Providence Lost: The Rise and Fall of the English Republic

by Paul Lay

Librarian's Note: This is an alternate cover edition of ASIN B06XRKMBHJ

Having won two civil wars, conquered Ireland and Scotland and seen off Charles II, in 1653 Oliver Cromwell assumed the title Lord Protector. The same Protestant wind that had filled the sails of Drake's ships in 1588 was surely behind him.

Determined to avenge the loss of the Puritan colony of Providence Island, he decided to take on the Spanish in the New World; but an assault on the island of Hispaniola proved a disaster.

To Cromwell, obsessed with God's plan for an elect nation, this was a grievous blow. Concluding that God had deserted him because his domestic reforms had not gone far enough, he introduced the hardline puritan rule of the Major-Generals. Sectarianism and fundamentalism ran riot; Levellers and royalists joined together in conspiracy against Cromwell. The only way out seemed to be a return to the Parliament presided over by a King. But would Cromwell accept the crown?

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics, Audiobook, British Literature, English Civil War, Civil War

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 9, 2020

Reviews

[Bettie]

Nice work from the staff at ⁦Waterstones Trafalgar Square.

Description: Having won two civil wars, conquered Ireland and Scotland and seen off Charles II, in 1653 Oliver Cromwell assumed the title Lord Protector. The same Protestant wind that had filled the sails of Drake's ships in 1588 was surely behind him.

Determined to avenge the loss of the Puritan colony of Providence Island, he decided to take on the Spanish in the New World; but an assault on the island of Hispaniola proved a disaster.

To Cromwell, obsessed with God's plan for an elect nation, this was a grievous blow. Concluding that God had deserted him because his domestic reforms had not gone far enough, he introduced the hardline puritan rule of the Major-Generals. Sectarianism and fundamentalism ran riot; Levellers and royalists joined together in conspiracy against Cromwell. The only way out seemed to be a return to the Parliament presided over by a King. But would Cromwell accept the crown?

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Detailed book looking at cromwells protectorate through the social and political aspects of the 1st republic and commonwealth and the insecurity the republic had. The author uses language which makes it easy to understand

[Christina Baehr]

Super keen to read this after Dominic (much to my delight, an avowed Roundhead) talked about it on The Rest is History podcast.

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

In Providence Lost, Lay’s stated aim is to provide readers with an accessible overview of the 1650s and Cromwell’s rule following the execution of King Charles I. The title is a play on words with a double meaning: it refers to both the regime’s failed campaign to capture Providence Island from the Spanish (the Grand Design) and how that defeat created doubt as to whether God’s providence, hereto assumed to have been behind Cromwell’s unfailing military success, had now deserted this puritanical regime.

Lay is right in saying that most people in this country ‘know a king was executed, someone called Cromwell won a mini-revolution, and that another king was restored soon after’ but not much more. By contrast, Lay shows in the bibliography that many serious historians have written much on this period and he modestly hopes his book will encourage readers to delve deeper.

The book only partially succeeds in meeting Lay’s goals. I did learn a lot more about Cromwell’s decade-long rule and I am tempted to know more. But this greater knowledge came at a great cost as the book is a struggle to read.

In the first three chapters the author makes the not unusual mistake of trying to cram into them the ‘everything I have ever known about the mid-C17’. This creates convoluted sentences full of historical, political and religious Labels (with a capital letter) that are only briefly set out and superficially contextualised. This assumes a level of prior knowledge in the reader that is the opposite of whom he wants to address.

I was maybe 2 pages away from giving up after those first three chapters. Then, suddenly, Lay finally moves to recounting the story of the campaign to capture Providence when he finds a more flowing narrative style. But for the rest of the book it remains intermittent and it never became a book I would return anticipating an hour or more of pleasure but rather as I would school homework of old, for one of the subjects I liked least.

[Jacob Stelling · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting read which looks at the profound changes which occurred under Oliver Cromwell as Lord Protector in areas such as morality, religion and local government. The author succeeds in condensing a complex period down to a few hundred pages - and although slightly rambling in places - presents a good summary and analysis of the years England spent under the Protectorate.

