the
early part of the day was to give support to Compton Wynyate, or get aid
therefrom. It was but three miles distant. Whether any deflection of
Hampden's force moving from Stratford-on-Avon was made to mask or retard
Compton's men is mere surmise: the main part of Hampden's rear did not
reach the field until the Sunday midnight, when Essex got reinforced by a
regiment of horse and two of foot.

The story of successive campaigns, as in this the first fight, resolves
itself into the superiority of the heavy armament of the Parliamentarian
horse. The improved status of the men added greater force at a later date.
With all the dash, and all the value of the light horse of the King for
foray, when in the field the cavalier went down before the iron armed
horse of the Parliament's army.

On the following day, the two armies again drew up, the Parliamentarians
having in the early morning retired from the hill side towards
Kineton,[PB] but neither showed any disposition to renew the fight. Essex
was pressed to do so by some of his more impetuous officers, but wanted
the daring necessary for so bold a movement. Charles sent a messenger into
the rebel lines with a pardon for Earl Essex, which "messenger returned
with so great a sense of danger as not to have observed the number and
disposition of the Parliamentary forces." Later on, Essex retired to
Warwick with his troops, and Prince Rupert is reported to have followed,
but failed to overtake them, though it is stated that he destroyed many
wagons and carriages with munitions, &c. The reconnaissance appears to
have been otherwise fruitless, for the King at once marched southward, and
received the surrender of Banbury Castle, and also subsequently of
Broughton Castle. Lord Saye, Sir Wm. Cobb, of Adderbury, and John Doyley,
Esq., were not only proclaimed traitors, but were specially exempted from
the King's pardon.[y430]

The position of the graves in which the slain were buried is about 200
yards south of Thistle Farm, the ground bearing still the name of the
Grave Field, and a wych elm marks the site of one of the graves.

The part that Oliver Cromwell played in the struggle has not unnaturally
been the cause of much comment. Carlyle[q101] characteristically cuts the
Gordian knot with the statement, "Captain Cromwell _was_ present, and did
his duty, let angry Denzil say what he will."[6] Denzil Hollis's[o226]
charge that Cromwell purposely absented himself from the field m