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The Legal Ghost of Charles I 7:57 Lena: We’ve been talking about the political strategy, but I want to get into the legal side of this. It’s wild to think that over ten years after his father's death, Charles II was using the law to essentially put ghosts on trial. I was reading about the Act of Attainder from 1660, and it’s so incredibly specific about who is to be punished. It’s not just a general "we’re looking for the bad guys"—it’s a list of names.
8:21 Jackson: It is a literal "Kill List" codified into law. The Act for the Attainder mentions people like Oliver Cromwell, Henry Ireton, John Bradshaw, and Thomas Pride. Now, here’s the thing—by 1660, all four of those men were already dead. But Charles II wasn’t going to let that stop him. The Act declared them "convicted and attainted of High Treason to all intents and purposes" as if they were still alive.
8:48 Lena: This is the part that sounds like something out of a horror movie. He didn't just declare them guilty; he ordered them to be dug up, right?
8:55 Jackson: He did. On the anniversary of his father's execution, January 30, the bodies of Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradshaw were exhumed. They were taken to Tyburn, where they were hung from the gallows in their shrouds, then beheaded. Cromwell’s head was then stuck on a spike at Westminster Hall, where it stayed for thirty years. It was a powerful, gruesome message: even death won't protect you from the King’s justice.
9:20 Lena: It’s so visceral. It’s like he needed to physically undo the act of 1649. His father was "murthered before the Gates of his owne Royall Pallace," and now the men responsible were being displayed in a similar way. But the Act didn't just stop with the dead. What about the people who were still alive?
9:40 Jackson: That’s where the hunt became international. The Act listed dozens of names—men like John Lisle, William Say, and Edmond Ludlow—who had "fled from Justice, not dareing to abide a Legall Tryall." For those who were captured, the punishment was often "hanged, drawn and quartered"—the statutory penalty for high treason. Ten men suffered this fate almost immediately, including Thomas Harrison and John Cooke.
10:06 Lena: I remember reading about Thomas Harrison. Even in those final moments, he was unrepentant. He reportedly took a swing at his executioner mid-torture! It shows that even though the monarchy was back, the ideological fire of the republicans hadn't completely died out. These weren't just "wretched men"—many of them genuinely believed they had done the right thing for liberty.
10:30 Jackson: And that’s what made them so dangerous to Charles. He had to prove that their "pretence of Law" was actually a "prodigious and unheard of Tribunall." The Act of Attainder went to great lengths to describe how the regicides had "subverted the very being and constitution of Parliament" and "secluded and imprisoned" members to get their way. It was a legal argument designed to show that the trial of Charles I was a complete sham.
10:55 Lena: And by reclaiming the "Mannours, Messuages, Lands, and Tenements" of these men, Charles was also physically stripping them of their legacy. The Act says their lands were "forfeited unto Your Majestie" and "vested and adjudged to be in the actuall and reall possession of Your Majesty." He was literally erasing them from the map of England.
11:17 Jackson: It was total confiscation. Even the goods and personal estates they possessed as far back as 1646 were targeted. It was a way to fund the new monarchy while impoverishing its enemies. But what’s really interesting is how Charles handled the "gray areas." Not everyone was executed. Some, like Henry Martin and Robert Tichborne, were imprisoned for life. Others had their executions suspended until the King and Parliament could decide their fate.
11:43 Lena: It feels like he was using the threat of death as a leash. "You’re guilty, and I could kill you, but I’ll keep you in a cell instead—as long as you behave." It’s a very controlled kind of vengeance. It’s not a blind rage; it’s calculated.
11:58 Jackson: Precisely. And he even set up a permanent "Anniversary of Humiliation." Every January 30 was to be a day of fasting and prayer in every church and chapel in the kingdom, to "implore the mercy of God" so that the "guilt of that Sacred and Innocent Blood" wouldn't be visited upon the nation. He wanted the trauma of his father's death to be a part of the national consciousness forever.
12:21 Lena: So he’s using the law to punish the leaders, the church to remind the people of their "sin," and the exhumations to make a spectacle of his power. It’s a multi-pronged approach to re-establishing the "Sacred person of his Majestie." But while he’s doing all this in London, there are people on the run all over the world. That "Kill List" had a very long reach.