KING CHARLES

Evening Star, Issue 19856, 3 May 1928, Page 1

KING CHARLES

THE FAIR AND FATAL KING SOME INTERESTING RELICS The London Museum already has its memorials of “the and iatal King.” The shirt which King Charles wore on tho January morning when Colonel Hacker knocked at his door in St. James’s Palace, and told him that it was time to go, is now to be set off by his skull cap, his jabot, and his gloves. Of the authenticity of these relics there is no doubt, says the London 1 Daily Telegraph.’ For ten generations they have been in the family of the Earl of Lindsey. The second Earl was one of tho four peers who attended the King to the last, and bore his body to Windsor. When Charles was in the hands of the Puritans Lindsey - acted as one of his advisers and commissioners. In the^ last scene of trial and execution tho King must needs stand alone. Those of whom we do hear, among them the Bishops Juxon and Morton, play parts not much more important than his valet, the faithful George Herbert. On tho day of execution Bishop Juxon walked with him across the park from St. James’s to Whitehall. There was a guard of halberdiers before and behind, with drums beating and colours Hying, a lino of troops" marching on either side. Tim King felt faint in the park, and had to sit down and rest, hut when he came out upon tho scaffold .into the view of his people ho bore himself, all witnesses agree, boldly enough. It is a Puritan poet who noted how ‘ his keener evo tho axe’s edge did try,’ and acknowledges that “ he nothing common did or mean upon that memorable scene.” To Juxon ho gave his hat and cloak, and they prayed together. Then lie walked about tfjp scaffold and held out his hands to the people, and made a declaration to them, of which the last words are said, not very credibly, to have been: “To your Dower I must submit, hut your authority I must deny.” Ho took off his doublet, and of himself knelt down by the block, thrusting away an officer .who “ offered to unbutton him or some such thing.” Juxon took leave of him with the assurance: “Yon are cxc .ringed from a temporal to an eternal crown, a good exchange.” The King, as he laid his head oil the block, spoke the one word “Remember!” Then the executioner, a fellow in a vizard and false hair, struck the blow. Two mysteries have been made out of this story. Many and strange answers have been invented to the unnecessary question who was executioner. Ardent Royalists persuaded themselves that he must have been a Puritan officer, or at least a Puritan divine. Colonel Pride, or Colonel Joyce, or Hugh Peters. But the Court of Charles 11. was well aware that nobody but the common executioner had been employed. He was Richard Brandon. As soon as the deed was done he was put into a boat at Whitehall Stairs with the axe, the block, and everv other article that had been stained with the King’s blood. All these things were conveyed to the-Tower and burnt. The Puritan Government wanted no relics of its martyr. The other mystery, the King’s “ Remember!” beyond doubt refers to the assurances be |iad given Juxon of his loyalty to the .church. Permission to bury the body at Westminster was sought in vain.. Juxon was able to obtain leave that it should be embalmed, and he and Lord Lindsey and their friends bore the coffin to the chapel Windsor. No prayers were said over the g’-ave, for the services of the King’s church-was forbidden. Twelve years had hardly gone before the King’s son was hack in power, and the head of Cromwell or. a spear above Westminster Hall.