Black Tom's Red Army

by Nicholas Carter

  A few of them were still awake, examining their nails as the messenger waited for Goring to digest his information. The rest dozed in their chairs, content for Goring to make up his mind. They were passing what was left of the bottle around the map-strewn table.

  Trouble with Rupert, he couldn’t make up his mind either. He’d been quick enough to pack him off West before Naseby. But he’d been ordering him back ever since. He had ducked and dived, avoiding outright refusal - but remaining in the west nevertheless.

  Now he’d sent some poor splinter barely out of his swaddling bands down here to do his dirty work.

  “Plague you say?” Goring inquired. The messenger nodded.

  “Aye my lord.” The youngster replied. “We’re losing a hundred or so a week. His Highness bid me to tell you, if he wasn‘t as hard pressed putting Bristol into a fit posture of defence, he would have come himself.”

  Ha, he doubted that.

  Goring stroked his straw-coloured eyebrows, deep in thought. Or as deep in thought as he could be after several bottles of sack.

  So now the Prince was expecting him to march his army back to a damned pest-house?

  “His highness conceives your force, when combined with the garrison and the Lord Gerard’s drafts from Wales, will give him a field force equivalent to the enemy.”

  Goring chuckled. Oh he did, did he?

  “New to the colours, I imagine?” The question caught the young ensign by surprise.

  “New…as in, not new my lord. I have been with the colours for a year and more.”

  He must have signed on shortly after his tenth birthday, Goring mused. Their armies were full of these boys, all far too big for their own boots.

  “I served in my father’s regiment, part of Langdale’s northern horse. I transferred to his highness Prince Rupert’s lifeguard after Naseby.”

  The laughing Cavalier nodded, temporarily sober enough. “Then you have seen as much action as half the gentlemen here,” Goring observed.

  Rupert had left the bulk of what was left of his cavalry with the king in Wales while he took over the remnants of the Bristol garrison. Gerard and the king had been dispatching a boatload of farm boys across the Severn every week, but the bewildered Welsh levies weren’t worth a cup of cold pish by all accounts.

  George Goring commanded the only force left in the West worth talking about. And he meant to keep it that way.

  Was Rupert seriously expecting him to march to Bristol and lose the majority of them to this latest pestilence? A plague on him!

  “Well then young, what did you say they called you, Spring, Summer was it?”

  “Winter my lord,” Thomas replied levelly.

  “Well then young Winter. How are you on your Caesar?”

  “My Caesar?”

  “Yes lad, your Caesar. Gallic Wars? Civil War? Rather appropriate, given our present circumstance, I would have thought. Have you not heard of Julius Caesar and Marc Anthony, of Pompei the Great, Titus Labienus, Brutus and Cassius?”

  Winter swallowed. What was this piss-dribbling buffoon babbling about? This was no time for Latin lessons. Not that Thomas had ever had any.

  “Do you imagine the great Caesar, negotiating the plains of Northern Greece at the head of half a dozen legions, would have marched his army broadside to a superior force, with nothing but a few reed-choked ditches between them?”

  Winter frowned.

  “Well sir,” his northern accent becoming more pronounced as his brittle confidence began to crumble in the face of Goring’s laconic interrogation. “That is…”

  “And do you imagine Sir Thomas Fairfax is going to stand by and let me march across his front, without interference at all?” Goring inquired.

  The Royalist army was encamped behind a river - he forgot which one, Somerset had more rivers than a dog had ticks. The New Model Army was lurking somewhere over the endless swamps, fields and ditches to the east. A forgotten land of herons, eels, toads and spotted cattle.

  Well, not so many cattle. Not since Goring’s army had turned up a year and more ago.

  Goring lifted another map from the clutter, held it up to the feeble candlelight.

  They had been forced to call off the siege of Taunton - hours before it had been like to fall - as advance units of the New Model had cantered across the levels to threaten his rear. Dispatched by their masters at Whitehall, they had covered more ground than Goring would have expected. That much was true.

