Col. Francis Hacker

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This text was copied from Wikipedia on 15 November 2024 at 6:10AM.

Colonel Francis Hacker

Colonel Francis Hacker (died 19 October 1660) was an English soldier who fought for Parliament during the English Civil War and one of the regicides of King Charles I of England.

Biography

Francis Hacker was baptised on 16 March 1605 at All Hallows, Gedling, Nottinghamshire, the third son of Francis Hacker of East Bridgford and Colston Bassett, Nottinghamshire, and Anne. They had about thirteen children. Anne died in 1616 and is buried at St Mary the Virgin, Lowdham, Nottinghamshire. Francis's second wife was Margaret, daughter of Walter Whalley of Cotgrave. She had first married George Rossell of Radcliffe-on-Trent with whom she had three children. The portrait featured is a newly discovered painting of Francis Hacker which is now on display at the National Civil War Centre, Newark, Nottinghamshire.

From the outbreak of the English Civil War Hacker, vehemently supported the Parliamentary cause, though the rest of his family seem to have been Royalists. On 10 July 1644 he was appointed one of the militia committee for the county of Leicester, the scene of most of his exploits during the Civil War,[1] On 27 November 1643 he and several others of the Leicestershire committee were surprised and taken prisoners at Melton Mowbray by Gervase Lucas, the Royalist governor of Belvoir Castle. A month later Parliament ordered that he should be exchanged for Colonel Sands.[2]

At the capture of Leicester by the king in May 1645, Hacker, who distinguished himself in the defence, was again taken prisoner.[3] Hacker was nevertheless attacked for his conduct during the defence, but he was warmly defended in a pamphlet published by the Leicester committee. His services are there enumerated at length, and special commendation is bestowed on his conduct at the taking of Bagworth House and his defeat of the enemy at Belvoir, where he was in command of the Leicester, Nottingham, and Derby horse (cavalry). Hacker is further credited with having freely given "all the prizes that ever he took" to the state and to his soldiers, and with having, while prisoner at Belvoir, refused with scorn an offer of "pardon and the command of a regiment of horse to change his side". "At the king's taking of Leicester", the pamphleteer proceeds, he "was so much prized by the enemy as they offered him the command of a choice regiment of horse to serve the king".[4] At the defeat of the Royalists at the Battle of Willoughby Field in Nottinghamshire (5 July 1648), Hacker commanded the left wing of the Parliamentary forces.[5]

During the trial of Charles I, Hacker was one of the officers specially charged with the custody of the King, and usually commanded the guard of halberdiers which escorted Charles to and from Westminster Hall. He was one of the three officers to whom the warrant for the King's execution was addressed, was present himself on the scaffold, supervised the execution, and signed the order to the executioner.[6] According to Herbert, he treated the King respectfully.[7]

Hacker commanded a regiment under Cromwell during the Invasion of Scotland. Cromwell wrote to Hacker, 25 December 1650, rebuking him for slightingly describing one of his subalterns as a better preacher than fighter, and telling him that he expects him and all the chief officers of the army to encourage preaching.[8] Hacker was a religious man, but a strict Presbyterian and a persecutor of the Quakers,[9] He confessed shortly before his death "that he had formerly born too great a prejudice in his heart towards the good people of God that differed from him in judgement".[10] While Cromwell lived he was a staunch supporter of the Protectorate, arrested Lord Grey in February 1655, and was employed in the following year to suppress the intrigues of the Cavaliers and Fifth Monarchists in Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire.[11] In Richard Cromwell's Parliament Hacker represented Leicestershire, but was a silent member. "All that have known me", he said at his execution, "in my best estate have not known me to have been a man of oratory, and God hath not given me the gift of utterance as to others".[12]

During the Second Commonwealth (the unstable period preceding the Restoration) he followed generally the leadership of his neighbour Sir Arthur Haslerig, whose "creature" he was (as Mrs. Hutchinson terms him).[13] By Haslerig's persuasion he, first of all the colonels of the army, accepted a new commission from the hands of the speaker of the restored Long Parliament, and was among the first to own the supremacy of the civil power over the army,[14] He opposed the mutinous petitions of Lambert's partisans in September 1659, and, after they had expelled the Rump Parliament from Westminster, entered into communication with Hutchinson and Haslerig for armed opposition.[15] After the triumph of the Rump he was again confirmed in the command of his regiment, and seems to have been still in the army when the Restoration took place.[16] On 5 July 1660 he was arrested and sent to the Tower of London, and his regiment given to Lord Hawley.[17] The House of Commons did not at first except him from the Indemnity and Oblivion Act, but during the debates upon it in the lords the fact came out that the warrant for the execution of the King had been in Hacker's possession. The Lords desired to use it as evidence against the regicides, and ordered him to produce it. Mrs. Hacker was sent to fetch it, and, in the hope of saving her husband, delivered up the strongest testimony against himself and his associates.[18] The next day (1 August 1660) the Lords added Hacker's name to the list of those excepted, and a fortnight later (13 August) the House of Commons accepted this amendment.[19]

