Chapter Chapter 27 · Of the Affair near Keynsham Bridge

Monday, June 21, 1685, broke very dark and windy, with dull clouds

moving heavily across the sky and a constant sputter of rain. Yet a

little after daybreak Monmouth’s bugles were blowing in every quarter

of the town, from Tone Bridge to Shuttern, and by the hour appointed the

regiments had mustered, the roll had been called, and the vanguard was

marching briskly out through the eastern gate. It went forth in the same

order as it entered, our own regiment and the Taunton burghers bringing

up the rear. Mayor Timewell and Saxon had the ordering of this part of

the army between them, and being men who had seen much service, they

drew the ordnance into a less hazardous position, and placed a strong

guard of horse, a cannon’s shot in the rear, to meet any attempt of the

Royal dragoons.

It was remarked on all sides that the army had improved in order and

discipline during the three days’ halt, owing perchance to the example

of our own unceasing drill and soldierly bearing. In numbers it had

increased to nigh eight thousand, and the men were well fed and light

of heart. With sturdy close-locked ranks they splashed their way through

mud and puddle, with many a rough country joke and many a lusty stave

from song or hymn. Sir Gervas rode at the head of his musqueteers, whose

befloured tails hung limp and lank with the water dripping from

them. Lockarby’s pikemen and my own company of scythesmen were mostly

labourers from the country, who were hardened against all weathers, and

plodded patiently along with the rain-drops glistening upon their ruddy

faces. In front were the Taunton foot; behind, the lumbering train of

baggage waggons, with the horse in the rear of them. So the long line

wound its way over the hills.

At the summit, where the road begins to dip down upon the other side, a

halt was called to enable the regiments to close up, and we looked back

at the fair town which many of us were never to see again. From the dark

walls and house roofs we could still mark the flapping and flutter of

white kerchiefs from those whom we left behind. Reuben sat his horse

beside me, with his spare shirt streaming in the wind and his great

pikemen all agrin behind him, though his thoughts and his eyes were

too far away to note them. As we gazed, a long thin quiver of sunshine

slipped out between two cloud banks and gilded the summit of the

Magdalene tower, with the Royal standard which still waved from it. The

incident was hailed as a happy augury, and a great shout spread from

rank to rank at the sight of it, with a waving of hats and a clattering

of weapons. Then the bugles blew a fanfare, the drums struck up a point

of war, Reuben thrust his shirt into his haversack, and on we marched

through mud and slush, with the dreary clouds bending low over us, and

buttressed by the no less dreary hills on either side. A seeker for

omens might have said that the heavens were weeping over our ill-fated

venture.

All day we trudged along roads which were quagmires, over our ankles

in mud, until in the evening we made our way to Bridgewater, where we

gained some recruits, and also some hundred pounds for our military

chest, for it was a well-to-do place, with a thriving coast trade

carried on down the River Parret. After a night in snug quarters we set

off again in even worse weather than before. The country in these parts

is a quagmire in the driest season, but the heavy rains had caused the

fens to overflow, and turned them into broad lakes on either side of the

road. This may have been to some degree in our favour, as shielding us

from the raids of the King’s cavalry, but it made our march very

slow. All day it was splashing and swashing through mud and mire, the

rain-drops shining on the gun-barrels and dripping from the heavy-footed

horses. Past the swollen Parret, through Eastover, by the peaceful

village of Bawdrip, and over Polden Hill we made our way, until the

bugles sounded a halt under the groves of Ashcot, and a rude meal was

served out to the men. Then on again, through the pitiless rain, past

the wooded park of Piper’s Inn, through Walton, where the floods were

threatening the cottages, past the orchards of Street, and so in the

dusk of the evening into the grey old town of Glastonbury, where the

good folk did their best by the warmth of their welcome to atone for the

bitterness of the weather.

