January 4, 1649: The Rump Parliament Decides To Bring King Charles I of England to Trial.

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3rd Lord Fairfax of Cameron, English Civil War, King Charles I of England, Oliver Cromwell, Pride's Purge, Rump Parliament, The Long Parliament, Thomas Fairfax, Thomas Pride, Treaty of Newport

Despite defeat in the First English Civil War, King Charles I of England, Scotland and Ireland retained significant political power. This allowed him to create an alliance with Scots Covenanters and Parliamentarian moderates to restore him to the English throne. The result was the 1648 Second English Civil War, in which he was defeated once again.

Charles I in Three Positions by van Dyck, 1635–36

Treaty of Newport

In September 1648, at the end of the Second English Civil War, the Long Parliament was concerned with the increasing radicalism in the New Model Army. The Long Parliament began negotiations with King Charles I via the Treaty of Newport intended to bring an end to the hostilities of the English Civil War.

The members wanted to restore the king to power, but wanted to limit the authority he had. Charles I conceded militia power, among other things, but he later admitted that it was only so he could escape.

Negotiations were conducted between September 15, 1648 and November 27, 1648, at Newport, Isle of Wight, on the initial proviso that they would not take longer than forty days (negotiations had effectively broken down by October 27, but continued formally to November). Charles was released on parole from his confinement at Carisbrooke Castle and lodged in Newport.

Pride’s Purge

The New Model Army wanted to prevent Parliament from agreeing on the Treaty of Newport to reinstate King Charles I. While Presbyterian and moderate elements within Parliament were inclined to continue negotiations, the Army was impatient with Charles.

Pride’s Prurge

Thomas Fairfax, by issuing a command to Commissary General Ireton, organized a military coup in 1648. Ireton intended to dissolve the Long Parliament but was persuaded to purge it instead. He then ordered Colonel Thomas Pride to prevent the signing of the Treaty of Newport.

Between December 6 and 12, Pride—supported by two regiments—prevented 231 known supporters of the treaty from entering the House, imprisoning 45 for a few days. The remaining free members then became the Rump Parliament.

Pride’s Purge brought Parliament to heel under the direct control of the Army; the remaining Commons (the Rump) then on December 13, 1648, broke off negotiations with the King.

Two days later, the Council of Officers of the New Model Army voted that the King be moved from the Isle of Wight, where he was prisoner, to Windsor, “in order to the bringing of him speedily to justice”. The King was brought from Windsor to London in the middle of December.

Thomas Fairfax, 3rd Lord Fairfax of Cameron

The Purge eliminated from Parliament those who backed a negotiated settlement with Charles, which included moderate Independents, as well as Presbyterians.

However, even those who agreed he had to be removed did not necessarily support his execution; this included Fairfax, who refused to take part in his trial, and initially Cromwell, who returned to London from the siege of Pontefract Castle in early December. In return for sparing his life, Cromwell hoped Charles would order the Duke of Ormond to end negotiations with the Irish Confederacy, and prevent a new war in Ireland.

Once it became clear Charles had no intention of doing so, Cromwell became convinced he had to die, stating “we will cut off his head with the crown still on it”.

On January 4, 1649, the House of Commons passed an ordinance to set up a High Court of Justice, to try King Charles I for high treason in the name of the people of England.

Charles I, King of England, Scotland and Ireland

The House of Lords rejected it, and as it did not receive Royal Assent, Charles asked at the start of his trial on January 20, in Westminster Hall, “I would know by what power I am called hither. I would know by what authority, I mean lawful authority”, knowing that there was no legal answer under the constitutional arrangements of the time.

When the ordinance to set up a High Court of Justice was rejected by the House of Lords, they declared themselves the supreme power in the state, and proceeded with the trial.

The Purge cleared the way for the execution of Charles in January 1649, and establishment of the Protectorate in 1653; it is considered the only recorded military coup d’état in English history.

