Three days before he hid in an oak tree, he said he wanted to be shot dead. Did this remarkably mature young man really mean it? He was Charles II, the alleged debauchee whom a filthy poem dubs ‘a merry monarch’, and we think of him partying with glee while reigning at Whitehall. The episode in the oak tree, however, is part of his earlier story – the first thirty years of his life. These formative years shine fascinating light on his influences and the development of his unique character, but some of that development took place at dark depths in his mind.
When he was 12 in 1642, the erupting civil war plunged Charles into a private melancholy that triggered fears for his future health. Then during his twenties, he passed various comments of a disturbingly despondent nature. By this time, his mother was railing against him, his financial pleas had been rejected across Europe and the MPs responsible for his father’s beheading were declaring England a republic as they ruled in his place.
His grandest stab at regaining power was the Battle of Worcester, and the bloodshed of his defeat here surrounded him when he blurted out his wish to be killed by gunfire. He nevertheless had little confidence in his 17-year-old brother, the heir who would lead the entire quest for the monarchy’s restoration if Charles died then, in 1651.
Finally persuaded to flee the battle, Charles was donning a woodcutter’s disguise just hours later as he tried to avoid capture and execution, but the chances were he’d be caught before the day was out, especially with ‘majestie beeing soe naturall unto him’. Despite numerous close shaves, his pursuers never got their hands on him. It’s worth noting that Charles, when a child, was told: ‘I would not have you so seared with majesty as to think you are not of mankind’, and he spent most of his life projecting a blend of regal and human qualities. It was all part of his plan.
(Metropolitan Museum of Art) A c. 1700 snuffbox depicting Charles in the oak tree: An angel presents him with the three Stuart crowns while below ride two Roundheads seeking him out.
To get a sense of Charles deep down, we need to look at his childhood first. His wet nurse Christabella Wyndham was known for her bossy, overbearing personality, yet Charles wanted her beside him everywhere, even years after weaning. Along the way, family life was loving, with Charles, as the senior prince, seeing his brother James look up to him, but also raised like a brother with them was George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham – a later minister who manipulated Charles in government from the 1660s.
In the 1630s, Buckingham lived as the eldest child in the palaces, finding Charles thus look up to him despite the duke’s lower status, so these boys had reason to envy each other. William Cavendish, Earl of Newcastle was meanwhile the servant who wanted majesty restricted in Charles, and the prince adored him, partly because Newcastle discouraged ‘too much book’. Charles’s adulthood aversion to paperwork springs to mind immediately, but so does Charles’s passion for science – Newcastle helped experimental research into optics, mechanics and more, not to mention turning his hand to playwriting with a style similar to Restoration comedy. Then there’s religion. Rumour had it that Newcastle was an atheist, but Charles is utterly enigmatic in this area.
Aged 6, Charles saw religion as a rare cause of rift between his parents when his mother Queen Henrietta Maria exposed him to Catholicism. Before long, he seemed wary of his mother, but he was so comfortable with his generally standoffish father King Charles I that the boy dared confront him in 1640. The matter causing upset just then was colossal. A second war over the king’s stubborn stand for episcopacy was brewing, and Prince Charles, aged 9, foresaw royal ruin – with religion behind this ruin.
In early adolescence, he spent nearly every day around his father, sometimes at gruesome clashes as the king’s Cavaliers fought Parliament’s Roundheads tooth and nail nationwide. Aged 14, however, the prince left the king’s court, to became an army general in the West Country. He was super-diligent here, constantly attending meetings so he could learn and contribute ‘with great ingenuity’.
Pendennis Castle, Cornwall (Wikimedia Commons) This was Charles’s residence in early 1646. He fled upon word of a plot to kidnap him.
After this, he involved himself in more, such as the construction of fortifications, and in 1648 he took command at sea, very nearly adding a fierce naval battle to English Civil War history.
By then though, his exile had begun. The Scillies, Jersey, France, Holland, Scotland, Germany, Flanders and Spain were all home to Charles in the 1640s–50s. The diversity of the cultures he experienced is profound, and he made moves to befriend leaders, aristocrats, commoners and clergymen of opposing views. At the request of Louis XIV, he even dabbled in talks to end French rebellion, with disastrous consequences. Probably most significant was nevertheless Charles’s experience with the Scottish Covenanters led by the Marquis of Argyll for the Kirk Party. To acquire their help in the wake of the 1649 regicide, Charles betrayed his own cause, becoming Presbyterian in name; he decided to sacrifice religious principles.
Charles was 20 when Scotland beckoned. He’d tried reaching Ireland to collude with Catholics instead, but Parliament’s Oliver Cromwell prevailed there, and posed a threat to the Continental nations. The Covenanters therefore had Charles hook, line and sinker, aware nobody else much was coming to his aid. While Westminster MPs called him simply Charles Stuart, the Covenanters addressed him as Majesty but treated him like a naughty schoolboy, telling him off non-stop, such as for smiling on Sundays, so they hardly knew where to start when Charles was caught ‘fondling’ a mistress.
His philandering is famous, but how did it originate? He’s said to have lost his virginity at 14, to Christabella Wyndham. He may have lost it earlier or later, though. Aged 18, he fathered the future Duke of Monmouth by Welsh gentlewoman Lucy Walter, whose promiscuity soon shocked. After two years, Charles despised her, and he was taking other women to bed, often to the dismay of their husbands. Evidence suggests he was also producing more children than thought, with a reported secret birth in the late 1650s. That’s nevertheless also when his (I think possibly three) children by another woman was showing his ability for long-term relationships.
(Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru – The National Library of Wales) Said to be Lucy Walter
Charles may have loved her in his teens, but did his promiscuity begin as revenge for hers?
His plans for marriage nonetheless proved tactical, particularly regarding the scheme to have him wed a daughter of Cromwell in the mid-1650s. But what’s most interesting about this is the question of how Charles intended to proceed. Whatever the terms of a marriage treaty, the way he’d developed gave him high chances of achieving his aims if he dealt with enemies face-to-face.
In his negotiations with Spain in 1656, Charles had none of his ministers present. He thus proved his people skills and political acumen nicely, securing Spanish alliance. Yet he’s considered merely lucky that Westminster ultimately invited him to the throne. Charles was no unknown quantity, though. Cromwell’s spies ensured that, for a start, one operating right under Charles’s nose for most of 1655. And once the Merry Monarch held the reins of power from 1660, his popularity helped him mould societal change.
When I began work for Charles II: From the Cradle to the Crown, I wanted to make the book more than a biography. Revolution, conspiracy, sex, ceremony and the secrets of royal childhood are all intriguing aspects of his pre-Restoration life. But the impact they had on Charles can perhaps explain some of the surprises we find in Restoration history.
Claire Hobson
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