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In May 1646, after 4 years of fighting,
Charles surrendered to the Scots, hoping they would agree with his Divine Right idea. They didn’t, believing instead in the divine cash-in-the–pocket idea so
they handed him over to Parliament for a large sum of money. Charles was then kept in prison but a rebellion in 1648 convinced Cromwell who was now leading
parliament, that Charles being alive was a bad idea so Cromwell accused Charles of the crime of treason, found him guilty and executed him on 30 January 1649.
Charles faced his trial and death with remarkable dignity. His last word on the scaffold was: 'Remember,' but sadly we can only guess at what we should remember.
The execution of a king was greeted across Europe with shock.
The meaning of treason is to betray one's country and it's a bit strange because you would be guilty of treason if you attempted to kill the King or
Queen of a country, which of course they now did. The argument was that Charles had acted against his country but it was a bit of bad luck to be found guilty of a
crime against yourself. Fortunately they didn’t ask him to cut his own head off. However to the ordinary people, when they found out, it was amazing; they had
killed their own king.
In view of the complaints Parliament had about the King trying to arrest some members it is rather funny that in 1648 a Colonel Pride of the New Model
Army and under instruction from Oliver Cromwell arrived at parliament, the long one was still sitting although they had gone home to bed each night, and stopped at
least 180 members from entering and arrested about 40 more. Those that remained, about 150, were known by those historians as the rump, the bit left over.
So now England, and Scotland and Ireland, had no King to rule. What would happen?
Forward to 1649AD
