BIRCH, John (1615-91), of Bristol, Westminster and Whitbourne, Herefs.

John Birch was born into a godly family of lesser gentry in Manchester, who had been settled on the Lancashire/Cheshire borders for hundreds of years. His father was ‘Captain’ Samuel Birch, a third son, and the title of captain indicates either middling military rank or perhaps the command of a ship. In either sense, it is clear that Samuel Birch had no independent wealth, but what distinguished him from his neighbours was his Protestant zeal. In the 1660s he was still living, by then a Presbyterian.30Heath-Agnew, Roundhead to Royalist, 1; Diary of Rev. Henry Newcome, ed. T. Hayward (Chetham Soc. xviii), 203-4. Because of his relatively obscure origins and his later talent for intruding himself, John Birch was the subject of various stories about his youth, all of which emphasised that he was of ignoble birth. These included the tales that he was a mere carrier, that he retained to the end of his days a ‘clownishness’, that he enlisted as a trooper in a parliamentary army because he was very tall, and that he took the side of Parliament after being held up with his packhorse by some royalists.31Newcome Diary, 204; Townsend, Hist. Leominster, 109; Oxford DNB. What is certain is that he was indeed a carrier, if by that is meant a trader in goods. By 1634 he was established with his brother Samuel, who later served in his regiment, as a merchant on the Severn, trading in ‘Manchester ware’ between Shrewsbury and Bristol. The Birch brothers used at least three Severn trows (shallow-draughted boats), carrying on some occasions as many as 30 packs or bales of Manchester cottons, the rough wool cloth made from unprocessed fleeces.32E190/1248/8/2/10, 1248/8/4/5, 1248/10/4/14; Military Memoir, p. ix. It was this long-distance trade between Manchester and Bristol that established Birch as a merchant of some standing by 1637, when he was still only in his early twenties, and endowed him with sufficient prospects to commend him to the widow of a Bristol grocer.33Bristol RO, Great Orphan Bk. 2, f. 44v. Marriage with Alice Selfe bestowed on Birch freeman status in Bristol.34Bristol RO, 04359/2, f. 288v. It also gave him a continuing interest in the city that partly focused on securing the money for his step-children held in trust by the Bristol corporation, and partly involved his own purchases of property in the parish where he was married.35Bristol RO, 04026/23, pp. 29, 155, 214, 217; 04264/4, p. 150; 09457 (3); Herefs. RO, F78/II/442.

Military career, 1642-6

Birch traded the length of the Avon and Severn between Bristol and Shrewsbury, and when civil war broke out he found a wine shipment of his seized at Shrewsbury by the royalist governor. He was in January 1643 regarded there as a parliamentarian, and he pleaded that he had not ‘taken up arms against the king, which God forbid and I presume you are misinformed in that’.36W. Phillips, ‘The Ottley Pprs.’, Trans. Salop Arch. Soc. ser. 2, vi. 63. He appeared in Shrewsbury to defend himself, pleading his love of ‘free trade’ but open about his allegiances in Bristol with the parliamentarians. He probably escaped incarceration in Shrewsbury only because of his previous business connections with some of the royalist Shropshire grandees.37Phillips, ‘Ottley Pprs.’, 66-7. By the time of his appearance in Shrewsbury in January 1643, Birch had in fact proved himself as a parliamentarian activist in Bristol. He was an associate of Richard Aldworth*, mayor there in 1642-3, and was captain of a militia company charged with defending Bristol bridge. In August 1642 he was challenged in his attempts to deliver ordnance to the Parliamentarians trying to besiege Sherborne castle in Dorset, and in February 1643 he was involved in a heated dispute with Thomas Essex, the high-handed parliamentarian colonel who nearly alienated the city against his cause. Birch had lent Essex £1,050 in December 1642 for military purposes, but was arrested for challenging the colonel’s authority. Such an energetic partisan was bound to be quickly released, and he was one of a group who exposed a plot to betray the city to the royalists. In March he was on Bristol bridge, defending the city for Parliament against Prince Rupert. Essex’s detention of Birch outraged Nathaniel Fiennes I*, who described the Lancashire man to his father, William Fiennes, 1st Viscount Saye and Sele, as ‘the most active man in the town for Parliament’.38Bodl. Nalson XIII, f. 199; More Full Declaration, 3; Military Memoir, pp. ix-x, 2; CJ v. 211b; Heath-Agnew, Royalist to Roundhead, 7-8. Bristol surrendered to Rupert in circumstances felt by many in Parliament to be ignominious (26 July 1643), and Birch must have left soon afterwards for London, having given instructions to safeguard his Severn trow. His energetic confiscation of goods in the Bristol region was taken amiss by some in the House, and he had to account for himself before the Members (10 Oct.) before he receiving a diplomatically worded commendation. Nevertheless, his authority to seize property was withdrawn.39CJ iii. 271a, 272a, 272b, 280a. He then took a commission under Sir Arthur Hesilrige* in the army of Sir William Waller*. He saw action at Farnham and Arundel, where he was shot in the stomach (17 Dec.).40Military Memoir, 3-8; Heath-Agnew, Roundhead to Royalist, 8, 14. Birch had recuperated by March 1644, and fought at Cropredy Bridge (29 June), where his advice on tactics was ignored.

