Britain's Party King | Charles II | Real Royalty With Foxy Games

Charles a second finally came to the throne up two years in exile following the execution of his father Charles the first who had struggled to be the king that everyone longed for the restoration would bring unity and glamour back to the country the people worn out by the austerity of Cromwell in the parliamentarian era and the ecstatically welcomed the new king people always say oh gosh Charles he was so relaxed just interest in a luxurious life but there was one part of him that was unforgiving and that was his attitude towards those who had been involved in the death of his father I've always thought the key to understanding child sex reign is he spends eleven years just desperately wanting to be king there once he becomes king he just want to do anything in the reign of Charles the second you have the birth of modern times there were people who were literally rebuilding England and then the fire in London which enabled London to be rebuilt it must have been so exciting by the time you got to about 1700 to look around and find yourself in this spanking new city in this series were examining the reins of the Stuart Kings to the lives of the wind' family here at gwydyr Castle in North Wales the winds had flourished during the reign of King James the first and his son King Charles the first Sir John when the patriarch of the family have been knighted and honored with a baronetcy his son Sir Richard Winn was a friend of King Charles the first and had been appointed First Gentleman of the bedchamber as well as treasurer to the new Queen Henrietta Maria but now the situation had reached an all-time low both the Stewart's and the wins [Music] [Music] King Charles the first was executed on the 30th of January 1649 the Royalists had lost the civil war the reign of the Stuart's appeared over the entire system of monarchy appeared over in its place was now the Commonwealth a new system of government were England Scotland Wales and Ireland were ruled over by Oliver Cromwell the Lord Protector the hero of the New Model Army is Oliver Cromwell and he had a spectacular career from the minute he gets into Parliament as the poorest man to make it the Parliament in 1640 he is a dynamo I mean he's a man totally committed to godly Reformation completely convinced of the fact that God has called him to some great cause and he just rises from being a captain in 1642 and then becomes the leftenant general and head of the cavalry for the New Model Army eventually of course the head of the whole army leading unparalleled they successful and brutal campaigns in Ireland the Scotland after the execution of Charles the first his wife Henrietta Maria had to escape and found refuge in the French Court his son Charles attempted to muster forces in France and the Netherlands they became royal prey they were pursued out of the country Henrietta Moriah fled in a ship from the southwest to France under gunfire from Parliament the future james ii as a young boy managed to escape from science in middlesex dressed as a girl and was spirited away to the netherlands and there was a little princess Elizabeth who sadly sort of faded away and died in carisbrooke castle in the Isle of Wight between 16 46 and 51 the future Charles a second in doors are really humiliating exile the story is that nobody dared tell Charles a second that his father had been executed and they didn't know what to do so one of the senior Cortes went in to see Charles a second and instead of saying your royal highness which would have been his title as Prince Bowden said your majesty meaning you are now the king and Charles took a moment to understand it but when he did it was an absolute body blow the wind family at guido castle were deeply affected by the execution of Charles the first so Richard Winn had lost both his king and his seat upon as he'd been expelled by the prides purge of 1648 orchestrated by Oliver Cromwell Sir Richard was heartbroken he would never recover and he died just a few months after King Charles was beheaded succeeding Sir Richard as the new head of the wind family would be his younger brother sir Owen Wynn Owen was a very different character bookish endlessly intrigued by the possibilities of alchemy it wasn't easy for poor on sorrow and when he was the third son and he was the more bookish one he wasn't the sort of glamorous courtiers his brother Richard had been and so he was given all the kind of difficult jobs he had to look after the estate for his brother his brother gave him an allowance to do so and he was at the brunt of it here during the civil war he and of course Lady Grace his wife so it can't have been easy during the Civil War having all of this going on being twice sacked being seriously squeezed in terms of finances so Owen had to be especially careful under this new Commonwealth the Wynne family had been close to the deposed Royal House of Stuart and there was a very real threat that the winner state could be seized by force at any moment just like wirless family's up and down the country following the end of the English Civil War and the battles that occurred across Wales Scotland Ireland known as the war for three kingdoms Oliver Cromwell had firmly established his grip on power he'd been sworn in as law protector in 1653 and drastically altered the cultural landscape of the country theatre was outlawed celebration of Christmas and Easter was banned for quite lost 1650s Oliver Cromwell is ruling England as Lord Protector refusing to take the title of King but very much like a king and his policy of promoting religious liberty you know does