The trials of Edward Vaughan: Law, civil war and gentry faction in seventeenth-century Britain, c.1596-1661

This volume tells a remarkable story. Edward Vaughan was the fifth son of a landed gentleman and cannot have expected much beyond a career as a lawyer. However, by fair means and foul (mostly foul) he managed to gain possession of one of the largest estates in seventeenth century Wales. His tenure was not to be a quiet one, however, as the Protestant Vaughan entered a bruising legal contest with one of the premier Catholic magnates in seventeenth century Britain over title to these lands. Vaughan’s case would ultimately help bring down the Council in the Marches of Wales and the Court of Star Chamber in 1641 as the Long Parliament reacted against the courts which had supported his Catholic adversary. His case became swept up in the politics of the civil wars as Vaughan, a moderate parliamentarian, fought new battles with local radicals to secure his patrimony, and was excluded from parliament in the revolutionary coup by the New Model Army known as ‘Pride’s Purge’. The trials of Edward Vaughan reveal much about the confrontational and sometimes bloody nature of law, politics, faction and family in early modern England and Wales. It is a rich and surprising story and one which has yet to be told