At Abingdon, a year to the day after he had taken his commission under Hesilrige, Birch left that regiment to command a Kentish one, raised in the south west of that county, as colonel.41Military Memoir, 13-4; Everitt, Community of Kent, 163, where Samuel and John Birch are confused. The precise reasons for Birch’s parting company with Hesilrige are unclear, but his ability – rather than any quarrel – is sufficient to account for his promotion, even if he never betrayed any particular affection for the Independents. Still under Waller’s command, Birch was sent by sea to Plymouth, where he defended the town against threats from the king’s army.42Military Memoir, 13-14; CSP Dom. 1644, pp. 502, 516, 522, 526, 534; 1644-5, pp. 7, 37, 251; Heath-Agnew, Roundhead to Royalist, 34. He returned to London in October 1644, by his own account to lobby for more resources for his regiment, but certainly also to press his own personal claims for compensation. On the way, Birch demonstrated his capacity for audacious military strikes in a skirmish near Newbury (30 Oct. 1644) when he captured over 50 prisoners.43Military Memoir, 16; CJ iii. 666a. Never formally incorporated into the New Model army, Birch was posted to Bridgwater as governor for two weeks, then to Bath and finally to the rendezvous outside Bristol under Fairfax. He was in favour of storming the city, and took charge of the regiment of Philip Skippon* when its commander was rendered hors de combat by his wounds.44Military Memoir, 21-2; CSP Dom. 1645-7, p. 38; Perfect Diurnall no. 104 (21-28 July 1645), 829 (E.262.33); Sprigge, Anglia Rediviva, 77. After the fall of Bristol (10 Sept. 1645) – an event in which Birch was singled out for mention by Oliver Cromwell* in his letter to the Speaker - and faced with the prospect of a posting as military governor of both Bath and Bristol, Birch preferred to return to London to seek a more active command. Early in December, a plan to attack Hereford was being devised by the Committee of Both Kingdoms, in which Birch was to play a prominent role, but subordinate to the governor of Gloucester, Colonel Morgan, helped by Thomas Hodges I*.45Abbott, Writings and Speeches, i. 375, 376; CSP Dom. 1645-7, pp. 298-9; Military Memoir, 23; Sprigge, Anglia Rediviva, 105, 116.

At Hereford, Birch once again proved his genius for surprise tactics. He overwhelmed the royalist garrison, sending the occupants fleeing across the ice of the frozen Wye (24 Dec. 1645). Among those surrendering were John Scudamore†, Viscount Scudamore [I] and his son, James Scudamore*.46Military Memoir, 27-31; A New Tricke to take Townes (1646); Brereton Letter Bks. ii. 455. Birch occupied Hereford as governor and strengthened the garrison so that it could be used as a base for an assault on nearby royalist strongholds.47Military Memoir, 31; J. Vicars, Magnalia Dei Anglicana (1646), 329-36 (E.348.1); LJ viii. 53a, 370b. His military career in the field culminated at the battle of Stow-on-the-Wold (21 Mar. 1646) and the taking some months afterwards of Goodrich castle.48Military Memoir, 35; CSP Dom. 1645-7, pp. 315, 323, 333, 344, 361, 368, 390, 393, 408, 412; Sprigge, Anglia Rediviva, 240. As he settled down as governor of Hereford, the main feature of Birch’s incumbency there was the antipathy that developed between him and the county committee. In December 1645, Birch and Edward Harley* had corresponded amicably enough over an exchange of troops between Hereford and Canon Frome garrison, and in January 1646, Birch’s complaints to Sir Robert Harley* about ‘extremely disaffected’ Hereford were quickly rewarded with a grant to him of authority to impose martial law there.49Add. 70005, f. 71 (2nd. foliation), f. 2 (3rd foliation); Add. 70108, misc. 41. The following month, Birch was trying to patch up what he represented as a misunderstanding that had developed between them, perhaps successfully, as in May, Sir Robert sought Birch’s recall from Shropshire, pleading that Herefordshire suffered by his absence.50CSP Dom. 1645-7, pp. 431, 433; HMC Portland, i. 142.

Early in June, however, John Flackett*, a stalwart of the Herefordshire committee, wrote bitterly to Edward Harley of Birch’s personal ambitions. Birch had discovered that Sir Robert had been active in the Commons against him, and indeed Harley had drafted complaints of Birch’s conduct that dwelt on the exactions of the military. Birch had written to Flackett to try and enlist the local committee’s support, but it is clear that the Herefordshire men stood with Harley in denouncing the outsider. Flackett’s dislike of Birch sprang from his sense that the Hereford governor was busy feathering his own nest, mouthed religious cant but was not committed to reformation, and perhaps most significantly, harboured electoral ambitions, trying to build up a party of his own. For Flackett, Birch’s request for committee support rang a warning bell:

We know not whether this pretence might not be a design to usher us into that whereof we might afterwards find the inconvenience, especially considering the time of its production, when he is making his party strong for election of such members for the Parliament (both for this city and county) as shall be most likely to promote his ends.51Add. 70058, loose: Flackett to Edward Harley, 6 June 1646.

