Prince Charles was to pretend to be a groom in an elopement party with Juliana Coningsby playing the part of
the bride, accompanied by Colonel Wyndham and Lord Wilmot. The party arrived safely in Charmouth where they
were to meet the boatman who had agreed to sail the prince to France for £60. Finding that the boatman
failed to keep the bargian on account of his wife, the party made their way to
Bridport.
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Such an event was bound to attract a goodly load of lore and a story is told of how, the princely
groom attending to the party's horses in the yard of an inn, he was approached by an ostler who thought he knew
the fugitive. The prince asked the ostler where he had worked previously and, on being informed that it was
at Exeter, assured the man that it was from that town that he knew him.
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The party found Bridport to be rife with Commonwealth troops and they soon left,
galloping on horseback towards Dorchester. The lane by which they left Bridport still
bears an inscribed stone comemmorating the event and a painting by FH Newbery, a local artist, hangs in the
town's town hall depicts it.
Colonel Robert Phelips of Salisbury rode to the house of Colonel Francis Wyndham at Trent in Dorset (then in Somerset) where the king had been hidden. The Colonel and his royal charge left Trent on October 6th. The king, with hair cut short, was attired so that he might pass as a serving man. Behind him rode Julia Conisby (Colonel Wyndham's cousin) and Henry Peters, a servant of Wyndham's household.
The party of fugitives made their way into Wiltshire to the village of Woodford near Salisbury. They sought shelter at Heale House, the home of the widowed Mrs Hyde who had been asked to hide them by Dr Henchman of Salisbury. Present at supper that night were also Mrs Hydes brother Frederick and her widowed sister-in-law. Dr Henchman had also been summoned by the king.
Mrs Hyde suggested that the King and Colonel Phelips leave in the morning. She would give her servants leave to attend the Salisbury Fair and, during their absence, the king could return in secret and be hidden more safely in the priest hole. The two men rode to Stonehenge where the king confounded the tradition that the stones (fallen and in much disarray in the 17th century) could not be counted twice and the same number concluded. Julia Conisbyand Henry Peters also left in the morning to return to Trent. The king and Phelips returned to Woodford to meet Dr Henchman who accompanied the King to Heale House while the colonel continued on with the king's horse to Newton Tony where he stayed overnight with a friend, Mr Jones.
Phelips contacted Colonel Goanter, a staunch Royalist, who managed to secure passage to the continent for Charles from Shoreham in Sussex. Dr Henchman informed the King of the arrangements and Charles met Colonel Phelips near the river Avon (where the horse brought for the king broke its bridle and galloped up the river. The animal recaptured, they made their way to Broad Halfpenny Down above Hambledon in Hampshire
