Believe or Die (13 page)

“What treachery is this?” he demanded.

“No treachery Sir, politics I am told,” shrugged the aide.

“What then are my orders pray tell Sir?” snarled Ketch.

“You are to attend to the prisoners Sir.”

“While the Ironsides ‘pursue’ the King’s baggage train?”

“They do the Lord’s work Sir.”

“And I do not?”

“I mean no disrespect Sir, but your command is not yet part of the New Model … ”

“Oh, so that’s the way of it! The New Model gets the glory and all others get the crumbs from the table!”

The aide did not reply. Ketch fumed but then composed himself. Perhaps he too should start thinking in a more ‘politic’ manner. He nodded to the aide then turned and barked orders to send his troops to round up the hapless Royalist Foot many of whom seemed to be just roaming around aimlessly like a huge flock of confused sheep.

Mead walked his horse slowly behind the dejected, trudging prisoners and wondered where the hell Corporal Bowman had got to. For some days now Bowman had been acting strangely. He had become tetchy of temper and was constantly rubbing his arms complaining of itching and scabbing but he would let none examine him. Then he spotted Trooper Hicks cantering towards him, everything about his demeanour suggesting trouble. Mead shouted at his cornet to take over and reined away towards Hicks.

“Something you need to see Sir,” said Hicks stonily.

Nearing a stretch of unenclosed ground tangled with gorse, they found Corporal Bowman, helmet off and grim of countenance. He was standing over the body of a fellow trooper. Looking up as Mead arrived he nodded at the body.

“It’s young Sweeney Sir. We’ll be hearing no more of that fine young voice I’m afraid.”

Mead stifled an oath and shook his head.

“Lord have mercy,” he grimaced. “Come, we’ll take him back and have the preacher do a proper job for him … ” he stopped, realising that Bowman and Hicks were shuffling uncomfortably.

“Is there more to this?” he demanded.

“He said he were just stopping for a piss Sir!” blurted out Hicks. “Said he’d catch me up directly he did. Then I seen ‘e weren’t behind me, so I turns back like. Found him dead. My fault it be Sir, his death’ll be on my conscience so it will God forgive me. I’d never of left ‘im if … ”

“Enough Hicks. No one is to blame here.” Mead looked around the tangled woods and hedges. “I’m thinking the lad disturbed a Royalist runaway and the Lord took him from us. Bad luck I’m thinking, nothing more, and no blame on anybody. Is that how you see it Corporal?”

“Pretty much Sir. Swine jumped young Sweeney, killed him for his horse most likely.

Only … ”

“Only?”

“Only I’ve a feeling the Devil’s been at work here, mocking us like. Look what killed the boy; bastard must of dropped it in his haste to be away.” And with that Bowman reached down and pulled something from the long grass. It was a partizan, a short spear-like implement that served an officer as both a weapon and a badge of rank. Bowman glared at it.

“My reading ain’t as good as it should be Sir, but someone’s had a sentiment carved on it, there’s a name on this plate see. It’s a name I seem to recall you shouting out when you was suffering from the wound sickness. Maybe’s I’m wrong.” He handed the weapon up to Mead. Richard hefted the partisan around. It was an especially fine example. The polished and engraved platelette read:

To Lieutenant Wil Pitkin. Loyal servant and saviour. Rupert

Cold fury began permeating through Richard Mead. He looked down at the dead youngster once more then flung the partisan away from him.

“Find him!” he hissed.

Light was fading. Pitkin had fallen from his horse when it stumbled down a ditch. Now afoot, he was trying to get to the Royalist baggage train, to his woman. He walked and jogged alternately cursing the loss of his precious partisan and trying to forget the expression on that young Parliamentarian trooper’s face when he died.

He intended to rejoin the King as soon as he could, mainly because he couldn’t think what else he could possibly do. Still, he would have his Josephine with him when he did. The notion brightened him a little. Then he came to a break in the trees. He could see fires and he could hear screams. He crept closer and could now make out troopers of the New Model Army doing what they considered to be their pious, God-given duty. They were slaughtering.

