Charles I: The Ignition for the English Civil War?

I was sorting through some of my paperwork from university, clearly very well organised in a huge box *please hence the sarcasm on that one*. I always seem to be immaculately tidy right up till revision time and then everything becomes tangled and messy, mainly because I could never face the prospect of flicking back through all the paperwork again after the exam just in case I realised I made a devastating mistake!

Anyway, I am deviating again... I came across my last essay for a course in the first year where I got a first. It was broadly named "Society, Culture and Politics in Early Modern Europe" or some such... it was an ace course where we covered everything. It included the English Civil War and working at the castle now, people, who want to know how we came to have a Civil War. It is hard to explain in a sort span of time, without seemingly either lecturing or shortening it to the point of historical criminality where I miss out key bits. Anyway, I often remark that Charles I was his own undoing in some ways... and here my conclusion of my essay I found in my pile of notes explains... Perhaps I could be accused of historical criminality as I am missing out quite a chunk of what happened... but go along with it for me, please??

Unfortunately for Charles I, his reign was based on 'personal monarchy', where his personality determined the style, efficiency and effectiveness of his rule. It was apparent that Charles lacked a strong personality. His readiness to defer duties to others was a dangerous weakness and the flaw that should never be present in a monarch was inconsistency and a bad judge of character. When his main advisor and friend, Duke of Buckingham was assassinated, Charles was left to his own devices. However, instead of getting back onto his feet, he turned to his wife, who he came to rely heavily on. She was all too eager to fill the vacant position of political favourite despite her lack of knowledge of the country she resided in and the fear she invoked in the nation (she was a French Catholic in an unstable Protestant country who also had uneasy relations with the French).

Although Charles was under no obligation to call parliament and they were often only called when the monarch needed them, usually for money. However, Charles pushed his authority too far. He did not call parliament for eleven years and had 'illegally' used Ship Money (which was to be used only for when the Navy needed to be equipped due to a national emergency) to supplement his income, which caused many people to think he was determined to subvert the laws and customs of England, especially when he proclaimed that he had forbidden any one to talk of calling another government. The historian Margaret James argues that the Reformation and the evolution of more democratic political thought have a link. Luther had proclaimed that no Christian should be ruled except by his own consent, a potentially destabilising idea for a monarch who believed in the 'Divine Right of Kings'. Religion had provided a political basis for opposing Charles' rule.

Charles also added to this link between religion and politics. Although he did not think politically, he did think that “kingship was a sacramental concept” and that if he traded parts of it away, like he thought the first parliament he called was asking him to do, he was committing the act of sacrilege. His rule and how he ruled was directly linked to God and religion. He was actually politicising religion further and the saying "If you give a man enough rope, he will hang himself..." the same could almost be said for Charles and his dogmatic insistence that he was handpicked by God to rule.

This ties back into the idea of a 'personal monarchy'. Charles refused to budge on how he ruled and he upheld backward and frail institutions in a religiously divided nation with social and economic problems. The majority of the nation hated the outdated feudal system he insisted on keeping and he was lengthening his own rope. The historian, John Morrill, agrees: “the personal weakness of the monarch could in themselves cause the collapse of order” and it did. Indeed Charles was so inapt in his role as monarch that he agitated matters.

Of course, there were inherent problems in English society which long preceeded Charles I. Henry VIII and the Reformation had unbalanced society long established on the Catholic faith. This religious issue had not been helped by Henry's son and two daughters, who first killed Catholics, then Protestants and then Catholics again for heresy. Social and economic problems had been a long time grievance of the peasantry. The history of religious and social issues with additional current social problems were a key issue and provided a strong base for discontent in society, but I genuinely doubt whether it would generate enough fervour to drive the nation to decapitate their monarch. However, the ministers that helped dispose the King- what was their motivation? They did not share the same despair at failing crops as the peasantry did. They would not starve, just see a dent in their profits. It was political. And Charles. They really had a grievance with Parliament not being called for 11 years. They no longer welded political influence and this is what irked them! Charles failed at keeping the masses happy (there was no rise in real wages, a rise in rent and in food costs and the Poor Law wasn't coping) and also at keeping his ministers happy with regular meetings and any attempt at showing a caring, listening ear.

The revisionist historians, such as Morrill, believe that the ‘revolution’ was caused by the monarchy, not the people, (and also by the Scottish and Irish, not the English, which I will delve into later perhaps). I believe that the offensive prayer book of 1637 forced upon the Three Kingdoms in an attempt to try an unite them is an example of how Charles was politically ignorant and exacerbated already highly strung tensions in his country. Three very different countries with very different religious beliefs. Elizabeth I and James I had never tried to unite them.

Religion and politics were so interwoven that religious reforms have a political context, which Charles did not recognise and this blunder cost him dearly. If Charles had been politically more astute, the social, religious and political problems would have been kept suppressed, as previous monarchs had done. However, Charles’ tactless handling of both social and political problems with the addition of exacerbating religious division created the Civil War. And he lost his head for it.