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Godly charity or political aid? Irish protestants and international Calvinism, 1641–1645

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Ole Peter Grell
Ole Peter Grell
Affiliation:
Clare Hall, Cambridge
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Type
Communications
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 39 , Issue 3 , September 1996 , pp. 743 - 753
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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References

1 Seaver, Paul S., Wallington's world. A puritan artisan in seventeenth-century London (London, 1985) p. 166.Google Scholar

2 Lindley, K.J., ‘The impact of the 1641 rebellion upon England and Wales, 1641–5’, Irish Historical Studies, XVIII, 70 (1972), 143–76CrossRefGoogle Scholar, especially pp. 143–4; for quotation, see 159. See also Clifton, R., ‘Fear of popery’, in Russell, C. (ed.), The origin of the English Civil War (London, 1978), especially pp. 159–60Google Scholar. For pamphlets about the German Palatinate and Bohemia, see Breslow, M. A., A mirror of England (Harvard, 1970), pp. 10–44.Google Scholar

3 Calamy, E., Englands looking-glasse (London, 1642), p. 16.Google Scholar

4 Ibid. pp. 33–4.

5 Calamy, E., Gods free mercy to England (London, 1642), p. 24.Google Scholar

6 Marshall, S., Meroz cursed (London, 1642), p. 50.Google Scholar

7 Lindley, , ‘The impact of the 1641 rebellion’, pp. 147–50.Google Scholar

8 Hessels, J. H. (ed.), Ecclesiae Londino-Batavae Archivum, I–III (1–2) (Cambridge, 1887–1897), III, 2, nos. 2660, 2672.Google Scholar

9 See Grell, O. P., The Calvinist international, forthcoming.Google Scholar

10 For Henry Vane's interest in Ireland, see Gardiner, S. R., History of England 1603–1642, 10 vols. (London, 1904), pp. 10, 69Google Scholar. For the merchant-members of the Dutch church in London, see Grell, O. P., Dutch Calvimsts in early Stuart London (Leiden, 1989), pp. 49–50, 176–223.Google Scholar

11 See Bellers, F., Abrahams interment (London, 1655), fo. F3r.Google Scholar

12 Hessels, , Ecclesiae Londino-Batavae, III, 2, nos. 2684–5.Google Scholar

13 Grell, , Dutch Calvinists, pp. 199–200Google Scholar. Josias Shute continued to have close contacts with Austin Friars. Thus, on 22 Sept. 1642, he was approached by the minister, Cesar Calandrini, and the elder, Gillis vander Put, who recommended two Irish ministers to him and his fellow distributors of the Irish collection. It is noteworthy that the leadership of the Dutch church in London decided not to forward 30 shillings collected for Irish ministers, which remained in the hands of the elder Dirick Hoste, until they had made sure that support for the two Irishmen would be forthcoming, see Guildhall Library MS 7397/8 fos. II5r, v.

14 For the collections for Coleraine, see Hessels, , Ecclesiae Londino-Batavae, III, 2 nos. 2688, 2699Google Scholar, Austin Friars contributed more than £86; for Londonderry, see no. 2697 and Guildhall Library MS 7397/8, fo. 117V.

15 Hessels, , Ecclesiae Londino-Batavae, III, 2 nos. 2704–6.Google Scholar

16 Wedgewood, C. V., The king's war 1641–1647. The great rebellion, 6th edn (London, 1973), pp. 241–3.Google Scholar

17 See Sprunger, K., Dutch puritanism. A history of English and Scottish churches of the Netherlands in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (Leiden, 1982).Google Scholar

18 For the appointment of the four commissioners, see Journal of the house of commons, III, 184. The ordinance published two days later is reprinted in Firth, C. H. & Rait, R. S. (eds.), Acts & ordinances of the Interregnum 1642–1660 (London, 1901), pp. 220–1Google Scholar. For the wealth and influence of the three Dutch merchants, see Grell, Dutch Calvinists, passim and idem, ‘From persecution to integration: the decline of the Anglo-Dutch communities in England, 1648–1702’, in Grell, O. P., Israel, J. I. & Tyacke, N. (eds.), From persecution to toleration. The glorious revolution and religion in England (Oxford, 1991), pp. 97–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