Mead had been ordered to desist in his vendetta. Ketch had made it clear that Richard’s troop had better things to do than hunt down a single Royalist renegade. There were hundreds, nay thousands to guard, and, if God willed, like numbers to battle anew. For the moment, the ‘better things to do’ for Mead consisted of an instruction to examine the huge quantity of arms and provisions that had formed part of the King’s baggage train and ‘liberate’ anything the Regiment might have a use for.

Approaching the scene of chaos and horror, Mead’s horse suddenly collapsed under him. He rolled free as it fell and was amazed to find a deep wound along its underside. The noble beast had given no sign that it was mortally wounded and he, Richard Mead, God curse him, had been so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he hadn’t checked as was his normal habit after a fray. He reached for a pistol then remembered that they were both empty. Not one of his men had a single charged piece either, so Mead, with tears trickling from his eyes, drew his sword and put his mount out of its misery. Bowman detached Hitch and Poulton to requisition a new mount. The troopers hefted axe and horseman’s hammer respectively and drifted into the shadows towards some celebrating Roundheads. The delay would be minimal in finding Mead a fresh mount. It was then they spotted the bodies: women, all of them women. Mead walked on unsteady legs into the light of the blazing wagons. Not all were dead, yet. But those who weren’t had had their faces slashed. A group of New Model infantry reeled past drunkenly clutching all manner of booty.

“Who ordered this?” demanded Mead.

“They’re nought but Catholic whores!” laughed one of the men.

“Irish some of ‘em!” added another enthusiastically.

Mead turned slowly on the men and levelled his sword, which was still dripping with his horse’s blood.

“Get out of my sight while you still can!” he growled. The infantrymen fled.

Concealed in a hedgerow, Wil Pitkin had just managed to wriggle into a position from where he could see a bit more of the ravaged camp. To his astonishment, he saw Richard Mead and instinctively reached for his weapons, but he had none, not even his beloved partisan. He could see Mead held a bloodied sword and he was now being joined by others of his ilk.

Mead absently accepted the reins of his new mount, which had been fitted with his old, battered saddle. He looked around at the dead and scarred women. He knelt and turned over one of the bodies. Once she must have been a very pretty young woman, now she was just another example of religious bigotry and fanaticism. Richard did not know it but once upon a time, her name had been Josephine.

No orders were given. The troopers mounted quietly and followed Mead into the darkness. Only one of them looked back and smiled contentedly at the scene. This, in his opinion, was how the Lord’s justice should be dispensed. It was an opinion though that he was wise enough to keep to himself.

Pitkin waited until all was quiet than crept stealthily forward. It took a moment or two for him to comprehend that what he was looking at was the dead wives, sweethearts, and camp followers of the Royalist Army. As if in a dream, he searched methodically through the carnage until he came to the body that he had observed Richard Mead standing over, bloody blade in hand. That was the image that burned into his brain as he carried Josehpine away and buried her in the cold, damp earth. That was the image that he added to his growing collection of the reasons that Richard Mead must die.

Initially, King Charles was not unduly depressed by the defeat at Naseby but his cause had suffered a grievous setback. During the plundering of the Royalist baggage train, the King’s personal travelling cabinet had been discovered. Amongst its contents were some disastrously incriminating correspondences. These revealed that Charles had been attempting to bring over an Irish army to England in return for favours being granted to Roman Catholics in the realm. These letters were promptly published and distributed causing widespread outrage, but the King continued to ignore advice and went on to conceive new and evermore convoluted strategies. Again he wrote to the Irish Lords demanding troops to augment those he was convinced he could recruit in Wales. He also had high hopes of French assistance and his Queen was busily intriguing abroad to that end on his behalf. Montrose was still doing well in Scotland and Goring’s forces were still intact in the West Country.

The country as a whole, however, was sick of war and pockets of resistance, resistance to ANY army, was spreading. The people of Dorset armed themselves with whatever came to hand and fiercely protected their villages and towns against all comers. The Royalists were unsure as how to deal with this. The New Model Army though had no misgivings and even less tolerance for what was perceived to be an affront to God’s cause. The ‘Clubmen’ of Dorset were quickly and viciously suppressed. Then Fairfax went after Goring and, after a fiercely contested affair, the Royalists broke and fled. For his part in this bloody business, Richard Mead was made a Captain.