[Michael Bully · Rating 4 out of 5]

Could have been a classic work: Some excellent material concerning the Protectorate. After Charles I had been beheaded, the Scots defeated at Dunbar, the Royalist forces crushed at the Battle of Worcester and leaving the future Charles II on the run,a Stuart restoration looked highly unlikely. The Protectorate seemed to have peaked . The book presents a case to show that as from 1655, starting with 'The Western Design' , the Commonwealth's attempt to start new colonies in the Caribbean at the expense of the Spanish empire, the cracks were starting to show. The attempt to seize Hispaniola from Spain in April -May 1655 was a dismal failure. Bad organisation and leadership played a significant part. Jamaica was captured instead, rather than conquered , as armed opposition to English rule carried on. Recriminations followed. The Protectorate faced new hostility from Levellers, Royalists, and Radicals who began to think that Cromwell had betrayed their idealism, whilst a new political organisation of the Republic via the Council of Major Generals took place. Sometimes dissident factions even worked together to undermine the Protector's authority. The persecution of the Quaker James Nayler, and the 1657 plot to assassinate Cromwell are depicted well. The death of Cromwell in 1658 seemed to leave the Commonwealth without any direction. And the drift towards the Restoration began, though the author is keen to avoid the term 'inevitable' in this respect.
A lively and engaging book,plenty of helpful notes and an extensive biography. Yes there seems to be little conclusions offered, and other reviewers have quite fairly wondered what is the actual aim of the book ? Also, would really liked to have known whether or not author felt that had some post war compromise and reconciliation been achieved ? Is it easy to focus on the conspiracies and dissent rather than on how daily economic and social life kept going through the Commonwealth. But still got a great deal from the book.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is one particular area of British history which I confess I am relatively unfamiliar with. However, Paul Lay does a good job of explaining key features and personalities associated with the interregnum, not least Oliver Cromwell himself, as well as less celebrated figures such as John Lambert, who the author clearly has huge respect for.
The intricacies of Parliament, the army radicals and a range of millenarian religious sects are bafflingly complicated but Lay manages to navigate the reader through this maze with as much clarity as possible.
However, the subject matter does make this a bit of a slog, to be honest! I'm glad I'm now fully clued up on this crucial period of History but, if you're looking for a rip-roaring read with thrills, spills and excitement, you should possibly choose a book on the civil war itself!

[Peter Dunn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is much more than just a new history of the Protectorate, which is welcome in itself, it’s also a clever and insightful examination of, as the title itself, suggests “Providence” both in terms of how the loss of Providence Island shaped both the Protectorate’s foreign policy and domestic confidence but how the very idea of divine providence drove the political and strategic thinking of many on the Parliamentary side but in particular Cromwell himself.

[Gareth Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

A superb introduction to an understudied period in British history - a republican island, lapped on either side by monarchy. The chilling, heightened evangelical self-righteousness of the Cromwellian elite can cause a shudder while reading and it is a tribute to Lay that he manages to narrate the protectorate’s history with humanity and interest.

[Michael Bernard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting account of the period. Had to keep track of the myriad characters, and some key parts (such as the restoration) are covered too quickly.

[Carolyn Cash · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic book focusing on Cromwell's protectorate during the 1650s and why Britain's experiment with republicanism failed.

Providence Lost introduces us to the men and women of this time, including those at the heart of the regime, providing so much more detail about life during that time.

A must-read for anyone interested in 17th-century British history.

[Koit · Rating 4 out of 5]

I kind of stumbled into this post-Civil War military & political history, or, at least, it wasn’t my intention to delve into this period at this time. Yet, I found Mr Lay’s account of the Protectorate strangely enthralling. I was most captivated by the Western Design, the name given to the English plan to capture Hispaniola, but the the entire myriad of problems that the Lord Protector faced make for a very thrilling story.

