Early Stuart England

Spring 1660

After a long exile, the rightful King returns, to restore the line of his ancestors.

January 1660

A broad movement for a free parliament unites royalists, Presbyterians, the apprentices of London, and the only coherent army left in England.

December 1659

Assailed on multiple fronts, the Committee of Safety simply dissolves. Without any other immediate options, England (for the third time) turns to the Rump.

1659

As the Committee of Safety struggles to establish itself as England's new government, London falls under the sway of different ruler - coffee.

1659

Army officers and the Rump squabble over the remains of the increasingly irrelevant Commonwealth state

Summer 1659

The new regime at Westminster is briefly united by the most dangerous royalist insurgency parliament has yet faced.

1659

Having run out of ideas, England once again turns to the men of the Rump parliament, who Oliver Cromwell had banished from Westminster six years earlier.

Fall 1658

With the death of Oliver Cromwell, the Protectorate seeks stability under a new, untested Lord Protector.

1658

Just when Cromwell completes his dream of securing Dunkirk, England is drawn into a new war in Scandinavia.

January 1658

Oliver Cromwell (who is the Lord Protector, definitely not the King) seeks to control the House of Commons through the new "Other House" (which is definitely not the House of Lords).

1657

Outside of London and Westminster, the people of England adapt to a new normal.

1657

Thirty years after the Duke of Buckingham's French alliance failed in spectacular fashion, Oliver Cromwell and the Protectorate once again outdo their Stuart predecessors.

1657

Rival Cromwellian factions in parliament (who had disagreed on just about everything so far) once again split on a final question - whether to make the Lord Protector a King.

1657

The Second Protectorate Parliament gathers, but rather than heeding Cromwell's call to confirm the existing constitution, the men at Westminster re-open fundamental questions of religion and money.

1656

A new radical religious group (the Quakers) suffers an internal power struggle, which threatens to de-stabilize the new parliament gathering at Westminster.

1656

It's election season for the Second Protectorate Parliament, and English voters use the opportunity to contemplate the meaning of republicanism, and how to reconcile liberty in Britain with slavery in the New World.

1656

England once again makes the capture of a Spanish treasure fleet the centre-piece of their war strategy. Only this time, it works!

1656

While Oliver Cromwell and his friends re-make the English state, a collection of eccentric academics and amateur enthusiasts re-make the field of natural philosophy.

1656

The Lord Protector, an Amsterdam Rabbi, and a merchant in the underground Jewish community of London seek to reverse a 350 year old ban on Jews in England.

1655

Oliver Cromwell sends his son Henry to Ireland, for an apprenticeship in ruling a nation.

1655

Stymied by traditional institutions like parliament, the Protectorate turns to the army to extend its rule into the provinces.

1655

The New Model Army finds waging war on the other side of the world, and with little local intelligence, is harder than it looks.

1654-5

The Protectorate state draws up plans for the most ambitious amphibious campaign in English history, and the first step in conquering a global empire.

Spring 1655

An underground network of royalists seek to take advantage of instability within the Protectorate regime, but find that they are hampered by internal divisions of their own.

Fall 1654

Lord Protector Cromwell opens his first parliament, and soon discovers what James or Charles could have told him - that managing the men at Westminster is no easy task.

Now Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell is forced to finally make some concrete decisions about England's spiritual life. Perhaps unsurprisingly, his choices are as much political as religious.

1654

Having seized control of the state, Cromwell immediately ends the war with the Dutch, and adopts a much more conventional foreign policy.

December 1653

John Lambert, after orchestrating the demise of the latest attempt at a political settlement (the Nominated Assembly), produces his own solution - a written constitution.

1653

With the Rump hastily dissolved, England turns to an ad hoc assembly to craft a new political order.

1654

As social unrest in France takes a revolutionary turn, England sends out feelers to potential republican comrades.

1652-3

With England distracted by the Dutch War, and turmoil at Westminster, a group of soldiers and administrators are left to determine Scotland's future on their own.

Spring 1653

A long stand-off culminates in the forced dissolution of the Long Parliament, twelve and a half years after its initial elections.