Birch certainly was beginning to establish himself as a proprietor in the region, buying land from the royalist delinquent Somerset Fox in July. As for his interest in acquiring a parliamentary seat, the times were propitious, as a round of ‘recruiter’ elections was taking place. Edward Massie* wrote to Edward Harley on 8 August, expressing a hope that writs for the shire and the city of Hereford would soon be moved.52Add. 70109 misc. 63; Add. 70061, loose: Birch to Sir Robert Harley, 4 June 1646; Add. 70058, loose: Flackett to Edward Harley, 6 June 1646; Brampton Bryan, Harley Pprs. bdle. 5; CJ v. 150a; HMC 6th Rep. 172.; Add. 70005, f. 42 (3rd foliation). By the end of July, Birch had started a campaign to get himself elected, apparently with the support of the radical treasurer of the county committee, Miles Hill.53Webb, Memorials, ii. 417-18. As the dates for elections in Herefordshire drew nearer, the committee’s complaints to Parliament at the burden of the soldiery grew louder and more bitter, and incorporated an ad hominem attack on one of Birch’s officers who, they alleged, had cited the troops in the garrison to near mutiny.54Add. 70005, ff. 46, 49, 52 (3rd foliation). The committee probably had little difficulty in persuading the grand inquest of the county to join it in these jeremiads (6 Oct.), and adding to it a plea that the elections should be postponed until the soldiers had gone: an obvious swipe at the governor.55Add. 70005, f. 57 (3rd foliation).

An exasperated Birch struck back by employing his powers of court martial to imprison Isaac Bromwich, a committeeman whose own erratic behaviour had been complained of the previous year by an ally of Edward Harley’s. ‘I had little dreamt it had been so dangerous a thing to oppose Colonel Birch in being knight of this shire’, complained Bromwich, hoping Sir Robert Harley would be able to rescue him from what in theory could have been the death penalty under the military code. Bromwich openly supported Edward Harley for the place of knight of the shire, and attributed his treatment at Birch’s hands entirely to his choice of candidate. 56Add. 70105, loose: Bromwich to Harley, 16 Oct., 20 Oct. 1646; Add. 16178, f. 110. Sir Robert Harley drafted articles against Birch, citing what he claimed was his arbitrary arrest of the committeeman, but the Bromwich affair postponed the election for a month, helping the Harleys.57Add. 70107, misc. 12. Birch’s hopes to be returned for the county were dashed, but probably a compromise was worked out by which he was allowed to take the Leominster seat, while Edward Harley joined his father in the House as knight. The county election took place on 14 November at Leominster, and the choice of Member for the borough was reportedly made the same day.58Perfect Occurrences no. 47 (13-20 Nov. 1646), sig. Yy3 (E.362.23). A note among Birch’s own papers recorded that his service as Hereford governor ended on 17 November, and a contemporary commentator noted that he left the county on the 18th.59Add. 70005, ff. 70-4 (3rd foliation), f. 36 (4th foliation); Herefs. RO, 057/1.

Presbyterian MP, 1646-8

Birch took the Covenant in the House on 9 December 1646. His first committee was one dominated by the Independents and the military interest, on the sensitive topic - both nationally and in his constituency - of arrears of pay for soldiers. He took the chair at this body, to which his comrade-in-arms at the assault on Bristol, Oliver Cromwell, was named second. The plight of the soldiers occupied much of Birch’s thinking in the first few months of his service at Westminster. On Christmas day, the petitions of the reformadoes, including those of the soldiers of Edward Massie, were referred to his committee.60CJ v. 7b, 9b, 10a, 28a. His own problems in Hereford were inextricably linked with these concerns. The opposition he had encountered from the county committee did not fade away when he left for Westminster. In January 1647 there was an acerbic exchange of correspondence between Sir Robert Harley, Birch and the committee covering the usual subject of the military presence, but with the resentful perception on the committee’s part that an ordinance that Birch was attributing to his own initiative was in fact the work of others.61Add. 70005, ff. 1, 3, 9 (4th foliation); HMC Portland, i. 148. Characteristically, en revanche, Birch’s allies showed their contempt for due process; in February, Samuel Birch sprang the radical Miles Hill out of the sheriff’s gaol, where he was lodged on an action for debt.62Add. 70005, f. 24 (4th foliation).

There were in fact two ordinances being perfected by Birch in the early months of 1647: one to parcel out the estate of a leading Herefordshire royalist, the other a settlement of the county’s military establishment that was achieved in March.63CJ v. 118a, 120b, 121a. By the terms of an ordinance which passed the Commons on 29 March, Birch was to take a regiment of 1,000 soldiers and officers to Ireland, a new governor was appointed for Hereford, and the arrangements were to be supervised by the county committee. The money was to come from the Committee for Compounding and the excise. Sir Robert Harley made notes of the terms, but it was Birch’s ordinance.64CJ v. 126a, 128b; Add. 70062, loose: notes by Sir Robert Harley, 23 Mar. 1647. Far from being satisfied, the county committee complained to Harley about the ‘heathenish soldiers designed for the bogs in Ireland’.65Add. 70005, f. 39 (4th foliation). In April, Edward Harley was still complaining about the high-handedness of Birch and his brother, but by the summer the mustering of the soldiers was going ahead, and the Hereford garrison was in the care of Colonel Samuel More*.66Add. 70061, loose pprs., bdles. 1, 2; CJ v. 139b, 151a, 176b, 188b.

