Tom was waiting, his face eagerly alight, though his lip was beginning to tremble on the verge of tears. As her child visibly prepared himself for the collapse of his birthday, Juliana grieved for the effect civil war had imposed on him. Tom was not surprised this had happened. A four-year-old should never be so ready for disappointment.
She discovered Orlando had gone to Pelham Hall. For once, she lost her temper. She stormed off there herself. She burst in on Lovell and Sir Lysander, ready to berate them like a sectarian zealot for their fecklessness and cruelty in arranging what she presumed was a drinking spree. Orlando was lucky she had not brought the heavy pancake pan to beat in his brains.
Curiously, there was no sack in sight. It gave Juliana pause. The two men were sitting together in the library: sober, serious, intent upon a letter. Lovell was reading it out aloud, because the knight's eyesight was poor even with spectacles. They sat either side of the fire, leaning forward intently on their carved, cane-backed chairs as they spoke in low voices. Lovell seemed to be consulting a cipher sheet.
His instant reaction was to push all the papers into his coat pocket. Then, for some reason, both men decided to include Juliana. Perhaps they simply could not bear to break off at that moment. Clearly there were secrets afoot, and possibly they could not remember how much or how little they had revealed before.
Lovell swiftly motioned her to sit. Thoroughly intrigued, Juliana dropped into a chair. She smoothed her skirts and glared at him. He muttered that they had a letter about the King; when she looked puzzled, he mentioned Will Legge. Whether Legge himself wrote this letter was never explained.
Juliana listened in amazement as she was told about the King's escape from Hampton Court. Using his sickly young daughter Elizabeth for cover, he had requested that his guards be moved further from his chamber, because the trampings of their heavy boots disturbed the child at night. Astoundingly, his jailors had agreed. Apparently the New Model Army's fighting hearts are tender towards pale, fair-haired little princesses!'
'That would be generous.' Juliana's mind was in turmoil. She was trying to grasp just what her husband's role was.
'Generous incompetence!' snarled Lovell.
Since it had been suggested that King Charles should try to find refuge in Essex, where Royalist support remained strong, in his wilful way he decided to make instead for the island of Jersey, in the opposite direction. Sir Lysander explained to Juliana, 'Ashburnham had also mentioned Sir John Oglander's house in the Isle of Wight. There the King could be concealed while the governor of the island was sounded out. If he was not sympathetic, our fugitive could take ship for France — although Ashburnham felt this might dismay supporters and encourage the enemy… But the Isle of Wight it is, and Lovell and I are sorry for it.'
With Will Legge, the King slipped away from Hampton Court, down a backstair and through the palace gardens. Arrangements began well; at Thames Ditton, a boat was waiting to row the escapees across the river. Ashburnham and Berkeley stood ready on the far bank with horses. The party galloped away in the night. No pursuit followed. Colonel Whalley, who had been in charge of the King, noticed that the bedchamber seemed too quiet, but its door was locked so the agitated Whalley strode through countless other rooms in the rambling old Tudor palace before he managed to reach the royal quarters and discovered the King had gone. Only a discarded cloak and the King's pet greyhound, whimpering pathetically, remained.
'But from then on,' growled Lovell to Juliana, 'a monkey could have arranged things better. They lost themselves for hours in Windsor Forest and took the wrong route past Farnham. At Bishop's Sutton they reached an inn where a servant was waiting with a change of horses — he came out to tell them that the local Parliamentarians were using the inn as a meeting place that night — '
'Debating the future of the monarchy?' Juliana scoffed. Her male companions bristled, then became sheepish. She forced herself to calm down. 'There is worse?'
'A debacle,' Lovell confessed. 'They made for the coast, where Ashburnham had allegedly arranged a ship for Jersey. They were so late, in the dark he could not find the ship. They panicked. The King was dumped — '
Sir Lysander grunted a protest.
'There were search parties out, and all the ports had been closed,' snarled Lovell, whose high opinion of himself as an organiser made him doubly scathing of this dangerous mess. 'His Majesty was deposited at a house of the Earl of Southampton at Titchfield, this side of the Solent.