Rupert advised the King to negotiate a peace; Charles dismissed the notion out of hand - a King demanded, he did not negotiate. Instead, His Majesty led a raid on Huntingdon, Cromwell’s birthplace, which was ransacked and all but destroyed. Then Charles returned to Oxford to plan afresh. Almost immediately his schemes and hopes of a recovery in his fortunes were dashed to ruin. On the 11th of September, Rupert, who had been desperately trying to hold Bristol with totally insufficient forces, was obliged to surrender the city. The King was outraged and accused Rupert of, alternately, incompetence and even treason. He dismissed the Prince from all his offices and refused to allow Rupert into his presence. The King’s cause now began collapsing like a house of cards. Montrose was defeated by the reinforced and vengeful Covanteers and savage indeed was the retribution that followed north of the border for his followers.

The Parliamentarians began tightening their grip and the end for Charles was surely nigh. In the spring of 1646, the King narrowly escaped capture by the Roundheads and, in a move that baffled many of his supporters, he handed himself over to the custody of the Scots. What was His Majesty thinking of asked people on both sides? But this was merely the opening gambit in a series of elaborate and devious manoeuvres by the King. If he couldn’t win in battle, he would triumph politically by playing the various parties off against each other. Despite their high hopes, Charles refused to promise the Scots that Presbyterianism would become the dominant religion in England. Instead, he said he would ‘consider’ the matter. When a letter was received from Parliament listing a series of conditions under which Charles could maintain his position, he waved it away and then he went and played golf. If he wasn’t playing golf or chess, he was engaged in theological debates with clergymen. Indeed, any and every time Charles was pressed for an answer on anything, His Majesty ‘was not at leisure’ and the petitioners would have to wait. In actuality, he was stalling, buying time as he sought a way to divide his enemies and turn them against each other. But he dallied too long.

Eventually, the Scots despaired of his endless procrastinating and promptly handed him over to the English, who briskly whisked him away to honourable and very comfortable captivity at Holmby House in Northamptonshire. This had not been on Charles’ agenda. However, he was still King and, so he believed, he had time on his side. After all, what could they do to him? He was King of England, anointed by God, and subject to no man.

Two problems now faced Parliament. What to do with the King, and, what to do with the Army? Despite Charles’ attitude and behaviour, most members of the House could still not readily come to terms with the concept of any head of State other than the King. But Charles had contemptuously dismissed their conditions for his reinstatement believing he was answerable to no one short of the Almighty. How could such an impasse be overcome?

The Army presented a much more immediate problem which Parliament mishandled completely. Like all politicians throughout the ages, the wise men of Westminster donned blinkers and blindfolds and acted without thought or consideration for those who had served their cause. They decreed that, as the Army had now served its purpose, at least half of it could be disbanded. The rest would then be either despatched to Ireland to crush dissidents or employed in small numbers to police the Realm. Simple. Problem resolved! But the Army, apart from a handful of independent units, was now entirely under the auspices of the New Model Army and it had no intention of allowing itself to be demobilised except under ITS own conditions. The Army’s High Command invited a deputation from Parliament to discuss the issues raised. At the same time, the rank and file submitted a petition demanding their arrears in pay and the setting up of pensions for the orphans and widows of those killed in the late war. The politicians considered this an utterly ridiculous proposal and made veiled threats against the petitioners. Suspicion and mistrust grew between the opposing factions. Westminster told Fairfax that he must ORDER his men to volunteer to serve in Ireland. Fairfax said he would ask his men but would not order them to volunteer. The Roundheads said they would do nothing until their arrears in pay were forthcoming. And so the issue see-sawed.

Charles spotted what he thought to be a perfect opportunity occasioned by the growing antagonism and began plotting to exploit it, but he was frustrated by a short-lived coup organised by impatient Army agitators when he found himself held under house arrest at Hampton Court. A radical Republican movement, led mainly by the almost Socialist
Levellers
in the Army, was gaining momentum. The Levellers said the country had shed blood in the cause of freedom, justice and equality, and they had NO intention of returning to the iniquities of the ‘old days’. Debates were held at Putney as the soldiers sought to thrash out some kind of future that all could agree on.