oliver cromwell: a hero or a villain?

-`, hero
- Nineteenth century, historians claimed/considered Cromwell to be a great reformer and a man of principle
- Cromwell dismissed the rump when they didn't follow his orders to make religious and legal reforms
- Cromwell expected Parliament to improve the country. Only those who were against monarchy and
support Cromwell’s idea of Republican were allowed in Parliament, but they were greedy and used
taxes to make themselves rich
- 1653, Cromwell took 30 soldiers to the House of Commons and threw the corrupt MPs out
- There was wider religious toleration under Cromwell’s reign

-`, villain
- When he heard that the Marquis of Ormonde was in france collecting soldiers & weapons, he immediately
assumed that he was going to invade england, so he invaded ireland with 12k men
- Killed 2k men
- “Every soldier.. And all citizens that were irish, man, woman and child was put to the
sword” -Clarendon
- No ‘quarter’ was given -Ormonde’s letter
- in Drogheda, when catholic rebels that were hiding in a church refused to surrender, he ordered his soldiers
to set it alight, burning them all alive
- caused people to fear that there would be religious wars
- Oliver was seen as an inhuman monster of militant dictatorship, who’d crush anyone who disagreed
with him
- Cromwell refused to become king but took extra powers as a Lord Protector
- Although protectorate was not hereditary, it was agreed that his son would be LP when he died
- “absolute rule of Lord Protector” (like DRoK)
- Biased against catholics/towards protestants
- Heard about terrible stories of the catholics committing horrible and cruel acts such as cutting off
people’s hand and feet and beating women’s brains with poles from protestants
- As a Puritan, he felt like it was his duty to punish catholics
- No evidence to prove that it happened

In the nineteenth century, historians considered Cromwell to be a great reformer and man of principle. This may be
because Cromwell supporters would have taken advantage of the significance of religion to the nation and created a
god-like impression for Oliver Cromwell so that Cromwell’s actions can be justified as the righteous judgement of
God. Historians today, however, use Cromwell’s actions in Ireland as an example to state that Cromwell was an
inhuman monster.