The English Civil Wars, Part 2 of 2

Short History Of...

The episode chronicles the volatile aftermath of the First English Civil War, detailing how Parliament's victory fractured into radical and conservative factions while King Charles I schemed to regain

Key takeaways

• King Charles I refused to recognize the court's authority during his trial, believing his divine right made him immune to judgment by his subjects.
• The New Model Army evolved from a military instrument into an independent political force, culminating in Colonel Thomas Pride's purge of Parliament in December 1648.

Main topics

• English Civil Wars aftermath
• New Model Army politics

Notable quotes

Kings would never be so powerful again.

Conclusion

The episode demonstrates how the English Civil Wars dismantled absolut

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:01) It is the 20th of January, 1649, in London. Speaker 2 (0:07) At the south end of Westminster Hall, a guard stands at his post, the cold from the stone floor seeping through his boots. Before him, the vast chamber has been cleared for an unprecedented purpose. Speaker 2 (0:24) Upon a raised chair sits the Lord President of the Court, John Bradshaw. Nearby stand the lawyers for the prosecution in their black gowns. Across from them, before the assembled commissioners and the watching crowd, a single red chair waits for the accused. Speaker 2 (0:43) Everyone else is merely here to be a witness to this extraordinary trial. Speaker 2 (0:53) The door opens and a murmur goes around the cavernous ceremonial hall before fading to whispers as the prisoner is brought in. The guard straightens, the gravity of the moment unmistakable. Speaker 2 (1:07) King Charles is not dragged or manhandled as other prisoners may be. Though he walks in under guard, he is dignified as he does so, and takes his place on the Red Seat with grave composure. Speaker 2 (1:21) He is dressed in dark, sober clothes and still wears his hat. In one hand he carries a paper, in the other a silver-tipped cane. Speaker 2 (1:33) Once the most powerful man in the kingdom, he is now defeated, captured, and about to be brought to judgment by his own subjects. From his post, the guard watches the king settle, eyes defiant as he assesses the room. Speaker 2 (1:50) The court is called to order and the indictment begins. Yet, almost at once, the king pushes back. As John Cook, the prosecuting lawyer, reads the charge, Charles leans forward from his chair and taps him sharply on the shoulder with his cane, trying to halt him in mid-flow. Cook carries on. Charles touches him again, harder this time. The gesture brief, sharp, and incredulous. Even now, the monarch refuses to accept that such an accusation can lawfully be spoken against him. In the tension of the moment, the silver tip of his cane comes loose and clatters onto the floor. Speaker 2 (2:32) For an instant, the sound hangs in the hall, and the guard stifles a smile. But the proceedings continue, and the charge is read in full. Speaker 2 (2:45) Charles is accused not merely of failure or bad counsel, but of tyranny and of making war upon his own people. Before the words can settle, he cuts in again, demanding to know by what authority this court presumes to sit in judgment on him, a crowned king and anointed by God. Speaker 2 (3:08) Around the hall, surprise registers in a rustle of bodies and a few uneasy whispers. Then silence again as Bradshaw insists the proceedings continue. Speaker 2 (3:19) The prosecutors press on. Charles continues his disruptions, and the atmosphere darkens. The court will not yield. Charles will not submit. Speaker 2 (3:31) Watching on, the guard understands that this is larger than one man's fate. If the court succeeds, the sacred distance that has always separated a king from his subjects will be gone. The monarch will have been brought inside the law like any other man. And if it fails, then all the bloodshed of the past years may yet lead only to more war. Speaker 2 (4:10) The First English Civil War ended with King Charles I defeated, his armies broken, and his cause apparently lost. Speaker 2 (4:20) But military victory for the parliamentarians brought no real peace. Instead, the months that followed saw an even more volatile struggle as parliament turned on itself and the captive king continued to bargain, delay, and deceive. As the search for settlement gave way to renewed fighting, the conflict evolved into outright revolution. And when the extraordinary solution to the problematic monarch was finally enacted, it would shock even many of those who fought against him. Speaker 2 (4:55) But why didn't the military defeat of Charles I bring the kingdom back to peace? How did Parliament's victory give rise to deeper division and more radical politics? And why did a war fought to limit the power of the monarchy end with the king on trial for his life? Speaker 2 (5:16) I'm John Hopkins. From the Noiser Podcast Network, this is the second in this two-part short history of the English Civil Wars. Speaker 2 (5:33) As 1647 dawns, technically the First Civil War is over. The Royalist armies have been beaten, their strongholds are falling, and Charles has surrendered to the Scots before being handed over to the English Parliament. The King is now effectively powerless. Speaker 2 (5:51) But the war's end brings no real peace, and England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland are left reeling from a conflict of extraordinary violence and upheaval. Speaker 2 (6:03) Mark Stoyle is Professor of History at the University of Southampton and specialises in the English Civil Wars. Speaker 3 (6:09) This is completely uncharted territory for English men and women. What's going to happen now with the King defeated and Parliament suddenly calling the shots across the whole of the country in a way that it's never done before? Speaker 2 (6:21) The war has left the kingdoms demoralized and deeply scarred. Families and communities have been torn apart, and the scale of the bloodshed is immense. As a percentage of population, in England, the Civil War has exacted a heavier death toll than the First and Second World Wars combined. In Ireland and Scotland, the devastation is greater still. Speaker 2 (6:46) But Parliament is already