They were
for a time encouraged by a belief, founded on their interpretation of
the Apocalypse, that the execution of their comrades was "the slaying
of the witnesses," and that their own triumph was speedily to follow.
Letters passed between Goffe and his wife, purporting to be between a
son and mother, and signed respectively with the names of Walter and
Frances Goldsmith. Four of these letters survive; tender,
magnanimous, and devout, they are scarcely to be read without tears.
In the tenth year of his abode at Hadley Whalley had become extremely
infirm in mind and body, and he probably did not outlive that year.
Mr. Russell's house was standing till within a little more than half
a century ago. At its demolition, the removal of a slab in the cellar
discovered human remains of a large size. They are believed to have
belonged to the stout frame which swept through Prince Rupert's lines
at Naseby. Goffe survived his father-in-law nearly five years, at
least; how much longer, is not known. Once he was seen abroad, after
his retirement to Mr. Russell's house. The dreadful war, to which the
Indian King Philip bequeathed his long execrated name, was raging
with its worst terrors in the autumn of 1675.
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