Editing Oliver Cromwell (section)

== Character assessment ==
[[File:Cromwell as a usurper.tiff|thumb|upright|A contemporaneous satirical view of Cromwell as a usurper of monarchical power]]
During his lifetime, some tracts painted Cromwell as a hypocrite motivated by power. For example, ''The Machiavilian Cromwell'' and ''The Juglers Discovered'' are parts of an attack on Cromwell by the [[Levellers]] after 1647, and both present him as a [[Machiavelli]]an figure.{{Sfn|Morrill|1990c|pages=263–264}} John Spittlehouse presented a more positive assessment in ''A Warning Piece Discharged'', comparing him to [[Moses]] rescuing the English by taking them safely through the [[Red Sea]] of the civil wars.{{Sfn|Morrill|1990c|pages=271–272}} Poet [[John Milton]] called Cromwell "our chief of men" in his ''Sonnet XVI''.<ref>{{Cite web |title=RPO – John Milton : Sonnet XVI: To the Lord General Cromwell |url=https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/html/1807/4350/poem1456.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150905214428/https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/html/1807/4350/poem1456.html |archive-date=5 September 2015 |access-date=28 October 2015 |publisher=Tspace.library.utoronto.ca}}</ref>

Several biographies were published soon after Cromwell's death. An example is ''The Perfect Politician'', which describes how Cromwell "loved men more than books" and provides a nuanced assessment of him as an energetic campaigner for liberty of conscience who is brought down by pride and ambition.{{Sfn|Morrill|1990c|pages=279–281}} An equally nuanced but less positive assessment was published in 1667 by [[Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon]] in his ''History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England''. Clarendon famously declares that Cromwell "will be looked upon by posterity as a brave bad man".{{Sfn|Gaunt|2004|page=9}} He argues that Cromwell's rise to power had been helped by his great spirit and energy, but also by his ruthlessness. Clarendon was not one of Cromwell's confidantes, and his account was written after the [[Restoration (England)|Restoration of the monarchy]].{{Sfn|Gaunt|2004|page=9}}

During the early 18th century, Cromwell's image began to be adopted and reshaped by the [[British Whig Party|Whigs]] as part of a wider project to give their political objectives historical legitimacy. [[John Toland]] rewrote [[Edmund Ludlow]]'s ''Memoirs'' in order to remove the Puritan elements and replace them with a Whiggish brand of republicanism, and it presents the Cromwellian Protectorate as a military tyranny. Through Ludlow, Toland portrayed Cromwell as a despot who crushed the beginnings of democratic rule in the 1640s.{{Sfn|Worden|2001|pp=53–59}}

{{Blockquote|text=I hope to render the English name as great and formidable as ever the Roman was.<ref>"The Life and Eccentricities of the late Dr. Monsey, F.R.S, physician to the Royal Hospital at Chelsea", printed by J.D. Dewick, Aldergate street, 1804, p. 108</ref>|source=Cromwell}}

During the early 19th century, Cromwell began to be portrayed in a positive light by [[Romanticism|Romantic]] artists and poets. [[Thomas Carlyle]] continued this reassessment in the 1840s, publishing ''[[Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches: With Elucidations]]'', an annotated collection of his letters and speeches in which he described English Puritanism as "the last of all our Heroisms" while taking a negative view of his own era.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Carlyle |first=Thomas |url=http://www.gasl.org/refbib/Carlyle__Cromwell.pdf |title=Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches |volume=2: Letters from Ireland, 1649 and 1650 |publisher=Chapman and Hall |date= 1897 |access-date=5 October 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061102174139/http://www.gasl.org/refbib/Carlyle__Cromwell.pdf |archive-date=2 November 2006 |url-status=live}}</ref> By the late 19th century, Carlyle's portrayal of Cromwell had become assimilated into Whig and Liberal historiography, stressing the centrality of puritan morality and earnestness. Oxford civil war historian [[Samuel Rawson Gardiner]] concluded that "the man—it is ever so with the noblest—was greater than his work".{{Sfn|Gardiner|1901|p=315}} Gardiner stressed Cromwell's dynamic and mercurial character, and his role in dismantling absolute monarchy, rather than his religious conviction.{{Sfn|Worden|2001|pp= 256–260}} Cromwell's foreign policy also provided an attractive forerunner of Victorian imperial expansion, with Gardiner stressing his "constancy of effort to make England great by land and sea".{{Sfn|Gardiner|1901|p=138}} [[Calvin Coolidge]] described Cromwell as a brilliant statesman who "dared to oppose the tyranny of the kings".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Coolidge |first=Calvin |title=The Autobiography of Calvin Coolidge |date=1929 |publisher=University Press of the Pacific |isbn=9781410216229 |location=Honolulu |page=29 |author-link=Calvin Coolidge}}</ref>

