The Life and Crimes of Oliver Cromwell!!

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The Lord Protector of England, Ireland, and Scotland who couldn't protect himself . . . from poison!!

Since time immemorial, England has always been a monarchy, with either a king or queen ruling the country. Usually the king or queen succeeds to the throne immediately upon the death of his/her predecessor.

However there was one BIZARRE 11 year episode in English history when the country was a republic or Commonwealth. It was called an INTERREGNUM and lasted from 1649 to 1660. The last 5 years were called a Protectorate with Oliver Cromwell reigning as Lord Protector.

For most of his life, Cromwell was an obscure commoner without a drop of royal blood, and stood no chance of inheriting the English throne.

Cromwell is considered a HERO in England . . . but in Ireland he is as HATED as Hernán Cortés in Mexico....He is the Irish ogre and is considered worse than Attila the Hun, Genghis Khan, and Ivan the Terrible combined....Even today, Irish mothers tell their children that if they don't behave . . . Cromwell will get them....Jesuit recruiters followed his small army of 12,000 "Puritans" and even mentioning his name in Ireland today is enough to swell the ranks of the hierarchy.

The reason for this bizarre episode in English history will be clearly seen when we carefully examine laws that were passed and alliances that were changed during Cromwell's career and the subsequent reign of the restored King Charles II.

It is ironic that the dictatorship of Oliver Cromwell lasted almost as long as another Jesuit tool—Adolf Hitler.

England and Holland were faithful allies until the Cromwell regime!!

England and Holland were faithful allies from before the time of the defeat of the "Invincible" Armada until the regime of Cromwell.

Many brave gallant English soldiers fought and died side by side with their Dutch brethren against the Spanish.

In 1567, Philip II dispatched a ruthless soldier named the Duke of Alva, with 12,000 men, to subjugate the Netherlands, and use it as a springboard to conquer England.

The small country of Holland made an heroic stand against the Spanish superpower when they invaded that country.

Throughout Europe, the Spanish army was notorious for their ferocity and ruthlessness. It had taken them over 700 years to drive the Moors from Spain . . . and suddenly they were the most feared army in the world!!

This "Iron Duke" as he was called began a 6 year reign of terror in the Netherlands. On August 22, Alba, accompanied by a body of select Spanish troops, made his entry into Brussels. He immediately appointed a council to condemn without trial those suspected of heresy and rebellion. On June 1, 1568, Brussels witnessed the simultaneous decapitation of twenty-two noblemen; on 6 June followed the execution of the Counts of Egmond and Horne. The "Council of Blood" was the popular designation of Alba's tribunal.

Only Protestant England, and the small Dutch Republic under William of Orange, stood in Spain's way of eventual world conquest. England had a small population of 4 million, and no overseas possessions.

The real reason for the English INTERREGNUM

In 1607, a small congregation of Christians left England bound for Holland. King James I—a bigoted Roman Catholic in disguise—refused to grant them freedom of religion. For the next 13 years they found a refuge and freedom of religion in Holland.

Eventually they decided to leave Holland and obtained a patent to found a colony in the New World.

In Sept. 1620, 101 men, women, and children of this Leiden congregation left Plymouth, England, in a tiny ship called the Mayflower, bound for the New World.

In Nov. 1620, the English finally obtained a beachhead on the coast of the New World when the Pilgrim Fathers landed at Plymouth Rock. They were Protestant Christians who left everything behind in order to worship God according to His Word.

The colony that they founded was too far north and bitterly cold for the Spanish to attack them. Eventually other Christians were driven out of England by Stuart persecutions, and they augmented the colony in the New World which eventually became the United States.

That colony was enough to give nightmares to the Jesuit general at Rome . . . but there was worse to come!!

The Dutch also planted a colony in the New World

Besides the Portuguese, the Protestant Dutch were the main competition for the Spanish. The Spanish declared war on the Dutch in 1568 and that terrible war lasted for 80 years (1568-1648). The Spanish did sign a treaty of peace with England in 1604, but it was always war to the death with the Dutch.

New York City was formerly called New Amsterdam!!

New York City—the greatest city in the world—was called New Amsterdam until the city was conquered by the English in 1664 and renamed New York after the Duke of York—the future king James II.

The beheading of King Charles I in 1649

Up to the time of King Charles I, peace and amity existed between England and Holland. The oldest daughter of King Charles, Mary Henrietta, was actually married to William II, Prince of Orange. This marriage between the Stuarts and the House of Orange cemented the friendship between the two allies and made war highly unlikely.

