Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [470]
“Some of the gentry in Wiltshire country will go with the king,” Edmund said. “The Catholics like Lord Arundel of course; Penruddock; Thynne of Longleat I think; the Hydes.” The large Hyde family, more recently settled near Salisbury, were cousins of the king’s great lawyer, and respected supporters of the king.
But Nathaniel shook his head sadly.
“Arundel’s old; Thynne’s crippled by a lawsuit; Penruddock’s a politician, not a soldier. Whereas, brother, you have Lord Pembroke. Though he’s no commander, the Pembroke influence still weighs in the balance.” For the earl, after seeming to hesitate, had accepted Parliament’s offer of the lord lieutenancy that spring and so effectively declared himself against the king. He had hated both Buckingham and Strafford and his example would be followed.
“Yet,” Nathaniel said with a laugh, “I still have the bishop with me.”
Although many of his clergy – half those even in Salisbury town – were Puritans, Bishop Duppa, a good High Churchman like his predecessors, had been made tutor to the royal princes.
“Much good it will do you,” Obadiah replied grimly.
“And Sir Henry Forest?” Nathaniel enquired. “Which way will he jump, brother?”
To which, for once, serious Edmund allowed himself a smile.
“Why, with the winning side, my dear Nathaniel, to be sure.”
Sir Henry Forest, Baronet, had decided to walk home. It was not far.
He had respected William Shockley and he had not been sorry when, twenty years before, the cloth merchant had bought the fine old farm that lay next to his estate at Avonsford, enlarged the house so that it was almost a small manor, and settled in the Avon valley.
He had a shrewd idea of the arguments in the Shockley family now, and guessed correctly that the brothers would be split apart.
Sir Henry Forest smiled. They did not realise it, but their falling out might be to his advantage.
As for which side he would take in the war with the king – he had not decided.
The time of the Stuarts had been good for the Forest family. After making several lucrative investments in the new tobacco trade with America, Forest’s father had done better still with the recently formed East India Company whose trade in the Far East was bringing all manner of new luxuries to the busy trading island.
It had not only been good for them financially: for it was the Stuarts, as one of their expedients to raise money, who had invented the new title of baronet. By acquiring this dignity a man would be called Sir Henry, like a knight, but unlike a mere knight, pass the title on to his male heirs in perpetuity, like a lord. It was a brilliant idea, perfectly aimed at rising families like the Forests, and Henry had gladly paid the considerable sum into the king’s coffers to see his family ennobled at last. Once on the ladder of nobility, there were higher titles to be had – baron, viscount, earl. Why, to secure his allegiance, Seymour had even been made a marquis, only one rank below a duke! Forest had every reason to support the Stuarts.
But was it wise to join the king when so many in Wiltshire were against him?
“I have no desire to be at odds with the country,” he had told his wife that morning.
By the word ‘country’ he meant not England, but only the county of Wiltshire. But the usage of the day conveyed very accurately the independence of each shire, with its magnates and gentry who administered justice, raised the levies when needed, and usually nowadays – still more than in the previous century – sat for the boroughs in Parliament instead of the burgesses.
“I’ll follow Pembroke,” he decided. “Besides,