A born soldier of humble origins, Cromwell's military record in the Civil Wars was second to none. His 'reign' as Lord Protector from 1653 to 1658 has marked him for later generations as either a visionary political figure or a loathsome tyrant, and both cases are equally arguable; his religious bigotry, and the bitter fruit it bore in Ireland, are sadly beyond dispute. He remains secure in his reputation as one of the most extraordnary Englishmen who ever lived.
During the interregnum the navy's role was far more spectacular. The rulers of continental Europe were horrified by the execution of the king in January 1649 and all repudiated the new Commonwealth. The navy was thus needed to protect England from possible invasion and to force foreign powers to recognize the new regime. Over the next eleven years it was almost continuously in action, both defensive and offensive.
The parliamentary navy had played a significant, if secondary, part in the civil wars; the civil wars played a still more significant part in the navy's own history, accelerating its evolution and fitting it for the primary role it was to play in the imperial ages ahead.
The Story of the Second English Civil War is short and simple. King, Lords and Commons, landlords, merchants, the City and the countryside, bishops and presbyters, the Scottish army, the Welsh people, and the English Fleet, all now turned against the New Model Army. The Army beat the lot.
By the end of 1648 it was all over. Cromwell was Dictator. The Royalists were crushed; Parliament was a tool; the Constitution was a figment; the Scots were rebuffed, the Welsh back in their mountains; the Fleet was reorganized, London overawed. King Charles, at Carisbrooke Castle, where the donkey treads the water wheel, was left to pay the bill. It was mortal.
I tell you we will cut off his head with the crown upon it.
I had rather have a plain, russet-coated Captain, that knows what he fights for, and loves what he knows, than that you call a Gentleman and is nothing else.
A few honest men are better than numbers.
God made them as stubble to our swords.
This is a righteous judgement of God upon these barbarous wretches, who have imbrued their hands in so much innocent blood.
You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately... Depart, I say; and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!
Distrust was the main obstacle to agreement between king and parliament, but it might not have been an insurmountable obstacle without the conjuncture of other factors, which involved the lower classes in the crisis and drove a deeper wedge into the ruling class. These other factors were the fear of papists, the sharp decline of trade and industry, and an upsurge of class-feeling and class-hostility.
Most of the Army preachers believed that the New Model was an army of saints who were possessed by the Holy Spirit and were thus assured of their own salvation- to the point of believing that they were victorious in battle because God had been in the midst of them. "If God be for us," ran the text from Romans 8:31, "who can be against us?"
William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle (1592-1676) commanded the Royalists in northern England, and during 1643 made heavy work of defeating a small parliamentarian army. In 1644 he faced the invading Scots, and his tardiness in joining Prince Rupert before Marston Moor may have cost the Royalists victory. After the battle he fled to the Continent, where he wrote a book on horsemanship which remains his chief claim to fame.
Prince Rupert was more than an inspiring leader; despite his youth he had wide experience of continental warfare, and was a keen student of military theory. His daring and skill gave victory to the Royalist horse in most of the early battles of the Civil Wars.
One comes across another form of musket during this period: an early flintlock known as the 'snaphance' or 'firelock.' It was comparatively rare, and soldiers so armed were usually employed to guard the train of artillery. There was less chance of unfortunate accidents if its escort consisted of men armed with flintlocks rather than with matchlocks.