  Goring had pulled his forces in from their siege lines about the smoking dump, and force-marched them ten miles to the south, where they would be safe enough behind the half dozen or so cunningly constricted river lines which criss-crossed south Somerset like the veins on an old bloat’s nose.

  His army had been operating across the area for the past year and more - and the men knew all the highways and byways, woods, fields and ditches like the back of their hands.

  He wasn’t particularly concerned at the unexpectedly rapid approach of the New Model. They weren’t likely to get one over on him around here.

  What was the place called? Evil?

  Yeovil, the locals called it.

  Goring conjoured the terrain, the rivers and the roads in his mind’s eye, studied every ditch and contour as if had been cunningly crafted in clay on the table before him. He could edge further West, hug the coast toward Minehead and Barnstaple in the hope of maintaining contact with the king by boat.

  Or he could take up a new position around Exeter, where he had the option of thrusting east along Fairfax’s open flank or covering an organised retreat into the far West.

  The general drained his cup as the bottle reached him again. He poured the dregs into his glass and tossed the bottle over his shoulder.

  His serving men appeared with another, uncorked and ready to go.

  Or he could disengage here at, what was it called, Yeovil, slip back to Bridgwater and link up with Rupert, just as the Prince was suggesting.

  After all, he didn’t relish being trapped in the peninsula, corked up like a genie in a bottle.

  And Fairfax, no doubt an enthusiastic and ardent student of Caesar, wouldn’t expect him to risk marching his army across his front. He tugged his moustache, pondering the odds.

  “What’s this river called again?” he asked.

  “The Yeo my Lord.” Ah yes. The Yeo. And the other, almost intersecting with it, The Parret.

  Fairfax wouldn’t dare attempt getting his fancy New Model across two bloody rivers with the Royalist army sitting comfortably on the further bank. He turned the map the right way up, squinted at the spidery blue lines which denoted the main river lines.

  They weren’t particularly wide, but they were deep and sluggish. The locals hadn’t exactly overburdened themselves with bridges. Which was all for the good as long as he kept sidestepping away from the rebels - west, then north, west then north.

  Thus closing the distance between him and Bridgwater, then Bridgwater and the mighty Rupert, picking his pustules in Bristol.

  Ah, but Fairfax wasn’t the only force in Somerset. Parliament still held a couple of cards, handy enough pawns to place between him and his Prince.

  “What news of Weldon and Massey?”

  One of his officers yawned, boots crossed on the table.

  “They’ve reinforced the garrison in Taunton, pulled back to the east to link up with Fairfax.”

  So the Bristol road would be open, if they moved quickly enough. He made up his mind in a moment, thrust the map toward one of the snoring imbeciles collapsed at the table.

  “Porter! Yes you sir!” the general called, tossing a discarded cork at the florid officer three places down the table. His brother-in-law. Vastly experienced but notoriously unlucky in the field. He’d been captured at Marston Moor and then exchanged.

  Parliament must have gotten the best of that particular piece of business.

  Porter blinked rapidly, took the map and tried to get his bearings.

  “While w
e’re busy confounding Caesar at every turn, we might as well go for broke.”

  Porter, never the quickest on the uptake at counsel, narrowed his eyes, trying to fathom what his commander was getting at now.

  “Dawn tomorrow Porter, you’ll take your brigade off toward Taunton. Bang all your drums and fly every flag, ensign and guidon you‘ve got.” Goring climbed to his feet, steadied himself on the back of Porter’s chair.

  “When Porter has their attention, I want all the guns and baggage drawn off to Bridgwater, the rest of the army to stand to and cover.”

  Goring’s officers exchanged glances, well accustomed to Goring’s strokes of genius - and his sudden descents into alcohol-fuelled fancy.

  “I want our rebel friends to know exactly what you are about.” Goring lifted a knife from the clutter, jabbed the point at the map. “With luck, Fairfax will fall for it, shift his army left to counter your move. Leaving us to trot off to Bridgwater, putting another couple of rivers between us and the New Model.”

