London in Modern Times: or, Sketches of the English Metropolis during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.Unknown
History
London in Modern Times: or, Sketches of the English Metropolis during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.
Unknown
London (England) -- History -- 17th century; London (England) -- History -- 18th century
The latter was made the prison-house of the monarch during his trial.
Hence he passed to the old orchard stair, to take boat for Westminster
Hall. A servant, whom he particularly noticed on these occasions, has
become an object of interest to the religious portion of the English
public, from his having been the father of the eminently holy Philip
Henry, and the grandfather of Matthew Henry, the commentator. When
Charles returned to the palace after the absence of a few years, which,
because of the sorrows that darkened them, seemed an age, he accosted
his old attendant with the inquiry, "Art thou yet alive?" "He
continued," says Philip Henry, speaking of his father, "during all the
war time in his house at Whitehall, though the profits of his place
ceased. The king passing by his door under a guard to take water, when
he was going to Westminster to that which they called his trial,
inquired for his old servant, Mr. John Henry, who was ready to pay his
due respects to him, and prayed God to bless his majesty, and to
deliver him out of the hands of his enemies, for which the guard had
like to have been rough upon him." The king was condemned by the court
of justice instituted for the occasion, and on the 30th of January,
1649, was publicly beheaded. The place which had been the scene of
many of his youthful revels with the Duke of Buckingham, and which had
witnessed the early pomp and pageants of his reign, having been
converted into his prison, now became the spot where his blood was to
be spilt. He had been removed to St. James's Palace, after his
sentence, and there spent Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. At ten o'clock
on Tuesday, he crossed the park to Whitehall, under military guard,
Juxon, bishop of London, walking on the right, and Colonel Tomlinson,
who was his jailer, on the left. Reaching the palace, he went up the
stairs leading to the long gallery into his chamber, where he remained
in prayer for an hour, and received the sacrament. Two or three dishes
of refreshments had been prepared, which he declined, and could only be
prevailed on to take a piece of bread and a glass of claret. All
things being prepared, and the hour of one arrived, he passed into the
Banqueting House, and thence proceeded, by a passage broken through the
wall, to the scaffold. It was covered with black, and exhibited the
frightful apparatus of death. There stood the block, and by it two
executioners in sailor's clothes, with vizards and perukes. Regiments
of horse and foot were stationed round the spot, while a dense
multitude crowded the neighboring avenues, and many a serious
countenance looked down from the windows and the roofs of houses. No
shouts of insult met the unhappy prince as he stepped on the stage of
death, but perfect and solemn silence pervaded the closely-pressed
throng, as well as the soldiers on duty. Pity for the fallen monarch
in his misfortunes, prevailed even with some who had condemned his
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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