Page:The histories of Launceston and Dunheved, in the county of Cornwall.djvu/300

 27o THE CASTLE. ag fc the fugitive souldiers ;" and on the 27th the Mayor "paid M r Currenton 2s. when he satt aboute gardinge of the brigges." Mr. Coryton was then one of the members for the borough. We regret that some purloining hand, or negligent custodian, has deprived us of the means of looking in upon the actions, and contemplating the daily anxieties of our busy burghers during the chief part of the years 1644 and 1645. We can discover no trace of the municipal accounts from the month of November, 1643, to tnat °f December, 1645. That period was very full of local interest. In the early portion of it the Parliamentary General, Essex, held Launceston ; and we learn from a private diary in the Record Office, that the King, having passed the night of the 31st July, 1644, at the parsonage house in Lifton, came next day to Launceston, accompanied by Prince Maurice, his nephew. In his way hither he found that the Earl of Essex had destroyed two of the bridges over the Tamar, one being presumably a bridge which crossed the river near the present Chain Bridge below Polston, and the other occupying a site a little above the present Polston Bridge. The Earl had evacuated Launceston before the King's arrival, going by way of Northhill towards Liskeard. While at Launceston his Majesty received a message from Sir Richard Grenville, then in the west of Cornwall' which induced him and the Prince to proceed at once towards Liskeard. They passed the night of the 1st August at Trecarell, then belonging to Mr. Ambrose Manaton, one of the members for Launceston. The army lay in the fields around the house. On the following day (2nd August) the King reached Liskeard, and on the 6th August wrote thence to the Earl of Essex, who was encamped at Lostwithiel. Negotiations for peace having failed, the armies met on the 1st September, 1644, and fought on Broadoak Down, near Boconnock, the seat of