An investigation into the execution of Charles

You have just watched an extract from a film called ‘Cromwell’. Imagine that you are a the
producer of the latest movie on this. What information would you need to find out exactly what happened at the execution?

Let’s look at some other sources about the execution of Charles I. Click the image to enlarge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of the most recent accounts of the death of Charles I comes from his biographer, Charles Carlton, who wrote in 1983:

The scaffold was draped in black, on it stood the executioner and his assistant, so well disguised that no one has ever discovered their identity for sure. On the middle of it was the block, so short that the condemned man could not kneel, but had to lie face down on the floor. Nailed to it were large staples to which he could be tied in case he struggled. In front of the scaffold Pikemen stood, stamping their feet in a cold so bitter that the River Thames had frozen. At either end of the street, cavalry were stationed. Charles asked Juxon to tuck his hair under his white cap, leaving his face free of obstructions.Charles gave the executioner the signal (extending his hands as he lay face down) and the axeman severed his neck in one clean blow at the third vertebra.

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