Assassination: The Royal Family's 1000-Year Curse (33 page)

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CHARLES II
30 January 1649 (de jure) or

 

29 May 1660 (restoration) – 6 February 1685

 

Charles I left six legitimate children: Charles, Mary, James, Elizabeth, Henry and Henrietta. Of course, on Charles’s execution in 1649 there was no coronation; first it was the Commonwealth, then the Protectorate.

After Naseby, Prince Charles fled first to the Isles of Scilly, then to Jersey
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, and after that he joined his mother in exile in Paris, spending the following years in idleness and debauchery. He later moved to the Netherlands where he was informed of his father’s execution when his chaplain entered the room and addressed Charles as “Your Majesty”; nothing more had to be said. Not long afterwards, Charles started an affair with an English exile, Lucy Walter, and she bore him an illegitimate son, James, later to be the Duke of Monmouth.

Despite the excesses, Charles was determined to recover the throne, and he realised that it would be easier to gain it through Ireland or Scotland where the execution of his father had been unpopular. The Scots offered Charles support on condition

22 In gratitude, after the Restoration Charles granted to the Governer of Jersey, George Carteret, land in the American colonies called New Netherlands, which Carteret naturally renamed New Jersey.

that he adopted Presbyterianism and promised to enforce its observance in England and Ireland. So Charles decided to forget about Scotland and instead go to Ireland. Whilst he was in Jersey (the only Royalist stronghold never taken by Parliament) waiting for a ship, he learned that Cromwell had arrived in Ireland with an army. Charles immediately changed his plans and went to Scotland, forced to accept the terms the Scots had demanded; though he had absolutely no intention of keeping to the bargain.

After Cromwell’s victory at Dunbar, Charles was crowned King of Scotland and was given a new army, but he was utterly defeated at Worcester. Charles had been watching the battle from Worcester Cathedral’s tower, but when he learned that the Duke of Hamilton’s head had been blown off, Charles joined the fighting, taking command. Seizing the opportunity, Cromwell’s forces made every effort to kill Charles, so much so that two horses perished under him. But Charles survived the attempts to kill him, and in defeat he managed to escape.

He left in such a hurry that he failed to pay £453 and 3 shillings to Worcester Clothiers for the uniforms they had supplied for his army. The present Prince Charles paid off his ancestor’s debt in June 2008, but he declined to pay interest, which at 5% p.a. compounded annually amounted to £15,643,542,841.

Charles fled with Lord Wilmot, Colonel Giffard and others, and they raced to Giffard’s Boscobel Estate. There they met the five Pendrell brothers, who were tenants living on the estate. They gave Charles old clothes to wear, and they cut his hair short.

Once it was dark, Richard Pendrell rode off with Charles, heading for Wales where Royalist support was strong. They reached the River Severn, only to discover that the riverside was being patrolled by Parliamentary troops. So they returned to Boscobel where they met another fugitive, Colonel Carlis.

Suddenly, a man came running into the building shouting that Parliamentary soldiers were approaching. Charles and Carlis were taken into the woodlands (Boscobel from the Italian
bosco bello
– beautiful woodland), and they were helped to climb high up a large oak tree. There they hung on, crouching motionless all day. Having found no fugitives in the houses on the estate, the troops began a search of the grounds. If caught, Charles would either have been killed (there was £1,000 on his head, dead or alive), or arrested and taken to London for trial. Charles had invaded England with an army from another country, so a conviction for treason would be automatic. His life literally hung in the balance as the soldiers searched the undergrowth below, but finding no one, they moved on.

Late the next day, the Pendrells took Charles to Moseley Old Hall, where Lord Wilmot was waiting for them. Charles was given food and wine by a Catholic priest, Father John Huddleston, who was chaplain to Thomas Whitgreave, the owner of the Hall.

