King Charles II

by Fraser, Antonia

  All this loaded the dice in favour of a sovereign with very wide theoretical powers at his command, who was also able to demonstrate the sheer intransigence of the Whigs by appearing to offer compromise. Above all, the Whigs had not made up their minds about the practical possibilities of resistance to the Crown, if any. It was scarcely likely that they would succeed against the sovereign until they did.

  Nevertheless, the nerve demanded from the King by the dissolution was considerable. There were troops present – on both sides. Armed clashes in the streets of Oxford, and the further nightmare of civil strife, were to be dreaded, whatever their outcome. Oxford University was Royalist, but the city itself was known to be Whig. The feeling that revolution – some new violent turnabout – was pending was not confined to the King. Men could read the signs, or thought they could. A correspondent wrote to Pepys in January, ‘I cannot but pray God to preserve us from the tumults, confusions and rebellions of 1641 and 1642, which seem to threaten us on one hand as much as Popery on the other.’20 No-one wanted a return to unsettled times; the man who risked plunging his country once more into such ‘tumults, confusions and rebellions’ bore a heavy responsibility if his plan went awry. It was therefore relevant that on 8 April, the day on which a long Declaration from the King on the subject of the recent Parliament was ordered to be read throughout the country, he also received the first payment of a new subsidy from Louis XIV. The two events were closely connected.

  This fresh agreement had been negotiated by word of mouth between Barrillon and Laurence Hyde. About the same time Hyde also spoke comfortingly to Barrillon on the subject of England’s tiresome involvement with Spain, that treaty negotiated by Sunderland a year back: Charles II would gradually divest himself of this obligation, which of course cut quite across French interests. Hyde, shortly to become Viscount Hyde and then Earl of Rochester after the death of Charles II’s sardonic friend, certainly deserved Dryden’s sobriquet of Hushai: ‘the friend of David in distress’. For without this agreement, it is doubtful that the English King – in the character of David – could have grappled so successfully with his ‘Goliath’ of a Parliament.

  The confidence that Charles II needed to organize his abrupt dissolution came from France. Even though the Whigs had not made up their minds to anything except to press raucously and childishly for the Exclusion of the Duke of York, this mental disarray might not prevail for ever. It was not even a question of the money which Charles II would now receive from Louis XIV – about 4,300,000 livres or over £300,000 spread over the next four years; although it was true that that would enable the King to jog along comfortably without Parliament for the time being.fn4 Once more, as in the 1660s, Charles II drew strength from the notion that Louis XIV was on his side and would help him, if need be, to uphold his ‘legitimate authority’.21

  Armed with this knowledge, the English King was able to display those qualities of attack and surprise which constituted one side of his nature; the other side, which craved ease and knew that delay often brings its own solution to difficulties, had enjoyed a long run. Fortune, which traditionally favours the bold, smiled upon the new determination of Charles II.

  The Declaration on the subject of the recent Parliament, ordered to be read aloud in all churches on 8 April, was as long as the message of dissolution had been short.22 It was also hypocritical. No-one should be persuaded that he was not going to use Parliament in the future, declared the King: this was merely ‘the restless malice of ill men who are labouring to poison our people, some out of fondness for their old beloved Commonwealth principles, and some out of anger at being disappointed in their own ambitions’. He repeated his familiar theme: no ‘irregularities’ would make him out of love with Parliaments. The King showed more of himself in disdaining responsibility for what had happened: ‘Having done our part … it cannot be justly imputed to us that the success hath not answered our expectations.’

  Charles II had done with dealing with five hundred Kings. In future he would deal with one French King and rest master of his own fate.

