The Commonwealth Continued

A period of history that has always fascinated me, and upon which I focused at university, was the English Republic of 1649-60. Whilst historically it collapsed shortly after the death of Oliver Cromwell, at the time this was by no means inevitable. There are a number of ways in which it might have continued, but in my personal opinion one in particular would have given it the best chance of surviving.

This is my first time writing up a timeline for this site, so please be lenient with me and accepting of any minor errors, be they historical, grammatical, etc. I'm not very good at writing narratives, so don't expect any conversation or character pieces; entries will be written from the perspective of the the modern day, summarising the events of this alternate timeline.

And now, to begin....

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26 November 1651: After weeks of steadily worsening illness, the health of Henry Ireton, Lord Deputy of Ireland and son-in-law of Oliver Cromwell, Captain-General of the Parliamentary New Model Army and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, finally begins to improve. Whilst Ireton remains seriously ill and extremely weak, his doctors no longer believe that he will die.
 
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Really can't leave this one there, lol. I've always been amazed at how quickly the commonwealth collapsed and how quickly the great and good turned the restoration and betrayed all the Republics leadership giving up hard won freedoms
 
Really can't leave this one there, lol. I've always been amazed at how quickly the commonwealth collapsed and how quickly the great and good turned the restoration and betrayed all the Republics leadership giving up hard won freedoms

Which freedoms were those? My impression of the English Civil War, the Commonwealth and the return of the Monarchy was that the end result was the cementing of Parliament as the core of political power, not the Monarch. What am I missing in this?
 
Really can't leave this one there, lol. I've always been amazed at how quickly the commonwealth collapsed and how quickly the great and good turned the restoration and betrayed all the Republics leadership giving up hard won freedoms
Consider that a teaser, and the identification of the point of divergence; IOTL Ireton died that day, and Cromwell lost his closest and most able colleague.

Which freedoms were those? My impression of the English Civil War, the Commonwealth and the return of the Monarchy was that the end result was the cementing of Parliament as the core of political power, not the Monarch. What am I missing in this?
Correct; Charles II's restoration for all intents and purposes solidified the various gains made by Parliament during the revolution and Civil Wars, and he was very careful to not repeat the mistakes of his father. When James II tried to rule as Charles I did, rather than as Charles II, Parliament promptly organised his removal along with William of Orange; they then established de-jure what had already been the case de-facto. The reality is that whilst the English Republic only lasted eleven years, it left a powerful and permanent legacy.
 
I'll be honest this isn't an area that I'm in anyway an expert in it does fascinate me though. Surely the freedom from one mafia type family taxing as they like could be one of the freedoms or not having ones corpse dug up and 'executed' then put on display could be another :)
 
I'll be honest this isn't an area that I'm in anyway an expert in it does fascinate me though. Surely the freedom from one mafia type family taxing as they like could be one of the freedoms or not having ones corpse dug up and 'executed' then put on display could be another :)
And that's the thing; whilst Charles II was returned to the throne, he didn't install arbitrary taxes, attempt to enforce a new form of religion, or imprison his political opponents without trial. His restoration was entirely conditional on him agreeing to a general pardon - the Indemnity and Oblivion Act 1660 - that only excluded the commissioners who sentenced Charles I to death - the "regicides" - and a handful of individuals deemed too dangerous, and too opposed to the restoration, to be left at liberty; and even in those cases only a handful were imprisoned or executed, most simply being prohibited from holding office. Parliament essentially provided terms under which they would accept Charles II as king, and he accepted them. He came into conflict with it multiple times in his reign, and on almost every occasion gave in to it.
 
To be fair though they did keep the whole 'my dad was King so I should be King' thing going (I know the republic tried it too for a short time but at least Richard had the decency to know when to call it a day without causing all the bloodshed) and so we did end up with the farce that was the Stuarts dynasty.
I do tend to get more peeved with the 'so quick they were falling over themselves to betray thing' of the rest of the great and the good of the country in turning over 'regicides'/revolutionary heroes to the Kings justice
 
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