benefit a lot of people including of course former Anglicans and even Catholics who are much easier time under Cromwell than they had under any of the Stuart's if Primal had lived beyond his 60th birthday the real possibility that the the Stuart option might have faded away in 1658 Oliver Cromwell fell ill and died and was succeeded by his son witcha Cromwell but Richard lacked any real authority because if the position of law protects it could be inherited so how is that any different from the monarchy a power vacuum was developing and the booth rebellion was one of several attempts to fill it Sir George Booth was a former member of parliament who organized it uprising against Richard Cromwell in 1659 joining him in his efforts would be another form of parliament Sir Thomas Middleton and Middleton's son-in-law Sir Richard win the younger son of Sir Owen the booth herbarium had been planned in the regions near quitea Castle North Wales and the Northwest of England the forces assembled were able to take the important city of Chester but although cromwell's power was undoubtedly failing and the Commonwealth was weak booth rebellion was still put down booth himself managed to escape capture dressed as a woman but Sir Richard win was not quite so fortunate when booths revolt happens in 1659 it is Sir Thomas Middleton and Sir Richard win they are rising North Wales at the same time as George Booth is rising Cheshire it was supposed to happen all over Britain but the problem is these were the only two areas that did rise so the full weight of a new model army under general land but were there waiting for them and they didn't stand a chance as you can imagine Sir Richard win is is caught in the fallout of that obviously he's one of the casualties have been mopped up and he's dragged after Carnarvon Castle where he's a prisoner I would have had you in the dungeon mother I did not think to see you my keeper permits me no less met the colonel he's a villain is he not I found him amenable he is Parliament's creature courtesy will loosen adorn rather than spite Richard and a ready purse is more persuasive still I think he will see you released his expectation was to be caught in I'm in no mood for wooing perhaps you were enjoying your little game too much there was a time to end this tyranny under which we live mother if general monk had joined but he did not he waited to see how the die would fall Parliament and the army are in dispute our king may return and our prayers rest upon that hope but some new Lord Protector may rising Cromwell's place we have weathered this long darkness a state and family intact but you do not throw away your winter garb at the first bud of spring snows may return as quickly as they are banished you were of no use to me here recall the habits of a courting youth and practice them upon the colonel my purse will do the rest the failure of the booth rebellion a terrible blow to Sir Richard win the younger and all wore this across the country even in its weakened state Cromwell's Commonwealth has somehow come on but their disappointment wouldn't last for long across the English Channel King Charles the first son and heir was patiently waiting in exile within a year he'd be summoned back to London and a new Stuart King will be back on the phone [Music] who the belyanov 16:59 had failed to bring down the Commonwealth but it hadn't been totally in vain the actions of Sir George Booth Sir Thomas Middleton and Sir Richard when the younger had inspired another key figure of the era George Monck governor of Scotland monk was a man of floating allegiance at one point he considered defending which a cromwell later he thought of joining booths rebellion but now in 1660 he was launching his own uprising he led his army of loyal soldiers down from Scotland to London and no one could stop him he became the most powerful man in the country but monk was not in the mould of Oliver Cromwell there would be no new Lord Protector he made overtures to the Stuart family in exile they were the only ones who could offer the country the stability it's so desperately needed general monk realized that the mood in the country was fed up with Cromwell fed up with the rule of the major generals the army had stopped being on the side of the revolution the army was reverting to the king and once that happened there was no hope of keeping Richard Cromwell he didn't have any of his father's but bullying strength he was a quieter man and anyway there's something absurd if you've given up the concept of monarchy thinking that there should be a hereditary protectorate even though the great rising didn't happen and it was put down nevertheless all eyes were on it and at that moment George Monck makes his move and he could have been king of course and in fact the throne was offered to him tentatively in that in the way of him becoming the inheritor of the protector ship but wisely he decided no it's much better to be the kingmaker than the king so he is the grand choreographer who brings Charles back what enables Charles to come back of course Charles doesn't actually win back the throne it's Parliament and the Commonwealth that lose it they haven't got somebody's just Ede Oliver Cromwell who has the substance or the respect of both Parliament and the army to take his place so it's really because of Oliver Cromwell's death and the inability of anyone following him to grab that power that eventually the English resort to default and think well we'll have a king back then Charles had spent most of his exile in the Dutch city of breda and on the fourth of April 1660 he issued the Declaration of Breda promising a