Cold Open

It’s the morning of June 14th, 1645, in a valley in Northamptonshire, England.

Sitting on horseback on the crest of a ridge, 46-year-old Oliver Cromwell stares down the slope at the battle unfolding below.

Thousands of cavalry are formed up around him, their horses snorting and pawing at the ground with impatience.

Cromwell grips his sword tight. He’s waiting for the right moment to give the command and send his men down the hill to join the battle.

It’s three years into a brutal civil war. The conflict between King Charles I and the English Parliament has torn the country apart. Charles believes that as king he is appointed by God and should wield absolute power over his subjects. But the parliamentarians believe that the English people should have some say over how they governed.

The course of the war has ebbed back and forth—but today the main armies of each side are meeting in battle. And for the commander of the parliamentary cavalry, Oliver Cromwell, it’s an opportunity to strike a decisive blow against the Royalists.

From his position on the ridge, Cromwell sees that the Royalist infantry has over-extended itself. It's pushing the Parliamentary infantry back—but that has left its flank exposed. These conditions are perfect for a cavalry charge.

Cromwell shouts out his orders. And all as one, his well-drilled cavalry surges forward. The earth churns beneath thousands of pounding hooves. Galloping downhill with them, Cromwell raises his sword above his head and lets out a guttural battle cry.

The Royalist infantry is pinned down in their fight with the Parliamentary foot soldiers. They can’t turn and form lines to defend themselves…before Cromwell’s horsemen smash into them in a devastating collision of horses, men, mud, and metal.

The Battle of Naseby will prove pivotal in the English Civil War. The overwhelming victory for Oliver Cromwell and the Parliamentary Army will end all Royalist hopes of winning the conflict on the battlefield. And less than a year later, King Charles will surrender. His defeat will pave the way for his execution, the end of the monarchy as an institution, and the founding of the Republic of England on May 19th, 1649.

Introduction

From Noiser and Airship, I’m Lindsay Graham, and this is History Daily.

History is made every day. On this podcast—every day—we tell the true stories of the people and events that shaped our world.

Today is May 19th, 1649: England Becomes a Republic.

Act One: Birth of a Republic

It’s May 19th, 1649, in Oxford, England, four years after the decisive Parliamentary victory at the Battle of Naseby.

Dressed in ceremonial robes, 49-year-old Oliver Cromwell rises from his pew and steps forward to meet the chancellor of Oxford University. In the high-ceilinged chambers of Magdalen College Chapel, Cromwell is presented with an honorary Doctor of Civil Law degree.

Cromwell knows that many in the room today resent him and this honor. During the civil war, Oxford was the Royalist headquarters, and the University was a strong supporter of Charles I. Now, however, they are rolling out the red carpet for Cromwell, the man who helped defeat the king.

As the university chancellor hands over the degree with a fixed smile, Cromwell’s mind wanders to a second piece of paper, currently being read out in the House of Commons in London. Worded by Cromwell himself, it is an Act of Parliament that will upend centuries of English law.

Cromwell doesn’t miss the opportunity to tell those in Oxford all about it. As he receives his doctorate, he explains to those in the chapel that from this day forth, England will no longer be ruled by a king. For the first time in its history, England will be a Republic.

This radical change seemed impossible only a few years earlier. After King Charles I’s defeat in the Civil War, there was a fierce debate about what to do next. Some among the victorious parliamentarians wanted widespread reforms that would sweep away the old social order entirely. Others, though, had less ambitious demands—they wanted to make a deal with the defeated King, one that would see him keep the throne in exchange for limits on his power.

And for a time, it looked as if these moderates would triumph. Negotiations with the King in the fall of 1648 seemed close to a deal. But then the Parliamentary Army intervened. Generals like Oliver Cromwell feared that any deal between parliament and the king would see the Army disbanded and their power destroyed. So, in late 1648, they moved decisively to make sure that couldn’t happen.

Soon, two regiments of soldiers surrounded the House of Commons, and 45 ministers of parliament who were seen as supporters of the King were arrested, and over 100 others were expelled. Another 80 MPs then left in protest, and those who remained were known as the Rump Parliament. It was this Parliament of army loyalists that pushed for the trial and execution of King Charles. And early the next year, 1649, the king was beheaded in front of a crowd in central London.

