Talk:Second English Civil War/Archive 1

Archive 1

Signing the death warrant

The current (26-2-07) text in the article says “The more resolute of the judges nerved the rest to sign the death-warrant”. I cannot find this text nor anything similar in the current on-line text of Encyclopedia Britannica. I do not have access to the 1911 text.

See http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Great_Rebellion#49._Preston_Fight --Philip Baird Shearer 12:09, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

As currently written, this appears to imply that some judges having voted for the death sentence, subsequently changed their mind.

I understand that there is a phrase in S. R. Gardiner's History of the Great Civil War which supports this – Cromwell and Ireton were said to be "steeling the hearts of the weak" (p. 579 of the 1891 edition).

However, A. W. McIntosh in the House of Lords Record Office Memorandum number 66 concludes:

“In any case, there is no evidence for any violent or dramatic disagreements among those who chose to remain on the scene of the Court's activities. Post-Restoration allegations of threats and coercion, made in self-exculpation by men threatened with death, have no support in the contemporary records. Men with powerful minds and purposes, and with powerful argumentative abilities, would carry more weight than others, and would influence the opinions and actions of others, as happens in all deliberative bodies; but in this place and at this time, in the environment of a divided movement, a divided country, and no settled constitution, they had no weapons of coercion.”

I suggest the following revision:

"At the restoration, many regicides claimed they were coerced into signing the death warrant. For example, Richard Ingoldsby says that Cromwell and others forced the pen into his hand and wrote his name themselves. Gardiner also suggests that Cromwell and Ireton had to pursuade reluctant judges to sign the death warrant. However, more recently, AW McIntosh has concluded that there is no contemporary evidence for any violent or dramatic disagreement."

References

Rjm at sleepers 09:47, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

The sentence in the page article is not suggesting that there was any "violent or dramatic disagreement". At the time any judges of weaker personality who thought that they were browbeaten into signing where not likely to stand around and tell people that they had been! But once the other side was back into power then they were willing to say so, because it served their interests to do so. The best known of these was Richard Ingoldsby. But as is shown in the case of Henry Mildmay if determined they did not have to sign (which one could call a "dramatic disagreement").

BTW I take with a pinch of salt the argument presented (in the article House of Lords Record Office The Death Warrant of King Charles I") that "they had no weapons of coercion." The Grandees who had organised Pride's Purge of Parliament and the trial of the King of England, had two powerful instruments of coercion: the carrot of advancement under the new regime, and the stick of the New Model Army which by now was the only instrument of power in the land.

The sentence "The more resolute of the 59 commissioners nerved the rest to sign the death-warrant," is I think an accurate description of what happened, and is a generally accepted as such. For exampe in the the same paragraph (in "House of Lords Record Office The Death Warrant of King Charles I") from which you have quoted: "Men with powerful minds and purposes, and with powerful argumentative abilities, would carry more weight than others, and would influence the opinions and actions of others, as happens in all deliberative bodies;", which is another way of saying "The more resolute of the 59 commissioners nerved the rest to sign the death-warrant".

One telling point made in that document in the section "Was there a Danger of some Signatures being repudiated?" is "All of the signers before Garland (like all of the signers after him except Ingoldsby and Challoner) took an even more decisive step than signing the death warrant when on Saturday the 27th they stood up in Westminster Hall to pass sentence of death on the King". That Richard Ingoldsby was one of only two not to stand up in Court tends to collaborate his plea that he was an unwilling signatory. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:33, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I have given a link for to the word nerved, perhaps it is a Commonwealth English idea, but nerved is what one has to do when there is something you want to do but are nervous of doing so. For example I might say I do not like speaking at public meetings, but I nerved myself to stand up and argue the case against the property development near my house. It does not mean that I am going to change my mind about what I said, just that I was nervous about doing it in the first place. In this case given the mysticism and respect surrounding the Crown (not the man in person but the institution) this was a very big step for contemporary of Charles I to take. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:45, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Surely the big step was agreeing to the sentence (in public for all but three). The warrant was a logical consequence.

In any case, if the current sentence means that what happened was simply what "happens in all deliberative bodies", I'm not sure it is making a historically interesting point. I think it is an interesting point if we name the "more resolute" (or "men with powerful minds") and similarly name (or at least categorise) those being "nerved". How about:

"All but three of the signers (Garland, Ingoldsby and Challoner) had stood up to in Westminster Hall to signify their concurrence with the death sentence, although at their subsequent trial, some (for example Downes, Smith and Waite) claimed they had been threatened by Cromwell and Ireton if they did not sign." Rjm at sleepers 12:04, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

On reflection, my suggested revision (above) won't do since it doesnt fit with the rest of the section. I'll make another suggestion shortly. Rjm at sleepers 12:19, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Edit Clash -- While I agree with what you are saying it is more complicated than that, because of the list of commissioners who did not sign. Did they not sign because they had some legitimate reason for not doing so that weekend (food posing or whatever), or did they not sign because like Henry Mildmay because they disagreed with the verdict or the punishment. As far as the Convention_Parliament was concerned just having the audacity to sit in judgement on their king was High Treason whether they signed or not. --Philip Baird Shearer 12:54, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

How about the text from the English Civil War page "The show trial reached its foregone conclusion. 59 Commissioners (judges) found Charles I guilty of high treason, as a "tyrant, traitor, murderer and public enemy". He was beheaded on a scaffold in front of the Banqueting House of the Palace of Whitehall on 30 January 1649. (After the Restoration in 1660, the regicides who were still alive and not living in exile were either executed or sentenced to life imprisonment.)" Rjm at sleepers 12:22, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Fine by me. --Philip Baird Shearer 12:54, 26 February 2007 (UTC)