Diary for Saturday, 4th and Sunday, 5th January, 2025

Two days ago, I indicated that I was interested in the contrasting views of John Morrill and Andrew Barclay on Oliver Cromwell's putative relationship with Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick. John Morrill had argued in his essay on The Making of Oliver Cromwell published in 1990 that the Earl of Warwick might, perhaps, have been the aristocratic patron who suggested that the town of Cambridge might return Cromwell as one of its two Members of Parliament to the Short and Long Parliaments in 1640. On the other hand, Andrew Barclay in his book, Electing Cromwell published in 2011, doubted whether Cromwell was a client of the Earl and raised questions about the relationship between Warwick and his younger brother, the Earl of Holland, who was the Chancellor of the University of Cambridge. Town and Gown had disputes that it was difficult to see how they might be resolved if Warwick was expected to influence Holland to resolve them without significant complexities. Barclay thought the issue irresoluble and that John Morrill's hypothesis was speculative. 

One surprising feature of both accounts is the omission of any reference to the letters of the Barrington family of Hatfield Broad Oak in Essex. Arthur Searle edited the bulk of the family's letters between 1628 and 1632 in 1983. Lady Joan Barrington was the future Lord Protector's aunt. It is possible to see the connections between members of the Bourchier family, to which Oliver's wife, Elizabeth, belonged as well as figures like Sir William Masham of Otes in High Laver in Essex, Lady Joan's son-in-law, to Oliver St John, Cromwell's friend, whose first marriage had been promoted by the Earls of Warwick and Bedford. Cromwell seems to have been linked, however, distantly to a number of people who were later important in his career after 1640. It is also possible, perhaps even probable, that he was known to Warwick's son-in-law, Edward,Lord Mandeville, later 2nd Earl of Manchester. 

Was Oliver Cromwell known to the 2nd Earl of Warwick? Was there any link other than the attendance of Cromwell's sons at Felsted school in the 1630s? There may be. the boys who attended the school and who were taught there by Martin Holbeach, its master, did not live in its building but were accomodated in the houses of people living in the village or, perhaps, in Little Leighs as the diary of Samuel Rogers and Warwick's correspondence with Sir Thomas Fairfax in 1647 shows. Holbeach must have been well acquainted with Cromwell's eldest son, Robert, who died in May, 1639 and who was buried in the churchyard of Holy Trinity, Felsted on 31st of that month. The Vicar was Samuel Wharton. His burial register recorded that "Robertus Cromwell filius honorandi viri Militis Oliveris Cromwell et Elizabethae ejus uxor sepultus fuit, 31 die Maii et Robertus fuit eximie pius juvenis Deum timens supra multos." This is the first such tribute of its kind in the burial register between 1636 and 1641 and suggests that Oliver Cromwell had been directly known to Wharton. It adds some weight to the view that Oliver Cromwell was, by then, more closely connected to the Rich family than has hitherto been understood.

Where does this leave Oliver Cromwell's return to the two Parliaments called in 1640? Exactly who nominated him to Cambridge is not known. But there is some evidence that Warwick and his allies were seeking to expand their electoral influence beyond the county of Essex. Deirdre Heaven's thesis suggests that John Gurdon's return from Ipswich in the autumn of 1640 owed something to his connection with Warwick. Warwick did have Cambridgeshire connections after his time as an undergraduate, e.g. with the university and with relatives like the 3rd Lord North. The balance of evidence has shifted in favour of the view that Oliver Cromwell had, by 1640, developed important links which may have favoured his entry into national politics at that time.