1652-3

Oliver Cromwell struggles to hold the disparate elements of the Commonwealth coalition together, but the mounting pressure seems to make a break all but inevitable.

1652

Having pacified all organized resistance in Ireland, the Puritan Commonwealth regime contemplates how to rule a pre-dominantly Catholic nation.

1652

The republics of England and the Netherlands test each other in battle, and in doing so act out a debate in naval tactics that had been brewing for a century.

1651-2

As England prepares for a Dutch war, factions within the Commonwealth find that they have enemies at home.

1652

Desperate to match the modernizing credit economy of the Dutch, the Commonwealth turns to a been enthusiast, an impoverished inventor, and England's spinsters.

1651-1652

After decades of close co-operation, the Anglo-Dutch relationship falls apart due to heated economic competition.

1651

Having pacified Scotland and Ireland, the Commonwealth regime looks to secure one last component of the old Stuart realms - the New World colonies.

1651

Amid the soul searching after their defeat at Worcester, the royalists re-assess the philosophical underpinnings of their cause.

1650-1

As Henry Ireton seeks to impose Commonwealth rule on Ireland, he finds his work obstructed by a persistent guerilla campaign.

1651

When the Scots and Charles find themselves unable to defend Scotland, they turn the tables on Oliver Cromwell, and invade England.

1649-50

In an effort to project the Commonwealth's military and economic power beyond the British Isles, the New Merchant faction re-organizes the navy.

Summer 1650

Oliver Cromwell marches north to Scotland - and into a well laid trap.

1649-1650

Charles II attempts to balance his desire for revenge on the men who killed his father, and the need to build allies in Europe.

1650

The Commonwealth government searches for the words to define itself, and at the same time, bind the people of England to its rule.

1650

A divided Commonwealth government institutes a pilot program in Wales that will determine the future of religion in England.

1649-50

While Cromwell continues his campaign in Ireland, Scotland veers from theocracy to reconciliation with the Stuart monarchy.

Summer/Fall 1649

Oliver Cromwell takes the New Model Army into Ireland, where it faces a renewed coalition of royalist forces.

Spring 1649

Fearing that they have merely traded one tyranny for another, the Levellers rise up to overthrow the infant Rump regime.

Winter 1649

The men who executed the King struggled to define the new political world they've created.

1649

London adapts to being the centre of a merchant republic with global ambitions.

1649

The new masters of London re-organize England's system of international trade, with their eyes firmly set on the East India Company.

1633-1649

The Calvert family founds the experimental colony of Maryland, but soon find their efforts undermined by the chaos of war.

1642-1649

With trans-Atlantic ties disrupted by war, the American colonies are forced to grow up quickly.

1643-1648

Decades of conflict come to an end in Europe, presenting post-monarchical England with a brand new geo-political landscape.

1649

After a decade of conflict, England finds itself a changed nation on a new trajectory into the 1650s.

January 1649

The King is put on trial. His life, and the future of England, hang in the balance.

December 1648

A heavily purged parliament ends two and a half years of stalemate by putting the King on trial for his life.

December 1648

Frustrated with parliament's continued negotiations with the King, a group of army officers engineers a coup to seize control of Westminster.

Fall 1648

With England once again secure, parliament returns to that has plagued English politics for two and a half years - what to do with the King?

1647-1648

As the rest of the British Engager project falls apart, Ireland once again devolves into a new set of factions and alliances of convenience.

1648

Mutinies at the main navy dockyard in Chatham threaten to give royalist exiles a ticket back to England.

Summer 1648

After the defeat at the battle of Preston, the Engager government in Scotland is challenged by insurrection. Meanwhile the royalists at Colchester see their struggle is futile.

Summer 1648

The centre-piece of the Engager campaign, a long delayed Scottish incursion, begins. The New Model Army rushes north to meet the invaders.

Spring 1648

After weeks of unrest, organized, armed opposition to the regime at Westminster erupts in the form of an army mutiny in Wales, and royalist-led insurrections in Kent and Essex.

Spring 1648

Protests break out across England against the regime's religious policies, taxation, and intrusion into local affairs. The disturbances in Norwich get particularly "explosive".