Charles rested for two days, and again a warning was received that soldiers were approaching. Huddleston and Charles were hidden in a priest hole, the secret room built in many Catholic homes to hide those in danger. Fortunately, the soldiers were not looking for Charles; they had come to arrest Thomas Whitgreave, who was suspected of fighting for Charles at Worcester. However, Whitgreave had not fought at Worcester because he had been ill. When the Parliamentary soldiers were convinced of his innocence, they left without searching the building.

Lord Wilmot had planned to escape from England by acting as servant to Jane Lane, who had a pass (as was required by a Catholic) for herself and a manservant to travel to Bristol to visit a friend. Wilmot suggested that Charles should take his place. So Charles and Jane set out, and after five weeks of adventures and near capture they reached Shoreham on the south coast. Charles boarded a coal boat, The Surprise, and for £60 he was taken to France.

After the Restoration, Jane Lane received £1,000 – the sum on Charles’s head. The Pendrell brothers were granted a pension of £200 a year in perpetuity; it is still being paid, although now divided amongst many descendants. As for the oak tree, it is commemorated in the name of 626 pubs called ‘The Royal Oak’.

Charles travelled around Europe, gaining the reputation of a wastrel. He left Lucy to die in abject poverty, having already taken their child from her. Charles’s future seemed hopeless.

Then, in 1658 Cromwell died, and his son, Richard, was appointed Lord Protector. Richard Cromwell had neither the ability nor the desire for the position; and he was not a soldier, so the army did not support him. Besides, the mood in England was for the restoration of the monarchy. General Monck marched to London with an army and reinstated Parliament, and this time it was controlled by Royalists. Charles immediately announced a pardon for his enemies, his intention to uphold the Anglican Church, his desire for liberty of conscience for all Christians and his promise to leave all difficult questions to Parliament. In response, Parliament sent a ship to collect him with a gift of £50,000. Richard Cromwell escaped to France, and Charles returned to England, reaching London on 29th May 1660 (his 30th birthday) amid wild celebrations. Once crowned King Charles II, the Restoration saw the encouragement of sport, theatre (women being allowed to act on stage for the first time), music, the arts and the sciences.

Later in the year, it was time for retribution. Of the 59 regicides who had signed Charles I’s death warrant, 20 had already died. Those who were still alive were pursued; 9 were executed and 3 died before execution, 14 were sentenced to life imprisonment, 12 escaped abroad and just one was pardoned. Of the Commissioners who did not sign the warrant, 6 were imprisoned for life, one was murdered, and most of the others suffered fines and confiscations. Many others involved in Charles I’s trial, such as clerks and guards, suffered similar fates; although only John Cook the prosecutor, one officer and a preacher were hanged, drawn and quartered – but the identity of the executioner of Charles I was never discovered.

Charles had had enough: “… I am weary of hanging, except upon new offences.” It was not enough for everyone. On the anniversary of Charles I’s execution, the bodies of Cromwell, his son-in-law Henry Ireton and Bradshaw were dug up, dragged along the streets of London from Holborn to Tyburn, hanged all day and then executed
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; although it may be that in anticipation of revenge Bradshaw’s son had taken his father’s corpse to Jamaica for burial and replaced it with another. The heads were stuck on poles at the top of Westminster Hall, where they remained for over 20 years. Cromwell’s head was then blown down in a gale, picked up and sold from person to person until in 1960 it reached his old college, Sidney Sussex at Cambridge University, where it now lies buried – the precise location remaining secret for fear of mischief by Royalists.

There was still one problem; Charles had not produced an heir. He married the Catholic Catherine of Braganza, daughter of King John IV of Portugal and Luisa of Medina-Sidonia. So the greatgranddaughter of the Admiral of the Spanish Armada became Queen of England. Her dowry included Bombay, Tangier and £300,000; and the chance acquisition of Bombay became the base from which colonial India and the British Empire developed.

Mistresses and illegitimate children multiplied in the scandalous court, with honours and titles heaped upon them. Charles eventually acknowledged that fourteen illegitimate children were his, but there would be no legitimate children
– Catherine was barren. However, she did make two lasting contributions to English life. One was making tea-drinking fashionable. Although it was the favourite drink of the Portuguese court (brought from Portuguese possessions in the Far East), until Catherine’s arrival in London, tea was a rarity in England. The other was the introduction of the fork at dining tables, previously regarded as an effeminate south-European custom.

