had heavy wooden platforms which bristled with cannon, protected under stone-tiled roofs. There were more than two hundred pieces of ordnance — from demi-culverins that hurled nine-pound balls and demi-cannons that threw twelve-pounders, right up to cannon royal that weighed over three tons and fired enormous missiles weighing sixty- four pounds.
Nobody could enter or leave the city without scrutiny from the sentinels. Companies from Trained Bands regiments were manning the fortifications day and night. It was far from an alarmist measure. Royalist strategy in that year of 1643 centred on a London attack. It was planned that Lord Newcastle in the north, Sir Ralph Hopton in the West Country and the King himself in the Midlands would defeat local opposition, then after meeting the King at Oxford all would surge towards the capital, set up a blockade by sea, and starve London into submission. If such a plan succeeded, which seemed quite likely as Royalist successes grew, Londoners could only hope the Lines of Communication would save them from the plight of so many desperate cities on the Continent.
'On the Continent, and here — as this grim pamphlet illustrates!'
Gideon reached for the pamphlet at last: Prince Rupert's Burning Love to England, Discovered in Birmingham's Flames. It was an eye-witness description of what had happened at Easter. 'Wherein is-related how that famous and well affected Town of Birmingham was unworthily opposed, insolently invaded, notoriously robbed and plundered, and most cruelly fired in cold blood the next day…' Gideon read it fast. Now he understood Robert's anger, shared it, saw why his colleague's outrage had simmered to a rolling boil with Bevan Bevan. When Bevan endlessly praised the King, whose unrestrained mercenaries had carried out the atrocities in Birmingham, Robert's frustration broke.
'I will not hold your wife's relatives against her, Gideon, but you must separate Lacy from any connection with the King's party. This is civil war. The conflict stalks in the parlour.'
Gideon was shaking his head in disbelief as he read: 'These were ordinary people, penalised — punished — robbed, raped, fired at in their houses, left naked in the street, terrorised with threats of more — a surgeon shot, a madman barbarised — their goods stolen and their homes burned.'
'If I had had my musket yesterday, I would have killed your uncle.'
Gideon looked up with a brief smile, 'That would have made a wedding to remember… Yet your nature is too sweet for it; you would have rued the business all your life. Robert, I can now see how you found the strength to tip so large a man into a horse-trough.'
Like Gideon, the printing press had made Robert tough, but he was of neat stature and not tall. 'I am proud of it. I pushed him hard against the trough; when the rim caught his gross thighs, he toppled backwards. A great wave washed over the brim. Then your brother Lambert helped, with that friend of his, who seized Bevan by the feet while Lambert fulcrumed him by his fat head. They spun him around, until he made a full-length fit. Lambert, being no featherweight, then leaned on his belly — I was hammering him flat — Bevan was soon so well wedged, he could not move. Then the sackbuts came and droned him a slow measure, so none could hear his pleas for help.'
'Lambert claims it took five men with a rope on a dray-horse to drag Bevan from his waterbed.'
'Traitors and reprobates,' Allibone declared. 'They should have drowned him.'
'It was impossible,' said Gideon. 'His bulk had swamped out all the water. The landlord begged to have my uncle's great carcass lifted, so he could refill the trough for waiting beasts — ' Thomas, the ostler at the Swan, pistolled, coming officiously to take their horses… 'This news is terrible. What can we do?'
Robert gestured to the printing press. 'Print it. You are reading one of three pamphlets I have seen on the streets about Birmingham. Some scabrous apologist wrote a Royalist version, but there are two lucid rebuttals. This in your hand was published for the Parliamentary committee in Coventry: 'that the Kingdom may timely take notice of what is generally to be expected if the cavaliers' insolences be not speedily crushed'. Gideon, our task must be to gather the facts of this conflict and relate them truly. I have on the press the thoughts of Mr A.R., whom I find always a very considerate, trustworthy commentator.'
