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English Civil War: Parliament
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The fundamental origins of the Civil War lay in the friction between the King and his supporters and Parliament. This confrontation was further heightened by the very marked differences in religious views between the two sides.
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This engagement was really no more than a skirmish in comparison to later engagements in the Civil War. Powick Bridge is important, for it was the first time units of the two opposing sides clashed in the war. The small Royalist force, commanded by Prince Rupert was in the process of covering the Royalist withdrawal from Worcester when it collided with a small Parliamentary force from the army of the Earl of Essex. The Parliamentarian force was routed.
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How does one explain the bloodless Restoration of monarchy after eighteen years of civil war, revolution, and interregnum? Like other revolutionary regimes the Commonwealth collapsed from within. Revenue never kept up with expenditure, and by the end of the 1650s the state was bankrupt. For all its military exploits in Scotland, Ireland, and abroad, it had failed to win the respect of the people of the landed classes, who increasingly yearned for the rule of law under the old constitution of king, Lords, and Commons. Distrust of standing armies combined with fear of religious radicalism and social anarchy, which appeared to be united in the phenomena of Quakerism, Anabaptism, and Fifth Monarchism. (Adherents of Fifth Monarchism believed that the Second Coming of Christ was imminent because the overthrow of the fifth monarchy, of which Charles I was thought to be the last representative, had been prophesied in Scripture as the precursor of the return of the Messiah.) Republican rigidity in Parliament, when set beside the internal division and intellectual exhaustion of the army grandees, furnished a recipe for the revolution's self-destruction.
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Whigs explained the Civil War as the result of a centuries-long struggle between Parliament (especially the House of Commons) and the monarchy. According to this school of thought, Parliament fought to defend the traditional rights of Englishmen, while the monarchy attempted on every occasion to expand its right to dictate law arbitrarily. The most important Whig historian, S.R. Gardiner, popularized the idea of describing the civil war as a 'Puritan Revolution' which challenged the repressive nature of the Stuart church and paved the way for the religious toleration of the Restoration. Puritanism, in this view, became the natural ally of a people seeking to preserve their traditional rights against the arbitrary power of the monarchy.
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Oxford served as the home base for King Charles during the English Civil War. The town itself supported the Parliamentary cause, but the University was staunchly royalist. In 1642 the colleges of Oxford University gave most of their plate to Charles.
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In the summer of 1644, the Royalist forces were threatening London in the English Civil War with the Parliamentarians. The Royalists confidently blocked a Parliamentarian force near Winchester and forced a battle. They would regret it. The battle was a turning point in the southern campaign and suddenly stopped the Royalist pincer strategy on London by destroying the lower jaw of it.
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