Today marks the Sunday closest to the execution of King Charles I by the Cromwellian puritans in 1649. We marked the day by attending a commemoration event put on by an English Civil War reenactors group. We saw brightly colored period costumes from the Seventeenth Century, including the long pikes, halberds (axes) and antique firearms, and we listened as a the solemn company laid a wreath at the very site where the king was "murdered." (Their word.) We listened to the solemn beat of the drums, and along with the reenactors we kept a sharp eye out for the hated enemy, another company of reenactors known as the Roundhead Army. The girls learned all about the English Civil War, the strained relationship between kings and parliaments and their own ancestors' role in this conflict. The girls have a partisan interest in this conflict because they learned at Madam Tussaud's that the king's nemesis, Oliver Cromwell, cancelled Christmas one year. If that's what you get with Roundheads, count them as Royalists!
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