It was Cromwell himself who signed the papers confirming the King’s sentence. And he now believes that it's God’s will that England become a republic.

But no one knows exactly what this new Republic will look like. England has been ruled by a king or queen for over six hundred years. The structure of English society and its laws have all been built around a single figurehead at the top. So, the Rump Parliament appoints a “Council of State” that includes Cromwell to act as an executive. But there’s still fear that England will soon descend into chaos without a monarch to rule it.

Some people embrace that. The more radical elements in the army call themselves “Levellers”. Who see this as the moment for wealth and power to be shared out among the English people. But Cromwell is determined that won’t happen. Although he allied himself with the hardliners when it came to the fate of the king, he has no interest in creating an England where all are equal. He doesn’t believe everyone should have the right to vote. And he doesn’t believe in religious toleration. He believes in order and stability.

So, Cromwell violently suppresses the Levellers, arresting and executing their leaders. Cromwell himself may have been a rebel in the past when he took up arms against the King, but now he won’t allow anyone to question his new regime’s authority.

But the Levellers are far from the only threat to the English Republic. As a result of the Civil War, England’s economy is in ruins, and its government is almost bankrupt. It can barely afford to pay its army, and England’s European rivals are watching closely, eager to see how they can take advantage of the country’s weakness.

Desperate to fill a hole in the public finances, the Council of State starts selling off property belonging to the dead king. Land and palaces are to be sold. The Royal collection of paintings and sculptures is to be inventoried and then auctioned.

But that new source of income will soon be consumed by a new threat. King Charles I may be dead, but his 18-year-old son is still alive. And soon, his supporters will raise their banners and reignite the civil war, hoping to put an end to the English Republic just months after it was born.

Act Two: Britain Without a Crown

It’s the morning of September 4th, 1651, in Worcester, in the west of England, more than two years after the country became a Republic.

Fog hangs over the city as 52-year-old Oliver Cromwell walks through its deserted streets. He passes smashed and looted stores, burned-out houses, and alleyways clogged with corpses.

The city was stormed by parliamentary troops last night, and the violence has taken a heavy toll. But Cromwell is unmoved. He believes it is all God’s will.

After the execution of Charles I, England became a republic. But Charles has not just been King of England—he had also claimed the crowns of Scotland and Ireland. So, Royalists in those countries quickly declared that their true leader was Charles’s son, Charles II. These Royalists hoped to raise armies in Scotland and Ireland and invade England to put the young prince on the throne.

To see off this threat to the English Republic, Cromwell first led an army into Ireland. And during a brutal campaign there, he won a string of major victories over Royalist forces. Then he returned across the Irish Sea to lead an army into Scotland. But after capturing the Scottish capital, Edinburgh, he received word that Charles II himself had landed with an army further south and was marching through England in the hope of seizing the crown.

Leaving Scotland, Cromwell headed south in pursuit, and caught up with the Royalists here at the city of Worcester. Charles II had hoped the people of England would rise up to support him. But they didn’t. And when the final battle began, Cromwell’s forces heavily outnumbered the Royalists—and they made that advantage count.

Now, 3,000 Royalist troops are dead, 10,000 more have been captured, and Charles II is fleeing into exile. The victory is so overwhelming that when Cromwell returns to London, he hopes the long years of civil war that have scarred the country are finally at an end.

But while one conflict seems to be ending, another is growing. This time, the battle is between the army and the Rump Parliament. Many in the Army think Parliament is ineffective and corrupt. Many in parliament fear that the Army has become too powerful. And both sides suspect the other is just waiting for the right opportunity to move against them.

The defeat of the Royalists at the Battle of Worcester only deepens the mutual mistrust. Charles II is now in exile, and Parliamentarians fear that without an external enemy to fight, the Army will turn on them instead. But, for their part, the army fears that Parliament will use the victory as an excuse to cut funding and slash their numbers.

