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Charles II and the reconstruction of royal power*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2010

Joyce Lee Malcolm
Joyce Lee Malcolm
Affiliation:
Bentley College
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Abstract

While the restoration of monarchy in 1660 has attracted considerable scholarly interest, historians have usually focused upon the events that led to the abrupt change in the fortunes of Charles II rather than the less dramatic tactics by which the restored king consolidated his power. Yet the challenges Charles faced at his return were formidable, his initial personal popularity surprisingly short-lived. Somehow the regime had to quiet political and religious dissension, satisfy sharply conflicting expectations, and retrieve the power of the sword from a republican army and a volatile and well-armed public. Existing studies of the restoration years fail to explain precisely how the royal government successfully negotiated these difficulties. This essay describes the methods by which order was maintained and control reasserted; how the peaceful disbandment of the republican army and the subsequent control of its veterans were achieved; a police establishment of unprecedented size and effectiveness organized; the foundation for a permanent army laid; and the capacity of English subjects to rebel effectively diminished. In sum, it exposes the policies used to reconstruct royal authority so swiftly and securely that a host of enemies and public disenchantment failed to dislodge it.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 35 , Issue 2 , June 1992 , pp. 307 - 330
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

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References

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17 See Langdale to Nicholas, 3 Jan. 1661, CSPD 1660–1, p. 466.

18 P.R.O., SP 29/11, fos. 146–74; B.L., ‘Instructions to lords lieutenant, Whitehall, 1660’, Egerton MS 2542, fo. 512; ‘Earl of Devonshire lord lieutenancy papers’, B.L., Add. MS 34306, fos. 18, 19.

19 See 13 Car. II, Stat., cap. 6.

20 For a discussion of Interregnum experiments with select militia see Ive, J. G. A., ‘The local dimensions of defence: the standing army and militia in Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex, 1649–1660’ (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Cambridge University, 1986), pp. 246–62.Google Scholar Ive refers to Charles II's volunteer corps, pp. 253–4, 341.

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23 The first Derbyshire muster after the Restoration, divided into ‘trayned soldiers’ and ‘private soldiers’.

Scarsdale Hundred 84 trayned 94 private

High Seat Hundred 80 trayned 79 private

Wirkesworth Hundred 47 trayned 47private

Whole number 432

(B.L., Add. MS 34,306, fos. 1–5).

Lincolnshire muster of cavalry, April 1664.

6 troops Trained Bands 360 men

5 troops Volunteers 400 men

(Bodl. Lib., MS Clarendon 92, fo. 143). In Kent the Earl of Winchelsea listed eleven troops of volunteer horse in October 1660 (B.L., Stowe MS 744, fo. 51).

24 See for example fn. 21 above.

25 Winchelsea to Dering, 4 Oct. 1660, B.L., Stowe MS 744, fo. 49.

26 ‘Some propositions concerning the trained bands’, B.L., Egerton MS, fo. 526.

27 Winchelsea to Dering, 29 Sep. 1660, B.L., Stowe MS 744, fo. 52.

28 Langdale to Nicholas, 3 Jan. 1661, CSPD 1660–1, p. 466. See p. 318 below.

29 Seaward, , Cavalier parliament, p. 144.Google Scholar This scheme would have created a force similar to the Protectorate select militia. See Ive, , ‘Local dimensions of defence’, p. 254Google Scholar.

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31 ‘Diary of Seymour Bowman, M.P., 1660’, Bodl. Lib., Salway MS dep. fos. 9, 39.

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36 Ibid. p. 167.

37 See the Statute of Northampton (1328), 2 Edward m. c. 3. This declared that no man should ‘go nor ride armed by night or day in fairs, markets nor in no part elsewhere upon pain’. It was enacted during a time of extreme disorder and there is no evidence it was enforced during the seventeenth century.

38 Carlton to Leveson, London, 1 Sep. 1660, duke of Sutherland MSS, HMCsth Report, p. 168. And see HMC Le Fleming MSS, p. 24; PRO., SP 29/29 fo. 45.

