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Stephen Timewell in his lusty youth had led first a troop and then a regiment through the wars of the Parliament, from Chalgrove Field to the final battle at Worcester, so that his warlike passages, though less varied and extensive than those of our companion, were enough to enable him to form and hold strong opinions.
He was the more willing to do this, as he had been ordered by the doctors to leave London and reside in the country before joining the army again, for he had received a dangerous wound the previous summer in the battle of Chalgrove, where his kinsman, the brave and pious John Hampden, was mortally wounded.
Who can tell how changed the destiny of England, had the Earl of Bedford's first compromise with the country party succeeded, and Hampden become the tutor of Prince Charles, or could this fight at Chalgrove Field issue differently, and Hampden survive to be general instead of Essex, and Protector in place of Cromwell? But that may not be.
For Hampden, the hope of the nation, is fatally shot through the shoulder with two carbine-balls, in the first charge; the whole troop sees it with dismay; Essex comes up, as usual, too late, and the fight at Chalgrove Field is lost. We must leave this picture, painted in the fading colors of a far-off time.
At Edgehill, Chalgrove, and even Naseby, men and standards were captured and rescued, through the impossibility of distinguishing between the forces. An orange scarf, or a piece of white paper, was the most reliable designation.
This self-styled Earl squandered his fortune in a life of debauchery, and then married the daughter of a clergyman, a widow with a large jointure but about as dissolute in character as himself, which is saying much. He left no sons. Such claims as there were to the titles of Purbeck and Buckingham then lay with the Rev. George Villiers, Rector of Chalgrove, in Oxfordshire.
Did he not lay down his life for his country in the box at Ford's Theatre as ungrudgingly as Hampden offered his in the smoke of battle upon Chalgrove field? Surely we must answer Yes. In other words, these three men all had the great moral attributes which are the characteristics of the English race in its highest and purest development on either side of the Atlantic.
Scarcely has this scene flitted through the brain, than from far away eastwards, hard by Chinnor, there seems to come a shouting and a noise of horses at the gallop, as Rupert bursts upon the enemy's convoy, and drives them into the Chiltern Hills, himself returning with his prisoners and spoils by way of Chalgrove, when again comes sound of battle, and he in his turn is for a moment held at bay by Roundheads' "insolence". No matter which way we turn our eyes, each bit of rising ground, each bridge across a stream gives birth to some imagining of skirmish or of ambuscade in that long civil war that waged round Oxford.
The inquiry might, however, have lasted longer and been more successful, had not lord Herbert just then come home, with the welcome news of the death of Hampden, from a wound received in attacking prince Rupert at Chalgrove.
The inquiry might, however, have lasted longer and been more successful, had not lord Herbert just then come home, with the welcome news of the death of Hampden, from a wound received in attacking prince Rupert at Chalgrove.
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