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it was published the following day. They were, they said, no ‘mere mercenary army, hired to serve any arbitrary power of a State, but called forth and conjured by the several declarations of parliament to the defence of our own and the people’s just rights and liberties’. They were making their demands as Englishmen, not soldiers, and they had a right to that even though they were soldiers. Drawing explicit comparison not only with the Covenanters, but with contemporary rebels in Portugal and the Netherlands, they said they could ground their actions in the defence of the fundamental laws of the kingdom, without ‘visible form either of parliament or king to countenance them’. They called for a purge of corrupt members of the House and constitutional reforms to ensure that it remained a true representative of the people: regular but limited meetings, no dissolution without its own consent and the right of the people to petition. In line with the interests of the people, they also called for restraint of the powers of military officers in the localities, full account of all the monies raised to fight the wars and public justice on the main delinquents responsible for the bloodshed. It was with this political programme in mind that the army would now move closer to London.95 This was not a completely unanimous display. Hardly any of the soldiery left the army during the early summer, but many officers did, and this tended to further reduce the social status of the command.96

The Declaration was received on 15 June, along with charges against eleven Members of Parliament, including Holles, Stapleton and Massey. When the charges were drawn up they were detailed and difficult to prove, but revolved around negotiations with the royalists: for example, dealing with the Queen’s party in France to restore the King on their terms, enlisting forces to prepare for a new war, and inviting the Covenanters to invade England in their support. It did not take a particularly hostile witness to compare this with the King’s charges against the Five Members, although they were not yet backed up by direct force. On 23 June, Parliament refused to discuss the constitutional proposals and demanded to see the evidence about the eleven members. On that day the Humble Remonstrance was issued. As the conflict escalated Fairfax refused an order to retire forty miles from London and the Houses issued defiant declarations. In the last week of June, though, they gave way. The army withdrew to Uxbridge, from where it was in a position to cut off supplies to London, and on 26 June the eleven members withdrew from the House. Two days later the minimum demands from the army were forwarded to Parliament.97 The Presbyterians, it seems, had blinked.

With the army hovering outside London at Uxbridge and then Reading, the pressure at Westminster and in the City was intense. And things were apparently moving against the Presbyterians. The Northern Association army was under the control of Poyntz, a man of reliable Presbyterian convictions, alarmed at the subversion being fostered by the agitators and almost certainly willing to co-operate with an intervention by the Covenanters if ordered to do so. But agitators in his army were co-operating with those in the New Model. At a council of war held at York on 2 July agitators demanded that some of the colonels there should sign a representation from the army to Parliament. Poyntz decided to resign his commission, since the army was no longer under his command and a dispute ensued about the command of the York garrison and the stronghold, Clifford Tower. It culminated with Poyntz being dragged from his bed and, still in his slippers, being taken under guard to Fairfax’s headquarters.98

This military blow to Presbyterianism coincided with another shift towards conciliation. On 6 July the army presented articles of impeachment against the eleven members. No impeachment had been moved from outside the House before, and it is clear that the agitators were fully involved in the drawing up of the (unprovable) charges. Central