Henry Marten (regicide)

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Henry Marten[1] (1602 – September 9, 1680) was a regicide of King Charles I of England.

Marten was the elder son of Sir Henry Marten, born in Oxford and educated at University College in the same city. As a public figure, he first came to prominence in 1639 when he refused to contribute to a general loan. In 1640, he entered Parliament as one of the members for Berkshire, where he lived at Beckett Hall in Shrivenham (now in Oxfordshire). Soon afterwards, his official residence became Longworth House in nearby Longworth, though he preferred to live in London. In the House of Commons, he joined the popular party, spoke in favour of the proposed bill of attainder against Strafford, and in 1642 was a member of the committee of safety. Some of his language about the king was so frank that Charles demanded his arrest and his trial for high treason.

When the English Civil War broke out Marten did not take the field, although he was appointed governor of Reading, Berkshire, but in Parliament he was very active. On one occasion his zeal in the parliamentary cause led him to open a letter from the Earl of Northumberland to his countess, an impertinence for which, says Clarendon, he was cudgelled by the earl; and in 1643, on account of some remark about extirpating the royal family, he was expelled from Parliament and was imprisoned for a few days.

In the following year, however, he was made governor of Aylesbury, and about this time took some small part in the war. Allowed to return to Parliament in January 1646, Marten again advocated extreme views. He spoke of his desire to prepare the king for heaven; he attacked the Presbyterians, and, supporting the New Model Army against the Long Parliament, he signed the agreement of August 1647. He was closely associated with John Lilburne and the Levellers, and was one of those who suspected the sincerity of Oliver Cromwell, whose murder he is said personally to have contemplated.

However, he acted with Cromwell in bringing Charles I to trial; he was one of the most prominent of the King's judges was the 31 of 59 Commissioners to sign the death warrant. He was then energetic in establishing the Commonwealth and in destroying the remaining vestiges of the monarchical system. He was chosen a member of the Council of State in 1649, and as compensation for his losses and reward for his services during the war, lands valued at £1000 a year were settled upon him. In parliament he spoke often and with effect, but he took no part in public life during the Protectorate, passing part of this time in prison, where he was placed on account of his debts.

Having sat among the restored members of the Long Parliament in 1659, Marten surrendered himself to the authorities as a regicide in June 1660, and with some others he was excepted from the Indemnity and Oblivion Act, but with a saving clause. He behaved courageously at his trial, which took place in October 1660, but he was found guilty of taking part in the king's death. Through the action, or rather the inaction of the House of Lords, he was spared the death penalty, but he remained a captive, and was in prison at Chepstow Castle when he died on September 9, 1680. Although a leading Puritan, Marten was a man of loose morals. He wrote and published several pamphlets, and in 1662 there appeared Henry Marten's Familiar Letters to his Lady of Delight, which contained letters to his mistress, Mary Ward.


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  1. ^ His name was spelt Henry Martin in the Proclamation for apprehending the late King's Judges (4 June 1660) and in other Parliamentary records of the time (see for example House of Lords Journal Volume 11 7 February 1662)