The Cromwell Deception

by John Paul Davis

  Among the forty-plus rooms that make up the interior of the gallery, rooms four and five are as impressive as any. Unlike the highly popular rooms one to three where portraits of the five Tudor monarchs watch over the rooms like guards on duty, room five in particular was bright and airy and, at 6:30pm on a Thursday, extremely peaceful. I’ve always loved history, and seeing so many recognisable faces from the Stuart era lining the walls immediately caught my imagination. With the room to myself, I decided to take in everything at leisure. After focusing for a while on the easily recognisable image of Charles I, surrounded by his allies from the Civil War, the famous portrait of Oliver Cromwell on the opposite side of the room seemed the next logical stop. I recognised the portrait immediately. It was the one I associated with him more than any other, the image always used in documentaries on the English Civil War and on the cover of practically every book ever written of him.

  Alongside Cromwell was another portrait about the same size, an obvious Roundhead of similar but not identical features and striking almost exactly the same pose. After failing to recognise him, I learned from the description that the man’s name was Sir Arthur Hesilrige, both an ally and, later, opponent of Cromwell. As I took in the description, I found something that took me altogether by surprise. Recent infrared examinations of the Hesilrige portrait confirmed it had actually been painted over another portrait: one of the man whose picture hung immediately to his right. Incredibly the painting appears to have originally been of Cromwell.

  When I finally departed the gallery around 7:30pm, taking the train back to my home in the Midlands, I found the recent visit had taken centre stage in my mind. An idea was forming, and continued to do so throughout the journey. These days I rarely catch a train without a pen and a few scraps of paper, if not a full notebook, and that day was no exception. By the time I left the train, the plot for this novel was almost complete.

  Thank you as always for reading this book. I hope you enjoyed the story. For those of you who are interested, I’ve included an additional section in order to separate fact from fiction.

  The National Portrait Gallery

  The National Portrait Gallery does, of course, exist in real life and is located close to Trafalgar Square in a building called St Martin’s Place, which also houses the famous National Gallery. Both are free to enter, and most days welcome thousands of visitors through their doors.

  Descriptions of the gallery in this book are largely accurate. The colour of the walls and the layout of the rooms and doorways are based on my visit. The portraits mentioned do exist and presently hang in the locations I have described.

  On some occasions I have taken liberties with my descriptions. It is my understanding that there are storage areas on both the top floor and beneath the ground floor of the gallery, though I have no definitive knowledge of where individual portraits are usually kept. Access to the non-display collection is possible, though I have never seen this at first hand. As far as I could tell there was only one security camera in room five, thanks to which the gallery probably have their own file on me by now! The staff areas of the gallery are all off-limits to the general public. I did consider tapping a guide on the shoulder and asking questions like “Where is the CCTV room?” and “How many guards are on duty at night?” but after being caught on camera so many times, I thought it might be best to leave those details to my imagination!

  Mentmore

  The village exists, as does the estate mentioned in this novel. Mentmore Towers dates back to the 19th century and was indeed constructed for Baron Mayer de Rothschild and used to store his valuable art collection.

  The suggestion in this book that the estate has been used at times to store art for the NPG is true. In World War II it took in many collections to protect them from the Blitz. As far as I’m aware, no NPG stock has been held there since the war. While part of the estate has since become a golf course, plans are currently in place to convert the house into a hotel.

  The Reign of Charles I

  The English Civil War is one of those strange eras of England’s history. Like the period involving King John and the Magna Carta or beliefs in the existence of a historical Robin Hood, it is generally defined by assumptions of what happened as opposed to what actually took place.

  The term ‘English Civil War’ encompasses a sequence of major conflicts that occurred in England, 1642–6, 1648–9, and finally 1649–51. The background of the war is in many ways just as important as the result.

  Charles I had replaced his father, James I, on the throne in March 1625, and ruled England alongside his wife, Henrietta Maria, the youngest daughter of Henry IV of France. Charles was unlike his father. Whilst James had been pretentious but strong, Charles was cultured but indecisive. Though his small stature and nervous stammer made it very difficult for him to gain the unqualified loyalty and respect of Britain’s elite, his passion for art and generous patronage of artists such as Rubens and Van Dyck made him many friends in the art world.

  His unfortunate misjudgement, from the outset of his reign, in clinging uncompromisingly to his father’s belief in the Divine Right of Kings contributed greatly to the troubles that confronted him. When addressing parliament, Charles spoke in a plain and concise manner, a welcome change from his father’s garrulousness, but his monetary demands exceeded those made by James and were viewed as excessive by the members. A Protestant-heavy House of Commons consistently refused his demands and began to consider labelling charges against the Duke of Buckingham, a key advisor to James who had maintained a strong influence over Charles. With Charles’s early actions brought into question, a new charter of political liberty was in the offing by 1628, in many ways a logical extension of the Magna Carta that, among other things, condemned the King’s ability to sentence without trial, tax without the consent of the Commons, control his own troops or even impose his rights against parliament without their approval. When the Petition of Right was first put to Charles, he dismissed it as a contradiction of his divine right.