Mr Lay’s account, nevertheless, is a starting point for one’s exploration. Lambert and Cromwell are the major characters, though many of the other people are mentioned, mostly in connection with the trial of James Nayler and the Western Design. The 17th century concept of Providence is considered in great detail, while Irish and Scottish internal politics, including Monck before his march on London, barely feature.

Having always considered the Protectorate… well… really not having thought much about the Protectorate beforehand, I became intrigued by these persons. Thurloe was another who featured often enough in interesting situations, being, perhaps after Walsingham, the most successful spymaster in pre-modern England.

This book is a gate. I’m sure Mr Lay’s scholarship has some holes, but I don’t know enough about them to know where they were. It’s still a very good work which, most importantly, tries to introduce the reader to a time that has now passed.

This review was originally posted on my blog.

[Charles Haywood · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book aspires to be too much—a chronicle of the Protectorate, an analysis of all the leading figures of the Protectorate, and a revisionist history that ascribes the Protectorate’s failure in large part to the failure of its attempts to expand English power in the Caribbean. The result is that nothing is done well, and the reader leaves not much better informed than he arrived. The book might have succeeded as simply a history of Cromwell’s Caribbean efforts, but that would presumably have been too narrow to satisfy Lay.

I think everybody, including me, should know more about seventeenth-century England. It was a time very instructional about the nature of mankind as filtered through Western civilization, a time of heroism and clashing visions of the good. It was a time that tells us much about politics and governance. To my chagrin, though, this book is not the right vehicle to learn about the era.

I should have read a much longer book, centering on either Charles I or Oliver Cromwell, of which there are several classic possibilities and also several new ones. I thought, however, that the focus promised here, on the Protectorate, would allow a narrower analysis, leaving aside Charles I and the Civil War, and offering lessons on legitimacy of the state and its governors applicable to today. Maybe a different book could have done that. I suspect that the real problem is that this book is a cut-down version of what is putatively the same book published in the United Kingdom, and that the abridgement process destroyed the cohesion of the book.

[Kieran · Rating 3 out of 5]

On the morning of January 30th 1649, the House of Commons sat in a rushed session to pass a law. The law stated that when the current monarch died, his son would not succeed; instead the monarchy died with him. That afternoon, Charles Stuart, “that man of blood,” was led to the scaffold and had his head severed from his neck with an axe.

This book charts what happened next, England’s only experiment with republican government. It has the traditional tale of the Commonwealth and Oliver Cromwell, the course and eventual collapse of the English republic. But it also things that are less well known, such as Royalist risings, arguments over religious liberty, the persecution of Quakers, and the attempt to seize the Spanish Caribbean.

[Gabriel Stein · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting

This is an extremely interesting book. Most books about the Protectorate tend to start with the Civil War. This begins after the peak of Oliver Cromwell‘s powers, and takes us to his death and the eventual restoration of Charles II. It is well written, and a pleasure to read.

[Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not especially ornate, but a solid history of the Interregnum. It would have benefited greatly from a more attentive editor who might have picked up on regrettably common instances of facts or phrases being repeated within pages of each other.

[Marin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Protectorate was a dramatic period which brought a new constitution (the only one written so far in the history of this country) and all sorts of new, mostly contradicting views of the way the country should be governed, and the ideals to unite it.
Finally, it was an unsuccessful religious interregnum, but not as radical as it is remembered.
“Their revolution, culminating in the king’s death, was a very public, if pyrrhic, triumph for a small faction which glossed the illegitimacy of its actions with a sheen of civic respectability.”
They truly (and frightening from the view point of a modern person) believed they were chosen to carry out God’s purpose on Earth and their triumph in the Civil Wars was the outward dispensation of their inward grace.

Seeing themselves as soldiers of Christ, they had an aggressive foreign policy targeting Spain's possessions in the new World. The Western Design invasion was a failure, the annual Spanish gold transport wasn’t seized, the main target, Hispaniola, was not conquered and the British suffered heavy losses in the fights and from diseases. The weakly-defended island of Jamaica offered a redemption of sorts, but overall, the expedition failed to achieve its goals.

