The Long Parliament was an English Parliament which lasted from 1640 until 1660. It followed the fiasco of the Short Parliament, which had convened for only three weeks during the spring of 1640 after an 11-year parliamentary absence. In September 1640, King Charles I issued writs summoning a parliament to convene on 3 November 1640. He intended it to pass financial bills, a step made necessary by the costs of the Bishops' Wars in Scotland. The Long Parliament received its name from the fact that, by Act of Parliament, it stipulated it could be dissolved only with agreement of the members; and those members did not agree to its dissolution until 16 March 1660, after the English Civil War and near the close of the Interregnum.
Oliver Cromwell was an English general and statesman who, first as a subordinate and later as Commander-in-Chief, led armies of the Parliament of England against King Charles I during the English Civil War, subsequently ruling the British Isles as Lord Protector from 1653 until his death in 1658. He acted simultaneously as head of state and head of government of the new republican commonwealth.
Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Burlington, 2nd Earl of Cork was an Anglo-Irish nobleman who served as Lord High Treasurer of Ireland and was a Cavalier.
Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of Orrery, styled Lord Broghill from 1628 to 1660, was an Anglo-Irish soldier and politician who sat in the House of Commons of England at various times between 1654 and 1679. Boyle fought in the Irish Confederate Wars and subsequently became known for his antagonism towards Irish Catholics and their political aspirations. He was also a noted playwright and writer on 17th century warfare.
John Jones Maesygarnedd was a Welsh military leader and politician, known as one of the regicides of King Charles I following the English Civil War. A brother-in-law of Oliver Cromwell, Jones was a Parliamentarian and an avid republican at a time when most of Wales was Royalist, and became one of 57 commissioners that signed the death warrant authorising the execution of Charles I following his trial. After the Restoration of the monarchy, Jones was one of few excluded from the general amnesty in the Indemnity and Oblivion Act, and was tried, found guilty, then hanged, drawn and quartered at Charing Cross.
Lieutenant-General Michael Jones, circa 1606 to 10 December 1649, was an Irish-born soldier of Welsh descent who served in the War of the Three Kingdoms, primarily in Ireland.
James VII and II was King of England and Ireland as James II, and King of Scotland as James VII from the death of his elder brother, Charles II, on 6 February 1685. He was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. He was the last Catholic monarch of England, Scotland, and Ireland. His reign is now remembered primarily for struggles over religious tolerance, but it also involved struggles over the principles of absolutism and the divine right of kings. His deposition ended a century of political and civil strife in England by confirming the primacy of the English Parliament over the Crown.
Theophilus Hastings, 7th Earl of Huntingdon was a 17th-century English politician and Jacobite. One of the few non-Catholics to remain loyal to James II of England after November 1688, on the rare occasions he is mentioned by historians, he is described as a 'facile instrument of the Stuarts,' a 'turncoat' or 'outright renegade.'
Thomas Jones was Archbishop of Dublin and Lord Chancellor of Ireland. He was also Dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral and Bishop of Meath. He was the patrilineal ancestor of the Viscounts Ranelagh.
Sir John Lenthall was an English Member of Parliament. He was elected MP for Gloucester in 1645, knighted by Oliver Cromwell in 1658 and made Governor of Windsor Castle from 1657 to 1660. After the 1660 Restoration of the Monarchy he was pricked Sheriff of Oxfordshire for 1672–73 and knighted a second time by Charles II in 1677.
Sir William Verner, 1st Baronet, KCH, was a British soldier who served in the Napoleonic wars, was wounded at the Battle of Waterloo and resigned as a colonel. He served as a politician, including 36 years as a Member of Parliament. Two of his sons were also members of Parliament. Verner was made Knight Commander of the Hanoverian Order and a Baronet, and was Grand Master of Armagh and Orange Order of Ireland.
The Restoration of the monarchy began in 1660. The Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland (1649–60) resulted from the Wars of the Three Kingdoms but collapsed in 1659. Politicians such as General Monck tried to ensure a peaceful transition of government from the "Commonwealth" republic back to monarchy. From 1 May 1660 the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were all restored under King Charles II. The term Restoration may apply both to the actual event by which the monarchy was restored, and to the period immediately before and after the event.
John Bysse (c.1602–1680) was a member of the Parliament of Ireland during the 1630s and 1640s. He was excluded from office during the Interregnum, but became one of the most senior Irish judges after the Restoration of Charles II.
General Daniel Harvey was a British soldier and politician who was Governor of Guernsey from 1714 to 1732.
Henry Jones was the Anglican Bishop of Clogher and Bishop of Meath.
Ambrose Jones was a Welsh-Irish cleric who served as Anglican Bishop of Kildare 1667–8. He was from a prominent family - his Oxford-educated father, Lewis Jones, served as Anglican Bishop of Killaloe, his oldest brother Henry Jones was Anglican Bishop of Clogher and later Meath, and his brothers Theophilus Jones, Oliver Jones, and Michael Jones were soldiers and politicians. His mother was Mabel Ussher, sister of James Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh.
Lewis Jones, was a Welsh priest, who joined the Church of Ireland in 1606, and became Bishop of Killaloe in 1633.
Sir Theophilus Jones, was an Irish soldier and government official of Welsh descent. One of five sons born to Lewis Jones, Bishop of Killaloe in the Church of Ireland, he formed part of a close-knit and powerful Protestant family.
Daniel Hutchinson was a wealthy Protestant Dublin merchant who supported the Cromwellian Occupation of Ireland. During the Interregnum he served as Mayor of Dublin, a member of parliament of the Barebones and First Protectorate parliaments, Sheriff of Dublin and Wicklow, and as Treasurer of Public Revenue in Ireland.
Sir John Meade, 1st Baronet (1642–1707) was an Irish barrister, judge and politician. He was the first of the Meade Baronets of Balintubber, and an ancestor of the Earls of Clanwilliam. He was unusual among the lawyers of his time for his lack of ambition to become a judge of the High Court, despite being generally regarded as a barrister of "excellent parts (qualities)". In matters of religion, he seems to have been, by the standards of his time, a man of very tolerant views: although he was himself a Protestant, he damaged his career by marrying Elizabeth Butler, who was a Roman Catholic, as his third wife.
