Charles I and the descent into war in three kingdoms I 62542
Charles I was a hard-working monarch with sincere convictions. However, some contemporaries and many historians have viewed him as a cold, formal, unattractive figure, unable or unwilling to explain himself, convince doubters or win affection, a man temperamentally and perhaps intellectually unsuited to holding power at a time of so many potential difficulties. From the outset, Charles pursued divisive and sometimes unworkable policies, refused to conciliate or compromise in the face of...
The fighting
The infantry formed the core of the civil war army and was generally the largest of its three main elements. Foot soldiers were either musketeers or pikemen. Musketeers, who usually wore no body armour, had swords and could use their muskets as clubs in close-quarter combat or when they ran out of ammunition. Thus at Naseby, Fairfax's musketeers attacked an obstinate unit of royalist foot 'with Butt-end of Muskets and so broke them'. However, the musketeer's principal role was to fire 011 the...