of grievances and to submit at once to the House of Commons the patents for the sole trade to Guinea and the sole importation of red-wood, also that concerning copperas stones and that for the monopoly of making and vending beads (Rushworth, iv. 53). For his share in these he was expelled from the house on 2 Feb. 1641. At the same time he and the other customers were called to account for having collected the duties on merchandise without a parliamentary grant, and only obtained an act of indemnity on payment of a fine of 150,000l. (Gardiner, History of England, ix. 379; Commons' Journals, May 25–6, 1641). In the civil war Crisp not unnaturally took the side of the king, but remained at first in London and secretly sent money to Charles. His conduct was discovered by an intercepted letter of Sir Robert Pye's, and his arrest was ordered (Sanford, Studies of the Great Rebellion, p. 547). But he succeeded in escaping to Oxford in disguise, and was welcomed by the king with the title of his ‘little, old, faithful farmer’ (Special Passages, 14–21 Feb. 1643). From Oxford Crisp continued to maintain his correspondence with the king's partisans in the city, and his name was placed at the head of the commission of array which was issued by the king on 16 March 1643, and afterwards conveyed to London by Lady Aubigny (Husband, Ordinances of Parliament, fol. p. 201; Clarendon, Rebellion, vii. 59, 61). He was also implicated in Ogle's plot in the winter of 1643, and the estate of his brother, Samuel Crisp, was sequestrated by the parliament for the same business (Camden Miscellany, vol. viii.; A Secret Negotiation with Charles I, pp. 2, 18). On 3 July 1643 Crisp obtained a commission from the king to raise a regiment of five hundred horse, but before it was complete it was surprised at Cirencester by Essex, on his march back from Gloucester, and captured to a man (15 Sept. 1643, Bibliotheca Gloucestrensis, pp. lxxiv, clxxiv). Crisp himself was not present with his regiment at this disaster. A few days earlier he had been involved in a quarrel with Sir James Enyon of Northamptonshire, which led to a duel in which the latter was mortally wounded. Crisp was brought to a court-martial for this affair, but honourably acquitted on the ground of the provocation and injury he had received from his antagonist (2 Oct. 1643, Sanderson, Charles I, p. 666). In the following November Crisp received a commission to raise a regiment of fifteen hundred foot (17 Nov., Black, Oxford Docquets), but it does not appear that he carried out this design. For the rest of the war his services were chiefly performed at sea. On 6 May 1644 he received a commission to equip at his own and his partner's charge not less than fifteen ships of war, with power to make prizes (ib.) He was granted a tenth of the prizes taken by his ships, and also appointed receiver and auditor of the estates of delinquents in Cornwall (Cal. Clarendon State Papers, i. 264, 294). As the royal fleet was entirely in the hands of the parliament, the services of Crisp's squadron in maintaining the king's communications with the continent and procuring supplies of arms and ammunition were of special value. He also acted as the king's factor on a large scale, selling tin and wool in France, and buying powder with the proceeds (Husband, Collection of Orders, fol. pp. 842, 846). These services naturally procured him a corresponding degree of hostility from the parliament. He was one of the persons excluded from indemnity in the terms proposed to the king at Uxbridge. His pecuniary losses had also been very great. When Crisp fled from London the parliament confiscated 5,000l. worth of bullion which he had deposited in the Tower. They also sequestered his stock in the Guinea Company for the payment of a debt of 16,000l. which he was asserted to owe the state (Camden Miscellany, vol. viii.; A Secret Negotiation with Charles I, pp. 2, 18). His house in Bread Street was sold to pay off the officers thrown out of employment on the constitution of the New Model (Perf. Diurnal, 16 April 1645). He is said also to have lost 20,000l. by the capture of two ships from Guinea, the one by a parliamentary ship, the other by a pirate (Certain Informations, 30 Oct.–6 Nov. 1643). Nevertheless his remaining estates must have been considerable, for on 6 May 1645 the House of Commons ordered that 6,000l. a year should be paid to the elector palatine out of the properties of Crisp and Lord Cottington (Journals of the House of Commons). On the final triumph of the parliamentary cause Crisp fled to France (Whitelocke, Memorials, f. 200), but he does not seem to have remained long in exile. He was allowed to return, probably owing to the influence of his many puritan relatives in London, and appears in the list of compounders as paying a composition of 346l. (Dring, Catalogue, ed. 1733, p. 25). In the act passed by parliament in November 1653 for the sale of the crown forests the debt due to Crisp and his associates in the farm of the customs was allowed as a public faith debt of 276,146l., but solely on the condition that they advanced a like sum for the public service within a limited period. The additional sum advanced was
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