Fairfax had been given a free hand. He only had to await the arrival of his own cavalry commander.
Leaving nothing to chance, Fairfax rode around his sentry posts in the dark, to satisfy himself there was no chance of being caught by a surprise attack. A sentry challenged him; Fairfax, brooding, had forgotten the password. While the captain of the guard was called, the general was forced to stand to in the wet while the soldier threatened to blow his head off if he moved. Fairfax rewarded the sentry for diligence.
Royalist troop movements and campfires suggested the enemy might be pulling out. At Fairfax's dawn council on the morning of Friday the 13th of June, it was decided to pursue. In the middle of that meeting, Oliver Cromwell and three thousand extra cavalry arrived, to a great shout of acclaim. Battle was now fully anticipated. Sir Philip Skippon, as field marshal, had been ordered to devise a battle array a full six days before.
On a fair evening at the height of the English summer, the royal army convened on a long east-west ridge and seemed ready to make a stand. Next morning, when Royalist scouts were unable to confirm the New Model's movements, Rupert went out in person to reconnoitre. Fairfax did not need to; he knew where the enemy were: seven miles away, before the fine shoemaking market town of Market Harborough which lay just over the county boundary in Leicestershire.
The battle would take place slightly to the south, in the Northamptonshire uplands. This was not beautiful, but honest open country where ancient woodlands still slumbered darkly around villages deserted in the Black Death. By a neat quirk of geography, the place was a watershed; streams on one side flowed to the south and west to the Bristol Channel, while barely a few miles away they flowed north and east to the Wash. Undulating ridges would help disguise troop movements in the early manoeuvres. The area was mainly unenclosed, with irregular stands of cultivated grain among ragged patches of gorse. Between the armies lay a valley with areas of soft ground, called Broad Moor. Fairfax had taken the New Model Army as far as a large fallow field, close to the ancient Saxon village of Naseby. A strong double line of hedges crossed this field at right angles, to the Parliamentarians' left. On the right hand was Naseby Warren. This was significant for their cavalry; it meant much more than a few rabbit-holes to cause stumbles. An ancient warren would have many miles of tunnelling and large underground caverns that could possibly collapse.
Bringing two armies into battle array and then into close contact could take a long time. For the commanders, this required care, in order to prevent their soldiers losing heart, while having them ready when needed. At Marston Moor the initial uncertainty had lasted many hours, which was tiring and dispiriting for the enormous forces involved. Naseby would be brisk by comparison.
Prince Rupert, the King's commander-in-chief, had ordered a battle array with his own cavalry on the Royalist right wing while Sir Marmaduke Langdale took the Royalist left, leading the experienced Northern and Newark horse. Behind their infantry in the centre, the King, resplendent in full black body armour, watched among his Lifeguard, five hundred men who served as the Royalist reserve.
For Parliament, Skippon was arraying the infantry in the Swedish style, six deep, as Gideon and Lambert Jukes had seen them at the first battle of Newbury. Cromwell's cavalry, on the right flank, would be negotiating the rabbit-holes. The left flank, at Cromwell's request, was led by his fixer son-in-law-to-be, Henry Ireton. The left were therefore facing the dreaded Prince Rupert, but they had better ground and Cromwell was planning further protection from dragoons.
During the first hours after dawn, Prince Rupert came in sight of the van of the New Model Army Signalling for the remainder of the King's army to follow him, he moved westwards, wanting to get upwind, so the Royalists would not be blinded by their opponents' gunsmoke. To the Parliamentarians, this looked like a flanking movement. It could mean Rupert had chosen not to give battle. He had, in fact, for once counselled against it, because of the enemy's superior numbers.
Fairfax finessed him. He moved his own men back a hundred paces from the higher ground they commanded. They could still see what the enemy were doing but while their dispositions for battle were being arranged, they were shielded by the crest of the ridge.
Thinking Fairfax might intend to withdraw, Prince Rupert was lured into action, even though his men would have to charge uphill against greater numbers. At about ten in the morning, even before his artillery had caught up, the prince ordered a general advance, while leading his cavalry into the start of a characteristic charge.