  The summer of 1681 bore a very different air from that of the previous year. Then there had been some dawnings of loyalty to the Crown visible to a discerning eye. Now the reactionary sun’s rays could be felt in a variety of ways. 13 April 1681 saw the first issue of Roger L’Estrange’s newspaper The Observator. Nahum Tate wrote of L’Estrange’s energies in attacking the Whigs, playing on his paper’s name: ‘He with watchfull eye/Observes and shoots their treasons as they fly….’ When the King and Queen went to dine at the Guildhall, the people’s rejoicing as they entered and left the City was considered to be in marked contrast to the coolness of previous years. As Henry Sidney wrote in his Diary at the end of June, ‘But which is most extraordinary is the favour the Queen is in.’23 She had emerged unscathed from the crucible of the bad years. It would take further time for the Duke of York (still in Scotland) to recover his lost popular prestige: nevertheless, the rehabilitation of the Catholics was part of the overall popular shift away from Whig influences.

  It was true that the summer of 1681 witnessed the dissection of yet another Pumpkin Plot at the trial of Edward Fitzharris. But Charles II’s cool and vigorous attitude towards this episode demonstrated as much as anything else how far he had moved from the worried stance of 1678. Optimists among plot-watchers expected, as usual, great things from Fitzharris’ revelations, and a connection with the household of the Duchess of Portsmouth was deemed encouraging.24 In the event, the King made it quite clear that he expected to see this petty informer condemned and executed. And executed he duly was, on 1 July. Justice was certainly done, since Fitzharris had sought to bring about the execution of a great many more. All the same, it was a public blow to the repute of the Whigs, notably Shaftesbury; it demonstrated how far their vicious control of these events had slipped. The condemnation and execution of another informer, an anti-Papist joiner named Stephen College (amongst whose alleged crimes was the singing of the gross ballad ‘The Raree Show’ at Oxford),25 continued the trend.

  About the same time quite a different trial, that of Oliver Plunkett, Archbishop of Armagh, showed up both English justice and the royal character in a less attractive light. Plunkett’s trial on a charge of high treason was a travesty. Dragged to England and kept in prolonged imprisonment there, he was unable to secure satisfactory Irish witnesses because of the expense and difficulty of travel. Those that did manage to arrive presented an alien spectacle, with their thick, often incomprehensible Irish accents, and were correspondingly badly treated in court. The witnesses produced on the other side, for this conspiracy that never was, puffed up with their own perjury, received a gentler welcome.

  Thus Oliver Plunkett was found guilty and on 1 July went presumably to his heavenly reward.fn5 As Sir Charles Lyttleton wrote, he was ‘generally pitied and believed to die very innocent of what he was condemned’.26 Yet no one cared to save him, not the Earl of Essex, who, as former Lord Lieutenant, knowing the Irish scene, might have protested effectively against his condemnation – nor, for that matter, the King. Charles II could see the significance of condemning Fitzharris, but, in common with most Englishmen, no matter how liberal, could not see that there was much to be gained from saving this Irish archbishop.

  The royal eye was fixed elsewhere. The newly piercing glance of the King was focused on Shaftesbury. On 2 July, the day after the executions, Shaftesbury was arrested. The King’s move was not unexpected. Shaftesbury had wagered his strength against the King’s in a series of provocative actions, including the attacks on Louise and James as prostitute and recusant, as well as the sallies at Oxford. Shaftesbury was also on excellent terms with those the King considered his enemies, such as the arch-informer Titus Oates, still at large, if not quite the popular hero of yester-year.

  The charge against Shaftesbury was frankly weak, as weak as some of the charges against the Catholic priests who had died (the fact has to be faced that Charles II did not regard the course of
justice as imperturbable, any more than the Whigs had done). Shaftesbury was accused of treason because he had conspired to levy war against the King at Oxford; but the most cogent piece of evidence against him was a Bill of Association, a list of people who were to be invited to protect the King and prevent the Catholic succession.

  The truth was that Shaftesbury’s arrest was an aggressive action which Charles II now felt himself strong enough to make. He was also animated by his strong personal dislike of the fair-haired villain. This dislike, like his rare outbursts of jealousy, stood out in contrast to his generally mild attitude to politicians. On the whole, Charles was content to be guided by their usefulness. In this way he amiably agreed to a reconciliation with the ‘Judas’ Sunderland in the following summer after some pleading from Louise, Sunderland’s long-term ally.27 But Shaftesbury was different. He was the burr under the saddle of the King, as Charles’ obstinate pursuit of his trial and conviction this autumn proceeded to demonstrate.