  “Well, my lord, he might,” Porter admitted. “And then again, he might not.”

  Goring shrugged. “Fairfax is careful. He wouldn’t risk losing Taunton to an unexpected sortie, not this late in the day. If he doesn’t take his whole force, he’ll detach a regiment or two, which means he won’t be able to launch a full scale attack on us, here at,” he clicked his fingers.

  “Yeovil my lord.”

  “Yeovil. Or this place down the road a way, what’s it called?” he handed the map to Winter. The youth squinted at the barely legible place name.

  “Langport.”

  “Langport, of course. Even better. Open slopes on top of another damned marsh. One lane up and over the hill and hedges to either flank. It’s tighter than a virgin’s back passage. They wouldn’t dare attempt it,” Goring exclaimed.

  Thomas Winter looked from the knife-pricked map to the grinning commander he had heard so much about, wondering if he was quite sane.

  “I will return to Bristol sir, to bring his highness news of your movements,” he bowed. Goring waved his hand, raised the bottle to his mouth and emptied it in one.

  “Aye, you do that lad.”

  By the Hot Baths, Bath and elsewhere, July 6, 1645

  Looking at the crowd in the Three Tuns, you could be forgiven for thinking the war had been called off - at least for that afternoon.

  Sparrow and Porthcurn had buried the hatchet, that was for sure. They were chattering away, laughing and hooting like long-lost brothers. Boots planted square, they swaggered and swayed, tankards in fists, as if determined to demonstrate some kind of physical as well as moral superiority over the fawning councillors, politicians and tradesmen crowded into the inn.

  The pair of them certainly caught the eye in the crowd, resplendent in their fine uniforms and swords, their boots and lace. But Bella had had her fill of posturing soldiery at Naseby.

  She wondered for the thousandth time how easily they had resumed their old lives - if given a fraction of a chance. If the war, of a sudden, was declared a draw and all the teeming armies sent straight home. Sparrow and Porthcurn on opposing sides but getting along like a house on fire, King and Parliament forgotten, at least for the moment.

  Sparrow had tucked Mary’s arm in his as if she was a bolt of good cloth, steered her backward and forward as barging guests elbowed their way through the crowd with fistfuls of tankards or plates of sweetmeats.

  True to his word, her father hadn’t stinted on the celebrations. Half the population of Bath had turned out to make the most of his unexpected - and unfamiliar - munificence.

  Sir Gilbert was as usual building bridges of his own, no surprise there. What was unusual was the extent to which Bath’s finest appeared to accept and encourage his rough wooing.

  If she had been Porthcurn, she would have been deeply concerned with their readiness to treat with a notorious turncoat and entertain a waggonload of rebel soldiery - rather than spend the afternoon supping cider in their company.

  Mary Keziah caught her glance, concerned to see her mistress so troubled.

  She unhooked herself from Sparrow’s proudly possessive grasp and threaded her way through the crowd to give her former mistress a close but endlessly tender hug.

  Bella couldn’t help bursting into tears all over again. Determined she would never blub and bawl like so many of her contemporaries, Bella was mortified to find she had been reduced to this state of acute vulnerability. She had always despised sloppy sentimentality, strode out proud in this horribly male world.

  And look where it had taken her. Naseby field. Where her pride and prospects had been ruined even more thoroughly than the King’s.

  “Whatever is it Miss Bella?” Miss Bella. Mary Keziah’s deliberate attempt to make things right, to use the familiar form of address she would have used before the war, only served to underline her own dependency on her old life.

  She had wandered and ridden across half the country - seen more of the world than she would have ever dreamt possible back in Chipping Marlwood - but the cruel world had delivered her back, shorn of her hair, her beauty, her spirit.

  “What on earth’s the matter? Is it, Hugo?” Bella bit her lip. She had barely thought of her dead lover. Trampled and broken like one of her old dolls.

  She sobbed into Mary’s shoulder, marvellously aware of her health and vitality, envying her pulsing, heart-throbbing happiness.