During the first half of the 20th century, Cromwell's reputation was often influenced by the rise of fascism in [[Nazi Germany]] and in [[Fascist Italy (1922–1943)|Italy]]. Historian [[Wilbur Cortez Abbott]], for example, devoted much of his career to compiling and editing a multi-volume collection of Cromwell's letters and speeches, published between 1937 and 1947. Abbott argues that Cromwell was a proto-fascist. However, subsequent historians such as [[John Morrill (historian)|John Morrill]] have criticised both Abbott's interpretation of Cromwell and his editorial approach.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Morrill |first=John S. |author-link=John Morrill (historian) |date=1990a |title=Textualising and Contextualising Cromwell |journal=Historical Journal |volume=33 |issue=3 |pages=629–639 |doi=10.1017/S0018246X0001356X |s2cid=159813568}}</ref>

Late 20th-century historians re-examined the nature of Cromwell's faith and of his authoritarian regime. [[Austin Woolrych]] explored the issue of "dictatorship" in depth, arguing that Cromwell was subject to two conflicting forces: his obligation to the army and his desire to achieve a lasting settlement by winning back the confidence of the nation as a whole. He argued that the dictatorial elements of Cromwell's rule stemmed less from its military origin or the participation of army officers in civil government than from his constant commitment to the interest of the people of God and his conviction that suppressing vice and encouraging virtue constituted the chief end of government.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Woolrych |first=Austin |date=1990a |title=The Cromwellian Protectorate: a Military Dictatorship? |journal=History |volume=75 |issue=244 |pages=207–231 |issn=0018-2648 |author-link=Austin Woolrych |doi=10.1111/j.1468-229X.1990.tb01515.x}}</ref> Historians such as [[John Morrill (historian)|John Morrill]], [[Blair Worden]], and [[J. C. Davis]] have developed this theme, revealing the extent to which Cromwell's writing and speeches are suffused with biblical references, and arguing that his radical actions were driven by his zeal for godly reformation.<ref>[[John S. Morrill|Morrill, John S.]] (2004). "Cromwell, Oliver (1599–1658)", in ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography,'' (Oxford University Press) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/6765 Oxforddnb.com] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190913030245/https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-6765;jsessionid=22FEFC452ED8814A742B9070C8583EC8 |date=13 September 2019}}</ref>{{Sfn|Worden|1985}}<ref>{{Citation |last=Davis |first=J. C. |date=1990 |title=Cromwell's religion |author-link=J. C. Davis}}, in {{Harvnb|Morrill|1990}}.</ref>

