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THE CAREER of EDWARD SEXBY, 1647-1657 by DEAN FORD

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THE CAREER of EDWARD SEXBY, 1647-1657 by DEAN FORD ‘UPON A DANGEROUS DESIGN’ THE CAREER OF EDWARD SEXBY, 1647-1657 by DEAN FORD LAWSON JOHN BEELER, COMMITTEE CO-CHAIR MICHAEL MENDLE, COMMITTEE CO-CHAIR DANIEL RICHES HAROLD SELESKY PATRICIA MCELROY A DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of History in the Graduate School of The University of Alabama TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA 2016 Copyright Dean Ford Lawson 2016 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ABSTRACT Perhaps no figure of England’s Civil Wars and Interregnum (1642-1660) is more deserving of study than Edward Sexby (c. 1616 – d. 1658). From April 1647 to July 1657 Sexby was, in succession, an ‘agitator’ (or agent) put forward from the Long Parliament’s New Model Army to communicate soldierly grievances, and larger concerns over England’s future; an intermediary between Oliver Cromwell and John Lilburne in the forging of a New Model and Leveller alliance directed against Charles I; an army officer and intelligencer for the English Republic or Commonwealth; and lastly, a conspirator against Oliver Cromwell’s Protectorate. Scholars of England’s 1640s and 1650s have long commented on parts of Sexby’s story, but few scholars have examined his work from beginning to end as a career and considered its impact. This dissertation seeks to fill that important historiographical gap. The chapters of this study provide a narrative and an analysis of a career that is shown to have been consequential, inasmuch as Sexby was a figure behind some of the momentous events that occurred in England between the spring of 1647 and the spring of 1657. This study reveals that Sexby’s work helped to produce discussions in the New Model Army in the fall of 1647 of proposed changes to England’s constitution, the New Model and Leveller alliance of the fall of 1648 that was a step towards Charles’ execution and founding of the Commonwealth, and the second Protectorate parliament’s offer in the spring of 1657 to restore England’s monarchy with Oliver Cromwell as king. Three times in his career, Sexby’s work touched on the very constitution and future of England. ii DEDICATION In memory of my father and mother Robert Archer Lawson Alma Dean Crowder Lawson iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My first thanks go to Dr. Michael Mendle, Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Alabama, for directing this dissertation. I have been fortunate, in many ways, to study under his exemplary direction. While bringing this project to completion, I have learned in the fields of history addressed by this study, and I have developed as a researcher and writer, with Dr. Mendle as my teacher, advisor, and principal source of encouragement. Looking forward, I can see that my work under Dr. Mendle’s direction has prepared me for continued learning and development. I am most appreciative and grateful. I would also like to thank my dissertation committee members, Dr. John Beeler, Dr. Daniel Riches, Dr. Harold Selesky, and Dr. Patricia McElroy, for their support of my dissertation and their invaluable questions and comments during my dissertation defense. Next I wish to acknowledge my gratitude to the Department of History and the Graduate School of the University of Alabama for their generous financial assistance while I completed the coursework, prepared for the comprehensive examinations, and researched and wrote the dissertation. My time with the Department of History was a very exciting and rewarding time for me, and I wish to express my gratitude to the professors I studied under who did so much to help make it so, Dr. John Beeler, Dr. Lawrence Kohl, Dr. George McClure, Dr. Michael Mendle, Dr. Harold Selesky, and Dr. George Williamson. I thank each of you. I am grateful also for the advice and encouragement of Dr. Lisa Dorr and Dr. Kari Frederickson. Thank you both. Kay iv Branyon, Julie Moore, Ellen Pledger, and Fay Wheat, the administrative staff of the Department of History, were always helpful to me, and I am grateful for their kind assistance. Finally, very special thanks go to Kinga and Padraig; your support and encouragement made the difference. v CONTENTS ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………………………………...…ii DEDICATION ………………………………………………………………………………...…iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS …………………………………………………………………….. iv INTRODUCTION ………………………………………………………………………………..1 CHAPTER 1: APPRENTICE AND SOLDIER ………………………………………………...33 CHAPTER 2: AGITATOR AND NEW AGENT……………………………………….………51 CHAPTER 3: INTERMEDIARY, ARMY OFFICER, AND INTELLIGENCER ...………….151 CHAPTER 4: CONSPIRATOR ……………………….………………………………………189 CHAPTER 5: KILLING NOE MURDER …………………….…………………......