December 1647

While the army contemplates an increasingly radical settlement, the King turns to last remaining option - the Scots.

Fall 1647

Now firmly in control of the kingdom, the army coalition debates what its goals are - revealing its fundamental divisions.

Summer 1647

The long awaited storm finally breaks as both the Independents and the Presbyterians provoke each other into open conflict.

Spring 1647

Alarmed by the consolidation of Presbyterian power in London and parliament, a coalition emerges in the army between Independents, political radicals, and soldiers worried about their back pay.

Spring 1647

Unable to find a voice under the repressive Presbyterian regime in London, a group of dissidents turn in a truly revolutionary direction.

1646-7

In preparation for a conflict with the Independents in the New Model Army, the Presbyterians consolidate their control over London's government, and mobilize the city's military resources.

1645-1646

The end of the war in England causes a re-alignment of factions in Ireland that (if anything) make the conflict more complicated and intractable.

1646

The Scots begin to regret hosting their royal guest and look to pass off the stubborn king on to the English parliament.

1646

The Presbyterian-controlled government of London does its best to suppress the Independent churches of the city, in preparation for the coming conflict.

1646

The people of England await a return to pre-war normalcy, but find that the kingdom's institutions have been irreversibly changed by the conflict.

1646

Charles finally accepts reality, and gives up the fight. But in ending the war, the King manages to initiate new rounds of political conflict within the parliamentary coalition.

1645-1646

The Kilkenny Confederation contemplates a series of offers from an increasingly desperate King Charles. But continental Catholics powers have some tempting proposals of their own.

1645-1646

In the southwest of England, a collection of royalists desperately hold out hope that reinforcements from Ireland might swing the balance of the war.

1644-1645

A rag-tag group of Scottish Highlanders and Irish warriors threaten to bring down the Covenantor government and turn the tide of the war.

Summer 1645

In desperate need of help, King Charles turns to his most consistently loyal subjects - the Welsh. But he finds that loyalty can wither, when taken for granted.

Summer 1645

The farmers of the West Country have had enough of the fighting, and declare war on the war.

Spring 1645

The King hopes to continue his recent run of successes against parliament's latest experiment - the New Model Army

Winter 1645

In order to break the deadlock over the Self-Denying Ordnance, parliament embarks on a comprehensive reform of the army.

Winter 1644/1645

Parliament's feuding generals lay down their arms for the winter, and sharpen their blades for a political knife fight.

Fall 1644

An all-star team of parliamentary generals confront the King in battle, but spend most of their time bickering with one another.

1643/1644

As parliament struggles to build a replacement to William Laud's anti-Calvinist church, disorder and uncertainty spreads through the parishes of England.

Summer 1644

With the royalist position in the north collapsing at Marston Moor, Charles fights for his life in the south.

1644

Prince Rupert goes on the march to save the beleaguered royalist army of the North. At Marston Moor he meets a joint Anglo-Scottish army for the largest battle of the war.

1643/1644

New soldiers enter England from Ireland and Scotland, changing the course, and nature, of the war.

1643/1644

Oxford is transformed from a sleepy university town into a royal court full of factional infighting.

1643/1644

London spends a winter without coal from royalist-controlled Newcastle.

1643-44

With the Scottish alliance providing added pressure, parliament finally divides into two factions on the religious question.

1630-1643

The limits of religious freedom are tested in the New England colonies. 380 years later a podcaster repeatedly fails to pronounce "Massachusetts".

1643

Parliament seeks an alliance with the Covenantor Scots, and in doing so, is forced into an uncomfortable clarification of its religious policy.

1643

In order to free up soldiers for the war in England, Charles orders the Marquis of Ormond (the commander of the government forces in Ireland) to negotiate a truce with the rebels of the Kilkenny Confederation.

Summer 1643

In East Anglia, a local gentleman named Oliver Cromwell emerges as one of parliament's leading commanders.

Summer 1643

The royalists look to cap off a successful campaigning season by capturing Gloucester, the last parliamentary garrison blocking the entrance to South Wales.