God Providence did not prove to sanction the new regime and from this point it will descend in a slowly unravelling.
The reliance on army was too costly, several parliaments were called up to vote for the financing without much success and the experiment of the Major Generals (in a way reminiscent of soviet commissars) charged with superintending “a reformation of manners”—the imposition of strict Puritan codes of social and sexual conduct was extremely unpopular and destroyed any remaining faith the populace might have had in the new regime.
“The vast majority remained committed to the Elizabethan Protestant settlement and the humane moderation of its Prayer Book, a beguiling, pragmatic mix of Calvinist theology and Catholic ritual expressed in language of peerless economy and beauty”

The succeeding Parliaments were not supportive. They were a focus for the manifold discontents of supporters and opponents of the government, questioned the entire basis of the newly established government, with the republicans vigorously disputing the office of lord protector.


“Oliver Cromwell, an amateur soldier from the lesser gentry, who, having lived in obscurity for the first two-thirds of his life, was late to a calling born of necessity” was the only unifying figure who kept the regime alive.
Despite his deep religious convictions, he was not at all a fanatic. His project – largely a sincere one – of ‘healing and settling’ stopped the religious excess that occurred during the civil war or during the previous monarchs. In the history of the Protectorate, only two Catholics were executed for their faith. He also readmitted the Jews to England.
Sequestration of Royalist property, practised since the outbreak of the Civil Wars, had all but ceased.

“Perhaps what is least understood about Cromwell is his conservatism, which often dragged him into conflict with his more radical supporters.
Above all, it was Charles I, his head turned by the new ideology of European absolutism, who was the innovator. Cromwell preferred to hold to some form of the Ancient Constitution – though he bowed to ‘cruel necessity’ on more than one occasion, for none of his parliaments came close to his ideal. Nor, ultimately, did his nation, which he had hoped was rather saintlier than it actually was.”

In the 1650s many wished him to become king, but he refused the crown, preferring the authority of the people to the authority of the sword. Almost one year after he died, in 1658, the monarchy was restored. The new king will have less power and the parliament will be more and more independent and The Protectorate will remain as a parenthesis in history.

There are tons of books and documentaries about Tudors and Stuarts but very few about one of the most dramatic periods of British history – The Protectorate.
This informative book is a very objective introduction to a convoluted historical period.

[Toby · Rating 3 out of 5]

History is a greased window that we too often mistake for a mirror, even so it is in many ways quite easy to find resonances with this strange period of history, told winningly by Paul Lay, and our present odd times. A populist attempt to "take back control" from the all encroaching Stuart monarchy leads to confused government at home and disastrous entanglements abroad. Hard-line republicans, disappointing that the Great Old Cause has been neglected, foment rebellion whilst embittered royalists plot from abroad. In the end the chaos resolves itself in the return of the old order. Well, anyone can play that game with any period of history, but the experience of the Protectorate is a salutary lesson in what ill thought out revolution leads to.

There are comparatively few books on England in the 1650s and Paul Lay's introduction is welcome. It is written in the style that you might expect from the editor of History Today, being both analytical and accessible. If it didn't completely spark my imagination that probably has as much to do with the material as the writing. England's (or Britain for those brief years) brief experiment with republicanism can be seen as part of the wider constitutional explorations that took place between Henry VIII's break with Rome and the settlement of 1689. During that period England saw church and state combined, parliament's power increase but only to be stymied by the incipient absolutism of the Stuarts, a catastrophic civil war and republic before a brief and unsuccessful attempt at absolutism ending with the settlement that largely lasted until the mid Nineteenth Century. Perhaps the Protectorate is better seen through this wider lens.

For those who wish the England had taken a different turn in 1660, the English Revolution came 130 years too soon. Without any satisfactory republican model to follow, Parliament fell back on a desire for some form of monarchy in order to give stability to a pre-democratic republic. Cromwell, who isn't a particularly fully-fleshed figure in Lay's telling, comes across with credit for refusing the trappings of monarchy but as an indecisive leader who could not see past the end of his own rule.