=== Irish campaign controversy ===
The extent of Cromwell's brutality<ref>Christopher Hill, 1972, ''God's Englishman: Oliver Cromwell and the English Revolution'', Penguin Books: London, p. 108: "The brutality of the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland is not one of the pleasanter aspects of our hero's career ..."</ref>{{Sfn|Coward|1991|page=65|loc="Revenge was not Cromwell's only motive for the brutality he condoned at Wexford and Drogheda, but it was the dominant one ..."}} in Ireland has been strongly debated. Some historians argue that Cromwell never accepted responsibility for the killing of civilians in Ireland, claiming that he had acted harshly but only against those "in arms".<ref>{{Cite book |last=McKeiver |first=Philip |date=2007 |title=A New History of Cromwell's Irish Campaign |publisher=Advance Press |location=Manchester |isbn=978-0-9554663-0-4}}</ref> Other historians cite Cromwell's contemporary reports to London, including that of 27 September 1649, in which he lists the slaying of 3,000 military personnel, followed by the phrase "and many inhabitants".{{Sfn|Ó Siochrú|2008|pp=83 & 90}} In September 1649, he justified his sacking of Drogheda as revenge for the massacres of Protestant settlers in [[Ulster]] in 1641, calling the massacre "the righteous judgement of God on these barbarous wretches, who have imbrued their hands with so much innocent blood".{{Sfn|Kenyon|Ohlmeyer|2000|p=92}} But the rebels had not held Drogheda in 1641; many of its garrison were in fact English royalists. On the other hand, the worst atrocities committed in Ireland, such as mass evictions, killings and deportation of over 50,000 men, women and children as prisoners of war and indentured servants to [[Bermuda]] and [[Barbados]], were carried out under the command of other generals after Cromwell had left for England.{{Sfn|Lenihan|2000|page=1022|loc="After Cromwell returned to England in 1650, the conflict degenerated into a grindingly slow counter-insurgency campaign punctuated by some quite protracted sieges...the famine of 1651 onwards was a man-made response to stubborn guerrilla warfare. Collective reprisals against the civilian population included forcing them out of designated 'no man's lands' and the systematic destruction of foodstuffs".}} Some point to his actions on entering Ireland. Cromwell demanded that no supplies be seized from civilian inhabitants and that everything be fairly purchased; "I do hereby warn ... all Officers, Soldiers and others under my command not to do any wrong or violence toward Country People or any persons whatsoever, unless they be actually in arms or office with the enemy ... as they shall answer to the contrary at their utmost peril."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Carlyle |first=Thomas |date=1897 |title=Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches II: Letters from Ireland, 1649 and 1650 |url=http://www.irishhistorylinks.net/Historical_Documents/Cromwell.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170814042917/http://www.irishhistorylinks.net/Historical_Documents/Cromwell.html |archive-date=14 August 2017 |access-date=6 August 2017 |publisher=Chapman and Hall Ltd, London}}</ref>

The massacres at Drogheda and Wexford were in some ways typical of the day, especially in the context of the recently ended [[Thirty Years' War]],{{Sfn|Woolrych|1990|page=112|loc="viewed in the context of the German wars that had just ended after thirty years of fighting, the massacres at Drogheda and Wexford shrink to typical casualties of seventeenth-century warfare"}}<ref>[http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm#30YrW The Thirty Years' War (1618–48) 7 500 000] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110311130500/http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm#30YrW |date=11 March 2011}}: "R. J. Rummel: 11.5M total deaths in the war (half democides)"</ref> although there are few comparable incidents during the Civil Wars in England or Scotland, which were fought mainly between Protestant adversaries, albeit of differing denominations. One possible comparison is Cromwell's [[Storming of Basing House|Siege of Basing House]] in 1645—the seat of the prominent Catholic the Marquess of Winchester—which resulted in about 100 of the garrison of 400 being killed after being refused quarter. Contemporaries also reported civilian casualties, six Catholic priests and a woman.{{Sfn|Gardiner|1886|page=345}} The scale of the deaths at Basing House was much smaller.<ref>{{Cite book |first=J. C. |last=Davis |date=2001 |title=Oliver Cromwell |publisher=Hodder Arnold |isbn=0-340-73118-4 |pages=108–110 |author-link=J. C. Davis}}</ref> Cromwell himself said of the slaughter at Drogheda in his first letter back to the Council of State: "I believe we put to the sword the whole number of the defendants. I do not think thirty of the whole number escaped with their lives."{{Sfn|Cromwell|1929|page=124}} Cromwell's orders—"in the heat of the action, I forbade them to spare any that were in arms in the town"—followed a request for surrender at the start of the siege, which was refused. The military protocol of the day was that a town or garrison that rejected the chance to surrender was not entitled to [[No quarter|quarter]].{{Sfn|Woolrych|1990|page=111}}{{Sfn|Gaunt|2004|page=117}} The refusal of the garrison at Drogheda to do this, even after the walls had been breached, was to Cromwell justification for the massacre.{{Sfn|Lenihan|2000|page=168}} Where Cromwell negotiated the surrender of fortified towns, as at Carlow, New Ross, and Clonmel, some historians{{Who|date=March 2015}} argue that he respected the terms of surrender and protected the townspeople's lives and property.{{Sfn|Gaunt|2004|page=116}} At Wexford, he again began negotiations for surrender. The captain of Wexford Castle surrendered during the negotiations and, in the confusion, some of Cromwell's troops began indiscriminate killing and looting.{{Sfn|Stevenson|1990|page=151}}<ref>{{Cite web |title=Eugene Coyle. Review of ''Cromwell – An Honourable Enemy''. ''History Ireland'' |url=http://www.historyireland.com/resources/reviews/review1.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20010221184835/http://www.historyireland.com/resources/reviews/review1.html |archive-date=21 February 2001}}</ref>{{Sfn|Ó Siochrú|2008|pp=83—93}}<ref>Schama, Simon, "A History of Britain", 2000.</ref>