The next morning was wet still and inclement, so the army made a short

march to Wells, which is a good-sized town, well laid out, with a fine

cathedral, which hath a great number of figures carved in stone and

placed in niches on the outer side, like that which we saw at Salisbury.

The townsfolk were strong for the Protestant cause, and the army was so

well received that their victual cost little from the military chest. On

this march we first began to come into touch with the Royal horse. More

than once when the rain mist cleared we saw the gleam of arms upon the

low hills which overlook the road, and our scouts came in with reports

of strong bodies of dragoons on either flank. At one time they massed

heavily upon our rear, as though planning a descent upon the baggage.

Saxon, however, planted a regiment of pikes on either side, so that they

broke up again and glinted off over the hills.

From Wells we marched upon the twenty-fourth to Shepton Mallet, with the

ominous sabres and helmets still twinkling behind and on either side of

us.

That evening we were at Keynsham Bridge, less than two leagues from

Bristol as the crow flies, and some of our horse forded the river and

pushed on almost to the walls.

By morning the rain clouds had at last cleared, so Reuben and I rode

slowly up one of the sloping green hills which rose behind the camp, in

the hope of gaining some sight of the enemy. Our men we left littered

about upon the grass, trying to light fires with the damp sticks, or

laying out their clothes to dry in the sunshine. A strange-looking band

they were, coated and splashed with mud from head to heel, their hats

all limp and draggled, their arms rusted, and their boots so worn that

many walked barefoot, and others had swathed their kerchiefs round

their feet. Yet their short spell of soldiering had changed them

from honest-faced yokels into fierce-eyed, half-shaven, gaunt-cheeked

fellows, who could carry arms or port pikes as though they had done

nought else since childhood.

The plight of the officers was no better than that of the men, nor

should an officer, my dears, when he is upon service, ever demean

himself by partaking of any comfort which all cannot share with him. Let

him lie by a soldier’s fire and eat a soldier’s fare, or let him hence,

for he is a hindrance and a stumbling-block. Our clothes were pulp, our

steel fronts red with rust, and our chargers as stained and splashed as

though they had rolled in the mire. Our very swords and pistols were in

such a plight that we could scarce draw the one or snap the other. Sir

Gervas alone succeeded in keeping his attire and his person as neat and

as dainty as ever. What he did in the watches of the night, and how he

gained his sleep, hath ever been a mystery to me, for day after day

he turned out at the bugle call, washed, scented, brushed, with wig

in order, and clothes from which every speck of mud had been carefully

removed. At his saddle-bow he bore with him the great flour dredger

which we saw him use at Taunton, and his honest musqueteers had their

heads duly dusted every morning, though in an hour their tails would

be as brown as nature made them, while the flour would be trickling in

little milky streams down their broad backs, or forming in cakes upon

the skirts of their coats. It was a long contest between the weather and

the Baronet, but our comrade proved the victor.

‘There was a time when I was called plump Reuben,’ quoth my friend, as

we rode together up the winding track. ‘What with too little that is

solid and too much that is liquid I am like to be skeleton Reuben ere I

see Havant again. I am as full of rain-water as my father’s casks are of

October. I would, Micah, that you would wring me out and hang me to dry

upon one of these bushes.’

‘If we are wet, King James’s men must be wetter,’ said I, ‘for at least

we have had such shelter as there was.’

‘It is poor comfort when you are starved to know that another is in

the same plight. I give you my word, Micah, I took in one hole of my

sword-belt on Monday, two on Tuesday, one yesterday, and one to-day. I

tell you, I am thawing like an icicle in the sun.’

‘If you should chance to dwindle to nought,’ said I, laughing, ‘what

account are we to give of you in Taunton? Since you have donned armour

and taken to winning the hearts of fair maidens, you have outstripped us

all in importance, and become a man of weight and substance.’