While the fruits of Birch’s efforts in Parliament were being harvested in Herefordshire, his career in Westminster continued to develop. He had been added to the influential committee of privileges (16 Dec. 1646), and sat on committees concerned with unapproved publications that had come to the attention of the House.67CJ v. 11a, 47a, These included Thomas May’s History of the Parliament of England. Birch was a teller against the motion that in effect May should be given a monopoly of printing his book (14 May 1647). His partner teller was the Kentish Independent, Sir Michael Livesay, suggesting that Birch was now finding the company of Independents more congenial than that of his enemies the Harleys.68CJ v. 175a. From the spring of 1647 dates his appointment to the important Committee for Indemnity – he had been involved in the drafting of the ordinance for it – in which his demonstrable interest in the fate of soldiers in the provinces would have been harnessed.69CJ v. 166a, 174a.

In the spring and summer of 1647, Birch was busy in the House, both as draftsman and manager of business between the Houses. He took the ordinance for taking the accounts of the kingdom to the Lords, having been involved in drafting amendments about soldiers’ accounts (25 May), and on the 28th of the same month took no fewer than nine ordinances to the Lords, on military topics mostly relating to local forces and disbanding regiments. He seems to have specialised in promoting the interests of the non-New Model soldiery.70CJ v. 183a, 187a, 191a, b. This commitment to his own politically isolated men in Herefordshire, and doubtless his eye to building up his interest there, probably account for his swinging into line with the Presbyterians and his moving away from the Independents. There were limits to how far he could be motivated by his problems with the Harleys. In June he joined a group of Presbyterian MPs including Edward Massie in meeting soldiers to tell them how £10,000 had been voted for them, and signed the letter to Fairfax asking him not to bring the new Model any closer to the capital. He was named to the committee that was formed to set up a London militia to defend the City (11 June), and was given charge of the important declaration of the House’s good opinion of the army.71CJ v. 201a, 207b, 209b. He took the lead on an ordinance to allocate £5,000 to the soldiers (14 June), an attempt to assuage anger in the army, as well as drafting other ordinances aimed at addressing the grievances of the officers.72CJ v. 210b, 211b, 212a.

Progress on his plan to take a regiment from Herefordshire to Ireland had been slow, but in June it was still mooted as a serious scheme. It did not win the approval of Lord General Fairfax, however, who must have instructed Thomas Rainborowe* to stay Birch on his journey from London to Hereford, at St Albans. Birch’s movements were suspected as a cover for a Presbyterian force to counter the New Model.73Military Memoir, 235. It was ordered explicitly by the House that Birch had permission to go to Ireland (28 June), and by 15 July he was writing from Hereford on the discontent he was encountering among the soldiers.74CJ v. 220b, 221b, 225b, 230a, b, 250a, 252a. Sir Robert Harley, enduring an uncomfortable summer in London as an enemy of the New Model, supported Birch, who missed the forcing of the Houses by the Presbyterian-controlled crowd and the flight of Independent MPs to the army. Birch was away from Westminster between 23 June and 11 August. As far as propagandists for the New Model were concerned, Birch and the Harleys were in league, the running disputes involving the committee notwithstanding. Birch was identified as a Manchester ware seller who had married the Bristol widow to make good - a simplistic but not entirely inaccurate biography of him – and was now profiteering from ‘dead pays’ for his regiment. This version of Birch’s personal history made much of his sale of Hereford castle: to the Harleys and the other MPs for the Herefordshire boroughs, at over four times what he had paid for it.75Clarke Pprs. ii. 158-9. At the end of September the Independent peer Philip Wharton, 4th Baron Wharton was reporting that Birch’s regiment would not go to Ireland without a month’s pay.76HMC 6th Rep. 198.

In October 1647, Birch was named to the Committee for Plundered Ministers, a challenge to John Flackett’s intimation to Harley that Birch was not genuinely interested in godly reform.77CJ v. 326b. Birch became involved in extensive but futile fine tuning of the Newcastle Propositions to the king, reporting on religious aspects and demonstrating that his sympathies were entirely with the Presbyterians.78CJ v. 327b, 332a, 336a, 339a, 340a, 351b, 359a. For the remainder of the year he pursued his perennial interests of settling the arrears and conditions of the army.79CJ v. 356a, 377b, 396a, 397b, 400a, 414b. In January 1648, probably because of his recent experience of drafting and reporting on the negotiations with the king, Birch was chosen with William Ashhurst* and Robert Goodwin* as a commissioner to the Scottish Parliament. Their aims were to turn away support for the Hamiltonian Scots, who had concluded the Engagement with the king to invade England and establish Presbyterianism there. The English commissioners courted the faction of Archibald Campbell*, marquess of Argyll. Birch reported from Edinburgh to Sir Robert Harley, in terms that make it clear that the two were by this time reconciled, on the two groups, the Protesters of Argyll and the Hamiltonian Engagers:

Two violent parties, the ministry and about 60 Lords and Commons desperately opposing a war and publicly protest again it and cursed them in pulpits that would carry it on. The other party as desperate for an army, and both at that height that you would believe it would break out every day; but on the whole matter I think no force will be raised here that’s considerable so long as they are so divided, which is like to continue especially if the hands of the ministers were strengthened by doing somewhat against heresy.80Add. 70005, f. 62 (4th foliation); CJ v. 442b, 447a, b, 462b, 470a.

Birch evidently felt that there were limits as to how far the English commissioners could support ‘the good party’ (the Protesters): ‘I wish it were well weighed by others’.81Add. 70005, f. 62 (4th foliation). In Scotland, Birch showed himself to be a realistic observer, but the commissioners were said to be taking detailed orders from Lord Saye, William Pierrepont*, Oliver St John* and others in London.82Underdown, Pride’s Purge, 89. The commissioners stayed in Scotland until May, when not even their report to the Scots of the taking of Berwick and Carlisle by northern English royalists was enough to stave off the recruitment of the covenanted Scots army.83CJ v. 554b, 556b, 670a.

Birch was back in the Commons on 21 August, when he was named to various committees dealing with the culprits in the second civil war.84CJ v. 676a, 689a, 692a. He returned to his former interests in financing local forces under parliamentary control, and supported a hare-brained move to allow Charles to go to Scotland now that the Engagers had been crushed. He was named to a committee to draft terms of safe conduct for Scots commissioners to the king on the Isle of Wight, and inevitably favoured the Newport Treaty.85CJ v. 678a, 697b; vi. 18b, 19b, 26a, b, 29b. He was charged with reporting to the parliamentary commissioners that the king’s response on religion was unsatisfactory (26 Oct.) and with Sir Robert Harley was involved in attempts to make the Covenant palatable to Charles.86CJ vi. 58a, 62a, b, 63a, 75b, 82a. Birch was bound to be viewed as hostile to the New Model. He was on a committee to reduce the size of the army (21 Oct.) and another reviewing the number and size of garrisons.87CJ vi. 78a, 87a. He supported moves for a London force, ostensibly to defend the Houses, but in practice to safeguard the capital against a further military coup by the army as had been seen in 1647.88CJ vi. 69b. He was one of the committee that made a last ditch attempt to avoid a showdown between Parliament and army on 5 December, but he was bound to be secluded in the purge the following day. He managed to get into the chamber, but was pulled out, shouting to those who sat inside ‘whether they would suffer their Members to be pulled out thus violently before their faces, and yet sat still?’89CJ vi. 93b; Kingdom’s Weekly Intelligencer no. 289 (5-12 Dec. 1648), 1178 (E.476.9); Parliament under the Power of the Sword (1648, 669.f.13.52); Underdown, Pride’s Purge, 147. In his anger and discomfort, Birch found himself in the same boat as his former bitter enemies, Sir Robert and Edward Harley. His treatment by the army was worse than that meted to them, however, and was doubtless occasioned by his temper, energy and determination. He was still imprisoned on 20 December along with other diehard Presbyterians, and was released apparently in January.90Underdown, Pride’s Purge, 168 n. 71, 195; Autobiography of Henry Newcome (2 vols., Chetham Soc. xxvi, xxvii), ii. 199.

Commonwealth and protectorate, 1649-59

In the months before the purge, Birch had been favoured by Parliament with regard to his arrears of pay as an army officer. Despite the fact that his regiment never did sail for Ireland, he was still awarded £750 of arrears (13 Oct. 1648) and a further grant of £800 from a sequestered estate in Monmouthshire. The post of high steward of Leominster, formerly held by Sir Walter Pye*, was awarded by the town to Birch, and the grant confirmed in Parliament.91CJ vi. 55b-56a, 84a. Such was his grip on local sources of wealth that his seclusion from the Commons at Pride’s Purge proved no barrier to his steady rise as a Herefordshire landed proprietor. The Rump did not repudiate its debt of £800 to him, despite his seclusion. Birch had bought royalist lands as early as 1646, earning the opprobrium of the local committee for doing so, and speculated heavily in church properties during the interregnum. He lived at the bishop’s manor of Whitbourne, and was better favoured by the new governor of Hereford, Wroth Rogers*, than the Harleys, keeping his place on assessment commissions through the 1650s. This was odd, given his support for Charles Stuart during the 1651 campaign and his arrest and brief sequestration that followed.92CJ vi. 191a, b, 192a; A. and O.; CCC 2578; CSP Dom. 1651, p. 467. As Edmund Ludlowe II* put it, Birch was ‘a nimble gentleman, and one who used to neglect no opportunity of providing for himself’.93Ludlow, Mems. i. 393.