Although Cromwell's time spent on campaign in Ireland was limited and he did not take on executive powers until 1653, he is often the central focus of wider debates about whether, as historians such as Mark Levene and [[John Morrill (historian)|John Morrill]] suggest, the Commonwealth conducted a deliberate programme of [[ethnic cleansing]] in Ireland.<!-- GENOCIDE RFF TAG START--><ref>Citations for genocide, near genocide and ethnic cleansing:
{{Refbegin|indent=yes}}
* {{Cite book |last=Axelrod |first=Alan |url=http://www.electricscotland.com/familytree/frank/axelrod.htm |title=Profiles in Leadership |date=2002 |publisher=Prentice-Hall |page=122 |quote=As a leader Cromwell was entirely unyielding. He was willing to act on his beliefs, even if this meant killing the King and perpetrating, against the Irish, something very nearly approaching genocide |ref=none |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121010231000/http://www.electricscotland.com/familytree/frank/axelrod.htm |archive-date=10 October 2012}}
* {{Cite book |title=Nationalism and Rationality |date=1995 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |editor-last=Breton |editor-first=Albert |page=248 |quote=Oliver Cromwell offered Irish Catholics a choice between genocide and forced mass population transfer |ref=none}}
* ''Ukrainian Quarterly''. Ukrainian Society of America 1944. "Therefore, we are entitled to accuse the England of Oliver Cromwell of the genocide of the Irish civilian population...."
* {{Cite book |url=http://www.soton.ac.uk/history/profiles/levene1.html |first=Mark |last=Levene |publisher=I.B. Tauris |location=London |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081216135041/http://www.soton.ac.uk/history/profiles/levene1.html |archive-date=16 December 2008 |date=2005 |title=Genocide in the Age of the Nation State |volume=2 |isbn=978-1-84511-057-4 |pages=55–57 |ref=none}} A sample quote describes the Cromwellian campaign and settlement as "a conscious attempt to reduce a distinct ethnic population." and later: "[The Act of Settlement of Ireland], and the parliamentary legislation which succeeded it the following year, is the nearest thing on paper in the English, and more broadly British, domestic record, to a programme of state-sanctioned and systematic ethnic cleansing of another people. The fact that it did not include 'total' genocide in its remit, or that it failed to put into practice the vast majority of its proposed expulsions, ultimately, however, says less about the lethal determination of its makers and more about the political, structural and financial weakness of the early modern English state."
* {{Cite book |last1=Lutz |first1=James M. |url=https://archive.org/details/globalterrorism00lutz_125 |title=Global Terrorism |last2=Lutz |first2=Brenda J. |date=2004 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |page=[https://archive.org/details/globalterrorism00lutz_125/page/n207 193] |quote=The draconian laws applied by Oliver Cromwell in Ireland were an early version of ethnic cleansing. The Catholic Irish were to be expelled to the northwestern areas of the island. Relocation rather than extermination was the goal. |ref=none |url-access=limited}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Morrill |first=John S. |author-link=John Morrill (historian) |title=Rewriting Cromwell – A Case of Deafening Silences |url=http://utpjournalsreview.com/index.php/CJOH/article/view/11399/10273 |date=December 2003 |journal=Canadian Journal of History |volume=38 |issue=3 |pages=553–578 |publisher=[[University of Toronto