John Hampden's regiment of Greencoats, which two days ago marched forth from Aylesbury bound for the rendezvous of Parliament's armies at Northampton, has carried out its first action in defense of the liberties of England: the arrest of a local noble who was preparing to raise men for the armies of Charles Stuart.

Acting on information received from one well-disposed to the cause of Parliament, Col. Hampden, with a troop of horse and a file of musketeers, arrested the Earl of Berkshire and several other malignant spirits at Ascott, the Earl’s estate near Chalgrove in Oxfordshire.

Colonel Hampden entered Ascott “without ceremony,” said an observer.

The Earl protested he had done nothing wrong. “Then you may look for me for protection,” Colonel Hampden replied.

The Earl said he and those with him were but justices of the peace, gathered to settle the shire’s business.

“In a way injurious to the rights of Englishmen,” Colonel Hampden said, who then invited the Earl and his guests to the carriage outside waiting, which then conveyed them to London.

A search of Ascott discovered two copies of a Commission of Array, signed by Charles and affixed with the Royal Seal, granting the Earl of Berkshire authority to raise the men of the country for the King’s service.

The arrest comes as Charles marches from York toward Nottingham, where he intends on August 22 to raise his standard and call upon "all well-affected persons on the north side of Trent to repair" and join him "for the suppression of the rebellion." He seized the arms of the Lincolnshire Trained-Bands some days ago, but not, it appears, their hearts: no men of the county elected to join his army on the road south, and to battle.

A letter, signed by the Earl of Lindsey, directed Berkshire to march any troops he raised to Portsmouth and there join Lord Goring in holding the city for the King. Goring, the governor of Portsmouth who on August 3 declared for Charles, is currently beset from the sea by the warships of the Earl of Warwick, and on land by the Trained-Bands of Hampshire and Sussex, led by Sir William Waller.

The Greencoats, mustered over the last two weeks from the country Colonel Hampden represents in Parliament and where his family has lived from ancient times, brings 600 pikes and 400 muskets against the King’s army. The regiment is marching to Northampton in the company of the Redcoats, a regiment commanded by Colonel Denzil Holles. Holles is with Hampden one of the “Five Members” of Parliament Charles sought to arrest in January on specious charges of treason.