English Civil War

The First English Civil War

In September 1642, King Charles I raised his standard in the market square of Wellington, a small, though highly influential, market town in the English Midland county of Shropshire and addressed his troops the next day at nearby Orleton Hall. He declared that he would uphold the Protestant Religion, the Laws of England, and the Liberty of Parliament.

At the outset of the conflict, much of the country remained neutral, though the Royal Navy and most English cities favoured Parliament, while the king found considerable support in rural communities. Historians estimate that between them, both sides had only about 15,000 men. However, the war quickly spread and eventually involved every level of society throughout the British Isles. Many areas attempted to remain neutral but found it impossible to withstand both the King and Parliament. On one side, the King and his supporters fought for traditional government in Church and state. On the other, supporters of Parliament sought radical changes in religion and economic policy and major reforms in the distribution of power at the national level. In addition, Parliament was not a united body; at one point in the nine years of war, there were more members of the Commons and Lords in the King's Oxford Parliament than there were at Westminster.

Parliament did, however, have more resources at its disposal, due to its possession of all major cities including the large arsenals at Hull and London. For his part, Charles hoped that quick victories would negate Parliament's advantage in materiel. This precipitated the first major siege, the first siege of Hull in July 1642, which provided a decisive victory for Parliament.

Oliver Cromwell.The first pitched battle at Edgehill proved inconclusive, but both the Royalist and Parliamentarian sides claimed it as a victory. One of the king's outstanding officers, his nephew, Prince Rupert of the Palatinate, proved himself a dashing cavalry commander. (A Parliamentarian cavalry troop raised by a country gentleman, evangelical puritan, and Member of Parliament named Oliver Cromwell also played a minor part in the battle. Cromwell would later devise the New Model Army system still evident in military organisation today. The New Model featured a unified command structure and professionalism, which would swing the military advantage firmly towards Parliament.) The second field action of the war, the stand-off at Turnham Green, saw Charles forced to withdraw to Oxford. This city would serve as his base for the remainder of the war.

In 1643 the Royalist forces won at Adwalton Moor and gained control of most of Yorkshire. In the Midlands, a Parliamentary force under Sir John Gell besieged and captured the cathedral city of Lichfield after the death of the original commander, Lord Brooke, and subsequently joined forces with Sir John Brereton to fight the inconclusive battle of Hopton Heath, where the Royalist commander, the Earl of Northampton, was killed. Subsequent battles in the west of England at Lansdowne and at Roundway Down also went to the Royalists. Prince Rupert could then take Bristol. In the same year, Oliver Cromwell formed his troop of "Ironsides", a disciplined unit which demonstrated his military leadership ability. With their assistance, he was victorious at the Battle of Gainsborough in July.

In the general, the early part of the war went well for the Royalists. The turning point came in the late Summer and early Autumn of 1643, when the Earl of Essex's army forced the king to raise the siege of Gloucester and then brushed the Royalist army aside at the First Battle of Newbury, in order to return triumphantly to London. Other Parliamentarian forces won the Battle of Winceby, giving them control of Lincoln. Political manoeuvring on both sides now led Charles to negotiate a ceasefire in Ireland, freeing up English troops to fight on the Royalist side, while Parliament offered concessions to the Scots in return for aid and assistance.

Parliament won at Marston Moor in 1644, gaining York with the help of the Scots. Cromwell's conduct in this battle proved decisive; and demonstrated his potential as a political or military leader. The defeat at the Battle of Lostwithiel in Cornwall, however, marked a serious reverse for Parliament in the south-west of England.

In 1645, Parliament reorganized its main forces into the New Model Army, under the command of Sir Thomas Fairfax, with Cromwell as his second-in-command and Lieutenant-General of Horse. In what were, in retrospect, two decisive engagements—the Battles of Naseby on June 14 and of Langport on July 10—Charles's armies were effectively destroyed.

