The World Turned Upside Down - The British Civil Wars 1638-1651

Over the last decade, extensive research conducted by academic historians in universities in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland has significantly expanded our knowledge of the origins, conducts and consequences of the British and Irish Civil Wars. As a result, attitudes and perceptions of this critically important period of history are continuously evolving. This presents a ... Read more

Over the last decade, extensive research conducted by academic historians in universities in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland has significantly expanded our knowledge of the origins, conducts and consequences of the British and Irish Civil Wars. As a result, attitudes and perceptions of this critically important period of history are continuously evolving. This presents a ... Read more

Much has been written about the New Model Army, which, when combined with images of Oliver Cromwell, has come to represent civil wars in popular books, films and TV programmes. In academic studies, the main focus has been on the founding and organisation of the army, its battlefield victories, the men who fought in its ... Read more

The British and Irish Civil War offer multiple opportunities across the curriculum and each of the key stages (KS). In this short talk Dr Jim Carroll, Departmental Lecturer in History Education at the University of Oxford, discusses: Current status of civil war history in schools Where the Civil War might be used to enhance learning ... Read more

On the 10th March 1629, Charles I dissolved his third parliament beginning years of Personal Rule which were described by his opponents as “11 years of tyranny”.  Indeed it is these years which many historians regard as a critically important causal factor in the outbreak of civil war in England in 1642. Knowing the upheaval and ... Read more

In seventeenth-century England, petitioning was one of the few opportunities for people at every level of society to make their voices heard by those in power. As a result, petitions became the ubiquitous means by which groups such as the Levellers sought to radically change the government and the organisation of religion in England, through ... Read more

On Easter Monday 1643 Prince Rupert led a force which assaulted the town of Birmingham as he moved along the road to meet up with Queen Henrietta Maria who was on her way to meet Charles I in Oxford. This was a short and seemingly insignificant skirmish. Birmingham had no significant defences and the parliamentary ... Read more

The Greek philosopher, Aristotle, said: “Give me a child until he is seven and I will show you the man”. How far is this true of the life of Oliver Cromwell who rose from being an obscure yeoman farmer in East Anglia to become one of the most revered, and by some reviled, figures in ... Read more

This is one of the great ‘what if’ questions of British history. Could the Commonwealth and the subsequent Protectorate have survived after the death of Oliver Cromwell on 3rd September 1658, or was it doomed to failure from the beginning? In our series ‘The Big Questions’, we invite distinguished historians to answer such critical important ... Read more

By 1644, the Civil War was entering its third year. Until then, the conflict in the North of England had been dominated by a victorious Royalist Army led by the Marquis of Newcastle, but the intervention of a Scots Army of 20,000 men dramatically now changed the balance of power in Parliament’s favour. By April, ... Read more