At the end Lay does allow the window to become a mirror, reflecting Cromwell back as Margaret Thatcher.

[Rory Fox · Rating 4 out of 5]

A detailed, and perhaps at times, too detailed history of Cromwell’s Protectorate, the book conveys a sense of what happened, as well as the character of the key individuals.

It ranges over events in England, Europe and in the Caribbean, weaving threads of stories about significant Puritans, as well as the exiled ex-monarchy.

It is a well known story of execution and Puritan zeal, but the author also manages to probe the ironies and hypocrisy of the Protectorate. The civil war broke out when King Charles 1 treated parliament with disrespect, trying to force his will by banning parliamentarians. Within 20 years Cromwell was doing exactly the same. The key difference was Cromwell’s enormous military which was effective in the short term but left the country bankrupted.

At its heart the protectorate is a story of integralism, with a leader determined to compel the country into morality, in order to ensure God’s favour. This gives the characters a forceful moral imperative, but it also makes them strangely unable to cope with set-backs. When Cromwell’s Caribbean adventures go wrong, it is his first military setback. As he attributed all of his previous victories to God’s direct involvement, this setback must show God’s displeasure. And so his confidence is suddenly upset as he struggles to understand the events and their implications.

Cromwell himself emerges from the story in an oddly ambiguous way. He is keen to uphold religious freedom… except for Catholics. Yet he tried to intercede against the death sentence for the Jesuit John Southwell. And he paid for the public funeral of archbishop Usher, even though he was an avowed anti-episcopalist. Keen to align himself with Nonconformists, yet he refused to step in to prevent Parliament torturing the Quaker James Naylor. And after events had run their course he then complained about them.

In interesting asides the book also shows us that Cromwell’s Puritanism was strangely flexible when it came to works of art, and, towards the end of his time, music.

Overall the story of events is well told, but occasionally detail gets in the way of a smooth narrative. If the reader can get beyond the first few chapters, the narration picks up pace and interest.

[Kevin Camp · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book reads well in fits and starts. One reviewer on this site noted that it "could have been a great book" and I understand completely with what he/she meant. It seems to me that Lay might have gotten into a hurry and packed too much content into such a reasonably short book as this one. As it stands, it's more helpful as a resource of notable events, people, battles, legislative accomplishments, and religious convictions.

That said, where the book is brilliant, it is brilliant. Speaking as a Quaker, I delighted that Lay added a fresh perspective and new eyes to our formative period--from two separate (and often confusing) Civil Wars, beginning in 1640's England. His criticisms of the Society of Friends are not meant unkindly--like any good historian, he's trying to peel back the mystique and to discourage groupthink. In this regard, he mostly succeeds. Any group comprised of human beings can lend itself to hubris. We are no different.

After reading this, I wished I'd known more about the early colonial period in North America. Americans are taught, often times, that their history truly begins just prior to the American Revolution. However, I know now that, unless one is made aware of the events covered in this period, one can't get a good understanding of the immediate historical events that strongly influenced influential and notable American founding fathers and founding mothers.

Note: This book is currently unavailable in North America. I had to buy it from Amazon.co.uk, which is Amazon's sister site. This makes it a little bit pricier than had I gotten it here in America. (I paid $27 for it). Pace yourself. This isn't the most dense book I've ever read, but it is fairly dense, particularly in the sections that don't have a great narrative flow.

[Red Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

Was hoping for more context on the Cromwell years, but thought the book dragged down by including too many characters, and then not fully flushing them out. The book seemed to take a confusing period of time in British history, and make it more confusing.

That said, Lay notes that Cromwell and his adherents were pulled by various factions ranging from the Royalists (some of whom wanted the Stuarts restored to the throne, and some of whom wanted Cromwell to take the crown - which would have initiated further issues of whether there would be succession by birth or merit), to Republicans (who wanted to Cromwell to be a kind of executive figure, with no monarchy, and with an effective Parliament and no House of Lords), to religious zealots (who wanted Cromwell to purify England - though whether via Puritan or Presbyterian or other means was controversial).

