The Restoration of the monarchy in May 1660 saw the return of the Stuart dynasty in the person of Charles II. Soon the persecution of religious non-conformity intensified. The Act of Uniformity, which became law on 24 August 1662, was part of a comprehensive process of suppression known as the Clarendon Code. It required that the Book of Common Prayer be used in all services, and that all clergy and teachers subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England. It banned extemporary prayers and unlicensed preaching, mainstays of Puritan worship. Long-term imprisonment, or even transportation, would be the fate of many who, by their righteous obduracy and refusal to submit, prolonged their confinement or exile. It was not, however, the first piece of legislation designed to enforce religious conformity.

Among the many Dissenters stuffed into the county gaols in the early years of Charles II, one stood out, the radical Puritan preacher and prolific writer, John Bunyan. He was also one of the first, as his offending behaviour pre-dated the Restoration. His first brush with the law came when he was thirty, during the Protectorate. In 1658, he was arrested ‘for preaching at Eaton’, but it seems that the grand jury dismissed that case. His luck would soon run out. On 12 November 1660 Bunyan, with a Bible in his hands, was arrested under an Act of 1593 on a warrant issued by Francis Wingate, the local justice of the peace. The charge was that he refused to attend Anglican services and had attended unlawful assemblies or conventicles. The real threat he posed was by his preaching. If convicted, the Act decreed that he should remain in prison until he conformed. Should he not do so within three months then worse would befall. Bunyan was taken, ‘with God's comfort in my poor soul’, to the county gaol on the corner of the High Street and Gaol Lane (as Silver Street was sometimes known) to await his hearing at the quarter sessions.