Hacker's trial took place on 15 October 1660. He made no serious attempt to defend himself: "I have no more to say for myself but that I was a soldier, and under command, and what I did was by the commission you have read".[20] The particulars of the share Colonel Hacker had in trial and execution, were related by Colonel Matthew Thomlinson, at Hacker's trial:[21]

I had indeed to do with the guard; being then an officer of the army, a colonel of horse. When the King came to St. James's, it was observed by some, that there was too great an access of people admitted to the King; and within a day or two after, there was a party of halberdiers appointed for the stricter observing the guard; they were commanded by three gentlemen, of whom this prisoner at the bar was one. The orders every day for removing the person of the king were commonly directed to four persons, and those were, myself, Lieutenant-colonel Cobbet, Captain Merryman, and one more; but the guards that still went along were the halberdiers. So that every day when the King did go to Westminster, he went to Sir Robert Cotton's house, and so far I went with him, but never saw him at that pretended high court of justice. When he used to go to Westminster Hall, Serjeant Dendy used to come, and demand that the King should go to the high court of justice, and Colonel Hacker did ordinarily go with him, with the halberdiers. It was my custom to stay in the room till he came back again. These orders continued during the time of his trial. After the sentence was given, on the day whereon the execution was to be done, it was ordered, that the guards that were for the security of the person of the king should cease, when a warrant from the high court of justice for the execution should be produced.

— Tomlinson.[22]

Colonel Tomlinson further deposed, "that Colonel Hacker led the King forth on the day of his execution, followed by the bishop of London, and was there in prosecution of that warrant, and upon the same their orders were at an end".[22] This evidence of Tomlinson was corroborated by Colonel Huncks, who stated that:

a little before the hour the king died, he was in Ireton's chamber, in Whitehall, where Ireton and Harrison were in bed together; that Cromwell, Colonel Hacker, Lieutenant-colonel Phayer, Axtel, and himself, were standing at the door, Colonel Hacker reading the warrant; but Upon witnesses' refusal to draw up an order for the executioner, Cromwell would have no delay, but stepping to a table that stood by the door, on which were pens, ink, and paper, he wrote something; which as soon as he had done, gives the pen to Hacker, who also wrote something, on which the execution of the king followed.

— Huncks.[22]

Hacker was sentenced to death, and was hanged at Tyburn on 19 October 1660.[23][22] His body, instead of being quartered, was given to his friends for burial, and is said to have been interred in the church of St. Nicholas Cole Abbey, London, the advowson of which was at one time vested in the Hacker family.[24][a] As with all convicted traitors, his property was forfeited to the Crown. His estate passed to the Duke of York, but was bought back by Rowland Hacker, and was still in the possession of the Hacker family in 1890.[27]


Notes

  1. ^ The Historian C. H. Firth speculates that the concession of hanging and burial rather than the usual punishment being hanged, drawn and quartered was probably due to the loyalty of other members of his family to the Royalist cause. One brother, Thomas Hacker, was killed fighting for the King's cause.[25] Another, Rowland Hacker, was an active commander for the King in Nottinghamshire, and lost his hand in his service.[26]
  1. ^ Firth 1890, p. 416 cites: Husband, Ordinances, 1646, p. 521.
  2. ^ Firth 1890, p. 416 cites: Commons' Journals, 25 December 1643.
  3. ^ Firth 1890, p. 416 cites: J.F. Hollings, History of Leicester during the Civil War, pp. 53, 62.
  4. ^ Firth 1890, pp. 416–417 cites: An Examination Examined, 1645, p. 15).
  5. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Memoirs of Col. Hutchinson, ed. 1885, p. 384.
  6. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Trials of the Regicides, pp. 217–226, ed. 1660.
  7. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Memoirs of Sir Thomas Herbert, ed. 1702, pp. 121, 132, 135.
  8. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Carlyle Letter clxii
  9. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Fox, Journal, p. 136.
  10. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: A Collection of the Lives, Speeches, &c., of those Persons lately Executed, 1661, p. 170.
  11. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Thurloe, iii. 148, 395, iv. 248, 598, 720.
  12. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Lives, Speeches, etc, p. 175.
  13. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Hutchinson Memoirs, ii. 179; Clarendon State Papers, iii. 53.
  14. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Ludlow, Memoirs, ed. 1751, p. 253; Commons' Journals, vii. 675.
  15. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Hutchinson, Memoirs, ii. 234 ; Baker, Chronicle, ed. 1670, p. 691.
  16. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Commons' Journals, vii. 824.
  17. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Mercurius Publicus, 28 June-5 July 1660, ib. 5–12 July.
  18. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Journals of the House of Lords, xi. 100, 104, 113; Hutchinson, Memoirs, ii. 253.
  19. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Journals of the House of Lords, xi. 114; Commons' Journals, viii. 118.
  20. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Trials of the Regicides, p. 224.
  21. ^ Granger 1824, pp. 137–138.
  22. ^ a b c d Granger 1824, pp. 137–138..
  23. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417.
  24. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Cal State Papers, Dom. 1660-1, p. 316; Briscoe, Old Nottinghamshire, p. 134.
  25. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 Briscoe, p. 134.
  26. ^ Firth 1890, p. 417 cites: Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1660-1, p. 339; Hutchinson, i. 262, 312.
  27. ^ Firth 1890, pp. 417–418.