A Parliamentarian forlorn hope had been placed on the slope ahead of their army, to dissipate the force of the enemy's first attack. These musketeers fired off initial rounds. Classically, this was the signal that battle had been joined. The forlorn hope pulled back. The main body of the New Model Army then advanced in formation to the edge of their high ground, on what was named Mill Hill, and came into view of the Royalists.
The battle of which veterans would speak until their death-beds had begun.
Chapter Thirty-Two — Naseby: 14 June 1645
Gideon was queuing for powder at the regimental budge-wagon when it started. He felt exhausted and dirty. The army had been on the march for three days, with Colonel Okey's regiment responsible for mounting guard each night. No one had eaten the previous evening, in their regiment or others, because they barely paused in their search for the King. Gideon would be going into action not as starved as at Newbury, but still famished.
He was tired too. It was a week before the longest day. Last night had been light until barely two hours before midnight. Dawn came early. At three o'clock this morning they were ordered up. He had blundered to the prayer meeting, his chest tight while the chaplain asked the Lord's protection on what they all knew would be a day of battle. Since then the New Model had been on the move, edging towards the enemy. Eventually word came that Fairfax had called a halt, lest they stumble out of the thick ground mist and come upon the Royalists unexpectedly.
They were further north than Gideon ever remembered being; the general temperature seemed cooler than it would have been in London, maybe sixty miles away. Here on the uplands, chilly air made the men stiff, especially those who had old wounds to grumble about, as some of his soldiers did. All the dragoons were fretting because after rain showers in the night the going was very heavy for horses. While Gideon was waiting for his ammunition he could barely see three men in front of him through the fog. They spoke in low voices, when they spoke at all, lest the sound carry and reveal their presence to unseen opponents.
He wiped the side of his boot against a tussock of dewy meadow grass. Part of him wished, as always, that he were back at home, cleaning off dung deposited by some Cheapside dray-horse, and whistling on his way to work with Robert at the print-shop. Mostly he was glad to be here. Among his new colleagues as they patiently waited to fill their rattling flasks and apostles with coarse and fine gunpowder, the mood was cheerful. They had glints in their eyes and showed their teeth, in satisfaction that they would soon be fighting
Gideon remembered his responsibilities; he nodded encouragement. His men tolerated the attempt mildly. How he performed today would make the difference between whether or not they really accepted him. As the newest sergeant he had been assigned a slightly ramshackle group. One, Thomas Bentall, had been pressed straight from prison where he had been put for brawling; broken-nosed and toothless, he looked like it. A couple of others, thin-faced and gingery, gave every impression of having been horse-thieves and must have escaped jail only because they were too quick to be caught. He had a hatter, a farmer, two confectioners who were brothers-in-law and not speaking to each other, a docker who had been in the Westminster Trained Bands. After only three days, Gideon was still learning their names. Glory-to-God Parchment was easy enough; he was the one reading his pocket Bible while he queued, at the same time as picking his nose with his free hand. Walter Gummery was the oldest, certainly sixty, and had an unacknowledged bladder problem; he was taking relief against the wheel of the budge wagon. All of them had seemed well disposed. Gideon's height, his modest manner, his scarred hands and his having side-stepped his commander's wishes at Newport Pagnell in order to be here combined to win their loyalty. Even the fact that his uniform coat and breeches failed to meet properly had helped; the men recognised him by the way he always tugged his coat down as he loped along on spidery legs. It made Sergeant Jukes look a bit of a character. His soldiers liked that — and the way he got on with things.
Colonel Okey had been supervising the share-out of powder and shot that morning in a large meadow. Between seven and eight o'clock, General Cromwell rode up and spoke to him. Gideon recognised the new commander of horse. Through yawns, he noticed the stout, armoured figure, clearly at one with his horse, a man who rode without haste and yet whose very presence signalled urgency. Cromwell passed within fifty feet,