  Over the next ten years the political situation became delicately poised in England. The murder of Buckingham in 1628 was followed in 1630 by Charles’s becoming a father (the later Charles II), and the King’s decision to dissolve parliament, ruling without one from 1629 till 1640. The void left by Buckingham’s death saw the rise of two key supporters, William Laud, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and former parliamentarian Thomas Wentworth, the Earl of Strafford. By 1635 Charles had ruled England with relative success, but his need for funds had become critical. After achieving mixed success attempting to raise funds through ‘ship money’ – funds levied on the coastal towns that didn’t require parliament’s consent – Charles’s decision in 1637 to impose Laud’s controversial high church prayer book on his Scottish subjects saw riots in Edinburgh and the King declare a so-called ‘Bishops’ War’ on Scotland. His forces suffered defeat at Newcastle, and a lack of funds led him to call the ‘Short Parliament’. His request for funds was refused, and a second parliament opposed his demands by nearly four to one. The events of what historians later dubbed ‘The Long Parliament’ was noteworthy in England’s history, as the shift in consciousness toward republicanism escalated alongside a shift in wealth from the church and baronial magnates to the ever-emerging Middle Class.

  The Long Parliament had been a notable setback to the King. Bullied to put his signature on Strafford’s death warrant, the spectre of the Magna Carta returned to haunt him again in 1641 with an updated 200-clause version of the Petition of Right that included the removal of the King’s Star Chamber (his personal court), regularisation of taxes and a demand that bishops be forever banned from sitting in the House of Lords. The proposal was radical, even compared to the current mindset, and was only narrowly voted in by MPs. Charles’s response became legendary. In January 1642 he personally entered the House of Commons and demanded the arrest of five MPs, including John Pym and Arthur Hesilrige, all of who escaped. Within two months, armed gangs from Londo
n began to bombard Westminster, forcing Charles and the Queen to take flight. While the Queen headed to France, along with the Crown jewels, Charles raised his standard at Nottingham, thus beginning England’s sixth major civil war.

  The First Civil War

  Perhaps the most fascinating legacy of this civil war is that even after more than three centuries opinion remains split over which side represented the heart of the English people. The longstanding stories that the war saw families divided is a somewhat surprising notion that is genuinely supported by much evidence, primarily at local level. In terms of logistics, parliament’s strengths were many. It had access to the key seaports that had been so critical in the First Barons’ War of the 13th century, and London was also firmly in parliament’s grip. The voice of the commoner, however, often remained nostalgically in Charles’s favour, and when the conflict began at Edgehill in October 1642, it was the valour of these courageous but undisciplined forces that successfully drove the Parliamentary horse from the field but failed to see the job through. As the first battle of the war ended without a decisive outcome, the general commanding the Parliamentary forces returned to London as Charles set up his new HQ at Christ Church in Oxford.

  The King’s nephew, Prince Rupert, fresh from excelling himself at Edgehill, had overseen Royalist control of the north, including York, and by the middle of 1643 the Royalist position was strong. Isolated military conflict throughout the year kept tensions simmering, but little occurred on either side to change the direction of the war until the fiercely republican John Pym convinced the Edinburgh assembly to assist the Roundhead cause with 18,000 infantry and 3,000 cavalry in recognition of parliament’s vow to abolish bishops from government and impose religious reforms in England. These reinforcements met up with their Roundhead counterparts near York in the summer of 1644, where a further band of East Anglian cavalry led by the Cambridgeshire MP, Oliver Cromwell, joined them. Conflict at Marston Moor, a short distance from York, saw the butchering of 3,000 Royalists and a key momentum shift in the Roundheads’ favour.

  If the previous year had been pivotal to the direction of the war, the remainder of 1644 and early 1645 were no less significant. Royalist recovery at Newbury and in Cornwall saw Cromwell come close to blows with the aristocratic Parliamentarian generals, the earls of Manchester and Essex, culminating in now famous words, “I hope to live to see never a nobleman in England.” Cromwell’s wishes were partially fulfilled, along with his demands for a New Model Army consisting of paid troops. A winter’s training paid off when the decisive action came at Naseby, a resounding Royalist defeat. After the fall of Bristol and finding himself besieged at Oxford, Charles escaped and remained successfully undercover before being recognised in disguise among the Scottish camp near Newark. After a year negotiating the King’s handover to parliament, the Scots sent Charles to London.

  The Second Civil War

  The King was greeted surprisingly well by the people of England on his way to London in February 1647. The country had suffered during four years of war, and there was fresh belief among the citizens that it was time for a swift conclusion. The Long Parliament agreed that Cromwell’s New Model Army should be disbanded, the majority of their pay to come from fines laid against the Royalist gentry. Cromwell was enraged that promises to his men had been broken. Adamantly opposed to any plans to disband his troops, Cromwell led them to capture the King as he was travelling to the city, and then held him captive at Hampton Court.

