Question 1
Using these four sources in their historical context, assess how far they support the view that the
army was responsible for Charles I being brought to trial.
Source A: The New Model Army explains why it came to demand the trial of Charles I.
After the king’s hard heart made him reject all the peace terms made to him by Parliament, including proposals from the army, he engineered a second civil war by allying with the Scottish against us. Then we became convinced that God’s purpose was to deal with the king as a man of blood. We regarded him and the monarchy as one of the ten horns of the Beast* which caused the shedding of the innocent blood of God’s chosen people; so we petitioned our superior officers and Parliament to try the king for these crimes.
*A reference in the Bible to one of the most important servants of the Devil.
A declaration of the English army now in Scotland, 1 August 1650.
Source B: A republican MP, who signed the death warrant of Charles I, explains why the king was executed.
It was agreed to kill the king if he would not preserve religion and liberty. It is impossible that anyone should support a man of so much blood as the king was. He was seven or eight times sent propositions, and would not yield. So long as he was obstinate, there were daily revolts in the army, and risings in all places. He caused trouble for us all, and it was impossible to allow him to live. Execution was the last resort.
Thomas Scot, speech, 7 February 1659.
Source C: The wife of an important parliamentarian soldier, politician and regicide* recalls the attitude of those trying the king.
Some of the regicides afterwards, for excuse, belied themselves and said they were under the awe of the army, and overpersuaded by Cromwell. But it is certain all men were left to their free liberty of acting, neither persuaded nor compelled. There were some nominated to the High Court of Justice that sat at first, but dared not hold on. So all the rest might have declined, when it is apparent they would have suffered nothing by so doing. For those who then declined were afterwards, when they offered themselves, received in again. Most of them retreated not for conscience but for fear and worldly prudence, foreseeing that the insolence of the army might grow.
*regicide – a person who kills or takes part in killing a king.
Lucy Hutchinson, Memoirs of the life of Colonel Hutchinson, written between 1664 and 1669.
Source D: A bishop, who consulted eye-witnesses of the trial preparations, comments on events.
Ireton* was the person that drove it on, Cromwell was all the while in some suspense about it. Ireton had the principles and the temper of an assassin in him; he stuck at nothing that might have turned England to a Commonwealth. Fairfax was much distracted and changed his purposes often every day. The Presbyterians and the body of the City were much against it, and were everywhere fasting and praying for the king’s preservation. The king’s party was without spirit; and they could never believe his death was really intended until it was too late. They thought all was a pageantry to strike a terror, and to force the king to concessions.
*Ireton was a lawyer and a general. He played a leading role in the parliamentary army.
Bishop Gilbert Burnet, History of My Own Time, written in 1683.
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