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Subject Area: Political Theory
Subject Area: History
Topic: The English Revolution

Whitehall, March 1, 1648. Att the Committee of Officers for forces & garrisons. - Sir William Clarke, The Clarke Papers. Selections from the Papers of William Clarke, vol. 2 [1894]

Edition used:

The Clarke Papers. Selections from the Papers of William Clarke, Secretary to the Council of the Army, 1647-1649, and to General Monck and the Commanders of the Army in Scotland, 1651-1660, ed. C.H. Firth (Camden Society, 1894). 4 vols.

Part of: The Clarke Papers. Selections from the Papers of William Clarke, 4 vols.

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Whitehall, March 1, 1648. Att the Committee of Officers for forces & garrisons.

b Nothing done but a consideration of the Petition for the Generall Councell.

[b ]In the Clarke MSS. here follows a copy of the petition presented to the general and council of the officers by certain soldiers demanding the re-establishment of the representative council of agitators which had existed in 1647. It is printed in The Hunting of the Foxes from New-Market and Triplos Heaths to Whitehall by five small Beagles (late of the Armie); or the Grandee-Deceivers unmashed, that you may know them. Directed to all the Free-Commons of England, but in especiall to all that have and are still engaged in the Military Service of the Commonwealth. . . . Printed in a Corner of Freedome right opposite to the Councel of Warre, Anno Domini 1649. This pamphlet is reprinted in the Somers Tracts, ed. Scott, vol. vi., p. 44. The petition is there (p. 54) signed by five soldiers, vix., Robert Ward, Thomas Watson, William Sawyer, Simon Graunt, George Jellis. Three others have their names appended to the Petition as given in the Clarke MSS., viz. Richard Rumball, John Benger, Thomas Harbye. The examinations of Grant, Ward, Watson, and Jellis are printed in the Hunting of the Foxes. Richard Rumball, or Rumbald, rose later, obtained a commission in the army. In the summer of 1659 he was lieutenant in Col. Packer’s regiment of horse. After the Restoration he became a maltster, and occupied Rye House in Hertfordshire. He took a prominent part in the Rye House Plot, was to have led the attack on the King’s person, and was finally executed at Edinburgh in 1685 for his share in Argyle’s rebellion. Rumbald had only one eye. “Him, therefore,” says Sprat, in his History of the Rye House Plot, “as their most daring captain, and by reason of a blemish in one of his eyes, they [the conspirators] were wont in common discourse to call Hannibal.” (A true account and Declaration of the horrid conspiracy to assassinate the late King, Charles II., ed. 1696, 8vo, part i., p. 69; part ii., p. 53.) On his death see Burnet’s Own Time, iii., 32, ed. 1833.

The Perfect Diurnal, under Thursday, March 1, gives the following account of the proceedings of the Council of Officers: “This day the General Councell of the Army sate in Whitehall where they past a petition to present to the House. . . .”

[The petition was presented March 2; the heads are printed by Whitelocke, Memorials, iii., and in the Old Parliamentary History, xix., 53].

“His Excellency produced at this councell a letter delivered to him that day, subscribed by 8 troopers of severall regiments, the effect of it was to assert the souldiers’ right to petition without their officers’ consent, expressing much against the Councell of State and High Court of Justice, which was ill resented by the officers, and each officer present being called per poll, declared their disfavouring and disapproving of the said letter, as tending to divide and disunite the Army. And 5 of the 8 troopers ordered to be committed to custody till they were cleared by Court Martiall.”

The five soldiers were tried on March 3, 1649 “and after a long debate they were found guilty upon the Fifth Article of War, concerning duties morall, viz.: “That no man shall use reproachfull nor provoking words or act to any, upon paine of imprisonment and further punishment as shall be thought fit to be inflicted upon enemies to discipline and service.” And foure of them sentenced to ride the horse, with their faces to the taile, their swords broke over their heads, and to be cashiered the Army. . . . The fifth taken was discharged upon confession of his being misled, and to return to the regiment.”—Perfect Diurnal.