‘I had more substance and weight ere I began trailing over the

countryside like a Hambledon packman,’ quoth he. ‘But in very truth and

with all gravity, Micah, it is a strange thing to feel that the whole

world for you, your hopes, your ambitions, your all, are gathered into

so small a compass that a hood might cover it, and two little pattens

support it. I feel as if she were my own higher self, my loftier

part, and that I, should I be torn from her, would remain for ever an

incomplete and half-formed being. With her, I ask nothing else. Without

her, all else is nothing.’

‘But have you spoken to the old man?’ I asked. ‘Are you indeed

betrothed?’

‘I have spoken to him,’ my friend answered, ‘but he was so busy in

filling ammunition cases that I could not gain his attention. When I

tried once more he was counting the spare pikes in the Castle armoury

with a tally and an ink-horn. I told him that I had come to crave his

granddaughter’s hand, on which he turned to me and asked, “which hand?”

with so blank a stare that it was clear that his mind was elsewhere. On

the third trial, though, the day that you did come back from Badminton,

I did at last prefer my request, but he flashed out at me that this was

no time for such fooleries, and he bade me wait until King Monmouth was

on the throne, when I might ask him again. I warrant that he did not

call such things fooleries fifty years ago, when he went a-courting

himself.’

‘At least he did not refuse you,’ said I. ‘It is as good as a promise

that; should the cause be successful, you shall be so too.’

‘By my faith,’ cried Reuben, ‘if a man could by his own single blade

bring that about, there is none who hath so strong an interest in it as

I. No, not Monmouth himself! The apprentice Derrick hath for a long time

raised his eyes to his master’s daughter, and the old man was ready to

have him as a son, so much was he taken by his godliness and zeal. Yet I

have learned from a side-wind that he is but a debauched and low-living

man, though he covers his pleasures with a mask of piety. I thought as

you did think that he was at the head of the roisterers who tried to

bear Mistress Ruth away, though, i’ faith, I can scarce think harshly

of them, since they did me the greatest service that ever men did yet.

Meanwhile I have taken occasion, ere we left Wells two nights ago, to

speak to Master Derrick on the matter, and to warn him as he loved his

life to plan no treachery against her.

‘And how took he this mild intimation?’ I asked.

‘As a rat takes a rat trap. Snarled out some few words of godly hatred,

and so slunk away.’

‘On my life, lad,’ said I, ‘you have been having as many adventures in

your own way as I in mine. But here we are upon the hill-top, with as

fair an outlook as man could wish to have.’

Just beneath us ran the Avon, curving in long bends through the

woodlands, with the gleam of the sun striking back from it here and

there, as though a row of baby suns had been set upon a silver string.

On the further side the peaceful, many-hued country, rising and falling

in a swell of cornfields and orchards, swept away to break in a fringe

of forest upon the distant Malverns. On our right were the green hills

near Bath and on our left the rugged Mendips, with queenly Bristol

crouching behind her forts, and the grey channel behind flecked with

snow-white sails. At our very feet lay Keynsham Bridge, and our army

spotted in dark patches over the green fields, the smoke of their fires

and the babble of their voices floating up in the still summer air.