There was no place for a Presbyterian of Birch’s stamp in the Nominated Assembly of 1653, but he retained and doubtless built up his interest as Leominster’s high steward: the town had always been sceptical of religious radicals, and there was something of the politique about Birch that may have commended him to the townsmen. He was elected on 8 July 1654 to the first protectorate Parliament, as Leominster’s only burgess under the terms of the Instrument of Government.94C219/44/1. He was voted on to the important committee of privileges (5 Sept.), but was unhelpful to the government in this assembly, instead siding with his old associates in the Presbyterian interest. Thomas Gewen* listed Birch among the ‘eminent and conscientious men’ of the Presbyterian party who had taken their seats rather than refuse to engage with this Parliament.95Archaeologia, xxiv. 140. Birch was also willing to work with republicans when it was expedient, and on 7 September, he was a teller with the Rumper, John Bradshawe, for a successful motion to refer the settlement of the government to a committee. Two months later, on 9 November, he opposed the Cromwellians Lord Broghill (Roger Boyle) and John Disbrowe who sought to adjourn a debate on the form of government. In similar vein, he sought to limit the lord protector’s delaying powers over bills, telling for a motion on this subject which passed the House 109 votes to 85 (10 Nov.), a few days later against another which sought a parliamentary endorsement for the protector’s veto, and in December and January he was involved in attempts to increase Parliament’s powers in relation to the army and even to the lord protector.96CJ vii. 366b, 367a, 384a, 403a, 408a, 413b. Between November 1654 and the end of the session in January 1655, Birch was a teller in 12 divisions on the Government Bill proposed by opponents of the regime as a replacement to the Instrument of Government. It is significant that his opposing tellers included staunch supporters of the protectorate as Lord Broghill, Sir Charles Wolseley and John Disbrowe, and that he was partnered as teller by prominent Presbyterians, including Sir Richard Onslow, John Bulkeley and Francis Rous. The series of divisions culminated in one on whether the militia should be raised only with the consent of the people (16 Jan. 1655). His side, in favour of popular sovereignty, won decisively, with 109 votes to 82.97CJ vii. 385a, 388a, 390a, 395b, 403a, 408a, 413b, 414a, 418a, b; Burton’s Diary, i. p. cxxxiii.

Despite his open opposition to the protectorate, according to Birch’s own testimony, at some point in the opening months of this Parliament he was asked to advise Oliver Cromwell on reducing garrisons. Ironically enough, the lord protector was drawing upon that aspect of Birch’s experience that had made him so distasteful to the New Modellers and Independents in 1648.98Burton’s Diary, iv. 383. Birch chaired a committee that reported to the House on retrenchment of the military (15 Nov. 1654), and was doubtless in charge of the sub-committee that briefed Cromwell. Related to this interest was his service on committees receiving the public accounts and on purveyance, but in the last month of the Parliament he was second-named, not first, to a fresh committee on army finance, perhaps reflecting his political differences with the government.99CJ vii. 385b, 387b, 407b, 419a. His mercantile background recommended Birch to committees with a focus on trade, among them bodies on the import and export of grain, dairy products and whale oil, and on the merchants of the Hanseatic League.100CJ vii. 374b, 375b, 395a. On 12 December he chaired a committee on listing heresies, appropriately for one of his moderate Presbyterian leanings, which arose from one of the interminable reports on the constitution. Soon afterwards he was named to another on the emerging Quaker movement, which was more investigative than openly censorious.101CJ vii. 399b; Burton’s Diary, i. cxxvii. Occasionally, he is difficult to distinguish from Colonel Thomas Birche*: one of them was on the committee for reviewing the legislation of the Nominated Assembly (10 Oct. 1654).102CJ vii. 375b.

Cromwell’s relatively tolerant attitude towards Birch was not shared by his officials in the Welsh marches. Returning to Herefordshire after the closure of this assembly, Birch found himself at odds with Wroth Rogers* during the emergency of 1655. As military governor of Hereford and a leading commissioner under Major-general James Berry*, Rogers interviewed Birch on his intentions, eliciting the response that ‘Though my sword be short now, it may be long enough within a while’.103TSP iv. 437; Military Memoir, 157; CSP Dom. 1655, pp. 90, 93, 136. Rogers kept him in Hereford gaol as a precaution. Birch many years later declared that he had been imprisoned no fewer than 21 times, but Berry had apparently relented by November 1655, when he put Birch under house arrest away from the 22 royalists actually rounded up.104Military Memoir, 157; Bodl. Rawl. A.34, p. 901. Berry’s assessment of Birch was shrewd.

It is true the man is popular in these parts and he loves to be so. He is taken for a great wit and guilty of some honesty and upon that account able to do hurt, if he have a mind to it.105Military Memoir, 157.

