page_title: History of the Puritans under King Charles I
section_title: The Second English Civil War (1648–49) and the Regicide (1649)
hierarchical_section_title: History of the Puritans under King Charles I / The Westminster Assembly, 1643–49 / The Second English Civil War (1648–49) and the Regicide (1649)
context_page_description: Under Charles I, the Puritans became a political force as well as a religious tendency in the country. Opponents of the royal prerogative became allies of Puritan reformers, who saw the Church of England moving in a direction opposite to what they wanted, and objected to increased Catholic influence both at Court and within the Church.
  After the First English Civil War political power was held by various factions of Puritans. The trials and executions of William Laud and then King Charles himself were decisive moves shaping British history. While in the short term Puritan power was consolidated by the Parliamentary armed forces and Oliver Cromwell, in the same years, the argument for theocracy failed to convince enough of the various groupings, and there was no Puritan religious settlement to match Cromwell's gradual assumption of dictatorial powers. The distinctive formulation of Reformed theology in the Westminster Assembly would prove to be its lasting legacy.
  In New England, immigration of what were Puritan family groups and congregations was at its peak for the period the middle years of King Charles's reign.
context_section_description: In summer and fall 1647, Henry Ireton and John Lambert negotiated with both houses of parliament and eventually the Army and Parliament reached agreement on a set of proposals, known as the Heads of Proposals, which were presented to Charles in November 1647. The main propositions were
  Royalists had to wait five years before running for or holding an office.
  The Book of Common Prayer was allowed to be read but not mandatory, and no penalties should be made for not going to church, or attending other acts of worship.
  The sitting Parliament was to set a date for its own termination. Thereafter, biennial Parliaments were to be called (i.e. every two years), which would sit for a minimum of 120 days and maximum of 240 days. Constituencies were to be reorganized.
  Episcopacy would be retained in church government, but the power of the bishops would be substantially reduced.
  Parliament was to control the appointment of state officials and officers in the army and navy for 10 years.
  Charles, however, rejected the Heads of Proposals.
  Instead, Charles negotiated with a faction of Scottish Covenanters and on 26 December 1647, signed The Engagement, a secret treaty with the group of Scottish Covenanters who became known as the Engagers. Under the Engagement, Charles agreed that episcopacy should be suppressed in the Church of England, and he agreed to support presbyterianism for three years, after which a permanent solution to the question of the church's polity could be worked out. In exchange, the Engagers agreed to bring an army of 20,000 into England in order to suppress the New Model Army and restore Charles to his throne. This led to the Second English Civil War. The royalist forces were defeated decisively at the Battle of Preston on 17–19 August 1648.
  The Independents in the Army now argued that the King was "Charles Stuart, that man of blood" who deserved to be punished, and that the outcome of the First English Civil War had been proof of God's judgment against Charles. Taking up arms after that judgment had been rendered resulted in the shedding of innocent blood. The leaders of the army therefore drafted The Remonstrance of the Army in November 1648, calling on the Long Parliament to execute Charles and to replace hereditary monarchy in England with an elective monarchy. When the Long Parliament rejected the Army's Remonstrance, the Army Council decided that they would take decisive action.
  On Wednesday 6 December Colonel Thomas Pride’s Regiment of Foot took up position on the stairs leading to the House. Pride stood at the top of the stairs. As MPs arrived, he checked them against the list provided to him; Lord Grey of Groby helped to identify those to be arrested and those to be prevented from entering. Pride's Purge excluded all but about 200 members of the about the 500 member who had been entitled to sit before the purge.
  After the Purge, the remaining members (who were sympathetic to the Independent party and the Army Council)—henceforth known as the Rump Parliament—proceeded to do what the Long Parliament had refused to do: put Charles on trial for high treason. The House of Commons passed an act on 3 January 1649 creating a High Court of Justice for the trial of Charles I. This Act was rejected by the House of Lords, but the Army insisted that the trial should go ahead anyway. It began on 20 January 1649 in Westminster Hall and ended on 27 January 1649 with a guilty verdict. 59 Commissioners signed Charles' death warrant, and he was subsequently beheaded on 30 January 1649.
  The execution of Charles I would be the lens through which the Puritan movement was viewed for generations. For its opponents, the outcome confirmed that Puritanism ultimately led to violent rebellion, and that there was a straight line from religious fanaticism to regicide. The largest single group of Puritans, the Presbyterians, had in fact opposed the regicide, but to the supporters of the king and of episcopacy, this seemed like too fine a distinction. On the other hand, for many Independents, the regicide was entirely justified: Charles w
caption: Frontispiece of Eikon Basilike, a book purportedly by King Charles (1600–1649), but likely ghost-written by John Gauden (1605–1662) and which appeared immediately after Charles' execution in January 1649. Eikon Basilike portrayed Charles as a Christian saint who had been martyred for defending episcopacy in the Church of England against Puritan fanatics.
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