Holland was a big winner at the end of the Jesuit instigated 30 Years' War. The Spanish Empire was the big loser, and the tiny Dutch Republic was replacing Spain as mistress of the seas.

From January 1631, Charles I of England engaged in a number of secret agreements with Spain, directed against Dutch sea power. He also embarked on a major program of naval construction, enforcing ship money to built such prestige vessels as HMS Sovereign of the Seas. Charles's policy was not very successful however. Fearing to endanger his good relations with the powerful Dutch stadtholder Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange, his assistance to Spain limited itself to allowing Habsburg troops on their way to Dunkirk to employ neutral English shipping. In 1636 and 1637 he made some halfhearted attempts to extort North Sea herring rights from Dutch fishermen until intervention by the Dutch navy made an end to such practices. When in 1639 a large Spanish transport fleet sought refuge in the English Downs moorage, Charles did not dare to protect it against a Dutch attack; the resulting Battle of the Downs undermined both Spanish sea power and Charles' reputation.

Obviously the king was not cooperating with the Jesuits in destroying the Dutch, navy so he had to be taught a lesson.

The public beheading of King Charles I of England on January 30, 1649, took place on a specially erected scaffold outside the Banqueting House in Whitehall, in Westminster. One week later his body was buried in Henry VIII’s vault at Windsor.

The Navigation Act of 1651

Cordial relations existed between England and Holland until the regime of Cromwell. An act was passed by the Cromwell "Parliament" in 1651 called the Navigation Act. It was aimed basically at the Dutch who carried on a brisk shipping trade between the New World, England, and Holland.

"The new policy was pursued with the fervour so characteristic of all new régimes. Moreover, when Cromwell soon afterwards rid the country of internal enemies, there was even less reason for fearing the Dutch. Charles II, defeated at Worcester in September, once again took refuge on the continent; Scotland and Ireland lay at Cromwell's feet. By October, Parliament felt free to pass the contentious Navigation Act which provided that all imports should be brought into England in English vessels or vessels of the country producing the goods. The Act was clearly directed against the Dutch traders; it denied them the freedom of the seas on which they had insisted throughout the negotiations at the Hague. Soon afterwards, the English government gave an even stronger proof of its hostility to the United Netherlands, when it issued letters of reprisal to the heirs of an English merchant, who was said to have suffered damage by the Dutch. These letters not only caused the Netherlands an unexpected financial loss, but involved recourse to a maritime law that had always been resented by the Dutch and had been the subject of long and tedious negotiations with the kings of England. To top it all English men-of-war began to search Dutch ships quite arbitrarily for 'contraband'"(Geyl, Orange and Stuart, pp. 89-90).

Cromwell went to war with the Dutch!!

Spain was the FIRST country to recognize the Cromwell regime....Cromwell declared war on England's faithful ally the Dutch. The first of the Anglo-Dutch wars lasted from 1652 to 1654..... Of course the Jesuits were DELIGHTED that the British were fighting for them and destroying the Dutch navy.

Most of the generals that fought for Cromwell also remained in the English navy after the restoration of Charles II.

Cromwell invaded Ireland in 1649

Cromwell arrived in Ireland in September 1649, with a small army of about 12,000 men. Ireland had many men who were loyal to King Charles II and they were led by James Butler, Duke of Ormonde.

As usual on all his campaigns, Cromwell consulted closely with his Jesuit advisers:

"During the expedition to Ireland (although Parliament had ordered that anyone giving shelter to a priest or to a Jesuit, even for a single hour, should lose his life and forfeit his property), a Jesuit, Fr. Nicholas Netterville, was on terms of great intimacy with Cromwell, often dining at his table and playing chess with him. When Captain Foulkes accused him of being a priest, he said, " I am a priest and the Lord General knows it, and (you may) tell all the town of it, and that I will say Mass here every day." (Taunton, History of the Jesuits in England, p. 427).

Jesuit propaganda flyers appeared soon afterward showing Cromwell's soldiers killing defenseless women and children.

Over 30,000 Protestant men, woman, and children were killed in the Sack of Magdeburg during the 30 Years' War but the small number killed in the siege of Drogheda was great recruitment propaganda for the Jesuits.

Cromwell went on to storm other cities in Ireland before his return to England in June 1650. Of course Cromwell and his Ironsides were carrying BIBLES and quoting Scriptures as they stormed the cities. The Jesuits LOVED him as they would use this episode to poison the wells of history in order to supply them with limitless recruits during the following centuries.

