Charles I of England - Trial

Trial

Charles was moved to Hurst Castle at the end of 1648, and thereafter to Windsor Castle. In January 1649, in response to Charles's defiance of Parliament even after defeat, and his encouraging the second Civil War while in captivity, the House of Commons passed an Act of Parliament creating a court for Charles's trial. After the first Civil War, the parliamentarians accepted the premise that the king, although wrong, had been able to justify his fight, and that he would still be entitled to limited powers as King under a new constitutional settlement. It was now felt that by provoking the second Civil War even while defeated and in captivity, Charles showed himself responsible for unjustifiable bloodshed. The secret treaty with the Scots was considered particularly unpardonable; "a more prodigious treason", said Cromwell, "than any that had been perfected before; because the former quarrel was that Englishmen might rule over one another; this to vassalise us to a foreign nation." Cromwell had up to this point supported negotiations with the king, but now rejected further diplomacy.

The idea of trying a king was a novel one; previous monarchs (Edward II, Richard II and Henry VI) had been overthrown and murdered by their successors, but had never been brought to trial as monarchs. Charles was accused of treason against England by using his power to pursue his personal interest rather than the good of England. The charge against Charles I stated that the king, "for accomplishment of such his designs, and for the protecting of himself and his adherents in his and their wicked practices, to the same ends hath traitorously and maliciously levied war against the present Parliament, and the people therein represented...", that the "wicked designs, wars, and evil practices of him, the said Charles Stuart, have been, and are carried on for the advancement and upholding of a personal interest of will, power, and pretended prerogative to himself and his family, against the public interest, common right, liberty, justice, and peace of the people of this nation."

Estimated deaths from the first two English civil wars has been reported as 84,830 killed with estimates of another 100,000 dying from war-related disease; this was in 1650 out of a population of only 5.1 million, or 3.6% of the population. The indictment against the king therefore held him "guilty of all the treasons, murders, rapines, burnings, spoils, desolations, damages and mischiefs to this nation, acted and committed in the said wars, or occasioned thereby."

The High Court of Justice established by the Act consisted of 135 Commissioners but only 68 ever sat in judgement (all firm Parliamentarians); the prosecution was led by Solicitor General John Cooke. Charles's trial on charges of high treason and "other high crimes" began on 20 January 1649, but Charles refused to enter a plea, claiming that no court had jurisdiction over a monarch. He believed that his own authority to rule had been given to him by God and by the traditions and laws of England when he was crowned and anointed, and that the power wielded by those trying him was simply that of force of arms. Charles insisted that the trial was illegal, explaining, "Then for the law of this land, I am no less confident, that no learned lawyer will affirm that an impeachment can lie against the King, they all going in his name: and one of their maxims is, that the King can do no wrong." When urged to enter a plea, he stated his objection with the words: "I would know by what power I am called hither, by what lawful authority...?" The court, by contrast, proposed an interpretation of the law that legitimised the trial, which was founded on

"...the fundamental proposition that the King of England was not a person, but an office whose every occupant was entrusted with a limited power to govern 'by and according to the laws of the land and not otherwise'."

Over a period of a week, when Charles was asked to plead three times, he refused. It was then normal practice to take a refusal to plead as pro confesso: an admission of guilt, which meant that the prosecution could not call witnesses to its case. However, the trial did hear witnesses.

The King was declared guilty at a public session on Saturday 27 January 1649 and sentenced to death. Fifty-nine of the Commissioners signed Charles's death warrant.

After the ruling, he was led from St. James's Palace, where he was confined, to the Palace of Whitehall, where an execution scaffold had been erected in front of the Banqueting House.