Why did Royalists lose the Civil War?

[Music] Why did the royalists lose the First Civil War from 1642 to 1646? This is a critical question for those who want to understand the Civil Wars, and, as ever, there are no simple easy answers. But in this programme, Andrew Hopper, professor in local and social history at Oxford University, examines both the well-known and the often forgotten factors, which contributed to the defeat of King Charles and his armies. Prepare to be surprised, as Professor Hopper looks beyond the battlefields and generals, to stories of treachery, espionage and personal slight. Many explanations have been offered as to why the royalists lost the First Civil War, but they often tend to fall into one of two categories. The first category is the structural explanation that the longer the war lasted, the more likely the royalists were to be defeated, owing to the superior resources of money and manpower at Parliament's disposal. The second argument is that the royalists lost the First Civil War, not because of any structural weaknesses in their war effort, but because the armies were defeated in the decisive summer campaign of 1645 at the battles of Naesby, Langport, and a host of smaller engagements. Allied to this view is that the King was indecisive and ill-advised, particularly by favourites, lacking military experience or acumen, such as Lord George Digby. So these are the two themes then, and one military explanation, looking at battles and general shit, and the other looking at the structural weaknesses in the royalist cause, that it had less resources than Parliament, that it was more likely to lose, should the war drag out and grow longer. So let's look at that first theme. Let us examine the evidence for the royalists being at a serious, strategic disadvantage. Parliamentary activists controlled Westminster and the city of London. Then as now, London dominated England. This gave them the ability to control the central fundraising mechanisms of the state, and to negotiate loans from the city of London, that far outstrip the financial resources the royalists were able to draw upon. This was so important because the ability to equip, clothes, feed and pay soldiers became increasingly critical once that initial wave of volunteers enthusiasm wore out. Parliament also controlled nearly all of the pre-war English navy, whose admiral was the influential Parliamentarian Pierre Robert Rich, Earl of Warwick. This enabled Parliament to develop superior systems of logistics and supply, to be able to deliver money, manpower and materials to coastal fortresses, deep within royalist health territory, such as Plymouth, Lyme Regius and Hull. Royalists tended to be more successful at mobilising men and resources in the poorer regions of Britain. For example, Wales, Cornwall, the West Country and Northern England. Parliament, on the other hand, controlled the richer and more heavily populated areas in the south and eastern parts of England, and this formed for them an intact power base rarely penetrated by royalist forces. And the royalists proved less successful in mobilising foreign military intervention. Parliament's treaty with the Scots procured the intervention of the army of the Solon-Legon Covenant in spring 1644. This was a mighty field army over 20,000 men strong that did much to overthrow the previous royalist dominance in Northern England. This was a decisive boost to the Parliamentarian war effort. From then on, royalist armies increasingly found themselves outnumbered in the major engagements. In contrast to Parliament's alliance with Scotland, the King's recall of the royal regiments serving in Ireland to support him in England never really amounted to more than 9,000 men. And these arrived in small batches of peace-meal reinforcements rather than as a marching army like the Scots. The presence of soldiers perceived to be Irish amongst the royalist forces was also a propaganda victory for Parliament. London newsbooks proclaimed that the King had brought over native Irishmen who were guilty of massacring Protestant settlers to do the same to their English subjects. There's evidence that this claim, however distorted and exaggerated, unsettled many royalists and made them think twice about their royalism. And by the third year of the war, the royalists fell behind the parliamentarians in recruiting and maintaining their infantry formations. As the territory royalists controlled, contracted, they found recruitment increasingly difficult and grew ever more reliant on the Welsh, Cornish and Royal troops recalled from Ireland. Mark Stoyle has argued that this enabled Parliament and its new model army to pose as champions of Englishness, in contrast to a royalism that had become increasingly dependent on ethnic diversity in its armies. For instance, according to the Petitions so far published on the Civil War Petitions website, around half of the royalist-mamed