A road ran along the Somersetshire bank of the Avon, and down this two

troops of our horse were advancing, with intent to establish outposts

upon our eastern flank. As they jangled past in somewhat loose order,

their course lay through a pine-wood, into which the road takes a sharp

bend. We were gazing down at the scene when, like lightning from a

cloud, a troop of the Horse Guards wheeled out into the open, and

breaking from trot to canter, and from canter to gallop, dashed down in

a whirlwind of blue and steel upon our unprepared squadrons. A crackle

of hastily unslung carbines broke from the leading ranks, but in an

instant the Guards burst through them and plunged on into the second

troop. For a space the gallant rustics held their own, and the dense

mass of men and horses swayed backwards and forwards, with the swirling

sword-blades playing above them in flashes of angry light. Then blue

coats began to break from among the russet, the fight rolled wildly back

for a hundred paces, the dense throng was split asunder, and the Royal

Guards came pouring through the rent, and swerved off to right and left

through hedges and over ditches, stabbing and hacking at the fleeing

horsemen. The whole scene, with the stamping horses, tossing manes,

shouts of triumph or despair, gasping of hard-drawn breath and musical

clink and clatter of steel, was to us upon the hill like some wild

vision, so swiftly did it come and so swiftly go. A sharp, stern

bugle-call summoned the Blues back into the road, where they formed up

and trotted slowly away before fresh squadrons could come up from the

camp. The sun gleamed and the river rippled as ever, and there was

nothing save the long litter of men and horses to mark the course of the

hell blast which had broken so suddenly upon us.

As the Blues retired we observed that a single officer brought up the

rear, riding very slowly, as though it went much against his mood to

turn his back even to an army. The space betwixt the troop and him was

steadily growing greater, yet he made no effort to quicken his pace,

but jogged quietly on, looking back from time to time to see if he were

followed. The same thought sprang into my comrade’s mind and my own at

the same instant, and we read it in each other’s faces.

‘This path,’ cried he eagerly. ‘It brings us out beyond the grove, and

is in the hollow all the way.’

‘Lead the horses until we get on better ground,’ I answered. ‘We may

just cut him off if we are lucky.’

There was no time for another word, for we hurried off down the uneven

track, sliding and slipping on the rain-soaked turf. Springing into our

saddles we dashed down the gorge, through the grove, and so out on to

the road in time to see the troop disappear in the distance, and to meet

the solitary officer face to face.

He was a sun-burned, high-featured man, with black mustachios, mounted

on a great raw-boned chestnut charger. As we broke out on to the road he

pulled up to have a good look at us. Then, having fully made up his mind

as to our hostile intent, he drew his sword, plucked a pistol out of his

holster with his left hand, and gripping the bridle between his teeth,

dug his spurs into his horse’s flanks and charged down upon us at the

top of his speed. As we dashed at him, Reuben on his bridle arm and I

on the other, he cut fiercely at me, and at the same moment fired at my

companion. The ball grazed Reuben’s cheek, leaving a red weal behind it

like a lash from a whip, and blackening his face with the powder. His

cut, however, fell short, and throwing my arm round his waist as the two

horses dashed past each other, I plucked him from the saddle and drew

him face upwards across my saddlebow. Brave Covenant lumbered on with

his double burden, and before the Guards had learned that they had lost

their officer, we had brought him safe, in spite of his struggles and

writhings, to within sight of Monmouth’s camp.

‘A narrow shave, friend,’ quoth Reuben, with his hand to his cheek. ‘He

hath tattooed my face with powder until I shall be taken for Solomon

Sprent’s younger brother.’

‘Thank God that you are unhurt,’ said I. ‘See, our horse are advancing

along the upper road. Lord Grey himself rides at their head. We had best

take our prisoner into camp, since we can do nought here.’

‘For Christ’s sake, either slay me or set me down!’ he cried. ‘I cannot

bear to be carried in this plight, like a half-weaned infant, through

your campful of grinning yokels.’

‘I would not make sport of a brave man,’ I answered. ‘If you will give

your word to stay with us, you shall walk between us.’

‘Willingly,’ said he, scrambling down and arranging his ruffled attire.

‘By my faith, sirs, ye have taught me a lesson not to think too meanly

of mine enemies. I should have ridden with my troop had I thought that

there was a chance of falling in with outposts or videttes.’

‘We were upon the hill before we cut you off,’ quoth Reuben. ‘Had that

pistol ball been a thought straighter, it is I that should have been

truly the cut-off one. Zounds, Micah! I was grumbling even now that I

had fallen away, but had my cheek been as round as of old the slug had

been through it.’

