Episodes

  • The realities of ‘a wound big with miseries’

    The realities of ‘a wound big with miseries’
    Apr 25 2025
    For decades the civil wars were presented as a “gentlemanly” conflict where both sides “played” by the rules of “civilised” warfare. But now we know the reality was very different. In fact this was a protracted, bloody fight that disrupted, and at times, destroyed, the lives of hundreds of thousands of men, women and children ... Read more
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    36 mins
  • Parliament and the slave trade – The Interregnum years

    Parliament and the slave trade – The Interregnum years
    Apr 4 2025
    While terms such as “slavery” and “liberty”, frequently occur in parliamentarian rhetoric, particularly when damning their enemies, ever-increasing numbers of West African people were actually being transported across the ocean to colonies in the Caribbean. According to distinguished parliamentary historian, Dr Stephen Roberts, it was during the Interregnum that the foundations of Britain’s leading role ... Read more
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    35 mins
  • A family at war – Lord and Lady Brooke of Warwick

    A family at war – Lord and Lady Brooke of Warwick
    Mar 28 2025
    New research now published by the Royal Historical Society reveals for the first time how Lord and Lady Brooke and their household made Warwick Castle a strategic stronghold for Parliament and withstood a Royalist siege. In this podcast, the authors of the book explore the lives of these men and women revealed in the household accounts of ... Read more
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    49 mins
  • Women in the english civil wars

    Women in the english civil wars
    Mar 14 2025
    To mark Women’s History Month we invited distinguished historian Jackie Eales, Emeritus Professor of Early Modern History at Canterbury Christ Church University, to explore the role of women in the civil wars – a topic largely ignored in earlier studies of the period. She concludes that overall changes in the social status of women were limited and ... Read more
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    30 mins
  • Remembering the Civil Wars – The fraught story of commemoration

    Remembering the Civil Wars – The fraught story of commemoration
    Mar 7 2025
    Following the execution of Charles I on 30th January 1649, the Republic’s government faced a dilemma: How should recent events be remembered and how, if at all, should they be commemorated? In the decade between the Regicide and the Restoration, authorities and individuals who had fought on both sides of the recent bloody conflict struggled to ... Read more
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    35 mins
  • Split – The New Model Army versus Parliament – The Saffron Walden debates

    Split – The New Model Army versus Parliament – The Saffron Walden debates
    Feb 28 2025
    The Saffron Walden debates In June 1646 as the First Civil War ended, there was an ever-widening gulf between the New Model Army and Parliament which would eventually split the two pillars of what later became Britain’s only experiment with a republican constitution. By the end of the year the pay of the New Model ... Read more
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    36 mins
  • Women and Cromwell’s Navy – The hidden story

    Women and Cromwell’s Navy – The hidden story
    Feb 21 2025
    While the attention paid to the naval history of the British and Irish Civil Wars has increased in recent years, the parts played by women have often been ignored. In this programme, Dr. Elaine Murphy, Associate Professor in History at the University of Plymouth, reveals how more and more women engaged with Parliament’s navy in ... Read more
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    25 mins
  • Cromwell’s Navy – The civil wars at sea

    Cromwell’s Navy – The civil wars at sea
    Feb 14 2025
    The histories of the British and Irish civil wars of the mid-Seventeenth century are usually written from the perspective of the conflict fought on land while the strategic importance of the war at sea which contributed so much to Parliament’s eventual victory, is often ignored or only mentioned in passing. But these maritime engagements were ... Read more
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    31 mins