- Stuart line was from Mary Queen of Scots to her son James to Charles I (executed when Cromwell took over in 1649) to Charles Stuart (later Charles II after Cromwell's death)

- John Milton defended Cromwell, but warned him of excess power

- Cromwell's time was the first when the kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland were united

- Lay presents Cromwell as tolerating different religions (except Catholicism), but not all of his followers were as tolerant

- Cromwell plagued by the same issue that always haunted England - no clear succession plan, so when he died his sons and followers were ineffective, and Charles Stuart was restored to the throne

[Stuart · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read around the topic of the English Civil War but I always wondered why the English Republic invited King Charles II back to rule.

This book is a detailed investigation into the events that preceded it mainly Cromwell's refusal to accept the title of the new hereditary King and his avoidance of making it clear who the next Lord Protector would be. The legislators were not anti-monarchy as such but preferred a godly king that was not Charles I.

We tend to look back at history with the eyes of our current experience but this book really brought home how differently they thought about the situation. For example, Parliament were convinced that they had God's blessing because of the military victories that they had attained in The Civil War but the failure and loss of the colonies in the Caribbean obviously showed that God was angry with them and they pondered as to what it was. As a result some suspicion lay with Cromwell as he was head of State so must have something to do with it.

I can't say that I listened carefully to this book as it was in the background at times when I did other things but I did feel that I have better grasp of the topic and enjoyed it.

One thing that surprised me was that Cromwell died partly from Fens Malaria. Looking into it, malaria was endemic to the Fens at that time and was a killer until the last century when the number of stagnant water bodies were reduced by drainage and it died out.

[Graham Shearer · Rating 3 out of 5]

An account of the Protectorate by someone who lacks sympathy for its chief protagonists and their motivations. This is not necessarily an obstacle to good analysis but the lack of dexterity in understanding the religious views of Cromwell and the Puritans does render some of the political judgements inapt. The book could probably have helpfully summarised the Civil War and it's aftermath more fully for the general reader, I was glad to have recently read Antonia Fraser's biography of Cromwell to know the significance of names like Dunbar. The author clearly has a personal aversion to Puritanism and Cromwell but rarely brings out evidence to justify it. The most telling lines in the book are when he writes, 'Perhaps what is least understood about Cromwell is his conservatism, which often dragged him into conflict with his more radical supporters. Above all it was Charles I, his head turned by the new ideology of European absolutism, who was the innovator.' For all its flaws, the book provides a good narrative of a very complex period and the bibliographical essay at the end is useful.

[Evan Þ. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd read a lot about the English Civil War, but this's the first book I'd read about the immediate aftermath: how Cromwell, at the head of the Army, seized power and ruled under the title of Lord Protector.

His rule was successful in that he did hold power for the rest of his life, but unsuccessful in that his apparatus of power was always clunky. He'd seized power at the head of the New Model Army, who largely favored radical Protestant sects ranging from Baptists to Quakers to Fifth Monarchists; but he ruled largely based on partly-Presbyterian merchant support who favored peace and predictable government. Plus, a lot of people didn't support radical changes to government, let alone new laws forbidding frivolous and supposedly-ungodly amusements. These differences finally forced Cromwell to institute more direct military government, and then - after his death - brought down the Protectorate government.

I'm glad to read about this aftermath of a revolution, and it's exciting my imagination already. Cromwell failed - but it's hard to imagine anyone doing any better.

