Religious and Political Figure. He is remembered as the author of political pamphlets going against Great Britain's King Charles I's “Instructions” for the Puritan faith. With the Church of England Archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud persecuting the Puritans, Scottish Presbyterians, and other Christian churches outside the Church of England, there was a serious conflict between the two groups. To ensure his instructions were enforced, Laud made visits to the Puritan churches. In 1637 for publishing writings against Laud's strict doctrine, he and two Puritan writers, Henry Burton and John Bastwick, were sentenced to have their ears amputated, cheeks branded with “SL” for seditious libeller and sentenced to life in prison, thus they became martyrs for their beliefs. Ironically, he claimed the “SL” meant “Stigmata Laudis.” These authors did not spend their lives in prison but were released by Parliament in 1640, supported the beheading of Laud, and supported Parliament during the English Civil War. Later, he argued with the poet John Milton, over the issue of divorce, opposed the execution of Charles I and wrote an article against the Commonwealth, which caused him to be sent back to prison in isolation. He supported the Restoration of Charles II, released from prison after the fall of Oliver Cromwell and as a grateful reward, given a position of Record Keeper at the Tower of London, which he did in an exemplary fashion. In 1660 he was elected as a Member of Parliament from Bath and re-elected in 1661 and was strongly involved with the impeachment of Lord John Mordaunt and Edward Hyde, the 1st Earl of Clarendon. In the play and film “Stage Beauty,” Charles II makes a dinner table speech in which he suggested that the stoicism show by Prynne at the pillory was an indirect cause of the English Civil War, which caused his father to be beheaded and himself in exile for twenty years. Of course, others blame Charles I and William Laud's “Instructions” as the cause. Some label Prynne as a Puritan while others a Presbyterian or an Erastian. Educated at Oriel College at Oxford, studied at Lincoln's Inn and was accepted to the bar in 1628 as a lawyer, he published over 200 books and pamphlets. Attacking the belief of man's free will, his first book of four on the subject was published in 1627. Like Puritans, he opposed religious holidays, such as Christmas. In his 1632 book, “Histriomastix”, he denounced actresses which was widely thought to be an attack on Charles I's Catholic Queen Henrietta Maria. For this book, he was sent to prison in 1634, thus began his fight for his cause of religious freedom. He died unmarried. He was the grandson of the Mayor of Bath, William Sherton.