  It would have been wiser to have let Shaftesbury depart for the Carolinas, as he himself wished.28 Shaftesbury had business interests there. An absent Shaftesbury was all the King really required in terms of safety. Instead, carried away one must believe by an animosity founded on fear, the King demanded a trial. He was punished for deserting his own former policies of forgiveness and flexibility. The new Lord Chief Justice, Pemberton, made strenuous efforts to secure Shaftesbury’s condemnation. He quoted the Act of 1661 by which it was treasonable to try and interfere with the King’s liberty. This, it was claimed, Shaftesbury had done at Oxford, supported by the presence of armed men. The famous blue silk bows in their hats were quoted in evidence against him. But on 24 November a Grand Jury composed of resolute Whigs returned a verdict of Ignoramus and Shaftesbury went free.

  In short, the King had struck too far too soon. He should have been more wary of the deeply Whig sympathies of the City: at the Lord Mayor’s Banquet a few weeks earlier ‘every little fellow’ was said to have censured both the King and ‘his proceedings at that time’.29 The acquittal of Shaftesbury was a personal blow. The Lord Mayor himself, on the King’s instructions, refused to allow the bonfires or rejoicing which the Whigs wished to mount. But neither King nor Lord Mayor could prevent the striking of a celebratory medal in honour of the event, adorned with the humiliating motto Laetamur – ‘Let us rejoice’. The obverse showed the sun emerging radiant from clouds over the Tower of London. Laetamur! No, the King did not rejoice.

  There were however other causes of rejoicing. There is an interesting juxtaposition between public and private happiness in the lives of famous men. The presence of private happiness can always atone for the lack of public fulfilment, if the man himself will suffer it to be so. The personal life of Charles II during the last years of his life was extremely happy, even serene. Queen Catharine, comforted by his championship, had settled into a role which suited her and did not conflict with the King’s other pleasures. She had, for example, protected Catholic Louise from the consequences of the Test Act of 1678 by including her name in the list of her own ladies who were not to be expelled. In explanation Catharine said that Louise had always behaved ‘decently’ towards her, unlike Barbara, who had been ‘cruel’.30 By now, the King’s mistresses resembled the great ships he also loved, floating grandly on the tide of the royal favour, their hulls weighed down with jewels and other riches. They flew their ducal titles like pennants, their ennobled offspring following in their wake like flotillas of lesser boats. Emotionally however the King had reverted to the ‘monogamy’ of the first decade of his reign, on which Pepys had commented.

  While Nell Gwynn retained what Aphra Behn called her ‘eternal sweetness’, the solace of the King’s later years, Madame de Maintenon to his Louis XIV, was Louise. Relaxation, not religion, was however what Louise offered. Just as the King’s accord with his wife and her own popularity were the subject of comment, the domestic ascendancy of Louise was also remarked. She had grown plumper, more ‘fubbsy’ than ever, as her later portraits show; it only increased her air of luxurious cosiness.

  Absence was one test of the King’s affections. With her son, Louise paid a visit to France in the autumn of 1684; she secured the settlement of the Aubigny estates and dukedom upon the boy as a result of Charles’ intercession with Louis XIV. The King’s delight at her return was unqualified. He also passed that other test of love, the appearance of a rival. When stories were circulated of Louise’s dalliance with Philippe de Vendôme, nephew of Hortense de Mazarin, Charles had the presumptuous swain thrown out of the country. To celebrate her ascendancy, Louise had her own medal struck, embellished with a Cupid and bearing the legend: Omnia Vincit – it was a more flirtatious form of insolence than Shaftesbury’s.

