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The Fireside Wars

by Pat Lyon; co-published with Trafford

166 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #03-0146; ISBN 1-55395-783-0; US$18.95, C$25.00, EUR16.30, £11.30

The Fireside Wars is a novel based on the journals kept by the secretary of the army during the English Civil War period, 1646-1747.

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about the book      about the author      sample excerpts or Table of Contents      catalogue info

About the Book "Relive the oppressed, hear the groans of poor prisoners in England. Be pleased to reform the abuses of all professions: and if there be anyone that makes many poor to make a few rich, that suits not a Commonwealth." -Oliver Cromwell in a letter to Parliment 17th Century England- As the first civil war ends, the victorious sides scarcely know what to do. The destruction of the Old Church Government leaves behind a wake of questions and deeply divided factions. With the King held prisoner by the Scottish, the victorious New Model Army turns on Parliment. As the theater of war streches across Europe, a Rector and his family in Saffron Walden, Essex, spend their evenings discussing their changing world. The nearby army headquarters bring not only news but romance as the Rector's involvement in the army debates brings the war to their dinner table. With a historic look and questions that have shaped politics for centuries, Pat Lyon's The Fireside Wars gives life and character to English history, that children do not get from the text books and history lessons as taught in our schools today.

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About the Author Author of the biography "The Life and Times of Richard Cromwell", and other writings, Pat Lyon has devoted many years to the study of Richard's Father, Oliver Cromwell and the 17th Century Civil Wars. Born and bred in England, she has spent many years of her writing life in the United States, where she now resides. Pat has also two pre-published novels: "The Second Adam" based on a Frankenstien Theme, and "Doctor Travellis" featuring a fishing fraternity in Cornwall, England as well as a children's story with it's sequel based on Mount Lemmon, Arizona, entitled "Windy Point".

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Sample Excerpts

CHAPTER 1

When Elizabeth drew her wheelchair up to the Rectory window and looked out one morning, all was peaceful, yet great things were drawing to a head; everyone seemed to think so. The drama being played out at the Sun Inn across the street was real enough. News had gone the rounds that the King, a semi-captive in Oxford, had taken flight disguised as a Servant girl with a cloak bag! Presumably he was making for the Scots Army at Newark!

Only that morning a dispatch rider had turned up at the Inn. Elizabeth had often seen dispatch riders come by night or early morning, but at the arrival of this one, the sudden sound of chairs scraping back in an upper room betokened trouble! Eventually the man came out again followed by Black Tom, his eyes fixed heavily on him. Elizabeth remembered thinking how tall and lithe in build the General was, how dark his hair and how handsome, despite the slight twist to his mouth.

When she mentioned the matter of the dispatch rider to her father later, the Rector made for his study murmuring, "This means the end!" 'The end of what; or of whom?' Maybe he took these matters so seriously because the Army's headquarters lay opposite the Rectory. In addition, the church, which they used for their meetings, was only a little higher up the street.

The Sun Inn, unlike the other houses on Church Street sported an unusual casting on its frontage showing two men in mortal combat, one holding a small shield, the other a club of Hercules. Some thought the fight portrayed an ancient Britain resisting Julius Caesar except the contestants wore doublet and hose. The locals thought the Sun Inn had been given that name because it never saw any, and here General Fairfax presided, attended by the Army's Secretary John Rushworth and his clerk.

The day following the news of the King's escape, a group of Parliamentary Commissioners from London came riding into Saffron Walden. From her window, Elizabeth heard the hustle and bustle of their horses and baggage being attended to in the Inn yard at the back. Then, after what seemed a long interval she saw the Commissioners file out again and make their way up to the Church. Soon after, a group of Army Colonels from Audley End came riding up the street and made much ado about stabling their horses in a nearby enclosure. Having various Parishional worries to attend to at the time, the Rector was much in haste trying to get to the Church before them, since it was his duty to be there at the meetings.

Elizabeth spent the rest of the day supervising the household affairs from her wheelchair. Although her riding accident of some three years back had practically crippled her for life, the theatre of her activity though somewhat limited, constituted the large Rectory garden at the back with its lawns and arbors and orchard trees.

The outcome of the meeting up at the Church was discussed at dinner that evening, during which her father's Curate Mr. Hare had much to say about the Army's arrears of pay. "The foot soldiers have fared worse than the dragoons" he remarked. "Thus you may see that Lieutenant General Cromwell being in command and his son-in-law Ireton, have looked after their own".

Elizabeth thrilled at hearing such names. Cromwell and Ireton were legends, but they were not apt to be seen coming into Saffron Walden. Or were they?

"If the Army is finally granted its arrears," her father was saying, "how long will it take to do all that computing? That will keep their Secretary up late at night!"