As head of the army and a member of parliament, Oliver Cromwell could be the man to mediate between the two sides. But there are growing tensions between him and other prominent members of the Council of State. And as the months pass, Cromwell becomes increasingly frustrated with the wider Rump Parliament as well. Its members were elected more than a decade earlier, before the execution of the king, before the civil war had even started. So, while the upheaval of recent years has made holding elections impossible, Cromwell now believes fresh blood is needed if the English Republic is to pass the reforms it needs to survive. The Rump, though, seems unwilling to give up power.

After months of often tense negotiations, in early 1653, Parliament finally agrees to call an election. But it won’t be an entirely free one. For the sake of the future of the Republic, both the army and Parliament want to exclude Royalists and other conservatives from standing in the election. But they can’t agree on exactly who should be ineligible. Parliament believes it alone should decide. But Cromwell and the Army worry that if it's left to the MPs, they’ll fix the result to ensure they are re-elected.

So at a meeting in April 1653, Cromwell suggests a compromise—that a new ruling council be drawn from both the army and parliament to drive through necessary reforms before calling an election. The MPs at the meeting are shocked at the idea of handing over power to unelected soldiers. Still, they placate Cromwell by assuring him that his proposal will be considered fully, and that Parliament will make no moves to call an election until that has happened.

The following morning, though, Cromwell gets word that the Rump Parliament is moving ahead with the election without considering his proposal at all. And under the parliamentarians’ plans, they alone will vet who is eligible to stand.

Cromwell and his allies in the army fear that everything they fought for over the previous decade is about to be put at risk. And this dispute will lead to a bitter stand-off and one of the most extraordinary displays of military power in English history when Oliver Cromwell storms into parliament to demand his say.

Act Three: God’s Work

It’s April 10th, 1653, in the House of Commons, in London, a year and a half after the Battle of Worcester.

An enraged Oliver Cromwell sits at the side of the chamber, darkly scowling. The members of parliament around him are moments away from calling a vote on a new election—an election in which they, the sitting ministers of parliament, will decide the rules, including who can and can’t stand.

But before it can be put to a vote, Cromwell rises to his feet. His voice is slow and measured at first. But the anger seething inside of him is impossible to miss. He tells his fellow MPs that they are not the ones who have fought for the right to decide how the country is run. His voice begins to rise as he marches up and down the chamber, his soldier’s boots thumping on the floor. He tells the shocked politicians that the people of England will not put up with their self-interest any longer. And when any MPs try to protest, he shouts them down, calling them “drunkards” and “whoremasters.”

Then, with a roar of command, Cromwell summons a group of soldiers into the chamber. He instructs them to throw out every last member of parliament, including the Speaker of the House.

Parliament is dissolved. And the army is in charge now.

Following this military coup, Oliver Cromwell declares himself “Lord Protector of England.” Some of his supporters want to offer him the crown and make him “King Oliver I,” but Cromwell refuses. He's determined that England will remain a republic. Still, he rules England much as a King would—he’ll believe his reign is divinely ordained and, on his deathbed in 1658, he will entrust his power to his eldest son.

But this will be the beginning of the end of the English Republic. The younger Richard Cromwell will lack his father’s iron will and his support among the army. After less than a year, his reign as Lord Protector will collapse. In 1659, the Rump Parliament will be recalled. But that won’t fill the power vacuum in England, and soon the country will turn to the model of government it knows best. In 1660, the exiled king Charles II will be invited to return to London and reclaim his throne. England will be ruled by a monarch once again.

The English Republic was a radical experiment that failed. But the idea of a country without a King will spread across the world, inspiring other, more successful, revolutions in the years to come. So, although the monarchy will persist in England, no king or queen will ever hold absolute power in the nation again. The relationship between rulers and the ruled will forever be changed by England’s brief existence as a Republic, one that began on May 19th, 1649.

Outro

Next on History Daily. May 20th, 1875. Diplomats from 17 countries meet in Paris to agree on an International System of Units: the metric system.

From Noiser and Airship, this is History Daily, hosted, edited, and executive produced by me, Lindsay Graham.

Audio editing by Muhammad Shahzaib.

Supervising Sound Designer Matthew Filler.

Music by Thrumm.

This episode is written and researched by Owen Paul Nicholls.

Edited by William Simpson.

Managing producer Emily Burke.

Executive Producers are William Simpson for Airship and Pascal Hughes for Noiser.