In the remains of his English realm, Charles attempted to recover stability by consolidating the Midlands. He began to form an axis between Oxford and Newark on Trent, Nottinghamshire. Those towns had become fortresses and were more reliably loyal to him than to others. He took Leicester, which lies between them, but found his resources exhausted. Having little opportunity to replenish them, on May 1646, he sought shelter with a Scottish army at Southwell in Nottinghamshire. This marked the end of the First English Civil War.

The Second English Civil War

Main article Second English Civil War.
Charles I took advantage of this deflection of attention away from himself to negotiate a new agreement with the Scots, again promising church reform on December 28, 1647. Although Charles himself was still a prisoner, this agreement led inexorably to the Second Civil War.

A series of Royalist uprisings throughout England and a Scottish invasion occurred in the summer of 1648. Most of the uprisings in England were put down by forces loyal to Parliament after little more than skirmishes, but uprisings in Kent, Essex and Cumberland, the rebellion in Wales and the Scottish invasion involved the fighting of pitched battles and prolonged sieges.

In the spring of 1648 unpaid parliamentarian troops in Wales changed sides. The Royalist rebels were defeated by Colonel Thomas Horton at the battle of St. Fagans (May 8) and the rebel leaders surrendered to Cromwell on July 11 after the protracted two month siege of Pembroke. A Royalist uprising in Kent was defeated by Sir Thomas Fairfax at the battle of Maidstone on June 24. Fairfax, after his success at Maidstone and the pacification of Kent, turned northward to reduce Essex, where, under their ardent, experienced and popular leader Sir Charles Lucas, the Royalists were in arms in great numbers. Fairfax soon drove the enemy into Colchester, but the first attack on the town was repulsed and he had to settle down to a long siege.

In the North of England Major-General John Lambert fought very successful campaign against a number of Royalist uprisings. The largest was that of Sir Marmaduke Langdale in Cumberland. Thanks to the successes of Lambert and the Scottish commander the Duke of Hamilton was forced to take the west route through Carlisle for the Royalist Scottish invasion of England. The Parliamentarians under Cromwell engaged the Scots at the Battle of Preston (August 17 – August 19). The battle was fought largely at Walton-le-Dale near Preston in Lancashire, and resulted in a victory by the troops of Cromwell over the Royalists and Scots commanded by Hamilton. This Parliamentarian victory marked the end of the Second English Civil War.

Summary

Trial of Charles I for treason

The betrayal by Charles caused Parliament to debate whether Charles should be returned to power at all. Those who still supported Charles's place on the throne tried once more to negotiate with him.

Furious that Parliament continued to countenance Charles as a ruler, the army marched on parliament and conducted "Pride's Purge" (named after the commanding officer of the operation, Thomas Pride) in December 1648. 45 Members of Parliament (MPs) were arrested; 146 were kept out of parliament. Only 75 were allowed in, and then only at the army's bidding. This Rump Parliament was ordered to set up a high court of justice in order to try Charles I for treason in the name of the people of England.

The trial reached its forgone conclusion. 59 Commissioners (judges) found Charles I guilty of high treason, being 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 January 30, 1649. At the Restoration the regicides who were still alive and not living in exile were either executed or sentenced to life imprisonment.