Birch was returned again to the second Protectorate Parliament, but was not admitted, the protectoral council naturally being wary of those who wished the government ill, whether royalists, republicans or old Presbyterians like Birch.106Little and Smith, Cromwellian Protectorate, 303. He signed a protest against his exclusion with his former commanding officer, Hesilrige.107CJ vii. 425b; TSP v. 453. The ‘Colonel Birch’ who was in the House for the short session in January 1658 was probably his near namesake, Thomas Birche, who sat for Liverpool, to judge from his interventions on Lancashire topics.108Burton’s Diary, ii. 332; CJ vii. 580b, 589a. Birch encountered no difficulty in being returned to Richard Cromwell’s* Parliament, and was a very vocal Member. Contemporaries agreed that Birch, like many old Presbyterians, had changed his political position from opposition to support of the protectorate. The Scottish agent James Sharp listed him with John Swynfen*, Richard Knightley*, Lambarde Godfrey* and Thomas Bampfylde*, as ‘chief’ among those who, ‘to avoid the hazard of casting matters into the hands of the republican party, or of being brought under the Cavalier power, do sway to the protector’s party’.109Stephen, Consultations, ii. 156. Jerome Sankey* agreed, portraying Birch, John Trevor*, Swynfen and ‘many lawyers and a great many others’ as supporters of the protector as long as his powers were balanced by those of Parliament.110Henry Cromwell Corresp. 450. A royalist observer even reported that Birch and John Maynard* were among the leaders of ‘the court party’.111Bodl. Clarendon 60, f. 209v. John Lambert* put it most succinctly: ‘I wonder much to see Colonel Birch so changed’.112Burton’s Diary, iv. 63.

Birch’s changed position can clearly be seen in his speeches in the House. When the bill to ‘recognise’ Richard Cromwell was debated in early February, Birch defended the protector against his old commander, Hesilrige, and told the House to believe it when ‘the protector says his interest shall be ours’.113Burton’s Diary, iii. 58. He was also surprisingly robust in his defence of the Humble Petition and Advice, which he saw as a way of blunting the power of ‘some in your army, dippers and creepers’; by re-establishing the ‘three estates’ of single person, Commons and Lords ‘we are now resorting to the old foundation’.114Burton’s Diary, iii. 138. The new House of Lords, the ‘Other House’, was central to this, as it would define the powers of the protector.115Burton’s Diary, iii. 320. On 19 February Birch described the Other House as ‘the return [answer] of the prayers of the good people’ – but thought that simply to reintroduce the hereditary peers would not address the current political problems, arguing on 28 February that its members must be approved by both Houses, so that the ‘single person’ (lord protector) could not impose its composition.116Burton’s Diary, iii. 367, 419, 547.

Birch saw the Other House, and the Humble Petition in general, as a bulwark protecting the position of the protector. In a major speech on 7 March he dismissed the Instrument of Government as ‘smoothly couched, and drawn by a cunning pencil’, to remove Parliament’s freedom, and he praised the Humble Petition for giving a greater role to the Commons and for re-establishing a House of Lords of sorts. If the latter were voted down, the people would ‘gird their swords closer about them’ – a comment that led to objections by Hesilrige and other republicans that he had spoken ‘words of force’, threatening the House. Birch recognised that Oliver Cromwell ‘could well sit in the saddle in all changes’, but saw that Richard was more precarious. Undermining the constitution would undermine the new protector, and the result of that could be the return of the House of Stuart.

If we miss this settlement that we are now under, we shall never come to it again ... I cannot see but when we have put down one single person, it is but to set up another; and the pulling down these will put it into the hands of those that will never be quiet till their bellies be full.117Burton’s Diary, iv. 60-3; W.A.H. Schilling, ‘The Parlty. Diary of Sir John Gell, 5 Feb.-21 Mar. 1659’ (Vanderbilt Univ. MA thesis, 1961), 181.

Birch’s dislike of the republicans and their allies in the army interest was obvious in this speech, and on another occasion he was doubtless glad to pay back Hesilrige when he committed a breach of privilege by calling the Speaker ‘the greatest man in England’, as if he were still in the Rump.118Burton’s Diary, iv, 348. As well as criticising the republicans, Birch took issue with those Presbyterians who questioned the Other House. On 5 March he countered Gewen’s arguments that the old House of Lords had never been legally abolished and the Humble Petition was invalid by warning the Commons that following that logic, ‘you are upon an unrighteous foundation, till you call in the old Lords’.119Burton’s Diary, iv. 23.

Birch was also a strong advocate of the rights of the Scottish and Irish Members, considered by many to be unquestioning supporters of the protectoral government. As early as 1 February he had expressed surprise that their status was in question: ‘I take it for granted they are admitted into oneness with us’, and when their rights were debated in March, he joined in with enthusiasm.120Burton’s Diary, iii. 29. On 19 March he defended Richard Cromwell’s decision to send writs to all the nations.

Being protector of England, Scotland and Ireland, would you have had him left out Scotland and Ireland? Had he then discharged his duty, being entrusted with the executive power?

Once again, to ‘question the legality thus narrowly’ would be to destroy the foundations of the protectorate, and that risked ‘setting up a ladder for others that come after to climb over our heads’ – probably a reference to Charles Stuart. For Birch, the constant questioning of the government was corrosive – ‘it had been our practice to pull down, not to build up’ – and to ‘let slip the Union’ was a dereliction of duty.

Niceties in law are fitter for Westminster Hall than here; but that which we are to look at is the interest of Jesus Christ, and of those that we represent.121Burton’s Diary, iv. 199; Schilling thesis, 249.

