The English Civil War was a vicious armed strife that took place in England between 1642 and 1651. It was fought between the Royalists, under Charles I, and the Parliament, led by Oliver Cromwell. It was basically a clash between the King, who did not accept the legal limit imposed by the legislative branch of government, and the Parliamentarians, who refused to grant him funds for his wars in Scotland and elsewhere. This political confrontation led the King to close the Parliament, which increased tensions between the two political groups. Belonging to the Scottish House of Stuart, Charles I tried to rule as an absolute monarch, without the legislative branch of government, summoning the Parliament only when he needed funds to wage war.
The result of the English Civil War was a clear victory of the forces of Parliament, whose New Model Army defeated the Royalist Army in a series of fiercely-fought military engagements, such as the Battle of Naseby (1945) and the Battle of Maidstone (1648). The defeat of Royalists resulted in the execution of King Charles I, Stuart, on January 30, 1649, by decapitation (beheading), and the establishment of the dictatorship of Oliver Cromwell as Lord Protector of the British Isles from 1653 to 1658. It can be said that this domestic armed conflict was one of the early bourgeois revolutions. The first revolution of European scope as it ushered in the era of the decline of the feudal structure in Europe, initiating the replacement of the feudal structure by the capitalist structure.
Cause of the civil war
In 1637, the attempts to introduce church uniformity in Scotland led to a national uprising against Charles I, who was a Catholic monarch, to the establishment of the so-called Covenant. In 1639, this led to the Anglo-Scottish war, in which English absolutism suffered a defeat. This defeat and the peasant and city uprisings, which had erupted in the 1620s and 1630s, hastened the start of the revolution. In order to obtain funds, Charles I recalled Parliament; however, it refused to grant him subsidies for the conduct of the Scottish war. As a result, Charles I closed it (hence the name the 'Short Parliament', which was opened from April 13 to May 5, 1640).
The lack of funds, on the one hand, and discontent among both the lower classes and the financiers and merchant class on the other made Charles’ situation hopeless. A new parliament was called, which subsequently received the name of the Long Parliament, which was opened from November 3, 1640, to April 20, 1653. The Long Parliament destroyed the basic instruments of absolutism: the prerogative royal courts (the Star Chamber and the High Commission) were liquidated; all monopolistic patents and privileges were eliminated and their holders dismissed from Parliament; and a bill preventing the dissolution of an existing parliament without its consent was adopted. Strafford, the king’s closest adviser, was brought to trial in Parliament and executed on May 12, 1641. Later, Archbishop Laud and other advisers of the king were also beheaded. This is how the civil war broke out.
Summary of the conflict
On August 22, 1642, Charles I declared war on Parliament. The first phase of the war, which was a conflict between the royalist Cavaliers and the parliamentary Roundheads began. The economically developed southeastern counties, led by London, supported Parliament, while the feudal and backward counties of the south and north supported the king. Thus, regular armies were created. The indecisive policy of the “moderate” majority of the Parliament, the Presbyterians, led to the defeat of the parliamentary army in the first Battle at Edgehill on October 23, 1642. This allowed the royalist army to establish a base in Oxford. As a result, the Independents led by Oliver Cromwell got organized to confront the Royalists. Cromwell created a new parliamentary army, the so-called New Model Army on January 11, 1645. On June 14, 1645, the reorganized parliamentary army routed the royalist army at the Battle of Naseby. By the end of 1646, the first phase of the civil war had ended in a victory for Parliament. Charles I surrendered himself to the Scots on February 1, 1647.
The second phase of the English Civil War began when Charles I negotiated a secret treaty with the Scots, promising them again church reform, on December 28, 1647. Under the agreement, called the "Engagement", the Scots invaded England on Charles' behalf and restored him to the throne on condition of the establishment of Presbyterianism for three years. The Scottish invasion occurred together with a series of Royalist uprisings throughout England in the summer of 1648. Forces loyal to Parliament put down most of the uprisings in England. However, the uprisings in Kent, Essex and Cumberland were strong and violent. These fierce armed uprising and the Scottish invasion involved the fighting of pitched battles and prolonged sieges.
Colonel Thomas Horton defeated the Royalist forces at the Battle of St Fagans on May 8, 1648, while the rebel leaders surrendered to Cromwell on July 11 after the protracted two-month siege of Pembroke. Meanwhile, Sir Thomas Fairfax defeated a Royalist uprising in Kent at the Battle of Maidstone on June 1. After his victory at Maidstone and the pacification of Kent, Fairfax turned northward to reduce Essex, where the Royalists had taken up arms in great numbers. Fairfax soon drove the enemy into Colchester, but his first attack on the town met with a repulse and he had to settle down to a long siege.
The Parliament army, under Cromwell, defeated the Scots at the Battle of Preston on August 19, 1648. The battle took place largely at Walton-le-Dale near Preston in Lancashire, and resulted in a victory by the troops of Cromwell over the Royalists and Scots commanded by Hamilton. On December 1, 1648, the king was taken into custody. The Parliament Army occupied London again and decisively purged the Long Parliament of its Presbyterian majority (Pride’s Purge, December 6, 1648). On January 6, 1649, a high court was established to review the case of the king. On January 30, Charles Stuart was executed as “a traitor and a tyrant.”
On May 19, 1649, England became a republic in which supreme power was vested in a single-chamber parliament; the House of Lords shared the monarch’s fate. The Independent republic combined socially protective functions in internal policies with annexationist attempts and a policy of suppressing the liberation movements of peoples under English domination. Cromwell’s military expedition to Ireland (1649–50) was aimed at the suppression of the national liberation uprising of the Irish people. In 1653, Oliver Cromwell was named Lord Protector by Parliament, ruling England until his death in 1658.
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| The Royalist forces at the Battle of Naseby, the first victory of the Parliament Army on June 14, 1645. |