References

Attribution

Further reading

6 Annotations

First Reading

Paul Miller  •  Link

Presbyterian Army officer from Nottinghamshire. His family were Royalists - one of his brothers died fighting for the King, another lost a hand. Colonel Hacker commanded the soldiers who guarded the King during his trial and controlled access to him. He signed the order to the executioner when Colonel Huncks refused to do so and supervised the guard on the scaffold. At his own trial Hacker pleaded that he was only following orders, but was sentenced to death.

vincent  •  Link

Is there a defence lawyer in the house? From Paul Miller on Sun 19 Oct 2003, 1:26 am

Nick Addington  •  Link

Col. Francis Hacker was my Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Grandfather

Third Reading

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"On this date in 1660, the English soldiers Francis Hacker and Daniel Axtel(l) were executed for their roles in keeping the captured King Charles I, and for eventually seeing that late king to his beheading.

"No hapless grunt, Hacker was a committed Roundhead although most of his family stayed loyal to the Stuarts. When captured by the royalists at Leicester, Hacker “was so much prized by the enemy as they offered him the command of a choice regiment of horse to serve the king.”

"Hacker disdainfully turned it down.

"And as the wheel of fortune turned, the king would become Hacker’s prize. It was Hacker who commanded the detail of 32 halberdiers who marched the deposed monarch into Westminster Hall on January 20, 1649 to begin a weeklong trial — and a whole new historical era of parliamentary ascendancy.

"Ten days later, when Charles was led out for beheading outside the Banqueting House, it was Hacker who escorted him. Hacker might have escaped even this much participation with his own life after the restoration of Charles’s son and heir, but it came out that he had even written, with Cromwell, the order to the executioner.

"(It was an order that one of his comrades that day had very presciently refused to set his own hand to; come 1660, Hercules Huncks would owe his life to this refusal.)
[PICTURE]
"Detailed view (click for a larger image) of an illustration of the king’s beheading. On the right of the scaffold, character “D” sporting a natty scabbard is Francis Hacker.

It’s a funny little thing to lose your life over, because — narrowly considered — it was nothing but a bit of bureaucracy. Hacker et al had been given from above a commission for the king’s death. On the occasion of the execution they had to convey from their party to the executioner a secondary writ licensing the day’s beheading.

"But monarchs asserting divine prerogative certainly do not take such a view of mere paperwork.

“When you come to the Person of the King, what do our Law Books say he is? they call it, Caput Reipublicae, salus Populi, the Leiutenant of God”

"Huncks refusing to set his hand to this death warrant, it was Cromwell who personally dashed it off, then handed it to Hacker, who fatally countersigned it, just before the execution proceeded.

"Meanwhile, Hacker’s subaltern Daniel Axtell razzed Huncks for chickening out. Axtell, who seemingly would be right at home in the kit of your most hated sports club, was indicted a regicide for his gauche fan behavior during the king’s trial, several times inciting soldiers (on pain of thrashing, per testimony in 1660) to chant for the king’s condemnation, whilst bullying any onlookers who dared to shout for Charles into silence.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 2

"Hacker did not bother to mount a defense; the verdicts were foreordained by political settlement.

