Negotiations for a personal treaty with the king.
By the 11th July the committee was in a position to report to the Common Council the result of the conference so far as it had gone.[880] The parliamentary committee had propounded seven questions bearing upon the terms of the City's engagement to protect the king against violence pending negotiations, and its intentions as to the king's person in the event of such negotiations falling through. To these the city committee had made replies (now submitted to the council for approval), and had added certain propositions to the parliamentary committee to enable the City the better to carry out its engagement. The first two of these related to the amalgamation and increase of the militia; the third asked that, pending negotiations, no force should be allowed to come within thirty miles of London, and that riot and[pg 285] tumult raised in the city during that period after proclamation made should be met with a death penalty; and the last that if parliament so willed no one who had ever taken up arms against it should be allowed within thirty miles of London without leave. Both the answers and proposals of the city committee were alike approved by the council, and a house-to-house visitation was organised for the purpose of getting names subscribed to the city's engagement.
The Speaker insulted by a member of the city militia, 8 July 1648.
The demand for a death penalty on rioters in the city was not unwarranted. There were not wanting signs of disaffection even in the ranks of the city's militia. So recently as Saturday, the 8th July, the Speaker himself, whilst being escorted to his coach by a company of soldiers, had been insulted by one in the ranks, who cried out to the surrounding mob "that now he was out of their charge they [the mob] should tear him in pieces."[881] A few days later (12 July) some prisoners of war were rescued in the streets of London by the mob, and the lord mayor received a sharp reprimand for not keeping better order in the city.[882] The Commons, in consequence, resolved that no more prisoners should be brought to London.[883]
Petition to parliament, 12 July.
The Speaker's reply to the petitioners.
It was known that about this time secret enlistments were being carried on in the city, and that horses were being despatched out of the city by twos and threes to assist the royalists. It was also reported that an attempt was about to be made to seize the Tower.[884] The majority of the inhabitants,[pg 286] nevertheless, remained faithful to parliament, and the Speaker took the opportunity of a petition addressed to both Houses (12 July) from "divers well-affected magistrates, citizens, ministers and other inhabitants" of the city and parts adjacent, praying them to enter into no treaty without proper assurances for the maintenance of the covenant,[885] to compliment the aldermen and great magistrates of the city on their courage and fidelity. It was a petition—the Speaker said, addressing the deputation—for peace, and such peace as the House and all honest men desired. It had come at a most seasonable time, when parliament was the object of much abuse and men dared not own their true opinions. The petition was the more valuable from the quality of the petitioners—"divers aldermen and great magistrates of the city of London, many reverend ministers, who have always held close to the cause, and others, the gentlemen of birth and quality that have less valued their blood than the hazard and loss of so noble an undertaking." On behalf of the Commons he returned them real and hearty thanks, assuring them that the House approved of the petition and the matter thereof, and that in prosecuting the peace it would take care to preserve the religion, laws and liberties of all those who have been constant to these ends.[886]
Another petition to Parliament for amalgamation of militia, 18 July, 1648.
On the 18th July the City caused two petitions to be presented to both Houses, one of which asked for an impost to be laid on Newcastle coals, and the other repeated the old request for an amalgamation of the[pg 287] city's militia with that of the neighbouring counties. To the first no answer was vouchsafed. To the second the Commons replied that the matter had already been referred to a committee; whilst the Lords directed an ordinance to be drawn up pursuant to the wishes of the petitioners. The petition relative to the militia was met by a counter-petition from "divers well-affected citizens of London and inhabitants in and about the same," the authors of which the Common Council wished to discover.[887]
The City desires Skippon's commission revoked, 22 July, 1648.