‘Where have I seen you before?’ asked our captive, bending his dark

eyes upon me. ‘Aye, I have it! It was in the inn at Salisbury, where

my light-headed comrade Horsford did draw upon an old soldier who was

riding with you. Mine own name is Ogilvy--Major Ogilvy of the Horse

Guards Blue. I was right glad that ye did come off safely from the

hounds. Some word had come of your errand after your departure, so this

same Horsford with the Mayor and one or two other Tantivies, whose zeal

methinks outran their humanity, slipped the dogs upon your trail.’

‘I remember you well,’ I answered. ‘You will find Colonel Decimus Saxon,

my former companion, in the camp. No doubt you will be shortly exchanged

for some prisoner of ours.’

‘Much more likely to have my throat cut,’ said he, with a smile. ‘I

fear that Feversham in his present temper will scarce pause to make

prisoners, and Monmouth may be tempted to pay him back in his own

coin. Yet it is the fortune of war, and I should pay for my want of all

soldierly caution. Truth to tell, my mind was far from battles and ruses

at the moment, for it had wandered away to aqua-regia and its action

upon the metals, until your appearance brought me back to soldiership.’

‘The horse are out of sight,’ said Reuben, looking backwards, ‘ours as

well as theirs. Yet I see a clump of men over yonder at the other side

of the Avon, and there on the hillside can you not see the gleam of

steel?’

‘There are foot there,’ I answered, puckering my eyes. ‘It seems to me

that I can discern four or five regiments and as many colours of horse.

King Monmouth should know of this with all speed.’

‘He does know of it,’ said Reuben. ‘Yonder he stands under the trees

with his council about him. See, one of them rides this way!’

A trooper had indeed detached himself from the group and galloped

towards us. ‘If you are Captain Clarke, sir,’ he said, with a salute,

‘the King orders you to join his council.’

‘Then I leave the Major in your keeping, Reuben,’ I cried. ‘See that

he hath what our means allow.’ So saying I spurred my horse, and soon

joined the group who were gathered round the King. There were Grey,

Wade, Buyse, Ferguson, Saxon, Hollis, and a score more, all looking very

grave, and peering down the valley with their glasses. Monmouth himself

had dismounted, and was leaning against the trunk of a tree, with his

arms folded upon his breast, and a look of white despair upon his face.

Behind the tree a lackey paced up and down leading his glossy black

charger, who pranced and tossed his lordly mane, a very king among

horses.

‘You see, friends,’ said Monmouth, turning lack-lustre eyes from one

leader to another, ‘Providence would seem to be against us. Some new

mishap is ever at our heels.’

‘Not Providence, your Majesty, but our own negligence,’ cried Saxon

boldly. ‘Had we advanced on Bristol last night, we might have been on

the right side of the ramparts by now.’

‘But we had no thought that the enemy’s foot was so near!’ exclaimed

Wade.

‘I told ye what would come of it, and so did Oberst Buyse and the worthy

Mayor of Taunton,’ Saxon answered. ‘However, there is nought to be

gained by mourning over a broken pipkin. We must e’en piece it together

as best we may.’

‘Let us advance on Bristol, and put oor trust in the Highest,’ quoth

Ferguson. ‘If it be His mighty will that we should tak’ it, then

shall we enter into it, yea, though drakes and sakers lay as thick as

cobblestanes in the streets.’

‘Aye! aye! On to Bristol! God with us!’ cried several of the Puritans

excitedly.

‘But it is madness--dummheit--utter foolishness,’ Buyse broke in hotly.

‘You have the chance and you will not take it. Now the chance is gone

and you are all eager to go. Here is an army of, as near as I can judge,

five thousand men on the right side of the river. We are on the wrong

side, and yet you talk of crossing and making a beleaguering of Bristol

without breaching-pieces or spades, and with this force in our rear.

Will the town make terms when they can see from their ramparts the van

of the army which comes to help them? Or does it assist us in fighting

the army to have a strong town beside us, from which horse and foot can

make an outfall upon our flank? I say again that it is madness.’