"Axtell argued superior orders, a defense best-known to us for its unsuccessful use by Nazis at Nuremberg but one which actually boasts a long history of failing to impress:

"... the Parliament, thus constituted, and having made their Generals, he by their Authority did constitute and appoint me to be an Inferior Officer in the Army, serving them in the quarters of the Parliament, and under and within their power; and what I have done, my Lord, it hath been done only as a Souldier, deriving my power from the General, he had his power from the Fountain, to wit, the Lords and Commons; and, my Lord, this being done, as hath been said by several, that I was there, and had command at Westminster-hall; truly, my Lord, if the Parliament command the General, and the General the inferiour Officers, I am bound by my Commission, according to the Laws and Customs of War to be where the Regiment is; I came not thither voluntarily, but by command of the General, who had a Commission (as I said before) from the Parliament. I was no Counsellor, no Contriver, I was no Parliament-man, none of the Judges, none that Sentenced, Signed, none that had any hand in the Execution, onely that which is charged is that I was an Officer in the Army."

"Sounding equally modern, the court replied:
"You are to obey them in their just commands, all unjust commands are invalid. If our Superiours should command us to undue and irregular things (much more if to the committing of Treason) we are in each Case to make use of our passive not active Obedience."*

"The two men were drawn from Newgate to Tyburn this date and hanged.

"Axtell was quartered, the customary fate of those regicides who had been put to death all the week preceding. Hacker, however, enjoyed the favor of hanging only, and was delivered and “was, by his Majesties great favour, given entire to his Friends, and buried” — perhaps because so many of Hacker’s family had remained true to Charles.

"* Axtell’s trial has a good deal of detailed bickering over the superior-orders defense, but the court itself did also take pains to differentiate the things Axtell did as an officer, such as commanding troops (for which Axtell was not charged) — and his going the extra mile and surely beyond his commission to shout for the king’s death."

FROM: https://www.executedtoday.com/tag…
with pictures

"On this date" (at the top) I should have clarified as being October 19, 1660.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

A biography that appeared in the Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Di…

HACKER, FRANCIS (d. 1660), regicide, was third son of Francis Hacker of East Bridgeford and Colston Basset, Nottinghamshire, by Margaret, daughter of Walter Whalley of Cotgrave.

From the outbreak of the first civil war, Hacker vehemently supported the parliamentary cause, although the rest of his family seem to have been royalists.

FOR HACKER'S CIVIL WAR SERVICE, SEE THE LINKED BIOGRAPHY

Col. Francis Hacker was again confirmed in the command of his regiment, and seems to have been still in the army when the Restoration took place (Commons' Journals, vii. 824).

On 5 July, 1660, Col. Hacker was arrested and sent to the Tower, and his regiment given to Lord Hawley (Mercurius Publicus, 28 June-5 July 1660, ib. 5-12 July).

The House of Commons did not at first except him from the Act of Indemnity, but during the debates in the Lords the fact came out that the warrant for the king's execution was in Hacker's possession. The Lords desired to use it as evidence against the regicides, and ordered him to produce it.

Mrs. Hacker was sent to fetch it, and, in the hope of saving her husband, delivered up the strongest testimony against himself and his associates (Journals of the House of Lords, xi. 100, 104, 113; HUTCHINSON, Memoirs, ii. 253).

The next day (1 Aug. 1660) the Lords added Col. Hacker's name to the list of those excepted.

On 13 Aug. 1660 the House of Commons accepted this amendment (Journals of the House of Lords, xi. 114; Commons' Journals, viii. 118).

Hacker's trial took place on 15 Oct. 1660. He made no serious attempt to defend himself: 'I have no more to say for myself but that I was a soldier, and under command, and what I did was by the commission you have read' (Trials of the Regicides, p. 224).

He was sentenced to death, and was hanged on 19 Oct. 1660.
His body was given to his friends for burial, and is said to have been interred in the church of St. Nicholas Cole Abbey, London, the advowson of which was at one time vested in the Hacker family (Cal State Papers, Dom. 1660-1, p. 316; BRISCOE, Old Nottinghamshire, p. 134).

This concession was probably due to the signal loyalty of other members of his family. One brother, Thomas Hacker, was killed fighting for the king's cause (BRISCOE, p. 134).
Another, Rowland Hacker, was an active commander for the king in Nottinghamshire, and lost his hand in his service (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1660-1, p. 339; HUTCHINSON, i. 262, 312).

Hacker married (5 July, 1632) Isabella Brunts of East Bridgeford, Nottinghamshire, by whom he had one son, Francis, an officer in his father's regiment, and a daughter, Anne.

His estate passed to the Duke of York, but was bought back by his brother, Rowland Hacker, and was still in the possession of the Hacker family at the time of publication.

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References

Chart showing the number of references in each month of the diary’s entries.

1660