Press]] |doi=10.3138/cjh.38.3.553 |access-date=23 June 2015 |quote=Of course, this has never been the Irish view of Cromwell. Most Irish remember him as the man responsible for the mass slaughter of civilians at Drogheda and Wexford and as the agent of the greatest episode of ethnic cleansing ever attempted in Western Europe as, within a decade, the percentage of land possessed by Catholics born in Ireland dropped from sixty to twenty. In a decade, the ownership of two-fifths of the land mass was transferred from several thousand Irish Catholic landowners to British Protestants. The gap between Irish and the English views of the seventeenth-century conquest remains unbridgeable and is governed by [[G. K. Chesterton]]'s mirthless epigram of 1917, that 'it was a tragic necessity that the Irish should remember it; but it was far more tragic that the English forgot it'. |archive-date=24 June 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150624014503/http://utpjournalsreview.com/index.php/CJOH/article/view/11399/10273 |url-status=dead |ref=none}}
* {{Cite book |first=David |last=Norbrook |date=2000 |title=Writing the English Republic: Poetry, Rhetoric and Politics, 1627–1660 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |ref=none}} In interpreting Andrew Marvell's contemporarily expressed views on Cromwell Norbrook says; "He (Cromwell) laid the foundation for a ruthless programme of resettling the Irish Catholics which amounted to large scale ethnic cleansing."
{{Refend}}</ref><!-- GENOCIDE REF TAG END--> Faced with the prospect of an Irish alliance with Charles II, Cromwell carried out a series of massacres to subdue the Irish. Then, once Cromwell had returned to England, the English Commissary, General [[Henry Ireton]], Cromwell's son-in-law and key adviser, adopted a deliberate policy of crop burning and starvation. Total excess deaths for the entire period of the [[Wars of the Three Kingdoms]] in Ireland was estimated by [[William Petty]], the 17th-century economist, to be 600,000 out of a total Irish population of 1,400,000 in 1641.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Faolain |first=Turlough |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=X-XWAAAAMAAJ&q=william+petty+600000+Irish |title=Blood On The Harp |date=1983 |publisher=Whitston Publishing Company |isbn=9780878752751 |page=191 |access-date=15 October 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230319213116/https://books.google.com/books?id=X-XWAAAAMAAJ&q=william+petty+600000+Irish |archive-date=19 March 2023 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=O'Connell |first=Daniel |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H19_RUCZzNcC&q=william+petty+600000+Irish&pg=PA317 |title=A collection of speeches spoken by ... on subjects connected with the catholic question |date=1828 |page=317 |access-date=15 October 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230319213117/https://books.google.com/books?id=H19_RUCZzNcC&q=william+petty+600000+Irish&pg=PA317 |archive-date=19 March 2023 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Brantlinger |first=Patrick |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ai5XAgAAQBAJ&q=william+petty+600000+Irish&pg=PT89 |title=Dark Vanishings: Discourse on the Extinction of Primitive Races, 1800–1930 |date=2013 |publisher=Cornell University Press |isbn=9780801468674 |access-date=15 October 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230319213117/https://books.google.com/books?id=Ai5XAgAAQBAJ&q=william+petty+600000+Irish&pg=PT89 |archive-date=19 March 2023 |url-status=live}}</ref>

