History of King Charles the First of EnglandAbbott, Jacob
History
History of King Charles the First of England
Abbott, Jacob
Charles I, King of England, 1600-1649; Great Britain -- History -- Charles I, 1625-1649; Great Britain -- Kings and rulers -- Biography
Charles advanced to the city of York, the great city of the north of
England. Here he paused and established his court, with all possible
pomp and parade. His design was to impress the Scots with such an idea
of the greatness of the power which was going to overwhelm them as to
cause them to submit at once. But all this show was very hollow and
delusive. The army felt a greater sympathy with the Scots than they
did with the king. The complaints against Charles's government were
pretty much the same in both countries. A great many Scotchmen came
to York while the king was there, and the people from all the country
round flocked thither too, drawn by the gay spectacles connected with
the presence of such a court and army. The Scotchmen disseminated their
complaints thus among the English people, and finally the king and his
council, finding indications of so extensive a disaffection, had a form
of an oath prepared, which they required all the principal persons to
take, acknowledging allegiance to Charles, and renouncing their having
any intelligence or correspondence with the enemy. The Scotchmen all
took the oath very readily, though some of the English refused.
At any rate, the state of things was not such as to intimidate the
Scotch, and lead them, as the king had hoped, to sue for peace. So he
concluded to move on toward the borders. He went to Newcastle, and
thence to Berwick. From Berwick he moved along the banks of the Tweed,
which here forms the boundary between the two kingdoms, and, finding a
suitable place for such a purpose, the king had his royal tent pitched,
and his army encamped around him.
[Sidenote: The king's march.]
[Sidenote: Artifice of the Scots.]
Now, as King Charles had undertaken to subdue the Scots by a show of
force, it seems they concluded to defend themselves by a show too,
though theirs was a cheaper and more simple contrivance than his. They
advanced with about three thousand men to a place distant perhaps seven
miles from the English camp. The king sent an army of five thousand men
to attack them. The Scotch, in the mean time, collected great herds of
cattle from all the country around, as the historians say, and arranged
them behind their little army in such a way as to make the whole appear
a vast body of soldiers. A troop of horsemen, who were the advanced
part of the English army, came in sight of this formidable host first,
and, finding their numbers so much greater than they had anticipated,
they fell back, and ordered the artillery and foot-soldiers who were
coming up to retreat, and all together came back to the encampment.
There were two or three military enterprises of similar character,
in which nothing was done but to encourage the Scotch and dishearten
the English. In fact, neither officers, soldiers, nor king wanted to
proceed to extremities. The officers and soldiers did not wish to fight
the Scotch, and the king, knowing the state of his army, did not really
dare to do it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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