soldiers that mentioned nasby in their later petitions were Welsh, and most of the other half were from English counties bordering Wales, such as Chesier, Shropshire and Herapherdshire. Ronald Hurton has suggested then that as the royalist cause declined, the military commanders grew ever more repatious in their demands upon the contracting base of civilian support in which their forces were quartered. Demands for food, money and shelter felt directly onto civilians who increasingly withheld this cooperation or even participated in clubmen uprisings in defence of their homes and property. A collapse of active support for the royalists in their own heartlands therefore accelerated their demise. In the west country, the cavalry of George Goring's army became known as Goring's crew by late 1645 with a reputation for plunder that turned other royalists against them. And setbacks to the royalist cause were worsened by the cult of honour amongst royalist commanders, many of whom responded badly to reverses. Many were prone to a divisive vindictiveness, personal recrimination, allegations of treachery, even dueling and violence against former comrades following a defeat. Unlike parliamentarians who had many different figureheads, committees and institutions to appeal to as part of their war effort, when royalist commanders were discredited they often had little reason to redouble their efforts as disfavor with the king often proved final. After his defeat at the Battle of Master Moore, the Marquise of Newcastle chose exile rather than suffering the ridicule of the court and Rupert's honour proved incompatible with further royalist service after his surrender of Bristol in 1645. So now let's turn to some of the military reasons why the king lost the First Civil War. Battles are important as military historians remind us. In contrast to these arguments you've just heard about inherent royalist structure or weaknesses, the recent books by Malcolm Wanklin stress the Civil Wars were battlefield events and that these impacted heavily on the outcome of the First Civil War. During 1645 rather than being in terminal decline the royalist war effort was alive and well. For instance Ian Atherton has shown us how the royalist garrison at Lichfield was far better maintained, administered and supplied in 1645 than it had been two years earlier in 1643 and Mark Stoyle has shown how renewed mass recruitment for the royalist cause was still possible in places such as Cornwall in the summer of 1645 with the raising of the new Cornish tertia by Sir Richard Grenville. It was once even suggested that the royalists had committed suicide at Naesby by attacking uphill against the force that was nearly double their own size. But recent work by Glenn Ford, Martin Marrick Sevenths and the Naesby Battlefield project suggests this inevitability is misplaced. The forces were not so unevenly matched, and most of the new model armies infantry were untried conscripts, and they were badly shaken by the royalist attack. Their commander General Skippen was badly wounded, General Eitan was captured at one point prospects of a parliamentarian victory looked remote. So Naseby was perhaps more of a closer and thing than has been suggested. Also the new model army's victory at the Battle of Langport a month later is often overlooked in the narrative of the Civil War. In this battle, Tertommas Fairfax and the new model army defeated a larger royalist army than that of the king at Naseby, and this prevented George Goring's army from being reinforced by the Cornish and Sarrichard Grenville. We see the importance of this from Fairfax's letter to his father after the Battle of Langport on the 10th of July 1645, which he said, "We cannot esteem this mercy less, all things considered than that of Naseby fight." So after the victory is at Naseby and Langport Fairfax did not disperse the new model army into winter quarters as his predecessor, the Earl of Essex, had done. Now, possessing both the finances and the will, he maintained the pressure on the remaining royalist forces and allowed them little time to recover. He developed better relations with civilian populations, owing to the superior pay and discipline of his forces. He persuaded the Somerset Clubman movement to align with him, and his campaign to reduce the Cornish Royalists was tactful, paying their surrendering soldiers to go home and lay down their arms, rather than taking revenge on them for Cornwall's royalist activism. When it became clear that he was not intending to punish the Cornish, many of the royalist gentry in Cornwall made terms with a treaty at Milbrook, leaving the royalist general Ralph Hopton isolated and with little choice but to surrender soon after. A new focus on landscape history has done much to shed new light on the decisive battlefield moments of the Civil Wars, as field walking, terrain reconstruction, and battlefield archaeology have deepened