  A series of debates ensued. Whilst later historians have pointed in particular to events held at Putney Church between 28 October and 9 November 1647 as having paved the way for the now established democratic principle that no man should be bound to a system of government that he played no part in creating, the fate of the King remained unresolved. Later in November Charles escaped Hampton Court and set up a new home on the Isle of Wight. Buoyed by his newfound freedom and warmed by rumours of rekindled affection for him among the people, he made contact with his subjects in Scotland about renewing the military campaign against the Roundheads. A Scottish invasion, accompanied by risings in the north, saw Cromwell return to the field, and elements of dissent were brutally vanquished. The King was returned to London where the Long Parliament had been growing increasingly concerned by the radicalism of Cromwell’s New Model Army. As negotiations between the King and parliament began to fall through, it was the army, not parliament, who took control. The Long Parliament was dismissed, aside from members approved by Cromwell and the army, a number estimated between 154 and 210. The so-called ‘Rump’ of the Long Parliament established a committee to try the King on grounds of treason. As the trial ended, during which Charles had shown nothing but contempt, the decision was guilty. On 30 January 1649, forty-three years to the day after the execution of four of the Gunpowder Plotters, Charles was led to a scaffold erected outside the Banqueting House in the heart of Whitehall and beheaded, a mournful groan among the crowd taking the place of the usual cheer.

  The Third Civil War

  The execution of the King was the first occasion of its type in England. Many kings had been killed – Edward II, Richard II and Richard III all met their downfalls in some way at the hands of their successors – but till now monarchy had always survived. The Rump Parliament ordered that no successor would replace Charles on the throne, but that England would become a republic. The image of the monarch, used for so long to decorate the seal used to authenticate acts of Parliament, was removed and the House of Lords was abolished; replaced by a forty-one-man council, with the enigmatic Cromwell sitting unchallenged as chief citizen. Whilst Cromwell took his military skills to Ireland to neutralise elements of dissent with such ferocity that his actions are now considered genocide, the Scots who had opposed Charles I now crowned his son Charles II in Edinburgh. An invasion by Scottish forces in the summer of 1651 ended in defeat at Worcester. Although Cromwell had succeeded in defeating a second king, Charles survived, spending a night hidden within the body of an oak tree in the grounds of Boscobel House on the Shropshire/Staffordshire border before making his way to France, disguised as a servant.

  Oliver Cromwell

  A full biography of Oliver Cromwell is far beyond the potential of this section, not to mention superfluous thanks to the tireless efforts of Lady Antonia Fraser. In short, Cromwell was born in the town of Huntingdon in 1599 to one of the wealthiest and most influential families in the area. He attended the University of Cambridge from 1616 and was elected MP for Huntingdon in 1628. His role in local politics was widely established in 1640 when he moved constituency to Cambridge. In the first year of the civil war he played a prominent role in raising troops for the Parliamentarian cause before being made a colonel in the Eastern Association. His prowess on the battlefield was celebrated amongst his contemporaries, leading to his being made lieutenant-general of the Eastern Association a year later and then the New Model Army that lined up at Naseby.

  Cromwell’s rise to success was nothing short of phenomenal. When the King came to trial, Cromwell’s command over the forces had augmented his position as the strongest placed Parliamentary statesman and a key pioneer in the running of a republican England. Cromwell imposed his will on both Ireland and Scotland, forcing a union with England, expanding on the vision of James I, and ruled by elected MPs throughout the union. The so-called commonwealth lasted only four years before Cromwell dismissed the Rump Parliament in 1653. As the year ended, he agreed to be named Lord Protector, ruling England with ‘somewhat of monarchical power’. Over the next four years elected parliaments came and went. Cromwell’s hold on the nation intensified with the establishment of eleven military regions in England, an introduction of puritanical rules and censorship topped off with bouts of Calvinist-style iconoclasm in the east of England. In 1657 he took seriously a petition by a group of lawyers and MPs with the potential to see the restoration of the monarchy. Whilst refusing the crown, his second inauguration as Lord Protector mirrored much of past coronations and
included his being seated in the coronation chair and donning the purple robes of past kings. A year later, he died at Whitehall, most likely from a combination of malaria and urinary complications, perhaps made worse by the death of his daughter, Elizabeth Claypole. He named as his successor Richard Cromwell, who was ousted after less than a year in office. In 1660, after an interregnum of eleven years following the death of Charles I, the restitution of the monarchy was completed by the succession to the throne of his son Charles II.

  Sir Arthur Hesilrige

  Born in 1601, Hesilrige was the eldest son of Sir Thomas, first Baronet, Hesilrige who hailed from Leicestershire. Hesilrige’s political career began in earnest after being elected MP for Leicestershire in the Short Parliament of 1640 and soon after in the same seat in the Long Parliament. Like many of his contemporaries, his fiery puritanical values put him on a direct collision course with Archbishop Laud, and in 1641 he was noted for his involvement in the Act of Attainder that saw the execution of the Earl of Strafford. Mainly in response to this, Hesilrige was one of the five MPs the King targeted for arrest in 1642, leading in no small part to the war that followed.