4 - Body Politics in the English Revolution

Summary

In early 1641, the fall of the king's leading minister, the earl of Strafford, dominated the news. Unsurprisingly, Strafford's fate was widely discussed by the writers of letters and pamphlets. But in reporting his trial and execution, a surprising amount of attention was paid to the gestures that marked Strafford's passage from trial to execution. According to one account, both at his appearance and departure from the Tower, Strafford returned the crowds' salutes, ‘with great humility and courtesie’. But the Scot Robert Baillie reported that at his departure that day this gesture was not reciprocated: there was ‘no man capping him before whom this morning the greatest of all England would have stood dis-covered’. Brought to the bar of the house of lords Strafford, whose own demands as Lord Deputy in Ireland that the king's officers there kneel to him had provoked criticism, was forced to kneel as a delinquent. During the trial, it was noted that when the king attended he removed his hat deferentially to Strafford as a public mark of his support and that subsequently he sent word that as a favour Strafford should be allowed to sit during his trial. Nevertheless, at key points in the trial Strafford fell to his knees, on one occasion after making ‘3 low congees to ye lords’ as an elaborate acknowledgment of their legitimacy; at another key point of controversy over evidence kneeling and ‘humbly craving pardon’.