Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Armour Plates" to "Arundel, Earls of"
61. It is difficult to summarize the history of the army between the
949 words | Chapter 69
Hundred Years' War and 1642. The final failure of the English arms in
France was soon followed by the Wars of the Roses, and in the long
period of civil strife the only national force remaining to England was
the Calais garrison. Henry VIII. was a soldier-king, but he shared the
public feeling for the old bow and bill, and English armies which served
abroad did not, it seems, win the respect of the advanced professional
soldiers of the continent. In 1519 the Venetian ambassador described the
English forces as consisting of 150,000 men whose peculiar, though not
exclusive, weapon was the long bow (Fortescue i. 117). The national levy
made in 1588 to resist the Armada and the threat of invasion produced
about 750 lancers (heavy-armed cavalry), 2000 light horse and 56,000
foot, beside 20,000 men employed in watching the coasts. The small
proportion of mounted men is very remarkable in a country in which
Cromwell was before long to illustrate the full power of cavalry on the
battlefield. It is indeed not unfair to regard this army as a
miscellaneous levy of inferior quality.
It was in cavalry that England was weakest, and by three different acts
it was sought to improve the breed of horses, though the light horse of
the northern counties had a good reputation, and even won the admiration
of the emperor Charles V. Perhaps the best organized force in England at
this time was the London volunteer association which ultimately became
the Honourable Artillery Company. At Floddon the spirit of the old
English yeomanry triumphed over the outward form of continental
battalions which the Scots had adopted, and doubtless the great victory
did much to retard military progress in England. The chief service of
Henry VIII. to the British army was the formation of an artillery train,
in which he took a special interest. Before he died the forces came to
consist of a few permanent troops (the bodyguard and the fortress
artillery service), the militia or general levy, which was for home, and
indeed for county, service only, and the paid armies which were
collected for a foreign war and disbanded at the conclusion of peace,
and were recruited on the same principle of indents which had served in
the Hundred Years' War. In the reign of Mary, the old Statute of
Winchester was revised (1553), and the new act provided for a
readjustment of the county contingents and in some degree for the
rearmament of the militia. But, from the fall of Calais and the
expedition to Havre up to the battle of the Dunes a century later, the
intervention of British forces in foreign wars was always futile and
generally disastrous. During this time, however, the numerous British
regiments in the service of Holland learned, in the long war of Dutch
independence, the art of war as it had developed on the continent since
1450, and assimilated the regimental system and the drill and armament
of the best models. Thus it was that in 1642 there were many hundreds of
trained and war-experienced officers and sergeants available for the
armies of the king and the parliament. By this time bows and bills had
long disappeared even from the militia, and the Thirty Years' War,
which, even more than the Low Countries, offered a career for the
adventurous man, contributed yet more trained officers and soldiers to
the English and Scottish forces. So closely indeed was war now studied
by Englishmen that the respective adherents of the Dutch and the Swedish
systems quarrelled on the eve of the battle of Edgehill. Francis and
Horace Vere, Sir John Norris, and other Englishmen had become generals
of European reputation. Skippon, Astley, Goring, Rupert, and many others
soon to be famous were distinguished as company and regimental officers
in the battles and sieges of Germany and the Low Countries.
The home forces of England had, as has been said, little or nothing to
revive their ancient renown. Instead, they had come to be regarded as a
menace to the constitution. In Queen Elizabeth's time the demands of the
Irish wars had led to frequent forced levies, and the occasional
billeting of the troops in England also gave rise to murmurs, but the
brilliancy and energy of her reign covered a great deal, and the
peaceful policy of her successor removed all immediate cause of
complaint. But after the accession of Charles I. we find the army a
constant and principal source of dispute between the king and
parliament, until under William III. it is finally established on a
constitutional footing. Charles, wishing to support the Elector Palatine
in the Thirty Years' War, raised an army of 10,000 men. He was already
encumbered with debts, and the parliament refused all grants, on which
he had recourse to forced loans. The army was sent to Spain, but
returned without effecting anything, and was not disbanded, as usual,
but billeted on the inhabitants. The billeting was the more deeply
resented as it appeared that the troops were purposely billeted on those
who had resisted the loan. Forced loans, billeting and martial law--all
directly connected with the maintenance of the army--formed the main
substance of the grievances set forth in the Petition of Right. In
accepting this petition, Charles gave up the right to maintain an army
without consent of parliament; and when in 1639 he wished to raise one
to act against the rebellious Scots, parliament was called together, and
its sanction obtained, on the plea that the army was necessary for the
defence of England. This army again became the source of dispute between
the king and parliament, and finally both sides appealed to arms.
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