38 THE BATTLE OF ED0EH1LL January soldiers were so dispersed that there were not ten of any troop together, and the soldiers, that their horses were so tired that they could not charge. 1 Then night, ' the common friend to wearied and dismayed armies ', parted the hostile forces, and the first drawn battle of the civil war was over. Satisfactory data as to the number of casualties are lacking. The highest computation is that of Thomas May, who records that he had heard that the country people thereabouts, by burying of the naked bodies, found the number to be about six thousand that fell on both sides, besides those that died afterwards of their wounds. 2 In opposition to this exaggeration may be placed the statement of Fiennes that the parliamentarians only lost from 200 to 400, excluding wagoners and boys, and the calculation of Clarendon that the royalist forces were found to be diminished by only 300 when the fugitives had returned to their ranks.' On the whole it is evident that the royalists suffered the heavier casualties. They lost — killed, wounded, or captured — three or four times as many officers in the higher commands as the parliamentarians, and their centre was broken and nearly surrounded without much chance of flight. Whereas the parliamentarians declared that they cut to pieces several opposing regiments, no such claim is advanced on the other side. Rupert scattered his enemies but killed few : the royalists themselves acknowledge the havoc wrought by Stapleton and Balfour. Probably Lord Bernard Stuart is approximately correct when he says of Charles's army, ' what is killed and run away I think is about 2500 and that is the most '. Probably the parliamentarians had as many temporary fugitives but far fewer permanent losses, since the run- aways would be intercepted in many cases by the fresh regiments hastening to join Essex. 3 G. Davie s. I British Museum, Hart. -MS. 3783, fo. 60. A brief relation of the battle at Red horse field under Edgehill* We marched on Sunday morning from Edgecot to Edgehill which is 5 miles to fight with them there. After our men were put into battalia and the cannon planted we gave fire with our cannon and then charged them with both wings of our horse. They stood still all the while upon the hill expecting the charge so that we were fain to charge them uphill 1 Clarendon, vi. 86. The story of Falkland's urging Wilraot to make a final charge and Wilmot's refusing comes from the Life, ibid. vi. 79 n. 2 History of the Parliament, ed. 1854, p. 264. 3 Kightley himself stopped some of them {A full and- true relation). 4 I have to thank Mr. C. H. Firth for lending me his transcripts of this and the following manuscript and for helping me in many other ways.