His mind full of whatever else had gone before, the Curate answered, "Ah yes, the arrears. Seemingly they only had about a third of what has already been paid to the Scots for their one single campaign. The city was quick to raise the first installment for that. Apparently the money was piled onto about 36 carts, all in sacks and chest loads". Somewhat surprised the Rector complained. "And now you say the King is on his way to them! What next?"

That surprised Elizabeth too. Why had the Scots been fighting on the Parliament's side to begin with? She was entirely confused.

Although the Rectory was considered to be in the town, from the extensive back garden, part of the rural scene with its farm cottages and meadows, presented a panorama of rolling hills unmatched in the whole of eastern England.

Over the garden wall lay a small cabbage patch adjoining a tiny cottage inhabited by Pattie the Sexton's small daughter. Josiah Bumshie's duties as Sexton included that of grave digging, which just about suited his mentality. From her wheelchair in the apple orchard, Elizabeth could sometimes hear him quite audibly giving Pattie what for. Although only a slight man in build, this time he was exerting a lot of weight behind his fist, pounding it on the kitchen table. "You expend your energies traipsing all over the town with that wheelbarrow. What do you think folks are saying about me having a daughter what picks up rubbish on market days and elsewhere!" Elizabeth wondered whether it ever occurred to him folks might be talking about his drinking!

"It's not rubbish!" Pattie shouted from the cottage doorway, her bony little arms akimbo. "I collect wheat for making corn dollies and I sell them. And I get fruit from the market and preserve it or make jam. I sell that too!"

"Gammy fruit you mean." Her father grumbled, picking up one of the pots. "And you get this stuff by hanging around those rubbish bins, I'll be bound!" Elizabeth smiled to herself on hearing him ask, "What are all these brown pieces?" "They're over-ripe that's all," said Pattie, "Over-ripe fruit never hurt anyone."

"Huh" her father shrugged, "I suppose Lucy Figgins told you that one -putting ideas into your head, her and her so-called potions!"

Not wishing to be an eavesdropper any longer, Elizabeth quickly wheeled her chair indoors but she could hear Pattie, really roused now, quite audibly banging her little fist on the table causing all the mugs and plates to rattle. "Lucy Figgins is no witch!" she shouted. "She sells herbs and was educated to be a lady. She can read and write lovely! And what's more, she plays the harpsichord. It's just that she's never been brought up to work!"

"That's just it!" said her father. "Bring 'em up as ladies and they'll never learn to work, so don't you get any ideas. Your so-called Mistress Figgins is known as the dirtiest woman in Saffron Walden; wears a gown without washing it 'til it drops off almost and then goes and makes another."

"Well, and why not," said Pattie stamping her foot. "She can sew wonderfully, you ask anyone." By now, Elizabeth was feeling quite sorry for Pattie. Her world, though comparatively small and insignificant was obviously important. She had talked to the child and found she had ideals about life, which sometimes seemed to soar above Saffron Walden. Anyway Pattie's real row with her father at this moment was because she refused to do any more touting for bookings for him at local Inns. Josiah Bumshie, a man of Italian extraction, was an excellent virtuoso at the violin. He sometimes played in concert with other musicians, but generally found it more lucrative to strike up the more popular tunes as a fiddler. However, his grumbling now having finally managed to throw a blight on everything where Pattie was concerned, she snatched up her little cloak hurriedly, perched her red woolen hat on her head somewhat jauntily askew and slipped outside into the fresh air.

The sun was going down as she trundled her little barrow towards the nearest cornfield intent on gathering corn for the making of corn dollies. However, when she arrived, she found only barley there. She stood for a moment watching it waving and nodding in the breeze. There seemed something magical in the way the barley moved -like sea waves, reminding her of that story of Jesus, going through a cornfield and picking ears of wheat to eat!

After climbing the fence two or three times to fill her little barrow, she set off down the cobbled lane singing a racy little tune in an attempt to cheer herself up. The tune, however, materialized into a rousing hymn from a Psalm of Martin Luther's, and before long she was trundling her barrow and singing loudly. Upon reaching the last line she screeched out, "A sword shall quickly slay him!" Coming round the corner she was brought to an abrupt standstill at the sight of Captain Scot standing directly in her path. A few inches further and the barrow would have trundled into his legs. Knowing Pattie as he did, he said wryly. "I see you have been gleaning a good harvest!"

"I've been thinking as I was going along," she sniffed, "how corn ..."

"That's barley, my dear," he interrupted, "and taken from my family's barley fields." He was alluding to his Pro-Royalist family at Walput Hall nearby!

"Well, barley then," she asserted daringly, "is a sort of symbol of how the Jews became something different from what they were."

This being more than the casual interchange he had bargained for, he stared at her in surprise. "In what way, my dear?"

