The Regicidal Hermit?

On Saturday 30^th January 1649, King Charles I was led to the scaffold erected outside Banqueting House in Whitehall, London. Apparently it was a cold day, and so the King wore two thick shirts to ensure he didn’t shiver from cold, and so avoid giving the impression of being afraid. Charles asked the executioner to wait for him to signal his readiness by outstretching his arms, to which the executioner is reported to have replied “Yes I will, and it pleases your Majesty.”* Shortly  thereafter the King gave the sign, and the executioner expertly severed his head from his body in one blow. The crowd that had gathered to witness the killing of a king, reportedly groaned in unison as the axe fell. Thus, King Charles I became the first, and so far only, British monarch to be tried and executed. But what do we know of the man who so deftly removed the head of the monarch?

What we do know is that no one seemed to want the job. Richard Brandon (d. 1649), the London Hangman, refused to carry out the deed, despite being offered a significant sum of money. The identity of the actual executioner was certainly concealed; by false hair and beard, according to some accounts. When the body of Charles I was exhumed in 1813, it was confirmed that his head had indeed been smote from his body in a single strike, thus suggesting the work of a very competent axeman.

So who did the deed? The simple answer is we don’t know. But one possible candidate, was a man by the name of John Bigg. Bigg was clerk to Simon Mayne of Dinton in Buckinghamshire. Mayne was a judge and Member of Parliament for nearby Aylesbury, and one of the signatories on the death warrant of the King. After the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660, he was tried, found guilty and sentenced to death. He died, however, whist being held at the Tower of London in 1661, thus evading his own execution.

John Bigg  (1629-1696)

Bigg, being just an employee of Mayne, was not required to stand trial himself, and at just over 30 years of age, with a good education and being of not insignificant means, might have been expected to have simply looked for gainful employment elsewhere. What he did next was, therefore, surprising to say the least. He took up residence in a cave! Not only that, but he remained there for the rest of his life; some 35 years! He became completely reliant on the charity of locals for his sustenance, and also begged for scraps of leather. He sewed or nailed the pieces of discarded leather to his clothes and shoes, the original material of the garments and footwear eventually being superseded entirely by the bits of old hide. If you happen to visit the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, you can see one of his shoes on display there. A true curiosity if ever there was one!

John Bigg’s Shoe

So what caused John Bigg to adopt this unconventional lifestyle? Certainly it is possible that he had become mentally ill, perhaps due to the stress of being in the employ of a parliamentarian at the time of the Restoration. However, he was not personally accused of any wrongdoing, and so rumours began to circulate that perhaps Bigg had something more on his conscience than just a slightly dodgy CV. Was he the man who had donned a wig and false beard, and separated the King’s bean from his shoulders? No primary source documents have ever confirmed the identity the executioner of King Charles I, and so we will probably never know, but something certainly made Bigg seek the solitude of a cave for the rest of his life. Fear of retribution perhaps?

On the other hand, it seems unlikely that a clerk would have had the kind of axe wielding ability to be capable of carrying out an execution with a single blow. Or was it just a case of beginner’s luck?

Today, a pub near Aylesbury goes by the name of The Dinton Hermit. Could it be that a more appropriate name for the hostelry should be The King’s Head?

Source:

http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/charlesI.htm