general pardon for crimes committed join the Civil War recognition of property rights religious toleration and payment of army wage arrears four days later the parliament in London proclaims Charles King at once the young exile made preparations in Europe to return home [Music] charles ii and his advisors they were convinced that if there were conditions they were going to be very onerous and there be probably close to what Charles the first had turned down before his trial execution but actually the English Parliament had turned around on his head in just two months in early sixty and sixty although he has promised everything be settled by Parliament he is returned unconditionally I mean Parliament passed the declaration that he has been king since the moment of the death of his father of royal memory so they say come back unconditionally but thank you for your promise that you will accept any sacrament we make on the most neuralgic terms charles landed at Dover on May the 25th he made his way to London which he reached four days later he had deliberately timed it said he'd we entered the city on his birthday he was exactly thirty years old the people of London were lining the streets the crowds were so thick that it took seven hours to cross the still familiar City perhaps some of them had been there that cold January morning more than a decade earlier when the king's father had been beheaded in Whitehall now they were cheering the return of the Stuart's charles ii had come home to claim his crown [Applause] so great and latitude and in Sumeria spirit to holding the king's picture aloft that was near a hanging matter but weeks ago it must be all of London we shall know of his coming from the crowd they lined the streets like this from Dover to Whitehall in all the years of Cromwell did you ever see such a thing no nor can i remember when last we two had an afternoon of leisure such as this he will be a fine I'm sure of it despite the general pardon offered by Charles and his Declaration of Breda not every crime was forgotten fifty people were deliberately excluded from Charles's acts of forgiveness nine men who'd signed his father's death warrants were executed the identity of the executioner who actually carried out the beheading of King Charles the first is still a mystery to this day as for Oliver Cromwell the man who userupp Charles's father even after death he'll be held accountable as for the judge who oversaw Charles's trial John Bradshaw and Henry Ireton who'd signed the King's death watch the three of them were moved from their graves and hung up for the clouds to witness before they were all decapitated and their heads placed on spikes there was one part of him that was unforgiving and that was his attitude towards those who had been involved in the death of his father and that's the 59 men who signed the death warrant and another 20 or so who were either legal officers in the court case or on the scaffold at the execution and Charles's hatred for them never ended the people who most blames for his father's death their heads were cut off and their bodies thrown into a lime pit and the head stuck on spikes on the palace Westminster I think he just adored his father and couldn't believe that these people could expect any sort of sympathy at all and there was also an underlying point to that if he had been soft for them what would it have said about him as a as a monarch so I think that there was a cold part of Charles a second and it was absolutely focused on those who'd killed his father [Music] life will change drastically with the return of the king primitive oppression was lifted almost at once a new age of liberty and even debauchery took hold and with a dazzling cultural rebirth poetry in the arts of prosper theatres reopened with women appearing on stage for the first time the sciences flourished as well with luminaries such as Sir Isaac Newton and olive oil expanding the horizons of human knowledge I think there was an enormous mood of optimism when charles ii came back but partly because he did this clever thing he was prepared to tolerate an awful lot of people who had supported the civil war therefore because he was a genial person on some on some levels and certainly politically very intelligent he was able to create an atmosphere in which political reconciliation could happen Charles's I came to work with many people who'd work with Cromwell as possible he wants to see healing and Saqlain his former enemies were much more likely to send him on his travels again than his former friends he'd rather disappoint his friends than his enemies because he's aim is not how to go away again [Music] Charles himself are we the founder of the Royal Observatory which you can see here is painting from its earliest days he had an interest in the burgeoning field of Natural Sciences and he would grant a charter to the Royal Society [Music] sir Owen Wynn would not get to see much of the restoration he died in the same year as king charles ii was crowned the pier that sir Owen Wynn had lived under so cautiously in the last years of his life was now called the interregnum sir Owen sons Sir Richard when the younger freshly released sump'n Arvin castle inherited the Wynn estate Sir Richard winds uncle had been such a key figure in the court of Charles the first there was no reason to believe that the wind family would not prosper once again now that the Stewart's were back [Music] king charles ii was finally on the throne and he needed a queen during the reign of king charles the first there had been negotiations with the royal family of portugal for the hand of catherine of braganza this