Now! Then! 2024! - Yorkshire On This Day

Excerpt

I cannot but here acknowledge God’s goodness to me this day. For being advanced a good way single before my men, having a colonel, and lieutenant-colonel, who had engaged themselves to be my prisoners, only with me, and many of the enemy now betwixt me and my men, I lighted upon a regiment of foot standing in the market-place. Being thus encompassed, and thinking what to do, I spied a lane which I thought would lead me back to my men again. At the end of this lane there was a corps-de-guard of the enemy’s, with fifteen or sixteen soldiers, who were just then quitting of it, with a sergeant leading them off, whom we met, and seeing their officers, they came up to us, taking no notice of me, and asked them what they would have them do, for they could keep the work no longer, the roundheads (as they called them) came so fast upon them. The gentlemen who had passed their words to me to be my true prisoners said nothing, and looking one upon another I thought it not fit now to own them as prisoners, much less to bid the rest to render themselves to me. But being well mounted, and seeing a place in the works where men used to go over, I rushed from them, and made my horse leap over the work, and by a good providence got to my men again.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Abbreviations:

• ER: East Riding
• GM: Greater Manchester
• NR: North Riding
• NY: North Yorkshire
• SY: South Yorkshire
• WR: West Riding
• WY: West Yorkshire

Comment

Comment

The OED doesn’t mention “true prisoner,” but my impression is that its use declines somewhere in the course of the 19th century, along with the notion of personal honour, the latter no doubt due to Harry Flashman. I haven’t delved, but the concept certainly exists in the French “vrai prisonnier” and, transposed to love, in Latin American Spanish as “fiel prisionero”:

Fear of subsequent retribution may have been a factor in Fairfax’s prisoners’ behaviour. For example, the Royalist commander Sir Charles was taken prisoner at Stow-on-the-Wold at the end of the First Civil War, and in exchange for his release agreed not to bear arms against Parliament in the future. However, during the Second Civil War he broke his parole of honour and took a prominent part in the seizure of Colchester, and when it was taken by Fairfax he was court-martialled and shot.

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Original

At Wakefield, six miles off, lay three thousand of the enemy; but they did not much disturb us: And we were busied about releasing prisoners that were taken at Seacroft, most of them being countrymen, whose wives and children were still importunate for their release, which was as earnestly endeavoured by us, but no conditions would be accepted; so as their continual cries, and tears, and importunities, compelled us to think of some way to redeem these men; and we thought of attempting Wakefield.

Our intelligence was, that the enemy had not above eight or nine hundred men in the town. I acquainted my father with our design, who approved of it, and sent some men from Leeds, so that we were able to draw out eleven hundred horse and foot.

Upon Whitsunday, early in the morning, we came before the town, but they had notice of our coming, and had manned all their works, and set about five hundred musketeers to line the hedges without the town, which made us now doubt our intelligence, but it was too late.

After a little consultation we advanced, and soon beat them back into the town, which we stormed at three places; and after an hour’s dispute, the foot forced open a barricado, where I entered with my own troop, Colonel Alured and Captain Bright followed with theirs. The street where we entered was full of their foot. We charged them through, and routed them, leaving them to the foot that followed close behind us. And presently we were charged again with horse led on by General Goring, where, after a hot encounter, some were slain, and himself taken prisoner by Colonel Alured.

I cannot but here acknowledge God’s goodness to me this day. For being advanced a good way single before my men, having a colonel, and lieutenant-colonel, who had engaged themselves to be my prisoners, only with me, and many of the enemy now betwixt me and my men, I lighted upon a regiment of foot standing in the market-place. Being thus encompassed, and thinking what to do, I spied a lane which I thought would lead me back to my men again. At the end of this lane there was a corps-de-guard of the enemy’s, with fifteen or sixteen soldiers, who were just then quitting of it, with a sergeant leading them off, whom we met, and seeing their officers, they came up to us, taking no notice of me, and asked them what they would have them do, for they could keep the work no longer, the round-heads (as they called them) came so fast upon them.

The gentlemen who had passed their words to me to be my true prisoners, said nothing; and looking one upon another, I thought it not fit now to own them as prisoners, much less to bid the rest to render themselves to me. But being well mounted, and seeing a place in the works where men used to go over, I rushed from them, and made my horse leap over the work, and by a good providence got to my men again….

536 words.

Tags

Tags are assigned inclusively on the basis of an entry’s original text and any comment. You may find this confusing if you only read an entry excerpt.

• Battle of Seacroft Moor (1) ·
• Capture of Wakefield (1) ·
• Cavalier (17) ·
• English Civil War (1642-1651) (27), a series of civil wars and political machinations between Parliamentarians ("Roundheads") and Royalists ("Cavaliers"), mainly over the manner of England's governance and issues of religious freedom ·
• Essex (2) ·
• Fairfax, Ferdinando, 2nd Lord Fairfax of Cameron (1584-1648) (4), English nobleman, politician and Civil War commander, father of Thomas Fairfax ·
• Fairfax, Thomas (1612-71) (6), politician, general and Parliamentary commander-in-chief during the English Civil War, ultimately rejected Cromwell and participated in the Restoration and was spared by Charles II ·
• First English Civil War (18), August 1642-June 1646 ·
• George Goring, Lord Goring (1) ·
• Honour (2) ·
• Horse (71) ·
• John Alured (1) ·
• 📌Leeds (235) ·
• Lucas, Charles (1613-1648) (1), Royalist cavalry commander at Marston Moor ·
• Roundhead (20) ·
• Second English Civil War (3), February-August 1648 ·
• Siege of Colchester (1) ·
• 📌Wakefield (36), cathedral city on the River Calder in the West Riding/West Yorkshire ·

All tags.

Similar

• 23 January 1643: Thomas Fairfax, the Rider of the White Horse, captures Leeds from the Beast with the help of Psalm 68
• 3 June 1648: Disguised as a furniture remover, John Morris takes Pontefract castle for the Stuarts (and for himself)
• 1 November 1643: Sam Priestley of Soyland (22) saves a Royalist enemy from drowning in Hebden Water at the Battle of Heptonstall, and himself dies later of pneumonia
• 16 June 1644: On Trinity Sunday, Parliament and the Scots breach York’s walls and destroy monastic records with a mine next to St Mary’s Tower
• 2 July 1644: Henry Slingsby of the Royalist York garrison recounts Prince Rupert’s defeat at Marston Moor today, which ends Charles I’s hopes in the north
• 15 October 1645: Unable to distinguish Cavaliers from Roundheads, Lord Digby’s victorious Royalist army flees the battlefield at Sherburn in Elmet and is destroyed
• 4 May 1643: The Royalists take Rotherham and begin a search for the preacher John Shawe
• 3 July 1643: The Royalists take Bradford after the Second Siege, but are warned off massacring the inhabitants by a ghost
• 28 October 1648: A letter claims that Pontefract Castle under John Morris, its Royalist governor, has become a den of apolitical brigands
• 18 December 1642: “Bradford quarter” is given to a Royalist besieger during the First Siege