Thomas Harrison

Major-General Thomas Harrison, baptised 16 July 1616, executed 13 October 1660, was a prominent member of the radical religious sect known as the Fifth Monarchists, and a soldier who fought for Parliament and the Commonwealth in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. One of those who approved the Execution of Charles I in January 1649, he was a strong supporter of Oliver Cromwell before the two fell out when The Protectorate was established in 1653. Following the 1660 Stuart Restoration, he was arrested, found guilty of treason as a regicide, and sentenced to death. He was hanged, drawn and quartered on 13 October 1660, facing his execution with a courage noted by various observers, including the diarist Samuel Pepys. Personal details Thomas Harrison was baptised 16 July 1616, second of four children and only son of Richard Harrison, four times mayor of Newcastle-under-Lyme, and his wife Mary. In 1646, he married his cousin Catherine Harrison; they had three children, all of whom died as infants. Career Harrison was probably educated at a local Grammar school before moving to London, where he became clerk to a lawyer based in Clifford's Inn. When the First English Civil War began in August 1642, the Earl of Essex was appointed commander of the Parliamentarian army, and Harrison enlisted in his personal troop of Lifeguards, which was recruited almost exclusively from the Inns of Court. Other members included Charles Fleetwood, Edmund Ludlow and Nathaniel Rich, all of whom played important roles in the political and religious conflicts that followed. This unit fought in two of the earliest battles of the war, Powick Bridge in September and Edgehill in October 1642. In summer 1643, he transferred to the army of the Eastern Association as captain of a cavalry troop in the Earl of Manchester's regiment. He had reached the rank of lieutenant-colonel by the time it took part in the decisive Battle of Marston Moor in July 1644.