Now Charles’s easygoing life was about to be interrupted. He wanted religious toleration for all Christians, the Council having already formalised the re-admission of the Jews on Charles’s urging. However, Parliament wanted further restrictions on Catholics and Puritans. Charles wanted peace, Parliament wanted war against the Netherlands, now England’s greatest rival in foreign trade. On both issues Charles was overruled.

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Colonel Pride was to suffer the same fate, but his corpse was too decayed.

The war would make official the fighting that was already taking place between the two nations. In North America, the Dutch towns of New Amsterdam and Fort Orange were taken. Senior members of the Royal Family had to have at least two titles, one English and one Scottish. Charles’s brother James was accordingly Duke of York in England and Duke of Albany in Scotland. So, in his honour, New Amsterdam was renamed New York and Fort Orange became Albany. New York was later divided into twelve counties, including ‘Queens’ named after Catherine and ‘Kings’ named after Charles.

All the joys of life came to a halt in June 1665, when plague struck London, killing over 100,000 people, later moving on to other parts of the country. It was believed that dogs and cats spread the disease, so the Lord Mayor ordered their destruction. The killing of 40,000 dogs and 200,000 cats allowed rats (the true culprits) to reproduce in ever greater numbers. By September 1666, the plague had gone, never to return. In its place another disaster arrived as the Great Fire of London destroyed most of the town, although only nine people were killed. St Paul’s Cathedral was made of stone and unlikely to catch fire. Unfortunately, it was being renovated and was covered in wooden scaffolding, so it burned to the ground.

After the fire, it was planned to rebuild London in a geometric pattern with avenues and gardens, much like Paris in later years. But in the aftermath of the plague and the fire, it was impossible to trace all the property owners in order to buy their land, so the rebuilding kept to the original haphazard pattern.

The war with the Netherlands appeared to be a stalemate, until another year brought another disaster. A Dutch fleet sailed up the River Medway (to the south of the Thames) as far as Chatham, fired on riverside towns, captured Sheerness on the North Sea coast, destroyed English vessels and towed away the navy’s flagship. England quickly entered peace negotiations with the Netherlands.

Better times came in 1669, with Sir Christopher Wren leading the rebuilding of London, and Charles becoming absorbed in horse racing at Newmarket; it therefore became known as ‘the sport of kings’. In the meantime, the court continued totally out of control; debauched, drunken and with the occasional murder. One of the court’s beauties was Frances Stewart. Charles had Jan Roettiers paint her in profile dressed as Britannia, holding a trident and shield. That image has appeared on English medals and coins ever since.

Charles’s latest mistress was the actress and (possibly) former prostitute, Nell Gwynne. When she produced an illegitimate son for Charles, she is said to have insisted on calling him ‘Little Bastard’, complaining that he had no other name; so Charles made him Earl of Burford and later Duke of St Albans. Another four bastards became dukes; two became earls.

Although Charles and his siblings living in England had been brought up as Protestants, his mother had managed to bring up her youngest child, Henrietta (called ‘Minette’), in Paris as a Catholic. Minette had been married off to King Louis’ brother, Philip Duke of Orleans, a homosexual and a brute. Living virtually alone, Minette became very close to Charles, and it was with her assistance (possibly at her instigation) that Charles negotiated the secret Treaty of Dover with her brotherin-law, King Louis XIV, who was also Charles’s and Minette’s cousin.

Under the terms of the treaty, Charles promised to join Catholic France in war against the Protestant Netherlands, to convert to Catholicism at a time of his choosing and to impose Catholicism in England. In return, Charles was to be paid £200,000 for each year of war against the Netherlands, plus £140,000 for imposing Catholicism. Was it greed, or was it plain stupidity? If the details became public, his crown would be gone within days.