Posted Mar 4, 2012, 10:10 PM
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Registered User
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Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: Wiltshire, England
Posts: 1,938
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XXXVI – Charles II
So, we’re back for another instalment in leafy St James’, trying, as ever, to find London’s prodigal sons and daughters – people condemned or punished by the city, only to be honoured after death.
This time, it’s the turn of the aristocrats – those who were born into the highest ranks of society, only to fall the furthest, yet eventually rise again.
And we start at the very top, with Charles II: the patron of St Pauls’ Cathedral, the founder of the Royal Society, London’s most flamboyant - and arguably most influential - monarch.
It was all very different on the 6th September 1651, when, having been defeated by Oliver Cromwell in the battle of Worcester, he spent the day hiding in an oak tree in Shropshire, a wanted man in his own kingdom, with a price of £1000 on his head for treason.
He managed to evade the Parliamentary forces and escaped to France. Nine years later, he returned to England as King, and is remembered with statues in London in Soho and Chelsea, as well as having a street that runs through London’s most swanky neighbourhood named after him.
Last edited by Bedhead; Jan 1, 2014 at 2:41 PM.
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