English Army
English Army | |
---|---|
royal arms of England | |
Active | 1660–1707 |
Country | Kingdom of England |
Allegiance | English monarchy |
Type | Army |
Engagements | |
Commanders | |
Captain-General | George Monck, John Churchill |
Notable commanders | Prince Rupert, James Scott, James Butler, Henri de Massue, James Stanhope |
The English Army existed while
Introduction
Primitive steps towards standing armed forces began in the Middle Ages: the Assize of Arms of 1252 issued by King Henry III provided that small landholders should be armed and trained with a bow, and those of more wealth would be required to possess and be trained with sword, dagger and longbow. That Assize referred to a class of Forty shilling freeholders, who became identified with 'yeomanry', and states "Those with land worth annual 40s–100s will be armed/trained with bow and arrow, sword, buckler and dagger".[2]
Tudor and Stuart organisation
Prior to the
In practice,
English Civil War
In 1642, at the start of the English Civil War both the Royalists (
After two years of ruinous but indecisive military campaigning, Parliament passed the
The New Model Army proved supreme in field, no more so than in the Second English Civil War which was succinctly described by Sir Winston Churchill:
The Story of the Second English Civil War is short and simple. King, Lords and Commons, landlords, merchants, the City and the countryside, bishops and presbyters, the Scottish army, the Welsh people, and the English Fleet, all now turned against the New Model Army. The Army beat the lot![10]
From its foundation, the New Model Army adopted social and religious policies which were increasingly at odds with those of Parliament. The Army's senior officers (the "
In the aftermath of the Second English Civil War, Parliament was made subservient to the wishes of the
The next two years saw the New Model Army invade
Interregnum
During the Interregnum (1649–1660) the power of all the republican experiments in governance relied on the military might of the New Model Army, which, whenever it was called upon, was easily able to meet the challenges of its enemies, both foreign and domestic.[14]
Two particularly notable events of the interregnum were to have long-lasting effects. The first was political; the army's complete seizure of power when Cromwell dissolved the Rump Parliament in 1653 is the closest to a coup d'état that England has had,
It was only after the death of
Stuart Asquith argues:
Many authorities quote the Restoration of 1660 as the birth date of our modern British Army. While this may be true as far as continuity of unit identity is concerned, it is untrue in a far more fundamental sense. The evidence of history shows that the creation of an efficient military machine and its proving on the battlefield, predates the Restoration by 15 years. It was on the fields of Nasby, Dunbar and Dunes that the foundations of the British professional army were laid.[14]
Restoration
On 26 January 1661, Charles II issued the Royal Warrant that created the first regiments of what would become the British Army,
For some of his enforced exile
This latter state of things was however so contrary to the constitutional customs of England that Charles II introduced it by degrees, gradually filling up the cadres of his battalions and, although contemporary writers considered it a formidable army, it did not exceed 5,000 men.[19]
King Charles put into these regiments those
It will thus be seen that the military system prevailed in England almost at the same time as in France; the two people, however, hailed in a very different manner an innovation, which changed, especially in time of peace, the character of the armed force. In France, under the absolute rule of Louis XIV, it does not appear that the establishment of standing armies met with the shadow of opposition. This was not the case in free England. Pamphleteers wrote tracts voicing the fear of a people who within living memory had experienced the
Army of the King or Parliament?
...the raising or keeping a standing army within the kingdom in time of peace, unless it be with consent of Parliament, is against law.
Many of the English were not fully reconciled to the need for a standing army until the reign of
Command and control
Supreme command of the English Army was vested in the sovereign, though monarchs (with the notable exception of King William III) seldom led their forces in battle after 1660. Instead, executive command was generally delegated, in time of war, to a soldier.
The captain general was assisted by a number of 'general officers' in the wake of the Restoration (called 'general' officers to distinguish them from those with 'particular' responsibility, e.g. to a regiment, rather than to the army as a whole):
In 1679, the captain general being absent, a
Operations
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The Second Anglo-Dutch War was predominately a maritime war but English army soldiers were involved in Holmes's Bonfire (19–20 August 1666), the Raid on the Medway (June 1667), the Battle of Landguard Fort (2 July 1667), the Capture of Cayenne (1667), and Recapture of Fort Zeelandia (1667).
The Third Anglo-Dutch War (1672–1674) was a maritime war, but English soldiers and officers (including John Churchill (the future Duke of Marlborough) saw service under French command (for example at the Siege of Maastricht (1673)).[26] The Blackheath Army of freshly-raised regiments was intended to take part an expedition to Zeeland in 1673, but this had to be abandoned following the naval defeat at the Battle of Texel (August 1673).[27]
After the marriage of
The Monmouth Rebellion and the Battle of Sedgemoor (6 July 1685).
- Glorious Revolution (1689),
- Williamite War in Ireland (1688–1691)
- Nine Years War(1688–1697)
- King William's War (1688–1697).
War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1714)
Amalgamation into the British Army
Shortly after the Act of Union in 1707 the English and Scottish armies were amalgamated to form the British Army.[29]
The order of seniority for the most senior line regiments in the British Army is based on the order of seniority in the English army. Scottish and Irish regiments were only allowed to take a rank in the English army from the date of their arrival in England or the date when they were first placed on the English establishment. For example, in 1694 a board of general officers was convened to decide upon the rank of English, Irish, and Scots regiments serving in the Netherlands, when the regiment that became known as the
See also
- Battle of Ethandun
- Wars of Scottish Independence
- Hundred Years' War
- Anglo-Scottish Wars
- Military of England
Notes
- ^ "Origins of Royal Marines". Archived from the original on 22 October 2016. Retrieved 2 October 2015.
