Everything about Sir Thomas Fairfax totally explained
Thomas Fairfax, 3rd Lord Fairfax of Cameron (
17 January 1612 –
12 November 1671) was a general and parliamentary commander-in-chief during the
English Civil War.
Early life
Born at
Denton Hall, near
Otley,
Yorkshire, Fairfax was the eldest son of
Ferdinando Fairfax, 2nd Lord Fairfax of Cameron. He studied at
St John's College, Cambridge (1626–29), and then proceeded to the
Netherlands to serve as a volunteer with the English army in the
Low Countries under Sir
Horace (Lord) Vere. This connection led to one still closer; in the summer of 1637 Fairfax married Anne Vere, the daughter of the general.
Pre-Civil War events
The Fairfaxes, father and son, though serving at first under King
Charles I (Thomas commanded a troop of horse, and was knighted by the king in 1640), were opposed to the arbitrary prerogative of the
Crown, and Sir Thomas declared that "his judgment was for the Parliament as the king and kingdom's great and safest council". When Charles endeavoured to raise a guard for his own person at
York, intending it, as the event afterwards proved, to form the nucleus of an army, Fairfax was employed to present a petition to his sovereign, entreating him to hearken to the voice of his parliament, and to discontinue the raising of troops. This was at a great meeting of the freeholders and farmers of
Yorkshire convened by the king on
Heworth Moor near York. Charles evaded receiving the petition, pressing his horse forward, but Fairfax followed him and placed the petition on the pommel of the king's saddle.
The Civil War
War broke out, Lord Fairfax was appointed general of the Parliamentary forces in the north, and his son, Sir Thomas, was made lieutenant-general of the horse under him. Both father and son distinguished themselves in the
campaigns in Yorkshire.
Sometimes severely defeated, more often successful, and always energetic, prudent and resourceful, they contrived to keep up the struggle until the crisis of 1644, when York was held by the
Marquess of Newcastle against the combined forces of the English Parliamentarians and the
Scots, and
Prince Rupert hastened with all available forces to its relief. A gathering of eager national forces within a few square miles of ground naturally led to a battle, and
Marston Moor (
2 July 1644) proved decisive for the struggle in the north. The younger Fairfax bore himself with the greatest gallantry in the battle, and though severely wounded managed to join
Oliver Cromwell and the victorious cavalry on the other wing. One of his brothers, Colonel Charles Fairfax, was killed in the action. But the Marquess of Newcastle fled the kingdom, and the
Royalists abandoned all hope of retrieving their affairs. The city of York was taken, and nearly the whole north submitted to the Parliament.
In the south and west of England, however, the Royalist cause was still strong. The war had lasted two years, and the nation began to complain of the contributions that were exacted, and the excesses that were committed by the military. Dissatisfaction was expressed with the military commanders, and, as a preliminary step to reform, the
Self-denying Ordinance was passed. This involved the removal of
the Earl of Essex from the supreme command, along with other Members of Parliament. This was followed by the
New Model Ordinance, which replaced the locally raised Parliamentary regiments with a unified army. Sir Thomas Fairfax was selected as the new lord general with Cromwell as his lieutenant-general and cavalry commander. After a short preliminary campaign the "
New Model" justified its existence, and "the rebels' new brutish general", as the king called him, proved his capacity as commander-in-chief in the decisive
victory of Naseby (
14 June 1645). The king fled to
Wales. Fairfax besieged
Leicester, and was successful at
Taunton,
Bridgwater and
Bristol. The whole west was soon reduced.
Fairfax arrived in
London on
12 November 1645. In his progress towards the capital he was accompanied by applauding crowds. Complimentary speeches and thanks were presented to him by both houses of parliament, along with a jewel of great value set with diamonds, and a sum of money. The king had returned from Wales and established himself at
Oxford, where there was a strong garrison, but, ever vacillating, he withdrew secretly, and proceeded to
Newark to throw himself into the arms of the Scots. Oxford capitulated following the final
siege of Oxford, and by the end of September 1646 Charles had neither army nor garrison in England, following the surrender of
Thomas Blagge at
Wallingford Castle after a siege conducted by Fairfax. In January 1647 he was delivered up by the Scots to the commissioners of parliament. Fairfax met the king beyond
Nottingham, and accompanied him during the journey to
Holdenby, treating him with the utmost consideration in every way. "The general", said Charles, "is a man of
honour, and keeps his word which he'd pledged to me."
With the collapse of the Royalist cause came a confused period of negotiations between the Parliament and the king, between the king and the Scots, and between the
Presbyterians and the
Independents in and out of Parliament. In these negotiations the New Model Army soon began to take a most active part. The lord general was placed in the unpleasant position of intermediary between his own officers and Parliament. To the grievances, usual in armies of that time, concerning arrears of pay and indemnity for acts committed on duty, there was quickly added the political propaganda of the Independents, and in July the person of the king was seized by
Cornet Joyce, a subaltern of cavalry — an act which sufficiently demonstrated the hopelessness of controlling the army by its
articles of war. It had, in fact, become the most formidable political party in the realm, and pressed straight on to the overthrow of Parliament and the punishment of Charles.