The sieges of Drogheda and Wexford have been prominently mentioned in histories and literature up to the present day. [[James Joyce]], for example, mentioned Drogheda in his novel ''[[Ulysses (novel)|Ulysses]]'': "What about sanctimonious Cromwell and his ironsides that put the women and children of Drogheda to the sword with the Bible text 'God is love' pasted round the mouth of his cannon?" Similarly, [[Winston Churchill]] (writing in 1957) described Cromwell's impact on Anglo-Irish relations:

{{Blockquote|
[U]pon all of these Cromwell's record was a lasting bane. By an uncompleted process of terror, by an iniquitous land settlement, by the virtual proscription of the Catholic religion, by the bloody deeds already described, he cut new gulfs between the nations and the creeds. 'Hell or Connaught' were the terms he thrust upon the native inhabitants, and they for their part, across three hundred years, have used as their keenest expression of hatred 'The Curse of Cromwell on you.' ... Upon all of us there still lies 'the curse of Cromwell'.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Churchill |first=Winston S. |author-link=Winston Churchill |title=[[A History of the English Speaking Peoples]] |date=1991 |publisher=Dodd, Mead and Company |volume=III: The Age of Revolution |location=New York |page=9 |quote=We have seen the many ties which at one time or another have joined the inhabitants of the Western islands, and even in Ireland itself offered a tolerable way of life to Protestants and Catholics alike. Upon all of these Cromwell's record was a lasting bane. By an uncompleted process of terror, by an iniquitous land settlement, by the virtual proscription of the Catholic religion, by the bloody deeds already described, he cut new gulfs between the nations and the creeds. "Hell or Connaught" were the terms he thrust upon the native inhabitants, and they for their part, across three hundred years, have used as their keenest expression of hatred "The Curse of Cromwell on you". The consequences of Cromwell's rule in Ireland have distressed and at times distracted English politics down even to the present day. To heal them baffled the skill and loyalties of successive generations. They became for a time a potent obstacle to the harmony of the English-speaking people throughout the world. Upon all of us there still lies 'the curse of Cromwell' |orig-date=1957}}</ref>}}

A key surviving statement of Cromwell's views on the conquest of Ireland is his ''Declaration of the lord lieutenant of Ireland for the undeceiving of deluded and seduced people'' of January 1650.{{Sfn|Cromwell|1929|pages=196–205}} In this he was scathing about Catholicism, saying, "I shall not, where I have the power... suffer the exercise of the Mass."{{Sfn|Cromwell|1929|page=202}} But he also wrote: "as for the people, what thoughts they have in the matter of religion in their own breasts I cannot reach; but I shall think it my duty, if they walk honestly and peaceably, not to cause them in the least to suffer for the same."{{Sfn|Cromwell|1929|page=202}} Private soldiers who surrendered their arms "and shall live peaceably and honestly at their several homes, they shall be permitted so to do".{{Sfn|Cromwell|1929|page=205}}

In 1965 the Irish minister for lands stated that his policies were necessary to "undo the work of Cromwell"; circa 1997, [[Taoiseach]] [[Bertie Ahern]] demanded that a portrait of Cromwell be removed from a room in the Foreign Office before he began a meeting with [[Robin Cook]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Cunningham |first=John |date=4 March 2012 |title=Conquest and Land in Ireland |url=http://www.theirishstory.com/2012/03/04/book-review-conquest-and-land-in-ireland/#.UM41RTORiSo |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130417083153/http://www.theirishstory.com/2012/03/04/book-review-conquest-and-land-in-ireland/#.UM41RTORiSo |archive-date=17 April 2013 |access-date=16 December 2012 |publisher=Royal Historical Society, Boydell Press}}</ref>

===Military assessment===
{{Main article|New Model Army}}
Cromwell has been credited for the formation of the New Model Army. As a member of Parliament, he contributed significantly to the reforms contained in the [[Self-Denying Ordinance]], passed by Parliament in early 1645. The ordinance was enacted partly in response to the failure to capitalise on victory at Marston Moor. It decreed that the army be "remodeled" on a national basis, replacing the old county associations. It also forced members of the [[House of Commons of England|House of Commons]] and the [[House of Lords|Lords]], such as Manchester, to choose between civil office and military command. All of them except Cromwell chose to renounce their military positions. In contrast, Cromwell's commission was given continued extensions and he was allowed to remain in Parliament.<ref name="bcw">{{Cite web |title=Oliver Cromwell |url=http://bcw-project.org/biography/oliver-cromwell |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170809124158/http://bcw-project.org/biography/oliver-cromwell |archive-date=9 August 2017 |access-date=6 August 2017 |publisher=British Civil Wars Project}}</ref>

