thug. He lost no time in setting out to intimidate the English merchants
in the hope of turning their support – and ships – away from the revolutionary cause. He showed little sensitivity in selecting
his targets and even attempted to have the chaplain to the English congregation shot. Parker described the event in an intelligence
briefing:
The rage is such here against the English that the servants of Col. Cochrane laid wait for the English minister, when he was
going to the English house to preach, and would have pistolled him; (but) the pistolls not taking fire, the fellows being
made with anger drew their Poyniards to stab the minister, who crying out murther, was rescued by the citizens.
Charles was desperate for both men and money and instructed hiscontinental agents to raise cash by whatever means. One scheme involving Cochrane entailed raising money by kidnapping English
merchants and holding them to ransom. At the town of Pinneberg, eighteen kilometres from Hamburg, the kidnappers succeeded
in luring three merchants on board a ship with the intention of taking them off and demanding £30,000 for their safe return.
After seizing their victims, the kidnappers did not act quickly enough and the merchants raised a troop of two hundred musketeers
in a successful rescue bid. 22
By April, Henry Parker had been recalled home, having been an agent in Hamburg since 1646. His replacement was Richard Bradshaw,
a relative of John Bradshaw, who had presided over the court that tried the king and was now president of the ruling Council
of State. In early May, a plot to kill the younger Bradshaw was uncovered before any harm was done. For fear of being assassinated
in the streets, Bradshaw became a virtual prisoner in his home. He complained that the city fathers did little to deal with
those hell-bent on doing away with him. Despite his fears, he survived.
In The Hague, tensions were even higher due to the presence of Charles himself. Royalist exiles ranged from hot-headed young
Cavaliers, who maintained their allegiance to Charles undimmed, to former royal advisors and civil servants such as Edward
Hyde and Sir Edward Nicholas. The cult of Charles I as the martyred king was well established on the Continent. By now, editions
of
Eikon Basilike
were circulating in English, Latin, Dutch and German. In a sermon preached before Charles II, Dr Richard Watson spoke of
‘the everlasting stupendous monument of a book raised higher than the pyramids of Egypt in the strength of language and well
proportioned expression’.
When word reached the city in early 1649 that Sir Isaac Dorislaus, the Dutch lawyer who had played such a central role in
drawing up the charges against the king, was being sent as a parliamentary emissary, the blood in many a young royalist’s
veins reached boiling point. One man in the city could provide direction for all this boiling blood.The Marquis of Montrose, a Scottish aristocrat and general who had fought bravely for Charles I in Scotland against the Covenanters, * was an exile like the rest – but he was an exile who would never give up. When he heard the news of the king’s death, he
is said to have fainted. On recovering, ‘he vowed to devote himself exclusively to revenge the murder of his beloved master;
and, to give solemnity to his vow, and at the same time expression to his grief, he retired to a private chamber, where he
spent two days, without permitting a living being to see or speak to him.’ 23 Montrose then wrote to Charles’s widow that he would revenge the king, whose epitaph he would write ‘with blood and wounds’. 24 If any man would know how to choose a target and organise a band of men to attack it, it was Montrose.
The men he selected for the job were no run-of-the-mill heavies who could be hired for a few shillings to do any rough deed.
Montrose hand-picked members of the Scottish establishment who had followed him into
in the hope of turning their support – and ships – away from the revolutionary cause. He showed little sensitivity in selecting
his targets and even attempted to have the chaplain to the English congregation shot. Parker described the event in an intelligence
briefing:
The rage is such here against the English that the servants of Col. Cochrane laid wait for the English minister, when he was
going to the English house to preach, and would have pistolled him; (but) the pistolls not taking fire, the fellows being
made with anger drew their Poyniards to stab the minister, who crying out murther, was rescued by the citizens.
Charles was desperate for both men and money and instructed hiscontinental agents to raise cash by whatever means. One scheme involving Cochrane entailed raising money by kidnapping English
merchants and holding them to ransom. At the town of Pinneberg, eighteen kilometres from Hamburg, the kidnappers succeeded
in luring three merchants on board a ship with the intention of taking them off and demanding £30,000 for their safe return.
After seizing their victims, the kidnappers did not act quickly enough and the merchants raised a troop of two hundred musketeers
in a successful rescue bid. 22
By April, Henry Parker had been recalled home, having been an agent in Hamburg since 1646. His replacement was Richard Bradshaw,
a relative of John Bradshaw, who had presided over the court that tried the king and was now president of the ruling Council
of State. In early May, a plot to kill the younger Bradshaw was uncovered before any harm was done. For fear of being assassinated
in the streets, Bradshaw became a virtual prisoner in his home. He complained that the city fathers did little to deal with
those hell-bent on doing away with him. Despite his fears, he survived.
In The Hague, tensions were even higher due to the presence of Charles himself. Royalist exiles ranged from hot-headed young
Cavaliers, who maintained their allegiance to Charles undimmed, to former royal advisors and civil servants such as Edward
Hyde and Sir Edward Nicholas. The cult of Charles I as the martyred king was well established on the Continent. By now, editions
of
Eikon Basilike
were circulating in English, Latin, Dutch and German. In a sermon preached before Charles II, Dr Richard Watson spoke of
‘the everlasting stupendous monument of a book raised higher than the pyramids of Egypt in the strength of language and well
proportioned expression’.
When word reached the city in early 1649 that Sir Isaac Dorislaus, the Dutch lawyer who had played such a central role in
drawing up the charges against the king, was being sent as a parliamentary emissary, the blood in many a young royalist’s
veins reached boiling point. One man in the city could provide direction for all this boiling blood.The Marquis of Montrose, a Scottish aristocrat and general who had fought bravely for Charles I in Scotland against the Covenanters, * was an exile like the rest – but he was an exile who would never give up. When he heard the news of the king’s death, he
is said to have fainted. On recovering, ‘he vowed to devote himself exclusively to revenge the murder of his beloved master;
and, to give solemnity to his vow, and at the same time expression to his grief, he retired to a private chamber, where he
spent two days, without permitting a living being to see or speak to him.’ 23 Montrose then wrote to Charles’s widow that he would revenge the king, whose epitaph he would write ‘with blood and wounds’. 24 If any man would know how to choose a target and organise a band of men to attack it, it was Montrose.
The men he selected for the job were no run-of-the-mill heavies who could be hired for a few shillings to do any rough deed.
Montrose hand-picked members of the Scottish establishment who had followed him into
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