1649-1658 Flashcards
Following Charles’ execution, what happened to the MPs who had been excluded during Pride’s Purge? (2)
- From February 1649, they were allowed to return to Parliament
- ->Between 100 & 140 did so over the next few months (outnumbering the 70 revolutionaries)
What was the impact of allowing Presbyterian MPs back to parliament following Charles’ execution?
The 100-140 that returned outnumbered the 70 revolutionaries lessening the radical aspects of the Parliament and adding conservative and factional aspects
What legislation was passed following Charles’ execution? (3)
March 17- Act abolishing the Monarchy
March 19- Act abolishing the House of Lords
May 19- Act declaring England a Commonwealth
–> Took over a month to introduce any constitutional reform: highlighting a lack of direction and purpose amongst Parliament
What happened to the Privy Council following the Regicide? (3)
- It was replaced by a Council of State
- Elected annually by the Rump Parliament
- Would consist of 41 individuals
What was the makeup of the first Council of State? What implications did this have on English government? (3+1)
34 MPs and 5 peers
14 of the Council were regicides
Only 19 out of 41 took the Engagement
Mix of different ideological and religious views limited the effectiveness of the council
When and what was the Oath of Engagement? (3)
January 2, 1650
- An oath indicating the subscriber would be true and faithful to the Commonwealth of England
- Used to develop a sense of commitment to the regime and highlight any serious opposition
What opposition was there from the Army following the regicide? (2)
- The Rump did not get around to paying the soldiers arrears until 1650 so many mutinied at their conditions
- In London, one soldier, Robert Lockyer, was shot and in Burford, three mutineers were shot
What opposition was there from the levellers following the Regicide? (3)
- Levellers were angry that the Rump was not dissolving to establish fresh democratic elections
- Feb 1649, Lilburne published ‘England’s New Chains Discovered’ and Overton published a similar pamphlet, ‘The Hunting of the Foxes’
- A third version of the Agreement of the People was published in May 1649
How did the Leveller opposition start to fall apart following the Regicide? (4)
- Leveller leader, William Thompson was shot at a rising in Oxfordshire
- Lilburne, Overton and two other civilian Levellers were imprisoned in the Tower of London
- -> Lilburne was brought to trial on account of treason but was acquitted and the other three were freed after taking the Engagement Oath
- Levellers were outflanked by more radical left groups, such as the ranters, quakers, Diggers etc.
What were the series of events in Cromwell’s Irish expedition?
- Summer 1649: 20,000 troops sent to Ireland with Cromwell and Ireton
- Victory at Drogheda 11 September, killed 3000 including 1000 civilians
- Victory at Drogheda 11 October, Irish force surrendered but some 2000 were massacred in cold blood
When and what was the Battle of Rathmines? (3)
2 August 1649
- 5000 Parliamentarian Army vs 11,000 Royalist Army
- Decisive Parliamentary victory
- under 100 Parliamentarian losses vs 25000 Royalist casualties and 1000 prisoners
What was the impact of the Battle of Rathmines?
Forced Royalists to flee Dublin, allowing Cromwell to land there –> He would never have been able to set port in Ireland without this
–> Hence allowed the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland to occur
Arguments for Cromwell committing atrocities in Ireland? (3)
- Killed 1000 Civilians at Drogheda
- Slaughtered 2000 at Wexford in cold blood after they had surrendered
- Cromwell was known to have seen the Irish as sub-human and was known to want retribution for the Protestant massacres of 1641
Arguments against Cromwell committing atrocities in Ireland?
