IV.

Since the parish of Broadoak was printed, an additional sheet of Mr. Hals’s manuscript has been communicated to the Editor by his friend the Rev. Richard Polwhele. It contains an account of the important military events which distinguished that parish and the neighbourhood, in 1644, and it is therefore printed as a curious addition to what has here been given in the body of the work, on the same subject. Mr. Polwhele has also sent another sheet relative to St. Stephen’s near Saltash, but that does not contain anything of the least importance.

These two sheets appear to have been separated from the work at Exeter by the carelessness of the bookseller in whose hands the whole had been lodged, and this confirms the suspicion of more important losses having taken place at the same time.

BROADOAK.

Broadoak is situate in the hundred of West, and hath upon the south Boconnock, west St. Winnow, east St. Pynock, north Cardinham; and by the name of Bradock it was taxed in Domesday Roll, 20 William I. 1087; which word, if it be single, signifies a rebel or traitor, one that betrays the trust and fidelity reposed in him by another; otherwise if it be commonly understood of Brad-ock or Brodock, it signifies broad trees of oak (Saxon).

In the Pope’s Inquisition into the value of Benefices before-mentioned, 1294, Capella de Bradock in decanatu de Westwellshire, appropriata Domui de Lanceston, was valued at xiii_s._ iv_d._ from whence it appears the church was endowed by the college of St. Stephen’s or Lanceston; in Wolsey’s Inquisition or Valor Beneficiorum at £8. 13_s._ 4_d._; the patronage in the Bishop of Exon, the incumbent Pearce, the rectory in possession of ――――; and this parish was rated to the 4_s._ per pound Land Tax for one year, 1696, £57.

Here let it be remembered that Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, General of the Parliament Army, being in Devon, received orders from his masters, 1644, to march from thence with the same towards Plymouth, in order to raise the siege thereof, it being then greatly distressed by Sir Richard Grenville, as was the west part of that county, who immediately set forward with his army, and marched on towards that place; yet not so quickly but that Grenville had notice of his motion, and, fearing he was not strong enough to engage his great army, he by night privately dislodged from the siege of Plymouth with his own regiment, Colonel Fortescue’s, Colonel Carew’s, and Colonel Acland’s; and the better to shun or avoid his enemy, marching down by way of Plympton, he turned aside towards St. Botolph’s and Saltash Passage, where with boats he passed over his troops, and so entered over the Tamar river into Cornwall; which Essex understanding as soon as he came to Plymouth, having thus raised the siege and relieved the town, forthwith marched after Grenville as far as Lestwithell and Bradoak Downs, himself quartering at Lanhydrock, the Lord Robartes’s house, and sending out troops of horse westwards if possible to attack him. In the mean time, King Charles I. being then in Somerset with his army, and having notice of those facts of Essex’s, forthwith marched out of Somerset through Devon with his army for Grenville’s relief, and entered Cornwall by way of Polston bridge, the 11th of August 1644; from thence advanced to Lanceston, and so directly to Liskeard, which place for some time he made his head quarters, where the townsmen and contiguous countrymen shewed themselves very zealous and loyal towards his service, especially for that the town or borough and manor of Leskeard was his son the Duke of Cornwall’s lands, in right of his Duchy of Cornwall.

Soon after which the country people gave private notice to the King, that on a certain day the quarter-master, General Dalbier, Lieutenant-Colonel Charleton, Colonel Allured, Colonel Barkley, and some other officers of Essex’s army were to dine at the Lord Mohun’s house, not far from Lestwithell.

At the day appointed the King dispatched a party of horse, and by surprise took them all prisoners (except Dalbier, who made his escape) and brought them all prisoners to Leskeard, where soon after Prince Rupert arrived at the King’s army, which gave great hopes of a notable victory over Essex; and, in order to give him battle, the King soon after drew forth his army from Leskeard, and marched west to Bradock Downs in this parish, opposite to St. Winnow and Boconnock Downs, where Essex lay encamped, on the east side of Lestwithell town, and there pitched his camp and standard, he himself, Prince Rupert, and Grenville quartering at the Lord Mohun’s house; from whence he sent a letter August 16th, as he had sent another before from Leskeard by the Lord Beauchamp’s nephew, to Essex, for a treaty of peace, to which he received no answer; then he sent another letter to him in the name of the officers of his army, to which Essex sent a negative answer directed to the Earl of Forth, purporting that he had received a letter from his lordship, and other commanders of the King’s army, by which a treaty with him was desired for a general peace, which he could not admit of without a breach of the trust reposed in him by the Parliament, having no power by his commission to treat in a matter of such importance.

