This article started life as a footnote in my upcoming book, Dominion Theology – Recovering our political and social responsibility (Wipf & Stock, 2026)

The English Civil war was actually three conflicts between 1642–51, the final conflict of 1650–51 was probably the most significant event that was a catalyst for the Puritan migration to the New World, as it marked the period of the betrayal and brutal suppression of King Charles II who had fought Cromwell with the support of the Scots Presbyterians on the promise of spreading Scots’ Presbyterian influence through the realm in preference to the English puritan republicans supporting Cromwell.  Owing to the historic alliance of Scotland with France against England, the “moderate” Scots Presbyterian party had chosen a political alliance with Charles (who had exiled to France) over a spiritual one with Cromwell.

The Scots were deceived in this matter, considering the English republic a bigger threat to Scotland as a nation than the compromising Charles II who had clear Catholic sympathies, even seeking assistance from the Pope to get him back into power after Cromwell had executed his father (Charles I) and established the protectorate.  They took what they believed was a political shortcut to the propagation of Presbyterianism throughout the realm by the royal patronage of Charles in return for their support.  Charles had initially been crowned King of Scotland as an act of defiance against the new English republic under Cromwell but was quickly defeated by Cromwell and went into exile until the Restoration of the monarchy following Cromwell’s death. Scotland had been incorporated into the English protectorate under Cromwell, so the desire to reassert political independence was a strong stream in Scots’ thinking amongst the political leaders.

Furthermore, the alliance of the Scots with Charles was a paradoxical alliance as the Scots’ Presbyterians and English puritans were of a common spiritual ancestry, both stood against the Catholic hegemony, were reformers of nominal state Protestantism, and should have been unified against Charles and with Cromwell in common cause to create a new British republic, much like the United States was to become. Like his father (and most of the other European monarchs who were intriguing against one another, as well as against the Pope who was constantly looking to reassert his authority throughout Europe through alliances with the local potentates) Charles II lied, and after his victory and the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660, brutally suppressed both his Scots Presbyterian supporters and the English Puritans, exhuming Cromwell’s body from Westminster Abbey, beheading it, and placing his severed head on a spike (where it remained for 25-years) as a sign of the new regime’s triumph.

The failure of the strategy of compromise for Scots’ Presbyterianism to maintain independence from England was completed when the Scots parliament was dissolved on May 1, 1707, following the Act of Union, which created the Kingdom of Great Britain. Though I am critical of Stark’s Prophets, one emphasis of her thinking is to avoid the unholy political alliances in preference to the purposes of God; a principle that should be considered carefully and might well apply in this scenario but which I have also argued can too easily lead to an indifferent agnosticism regarding fighting for just political government.

To complete his iniquity, Charles later entered secret treaty with Catholic Louis XIV of France gaining subsidy in return for publicly converting to Catholicism (reopening the door for papal subjugation of the entire realm); but he only finally converted to Catholicism on his deathbed when there was no political risk of conflict with parliament. He had obviously only indicated support for Presbyterianism as a means to his desired end: his restoration to the throne and the restoration of the monarchy. To this point, the British monarchy and its hegemony have remained ever since, with only the post-WWII settlement and the subsequent loss of the Empire seeing a reduction in the political influence they exerted behind the scenes despite the alleged ascendency of parliament. Even now, any bills passed in the British Parliament still need “Royal Assent” before they pass into law; often thought of as merely a formality, it was only a few years ago that senior figures of the British establishment and Army argued that such Assent be withheld if Jeremy Corbyn had come to power in 2019.  British democracy has only ever dangled by a thread, quickly washed away should the people dare to speak too loudly.

However, taking the long view, the ascension of the US as the premier Christian nation with its republicanism, traditions of religious freedom and tolerance (after Roger Williams, a reformer of puritanism), in preference to the European nations with their state churches, has its roots in this period as the Puritans struggled to reform English and Scottish Protestantism, many of them later became key voices in the Puritan colonies.  Nevertheless, it pains me to think, as a Scot, that the Scots betrayed the protestant cause for Britain and probably the rest of Europe, but our betrayal did lead to the foundation of the American republic and its vision of a free people under God, we can rest in this marvelous example of divine providence that we see in the foundation of that new republic of the United States.