………....254 CONCLUSION ………………………………………………………………………………...307 REFERENCES ………………………………………………………………………………...313 vi INTRODUCTION Sexby is in England, and upon a dangerous design. I have used all possible endeavors to learn, where he is, and with whom he corresponds there, but with no success. ― Sir William Lockhart to John Thurloe (19 June 1656) Spanning a decade of England’s Civil Wars and Interregnum (1642 - 1660), the various and often dangerous enterprises of Edward Sexby (c. 1616 - d. 1658) amounted to a most “remarkable career.”1 Having been an apprentice in London and then a soldier for the Long Parliament in the first Civil War (1642 - 1646), Sexby first came into prominence in April 1647 as an elected ‘agitator’ or agent of a cavalry regiment of the New Model Army. He later functioned as an intermediary between Oliver Cromwell and John Lilburne in the forging of a New Model and Leveller alliance aimed at holding Charles I accountable for the second Civil War (1648), and after Charles’ execution was an army officer in Scotland and then an intelligencer in France for the English Republic or Commonwealth. After turning against Cromwell in 1654, Sexby was a conspirator against Cromwell’s Protectorate, and as such was a figure behind the second Protectorate parliament’s offer to restore the monarchy with Cromwell as king. Sexby is most often remembered today as a participant in those discussions in the New Model Army now known as the Putney Debates (1647), where he clashed with Cromwell and Henry Ireton to demand the parliamentary franchise for the army’s ordinary soldiers as part of 1 Charles Firth and Godfrey Davies, The Regimental History of Cromwell’s Army 2 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1940), 1: 61-62, and 64-66. Sexby awaits the publication of a book-length biographical study. In the meantime see Robert Zaller, “Sexby, Edward (c. 1616 - 1658),” in Biographical Dictionary of British Radicals in the Seventeenth Century 3 vols. eds. Richard Greaves and Robert Zaller (Brighton, UK: Harvester Press, 1984), 3: 161-163; Antonia Southern, Forlorn Hope: Soldier Radicals of the Seventeenth Century (Sussex, England: The Book Guild Ltd, 2001), 115-146; and Alan Marshall, “Sexby Edward (c. 1616 - 1658),” in the online Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/25151 [accessed 26 Aug 2015]. 1 their recovered ‘birthright;’ and as the author of Killing Noe Murder (1657), a pamphlet which provided learned arguments for Cromwell’s assassination in response to the offer of the crown and to what Sexby maintained was Cromwell’s tyranny. While pursuing another design against Cromwell, Sexby was arrested by Protectorate officials in July 1657 and died of an illness in the Tower of London on 13 January 1658, about eight months before the death of Cromwell, the target of his years of conspiracy, but with whom he had previously had a close relationship.2 Historians of England’s 1640s and 1650s have long regarded Sexby’s ‘career’ as ‘remarkable.’ For Charles Firth and Godfrey Davies, “There is no more remarkable career in the annals of the New Model Army.”3 Gerald Aylmer wrote of Sexby, “His career, it can safely be said, is one which only the most reckless historical novelist would dare to invent!”4 But few historians have examined Sexby’s career from beginning to end and considered its impact.5 This dissertation seeks to fill that important historiographical gap. Its chapters examine Sexby’s successive enterprises more thoroughly than has yet been done and show that his career was indeed impactful, and that he was a factor behind some momentous developments that occurred in England. At the same time, this dissertation adds to our understanding of Sexby’s character and his relationship with Cromwell, thus supplying a context for Killing Noe Murder. 2 Most of these details of Sexby’s career are found in Zaller, “Sexby, Edward,” 161-163; Southern, Forlorn Hope, 115-146; and Marshall, “Sexby, Edward.” Other and less well-known details of Sexby’s career are found in sources examined later in this ‘Introduction’ and in the Chapters. 3 Firth and Davies, The Regimental History of Cromwell’s Army, 1: 66. 4 G. E. Aylmer, ed. The Levellers in the English Revolution (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1975), 24. The historical Sexby has required little fictionalization in order for his character to hold people’s attention in recent works of popular historical fiction. In 2008 Sexby, as portrayed by the actor John Simm, was a central figure in The Devil’s Whore, a four episode drama produced for British television. More recently, Sexby appears in Lindsey Davis’ novel Rebels and Traitors. See http://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-devils-whore/, [accessed on 26 September 2014]; and Lindsey Davis, Rebels and Traitors (London: St. Martin’s Press, 2010). 5 These include Zaller, “Sexby, Edward,” 161-163; Southern, Forlorn Hope, 115-146; and Marshall, “Sexby, Edward.” James Holstun examines Sexby’s conspiracy against Cromwell and Killing Noe Murder in Ehud’s Dagger: Class Struggle in the English Revolution (2000, reprint, London: Verso Books, 2002), 305-366. 2 David Wootton observes that Killing Noe Murder “is indeed perhaps the finest of all tracts in favour of tyrannicide and is evidently the work of an accomplished author.”6 Other scholars have more recently suggested Sexby as the author of some earlier tracts.7 But no attempt has yet been made to define Sexby’s body of written work to show how he might have become ‘accomplished.’ Therefore, another purpose of this dissertation is to show what tracts may have helped prepare Sexby to write Killing Noe Murder.
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