Post-enthronement problems After Cromwell’s enthronement, his time was much taken up by the wars with Roman Catholic Spain, but his elevation, as Queen Christina of Sweden foretold, began to earn respect for him abroad. Thurloe’s State Papers include a letter from the English ambassador in Spain now informing Cromwell that Spain was eager for a treatise between the ‘King of England and the King of Spain’. The matter was most delicate as Durie and Penn at the time were campaigning for ecclesiastical and political agreements with England in Protestant Switzerland, Germany and Holland, but Roman Catholic France had put a price on their heads. Spain strongly supported the Roman Catholics against the Protestants in these… Full Article
Posts Tagged William Prynne
The New Babel Confusion. Before Charles was placed in his coffin at Whitehall, it became clear that a number of the judges, now faced with punishment, had refused to sign the death warrant and others had been compelled to sign by force. Cromwell is said to have examined the head of the King at Whitehall to make sure it was totally severed and he was really dead, before saying, ‘If he had not been King, he would have lived longer’. The regicides now refused permission for Charles to be buried in Westminster Abbey and told Bishop Juxon that he could not give Charles a Church of England Prayer Book burial. The King was then interred on 9 February, 1648 (old style) at Windsor Castle. An enormous pamphlet war now took… Full Article
Lecture III: The Watershed: the Restoration of Uniformity My task and my sources My task is to present an overview of the 17th century lead-up to the Act of Uniformity of 1662. My primary sources besides the Prayer Book are the Calendar of State Papers; the Common’s Journals: the Thurloe Papers; Gardiner’s Constitutional Documents, Cardwell’s History of Prayer Book Conferences, the Hartlib Papers; Byfield’s Assembly Minutes; Walker’s and Shaw’s records; Evelyn’s and Pepys diaries: Burnet’s, Durie’s, Laud’s, Prynne’s and Fuller’s eye-witness accounts and the Bodleian Library’s Special Collections. My secondary research includes Hooker, Strype, Benton, Huntington, Butler, Parker, Blunt, Tatham,… Full Article
Cromwell’s swift rise to power Now sitting firmly in his cavalry saddle in the war against the King and the Church of England, Cromwell was soon reimbursed by Parliament of all his expenses in building up his personal army. Before entering officially into the Civil War, in May, 1641, Cromwell signed a Commons’ vow, ‘To maintain and defend as far as Lawfully I may, with my life, power, and estate, the True Reformed Protestant Religion, expressed in the Doctrines of the Church of England, against all Popery and Popish innovations’. It does appear that Cromwell, who was a harsh critic of the Anglican system, was merely accommodating himself with this statement for the sake of his career. It could mean that he was merely… Full Article