'Perhaps I shall meet the gentleman one day!' Gideon knew of several rousing pamphlets by this 'Mr A.R.'. He was sure Robert wrote them, hiding from censorship.
Robert smiled. 'Oh he comes to me bringing his work privately, late at night, and keeps his face hidden.'
'You are still responsible for what you print,' Gideon warned.
'I will answer for it, if challenged. He relates truth and his language is temperate. There are no 'Turds shat from the devil's flaming arse' with Mr A.R.'
'And what is his next topic, Robert?'
Robert applied the oily ink to the composited letters with his lambs-wool swab. His freckled face was calm yet alight, as if he were engaged in holy work. 'That Birmingham will prove a disaster for the King. All the country is shocked by these monstrosities. The King hires the filthy foreign troops. His brigand nephew — another glorified mercenary — leads them. Incidentally, Charles has been forced to berate Rupert, and to beg him in future to take his subjects' affections rather than their towns. It is scant consolation for the widows and orphans, and those left naked in the street when their homes burned. What may cheer them a little is that Lord Denbigh, a close confidant of the prince and much mourned by him, died from his wounds four days later at Cannock; the best of that is that Denbigh's son is staunch for Parliament. But a steel mill in Birmingham which had produced swords for Parliament has been pulled down by malignants — royal supporters lost more goods than anyone else, and they have claimed that the mill caused his anger against the town.'
Gideon was in a dark mood. 'The cavaliers' weapons are fire and fear — but we have our own. Words.'
'Never truer. Telling the news must become regular and accurate. It pains me to say, but the King has equipped himself for propaganda before our party even stirs.' King Charles had always taken a keen interest in what was printed; he had even written self-defensive pamphlets. Robert fumed, 'There is a printing press close to the King in Oxford — though I know of nobody there who belongs to our fraternity'
'Is the printer a true Royalist', asked Gideon, 'or has he simply seen a way to profit?'
'Why that would make him an opportunist!' laughed Robert. Neither thought it impossible. 'What's certain is that since January this astute toady has been printing a weekly news-sheet that speaks for the court. Mercurius Aulicus — dross, but we have nothing to compete. The King's version is the only version. It is not only produced at Oxford to edify the cavaliers, but it is carried to London in secret pouches and reprinted here in a larger format.'
Gideon straightened up. 'We need a Parliamentary answer — fast.'
'Why that must be done by a committee! Robert scoffed. Then he grew more serious. 'We must give weekly accounts of debates and events. The sheets must be cheap, no more than a penny or tuppence. They must be sold on every street corner in London, then carried to the provinces and made available at great highroad inns. We cannot have this present situation, where one or two interested parties procure the news from London haphazardly, but only if Honest Ned or the parson happens to be visiting town to sell eggs or see a cousin. Nor can we tolerate Royalist bleats or lies concocted by sloppy scriveners who print the most ridiculous rumours.'
'You must have honest intelligencers.' Gideon was ahead. 'Like those ambassadors to foreign courts, who write accounts of rulers, society and commerce overseas. Kings dispatch and merchants employ such people. Now, here at home, there must be trusted correspondents placed everywhere — in Parliament, close to the King, even on the battlefield.'
Robert nodded. 'And there must be a reliable network of carriers to take the truth every week from the press to the public'
'Every week?'
'Every week,' stated Robert calmly. 'I am ready to work. I shall find scouts. There must be some cobbler in Westminster who can winkle me out information while he taps the members' boot-soles. I know of a victualler who has approval to run delivery carts through Clerkenwell; when he brings in cabbages he can carry out the news. He may need a false base building into his cart — ' He realised the scope of this venture was worrying his younger colleague. 'The plan has some danger. You can be in, or out, Gideon.'
'Oh, I am in! What if we cannot discover enough news for the week?'
'We shall fill in with advertisements for ointments. Apothecaries' shillings will fund us.'
'Will it work?'
'Telling the news will be standard practice,' Robert assured Gideon airily. 'Parliament can grumble all it likes: this is the future, my friend.'
