To the extent possible under law, the Text Creation Partnership has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this keyboarded and encoded edition of the work described above, according to the terms of the CC0 1.0 Public Domain Dedication (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/). This waiver does not extend to any page images or other supplementary files associated with this work, which may be protected by copyright or other license restrictions. Please go to http://www.textcreationpartnership.org/ for more information.
NExt unto the Prince Elector Pala∣tine and his Sister is the illustrious Prince Rupert, Duke of Bavaria and Cumberland, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Earl of Holderness, and Knight of the most noble Order of the Garter, born at Prague on the seventeenth of December 1619, not long before that very unfor∣tunate Battel, there fought, whereby not only all Bohemia was lost, but the Palatine Family was, for almost thir∣ty years, outed of all their possessions in
Germany, till that in the year 1648 by the Famous Treaty at Munster Charles Lodowick, eldest Brother to this Prince, had the Lower Palatinate restored to him, for which he was constrained to quit all his right to the Ʋpper Palati∣nate, and to accept of an eighth Elect∣orship, at a juncture of time, when his Uncle Charles the Ist. King of Great Britain (had he not been embroiled at home by an horrid Rebellion) had been the most considerable of all other at this Treaty, and the Prince Elector, his Nephew, would have had the grea∣test advantages there.
Prince Rupert, at the age of thirteen years, marched with the then Prince of Orange to the Siege of Rhineberg.
At the Age of eighteen he com∣manded a Regiment of Horse in the German Wars, and being at the Bat∣tel of Lemgou in the year 1638 taken by the Imperialists under the command of Count Hatzfield, he continued a Priso∣ner above three years.
About the beginning of September 1642 he came into England with his Brother Prince Maurice, to offer his ser∣vice to the King his Uncle against a factious Party of the two Houses, then
rebelling against him, and being within a fortnight after his arrival put in com∣mand over a small Party of those For∣ces, which the King had at that time gathered together, marched with them into divers parts of Warwickshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Worces∣tershire, and Cheshire, his Forces still increasing as he marched.
Being about the middle of October following made General of the Horse to the King, he soon after fought and defeated Colonel Sandys neer Worces∣ter; on the three and twentieth of the same moneth routed the Rebels Horse at Edg-Hill; and on the second of February following took Cirencester, and therein eleven hundred Prisoners and three thousand Arms.
On the fourteenth of April 1643. he recovered Litchfield, taken the March before by the Rebels; on the eigh∣teenth of June he routed Sheffield and Hambden in Chalgrove-Field, being the very place, where Hambden, who soon after died of his wounds there recei∣ved, first executed the Parliaments Com∣mission for the Militia against the Kings Authority; on the twenty se∣venth of July he took the City of Bris∣tol;
he was on the twenty-fourth of January following created Earl of Holdernesse and Duke of Cumberland, the Male-Line of the Cliffords being extinct in Henry the Last Earl; and on the two and twentieth of March he raised the siege at Newark, having got a compleat victory over Sr. John Meldrum, who lay before it with eight thousand men.
On the twenty-seventh of May 1644 he forced Rigby, commander for the Rebels, to depart from before Latham House, wherein that magna∣nimous and incomparable Lady Char∣lotte, Countess of Derby, had been eigh∣teen weeks closely besieged, and the next day stormed and took the town of Bolton; on the third of July having relieved York, wherein the then Mar∣quess, afterwards Duke of Newcastle, had been nine weeks besieged by three Armies, under the command of Man∣chester, Fairfax, and Lesley, he fought the great Battel of Marston-Moor, wherein though at first he had much the better, yet by a wonderful and un∣expected Fatality, the fortune of the day turned, and the Rebels obtained the victory.
On the twenty-second of April 1645 he defeated Massey at Lidbury; on the seventh of May, fetcht off the King from Oxford, which Fairfax was a∣bout to besiege; and on the one and thirtieth of the same moneth took Lei∣cester by assault.
In the year 1646, the Forces of the King his Uncle at Land being totally defeated, he transported himself after the surrendry of Oxford into France, and was afterwards made Admiral of such Ships of War, as submitted to His present Sacred Majesty, then Prince of Wales, to whom after di∣vers disasters at Sea, and wonderful preservations, having been blockt up the most part of one Summer in the Port of Kingsa••e by Popham, and ano∣ther in ••hat of Lisbon by Blake, and having l•…•… his Brother the valiant Prince Mau•…•… about the Caribbe Islands by an Hurricane, he returned to Paris, in the latter end of the year 1652, where now almost the whole Royal Family of Great Britain were met together.
Departing thence with his Majesty in the year 1654, he went into Germany, where partly at the Imperial Court of Vienna, and partly at Heidelbergh, the
chief Seat of his Brother the Prince E∣lector Palatine, he passed his time in Princely Studies and Exercises till his Majesties happy Restauration: after which returning into England, he was in the year 1662 made a privy Coun∣cellor, and in 1666, being joyned Admi∣ral with the late Duke of Albemarl, first attackt the whole Dutch Squadron in so bold and resolute a manner, that he soon put them to flight.
He enjoys a pension from his Ma∣jestie of four thousand pounds Sterling per Annum, and the Constableship of Windsor Castle.