Attempts at Settlement and the Rise of Radicalism

Feature	Newcastle Propositions (1646)	Heads of Proposals (1647)
Proposing Faction	Political Presbyterians in Parliament	Grandees (early leaders of the New Model Army)
Religious Terms	Strict enforcement of Presbyterianism; King must sign the Covenant.	Moderate; Episcopacy (bishops) remained. Use of the Book of Common Prayer was permitted but crucially not compulsory.
Military Control	Parliament controls the militia and navy for 20 years.	Parliament controls the militia for 10 years.
Political Reform	Parliament to nominate key state officials and judges.	Required biennial parliaments and a fairer redistribution of parliamentary seats.
Justice	Harsher: 58 Royalists excluded from a general pardon.	Lenient: Only 5 Royalists excluded from a general pardon.

Why the Settlements Failed

A defeated king's best weapon is often the division among his enemies. Charles I recognised that Parliament, the army, and the Scots deeply distrusted one another, and he exploited this to avoid signing any settlement. He used persistent delaying tactics, refusing to give direct answers while secretly hoping his opponents would turn on each other.

His ultimate betrayal came in December 1647 when he signed The Engagement. This was a secret treaty with a faction of Scottish nobles known as the Engagers. Charles promised to trial Presbyterianism in England for three years; in return, the Scots promised to send an army of 30,000 men to crush the New Model Army and restore his power.

This deliberate double-crossing directly sparked the Second Civil War in 1648. After Oliver Cromwell decisively defeated the Scottish forces at the Battle of Preston, a furious Parliament passed the Vote of No Addresses, officially cutting off all negotiations. The army now viewed Charles as a "man of blood" who could never be trusted, sealing his eventual fate.

The Threat of Radical Groups

You can easily overthrow a monarch, but controlling the radical ideas that spread during a revolution is much harder. The turmoil of the civil wars sparked an explosion of new religious and political thinking that terrified the traditional ruling classes.

The Levellers emerged as a severe political threat, representing artisans and shopkeepers. They demanded radical changes, including sovereignty of the people, religious toleration, and equality before the law. They documented their demands in a proposed constitution called the Agreement of the People.

In contrast, the Diggers (or "True Levellers") posed a massive social and economic threat. Led by Gerrard Winstanley, they argued that the earth was a "common treasury for all" and explicitly rejected the concept of private property. They practised communalism by taking over public land at St George’s Hill in Surrey to farm crops together. Other fringe groups, such as the Quakers and Ranters, further threatened the social order by rejecting traditional priests and conventional morality.

The Putney Debates

Understanding the Putney Debates explains why the English Civil War is often viewed as the birthplace of modern democratic ideas. In the autumn of 1647, the New Model Army paused its military campaigns to debate the future of England's constitution at St Mary's Church in Putney.

Elected soldier representatives called Agitators argued fiercely with conservative Grandees like Cromwell and Henry Ireton. Radical figures like Thomas Rainsborough argued passionately for universal manhood suffrage, famously stating that "the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he."

Ireton strongly opposed this radical expansion of voting rights. He argued that the vote must be strictly limited to men with a "permanent fixed interest" in the nation, meaning only those who owned substantial property. He feared that giving poor men the vote would inevitably lead to the working classes voting to abolish private property entirely.

The Grandees’ Reaction and Suppression

Every military commander knows that an army without strict discipline is just a dangerous, armed mob. As Leveller ideas spread rapidly through the ranks, the Grandees realised they had to act decisively to prevent a total collapse of military and social authority.

The elites were terrified of a "World Turned Upside Down", a scenario where social hierarchy and property rights would be completely destroyed. Furthermore, widespread radicalism threatened the strict military discipline required for their planned 1649 invasion of Ireland. To maintain control, the Grandees used brutal military suppression against their own men:

• Ware Mutiny (1647): Soldiers arrived wearing the Agreement of the People tucked into their hats. Cromwell violently crushed the protest and executed mutineer Richard Arnold.
• Bishopsgate Mutiny (1649): A rebellion over pay and Leveller demands resulted in the execution of Robert Lockyer. His subsequent funeral turned into a massive civilian demonstration.
• Burford Mutiny (1649): Cromwell and Fairfax led a gruelling 45-mile forced march in a single day to surprise 400 mutineers, executing three ringleaders in a local churchyard.

The Grandees treated the Diggers differently, viewing them as a local nuisance rather than a military threat. They simply allowed local landowners to harass the communes and used small army units to disperse their settlements, effectively neutralizing the radical threat to the established social order.