In April 1645 the New Model Army finally took to the field, with [[Thomas Fairfax]] in command and Cromwell as Lieutenant-General of cavalry and second-in-command.<ref name=bcw/> Some authorities maintain that the army's organisation and the thorough training of its men were accomplished by Fairfax, not Cromwell.<ref>{{Cite web |title=New Model Army |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/New-Model-Army |access-date=7 January 2025 |publisher=Encyclopaedia Britannica}}</ref> In contrast to Fairfax, Cromwell had no formal training in military tactics. However, he is generally accepted to have been a capable military leader, particularly as a battlefield commander.<ref name="Ashley">{{Cite web |last1=Ashley |first1=Maurice |author-link1=Maurice Ashley (historian) |last2=Morrill |first2=John S. |author-link2=John Morrill (historian) |title=Oliver Cromwell: Military and Political Leader |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Oliver-Cromwell/Military-and-political-leader |access-date=7 January 2025 |website=Britannica}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Oliver Cromwell: Lord Protector |url=https://www.nam.ac.uk/explore/oliver-cromwell-lord-protector#:~:text=Lieutenant%2DGeneral%20Oliver%20Cromwell%20was,campaigns%20in%20Ireland%20and%20Scotland. |access-date=7 January 2025 |website=National Army Museum |publisher=Royal Hospital, London, SW3}}</ref>

In recruiting, he sought loyal and well-behaved men regardless of their religion or social status. He required good treatment and reliable pay for his soldiers, but also enforced strict discipline.<ref name=Ashley/>

As a battlefield commander, Cromwell followed the common practice of ranging his [[cavalry]] in three ranks and pressing forward, relying on impact rather than firepower. His strengths were an instinctive ability to lead and train his men, and his [[moral authority]]. In a war fought mostly by amateurs, these strengths were significant and most likely contributed to the discipline of his cavalry.{{Sfn|Woolrych|1990|pages=117–118}} Cromwell introduced close-order cavalry formations, with troopers riding knee to knee; this was an innovation in England at the time and a major factor in his success. He kept his troops close together after skirmishes where they had gained superiority, rather than allowing them to chase opponents off the battlefield. This facilitated further engagements in short order, which allowed greater intensity and quick reaction to battle developments. This style of command was decisive at both Marston Moor and Naseby.{{Sfn|Fraser|1973|pages=154–161}}

[[Alan Marshall (historian)|Alan Marshall]] was critical for Cromwell's approach to warfare i.e. the "[[War of annihilation]]" style which usually brought swift victory but also contained high risk.<ref name="Peter Gaunt 2006 222–223">{{Harvtxt|Gaunt|2006|pp=222–223}}</ref> Marshall notes Cromwell's shortcomings in Ireland, highlighting his defeat at Clonmel and condemning his act at Drogheda as "an appalling atrocity, even by seventeenth-century standards".<ref name="Peter Gaunt 2006 222–223"/> Marshall and other historians saw Cromwell as less proficient in the field of manoeuvre, attrition warfare and at [[siege warfare]].<ref name="Peter Gaunt 2006 222–223"/> Marshall also argues that Cromwell was not truly revolutionary in his war strategies.<ref name="Peter Gaunt 2006 222–223"/> Instead, he observes Cromwell as a courageous and energetic commander, with an eye for discipline and logistics.<ref name="Peter Gaunt 2006 222–223"/> However, Marshall also suggests that Cromwell's military proficiency had improved significantly by 1644–1645—and that he operated efficiently during the operations of those years.<ref name="Peter Gaunt 2006 222–223"/> Marshall also points out that Cromwell's political career was shapen by his military career advance.<ref name="Peter Gaunt 2006 222–223"/>

Cromwell's conquest left no significant legacy of bitterness in Scotland. The rule of the Commonwealth and Protectorate was largely peaceful, apart from the Highlands. Moreover, there were no wholesale confiscations of land or property. Three out of every four Justices of the Peace in Commonwealth Scotland were Scots and the country was governed jointly by the English military authorities and a Scottish Council of State.{{Sfn|Kenyon|Ohlmeyer|2000|p=320}}