- ^ Delbrück 1990, p. 177.
- ^ Bartlett 1995, p. 3.
- ^ Mallinson 2009, p. 8.
- ^ Barker 2005, p. [page needed].
- ^ Young & Holmes 2000, p. 30.
- ^ a b Atkinson 1911, 1. First Civil War (1642–46).
- ^ a b Gardiner 2010, p. 188.
- ^ Mallinson 2009, p. 17.
- ^ Churchill 1956, p. 200.
- ^ Underdown 1985.
- ^ Mallinson 2009, p. 23.
- ^ Atkinson 1911, pp. 418–421.
- ^ a b c Asquith 1981, p. 3.
- ^ Wilson 2013, p. 204.
- ^ This first battle in which uniformed regiments from the British Isles on the European mainland wore this colour (Chisholm 1911, p. 248).
- ^ Chisholm 1911, p. 248.
- ^ Mallinson 2009, p. 30.
- ^ a b c Colburn 1860, p. 566.
- Gentlemen at Arms; they are now a ceremonial of body guard who attend at great public ceremonies. The "Yeomen of the Guard" (officers of the King's household) do duty at the Palaces in a uniform of the time of Henry VIII (Colburn 1860, p. 566).
- ^ Colburn 1860, pp. 566–567.
- ^ "English Bill of Rights 1689". Yale Law. 31 December 2008. Retrieved 22 August 2013.
- ^ Colburn 1860, p. 567.
- ^ a b c d Roper, Michael (1998). The Records of the War Office and Related Departments, 1660–1964. Kew, Surrey: Public Record Office.
- ^ a b c Walton, Colonel Clifford (1894). History of the British Standing Army AD 1660–1700. London: Harrison & Sons.
- ^ Konstam 2011, p. 7.
- ^ Childs 2013, pp. 181–182.
- ^ Childs 2013, pp. 185–190.
- ^ On the experience of the Scottish soldiers see Victoria Henshaw, Scotland and the British Army, 1700–1750: Defending the Union (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2014), ch 3
- ^ Royal Scots Greys 1840, pp. 56–57.
References
- Asquith, Stuart (1981), New Model Army 1645–60 (illustrated ed.), Osprey, p. 3, ISBN 978-0-85045-385-0
- ISBN 978-0-316-72648-1
- Bartlett, Clive (1995), The English Longbowman, 1330-1515, Osprey Publishing, ISBN 978-1-85532-4916
- Childs, John (2013), Army of Charles II, Routledge, pp. 185–190, ISBN 978-1-134-52859-2
- ISBN 978-0-8032-6585-1
- Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911), , Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 11 (11th ed.), Cambridge University Press, p. 248
- Churchill, Sir Winston (12 November 1956), "English-Speaking Peoples, Continued", Life, pp. 195–200–204
- Gardiner, Samuel (2010), History of the Great Civil War, 1642–1649, vol. 2, Nabu Press, ISBN 978-1-147-19694-8
- Mallinson, Allan (2009), The Making of the British Army, Bantam Press, ISBN 978-0-593-05108-5
- Royal Scots Greys (1840), Historical record of the Royal regiment of Scots dragoons: now the Second, or Royal North British dragoons, commonly called the Scots greys, to 1839, p. 56-57
- ISBN 978-0-04-822045-5
- Wilson, Ben (2013), Empire of the Deep: The Rise and Fall of the British Navy (illustrated ed.), UK: Hachette, p. 204, ISBN 9780297864097
- ISBN 978-1-84022-222-7
Attribution
- public domain: Atkinson, Charles Francis (1911), "Great Rebellion", in Chisholm, Hugh (ed.), Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 12 (11th ed.), Cambridge University Press, pp. 403–421 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
- This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain: Colburn, H. (December 1860), "French view of our military institutions: The English Army", The United Service Magazine, Part 3 (385): 566–567
Further reading
- Chandler, David G. (2003), "The Restoration Army 1660–1702", The Oxford History of the British Army, ISBN 978-0-19-280311-5
- Childs, John (2013) [1976], Army of Charles II, Routledge, pp. 181–182, ISBN 978-1-134-52866-0
- Dalton, Charles (1904), English army lists and commission registers, 1661–1714, vol. 1, London: Eyre & Sporttiswoode
- Firth, C. H. (1898), "Royalist and Cromwellian Armies in Flanders, 1657–1662", Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, London, pp. 69–119
- Firth, C.H. (January–June 1894), "The army or the Commonwealth and Protectorate-II", Notes and Queries, eighth series, 5: 161–162
- Folkers, Maarten (6 March 2015), "The English Army", The Spanish Succession and the War of the Spanish Succession, retrieved 13 June 2015
- Konstam, Angus (2011), Marlborough (illustrated ed.), Osprey Publishing, p. 7, ISBN 9781780962320
- Sprigg, Joshua (1854) [1646], Anglia rediviva: England's recovery: being the history of the motions, actions, and successes of the army under the immediate conduct of Sir Thomas Fairfax, Oxford University Press, pp. 329–332
- White-Spunner, Barney (2006), "Part one: Royal Guard and Standing Army 1660–1685", Horse Guards (illustrated ed.), Pan Macmillan, ISBN 9781405055741