Cromwells Spy – Dennis Sewell

By the second week of December, Cromwell’s patience was stretched. A Captain Hammond, one of Colonel Goffe’s officers, had been down to inspect progress at the mine – the Derbyshire men were fully recovered and back at the rockface. All of a sudden Hammond dropped down dead, shot by a sniper from the battlements. This brutal reminder of unfinished business came as two members of the Council of State, Sir Arthur Hesilrige and Thomas Scot, came on a visit to Edinburgh.

The latter’s arrival provided Scoutmaster Downing with an opportunity to brief the spy chief in person about an operation that was, according to the most recent missive dropped down to him, heading towards a satisfactory conclusion. Ideally the visiting grandees would themselves be able to witness the long-delayed denouement of the siege. On the Monday, Thomas Scot watched the snowfall leaving a thick covering all over the castle and reported back to London.

On the Wednesday, he watched a grenado kill five of the enemy and wound half a dozen more. As it happened, these final noisy bombardments, though deadly and carried out with guns and mortars brought in from as far away as Holland, were mostly for show. They provided plausible military cover for decisions actually being taken for reasons of politics and religion.

There remained an all-night negotiation to be held at Colonel Overton’s lodgings between Colonels Monck and White for the English and two of Dundas’s officers for the castle; but as Thomas Scot drily noted, these talks were ‘chiefly on point of time’ rather than about the substantive issue of capitulation. Strachan had done his work and the fix was in. Dundas was ready to hand over the castle. It is not clear what argument had been the clincher.

Perhaps it was the King’s insincere covenanting, or the news that engagers and malignants were being allowed back, or Lord Craighall’s resignation from the Committee of Estates over these same issues. What Dundas told his own soldiers was that he ‘would not own the malignant interest’.4 So it was that on Christmas Eve 1650, the entire garrison of Edinburgh Castle marched out under their colours, dressed in their finest uniforms, heads held high and still bearing their arms. They faced no prosecution or sanction.

All ranks were free to go home to their families. Their commanding officer, Colonel Walter Dundas, had an appointment that evening for dinner – at the Lord General’s lodgings in the Canongate.

George Downing (1623–84) – scholar, preacher, spy, diplomat, politician, American Roundhead, member of the Cavalier Parliament, Envoy Extraordinary, property developer, antihero. Emmanuel Downing (1585–1660) – George’s father. Puritan, barrister-at-law, New England pioneer, entrepreneur, shameless opportunist, crook. Lucy Downing (née Winthrop) (1600–79) – George’s mother. Stalwart promoter of the interests of her many offspring. John Winthrop Senior (1588–1649) – George Downing’s uncle.

Leader of the Great Migration to New England. Twelve times elected governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony between 1630 and 1649. Puritan, intolerant, politically savvy. John Winthrop Junior (1606–76) – George Downing’s favourite cousin, friend and collaborator. College drop-out, alchemist, metallurgist, founder of Saybrook Colony, governor of Connecticut Colony, markedly more liberal than his father. Hugh Peter (1598–1660) – Puritan pastor noted for his theatrical style of preaching.

A radical political activist during the English Civil Wars. A close ally of Oliver Cromwell and George Downing’s early mentor. Oliver Cromwell (1599–1658) – Parliamentarian, Civil War general, man of destiny, Lord Protector, political and spiritual sphinx. George Downing’s most important patron. Thomas Scot (n.d.–1660) – Commonwealth spymaster and George Downing’s overseer in the intelligence office at Whitehall. Archibald Campbell (1607–61) – 1st Marquis of Argyle, leader of the Whiggamore or Kirk Party in Scotland.

Covenanter, unreliable friend, one of the spied upon. Lord Wariston (Archibald Johnston) (1611–63) – Presbyterian zealot, Covenanter, Argyle’s political sidekick, instinctively suspicious of George Downing. George Monck (1608–70) – professional soldier, general, reliable in a crisis, indulgent of and avuncular towards George Downing, ultimately Earl of Albemarle. John Thurloe (1616–68) – Thomas Scot’s successor as spymaster, Secretary of State, George Downing’s boss under the Protectorate and his match in intellect and energy.

Charles Howard of Naworth (1628–85) – Cumberland aristocrat, religious and political chameleon, commander of Oliver Cromwell’s Life Guard, George Downing’s brother-in-law, eventually Earl of Carlisle. Frances Howard (1625–83) – Charles Howard’s sister, George Downing’s wife and mother of his children. Woman of mystery. Johan de Witt (1625–72) – Grand Pensionary of Holland, dominated the States General – the parliament of the Dutch Republic – and was effectively political leader of the United Provinces of the Netherlands.

De Witt was the champion of the merchant class and an anti-monarchist. He and George Downing tried constantly to outsmart one another. Another of the spied upon.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

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