Pym << pihm >>, John (1584-1643), an English statesman, led parliamentary opposition to King Charles I. Pym, a member of Parliament from 1614 until his death, was so powerful that his enemies nicknamed him “King Pym.”
Pym, a Puritan, believed that Charles sought to rule as an absolute monarch and that his religious policies favored Roman Catholicism over Protestantism. In 1621, Pym called for an anti-Catholic oath and spoke out against reforms to the Church of England. Charles dismissed Parliament in 1629, and the body did not reconvene until 1640. Pym then became Parliament’s unofficial leader and a chief organizer of the campaign against the king. After the English Civil War broke out in 1642, Pym established an alliance with Scotland to assist the parliamentary forces. Scottish troops entered England in 1644. See England (The Civil War).
Pym was born on May 20, 1584, in Somerset, England. He died on Dec. 8, 1643.