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42 Council to Devonshire, 14 Dec. 1660, ‘Correspondence of Lord Cavendish, earl of Devonshire as lord lieutenant of Derbyshire’, B.L., Add. MS 34306, fo. 6.

43 Morrice to Downing, cited by Seaward, , Cavalier parliament, p. 146.Google Scholar Seaward provides further information on the government's disclosures and finds ‘the attempt to manipulate parliamentary opinion… quite evident’. Seaward, , Cavalier parliament, pp. 144–6Google Scholar See Greaves, R. L., Deliver us from evil: the radical underground in Britain, 1660–1663 (Oxford, 1986)Google Scholar.

44 PRO., PC 2/55, fo. 71.

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47 P.R.O., SP 29/24, fo. 96.

48 P.R.O., SP 29/24, fo. 43. For evidence of such fears see, for example, Newport to Leveson, 22 Sept. 1660, HMC 5th Report, appendix, p. 153; Delaville to Grey, 10 Jan. 1660/1, CSPD 1660–1, p. 470.

49 Delaville to Grey, 10 Jan. 1660/1, CSPD 1660–1, p. 470.

50 Cobbett, W. and Howell, T. B., eds., A complete collection of state trials and proceedings JOT high treason and other crimes and misdemeanours from the earliest period to the year 1783 (21 vols., London, 1816), VI, 67 note.Google Scholar The Fifth Monarchists had attempted to overthrow the regime of Oliver Cromwell and somehow ‘escaped beyond expectation’.

51 Ibid. p. 69 note.

52 Pepys, Diary, entry for 10 Jan. 1661, and see Evelyn, , Diary, III, 266Google Scholar.

53 LJ, XI, 243.

54 See Johnson, W.G., ‘Post-restoration non-conformity and plotting, 1660–1675’ (unpublished M.A. dissertation, University of Manchester, 1967).Google Scholar Articles of impeachment drawn up against Clarendon in 1667 charged: ‘That he set on foot a plot at a committee of Lords and Commons merely on purpose to move the King to set up a standing army.’ Milward, , Diary, p. 100Google Scholar.

55 Privy council orders, 8 Jan. 1660/1, 22 Jan. 1660/1.

56 Council to lords lieutenant, 8 January 1660/1, B.L., Add. MS 34222, fo. 15.

57 B.L., Add. MS 34222, fo. 17.

58 Johnson, , ‘Post-restoration non-conformity’, p. 85Google Scholar.

59 Capt. John Butler to Monck, 22 Jan. 1660/1, P.R.O., PC 2/55, fo. 520.

60 29 March 1661, P.R.O., PC a/55, fo 189.

61 ‘Proclamation prohibiting the seizing of any persons, or searching houses without warrant except in time of actual insurrections’, 17 Jan. 1660/1, B.L., 669, fo. 26(49).

62 Council to lord lieutenant, 22 January 1660/1, B.L., Add. MS 34306, fo. 9.

63 See for example B.L., Add. MS 34222, fo. 18, Council to lord lieutenants, 4 Mar. 1660/1, giving permission to discharge quakers from prison excepting only ‘Ringleaders of faction amongst them’.

64 LJ, IX, 241–3.

65 Clarendon, Life, II, 97.

66 13 Car. II, stat. I, cap. 6.

67 Thomson, Mark, A constitutional history of England, 1642–1801 (London, 1938), p. 160.Google Scholar And see Tanner, Joseph R., English constitutional conflicts of tht sevenventh century, 1603–1689 (Cambridge, 1938), p. 224.Google Scholar Western wrote on this point: ‘The militia system established by the acts of 1661–3 gave the king the shadow but only a little of the substance of power’ (Eighteenth century militia, p. 16). And see Fletcher, Anthony, Reform in the provinces: the government of Stuart England (New Haven, 1986), especially p. 321.Google Scholar Fletcher writes that despite the concession to the king in 1661 the ‘real significance’ of the militia acts of 1661, 1662, and 1663 lay elsewhere. ‘The king won a victory of principle but the country gentry obtained the substance of power.’ On the other hand, Hassell Smith argues that these acts ‘provided a sound militia system which could be misused by the Crown’ (Militia rates, and militia statutes’, p. 110).