our understanding of the awful bloody and confused affairs that Civil War battles were. So we should not neglect the role played by the English countryside itself in deciding the outcome of the Civil Wars. It's important to remember that the landscape wasn't the backdrop for all of these military events, that the landscape itself shaped them, so it's worth understanding more about the historical terrain over which these battles were fought. For instance, fresh examination of the historical terrain at Naysby demonstrates that Cornwall's cavalry were drawn up very deeply over a narrow front, hemmed in by a rabbit-warren. This meant that ground was covered in holes to the rabbits' burrows, making it dangerous for horses hooves. It could therefore be argued that Cornwall's much celebrated control over his troopers was as much dictated by the landscape as by any of the legendary puritanical discipline that is often attributed to them. Cornwall was able to defeat the royalist northern horse and the Marmerdjut Langdale ranged against him, and then have his troopers intervene against the royalist infantry purely because his cavalry out numbered Langdale's 2-1 and was drawn up in much much deeper formations. We should also consider news management as a prime factor in Parliament's victory. Jason PC, Joed Raymond and other historians have shown how Parliament proved more adept at using print, propaganda and paper bullets to bolster their cause. The royalists were instinctively reticent about appealing for popular support in print, and we can see this in a famous quote from one of their generals, Sir Marmerdjut Langdale. The Parliament is far too nimble for the king in printing. The common people believe the first story which makes impression in their minds and it cannot be beaten out. But in time, the royalists overcame this reserve, and they did produce the celebrated Sirial Weekly Newsbook Mercurius Alicus. But their provincial printing presses in Oxford and York could never match the sheer volume of Parliamentarian output coming from London. Print was able to mobilize the anti-catholic prejudices of many English subjects into supporting war against their king. A king who became widely regarded as irretrievably untrustworthy after his duplicitous correspondence captured at Naesby was published soon after the battle in the pamphlet The King's Cabinet opened. A recent book by John Ellis to walk in the dark has argued that part of the reason for the royalist defeat was that parliamentarians developed super-area systems of military intelligence and espionage. This proved importance in the prelude to the decisive battles of 1645 as well as in undermining several important royalist garrisons. So Thomas Fairfax wrote to speak a lenthel at Nottingham on 17 February 1647 requesting that Parliament reward John Tarant with a livelihood for him and his family for his scouting services in 1645. Fairfax remarks that Tarant very often hasited his life in bringing me from the enemy's quarters exact intelligence of their affairs. Tarant had been sent to General Goring in the West by Secretary Nicholas Adoxford. When he returned to Oxford, Tarant was sent to the king with all the papers and details about Goring's campaign in the West and the state of Oxford. Instead Tarant changed sides and presented all of this to Fairfax right before the Battle of Naesby. This enabled the new Model Army's Swift-O-Releif of Taunton, which otherwise would probably have been lost, and Fairfax wrote this was a seasonable and remarkable service to the kingdom. My book Turncoats and Renegados on the subject of side-changing argues that the military strategies of both sides at the very highest level so frequently hinged upon securing the surrender of towns and fortresses by encouraging their commanders to change sides. Whilst he was imprisoned in the Tower of London, the future Parliamentarian general George Monk wrote in his observations on military and political affairs that the best way to take a town was by treachery. But when presented with their best chance of decisive victory in the summer of 1643, the royalist sieges of whole, Gloucester and Plymouth hinged on this strategy, but in each case their hopes proved misplaced. In contrast, by 1645, Parliament's attempts to gain ground through subverting royalist garrison commanders began to pay off. Local disputes between royalists led to alienation and defections amongst those the king decided against. While treachery did not ultimately cause the royalists to lose the war, by 1645 it clearly accelerated a loss of support in their heartlands. There was quarrelling and subversion within many royalist garrisons in the western marches and wails and the west midlands, which robbed the king of his capacity to rebuild after Naesby. As towns such as Shrewsbury, Monmouth and Heriford fell to Parliament, royalist frustrations turned inwards, with garrison commanders demanding