arrangement had been put on permanent hold thanks to Oliver Cromwell but it was brought back to life following the restoration King Charles a second married Catherine of Braganza in 1662 and the nation of tea drinkers was born Catherine bought over the custom of tea drinking from Portugal and it quickly became popular amongst the aristocracy in the reign of King Charles a second Sir Richard when the younger would be a key part of this restored royal court taking up the position of Chamberlain to Charles's new queen a delighted nation dubbed the new king the merry monarch but just like his father Charles had married a Catholic and the religious difficulties it is so blighted the past did not simply disappear however there were far more pressing problems just around the corner the worst outbreak of plague since the Black Death and the Great Fire of London your fire was dying Lady Grace let me sum in the mood I have brought it back to life it is quite all right I can manage a fire sit I thought I heard the foot-post not long ago yet I know that cannot be i forbade the London post from approaching our gates and none would be so disrespectful as to disobey my wishes do not blame the poor man no I do not you commanded him and he obeyed as he should I had not heard from Richard and so very long he lives then the existence of the letter was all you needed to know that I fear it is very bad this time I remember the plague in 1625 I was younger than you not long married old Sir John kept carts of London cloth outside for days at a time happier as he was to see his finest purchases ruined than risk plague within our walls it must be destroyed it is one letter has passed through what hands of what parts of the country we know not every moment it is in this house their danger deepens I will have it removed from you if I must [Applause] in 1665 the Great Plague of London hit the city there had been large outbreaks throughout the 17th century particularly in 1625 and 1636 but nothing as bad as this it would be the last major outbreak of the disease to occur in England a quarter of the population of the capital died in little over a year plague had been something they'd all lived with forever it's something that they were pretty wised up to and there are accounts of bolts of cloth for example or being sent up from London which would be kept outside the gates that would have for up to two weeks so the Carters would not be allowed into the the main the great court they'd be kept outside by the porter and they would observe for two weeks they knew that one thing was certain if you have an infected the cargo that came into someone like Twitter the hospital [Music] king charles ii and the family escape to Salisbury and England's Parliament relocated to Oxford by the spring of 1666 the outbreak had died down and it was deemed safe for the Stewart's to return to London but just as life was returning to normal yet another disaster unfold it [Music] the Great Fire of London broke out on the 2nd of September 1666 what began in a pudding main bakery spread out of control and burned for three days straight the fires gutted the medieval heart of the city and the ancient Sint Paul's Cathedral was utterly destroyed fears are bounded that the fire was a foreign plot and King Charles a second worried that the entire city might fall into Anarchy England was at war with the Netherlands at the time the Dutch saw the fire as a divine retribution for the actions of the English Navy and Rear Admiral Robert Holmes who set the town of West cherishing the blaze in what became known as Holmes's bonfire the disasters that the Fowler Charles the hammer blow of the plague the fire the wars with the Dutch meanwhile the people of England were predominantly in favor of the Dutch so he was out of kilter with the political feeling of his of his Parliament for a lot of his reign these were terrible things because the mentality of the time was somehow that the the monarch was responsible for life everyday life king charles ii was facing battles on all fronts just like the Stewart Kings who come before him his capital burned to the ground the economy in the doldrums the only reason why he'd gone to war in the first place was to try to help the economy the Dutch Republic was in the midst of its golden age lucrative trade routes across the globe Charles's Lunger brother James had suggested they seize lucrative colonial possessions from the Dutch disrupt their trading dominance Charles agreed he was keen for popular war to boost his standing the war was not a success the Netherlands may have been a smaller nation they had a far superior Navy and much more money disasters such as the Great Fire of London further sapped England's ability to prosecute them [Music] by 1667 the Dutch controlled much of the waters around the South of England they'd secured pivotal European alliances and that tune they staged a devastatingly bold naval assault dumped the road on the Midway they attacked the English fleet at anchor in the mouth of the Thames many ships are destroyed and it remains one of the greatest disasters in the history of the Royal Navy Charles crushed had to sue for peace [Music] the Royal Oak burned the loyal London in the Royal James to the flagship carried off without a single shot fired in her defense I thought the Dutch a much lesser power than England we are the more numerous but they are richer and they have directed their wealth with far greater wisdom since the last war they've rebuilt their Navy and plane made experts study of river navigation and the warfare and what have we done beggared our Garrison's with masks and courtly merriments