Fairfax was more at home in the field than at the head of a political committee, and, finding events too strong for him, he sought to resign his commission as commander-in-chief. He was, however, persuaded to retain it. He thus remained the titular chief of the army party, and with the greater part of its objects he was in complete, sometimes most active, sympathy. Shortly before the outbreak of the second Civil War, Fairfax succeeded his father in the barony and in the office of governor of
Hull. In the field against the English Royalists in 1648 he displayed his former energy and skill, and his operations culminated in the successful siege of
Colchester, after the surrender of which place he approved the execution of the Royalist leaders' Sir
Charles Lucas and Sir
George Lisle, holding that these officers had broken their
parole. At the same time Cromwell's great victory of
Preston crushed the Scots, and the Independents became practically all-powerful.
John Milton, in a
sonnet written during the
siege of Colchester, called upon the lord general to settle the kingdom, but the crisis was now at hand. Fairfax was in agreement with Cromwell and the army leaders in demanding the punishment of Charles, and he was still the effective head of the army. He approved, if he didn't take an active part in,
Pride's Purge (
6 December 1648), but on the last and gravest of the questions at issue he set himself in deliberate and open opposition to the policy of the officers. He was placed at the head of the judges who were to try the king, and attended the preliminary sitting of the court. Then, convinced at last that the king's death was intended, he refused to act. In calling over the court, when the crier pronounced the name of Fairfax, a lady in the gallery called out that the Lord Fairfax wasn't there in person, that he'd never sit among them, and that they did him wrong to name him as a commissioner. This was Lady Fairfax, who couldn't forbear, as
Bulstrode Whitelocke says, to exclaim aloud against the proceedings of the High Court of Justice.
His last service as commander-in-chief was the suppression of the
Leveller mutiny at
Burford in May 1649. He had given his adhesion to the new order of things, and had been reappointed lord general. But he merely administered the affairs of the army, and when in 1650 the Scots had declared for
Charles II, and the council of state resolved to send an army to Scotland in order to prevent an invasion of
England, Fairfax resigned his commission. Cromwell was appointed his successor, "captain-general and commander-in-chief of all the forces raised or to be raised at authority of Parliament within the Commonwealth of England."
After the fighting
Fairfax received a pension of £5000 a year, and lived in retirement at his Yorkshire home of
Nunappleton till after the death of the
Lord Protector. Nunappleton and Fairfax's retirement there are the subject of Andrew Marvell's country house poem,
'Upon Appleton House'. The troubles of the later Commonwealth recalled Lord Fairfax to political activity, and for the last time his appearance in arms helped to shape the future of the country, when
George Monck invited him to assist in the operations about to be undertaken against
John Lambert's army. In December 1659 he appeared at the head of a body of Yorkshire gentlemen, and such was the influence of Fairfax's name and reputation that 1200 horse quitted Lambert's colours and joined him. This was speedily followed by the breaking up of all Lambert's forces, and that day secured the restoration of the monarchy. A "free" Parliament was called; Fairfax was elected member for
Yorkshire, and was put at the head of the commission appointed by the
House of Commons to wait upon Charles II, at
the Hague and urge his speedy return. Of course the "merry monarch, scandalous and poor", was glad to obey the summons, and Fairfax provided the horse on which Charles rode at his coronation.
The remaining 11 years of the life of Lord Fairfax were spent in retirement at his seat in Yorkshire. He must, like Milton, have been sorely grieved and shocked by the scenes that followed – the brutal indignities offered to the remains of his companions in arms, Cromwell and
Ireton, the sacrifice of
Henry Vane the Younger, and the factious splintering that undermined the effectiveness of Caroline Parliament. Fairfax died at Nunappleton, and was buried at
Bilbrough, near York.
Analysis
As a soldier he was exact and methodical in planning, in the heat of battle "so highly transported that scarce any one durst speak a word to him" (Whitelocke), chivalrous and punctilious in his dealings with his own men and the enemy. Honour and conscientiousness were equally the characteristics of his private and public character. But his modesty and distrust of his powers made him less effectual as a
statesman than as a soldier, and above all he's placed at a disadvantage by being both in war and peace overshadowed by his associate Cromwell.
Fairfax had a taste for
literature. He translated some of the
Psalms, and wrote poems on solitude, the Christian warfare, the shortness of life, etc. During the last year or two of his life he wrote two Memorials which have been published – one on the northern actions in which he was engaged in 1642-1644, and the other on some events in his tenure of the chief command. At York and at Oxford he endeavoured to save the libraries from pillage, and he enriched the
Bodleian with some valuable manuscripts.
The metaphysical poet
Andrew Marvell authored "Upon Appleton House, To My Lord Fairfax", nominally about Fairfax's home, but also his character as well as England during his era.
Lord Fairfax of Cameron's only daughter, Mary Fairfax, was married to
George Villiers, the profligate duke of Buckingham of Charles II's court.
Other
The Fairfax cup presented at the
York International 9s rugby league festival is named after Thomas Fairfax.
Fairfax House, a 92 bedroom student accommodation house located within the
University of York is named after Sir Thomas Fairfax.
Further Information
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