- No woman or children were killed
- At Drogheda, he was acting within the laws of war at the time as the Irish had refused the offer of quarter
- Cromwell’s harsh actions limited further bloodshed down the line and discouraged future revolt
How did the Scots respond to the regicide? (2)
- Furious that the English had executed their king
- June 1650, in return for agreeing to erect a fully Presbyterian church in England, Charles II was coronated King Charles II and was provided an army to invade England
What was Cromwell’s policy towards Scotland? (3)
- Rather than wait until the Scots invaded England, he led a force of 15,000 into Scotland
- At Dunbar (September 3 1650), despite being outnumbered two to one, he won a great victory
- -> 3000 Scots were killed whilst only 20 English died
How was a union formed between England & Scotland? (2)
- Scottish invasion was destroyed at Worcester (September 3 1651) and Charles II fled to the European continent
- The Tender of Union in 1651 marked the union of England and Scotland under the Commonwealth of Great Britain
What were some of the religious acts passed by the Rump in the Spring and Summer of 1650? (3)
- Act against Sins of Swearing and Cursing
- Act for the Propagation of the Gospel in Wales
- Act for Suppressing the Detestable Sins of Incest, Adultery and Fornication
When and what was the Toleration Act? (3)
- September 1650
- Abolished the need for people to attend church so long as they went to some form of religious service each week
- -> Encouraged religious freedom
What legislation did the Rump pass in regards to the poor? (3)
- September 1649
- Act for the Relief of Poor Debtors
- Ended imprisonment for debtors who had less than £5
What legal reform did the Rump make? (5)
- December 1651
- Changed legal proceedings from Norman French to English
- Set up the Hale Commission to look at Law reform
- -> Met three times a week until July 1652
- -> Made no changes based on recommendations from the Hale Commission
Evidence for the failure of the Rump Parliament? (4)
- None of the Hale Commissions recommendations were set in law
- In 1649, it passed 125 Acts; By 1652, it passed merely 51 acts per year
- Despite an act in November 1651, the Rump failed to dissolve itself by the set date of 3 November 1654
- Stalled over Hale Commission and Owen Scheme
What was the level of taxation under the Rump Parliament?
December 1652, raised the Monthly Assessment from £90,000 to £120,000 (equivalent of 24 pre-war parliamentary subsidies) to maintain wars with Ireland, Scotland and the Dutch
When and what was the Navigation Act?
- 9 October 1651
- An Act stating that non-English ships could only enter English ports if they carried goods from their own country
What was the impact of the Navigation Act? (3)
- Hit Dutch fleets hard as their vessels carried more foreign goods than goods from their own country
- Royalist sympathies of Dutch Sailors meant that they refused the English demand of saluting their flag on English ships
- The tensions between the two fleets led to a clash on the Channel- an event which started a two year war.
When and how was the Rump Parliament dissolved?
20 April 1653
Cromwell and 30 soldiers entered the House of Commons and ordered the dissolution of Parliament
Evidence of International opposition to the Rump & Commonwealth? (6)
- Dutch war with England
- Ambassadors of the regime were assassinated by Royalist refugees in Spain & Holland, whose rulers failed to meet the commonwealth’s demands that they bring the perpetrators to account
- William of Orange sought allegiance with Charles II and France against the Rump and also to enforce his own position in Holland where a Republican Party was developing
- French piratical attacks on English merchant ships
- French and Portgual allied fleet commanded by Prince Rupert
- Ormond singed a treaty with the Catholic Confederates a fortnight before his execution which raised the prospect of combined action
What was the result of Parliamentarian victory in Ireland? (3)
- Ormond was excommunicated by Catholic Bishops in the winter of 1650
- Victorious troops massacred the Irish, brought disease, starvation and was estimated to have wiped out 1/5 of the Irish population
Evidence of the panic caused by radical left wing groups, such as the Quakers?
- 1656: James Nayler, a leader of the Quakers was brought before parliament on the charge of blasphemy after riding into Bristol on a donkey in imitation of Christ’s entry into Jerusalem
- -> Despite Cromwell’s calls for religious toleration, he feared the unrest events like this would cause and so authorised severe physical punishment such cutting a hole through his tongue
How did the Rump attempt to create a sense of legitimacy and authority? (4)
- Requested recognition from international powers, which it got from nations such as the United Provinces
- Issued the Oath of Engagement in Jan 1651
- Drew heavily upon Thomas Hobbes’ ‘Leviathan’ in 1651, insisting that subjects owe obedience to any government, good or bad, that offers them protection
- Milton wrote a latin vindication of the regicide, ‘Defensio’ in 1651, which echoed across Europe
How did Cromwell gain further power over the Army?