I have no place there it can be done with London go not there again the pride and Ponton luxury all the jails of England hold no more cunning a collection of thieves than court they never leave off robbing his majesty even his dogs a target for pilfering it was thought the Dutch could not even set how to flip this year it will have to be peace or the kingdom hold may be undone [Music] the treaty ending the war was signed in 1667 in the town crater where Charles had made his famous declaration that had allowed him to return to the English throne several years earlier Charles was humiliated but it is at least bring the war to an end and allow London to be rebuilt Charles encouraged the greatest architects to come forward with radical plans for the city had these been realized London today would be a completely different place but in the end practicalities money meant most of the city was rebuilt on the same plan as before but the building's themselves were much changed here the genius of Sir Christopher Wren did have the opportunity to shine and his designs remain some of the most famous in the London skyline because there was a sense of a new beginning but a new beginning not out of total novelty but something that was old all sorts of exciting things happened during the restoration and then as it unfolded the full reign of charles ii the birth of the royal society figures like boyle figures like Christopher Wren clever people who were scientists who were architects who were literally rebuilding England and then the rather good luck as it happened of the fire which enabled London to be rebuilt and gloriously rebuilt it must have been so exciting to look around and find yourself in this spanking new city with so many absolutely mind-boggling ly beautiful buildings all around him on River Thames which was crammed with ships commerce entertainment theaters it really was blessed to be alive I think in the reign of Charles a second asking Charles arranged for his city to be rebuilt he was also building up the forces for another battle with a Dutch Republic that had so humiliated him in secret a new alliance was forged with nuit the xiv of france together they take on the dutch in 1670 king charles ii made a monumental decision he signed a secret agreement with the French known as the Treaty of Dover Charles had been humiliated by a loss to the Dutch Republic three years earlier he was determined to gain revenge by joining forces with France to conquer the Dutch but one of the provisos of the pact was that Charles would convert to Catholicism Charles was playing with fire perhaps the thing which historians are most divided about how a child's second is what an earth he was doing in the Treaty of Dover when he told louis xiv that he would become a catholic if Louie would give him the money the money and the troops to make good his claim now there are plenty people think that he's being too clever by half that he's simply using this as a device that getting Louie to believe him and give him all the things I've always been inclined to think that Charles always yearns to become a Catholic that for most of his reign he can see that he'll become a it will be very dangerous that he will cause a huge amount of political reaction but there's a point around then and when no he's under such pressure from his Catholic wife his Catholic mistress and there's just a moment at which he thinks everywhere in Europe where monarchy is strong Catholicism is strong Catholics have been people have been my most loyal supporters it but for the Catholics I would not escape after Battle of Worcester it was the Catholics who risk their lives to hide me get me out of the country and they it's just possible that he went through a a moment when he thought I wonder if I can get away with becoming a Catholic [Music] England was still fiercely divided by religion a Catholic King would rip open old wounds in March 16 72 Charles made the first moves towards fulfilling part of the secret deal with king louis xiv of france by making the royal declaration of indulgence it promised religious toleration for all including catholics and seemed to be a first step towards some kind of reconciliation between england and rome following the great break Henry the eighth's Wayne you seek stained glass for the new Chapel I shall not ask how you came by such intelligence lest you implicate the walls and doors of my chamber I had thought it an art lost in this country there are men in Paris who preserved the skill why not row the King has declared indulgence on matters of religion and Parliament I care not is his declaration even legal I care not I have an image in my mind mother the chapel shall not be complete without it it is across a fine cross I must have it it was working too longer the day that took your father Hill it is not yet a must mother it is not that we shall consult physicians I have the outward applications having proved unsuccessful they now prescribe inward medicines and what course do they predict I must have that glass mother after the declaration of indulgence things become obviously much easier for not just Catholics but but crypto Catholics we don't know precisely where sirisha when the youngest stood on this but we know that he's the Chamberlain of Queen Catherine of Braganza and we know that he's trying to get a stained-glass cross the new chapel he's building in 1673 - for if you look the chapel you would think it was a Catholic chapel initially [Music] in April 16 72 just a month after the Royal declaration of indulgence England and France declared war on the Netherlands it did not go according to plan the money