I can hardly speak the next damned wickedness. That poltroon Berkeley goes across to the Isle of Wight, where the governor is a certain Hammond. The courtiers have convinced themselves Hammond will be sympathetic — why, in the name of God, should they think that? Hammond is John Hampden's cousin, fought under Essex, a fixed Cromwellian, a rabid puritan!'
'Calm yourself!' murmured Sir Lysander ineffectually.
'The ludicrous Berkeley excels himself. He blurts out to Hammond that he has somebody special secreted at the earl's house. "Oh Governor Hammond! You will never guess who is nearby!" Hammond not only guesses, he gallops straight to the house — '
'With soldiers?' asked Juliana.
'Of course! He swiftly took the King into custody. Whipped him across to Cowes and installed him in Carisbrooke Castle, which lies right in the heart of the island, terrifically defended. Even if His Majesty ever escapes the castle, he cannot get off the Isle of Wight. Anyone who tries to come to him will be spied upon as they make the crossing. Oh imagine how fast messengers rode to inform Parliament of this triumph!'
Juliana had rarely heard Orlando so angry. His voice squeaked like an old gate, hoarse with frustration. She could see the implications: 'At Hampton Court, confinement was comparatively civilised, but now the King will be securely barred up.' She gave Sir Lysander and Orlando a straight look. 'Ashburnham, Berkeley and Legge… And are others working for His Majesty?'
'It is best you do not know,' Sir Lysander told her with a kindly manner. She found it patronising. He could probably tell.
'Can I not be trusted?'
'Nobody can be trusted, sweetheart,' declared Orlando. Juliana froze him with a look. 'As soon as Colonel Hammond was brought to Titchfield, the King knew it was a fatal mistake — "Ah Jack, you have undone me!" he cried.' Lovell was skimming through the last sentences of their letter. 'He was dealing with idiots. Oh, listen! Ashburnham had a bright idea to put all to rights — he only offered to go downstairs to where Hammond was being given supper, and kill him! The King refused to countenance the deed.'
Sir Lysander pulled a face. 'One has to have standards.'
'It should never have come to that. It is too serious! Lovell burst out, full of rage again. 'There should have been no risks, no mistakes, no compromises. Nothing left to chance. No thinking on the wing. No damned incompetence by pretty dancing-master courtiers of the Queen's! Will Legge should have been in charge of the escape, with a band of decent soldiers and a plan that allowed no slips.'
'The King was highly nervous,' Sir Lysander soothed him. 'He needed faces he knew. Even the jailors were more likely to relax their guard if they only saw familiar attendants.'
Lovell muttered something inaudible, clearly an obscenity.
After Lovell glanced through the letter one final time, he destroyed it. He flung it into the fire, but controlled his annoyance and carefully ensured with a poker that all the pages were consumed. In the light of the rising flames, Sir Lysander looked less tipsy and more adroit than Juliana had ever seen him; he announced that they must digest this news carefully. Tomorrow he and Lovell would speak further. Juliana now understood there was some much bigger conspiracy afoot.
Lovell returned with her to the farmhouse, saying no more. Juliana also remained silent, not trusting herself to talk.
Now the contrite father, Lovell threw himself into entertaining Tom. He tossed pancakes amidst much genuine merriment, slathering them with orange juice, feinting a near-miss with a flying crepe. He played a full part in the birth
day celebration. There was no sign that this was a disappointed plotter who had much to think about. Juliana realised that had she not gone to the Hall, she would never have learned Orlando was so close to the political crisis.
That night she tried to tackle him: 'You and I always believed in companionship, Orlando. A wife should share all her husband's secrets.'
'Were I able to speak freely, I should tell you all.' Begging had been fruitless. The need-to-know principle has caused many a domestic conflict. Safe people are excluded unnecessarily. Idiots and incompetents then break the confidence. 'They are not my secrets, sweetheart,' explained Orlando, disingenuously.
Juliana could not have watched him closer then, if she had suspected he had a mistress. When Lovell travelled to the Isle of Wight shortly afterwards, she was at least prepared. He, for once, did tell her he was going. She thought no better of him for that.