68 Henry Coker was threatened by some victims with litigation for his militia activities in Wiltshire despite the fact he had acted according to orders. He believed he was saved by the 1661 Militia Act. See Western, , English militia, p. 11Google Scholar.

69 Council to lords lieutenant, 19 Aug. 1661, B.L., Add. MS 34306, To. 12.

70 Lord lieutenants to deputies, 21 Aug. 1661, B.L., Add. MS 34306, fo. 12, and see fo. 14.

71 B.L., Add. MS 34222, fo. 19.

72 William Holcroft, Notebook and papers of William Holcroft of Walthamstow, Essex Record Office, D/DCVI, fo. 2.

73 Deputy lieutenants to lord lieutenants, 11 Oct. 1661, B.L., Add. MS 34222, fo. 19.

74 Mil ward to lord lieutenant, 11 Jan. 1660/1, B.L., Add. MS 34306, fo. 9.

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76 P.R.O., PC 2/55/367, 187. The order was dated 4 Sept. 1661.

77 CJ, VIII, 334.

78 B.L., BM 1851. c. 8 (133), (134), (135).

79 CJ, VIII, 338–9.

80 This proclamation was reissued on 22 June 1664; 3 Nov. 1664; 18 Nov. 1665; to June 1670.

81 Francesco Giavarino to Doge and Senate, 15 Dec. 1662. Col. SP Venetian, 1661–4, P. 221.

82 Bennet to King, Apr. 1662, Bodl. Lib., MS Clarendon 76, fos. 150–3. Bennet was a hard line royalist, an enemy to Clarendon, always ready to advance the king's power. He was created Lord Arlington in 1665.

83 LJ, IX, 471, 19 May 1662. For a thorough explanation of the assessment system the new act set in place see Smith, Hassell, ‘Militia rates and militia statutes’, p. 110.Google Scholar He finds that the militia acts of 1662 and 1663 ‘satisfactorily resolved militia difficulties at the local level, but in so doing they provided a sound militia system which could be misused by the Crown’.

84 Northampton to King, Coventry, 18 Aug. 1662, Bodl. Lib., MS Clarendon 77, fos. 236–7. The new militia act required officers to swear that they did not believe it lawful ‘upon any pretence whatsoever’ to take up arms against the king.

85 Brereton to Lord Norwich, 9 Sept. 1662, Bodl. Lib., MS Clarendon 77, fo. 380.

86 CSPD 1661–2, pp. 423–4.

87 B.L., Add. MS 34222, fos. 24–6.

88 Westmorland to Vane, 21 July 1662, Bodl. Lib., MS Clarendon 77, fo. 66a.

89 Northampton to King, 18 Aug. 1662, Bodl. Lib., MS Clarendon 77, fos. 236–7.

90 Samuel Pepys was, by the autumn of 1662, sceptical of crown alarms about plots. On Sunday, 26 Oct. he recorded in his diary: ‘All this day, soldiers going up and down the towne, there being a alarme and many Quakers and others clapped up; but I believe without any reason. Only they say in Dorsettshire there hath been some rising discovered.’ The Lords and Commons, in drawing up articles of impeachment against the earl of Clarendon in 1667, were more specific about their suspicions that plots had been created for purposes of strengthening Charles's military control. Clarendon was accused of having ‘set on foot a plot at a committee of Lords and Commons merely on purpose to move the King to set up a standing army’ (Robbins, Caroline, ed., The diary of John Milward: September 17, 1666 to May 8, 1668 (Cambridge, 1938), p. 100)Google Scholar.

91 LJ, XI, 455.

92 Macpherson, James, ed., Original papers, containing the secret history of Great Britain, from the restoration, to the accession of the house of Hannover to which are prefixed extracts from the life of James II as written by himself: 1660–1714 (2 vols., London, 1775), 1, 9Google Scholar.

93 Pepys, , Diary, 22 01. 1661/1662; II, 165–6Google Scholar.

94 Hutton, , Restnatum, p. 289Google Scholar.