- Fairfax resigned in 1650 in the face of what he saw as the unjustified invasion of Scotland
- -> He was replaced by Cromwell
Evidence of Cromwellian suppression of opposition? (7)
-Intelligence system established under the Rump by MP Thomas Scot and later developed by John Thurloe, Cromwell’s secretary of state
- 1655 Appointment of Major Generals of County Militias set up effective military controls of the County
- -> Resulted in the disarmament of all known Royalist whilst 14,000 suspects and all their male servants were ordered to post bonds for good behaviour
- Purge of county JPs- over 2/3 replaced
- Prominent Royalists, such as Earls of Holland and Derby were executed
- September 1652 Act of Settlement made more than 100,000 Irish Catholics liable to the death sentence
- ‘Commission of Triers’ established to screen applicants for clergy appointments –> Resulted in the ejection of 130 ministers (roughly 2% of the total)
- National Register office set up to follow the movements of all Royalists
What was the Owen Scheme?
Religious reform based on joint control of Church from state and clergy and religious toleration only under this umbrella
-> For example, he opposed the radical religious groups, such as the ranters, quakers and diggers etc.
How were Scotland and Ireland integrated with England?
- Both were incorporated into the English Commonwealth under the 1651 ‘Tender Union’
- 30 MPs for Scotland and 30 for Ireland would be represented in English Parliament in the 1650s
What were the attempts for an English and Dutch Union?
- Early in 1651, an embassy led by Oliver St. John carried a proposal for a Union of the English Republic and the newly liberated Netherlands
- -> They could share military, naval and commercial resources that would defy any monarch
–> When the Dutch refused, St John returned to England and encouraged Parliament to pass the Navigation Act
What was the purpose of the Navigation Act? (2)
- To stifle their commercial competitor, the Netherlands for international trading supremacy
- The upcoming merchant class- who had previously been stifled by state backed monopolies, such as the Levant and East India Companies- had close connections with the Rump and would benefit strongly from the Navigation Act (eg. Maurice Thomson)
What was the Rump Parliament’s policy on commercial interests?
- Navigation Act improved their own trade at the expense of the international community
- 1650 Set up a council to foster new initiatives in trade and manufacture
- Passed legislation to cripple the trade of those English colonies in North America and the Caribbean where Royalists were obstructing the acceptance of the new regime
How did the Rump impact the Navy? (5)
- The royalist factions that divided the Navy in 1648 were eliminated –> 1649 the control of the navy was transferred to a committee of radical MPs who oversaw a flurry of administrative reform
- During the Rump’s rule, a massive programme of ship building in the dockyards of Kent nearly quadrupled the number of the state’s warships –> Gave England unrivalled naval force and allowed the enforcement of the Navigation Act
- In 1650, a Commonwealth fleet under Admiral Blake attacked and destroyed the nation’s returning Brazilian fleet as it entered the River Tagus, thus ending their allegiance to Rupert
- Blake also destroyed a French fleet that was besieging the Spanish-controlled port of Dunkirk
- Naval expedition to the New World under Sir George Ayscue 1651-1652 brought both Virginia and Barbados under Parliamentary control after it had been under Royalists
What was the impact of the regicide on the colonies?