Juliana felt betrayed. It seemed their whole time at Pelham Hall had been arranged only to enable Lovell to work as a Royalist agent, close to his patron. He had had no real thought of giving her and the boys some family life, family life in which she had taken such delight but upon a false premise. Still, doggedly, she continued to pretend she and Lovell were as one. She offered to go to the Isle of Wight with him, taking the children, which might provide camouflage. Lovell made spurious excuses that his work for the King was too dangerous; he could not expose his dear family to risk. Juliana decided bleakly that he simply did not want them. She believed Orlando enjoyed the excitement and isolation. He wants freedom to play on his own!
Their year-long idyll abruptly ended. So too did Juliana Lovell's complaisance with her marriage, another casualty of the civil war.
Chapter Forty-Six — Carisbrooke to Goldsmiths Hall: 1648
Some stories of the King's captivity at Carisbrooke Castle were confided to Juliana by Sir Lysander Pelham. She knew that her husband was on the Isle of Wight at the end of 1647 and that he left in the early months of 1648. She was never told what part, if any, he played in the escape attempts. Not much, she thought. To give him credit, Lovell was competent. He would have managed better results.
The castle was a stalwart Norman motte-and-bailey affair, with stone walls, towers and a keep added to fortify it against possible invasion by the Spanish or the French. It made a strong prison but had never been used defensively. Nevertheless, it would be from here that King Charles launched the second civil war whilst, ironically, sanctioning a foreign invasion for his personal assistance.
At first the prison regime was lax, although his room did have barred windows, just as Royalist broadsheets depicted. They showed him looking out through the bars forlornly while wearing a full crown and a glimpse of ermine, which Juliana thought unlikely. The King's pursuits were those of a gentleman with endless leisure; she reckoned he would require smart, warm daywear which had plenty of room for movement, plus hat and gloves.
His carriage was brought over the Solent for taking the air; he went out sightseeing and even attended a funeral of a man he had never met. Colonel Hammond had a bowling green created in the castle for him. Reading material was available. As well as sermons, Latin for translation and Bacon's Advancement of Learning, Charles read Tasso and The Faerie Queene. Fiction should provide solace, but it was characteristic of the man to bury himself in romantic escapism just when he should have been most grounded in reality. Socially, his usher was busy. Political negotiators approached him gingerly. Isle of Wight gentry from time to time were permitted to kiss their sovereign's hand and, as Sir Lysander growled, 'piss themselves with the thrill of being in the same room as the blood royal'.
The courtiers who had assisted with the flight from Hampton Court stayed only briefly. Parliament ordered Will Legge's arrest. By January he had made his way to the Channel Islands though Juliana would learn later that he returned to the mainland to join Royalist activitists in Kent. Berkeley was again employed as a messenger from the Parliamentary generals to the King in April 1648, but he feared prosecution and thought it wise to retire abroad.
Royal servants of lower rank who had been left behind at Hampton Court faithfully followed what was now routine; they packed up trunks and traipsed after their master. He soon had his page, barber, tailor, coal-carrier and laundress; the laundress's assistant was one of several women who brought in letters from the Queen and supporters outside. Correspondence was passed to the King at dinner or hidden under carpets in his room. Royalist agents were everywhere — actually inside the castle or waiting ready to help in nearby towns, both on the Isle of Wight and the mainland. A flame-haired female devotee called Jane Whorwood, who had previously hung about Holdenby House, turned up in the Isle of Wight and affixed herself to the castle. The governor was too polite to send a woman packing — or preferred perhaps to keep her under observation.