  Mary had spent the past two years housekeeping for her father. Running his several households and bringing up Will’s bastard into the bargain.

  Bella could barely credit the fact this unlikely arrangement had worked wonders for all of them. For Mary, Callum and her father. A happy little household she knew absolutely nothing about. Bella felt an inexplicable twinge of jealousy. For world she barely knew existed.

  The world she had run away from three years since.

  They had trundled along in delightful domesticity while she had flown around the country like a witch on a broomstick. Making or breaking spells, breaking hearts. Including her own.

  Mary’s happy face re-arranged itself into a mask of near-panicked concern.

  “Should I fetch a doctor? Shall I…”

  “Mary, it’s alright. I’m fine. I’m happy for you,” she said sincerely. “I’m so happy for you.”

  Mary Keziah looked desperately bewildered, wondering what ailed her former mistress. What had they done with the old Bella? Broken her on the wheel? Her wounds were recovering, unless she had taken some unexpected turn for the worse?

  “I’m fine. It’s just, so lovely to see you happy. You and Will,” she added, Mary Keziah easing away from her to watch for sudden breakages or seeping bloodstains.

  She would need to look deeper.

  Bella steadied herself, annoyed to find herself vapouring like some knock-kneed virgin. She determined to pull herself together while she could.

  “I’m fine. I’m back here, with you, with Callum. With father.” Mary Keziah’s eyes widened, even more concerned now.

  Bella’s heart went out to her, blissfully happy to have finally got her man, but unable to allow her former mistress to mope alone.

  Mary Keziah held her away, squinted at her like some old wise woman. Bella couldn’t help giggling.

  “Get along now, you’ve spent more time fussing over me as you have your husband. He’s looking out for you, see?”

  “He’s alright for a moment. He’s waited two years, another couple of hours won’t hurt him.”

  Bella laughed out loud, as if a weight had been lifted from her. At least for now. She wouldn’t spoil her best, her only friend’s day by moping and tottering in these damn fogs and mists of self-pity. It wasn’t like her. It simply wasn’t her.

  Her father, Sparrow and Porthcurn, Telling, turning their heads as if she had simply clicked her fingers.

  She returned Mary’s concerned grasp with interest, stood back to beam at her.

  “For heaven’s sake Mary, I’m fine. Tha
nks to you! You’ve done me more good than all their poultices and potions!” She risked a half turn, as if they were dancing around the maypole back home.

  “Never mind me. You’re a married woman now! Go and grab that husband of yours before Will and Porthcurn decide to change sides,” she advised.

  It was Mary’s turn to look concerned.

  “I was wondering, d’you think…I mean, what’s going to happen now?”

  Bella shrugged. She had been wondering the same thing herself.

  “Well, I imagine Will is going to lift you off your feet, carry you up those stairs and…”

  Mary Keziah, comically straightlaced despite her own well documented disgrace, feigned shock.

  “I’ll do no such thing. I’m not spending the night in the Bridewell either,” she raised her chin in defiance. “In fact, Porthcurn’s welcome to him!”

  “You’ve spent nights in worse. That stable back at Roundway?” Bella asked archly. Mary Keziah reddened.

  “You mustn’t tease,” the girl said. “Two years I’ve had to put up with all the muttering and pointing. Me and the little Roundhead bastard.” Now it was Mary’s turn to sob. Tears springing into her eyes as Bella threw her good arm around her shoulder.

  “Never mind them Mary. You weren’t the first and you can wager you won’t be the last. I’ve known dozens of girls who found themselves…”

  “But you weren’t here Bella,“ Mary Keziah insisted. “If it wasn’t for your father, I don’t know what I would have done, I don’t straight,” she exclaimed. “And it’s not half as bad here as it would be with the Parliament.”

  She had that right and all, Bella thought. Bible brandishing fanatics, foaming at the mouth about hell-poxed harlots. The bloody hypocrites hadn’t paid much heed to their moral code on Naseby field.

  She looked around the bustling inn, even more uproarious thanks to Sir Gilbert’s freely administered small beer and cider.