Covenanting Citizens: The Protestation Oath and Popular Political Culture in the English Revolution, by John Walter

Abstract

On 3 and 4 January 1642, King Charles staged his abortive attempt to arrest five radical leaders of the House of Commons for treason. But he found ‘the birds … flown’ from Westminster to safety in the city of London, which erupted in armed demonstrations, and the king swiftly abandoned his capital. On 10 January, members of the Commons were returned triumphantly, escorted by a guard of the London militia who bore, on their ensigns and pikes or in their hats, copies of the Protestation. Next day, 3,000 men rode in from Buckinghamshire in support of their MP, John Hamden, ‘every man with his protestation in his hand’. On 20 January, Speaker Lenthall sent out letters to the local authorities ordering them to ensure that the Protestation had been taken in their localities, and to return the names of those who had taken it, and those who had refused. Those local returns, now in the Parliamentary Archive ‘in their thousands’ (p. 153), are at the heart of John Walter’s book.