promised by France to Charles was not enough to cover the military expenses the king was forced to record Parliament and it contained many members who were fiercely opposed to the royal declaration they deemed it far too generous to Catholics and they now had the King in a bind Parliament refused to fund the war until the Declaration was withdrawn Charles had to comply but worse was to come for the King the details of his secret pact with louis xiv were leaked the public was furious charles quickly realized that to defend his own position he had to pull out of their lines with france end the war with the netherlands in early 1670 for the Treaty of Westminster was signed which brought peace between England and the Netherlands the war had achieved precisely nothing [Music] fortunately the full details of what he'd agreed who never did come out but he clearly helps to build the climate of anxiety in the 1670s about whether there is a drift back towards Catholic monarchy there were still a lot of political tensions and the constant question of if Charles couldn't produce a legitimate heir with Catherine of Braganza who was going to succeed and then the realization that his brother James Duke of York was a Roman Catholic was it led to a flaring up of intense anti-catholic feeling and part of that was driven by a wish to make sure that James could not become the future King of England so all in all i think charles ii would have preferred a much quieter time than he was handed [Music] 1674 also saw the death of Sir Richard wind the younger he'd been a member of parliament for a total of 20 years both before and after the interregnum without any male heirs the winners state passed to his daughter Mary but his title of baronet would be given to his cousin John Wynn the strength of the wind family seemed to be dissipating charles the second's have returned to england and so many across the country had such high hopes but his reign was turning out to be a disappointment just like the winds the Stewart's were losing power despite having many children with his numerous mistresses King Charles had no legitimate heirs with his wife Catherine of Braganza nor would only be born in the remaining 11 years of his life the heir apparent throughout was his younger brother James many suspected that James was a Catholic though right in fact Charles a second himself converted to the Catholic religion on his deathbed it became incredibly ill in February 1685 very very quickly and suddenly had a massive seizure and then poor man he was handed over to the combined ignorance of the Royal physicians who did not know what to do and they took a view that the best thing they could do was stimulate him and get his whole energy pulsing through him I suppose so they shaved off his hair and applied white-hot glass to his scalp they put a sort of acid in his nostrils they pumped him full of laxatives and enemas and they gave him tonics of ground-up man's skull and put poultices of pigeon droppings on his feet and although occasionally bizarrely he seemed to be getting better the general flow was towards death and one of his mistresses louise de caraway took James Duke of York the King's brother aside and said look please don't tell anyone I've said this but his one wish has always been that he dies a Catholic the evidence the Charles second version his deathbed is in the end the testimony of the tiny number of people who were witnesses to it it it is very widely accepted that it was so the man who was is supposed to have received into the church while someone who had helped him during his escape after Worcester in 1651 and had been in that sense someone he trusted for many years and for me at any rate he is the logical outcome out of the shadows James brings a man called Father Huddleston who had helped Charles survive during his six weeks on the run after the Battle of Worcester and James utters the immortal line of fire I bring you now a man who once saved your life and now he'll save your soul and Huddleston sits with the King and takes him through the various processes to bring him to Catholicism including what I'd imagine was rather a long confession by Charles and he dies the following day having just reconnected briefly with the six weeks in his life of which he was most proud when he had shown himself to be brave and resilient [Music] if anyone thought that the controversial issue of religious tolerance had gone away they were mistaken the reign of james ii would bring with it another crisis in england and another war in the next episode of the Stewart's of bloody rain we see how to commit a catholic james ii ascends to the throne of england succeeding his brother what had seems an impossibility decades earlier was now a reality the religious tensions across the british isles reached fever pitch and they would test the lords of the wind family at quitea castle in their relationship with the House of Stuart all across the country plans were made to usurp the Catholic King but the real danger lay very close to home James's own daughter Mary and her husband the Protestant William of Orange of the Dutch Republic were the greatest threat of all this would spell the end of the House of Stuart and the beginning of the Glorious Revolution [Music]

Channel: Real Royalty

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Keywords: real royalty, real royalty channel, british royalty, royalty around the world, royal history, horrible histories song, charles ii king of bling, king charles ii, party king, stuart dynasty, history of british monarchy

Id: dSL6FJKC0nI

Length: 43min 20sec (2600 seconds)

Published: Tue May 19 2020