court marshals and threatening duels to vindicate their honour. A fatalism crept in amongst the royalists that treachery was there undoing. Alexander Brom was a dorset poet and lawyer who composed 200 poem satires attacking enemies of Charles I. His poem on the loss of a garrison and meditation illustrates this fatalism that crept into the royalist cause after Naesby. Town after town, field after field. This turns and that profidiously doth yield. He's banded on the traitorous thought of those that Janeus like looked to him and his foes. In vain our bullworks and the strongest hold if the procedure's bullets are made of gold. Trust not in friends. For friends will soon deceive thee. They are in nothing sure, but sure to leave thee. So the parliamentarians and royalists reacted differently to battlefield setbacks and defeat. After the destruction of his infantry at the Battle of Maaston more, we've seen how the the Royalist Viceroy of the North, the Marquis of Newport. castle took ship with some of his own officers into exile in Europe, reflecting he could not endure the laughter of the court. After the restoration, Newcastle's wife Margaret Cavendish Duchess of Newcastle wrote extensively to clear her husband from blame for the loss of royalist north. That it is remarkable that in all actions and undertakings, when my lord was in person himself, he was always victorious and prospered in the execution of his designs. What so ever was lost or succeeded ill happened in his absence and was caused either by treachery, negligence or carelessness of his officers. There was such juggling, treachery and falsehood in his own army and among some of his own officers that it was impossible for my lord to be prosperous and successful in his designs and undertakings. This contrast sharply with the behaviour of Newcastle's opponents in Yorkshire, the Fairfax family, after their crushing defeat at Abdul-Waltz and Moore in 1643. They did not flee into exile but redouble their efforts to raise a new army and continue the struggle. Another problem for royalist leaders was about their need to secure personal favour and the gratitude of the monarch. This led them to concentrate on the king's person and neglect the royalist war effort in their own localities. For example, the royalist gentry of Norfolk abandoned their county to join the king's person at Oxford. To conclude, the formation of the new model army from April 1645 is often cited as the principal factor in the royalist's defeat. Here at last Parliament established a national standing army not tied to serving in any particular region. It became better supplied and more regularly paid than its rivals. It did not have to resort to plunder to maintain itself as the royalists increasingly did and it was led by Fairfax, Cromwell and Skippen, capable and energetic generals who sought out rather than shunned decisive confrontations with the enemy. Yet, if this army had floundered at Naesby, as it so nearly did, Parliament's victory would have been far from assured, despite all of its advantages of territory, manpower and resources. The fledgling new model army had plenty of political enemies at Westminster who would have jumped on a royalist's success at Naesby to eject Fairfax and Cromwell from command. A negotiated peace or an even longer, more protracted war, might then have followed. So in explaining the royalist's defeat, no single factor can be stressed in isolation. Parliament was able to bring superior manpower and resources to bear, but even this might not have been enough in the face of a decisive military defeat. Historians increasingly appreciate the fluid, changing and contingent nature of civil war allegiances, how they were not fixed identities but continuously reshaped by political and military circumstances. For this reason, civil war battlefields remained deserving of significant research and military history needs to widen its remit. A better understanding of royalist failure will be gained through studying issues such as recruitment, mobilisation, pay and supply, along with how the social identity of the armies influence their commanders' strategies and their battlefield performance. We hope you enjoyed this talk. Do take a look at the programme notes, while you'll find resources, including further reading and original sources. Other fascinating programmes answering some of the big questions of the British Civil Wars are available now on our website, www.worldtindupsidedown.co.uk. In the first of these, Professor Edward Valance of the University of Rohampton explores how far Charles I was personally responsible for the outbreak of the wars. In his second programme, he asks why was Charles I executed? The answers, based on modern scholarship, may surprise you. While you're visiting the website, do register for a monthly newsletter, the world turned upside down. To learn about all the new programmes which are coming. [BLANK_AUDIO]