Whereupon happened several skirmishes between the cavaliers and parliament troops; and in particular that challenge and sharp charge between Colonel Straughan’s for the Parliament and Colonel Digby’s for the King, was most remarkable. Straughan’s troop consisted of a hundred young men from sixteen to twenty years of age, on whose faces, as was said, never razor had past in order to shave their beards, all double, if not treble armed for this encounter. This troop of Straughan’s was led forth by himself on Bradock and St. Winnow Downs, having nothing on his head but a hat, and on the trunk of his body nought but a white linen shift, where they braved it for some time as was said before, giving defiance to a like number of the King’s party in sight of the King and both armies; whereupon soon after dislodged the Lord Digby’s troop for the King, to accept and fight this challenge of Straughan’s, who with great resolution and bravery advanced towards him, and gave the first onset or charge, but firing their pistols at too great distance, it did little harm to his adversary, whilst instantly Straughan, like a firebrand of hell, with a led horse by his side, had before commanded his boys, as he called them, to take their adversary’s fire, which they then did with unspeakable hardiness, and rushed on to the very horse heads of Digby’s troopers, that before had spent their shot, himself leading the fore front to the very points of their swords, when he discharged his double-barrelled pistols, and was in like manner seconded by his troopers, who had all the same sort of pistols, and most of them laden with three or four bullets each, which proved so fatal and disastrous a blow to Digby’s troopers, that the one half of them were slain on the spot or mortally wounded; and it was further observable, that scarce horse or man that escaped went not off without some hurt or damage, as I was told by one Mr. William Maye, a gentleman that was one of Digby’s troop, and sorely wounded in this battle, the marks of which through his hands, arms, and legs were visible, though cured to a large degree, till his dying day, 1672; and much the like account I had of this battle or combat from Mr. William Upcott, of Truro, and Mr. Joseph Upcott, of Morval, brothers, that were parcel of Straughan’s troop, who there took some of the King’s horses alive, their riders being slain, upon whose furniture was his proper arms, the star and the letters C. R.

But, alas! notwithstanding this success of Straughan’s troop, the King with his army had so hemmed in or surrounded Essex in his head quarters at Lestwithell, that he could not long subsist or have relief for his soldiers, for the Lord Goring and Sir Thomas Basset, Knt. stopped all provision with a great body of horse, that was coming to him by way of St. Blazey from the west, as Sir Richard Grenville did the like by way of St. Colomb, Bodmin, and Lanhydrock from the north; whereupon it was resolved by Essex’s council, that he should desert his army, and privately by night in a boat go down the river to Fowey, and from thence take ship for Plymouth, which expedient was accordingly put in execution, and the General Essex, the Lord Robartes, and some others the next day got into Plymouth, being the 31st of August 1644. On the same day Sir William Balfour with two thousand five hundred of the Parliament horse, with divers officers, viz. Colonel Nicholas Boscawen, his Lieutenant-Colonel James Hals, of Merther, Henry Courtenay, of St. Bennet’s in Lanyvet, Colonel John Seyntaubyn, of Clowans, and his Lieutenant Colonel Braddon, Colonel Carter, and several other officers and gentlemen of quality, early in the morning forced their passage over St. Winnow, Boconnock, and Bradock Downs, though the body of the King’s army, which lay encamped on the heath in those places, maugre all opposition to the contrary; from thence they rode to Leskeard, from thence to Saltash Passage, and from thence to Plymouth safely the same day, amidst their own garrison and confederates.

Notwithstanding this desertion of the general and other officers as aforesaid, Major General Skippon (a Londoner), like a good commander, resolved to live and die with his soldiers; and in order to their preservation, being at least twelve thousand men, he led them down the banks of the river on the west side thereof towards Foye, in order to transport them over the passage or river to Lanteglos, or ship them from thence for Plymouth, all other roads and high ways being stopped up by the King’s army as aforesaid, during which march Skippon’s men were sorely distressed in the rear by the King’s soldiers, so that five of their field pieces were taken in the lanes, whereupon the next morning his men made a stand, and with a brigade of horse that never deserted the infantry, charged the King’s troops with great courage and animosity, and beat them out of the field which they had lost the day before, with some loss; whereupon immediately the King sent Captain Brett with the Queen’s troop to attack them, who in the King’s sight charged Skippon’s brigade with that fury and violence as forced them to retire from the field aforesaid, whereby not only he regained the ground that was lost, but got some other fields from his party, and then returned in good order, having lost only four men, himself being shot in the arm, for which brave adventure the King knighted him on the spot. After which the Parliament soldiers were so dispirited that they could hardly be brought to stand to their arms; upon which dismay Colonel Butler and a trumpeter came to desire a parley with the King, which was forthwith granted, and a treaty followed on the first of September, when the Commissioners on the King’s part were Prince Maurice and the Earl of Bramford, for Essex’s soldiers Major-General Philip Skippon, Colonel Christopher Whichcott, and others, by whom a cessation of hostility was agreed upon in these terms――

APPENDIX.