"Yes. I have seen what an army can do to civilians, whether the civilians are on their side or not. I want defences that make an armed force decide to go elsewhere. I want to deter attacks, not necessarily defend against a determined army."
"Yes, Lord Westbury. For a start we would change our drainage plans. It would be simple to provide a moat around the fort, and it might make the drainage works easier. We would need a sluice gate to drain the moat, to ensure the water doesn't get too high, and to keep out high tides. That sluice gate would have to be defended. We can change our plans in the next couple of days because we have only just started. There is a ship coming from Amsterdam in a few days bringing our workmen. I could go back on it and try to find a military engineer to advise you. Would that do?"
"Yes, Herr Onbart, that would be acceptable. But any engineer would need a fee for his consultancy. I will give you fifty guineas to persuade the military engineer to come. Would that be enough?"
"That would be generous, Lord Westbury. For fifty guineas I could probably get one of our best."
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The next day, suggested by the local vicar, I would be hosting an afternoon wine and cake event for the local gentry. The intention was to discuss the coming war and what we should do. We all live in a remote part of East Anglia that has no strategic importance. We hoped any battles would not come near. I didn't know whether any of my neighbours would be supporters of either side. My intention was to find out how they would react to a war, which side, if any, they would be supporting, and how we could keep ourselves, our families, and our staff of farm and domestic workers safe.
In the morning I walked around with Herr Onbart. He suggested that the moat should be at least fifty yards wide, about ten feet deep, and be inside any additional defences constructed. His idea, until the military engineer arrived, was that the defences should be erected in a space one hundred yards from the Roman walls. That startled me. I hadn't expected that such a large area would be needed.
The cost would be considerable, but I had money, more money than I could reasonably spend. My grandfather had opened some copper mines on his land in Wales. Now I owned that land and the mines. There were now ten separate mines producing nearly a third of the total output elsewhere. I hoped that Wales would not be involved in the Civil War, but if it was, I would shut down and seal the mines when any army was near. In the meantime, I intended to reduce production and bring many of the miners and their families here, for the miners to help with the labour for the drainage works, and possibly now any defences. I had written to my agent in Wales. He had persuaded about eighty miners and their families to come to East Anglia, for easier work above ground.
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At the afternoon wine and cake party, my pastry cook had surpassed himself. I was not surprised that most of the local gentry didn't want war and would not support either side. They might have feelings of sympathy with a particular side, but not enough to send their sons to war. Except? Helen Anstruther, Sir George's daughter whom I had considered as a possible fiancée when I had time for courtship, was a strong supporter of the Parliamentarians, as were her wider family mainly based in London and Newark. Helen had been looking after her aged grandmother until the grandmother died a few months ago. Helen had inherited her grandmother's mansion in the village.
I shouldn't have been surprised by Helen's views. Her father and an uncle were Members of the much-abused Parliament. She understood that I wanted to stay out of any conflict. Unlike many locally, I had been to war and had been wounded in action, I still had a limp from a musket ball that had been cut out of my leg.
If I could make my estate defensible, most of my neighbours and their workers would take refuge with me. I would need defenders. I was hoping that some of the Welsh miners would fight, but the agricultural staff from several estates, if trained, might be a considerable force.
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Four months later, with advice and direction from the Dutch military engineers, the Roman walls had been surrounded by star bastions with wide moats outside them. We had some cannon but not enough and generally only of small calibre. Heavier guns would be delivered with the week, sea conditions permitting, I had been buying and storing food for a possible siege which I hoped would never happen. But the signs were that Civil War would start within days.
I was impatient for the larger guns to be delivered and for the defenders to be better trained. Most of them could now load and fire a musket, but whether they could aim and hit anything? That I doubted. We were using a lot of gunpowder to train them but in deep cellars under my mansion and in rooms inside the Roman fort's walls I already had seven tons of gunpowder and many more tons would be delivered with the heavy guns that would come with experienced Dutch mercenary gunners. I couldn't expect to train gunners from scratch in a couple of months.
The neighbours met once a week in my house to discuss the impending crisis. I had expected Helen to go to London to be with her father and family but her father had sent her a letter asking her to stay away because she was more likely to be safe locally. She was concerned that buying cannon would make my place a target, because so many modern cannon would be useful to either side. I reassured her. Our cannon would deter any attack, and if it was likely that we would have to surrender, I would ensure our cannon were wrecked first.
The first delivery of cannon from the Netherlands were stock weapons that could be mounted on ships. I had eighteen long Sakers firing a 3.65 inches ball. They arrived before the outer defences were completed. But I had ordered the largest guns available to be cast -- Cannon Royal. The shot weighed 74 lbs, bore 8.54 inches and their range was useful. They were expensive and used a significant amount of gunpowder, but should deter any army not having equivalent guns. Cannon Royal were really too large to be moved with an army because they weighed 8,000 pounds without the carriage. With the local roads in the poor state they were, moving Cannon Royal would take dozens of horses and a very strong cart on which to mount them with block and tackle.
My mansion had been modernised and wasn't the castle it had been. The windows were too large. But we built a strong brick-backed rammed earth embankment on all four sides, rising to above the first floor. We had overlapped part of the embankment to provide a protected entrance. It meant that the principal rooms were darker even in sunlight than they should have been and the uppermost floor might be vulnerable to cannon fire if the opposing cannon could get in range. They probably couldn't because the Cannon Royal would destroy them at twice or three times the range of any moveable cannon.
The Civil War had started before our defences were completed. Even so, what we already had should deter anything short of the main army of either side, who were well away from us. Two months after the start of the war, the works had finished. The outer works meant that no one could get closer to the Roman walls than two hundred yards. Inside those walls, as lean-tos against the walls we had the tradesmen -- the blacksmiths, armourers, farrier etc. Our gunpowder stores, except the ready-use stores near each gun, were in the mansion's cellars or in specially dug underground stores. Some of the Welsh miners were digging tunnels from those cellars and stores out towards the outer bastions so that powder could be transferred without coming under fire.
Our weekly session had a long debate over what flags we should fly to show that we weren't Royalist or Parliamentarian. Up to now, my personal standard had flown but that told any approaching force nothing. I had been born on our family estates in Wales and my mother was Welsh, so after some discussion we agreed we could fly the Welsh Dragon. Because so many of our defenders were Dutch mercenaries, we added the Prince's Flag of the Netherlands, a Tricolour of orange, white and Blue. Apparently that flag might shortly be obsolete, but it was recognised.
I asked Helen, together with some of the other women, to make a Herald's Tabard, quartered with the Welsh Dragon and Prince's flag. If any force approached. We would have to speak to them. Although the College of Heralds might object, that Tabard should protect the person wearing it.
Despite Helen's obvious partiality for one side, she was beginning to see that my precautions might keep her and our neighbours safe whoever came close. I was very impressed at what Helen was doing with my housekeeper and staff. Despite the large numbers of people now within our fortifications, they were all kept housed, clothed and fed. Most of that was Helen's doing.
We now had four arrow-head bastions, each armed with two Cannon Royal and four Sakers. The harbour was defended by an outwork with the last two Cannon Royal and originally two Sakers, but we had added four small guns as well. Inside the harbour defences was the sluice-gate that controlled the level of water in the moats around our bastions. If an army approached, the local cattle could be grazed between the outer defences and the Roman walls. People not defending the walls would be inside the Roman walls or in the mansion.
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