In the wilderness, 1649–1660

On 6 February 1649 the House of Lords assembled for the last time for eleven years: the peers did not occupy their chamber again until 25 April 1660. Early on that inauspicious February day the recently purged House of Commons resolved ‘that the House of Peers in parliament is useless and dangerous and ought to be abolished’. A bill for that purpose was accordingly drafted and debated, passing the Commons on 19 March. The abolition of their House divested peers of their parliamentary powers and privileges, swept away their personal privileges (enjoyed by virtue of their nobility), which had reinforced their exalted position in the social order and, above all, abruptly ended the key role played by those lords who had remained at Westminster during the Civil War in helping to shape the course of parliamentary politics. Yet when peers eventually re-assembled at Westminster in 1660 they successfully reasserted their own authority and that of their chamber. The restored House of Lords proved to be a robust institution, enjoying considerable influence in the government of the realm. The character and composition of the House of Lords changed enormously during the 1640s. In February 1642 the bishops were formally excluded and were closely followed by the Catholic peers. Gradually Royalists ceased to attend, many rallying to the royal standard at Nottingham and later drifting to the king's Oxford headquarters. Only a fluctuating group of about thirty lords remained at Westminster for the duration of the Civil War and its aftermath, and even this group dwindled to below ten on numerous occasions towards the end of the decade.