Cromwell got very sick in Scotland!!

After subduing Ireland, Cromwell set his sights on Scotland and invaded that country in July 1650. Cromwell fought a battle with the Scots in September of that year and defeated them. Then he marched his army to Edinburgh and that is when he got very sick for the first time:

"In 1651 Cromwell was dangerously ill during the Scottish campaign; this news caused so much concern in Parliament that on May 27th Dr Bate and Dr Lawrence Wright (who was already Physician-in-Ordinary to Cromwell) received orders to proceed at once to Edinburgh to take care of the Lord General. They arrived on 30th May 1651 but in the meantime their patient had greatly improved. In a letter dated 3rd June 1651 Cromwell profusely thanked John Bradshaw, the President of the Council, for sending the two doctors. In 1653 Oliver was installed as Protector of the Commonwealth and Bate became his chief physician. Although in some circles Bate 'pretended to be a concealed royalist he flattered Cromwell in a high degree'" (Bruce-Chwatt, George Bate—Cromwell's Devious Physician).

Dr. Bate was the personal physician to Charles I, Oliver Cromwell, and Charles II.

This Dr. Bate that was called in to give "medical aid" Cromwell was none other that the personal physician to the beheaded King Charles I.

The great Lord "Protector" must have been a complete BLOCKHEAD because he had the same personal physician as the king he beheaded:

"He (Bate) proceeded to Doctor of Medicine in 1637 and his reputation grew so fast that, while the Court was in Oxford, Charles I appointed him as his chief physician. On 30th September 1639 he was admitted as a candidate of the College of Physicians and on 25th June 1640 he became a Fellow of the College. He served in the office of Censor in 1645, 1648 and 1649. When, during the Civil War, the royal cause was adversely affected, Dr Bate retired to London, became physician to the Charterhouse and declared his loyalty to Cromwell." (Bruce-Chwatt, George Bate—Cromwell's Devious Physician).

The most important position in the government is the DOCTOR because he has the power of life and death over the ruler. This Dr. Bate was an expert in mixing poisons....When Cromwell finally got back to London in the fall of 1651 he was installed at Whitehall and in Dec. of 1653 he was inaugurated as Lord Protector of England, Ireland, and Scotland.

Cromwell was made DICTATOR for life!!

Now that Cromwell had subdued the 3 kingdoms, he began his almost kingly reign. As commander of the standing army, he was de facto dictator from the death of the king, and all that remained was to make his dictatorship legal by his puppet Parliament:

"On 16 December 1653 Cromwell became head of state of a united Britain as Lord Protector, accepting a position which years later he likened to that of a watchman, promoting good and warding off evil; he also compared his position to that of 'a good constable to keep the peace of the parish', though on a less happy occasion he protested that 'I would have been glad ... to have been living under a woodside to have kept a flock of sheep, rather than to have undertaken such a place as this'. Cromwell and his senior colleagues moved quickly in December 1653 to establish a new government by a written constitution, called the Instrument of Government, which had been written by a group of senior officers. It appointed Cromwell Lord Protector for life and defined his position and powers, while also guaranteeing a return to more normal, elected parliaments. Cromwell remained in office as Protector for almost five years until his death in September 1658. As both head of state and commander-in-chief of the army, Cromwell now held potentially huge power to pursue his agenda and advance his policies, though in practice he was hedged about by limitations and difficulties, and his record as Protector was mixed. However, there is no doubt that Cromwell's position changed massively in December 1653 and that thenceforth he exercised a degree of power and influence all the more remarkable when we recall that just twenty years before he had been a struggling, obscure tenant farmer in a small Cambridgeshire town." (Gaunt, Oliver Cromwell, p.98.)

Cromwell died by poisoning in 1658

King Charles II must have learned his lesson well and promised to become a compliant Jesuit tool because he was allowed to regain his throne. Of course Cromwell had to have a hasty demise and Dr. Bate was on standby to give him the eternity powder.

Dr. Bate kept a careful diary of his visits to his patient but he omitted the most important of all—Oliver Cromwell.