- Loosened the ties between England and it’s colonies, which neither Parliament nor the Royalists could afford to maintain
- Divisions between Royalists & Parliamentarians extended to battles over the colonies
- End of Laudianism stopped the flow of emigration to the New World and so widened the divides between the colonies and England
What was Cromwell’s view on the Anglo-Dutch war? How did it impact his ideological policy? (1+2)
-He held the conventional Puritan preference for a Protestant alliance and regretted the Anglo-Dutch war
-Forced to make a number of ideological compromises:
The expense of the War was largely financed by further sequestration of Royalist land, damaging his desired process of ‘Healing’ (eg. Number of Royalists named ‘Malignants’ and properties to be sold increased from 73 to 780)
-Focusing on this war and the conquests of Scotland and Ireland had led to a lack of progress with ideological & religious legislation
What happened to the army under the Rump? (3)
- Had increased to 70,000 men
- 3x the size of the NMA in 1648 and 6x the size of the army in the First Civil War
- -> Everyone in government agreed that this number had to be reduced but even the prospect of partial disbandment brought unrest to the army and fears of parliamentary treatment from 1647
Why did Cromwell disband the Rump? (4)
- Lack of policy driven through
- Fears of self interest eg. not dissolving when agreed and stalling on discussions of Biennial government & Sept 1652 Act of Settlement saw the redistribution of much Irish Land to Rumpers
- Harsh taxation and difficult financial situation for many
- The fresh elections brought in would allow Presbyterians to be elected at the expense of radicals and Cromwell felt that any possibility at a godly reformation would be lost
Why did many noblemen and upper class dislike the Rump? (3)
- Execution of Charles and the abolition of the House of Lords damaged the political influence of many
- Purge of parliament and administrative reform led to downward social trend of those in positions of power
- The creation of counties controlled by Militia Commissioners as part of an Act in 1650 alienated the traditional elite
When and what was the Rump’s vote to dissolve itself?
6 September 1651- voted by 33 votes to 26 to create a bill to set a date for its own dissolution
14 November 1651- Again voted that it would now pass a bill setting a date of its dissolution: won by 49 votes to 47
18 November 1651- Agreed to set the date as 3 November 1654
What was the impact of the Rump’s vote to dissolve itself in the future? (2)
- The closeness of the vote (33 vs 26 and then 49 vs 47) showed it was a contentious issue within Parliament
- The date set (3 November 1654) was three years into the future and meant that many members would have held their seats unchallenged for fourteen years and was disliked by many who wanted a chance to elect their representatives following the regicide
When and what was the Act of Oblivion?
- February 1652
- Gave general indemnity to all soldiers for actions committed during the Civil Wars
When and what were the County Militias? (4)
- Set up in Autumn 1655/ closed down in December 1657
- Implemented commissioners of the new county militias of 6000 men split into 12 county associations
- -> These led to a semi-military system of regional government in England and Wales under Major-Generals
- -> Aimed to clamp down on Royalists and other form of opposition, to promote godly reformation and to raise new cavalry militia
What was the state of the economy under the Rump? (4)
- Government falling into debt: Parliament had accrued a £3million deficit over the War years
- Army costed £110,000/month and there was a £31,000 monthly deficit on the army bill
- Monthly Assessment forced to rise to £120,000/month but less coming in from localities
- Coal ships had been plundered by Dutch fleets on the Yorkshire coast for many weeks –> Many homes went unheated over the winter of 1652 and cooks and brewers shut their shops as they could not fire their ovens
When and what was the Barebones’ Parliament? (3)
- Created July 4, 1653
- A parliament nominated by Churches and the Army made up of 140 godly men, including 6 representatives of Ireland and 5 of Scotland
- Followed the failure and dissolution of the Rump Parliament
What was the composition of the Barebones’ Parliament? (3)
- Made up 140 Godly men, elected by churches and the Army Council
- Based on the Jewish Sanhedrin of Jerusalem
- Contained a strong ‘Fifth Monarchist’ section, such as Praise-God Barebone
What did Cromwell do after the dissolution of the Rump Parliament? (2)
- Created a new Council of State composed of 10 men rather than the previous 41: 7 military men and 3 civilians
- Created a Nominated Assembly comprised of 140 Godly men
What was the role of Praise-God Barebone in the ‘Barebones’ Parliament’? (3)
He held no position of authority in the Assembly
- -> Perpetuates the view that the assembly was made up of religious radicals from the lower classes
- -> In reality, it contained relatively few religious radicals and at least 4/5ths were ranked gentlemen
What important legislation did the Barebones’ Parliament pass? (4)
- The Establishment of Civil Marriages, to be performed by JPs rather than Clerics
- Protection for Lunatics and their estates
- Relief of impoverished debtors and creditors
- Abolition of the tyrannical Court of Chancery
Why was the Barebones’ Parliament able to pass radical reform despite a majority conservative faction?
-The radical elements attended far more regularly (6 days/week) and arrived early to discuss policy (8am)
