Risen from obscurity a study day on Cromwell s early life.

Transcription

1 Risen from obscurity a study day on Cromwell s early life. For over half his life Oliver Cromwell lived in Huntingdon in relative obscurity. He was well connected but his family fortunes were on the wane. Briefly he had served as the town s MP in the parliament of 1628 but he was not in any way a national figure until he was well into his fifth decade. Recent work by historians has begun to cast significant new light on some aspects of Cromwell s early years. Diligent research has revealed some surprising answers which will lead to further re-appraisal of the character of Oliver Cromwell. This study day, organised by the Cromwell Museum in partnership with The Cromwell Association, aims to present these findings to an interested general audience. The study day will take place on Saturday 22nd October 2011 at Huntingdon Library & Archive, Princes Street, Huntingdon, PE29 3PA. The cost of the day, including coffee on arrival and buffet lunch, is 30 per head, ( 25 for Cromwell Association members and full-time students). Please note that lunch will be served at the nearby Commemoration Hall.

2 Programme Chairman: Professor John Morrill, Professor of British and Irish history, Selwyn College, Cambridge. Professor Morrill is a vice-president of the Association and author of numerous books and articles on Cromwell, including the entry for Cromwell in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. He is currently leading a team of academics to produce a new and definitive edition of Cromwell s letters and speeches Coffee and registration Introduction and welcome Oliver Cromwell and his family connections, Simon Healey When Cromwell began raising his Ironsides, two of the first recruits he made were his brother-in-law John Disbrowe and his cousin Edward Whalley. It is hardly a revelation to say that family connections mattered in early modern England, but it is instructive to look at Cromwell's extended family, firstly to see what was routine and what was unusual about the background of the future Lord Protector, and secondly to explore the connections Cromwell had at his disposal. (1) the Cromwells of Hinchingbrooke: both Sir Henry and Sir Oliver, heads of one of the wealthiest non-noble families in England; and by comparing and contrasting Oliver's father Robert Cromwell and Robert's four other brothers, the younger sons of Sir Henry Cromwell. (2) the Cromwell cousinage, particularly the Barringtons, the Whalleys and their connections. (3) Cromwell's mother's family, the Stewards of Ely, and their connections (4) Cromwell's wife's family, the Bourchiers of Little Stambridge, Essex Simon Healy: has worked for the History of Parliament Trust for almost 22 years. His London University thesis on State formation and the political nation in early Stuart England is still not quite finished(!), but will hopefully be submitted by the time he gives this talk in October 2011.

3 In 2010 he published articles on three members of the Cromwell family in The House of Commons ed. AD Thrush and JP Ferris, together with more than 200 other articles on MPs from the same period, elected to the Commons from the length and breadth of England and Wales. His other publications include topics as diverse as parliamentary debates, Catholic converts, Crown finances, the Newcastle coal trade and John Donne Farmer Oliver? Patrick Little Historians have always been impressed by Cromwell s rural origins. As one authority puts it, No man who rises from a working farmer to head of state in twenty years is less than great. This paper explores the rural context of Cromwell s career, and the way in which his image as a plain and honest man from a fairly ordinary background was cultivated by those around him not least during the protectorate, when he was routinely accused of self-aggrandisement and hypocrisy. Dr Patrick Little is the chairman of the Cromwell Association, and editor of Oliver Cromwell: New Perspectives (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008) Lunch break. A buffet lunch will be served in the Commemoration Hall approx 300m from the Library. The Cromwell Museum will also be open over the lunch break Oliver Cromwell and the underground opposition to Bishop Wren of Ely Andrew Barclay Very little is known about Cromwell s religious beliefs before Yet a surprising number of later sources claim that during the 1630s he had been attending secret nonconformist services. Are these just predictable Royalist smears or do they have some basis in fact? Building on the latest research, this talk will suggest that such stories are less easy to dismiss than might be assumed at first sight. Some details do check out. The more plausible versions even contain tantalising hints of connections between the disaffected Protestants of the diocese of Ely,

4 especially during the Laudian ascendency of Bishop Wren. Historical evidence does not come much more elusive or insubstantial than this. But some hard facts can be established and together these point towards the possibility that Cromwell in the late 1630s was more religiously subversive than most of his biographers have dared to assume. Andrew Barclay is a Senior Research Fellow with the Section of the History of Parliament Trust and is the author of Electing Cromwell (Pickering & Chatto, 2011) From Civilian to Soldier, Oliver Cromwell in 1642 Sue Sadler When Cromwell took up arms in August 1642, he was nearly a fortnight ahead of the official beginning of the Civil War. His activities regularly appear in accounts of activists dragging moderates over the brink, and studies of his extraordinary career. Aspects of his transition from civilian to soldier in the summer and autumn of 1642 are well known, and his determined actions during a time of doubt are frequently used to show the metal of the man who would become Lord Protector. Yet, like so much of his early career, there are gaps in the story, and Cromwell s later trajectory casts a shadow over events that merit re-examining. We will review his entry into the war, by embedding it in its local setting and casting it in the light of his reputation amongst contemporaries during this critical phase of Cromwell s life. S.L. Sadler was formerly a part-time Lecturer in History for Anglia Ruskin University, principally at Huntingdonshire Regional College. She studies the limits of authority and has published articles on aspects of the civil war and regional history centered on Cambridgeshire and the fens, was a contributor for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, and most recently wrote Lord of the Fens Oliver Cromwell s Reputation and the First Civil War in Patrick Little ed. Oliver Cromwell: New Perspectives (2009) 3.30 General discussion and Chairman s closing remarks Close

5 Please book using the booking form. All bookings must be received by 12 th October. We regret that we are not able to accept credit card payments for this event. Booking Form Name/s Address .. Telephone No Special catering requirements please indicate If you have any mobility concerns regarding the lunch arrangements, please advise on booking. I wish to book.. place/s for the Study Day at per person. (Special rate for members of the Cromwell Association & full-time students 25.00). Please find cheque enclosed for.. payable to Cambridgeshire County Council. Please send form and payment to The Cromwell Museum, Grammar School Walk, Huntingdon, Cambs, PE29 3LF, by 12 th October. All bookings will be acknowledged by if you would prefer a hard copy reply, please enclose a stamped addressed envelope Queries to cromwellmuseum@cambridgeshire.gov.uk