[Joseph Ficklen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book, this is my second time reading it. It’s a straightforward history of Cromwell’s Protectorate (1653-1658) and his son’s brief rule after him. The author does well to make “providence” the main theme of his work, describing the driving force behind the theology of the Puritans. I am always amazed to hear of Cromwell’s piety, or of how foreign policy decisions, such as the war with Spain, were made sometimes according to exegesis of a certain passage of scripture. Cromwell’s Protectorate managed to be more tolerant and more stringent, more progressive and more reactionary, more liberal and more conservative in different areas than any government that came before it, but in the end it was so strange and novel that it could not long last after Cromwell’s own death. After 20 years of chaos in its politics, the vast majority of Britons were relieved to see a restoration of the “ancient constitution” under King Charles II in 1660.

[Gordon Tyrrall · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a follow-up read for me from C.V.Wedgwood's "The King's War" which is mainly about the "First" Civil War lasting up to 1647. That aroused my interest in the period,and what came after. This must be one of the most critical periods in English history,along with Henry VIII's break with Rome.
Anyway, it begins,unexpectedly, with the "Western Design" - Cromwell's adventure in the Caribbean (reminding me of a more recent disastrous euphemism - Putin's "Special Military Operation"), but Paul Lay suggests that this was the start of the downfall of the Protectorate. Other main reasons he puts down to the military rule of the major-generals; the attempt to tax ex-Royalists through the "decimation" tax, the foolish attempt to reform the morals of the country by banning things like theatre-going; and possibly most important of all - the death of Oliver Cromwell himself in 1658, without a viable successor.
I found it fascinating, a page-turner, and very well written

[Benj · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting study of the Protectorate, when a bunch of religious well-meaning fanatics (as we would think them) attempted to reform the Great British public, and failed utterly.

Traditional histories chart the various conflicts between the Army and Parliament during this period, but this book goes into the individual characters and their personalities, which adds a welcome human element.

One interesting aspect that comes out is that nobody could contemplate and alternative to the hereditary principle e.g. an elected Head of State. This led to the ridiculous scenario where, on Cromwell's death, the Protectorate passed to his eldest son Richard. He had no interest in politics or government, with the inevitable results. It is interest to speculate what could have happened had his younger son Henry, who was much more capable and involved, succeeded.

[Colin Mitchell · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am uncertain where to start with this one. An interesting subject based upon the later part of the Protectorate, Cromwell's death and the restoration of the monarchy but there were simply too many characters introduced and too often it is difficult to follow exactly who is being written about and what side they represent. It seems rather certain that a great many of the country. whatever walk of life probably thought the same and simply did what they thought would cause the least anguish for their families. Cromwell comes over as quite conservative and yet found it difficult to challenge the army or the parliament and in the end, the country seems to have slipped back to the same point that was reached at the Kings execution with no one able to agree on anything. Nothing much changes.

I struggled to reach the end of this book and from my perspective, it is just an ok read so 2 stars.

[Shane Goodyear · Rating 4 out of 5]

* Book about the Cromwellian protectorate
* The failure, succes and the contradiction of it
* Failure of the western design. Capture of Hispaniola did not happen but Jamica did
* Shock Cromwells belief in providence being with him and England
* Failures: western design, military generals ruling trial of Quaker James nayler. No successor
* Other failures: not constitution/ parliament kept failing due to its radicals and disagreements
* Regime proper up by support of army.
* After crowmwells death army underpaid and could not keep power by itself so Monck recalled Parliament and disbanded the rump Parliament
* Protectorate was based on the rule of one man Cromwell
* He believed in religious feeling and was a mediator in one sense between the radicals and the conservatives when he died no hope of the protectorate surviving

[James Lynch · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book brilliantly gives insight into a period of religious turmoil and political upheaval that I, and I'm sure many others are in a similar position, was simply not familiar with. The roots of so much in modern British, and indeed western, thought, politics and theology, can be traced to, or at least through this, fascinating time. The origin of the Quakers, the existence at this time of Soul Sleepers and Soconians, doctrines now associated with Christian denominations such as Jehovah's Witnesseses and the Christedelphians, and the Fifth Monarchists, a now extinct group offering a riveting new perspective on Christian nationalism, this book covers all these and more brilliantly. Worthwhile as a guide to the era and for the study of religious history.