Cromwell and the Poets
Contemporary poets found it difficult to deal with Cromwell, both before and after his death. Margaret Oakes talks about how the approach they took, and what they chose to reflect of the man and his c...
1 Dec 202444min
419 Cromwell and his Reputation
"Never man was highlier extolled, and never man baselier reported of and vilified” write Richard Baxter - a contemporary of Oliver Cromwell, who was not a fan. In this he was closer to the truth than ...
24 Nov 202444min
Nelson with Dominic Sandbrook
Nelson was a military genius and fierce patriot, idolised by his men and the British public - and held up to ridicule too, for his affair with Emma and his treatment of Fanny. In his book for children...
17 Nov 202454min
AAG 1649-1653 The Commonwealth
In 1649 the English parliament proudly declared that freedom had been restored and that King and Lords had been rejected. But in other ways, the new Commonwealth failed to bring about a new world. Tru...
10 Nov 20241h 1min
AAG 1646-1649 To Kill a King
In 1646, Charles secretly left Oxford, not sure whether to appeal to the English in London, or the Scots at Newark. It was the start of a long process of three years, which would see torturous negotia...
3 Nov 20241h 3min
418 Barebones
In his haste to expel the Rump which had failed so badly, Cromwell and the Army officers came up with a temporary expedient. The Nominated assembly would be chosen from the most sober, Godly and intel...
20 Okt 202441min
417 Kicking the Rump
The promised land looked for so longingly by so many seemed in 1653 to be stubbornly remote. Legal reform blocked, religious programmes cancelled, an apparently corrupt parliament, high taxes, and sti...
13 Okt 202438min
Milton, Nedham and the Commonwealth with Anthony Bromley
John Milton and Marchamont Nedham were unlikely bedfellows; and yet they became friends, worked closely together and in their very different ways sought to promote the English Republic to the country ...
6 Okt 202446min