  It is impossible to be certain when – if ever – the sexual bond between King and Duchess ceased. In January 1682 there were rumours that the King had not slept with the Duchess for four months. Bruce’s testimony that the King supped with Louise ‘without intent’ is to be taken more seriously because of Bruce’s intimate position in the King’s household.31 Yet no outsider can pronounce with complete confidence on such matters. Given the continued healthy vigour of the King, absolute cease seems unlikely. What is much more certain is that the domestic bond increased. In principle, King Charles, Queen Catharine and Duchess Louise created a master triangle in which all parties, for the first time in their lives, were roughly content with the status quo.

  The King does not appear to have practised any form of birth control – there are no references to the topic by any of the interested parties. He also derived a great deal of happiness from his children. As far as one can keep track of them, the total of those that survived long enough to feature in the royal records was a round dozen. As Buckingham brightly observed, a King is supposed to be the Father of his People, and Charles II was certainly the father of a good many of them. These twelve known bastards were born from seven women: Lucy Walter, Elizabeth Killigrew, Catharine Pegge, Barbara Villiers (mother of five), Nell Gwynn (mother of two), Moll Davis and Louise de Kéroüalle. The King certainly did not suffer from that complex characteristic of some Casanovas who must claim the paternity of every child conceived within their orbit: to be cynical, he could scarcely afford to do so, since paternity for a sovereign was a serious (financial) business. At the same time he honoured his genuine paternal obligations with a mixture of love and liberality.

  The royal accounts include payments which have a distinctly nursery flavour – rattles, cradles and so forth. As the children grew older, more substantial sums were disbursed. In April 1684 Lady Mary Tudor, daughter of Moll Davis, received a suite of tapestry hangings, a looking-glass, a little crimson damask bed for country use, a bed of druggett for her gentlewoman, and for her chambermaid, laundry-maid, page and footman 150 ells of Holland to make six pairs of sheets. There were wedding expenses, which any father might expect to pay (the King’s heart was in the right place: as we have seen over the wedding of Anne Fitzroy, he accepted the responsibility, even if payment came at a characteristically slow pace). There were dowries and allowances. As late as 1693 Charles Duke of Southampton was still being allotted an allowance of £6,000 a year.32

  Where the emotions were concerned, so affectionate were the relations of Charles II with his illegitimate children that it was all the more regrettable that he should lack legitimate heirs. The next century would see disputes between royal father and son become the norm, not the exception. Since children tend to reproduce the family pattern they have experienced, a terrible chain reaction was set up. King and Prince of Wales were in constant conflict. The boy dreamt of by Queen Catharine in her delirium would have had a happier fate, since Charles II had always enjoyed delightful relations with Charles I. For that matter, Charles I had been greatly loved by his own father. The Stuarts, for all their weaknesses in other respects, made good parents; unlike the Hanoverians, they were characterized by warm family relationships. Charles II would have been an excellent f
ather – within the marriage bond.

  As it was, he did make an excellent father – but outside it. His blood courses down through the veins of the English aristocracy into the body of English life. His descendants, if not quite as numerous as the sands of the sea, are at any rate numerous enough for the line to be unlikely to die out. ‘Six bastard Dukes survive his luscious Reign’: so Defoe summed up the King’s achievement; and it is a point often made today in attacks on the hereditary House of Lords that so many dukedoms derive from the amours of King Charles II.fn6 Such critics would undoubtedly approve the contemporary satire of Marvell on the subject:

  The misses take place, each advanced to be duchess

  With pomp great as queens in their coach and six horses,

  Their bastards make dukes, earls, viscounts and lords,

  With all the title that honour affords …

  In fact, six of the King’s sons received nine dukedoms: Monmouth and Buccleuch for Lucy Walter’s son; Southampton, Northumberland and Grafton and Cleveland, on her death, for Barbara’s three boys; St Albans for Nelly’s surviving son; Richmond and Lennox (joined together) for Louise’s only child.fn7 Monmouth’s marriage to Anne Duchess of Buccleuch in her own right, led to the pair being created Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch in England jointly. After his death, Duchess Anne was allowed to retain her own Scottish Buccleuch title, although that of Monmouth was swallowed up in her husband’s disgrace.