Thomas Cromwell’s sister had a son called Richard Williams. Williams entered Cromwell’s household and changed his name from Williams to Cromwell – it was a sound move at the time with Cromwell being Henry VIII’s chief minister. Miranda Malins’ book entitled The House of Cromwell explores the family from their earliest antecedents.
 The House of Cromwell is compelling in its extraordinary level of detail. Miranda Malins has clearly immersed herself in the world of the Cromwells, and that knowledge brings the people, places and politics of the period vividly to life. Rather than simply presenting history as a sequence of political events, she allows us to see the family behind the history —weaving together their ambitions, loyalties, rivalries and vulnerabilities – not to mention introducing us to the rather less successful members of the family…think an excess of drinking, gambling and entertaining.
What I found particularly fascinating was the book’s exploration of identity and power. The Cromwells’ rise raises such interesting questions about what happens when people from outside the traditional aristocracy suddenly find themselves at the centre of national power. Thomas and Oliver Cromwell may have been separated by generations, but Malins makes us think about the connections between them and about the different ways in which power can be acquired, exercised and ultimately lost.
I also loved the attention given to the wider family, particularly the women whose lives and influence can so easily disappear behind the better-known political story. It gives a much richer sense of how power actually worked: not simply through kings, parliaments and battles, but through marriage, family relationships, reputation, loyalty and personal influence…though I’m still not a huge fan of Oliver, although it turns out that he had something of an interest in family history and a sense of humour.
For me, the great strength of the book is the way Malins combines scholarship with a real feeling for the human story. And lets face it while Thomas Cromwell ended up losing control of his story Oliver ended up controlling his own history unlike Sir Thomas Fairfax who deliberately stepped away from power which meant that although it was Fairfax who was the commander-in-chief of the New Model Army that its Cromwell who everyone remembers.
Unlike Thomas, His two times great nephew Oliver received a state funeral but in 1661, orders were given by. the restored Crown to have the Lord Protector’s body dug up, hanged at Tyburn where it remained for several hours before being beheaded. Oliver’s body went into an unmarked grave near Tyburn. Thomas fared better. Having been beheaded, his remains were interred at St Peter ad Vinincula – and remained undisturbed even though the grave was eventually lost to history. Both men discovered that power can be rather a dangerous commodity.
Thomas, a canny administrator if ever there was one, had ensured that both his son Gregory and his nephew Richard were well provided for prior to his death. It helped that Gregory was married to Jane Seymour’s sister and that Cromwell made sure property deeds were watertight in terms of inheritance even if the Crown did take back property under attainder laws. Oliver’s family estates were little impacted by the Restoration – they hadn’t been that significant to start with. However, land he acquired in the aftermath of the civil war – particularly Irish estates – were removed from his heirs. For the younger Cromwells who had made good marriages there was life in the gentry.
The Cromwells didn’t disappear they simply retreated back to the life that Oliver emerged from. Perhaps the government didn’t feel the need to make martyrs of them. Richard Cromwell who spent some years abroad returned to England to live a quiet life and like his brother, Henry, was permitted to live undisturbed. It probably helped that Mary Cromwell, the third of Oliver’s daughters, was married to Thomas Belasyse, 1st Earl Fauconberg, an active supporter of the Crown.
I’d like to thank Harper Collins and Net Galley for giving me the opportunity to read Miranda Malins’ The House of Cromwell prior to its publication.
