His father died, leaving but an insignificant sum to be divided among his many children, and Robert, with strong Republican views, was returned to Parliament for his native town of Bridgwater. Events were moving rapidly towards Civil War, and in the outbreak of that momentous struggle many men found at last their vocation. Among them was Blake, whose great defence of Taunton town against the Royalist siege in 1645 was one of the most dogged and successful incidents of that time. Encompassed by ten thousand men and his ammunition all shot away, food exhausted, and a breach actually made in the walls and the enemy swarming through it; still he would not yield, and declared he would eat his boots first. Fortunately the rumour of Fairfax’s relieving army at that moment spread among the besiegers, and the siege was raised, else Blake would have had a full and an unappetising meal before him, as any one who contemplates his statue here, and the great thigh-boots he is wearing, may judge for himself. At the establishment of the Commonwealth, Blake was given high command at sea: a military man afloat as Admiral; a thing in our own highly specialised times unthinkable. His complete success in that new environment is a part of our history that need not be recounted here. After many inconclusive duels with the Dutch, who, under Van Tromp, disputed the sovereignty of the seas, and after brilliant services abroad, Blake died while yet in what may be termed the prime of life, of an intermittent fever, and probably also from an exhaustion induced by old wounds, on board his flagship, off Plymouth, in 1657. With his death disappeared one of the few entirely honest Republicans of that time: a man that England could then ill spare, as the nation was to find but ten years later, when the Dutch fully revenged themselves for former reverses by their historic raid up the Medway and destruction of English ships off Chatham. After many years, Bridgwater has at last honoured itself and the memory of this great man with a statue, placed prominently in front of the Corn Exchange. He is represented in the military costume of the time, with a short, wind-blown cloak flying from his shoulders, pointing into space. It is a pose admirably chosen, and every line of this fine bronze figure expresses the courage, zeal, and bull-dog determination characteristic of the man. Bronze panels in relief on the plinth represent Blake’s fleet off Portland, February 1653; the capture of Santa Cruz, April 20th, 1657; and Blake’s body brought into Plymouth Sound, August 7th, 1657. This appropriate couplet from Spenser is added: Sleepe after toyle, port after stormy seas, Ease after war, death after life, doth greatly please. Bridgwater church has its place in history, for it was from the battlements of this tower that the ill-fated Monmouth looked forth upon the plain of Sedgemoor, just before the battle that was to decide his fortunes.