The Battle of Naseby is, rightly, regarded as one of the most significant engagements of the English Civil War. However, the importance accorded to the battle in the war’s wider context has meant that the finer details of the engagement itself continue to be overlooked. In particular, our knowledge of how the New Model foot was organized is quite vague.
A closer investigation of the Parliamentarian infantry formations can provide us with a fuller understanding of how Fairfax’s foot were organised and how they operated.
A closer investigation of the Parliamentarian infantry formations can provide us with a fuller understanding of how Fairfax’s foot were organised and how they operated.
The biggest problem in our understanding of how Parliament’s foot was organised is the result of one of the battle’s key sources, Robert Streeter’s illustration of the army formations.
Streeter depicts two clearly defined divisions of Parliamentarian foot: a front line of five regiments, supported by a second, ‘reserve’, line of three regiments. On this evidence most histories treat these two lines of Parliament foot as the separate, distinct bodies that they appear to be in Streeter’s illustration. But this interpretation is skewed. For a start, it is commonly accepted that Streeter was not present at the battle (his illustration was not published until 1647). We should therefore turn to other, eyewitness accounts to test how reliable Streeter is.
One such account is the report of George Bishop (Thomason Tracts EE.288.38), who described himself as ‘a gentleman with the army’, and in all likelihood was a civilian. Viewing the troops moving off on the morning of the battle, he described the foot as formed of two ‘wings’: the regiments of Fairfax, Mountague, Pickering and Waller he describes as the ‘right wing’; those of Skippon, Lt. Col. Pride, Hammond and Rainsborough as the ‘left wing’.
We can assume from this account that Bishop viewed the battle from the top of Windmill Hill, or at least from an easterly position. What he was seeing was the two lines of foot depicted by Streeter, but looking across them lengthways, east to west. It is clear from Bishop that Skippon’s regiment was in the lead of the second wing and that this was the second body of foot, which Streeter labels ‘a reserve’. Bishop’s interpretation is important because it allows us to see that Parliament’s foot at Naseby was formed of two brigades of equal strength, not the unbalanced bodies of front line and reserve shown by Streeter.
Streeter depicts two clearly defined divisions of Parliamentarian foot: a front line of five regiments, supported by a second, ‘reserve’, line of three regiments. On this evidence most histories treat these two lines of Parliament foot as the separate, distinct bodies that they appear to be in Streeter’s illustration. But this interpretation is skewed. For a start, it is commonly accepted that Streeter was not present at the battle (his illustration was not published until 1647). We should therefore turn to other, eyewitness accounts to test how reliable Streeter is.
One such account is the report of George Bishop (Thomason Tracts EE.288.38), who described himself as ‘a gentleman with the army’, and in all likelihood was a civilian. Viewing the troops moving off on the morning of the battle, he described the foot as formed of two ‘wings’: the regiments of Fairfax, Mountague, Pickering and Waller he describes as the ‘right wing’; those of Skippon, Lt. Col. Pride, Hammond and Rainsborough as the ‘left wing’.
We can assume from this account that Bishop viewed the battle from the top of Windmill Hill, or at least from an easterly position. What he was seeing was the two lines of foot depicted by Streeter, but looking across them lengthways, east to west. It is clear from Bishop that Skippon’s regiment was in the lead of the second wing and that this was the second body of foot, which Streeter labels ‘a reserve’. Bishop’s interpretation is important because it allows us to see that Parliament’s foot at Naseby was formed of two brigades of equal strength, not the unbalanced bodies of front line and reserve shown by Streeter.
Bishop does not use the term ‘brigade’, neither it seems did anybody else in relation to Fairfax’s foot at Naseby, but we know that these two ‘wings’ were units in their own right because the same combinations of regiments occur time and again during the subsequent New Model campaign. Rainsborough commanded a brigade at Bristol in September 1645 which comprised his own, Skippon’s, Hammonds and Lt. Col. Pride’s Regiments (Sprigg, 105). The following month Pickering, Waller and Mountague brigaded together at Basing House (ibid., 149). Thus the bodies of foot described at Naseby were fairly consistent formations: brigades.
Of the twelve regiments of New Model Army foot, eight were present at Naseby. The remaining four had been detached from the main body of the army earlier in the campaign to aid the beleaguered town of Taunton. This further argues for Fairfax’s foot being organised into brigades of equal strength, each of four regiments.
We can assume that the Parliament’s foot marched to the field at Naseby in the formations described that morning by Bishop. Once in position, Skippon would then have manoeuvred his own regiment further forward to extend the Parliament front line and gain an advantage over the attacking Royalist foot.
The ‘reserve’ line of Parliament infantry was not a distinct unit as such. Streeter’s plan of the Battle of Naseby should be considered misleading, at least in his labelling of Parliamentarian infantry foot, and further analysis of the battle (including re-enactment) ought to take into account the existence of Fairfax’s foot brigades, revealed by Bishop’s account and in the reports of the subsequent campaign.
Robert Hodkinson
June, 2015
Of the twelve regiments of New Model Army foot, eight were present at Naseby. The remaining four had been detached from the main body of the army earlier in the campaign to aid the beleaguered town of Taunton. This further argues for Fairfax’s foot being organised into brigades of equal strength, each of four regiments.
We can assume that the Parliament’s foot marched to the field at Naseby in the formations described that morning by Bishop. Once in position, Skippon would then have manoeuvred his own regiment further forward to extend the Parliament front line and gain an advantage over the attacking Royalist foot.
The ‘reserve’ line of Parliament infantry was not a distinct unit as such. Streeter’s plan of the Battle of Naseby should be considered misleading, at least in his labelling of Parliamentarian infantry foot, and further analysis of the battle (including re-enactment) ought to take into account the existence of Fairfax’s foot brigades, revealed by Bishop’s account and in the reports of the subsequent campaign.
Robert Hodkinson
June, 2015