"Bate's "diary" contains notes for consultations in August 1658 while he also attended the lord protector. He saw "Lord Rich" on the eighth and the tenth, "Sir Thomas Reinall" on the ninth, and "Mrs. Rolles in threadneedlestreet" on the twelfth. These were prominent persons, typical of Bate's patients in general. The whereabouts of the first two cannot be verified for the days mentioned, but a reasonable inference is that they were with the protector in Hampton Court.
The implication for the protector's medical narrative is at least curious, if not ominous. Bate saw the first two patients, doubtlessly at Hampton Court, on 8, 9, and 10 August, days when Cromwell, also at Hampton Court, displayed increasingly debilitating symptoms from a second dose of poison, probably mercury administered on the eighth. On the tenth Cromwell was unable to attend his daughter's burial at Westminster; he was assumed to be near death. The attack lasted about five days altogether. On the twelfth Bate was away from the Hampton Court sickroom attending Mrs. Rolles in the City, and during this absence Cromwell began to recover. Bate perhaps assumed the protector would die following the dosage of mercury administered on the eighth and absented himself to avoid suspicion, should it arise. A further inference is that the émigrés had pressed him to act quickly, consistent with their motive to prevent Parliament's bestowing the kingship. During Bate's absence, Cromwell nearly recovered and on 17 August went horseback riding. Dr. Bate meanwhile returned to Hampton Court, and the protector saw the doctors; then during the night of 17 August Cromwell fell into another round of debilitating pains. Bate's next recorded consultation was 6 September, two days after he assisted in the unsuccessful embalming of Cromwell's body." (McMains, The Death of Oliver Cromwell, pp. 115-116.)

Dr. Bate performed the autopsy on Cromwell....The hastily embalmed body was placed in a double coffin and interred in a vault in Westminster Abbey.

Oliver Cromwell died at Whitehall on the afternoon of Friday, September 3, 1658. At the direction of the Council, the corpse was embowelled and embalmed on the following day. Thereafter the physical remains effectively disappeared from public view and both the elaborate lying in state at Somerset House during October and early November and the grand state funeral through London on 23 November centred on a (probably empty) coffin and on one or more life-size models or effigies.

George Monck was the real power behind the Cromwell regime!!

General George Monck was the real power behind the Cromwell regime and commanded the standing army. Without a drop of royal blood, Cromwell had absolutely no chance of becoming king, but George Monck was descended from the English royal line known as the Plantagenets. He was a consumate hater of the Dutch and fought in the first and second Anglo-Dutch wars.

The oldest English standing army is called the Coldstream Guards and general Monck is considered their official founder.

King Charles II carried on the policy of Oliver Cromwell

Like the Bourbon dynasty in France after the defeat of Napoleon, a greatly chastened King Charles II was allowed to regain his throne in May 1660. Many of the laws enacted during the Cromwell regime were repealed but new navigation acts were enacted aimed at destroying Dutch trade in the New World.

England continued to make war on the Dutch and they were expelled from New Amsterdam in August 1664, which then became known as New York.

Cromwell's regime was a big blow to the Reformation in England, as it produced limitless recruits for the Jesuits in Ireland. There is an old Jesuit saying:

"He who would England win, Must in Ireland begin."

Vital Link

Dr. George Bate—Cromwell's Devious Physician

References

Ashley, Maurice. Oliver Cromwell and His World. G.P. Putnam's Son, New York, 1972.

Bowle, John. Charles the First. Little, Brown and Co., Boston, 1975.

Frazer, Antonia. Cromwell the Lord Protector. Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1973.

Furdell, Elizabeth Lane. The Royal Doctors 1485-1714. Medical Personnel at the Tudor and Stuart Courts. University of Rochester Press, 2001.

Gaunt, Peter. Oliver Cromwell. New York University Press, 2004.

Geyl, Pieter. Orange and Stuart 1641-1672. Phoenix Press, London, 2001.

Hutton, Ronald. Charles II King of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989.

Hibbert, Christopher. Charles I. Harper & Row, New York, 1968.

Hutton, Ronald. Charles the Second King of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Clarendon Press. Oxford, 1989.

McMains, H.F. The Death of Oliver Cromwell. The University Press of Kentucky, Lexington, KY. 2000.

McRedmond, Louis. To the Greater Glory. A History of the Irish Jesuits. Gill And Macmillian, Dublin, Ireland, 1991.

Sherwood, Roy Edward. Oliver Cromwell: King In All But Name, 1653-1658. St. Martin's Press, New York, 1997.

Taunton, Ethelred L. History of the Jesuits in England. Methuen & Co., London, 1901.

Warner, Oliver. Hero of the Restoration. A life of General George Monck. Jarrolds Publishers, London. 1936.

Copyright © 2008 by Niall Kilkenny

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