What the German soldier said was so clearly the truth that even the

fanatics were silenced. Away in the east the long shimmering lines

of steel, and the patches of scarlet upon the green hillside, were

arguments which the most thoughtless could not overlook.

‘What would you advise, then?’ asked Monmouth moodily, tapping his

jewelled riding-whip against his high boots.

‘To cross the river and come to hand-grips with them ere they can

get help from the town,’ the burly German answered bluntly. ‘I cannot

understand what we are here for if it be not to fight. If we win, the

town must fall. If we lose, We have had a bold stroke for it, and can do

no more.’

‘Is that your opinion, too, Colonel Saxon?’ the King asked.

‘Assuredly, your Majesty, if we can fight to advantage. We can scarce

do that, however, by crossing the river on a single narrow bridge in

the face of such a force. I should advise that we destroy this Keynsham

Bridge, and march down this southern bank in the hope of forcing a fight

in a position which we may choose.’

‘We have not yet summoned Bath,’ said Wade. ‘Let us do as Colonel Saxon

proposes, and let us in the meantime march in that direction and send a

trumpet to the governor.’

‘There is yet another plan,’ quoth Sir Stephen Timewell, ‘which is to

hasten to Gloucester, to cross the Severn there, and so march through

Worcestershire into Shropshire and Cheshire. Your Majesty has many

friends in those parts.’

Monmouth paced up and down with his hand to his forehead like one

distrait. ‘What am I to do,’ he cried at last, ‘in the midst of all this

conflicting advice, when I know that not only my own success, but the

lives of these poor faithful peasants and craftsmen depend upon my

resolution?’

‘With all humbleness, your Majesty,’ said Lord Grey, who had just

returned with the horse, ‘I should suggest, since there are only a few

troops of their cavalry on this side of the Avon, that we blow up the

bridge and move onwards to Bath, whence we can pass into Wiltshire,

which we know to be friendly.’

‘So be it!’ cried the King, with the reckless air of one who accepts

a plan, not because it is the best, but because he feels that all are

equally hopeless. ‘What think you, gentlemen?’ he added, with a bitter

smile. ‘I have heard news from London this morning, that my uncle has

clapped two hundred merchants and others who are suspected of being true

to their creed into the Tower and the Fleet. He will have one half of

the nation mounting guard over the other half ere long.’

‘Or the whole, your Majesty, mounting guard over him,’ suggested Wade.

‘He may himself see the Traitor’s Gate some of these mornings.’

‘Ha, ha! Think ye so? think ye so!’ cried Monmouth, rubbing his hands

and brightening into a smile. ‘Well, mayhap you have nicked the truth.

Who knows? Henry’s cause seemed a losing one until Bosworth Field

settled the contention. To your charges, gentlemen. We shall march in

half-an-hour. Colonel Saxon and you, Sir Stephen, shall cover the rear

and guard the baggage--a service of honour with this fringe of horse

upon our skirts.’

The council broke up forthwith, every man riding off to his own

regiment. The whole camp was in a stir, bugles blowing and drums

rattling, until in a very short time the army was drawn up in order, and

the forlorn of cavalry had already started along the road which leads to

Bath. Five hundred horse with the Devonshire militiamen were in the van.

After them in order came the sailor regiment, the North Somerset men,

the first Taunton regiment of burghers, the Mendip and Bagworthy miners,

the lace and wool-workers of Honiton, Wellington, and Ottery St. Mary;

the woodmen, the graziers, the marsh-men, and the men from the Quantock

district. Behind were the guns and the baggage, with our own brigade and

four colours of horse as a rearguard. On our march we could see the red

coats of Feversham keeping pace with us upon the other side of the Avon.

A large body of his horse and dragoons had forded the stream and hovered

upon our skirts, but Saxon and Sir Stephen covered the baggage so

skilfully, and faced round so fiercely with such a snarl of musketry

whenever they came too nigh, that they never ventured to charge home.