Wentworth arrived in England in September 1639, after Charles's failure in the first Bishops' War, and from that moment he became Charles's principal adviser. In January 1640 he was created earl of Strafford, and in March he went to Ireland to hold a parliament, where the Catholic vote secured a grant of subsidies to be used against the Presbyterian Scots. An Irish army was to be levied to assist in the coming war. When in April Strafford returned to England he found the Commons holding back from a grant of supply, and tried to enlist the peers on the side of the king. On the other hand he induced Charles to be content with a smaller grant than he had originally asked for.
The Commons, however, insisted on peace with the Scots. Charles, on the advice of Vane, returned to his larger demand of twelve subsidies; and on May 9, at the privy council, Strafford, though reluctantly, voted for a dissolution. The same morning the Com mittee of Eight of the privy council met again. Vane and others were for a mere defence against invasion. Strafford's advice was for a vigorous prosecution of war.
Under safe conduct from Charles, he arrived on the 9th and on the loth proposed to the king to forestall his impeachment, now being prepared by the parliament, by accusing the leaders of the popular party of treasonable communications with the Scots. But Pym immediately took up the impeachment to the Lords on the 11th. Strafford came to the house to confront his accusers, but was ordered to withdraw and committed into custody. On Nov. 25, the preliminary charge was brought up, whereupon he was sent to the Tower, and, on Jan. 31, 1641, the accusations in detail were presented. These were, in sum, that Strafford had endeavoured to subvert the fundamental laws of the kingdom. Behind the legal aspect of the case lay the great constitutional question of the responsibility to the nation of the leader of its administration. The Commons, convinced that the destruction of Strafford was essential to the liberties of the kingdom, dropped the impeachment, and brought in and passed a bill of attainder, though, owing to the opposition of the Lords and Pym's own preference for the more judicial method, the procedure of an impeachment was practically adhered to. Strafford might still
have been saved but for the king's ill-advised conduct. The revelation of the army plot on May 5, caused the Lords to pass the attainder. Nothing now remained but the king's signature. Charles yielded, giving his assent on May io. Strafford met his fate on May 12, on Tower Hill, receiving Laud's blessing, who was then also imprisoned in the Tower, on his way to execution.
Thus passed into history "the great person," as Clarendon well calls him, without doubt one of the most striking figures in the annals of England. Strafford's patriotism and ideas were fully as noble as those of his antagonists. Like Pym, a student of Bacon's wisdom, he believed in the progress of England along the lines of natural development, but that development, in oppo sition to Pym, he was convinced could only proceed with the increase of the power of the executive, not of the parliament, with a government controlled by the king and not by the people.
Strafford was married three times: (I) in 1611 to Lady Mar garet Clifford, daughter of Francis, 4th earl of Cumberland; (2) in 1625 to Lady Arabella Holles, daughter of John, 1st earl of Clare; (3) in 1632 to Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Godfrey Rhodes. He left three daughters and one son, William, 2nd earl of Strafford.
See the article on Strafford in the Dict. Nat. Biog. by S. R. Gar diner; Strafford's Letters, ed. by W. Knowler (1739) ; R. Browning's Life of Strafford, with introduction by C. H. Firth (1892) ; Papers relating to Thos. Wentworth ed. by C. H. Firth for the Camden Society (189o), Camden Miscellany, vol. ix.; Private Letters from the Earl of Strafford to his third Wife (Philobiblon Soc. Biog. & Hist. Misc. 1854, vol. i.) ; Lives by H. D. Traill (1889) in "English Men of Action Series," and by Elizabeth Cooper (i886) ; Cat. of State Papers, Domestic and Irish, esp. 1633-1647 Introduction; Hist. MSS. Comm. MSS. of Earl Cowper; Strafford's Correspondence, of which the volumes published by Knowler represent probably only a small selection, remains still in MS. in the collection of Earl Fitzwilliam at Wentworth Woodhouse; also H. O'Grady, Strafford and Ireland (Dublin, 2 vols., 1923).