On being nominated one of the king's judges, he attended on 20, 22, and 23 Jan. 1649, but refused to take part in the ultimate proceedings (Nalson, Trial of Charles I, ed. 1684). He was, however, placed by the parliament on the committee appointed to receive and take note of the dissent of any member from the vote of 5 Dec. 1648 (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1649-50, p. 1). On 19 July 1649 he tried to persuade the house into the belief that the sum of 4,500l. was owing him as arrears of the pension due to his late wife the Countess of Nottingham (Commons' Journals, vi. 264), but he lost his motion by two votes. The Long parliament, when restored in May 1659, was obliged, in order to form a quorum, to send for Monson and Henry Marten [q. v.] from the Fleet; prison, where they were both confined for debt (England's Confusion, 1659, p. 10).
At the Restoration he was excepted out of the bill of pardon as to pains and penalties, and upon surrendering himself on 21 June was recommitted to the Fleet. On 1 July 1661 he was brought up to the bar of the House of Commons, and, after being made to confess his crime, was degraded from all his honours and titles and deprived of his property. He was also sentenced to be drawn from the Tower through the city of London to Tyburn, and so back again, with a halter about his neck, and to be imprisoned for life (Commons' Journals, viii. 60, 70, 285-6). In petitioning the House of Lords on 25 July to remit what was most ignominious in his sentence, Monson declared that his design in sitting at the king's trial was, if possible, to prevent 'that horrid murder' (Hist. MSS. Comm. 7th Rep. pp. ix, 150). The ignominious part of the sentence was duly carried out each year on the anniversary of the king's sentence (27 Jan. : Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1661-2, p. 225; Pepys, Diary, ed. Bright, i. 407, 528-9). Monson appears to have died in the Fleet prison about 1672. His estate at Reigate was granted to the Duke of York.
Monson married, first, Margaret (d. 1639), daughter of James Stewart, earl of Murray, and widow of Charles Howard, earl of Nottingham (1536-1624) [q. v.]; secondly, Frances, daughter of Thomas Alston of Polstead, Suffolk, by whom he left a son Alston (d. 1674 without issue); and thirdly, Elizabeth (d. 1695), second daughter of Sir George Reresby, knt., of Thrybergh, Yorkshire, widow of Sir Francis Foljambe, bart., of Aldwark in the same county, and of Edward, younger son of Sir John Horner of Mells, Somerset. By his last wife (who married, fourthly, Adam, eldest son of Sir Henry Felton, bart., of Playford, Suffolk) he had an only daughter, Elizabeth, married, first, to Sir Philip Hungate, bart., of Saxton, Yorkshire; and, secondly, to Lewis Smith of Wotton, Warwickshire (Nichols, Collectanea, ii. 82). At the intercession of her nephew, Sir John Reresby, Lady Monson was restored to her title of Viscountess Castlemaine (Reresby, Memoirs, ed. Cartwright, p. 13).
[Noble's Lives of the English Regicides; Collins's Peerage, 1812, vii. 239-40; Commons' Journals, ii. 200, 549, 556, 955; The Traytor's Pilgrimage from the Tower to Tyburn.]
MONSON, WILLIAM (1760–1807), Indian officer, fourth son of John, second baron Monson [see under Monson, Sir John, first baron], by his wife Theodosia, daughter of John Maddison of Harpswell, Lincolnshire, was born 15 Dec. 1760. In 1780 he received a commission in the 52nd regiment of infantry, with which he proceeded to India. By 5 Aug. 1785 he had risen to the rank of captain. Taking part in the war carried on by the English against Tippoo, sultan of Mysore, during the administration of Charles, lord Cornwallis [q. v.], he commanded a light company of the 52nd regiment, which successfully attacked the southern entrenchment of Seringapatam, Tippoo's capital, on 22 Feb. 1792. Monson continued in India after the peace, and had by September 1795 reached the rank of major. In 1797 he exchanged into the 76th English regiment, which had recently come out to India, and received the grade of lieutenant-colonel. On the outbreak of the Mahratta war in 1803 Monson was appointed by Lord Lake [see Lake, Gerard] to the command of the first infantry brigade of the army destined for the invasion of the Mahratta dependencies in Northern India, and he led the storming party which took Allyghur on 4 Sept. 1803, receiving a severe wound, which incapacitated him from field duty for six months. In April 1804 Monson, now restored to health, and in high favour with Lord Lake, was sent, with a force of about four thousand men, all natives except the artillerymen, to keep watch on the large army of Jeswunt Rao Holkar, who was threatening our ally the rajah of Jeypore. Monson reached Jeypore on 21 April. Two days later Holkar broke up his camp and retreated southwards, Monson steadily following till the Mahratta chief crossed the Chumbul, when he was directed by Lord Lake to take up a position at Kotah, so as to guard against any attempt of Holkar to return north. He, however, persisted in advancing, on his own responsibility, due south, along the line of the Chumbul, thinking that a
