ABSTRACT
The king had moved his court to Oxford, and therefore the Spanish ambassador addressed him there. His opponents, organized into a remnant of the Parliament elected in 1640, held London. Hence a protest made to the king in Oxford but picked up for publication in London crossed a political divide when it moved from the place where the protest was lodged to the place where it was reported as a news story. When the English sailed into San Domingo, they took a Spanish ship and then brought their prize to Southampton, England. The rival government centred in Parliament utterly ignored this protest and the king’s proclamation. In January it ordered the cargo sold and the money turned over to Parliament. The printer had a history not only of issuing news but of criticizing royal policy for being insufficiently aggressive against powerful Roman Catholic Hapsburg monarchs.