The Third English Civil War
Ireland

See also the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland.
Ireland had known continuous war since the rebellion of 1641, with most of the island controlled by the Irish Confederates. Increasingly threatened by the armies of the English Parliament after Charles I's arrest in 1648, the Confederates signed a treaty of alliance with the English Royalists. The joint Royalist and Confederate forces under Ormonde attempted to eliminate the Parliamentary army holding Dublin, but were routed at the Battle of Rathmines. As the former Member of Parliament Admiral Robert Blake blockaded Prince Rupert's fleet in Kinsale, Oliver Cromwell was able to land at Dublin on August 15, 1649 with the army to quell Royalist alliance in Ireland. Cromwell's suppression of the Royalists in Ireland during 1649 still has a strong resonance for many Irish people. The massacre of nearly 3,500 people in Drogheda after its capture—comprising around 2,700 Royalist soldiers and all the men in the town carrying arms, including civilians, prisoners, and Catholic priests—is one of the historical memories that has driven Irish-English and Catholic-Protestant strife during the last three centuries. However, the massacre is significant mainly as a symbol of the Irish perception of Cromwellian cruelty, as far more people died in the subsequent guerrilla and scorched earth fighting in the country than at infamous massacres such as Drogheda and Wexford. The Parliamentarian conquest of Ireland ground on for another four years until 1653, when the last Irish Confederate and Royalist troops surrendered. It has been estimated that up to 30% of Ireland's population either died or were exiled by the end of the wars. Almost all Irish Catholic owned land was confiscated in the wake of the conquest and distributed to the Parliament's creditors, to the Parliamentary soldiers who served in Ireland, and to English people who had settled there before the war.

Scotland

The execution of Charles I altered the dynamics of the Scottish Civil War, which had been raging between Royalists and Covenanters since 1644. By 1649, the Royalists there were in dissaray and their erstwhile leader, the Earl of Montrose, was in exile. At first, Charles II encouraged Montrose to raise a Highland army to fight on the Royalist side. However, when the Scottish Covenanters (who did not agree with the execution of Charles I and who feared for the future of Presbyterianism and Scottish independence under the new Commonwealth) offered him the crown of Scotland, Charles abandoned Montrose to his enemies. However, Montrose, who had raised a mercenary force in Norway, had already landed was unable to abandon the fight. He was unable to raise many Highland clans and his army was defeated at Carbisdale in Ross-shire on April 27, 1650. Montrose was captured shortly afterwards and taken to Edinburgh, where on May 20 he was sentenced to death by the Scottish parliament and was hanged the next day. Charles landed in Scotland at Garmouth in Morayshire on June 23 1650 and signed the 1638 National Covenant and the 1643 Solemn League and Covenant immediately after coming ashore.

"Cromwell at Dunbar", Andrew Carrick Gow.With his original Scottish Royalist followers and his new Covenanter allies, King Charles II was considered to be the greatest threat facing the new English Republic. In response to the threat, Cromwell left some of his lieutenants in Ireland to continue the suppression of the Irish Royalists and crossed the Irish channel to Scotland. He arrived in Scotland on July 22 1650 and proceeded to lay siege to Edinburgh. By the end of August, his army was reduced by disease and a shortage of supplies, and he was forced to order a retreat towards England. A Scottish army, assembled under the command of David Leslie, tried to block the retreat, but the Scotts were defeated at the Battle of Dunbar on September 3. Cromwell's army then took Edinburgh, and by the end of the year, his army had occupied much of southern Scotland.

In July 1651, Cromwell's forces crossed the Firth of Forth into Fife and defeated the Scots at the Battle of Inverkeithing. The New Model Army advanced towards Perth, which allowed Charles at the head of the Scottish army to move south into England. Cromwell followed Charles into England leaving George Monck to finish the campaign in Scotland. Monck took Stirling on the August 14 and Dundee on September 1. The next year, 1652, the remnants of Royalist resistance were mopped up and under the terms of the "Tender of Union", the Scots were given 30 seats in a united Parliament in London, with General Monck appointed as the military governor of Scotland.

England

Although Cromwell's New Model Army had defeated a Scottish army at Dunbar, Cromwell was unable to prevent Charles II from marching from Scotland deep into England at the head of another Royalist army. The Royalist army marched to the west of England because it was in that area that English Royalist sympathies were strongest, but although some English Royalists joined the army, they came in far fewer numbers than Charles and his Scottish supporters had hoped. Cromwell finally engaged the new king at Worcester on September 3, 1651, and defeated him. Charles II escaped, via safe houses and a famous oak tree to France, ending the civil wars.

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