As this last comment suggests, Birch’s political position was influenced by the situation in Herefordshire. In early February he defended Edward Freeman*, a client of the Harleys and recorder of Leominster, in his denunciations of the Cromwellian corruption, particularly against the associates of Colonel Philip Jones*.122Burton’s Diary, iii. 140. At the end of March he was unsurprisingly hostile towards the claims of associates of Somerset Fox, the Herefordshire royalist whose lands he had acquired back in 1646.123Burton’s Diary, iv. 262, 308. In debate, Birch often claimed to represent the view from the shires more generally, telling the Commons on 7 March that ‘I never had any office nor any of my relations. I have no courtship’. This approach also characterised his attitude towards the public finances. In an important speech on 9 April, he pointed out the increased cost of the navy since 1653, and argued for a reduction in naval pay: ‘in war let them have the pay of the time of war, in peace the pay of peace’. Warming to his theme, he suggested ways of reducing salaries in other areas of public service, a remedy which probably came relatively easily to the former soldier now landed gentleman. Adopting the persona of the bluff country gentleman, he referred to the lack of ready cash ‘in the county where I live’, and said of the increasing costs of the civil list, ‘I have been employed in the country and could not understand that’.124Burton’s Diary, iv. 383-4. Birch returned to the revenue question on 13 April, this time focusing on the customs farm, which he denounced as ‘an ill bargain’, and adding disdainfully, ‘The country will be ruined if you go this way to work’.125Burton’s Diary, iv. 417. The cost of the army and the arrears owed to the soldiers was already causing unrest in the ranks, to the alarm of MPs. In the crucial debate on the army on 18 April, Birch warned that the troops must not be provoked, but he also denounced the army’s petition to Charles Fleetwood, which he saw as ‘a very ill precedent’.126Burton’s Diary, iv. 455-6. His concerns were real enough: on 22 April the senior officers were prompted to close down Parliament, and re-establish the Rump.

Restoration, 1659-60

In the turbulent months following the collapse of the protectorate, Birch was again arrested.127CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 95. But after the Secluded Members had been admitted and the re-assembled Long Parliament met to choose a council (23 Feb. 1660), they elected Birch to it.128Ludlow, Mems. ii. 239. He was added to a number of other important bodies, including several committees on securing loans from the City (22 Feb., 1 Mar.), in which Birch’s expertise on army finance was again utilised.129CJ vii. 848b, 856a, 857a, 858a. The other general area of Birch’s activity was on the militia. With Oliver St John, he was responsible for the militia bill (23 Feb.), and on 5 and 6 March announced to the House the names of the commissioners. A proviso to this bill sought to ensure that all the commissioners should subscribe to the notion that Parliament’s war with the late king had been just. Birch was on the committee to draw up this delicate formulation.130CJ vii. 860a, 862b, 865a, b, 871a. Presbyterian opinion of him was divided. Massie was deeply suspicious of him, but Edward Harley put his finger on a main, if not the main, motivation of Birch when he said that he was reliably the king’s if he could keep his church lands. These returned to the bishop and dean and chapter in 1660, but Birch was given favourable leases of some of them.131Herefs. RO, 057/10, 11. He embarked on a new round of land purchases from 1661, starting with Garnstone, bought from Thomas Tomkins*. Particularly after 1670, he bought and sold many parcels of land to strengthen his interest in Weobley.132Herefs. RO, L56/bdles. 1, 4B, 6, 109. The Homme, near Leominster, seems only to have come to the Birch family in 1787, however.133Herefs. RO, L56/bdle. 2; HP Commons 1660-1690, ‘John Birch’.

As well as smoothly making the transition from illegitimate to legitimate landowner, Birch managed to retain his military status. In June 1660, he was given command of a Herefordshire foot regiment, over a thousand strong at a muster in August.134Herefs. RO, AK10/1, 6. In February 1661 he became auditor of the excise; as in the case of Samuel Pepys†, the technical expertise he had gained during the interregnum was thought too valuable by the new government to be discarded. With a £500 salary for life, the office was another valuable acquisition. As late as 1689, he was pursuing claims for arrears of the salary, an echo of the 1640s.135Herefs. RO, AK10/2, 4. In the Convention of 1660 he had spoken in favour of Hesilrige, with whom he had parted company in 1644, and with whom he clashed on a number of occasions in 1659, but George Monck* put him up to it. In the memoir of his military career, dictated to a hagiographical scribe, he excised references to Hesilrige, but this was probably after 1660. His parliamentary career during the Cavalier Parliament was busy and varied, and he could not be counted upon to support any political grouping automatically. Given his background, he naturally gravitated towards the Exclusionists from the late 1670s, and joined William of Orange at Salisbury in November 1688. His political judgments in Parliaments after 1660 seem to have been shrewd, and as an administrator he seems to have been a man of integrity. Birch was buried at Weobley in 1691, but the impressive tomb he had built for himself was defaced by the bishop of Hereford.136HMC 5th Rep. 384. His son sat as a whig for Weobley after 1701.