January 30, 1649: Execution of Charles I, King of England, Scotland and Ireland.

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Commonwealth, Execution of Charles Stuart of England, House of Lords, King Charles I of England, Long Parliament, Pride's Purge, Privy Council, Rump Parliament, Thomas Pride

Charles’s beheading was scheduled for Tuesday, January 30, 1649. Two of his children remained in England under the control of the Parliamentarians: Elizabeth and Henry. They were permitted to visit him on January 29, and he bade them a tearful farewell. The following morning, he called for two shirts to prevent the cold weather causing any noticeable shivers that the crowd could have mistaken for fear: “the season is so sharp as probably may make me shake, which some observers may imagine proceeds from fear. I would have no such imputation.”

He walked under guard from St James’s Palace, where he had been confined, to the Palace of Whitehall, where an execution scaffold had been erected in front of the Banqueting House. Charles was separated from spectators by large ranks of soldiers, and his last speech reached only those with him on the scaffold. He blamed his fate on his failure to prevent the execution of his loyal servant Strafford: “An unjust sentence that I suffered to take effect, is punished now by an unjust sentence on me.”

He declared that he had desired the liberty and freedom of the people as much as any, “but I must tell you that their liberty and freedom consists in having government … It is not their having a share in the government; that is nothing appertaining unto them. A subject and a sovereign are clean different things.” He continued, “I shall go from a corruptible to an incorruptible Crown, where no disturbance can be.”

At about 2:00 p.m., Charles put his head on the block after saying a prayer and signalled the executioner when he was ready by stretching out his hands; he was then beheaded with one clean stroke. According to observer Philip Henry, a moan “as I never heard before and desire I may never hear again” rose from the assembled crowd,some of whom then dipped their handkerchiefs in the king’s blood as a memento.

The executioner was masked and disguised, and there is debate over his identity. The commissioners approached Richard Brandon, the common hangman of London, but he refused, at least at first, despite being offered £200. It is possible he relented and undertook the commission after being threatened with death, but there are others who have been named as potential candidates, including George Joyce, William Hulet and Hugh Peterrs. The clean strike, confirmed by an examination of the king’s body at Windsor in 1813, suggests that the execution was carried out by an experienced headsman.

Cromwell was said to have visited Charles’s coffin, sighing “Cruel necessity!” as he did so. The story was depicted by Delaroche in the nineteenth century.

It was common practice for the severed head of a traitor to be held up and exhibited to the crowd with the words “Behold the head of a traitor!” Although Charles’s head was exhibited, the words were not used, possibly because the executioner did not want his voice recognized. On the day after the execution, the king’s head was sewn back onto his body, which was then embalmed and placed in a lead coffin.

The commission refused to allow Charles’s burial at Westminster Abbey, so his body was conveyed to Windsor on the night of February 7. He was buried in private on February 9, 1649 in the Henry VIII vault in the chapel’s quire, alongside the coffins of Henry VIII and Henry’s third wife, Jane Seymour, in St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle. The king’s son, Charles II, later planned for an elaborate royal mausoleum to be erected in Hyde Park, London, but it was never built.

The execution of Charles I had been carried out by the Rump Parliament. The Rump was created by Pride’s Purge when Colonel Thomas Pride forcibly removed from the Long Parliament all those members who supported the King and were not supporters of the Grandees in the New Model Army and the Independents. Many historians consider called it a coup d’état.

Just before and the execution of King Charles I, the Rump Parliament passed a number of Acts of Parliament creating the legal basis for the republic. After the execution of Charles I, the House of Commons abolished the Monarchy, the Privy Council and the House of Lords, and declared the people of England “and of all the Dominions and Territories thereunto belonging” to be henceforth under the governance of a “Commonwealth”, effectively a republic. The House of Commons now had unchecked executive and legislative power. The English Council of State, which replaced the Privy Council, took over many of the executive functions of the monarchy.