^{page ix note a} When Charles I. in October, 1642, withdrew from York to Shrewsbury, he was attended there by Sir Francis Ottley, of Pitchford, in the county of Salop, a gentleman of devoted loyalty, who had been declared a delinquent, Aug. 6, 1642, and to whom, by warrant dated Oct. 11, he gave command not to remove out of that county: “he could not think of sparing him,” was his expression, “till the present great distractions should be better settled.” He was then about to draw out his forces from the place and county. Jan. 16 or 17, he was appointed Governor of Shrewsbury. Nichols, Collectanea, v.

^{page ix note b} Ottley MSS.

^{page x note a} [John Birch had two brothers, Samuel and Thomas, the latter of whom became Rector of Hampton Bishop, in the county of Hereford. Samuel must therefore be the one here referred to. He reappears as Major, commanding at Hereford in his brother's absence in 1647–8.]

^{page xi note a} Aldworth was a merchant who had accepted, conjointly with Richard Wollaston of London, a contract for shirts for the soldiers in Ireland.—Commons' Journals, July 13, 1642. A proof of the commercial relation between the two towns.

^{page xi note b} Owing to the interference of the mayoress and other ladies, whose entreaties threw the mayor and corporation off their guard.—Barrett, Hist, of Bristol, 216.

^{page xi note c} His temper was equally ungovernable towards his own men. He acted with such despotic power, says Barrett, that, “offended with one of the soldiers for modestly asking for his pay, he instantly shot him through the head.”—Hist, ut supra, 227; Merc. Aulicus, Feb. 10, 1642.

^{page ix note d} Hargrave's State Trials, i. 796.

^{page xii note a} [A remarkable passage occurs in a letter from the new governor, apparently to his father, given by Seyer, Memoirs, ii. 326. He complains of Essex as “being himself familiar and intimate with the chief malignants, and siding with them against the good partie, and that in so high a degree, that even after I came to the town he imprisoned Capt. Birche, who is and always was the most active man in the town for the Parliament, and swore that neither he nor any of his men, nor any of the Bridge-men (who are known to be the honestest men in the town, and who only appeared in their arms for us when Prince Rupert came before the town) should have any arms or any command in the city; and this I can testifie myself, for he swore it deeply in my presence.” Fiennes, it appears, disarmed some of the citizens who had been armed by Essex.—The Earl of Stamford had said, in a letter to the Speaker of the House of Lords, Dec. 19, 1642, “I find this city infinitely well affected to the good cause.”]

^{page xiii note a} Life, i. 40.

^{page xiii note b} Lady Brilliana Harley's Letters, Camden Society, 18, 202, et al.

^{page xiii note c} [In a letter, apparently by Aldworth, it is stated that the bells of three churches were to be tolled. “St. Nicholas' bell for the butchers, St. John's bell for the sailors, and St. Michael's bell to bring down the cavaliers.”—Seyer, Memoirs, ii. 354.]