She sniffed again and reflected for a moment. "Doctor Gaze told me about a seed of the dead corn falling into the ground and springing up as life, but I'm a bit mixed up how he said it." Quickly glancing up at him, but meeting with no response, she continued. "Doctor Gaze goes all over the place you know! I meet him sometimes when he comes here at Lucy figgins' cottage." As an after-thought she ventured, "I think he stays mostly at the Dog Inn in London town, and sometimes at the Sign of the Flea."

By now Captain Scot's face had split into a broad grin. "I know the Dog Inn near Ship Street," he said, "but I cannot exactly recall the Sign of the Flea! Err, what is his persuasion? I mean, his religion?"

"I don't know," she answered, "but he knows lots of spiritual things from the Bible that nobody knows about. I think he has to keep himself quiet or the King's lot 'ed seek him out, hound him down!"

Again Scot grinned. "Rather appropriate for one who commutes between the Sign of the Flea and the Dog Inn!" However, seeing her frown he said, "I'm sorry, my dear." Only a few minutes ago he had been despairing over the way things were going concerning the suffering and hardship in the country generally! Now he was almost apologizing for being jocular. "I suppose," he said, clearing his throat, "your good doctor friend has some very interesting views on the bible pertinent to the troubles this country is embroiled in."

Here, she lit up. "Doctor Gaze told me about Moses leading the people from Egypt and them getting frightened in the desert and wanting the comfort of their idols. He lifted up the snake, the serpent, you know, on a stick as a sign he meant to end it. 'No more,' he said banging his fist on the stone tablet. 'I will teach you to stop praying to idols!'"

"Somewhat crudely put!"the Captain said amused. "But very much to the point all the same! So they were to have no more graven images, which means they had to prepare for a time when their inner-consciousness would awaken to self dependence." However, he was very much taken aback when she chimed in, "Yes, Doctor Gaze said they had to feel God in their thinking you know, and be able to understand things themselves.

So this Doctor Gaze was not some fictitious character she had dreamed up, but real after all!

"You mean personal responsibility?" he queried.

"Zactly," she said. Then she remembered her father. "I've got to be going now."

"Got to be going where?" Scot said, slowly releasing his mare from its hitching post. "Surely on this pleasant evening when all the birds and beasts have gone to their rest, you too can afford to be at leisure?"

"I have to be in bed early," she explained. "My father expects it. If I'm not back soon he'll come looking for me." She found herself wondering whether his family up at the Hall knew all about her father and his drinking or whether they had only known him through playing his fiddle at their gatherings. But then Captain Scot didn't live there himself, but in Audley End where his troupes were stationed.

"Well, we mustn't let that happen," he assured her walking his mare beside her. "By the way, what is the barley in aid of?"

"It should be corn for corn dollies, you know," she answered, "But I'll try making barley dollies instead and sell them on market days." "In that case you'll have all the brewer's maltsers of Saffron Walden after you." He said. "Well, I'll look out for you, then perhaps we can discuss these matters further."

The child received his offer with a reflective silence for a moment and then said; "Doctor Gaze told me the Hebrews worshiped the sun, moon and stars, all at different times as things to guide them. Then God told Abraham they were to listen to his voice in water, wind and earthquakes. Oh yes, and fire, and clouds as well." She was trundling her barrow beside him somewhat industriously now as he walked his mare at a leisurely pace. "Oh yes," he said. "A pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night!"

"Yes," she chimed in pulling up abruptly. "And the Archangel Michael going before them!" "With his barrow, no doubt," the Captain muttered. Ignoring him she went on, "He was their special saint you know."

Quite overcome now at this remark Scot answered, "Yes, many's the time Michael appeared to men when they were beset with doubts, just as now the Lord is leading his faithful ones. In the burning bush he appeared to Moses. Then later, on Mount Sinai he came in the lightning. And later still he appeared to Balaam who was on his way to curse the Israelites. Even Balaam's ass saw Michael three times, whereas the stupid man saw nothing and only beat the poor beast. It is all the same today, some horses have more religion in them than we men."

The child was quite impressed now at his poetic interpretation of the scriptures. The biblical passages having awakened Jewish history strongly in his mind he was adding fervently, "Many of the Psalms in the book of Isaiah are ardent with expectation of the Lord's coming. Zion, the Holy city, was yearned over just as it is yearned over today by his faithful ones." Here he began to recite, "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down. Yea, we wept when we remembered thee O Zion. We hung our harps upon the willow in the midst thereof ..."

"Well my dear," he said with a wry smile as they were about to part. "You and I have got something out of this formal religion imposed on us, if only for knowing the Psalms!" Actually the child could have taken his Pro-Royalist family's whole field of barley by the way he was feeling just then.

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Catalogue Information

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