Note 31 — THE GRENVILLES OF STOW,

A writer in 'Notes and Queries' says that Sir Bevill did not die on the spot, but that he expired next day at Cold Aston (Ashton) Parsonage, some four or five miles to the north of the battle-field.

Green, in his 'History of the English People,' thus refers to the event:

'Nowhere was the Royal cause to take so brave or noble a form as among the Cornishmen. Cornwall stood apart from the general life of England: cut off from it not only by differences of blood and speech, but by the feudal tendencies of its people, who clung with a Celtic loyalty to their local chieftains, and suffered their fidelity to the Crown to determine their own. They had as yet done little more than keep the war out of their own county; but the march of a small Parliamentary force under Lord Stamford upon Launceston, forced them into action. A little brave band of Cornishmen gathered around the chivalrous Sir Bevil Greenvil, "so destitute of provisions that the best officers had but a biscuit a day," and with only a handful of powder for the whole force; but, starving and out-numbered as they were, they scaled the steep rise of Stratton Hill, sword in hand, and drove Stamford back to Exeter, with a loss of two thousand men, his ordnance and baggage train. Sir Ralph Hopton, the best of the Royalist generals, took the command of their army as it advanced into Somerset, and drew the stress of the war into the west. Essex despatched a picked force under Sir William Waller to check their advance; but Somerset was already lost ere he reached Bath, and the Cornishmen stormed his strong position on Lansdowne Hill in the teeth of his guns.'