Note 6 — Chapter VI · CROMWELL'S NEW LIEUTENANT

Monk's biographers give him the credit of originating the whole movement, but in the face of Cromwell's despatch that is hardly possible. Heath (Chron. p. 274) is probably right when he says that "at the general's request he did draw and design the whole fight and embattle the army," but he cannot be trusted in assigning the whole credit of the victory to Monk. Hodgson, of course, attributes everything to Lambert, and states that at the end of the Council one stepped up and asked that he (Lambert) might have the conduct of the army that day—an assertion which is only credible on the supposition that Cromwell had previously taken the conduct out of his major-general's hands. In view of Monk's recent feat at Haddington this is not unlikely, and Lambert may well have been given the post of honour at the head of the attack to reconcile him to the slight.