Using guidance from the astrologer William Lilly, Jane Whorwood made numerous attempts to help the King escape. The stars proved unreliable on logistics: one plan was for the King to escape through the window bars, which Charles had tested for feasibility by poking his head out. The plan failed when his body would not follow (something he had not rehearsed) so, as the wind changed and his ship sailed away empty, he became ignominiously stuck. Jane Whorwood then fetched from London a consignment of aqua fortis, which was nitric acid; she spilled much of it on the long bumpy journey down to Hampshire though she managed to carry some, together with a file, as far as the King's stool-room. Her scheme was to weaken the window bars so they could be removed from their sockets. Unfortunately, the castle governor became aware what was going on and intervened. Other, wilder ideas were abandoned: to cut a hole in the ceiling of the King's bedroom; to fit him out in a crazy theatrical disguise; to set fire to a heap of charcoal stored near the royal chambers, as a diversion… As Colonel Hammond routinely uncovered these stratagems and routinely blocked them, he reduced the number of the King's attendants; after his barber was dismissed, Charles balked at having a Parliamentarian come anywhere near him with sharp implements, so he had to grow his hair.
Meanwhile in London a daring plan to free the King's second son, James, Duke of York, did come off. A woman called Anne Murray was enlisted by her lover, Colonel Bampfylde, to provide female clothing; after a convenient game of hide-and-seek, the young duke successfully bolted for freedom. Disguised in a dress with a crimson petticoat and fortified by Wood Street cake, he was whisked away to his mother in France, safe from being made a puppet-ruler in his father's stead.
As these ludicrous stories surfaced through Sir Lysander, Juliana became ever more annoyed with Lovell. She could have been just as willing, inventive and brave as those women. Her grandmother had worked for the court and although Juliana had never been compelled to declare formally whether or not she was a Royalist, she would certainly have made an indomitable partner. She shared Lovell's clear-eyed understanding of the King's faults and the limitations of the King's chosen advisers; her husband should have seen she could have done better. Juliana knew her own value; she thought Lovell knew it too. Being excluded left a chill in her heart.
Work was found for her, none the less. Early in 1648 Lovell wrote instructing her to go up to London, to face the notorious Committee for Compounding. Her task was to beg, plead, apologise, promise, rend hearts, screw favours and if needs be perjure herself in order to obtain the release of Lovell's property in Hampshire.
Sir Lysander sent her with a groom, and allowed her to live in his elegant London town house in Covent Garden. He had been a member of Parliament, though had ceased to take his seat at the Commons when the war began; as a result his London home was rather sparsely furnished and staffed — it had been ransacked in 1642 by Parliamentary officers. Juliana offered to organise an inventory of what survived and a list of work needed, in return for her keep.
Her departure for London was much approved by Bessy Sprott, nee Pelham, who had recently come home to live at Pelham Hall because her husband died. The death of so young a man would once ha
ve been occasioned by pox or plague; nowadays, wounds were a more common cause. In fact Jack Sprott, the livelier of Sir Lysander's sons-in-law, died of an ague, caught on the malarial Essex marshes. It was a while before Juliana worked out what he had been doing there — Royalist plotting — and she reckoned his wife never did understand. The baffled Bessy returned to her childhood home, eager to annoy her sister by strengthening her hold over their father as gout and general bleariness took him towards the grave. Both sisters viewed Juliana's presence with jaundiced eyes. The more Sir Lysander admired Juliana, the more leery they became. Although entirely innocent, she was glad to leave.
She stayed in London for a month and a half, a time made the more tedious because she had left her children behind in Sussex. She had not realised how long this might take.
Delinquents had to present themselves at the Committee for Compounding of Malignants, which sat at Goldsmiths Hall. How appropriate! thought Juliana, as she became aware of how much money this committee was extorting. Successful appellants swore an oath not to bear arms against Parliament again, and they took the Covenant. They had to declare the full value of their estates; any misstatement or fudging rendered them liable to heavy fines. Juliana knew that the rates of assessment varied, depending on how strong a supporter of the King the victims were deemed to be. Sir Lysander, as an MP and a full colonel, had been fined half his estate. Lovell reckoned he might get away with the general rate, which was only a sixth.
Among Royalists there was much conferring about how to manage the committee. It was believed that sending a wife to plead was more likely to work than appearing in person. The more pregnant and sickly the wife looked, and the greater the number of her dependent children, the better. Lovell had written that he hoped he had left Juliana pregnant for this purpose; he had, but she suffered a miscarriage. 'Use your grief!' Bessy Sprott had advised her, which was cynical but sound.
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