John Downes (regicide) John Downes (regicide) Colonel John Downes (1609 – c. 1666) was a commissioner who signed the death warrant of Charles I of England. After the English Restoration he was found guilty of regicide and was imprisoned until he died. John Downes; family had moved southwards from Cheshire to Warwickshire. They were said to be able to trace their Cheshire lineage back to 864 AD, according to John Parsons Earwaker's "History" of East Cheshire families. It is said that when the King came hunting in Macclesfield Forest, a Downes would hold the King's stirrup, whilst he mounted and Lord Stanley would
Letters on a Regicide Peace of the country for the continuance of the war". The fourth letter, addressed to William Fitzwilliam, was written following Burke's reading of William Eden's "Some Remarks on the Apparent Circumstances of the War in the Fourth Week of October 1795". When Pitt's government tried to negotiate peace with France, Burke stopped composing the letter and instead published what became the first two letters, called "Two Letters on a Regicide Peace". Burke attempted to rewrite the letter to Fitzwilliam, but he did not finish before dying. The 1812 edition of his works did include a copy of the fourth letter that