Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 45.djvu/80

 and the propagation of the gospel should be vigorously taken in hand (ib. pp. 8–13). He added in a vindication of the army, published in the following year, a list of twenty necessary political and social reforms (A Word for the Army, 1647; Harleian Miscellany, v. 607).

During the quarrel between the army and the parliament, Peters acted throughout with the former, preached often at its headquarters, and vigorously defended its actions. He protested on his trial that he had not been privy to the intended seizure of the king at Holmby, nor taken part in any of the army's councils. In June 1647 he had an interview with Charles at Newmarket, and was favourably received by Charles, who was reported to have said ‘that he had often heard talk of him, but did not believe he had that solidity in him he found by his discourses.’ Subsequently he had access to the king at Windsor, and, according to his own statement, propounded to his majesty three ways to preserve himself from danger (, Historical Collections, vi. 578, vii. 815, 943; Last Legacy, p. 103; Trial of the Regicides, p. 173; A Conference between the King's Most Excellent Majesty and Mr. Peters at Newmarket, 4to, 1647).

When the second civil war broke out, Peters took the field again, and did good service at the siege of Pembroke in procuring guns for the besiegers (Cromwelliana, p. 40). He also helped to raise troops in the Midland counties, and negotiated, on behalf of Lord Grey of Groby, for the surrender of the Duke of Hamilton at Uttoxeter. In New England it was commonly reported that Peters himself had captured Hamilton (The Northern Intelligencer, 1648, 4to;, Lives of the Dukes of Hamilton, ed. 1852, pp. 491–3; , ii. 436).

Rumour also credited him with a share in drawing up the ‘Army Remonstrance’ of 20 Nov. 1648, and Lilburne terms him the ‘grand journey-man or hackney-man of the army.’ In the discussions on the ‘agreement of the people’ he spoke on the necessity of toleration, quoted the example of Holland, and urged the officers to ‘tame that old spirit of domination among Christians’ which was the source of so much persecution (, Great Civil War, iv. 236; Clarke Papers, ii. 89, 259). The royalist newspapers represented Peters as one of the instigators of the king's trial and execution, which he denied himself in his post-Restoration apologies; but his sermons during the trial, as was proved by several witnesses, justified the sentence of the court. In one of them he took for his text the words ‘To bind their kings in chains and their nobles with fetters of iron,’ and applied to Charles the denunciation of the king of Babylon in Isaiah xiv. 18–20 (ib. ii. 30;, iv. 304, 314; Trial of the Regicides, pp. 170). In like manner Peters was credited with a part in contriving ‘Pride's Purge,’ though all he did was to release two of the imprisoned members by Fairfax's order, and to answer the inquiries of the rest as to the authority by which they were detained with the words ‘By the power of the sword’ (, iv. 272). Towards individual royalists Peters often showed great kindness, and at his trial in 1660 he was able to produce certificates from the Earl of Norwich and the Marquis of Worcester expressing their thanks for his services to them. At Hamilton's trial, also in March 1649, Peters was one of the witnesses on behalf of the duke (Trial of the Regicides, p. 173;, p. 493).

The establishment of the republic and the end of the war seemed to set Peters free to return to New England, and at intervals since 1645 he had announced to Winthrop his intention of embarking as soon as possible. His wife had been despatched thither in 1645. ‘My spirit,’ he wrote in May 1647, ‘these two or three years hath been restless about my stay here, and nothing under heaven but the especial hand of the Lord could stay me; I pray assure all the country so.’ At one time, however, illness, at another the necessity of first disposing of his property in England, at others the state of public affairs, prevented his departure (Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll. 4th ser. vi. 108, 110, 112). He was also detained by the wish to assist in the reconquest of Ireland, whither he accompanied Cromwell in August 1649. Peters landed at Dublin on 30 Aug., having been entrusted by the general with the charge of bringing up the stragglers left behind at Milford Haven (, History of the Commonwealth and Protectorate, i. 119). He was one of the first to announce the fall of Drogheda to the parliament, was present at the capture of Wexford, and returned again to England in October to superintend the forwarding of reinforcements and supplies. Cromwell even commissioned him to raise a regiment of foot for service in Ireland, but that project seems to have fallen through, owing to the illness of Peters himself, and to some difficulties raised by the council of state (, Aphorismical Discovery, ii. 262; Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1649–50, pp. 349, 390, 432;, England's Shame, 1663, p. 75). Peters remained in South Wales during the spring of 1650, employed in business connected with the expedition, and in persuading the Welsh to