King, Tyrant, Beheaded Traitor: The Many Trials Of Charles I

Transcript

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

England in the 1640s was a country torn apart by civil war. Tens of thousands died as King Charles I and his supporters battled Parliament and its army. At stake - who would control the country, the coffers and religious beliefs. And it was the king who came to be perceived as a traitor and blamed for the bloodshed.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

A new book spins a gripping tale of the downfall of a king and the bloody vengeance that followed. Author Charles Spencer, an earl and descendent of Charles I, has written other well-received volumes of British history.

MONTAGNE: Now in "Killers Of The King," he turns to the story of the men who signed the death warrant of his royal ancestor, a man especially unsuited for the throne.

CHARLES SPENCER: He was not meant to be king, in fact. It was sort of unfortunate. He had an elder brother who went for a swim in the River Thames in London and picked up some terrible illness and died. So suddenly, we had the second son on the throne. And Charles was this very cultured, very intelligent man, very devout but not a leader of men at all. And he came up against some very, very focused individuals.

MONTAGNE: Individuals like Oliver Cromwell, one of the leaders and a man of limitless ambition, as Charles Spencer describes him. There were also those of humble backgrounds - a silversmith, a butcher's son who rose to prominence in the civil war. It was these men, who upon defeating the king, had to decide what to do with him.

Put this into perspective for us. How shocking was it to consider the king being executed, to even put a king on public trial?

SPENCER: Well, first of all, there was no mechanism for trying a king. It is fair to say that the courtroom where the king was tried in early 1649 was convoluted and legally unsound. But then on the other hand - and this is what the parliamentarians said later - you know, what were we supposed to do? We had to put a court together 'cause these were times like no other. And we had a problem like no other - a king who they believed was a traitor and a tyrant.

Now, Charles was absolutely certain that he must not even acknowledge the right of this court to do what it did. But he was met by an absolutely rigid determination that he was not there as King Charles I. He was there as Charles Stewart, his family name. And he was there because he had committed crimes effectively against the state. So really, in his trial, you have the essence of what the civil war was all about - a king who believed he was only answerable to God and a parliament believing that the king had acted as a man in an improper way. And he had to pay for it.

MONTAGNE: You speak of the 59 men who signed his death warrant. And there's this moment when Oliver Cromwell and another of these judges, basically, Henry Martin. What did they do? You tell us what they did.

SPENCER: Yes. No, it's quite extraordinary, you know, when you get - I've always thought of Cromwell. You know, he's this sort of ferocious, very capable, cold figure. But looking into him as a human being at this moment of high drama - you know, 59 men, as you mention, going into a room in the Palace of Westminster to sign the death warrant of a king. You'd have thought there could not be a more solemn moment. But Oliver Cromwell had a sort of hysterical fit. And we had eyewitness accounts of him like a schoolboy, sort of flicking ink at Henry Martin - with, like, quills, just flicking ink at each other in a sort of moment of such euphoria that they couldn't contain themselves. And it's - I love finding these little details.

And you asked me earlier, you know, what were people thinking? I honestly believe that the thousands who turned up to witness the execution of the king - that very, very cold morning in January, 1649 - I really don't think they thought it was going to happen. A lot of the people in the crowd believed that he was semi-divine. And we know this from the great diarist who was present, Samuel Pepys. When the ax fell and the king's head was presented to the crowd, there was a stunned gasp from the crowd. It was such an unbelievable moment. And the crowd rushed forward. And they were dipping clothing and handkerchiefs in the blood of the king, believing it had magical properties and would protect them from illness or disaster in the future.

MONTAGNE: Well, Charles I - his last words included saying that he wanted forgiveness for those who did this to him. And that was understood to be spoken to his heir who would be Charles II. In fact, little over a decade later, when Cromwell was dead and when Charles II finally came back from Europe - in exile in Europe - and took back the crown, there was, as you describe it, a great hunt for those - his executioners. And you call it a rich harvest of revenge.

SPENCER: And originally, there were 80 men who were involved. The killers of the king were the prosecutors, the judges and the masked executioners on the scaffold who dispatched the king. I think they became scapegoats. You know, at the end of a civil war, often somebody has to pay the price. And it became a sort of spiral of viciousness which went on, really, for the rest of Charles II's reign - for 25 years.

MONTAGNE: That manhunt stretched across Europe, even to the American colonies. For many who were caught, they suffered an agonizing death. Revenge even rained down on those who had already died. Oliver Cromwell's corpse was pulled from his tomb and publicly desecrated. At the very end of this saga of blood, author Charles Spencer makes a point of thanking these very killers of the king, calling them extremely brave.

We should say, Charles Spencer, you are the ninth earl Spencer, the brother of Princess Diana, a descendent of the executed King Charles I.

SPENCER: Correct.

MONTAGNE: Why do you admire those men?

SPENCER: Well, I started researching the book thinking I'd just feel very sorry for Charles I. But as I researched it, I realized that he really was responsible for so much of this bloodshed. You know, when five percent of English people were killed in the war. And it was a terrible time. And then at the same time, I respected the men because I - you know, I found none of them, apart from perhaps one - none of them were doing it out of personal malice. And it did bring forward the first steps towards democracy. And it did actually deal with the problem of kingship in England. And, you know, the royal family we have today is alive and kicking very much because of what happened back in the mid-17th century, where the British thought, right, we do want to continue having a ruler. But we're not going to be dealt with in a way that is basically dictatorial.

MONTAGNE: Author Charles Spencer. His new book is "Killers Of The King: The Men Who Dared To Execute Charles I." Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.