struggling to turn victory into peace, and the alliance that held its side together during the war starts unravelling. It splits into two broad factions, the Presbyterians and the Independents. Speaker 2 (7:03) The independents are religious Speaker 3 (7:04) radicals who want a much sort of freer form of Protestantism established here in England. The Presbyterians are more conservative Protestants. They're not as conservative as the King's supporters, the Anglicans, but they want some sort of state church. And there's this big divide now in the triumphant parliamentary camp between the radical independents on one side, who are particularly influential and numerous in the New Model Army, and the more conservative Presbyterians, on the other hand, who are not so strong Speaker 2 (7:35) in the New Model Army. Speaker 2 (7:39) In Westminster, MPs are split over what kind of settlement should now be imposed. Though Charles has lost the war and is no longer free, he remains king, and many in Parliament still intend to bring him back under strict conditions, rather than abolish monarchy altogether. The question is how much power he should be allowed to keep and whether he can be trusted to honor any agreement. Speaker 2 (8:04) The Scots, who have helped secure victory, are determined to secure something that protects both their political influence and the Presbyterianism they have fought to defend. Meanwhile, the new model army, hardened by war and increasingly conscious of its own strength, also wants a say in how the land will be governed. Speaker 3 (8:24) Everybody wants peace, obviously, but the problem is that they all want peace on their own terms. So those groups have all got different agendas and motivations. And the king, for his part, he feels that he's appointed by God. His father had told him repeatedly, you're appointed by God. Your duty is to protect the throne, protect the country, and to protect the church. And so Charles feels that he must do those things and that he can't give those things away in terms of compromising too far. Speaker 2 (8:56) Even in captivity, Charles refuses to accept that he is truly beaten. Passed between different custodians and cut off from direct power, he continues to believe that his opponents are too divided to act decisively without him. Speaker 3 (9:11) He's still hoping to kind of play these sides off against each other and hoping eventually, by aligning myself with one of these groups, I might be able to restore myself to a position which is strong enough that I can reconcile it with my duty to God and my office. I mean, that may have been an absolutely hopeless premise, but that's what he's constantly striving to Speaker 2 (9:32) obtain. Speaker 2 (9:36) His best chance, as he sees it, is with the Scots. Though they fought against Charles, they did so to defend their Presbyterian church, not to destroy the monarchy altogether. As the independence and the new model army gain power in England, many Scots fear that the religious promise they had fought for is slipping away. Charles' hope is that, though weakened, if he offers enough on religion, the Scots will see him as a less dangerous option than an England dominated by radical independence. So, rather than making the kind of meaningful concessions that might secure a lasting settlement, Charles negotiates separately with the Scots, with Parliament, and with elements inside the army. Speaker 2 (10:22) But his reputation for scheming runs deep, and many doubt whether he can be trusted at all. And as the search for peace falters, the new model army goes from being Parliament's military instrument to a political force in its own right. Speaker 3 (10:37) The New Model Army is an army of a type which England has never seen before. It's a standing army at this time. It's been kept in being. What the Presbyterians want to do, of course, is to dismantle the New Model Army so that their independent rivals no longer have a military force at their disposal. But of course, the leaders of the independent faction are very unwilling to see the New Model Army dissolved, and particularly when the soldiers haven't yet been paid. Speaker 2 (11:04) With its soldiers awaiting their wages, the New Model Army suspects that the politicians in Westminster who were eager to use them in war will cast them aside unpaid in peace. Speaker 2 (11:18) But material grievances are only part of the story. Speaker 2 (11:22) Years of conflict and sacrifice, as well as intense religious conviction, lead many within its ranks to demand some influence over how the kingdom should now be run. Commanders like Sir Thomas Fairfax and Oliver Cromwell become central figures, but the army's political energy also comes from within the rank and file. Ordinary troopers and officers are now petitioning, debating, and spreading radical religious and constitutional ideas. Speaker 2 (11:54) This October, on the Noiser Podcast Network, Real Dictators returns. We're in the Dominican Republic for the story of Rafael Trujillo. On Short History Of, we'll uncover the secrets of the Hoover Dam and follow Mary Shelley, the creator of Frankenstein and his monster. On Real Survival Stories, a modern Viking adventure as a replica Norse vessel embarks on a daring voyage across the North Sea and a man is struck blind, all alone, at the very top of the world. In Jane Austen stories, Emma continues with Dame Julie Andrews. And in Sherlock Holmes short stories, Holmes and Watson unpick an epic mystery of hidden treasure and murder in The Sign of Four. Get all of these shows and more early and ad-free on Noisa Plus. Speaker 2 (12:44) By 1647, the New Model Army is not just a powerful armed force, but an organization that sees itself as separate from Parliament, a guardian of the cause for which it has fought. And that is deeply unsettling for political authority. Speaker 2 (13:01) In the autumn, discussions over the future are held with remarkable openness at St. Mary's Church in Putney, just outside London. Known as the Putney Debates, these are not parliamentary meetings, but gatherings of the New Model Army's General Council, bringing together senior officers, soldier representatives, and radical voices to argue over the future of the kingdom. Speaker 2 (13:27) Though the debates don't settle