Bolingbroke Hill, where he would expect the enemy, being the only convenient ground to fight with him. But Colonel Cromwell was no way satisfied that we should fight; our horse being extremely wearied with hard duty two or three days together.
‘The enemy also drew, that’ Wednesday ‘morning, their whole body of horse and dragooners into the field, being 74 colours of horse, and 21 colours of dragoons, in all 95 colours. We had not many more than half so many colours of horse and dragooners; but I believe we had as many men,—besides our foot, which indeed could not be drawn up until it was very late. The enemy’s word was “Cavendish”;’—he that was killed in the Bog; ‘and ours was “Religion.” I believe that as we had no notice of the enemy’s coming towards us, so they had as little of our preparation to fight with them. It was about twelve of the clock ere our horse and dragooners were drawn up. After that we marched about a mile nearer the enemy; and then we began to descry him, by little and little, coming towards us. Until this time we did not know we should fight; but so soon as our men had knowledge of the enemy’s coming, they were very full of joy and resolution, thinking it a great mercy that they should now fight with him. Our men went on in several bodies, singing Psalms. Quartermaster-General Vermuyden with five troops had the forlorn-hope, and Colonel Cromwell the van, assisted with other of my Lord’s troops, and seconded by Sir T. Fairfax. Both armies met about Ixbie, if I mistake not the Town’s name,’—you do mistake, Mr Vicars; it is Winceby, a mere hamlet and not a town.
‘Both they and we had drawn-up our dragooners; who gave the first charge; and then the horse fell in. Colonel Cromwell fell with brave resolution upon the enemy, immediately after their dragooners had given him the first volley; yet they were so nimble, as that, within half pistol-shot, they gave him another: his horse was killed under him at the first charge, and fell down upon him; and as he rose up, he was knocked down again by the Gentleman who charged him, who ’twas conceived was Sir Ingram Hopton: but afterwards he’ the Colonel ‘recovered a poor horse in a soldier’s hands, and bravely mounted himself again. Truly this first charge was so home-given, and performed with so much admirable courage and resolution by our troops, that the enemy stood not another; but were driven back upon their own body, which was to have seconded them; and at last put these into a plain disorder; and thus, in less than half an hour’s fight, they 
Prince Rupert
were all quite routed, and’—driven along Slash Lane at a terrible rate, unnecessary to specify. Sir Ingram Hopton, who had been so near killing Cromwell, was himself killed. ‘Above a hundred of their men were found drowned in ditches,’ in quagmires that would not bear riding; the ‘dragooners now left on foot’ were taken prisoners; the chase lasted to Horncastle or beyond it,—and Henderson the renegade Scot was never heard of in those parts more. My Lord of Manchester’s foot did not get up till the battle was over.
This very day of Winceby Fight, there has gone on at Hull a universal sally, tough sullen wrestle in the trenches all day; with important loss to the Marquis of Newcastle; loss of ground, loss of lives, loss still more of invaluable guns, brass drakes, sackers, what not:—and on the morrow morning the Townsfolk, looking out, discern with emotion that there is now no Marquis, that the Marquis has marched away under cloud of night, and given up the siege. Which surely are good encouragements we have had; two in one day.
This will suffice for Winceby Fight, or Horncastle Fight, of 11th October 1643;[3] and leave the reader to imagine that Lincolnshire too was now cleared of the ‘Papist Army,’ as we violently nickname it,—all but a few Towns on the Western border, which will be successfully besieged when the Spring comes.
- ↑ 20th September 1643, Husbands, ii. 327.
- ↑ Third Form of Vicars: God’s Ark overtopping the World’s Waves, or the Third Part of the Parliamentary Chronicle: by John Vicars (London, printed by M. Simons and J. Meecock, 1646), p. 45. There are three editions or successive forms of this Book of Vicars’s (see Bliss’s Wood, in voce): it is always, unless the contrary be expressed, the second (of 1644) that we refer to here.
- ↑ Account of it from the other side, in Rushworth, v. 282; Hull Siege, etc. ib., 280.