19 Journal of the house of commons, III, 184. For the association of Thomson's wife with the Dutch church in London, see Guildhall Library MS 7390/1 (1632) and passim. See also MS 7397/8, fo. 255V. The parliamentary ordinance is mentioned in Tolmie, M., The triumph of the saints (Cambridge, 1977), p. 140Google Scholar. In spite of this evidence, both Tolmie, and more recently R. Brenner, consider Thomson to have been a religious, as well as a political, radical, see Brenner, R., Merchants and revolution. Commercial change, political conflict, and London's overseas traders, 1550–1653 (Cambridge, 1993), pp. 414, 417, 423 and 449Google Scholar. For the Corselis family, see Clark, A., ‘The Corsellis legend’, The Essex Review, XVIII (1909), 137–46Google Scholar, Sier, L. C., The Essex Review, LI (1942), 132–7Google Scholar. Nicholas Corselis, Junior married Martha Thomson in 1660, see copy of settlement by his father in Essex Record Office, Colchester, Ace. 2972 (Corsellis family), F45. Nicholas Corselis, Senior, in spite of supporting the cause of parliament in the Civil War, was deeply worried by the effects of the confrontation, as can be seen from his letter to his friend Samuel Hartlib written in June 1645: ‘Wee haue heer certain newes that his Mtt. Army was marchinge towardes Lester with ladders and other prouisions of war to schale the towne which we fear will be lost. Cornell Cromwell hath sent from Cambridge to the Committee heer to haue all the aijde that they could sparre and this day the drums haue beat for the Auxiliaries, and one wensday all the horse off this country are to meet heer. The Lord joyn all our hearts close unto him and then wee shall not bee soo devijded one amonge an other…’. See Sheffield University Library, Hartlib papers MS 50H 27/40/1 (2 June 1645); see also his letter to Hartlib written from Amsterdam 24 Sept. 1648 which expresses an even stronger desire for peace, Hartlib papers MS 50H 27/40/2.

20 For Thomson's Dutch business partners, see Brenner, , Merchants and revolution, pp. 192–3Google Scholar; see also pp. 160, 171, 175, 176, 183. For Maurice Thomson, see ibid. passim and Farnell, J. E., ‘The Navigation Act of 1651, the First Dutch War and the London merchant community’, Economic History Review, 2nd Ser., XVI (1963–1964), 439–54, especially 445.Google Scholar

21 For the Commissioner's brief, see Acts & ordinances of the Interregnum, pp. 220–1Google Scholar; for the letters from the ‘Towns of the Low Countries’, see Journals of the house of commons, III, 122; for their precise origin and Dutch neutrality, see Groenveld, S., ‘The House of Orange and the House of Stuart, 1639–1650: a revision’, Historical Journal, XXIV, 4 (1991), 955–72CrossRefGoogle Scholar, especially pp. 960–2. For the letters from the Synod of South-Holland, see Knuttel, W. P. C. (ed.), Acta der Particuliere Synoden van Zuid-Holland 1621–1700, 6 vols. (The Hague, 1908–1916), II, 399–400.Google Scholar

22 See Acts & ordinances of the Interregnum, p. 220Google Scholar and Carter, A. C., The English Reformed Church in Amsterdam, in the seventeenth century (Amsterdam, 1964), pp. 29, 76, 218–20Google Scholar and Grell, , Dutch Calvinists, pp. 269, 273Google Scholar. For English puritanism and the English Reformed Church in Amsterdam, see also Sprunger, , Dutch puritanism, pp. 91–122.Google Scholar

23 Acts & ordinances of the Interregnum, p. 220Google Scholar and Hessels, , Archioum, III, 2Google Scholar, no. 2216. For Maurice Thomson and his associates, see Brenner, , Merchants and revolution, passim.Google Scholar

24 See Groenveld, S., Verlopend Getij. De Nederlandse Republiek en de Engelse Burgeroorlog 1640–1646 (Dieren, 1984), p. 112 and note 11.Google Scholar

25 Journals of the house of commons, III, 263. On 8/18 Aug. 1643 the house of commons had ordered that Dirick Hoste, Adam Lawrence, Maurice Thomson and Nicholas Corselis ‘with their wives, children, servants and Baggage, shall have the Speaker's Warrant to imbark themselves at any of his Majesty's Ports within the Kingdom of England, to pass the sea into Holland, ibid. p. 198.

26 Journals of the house of commons, III, 184 and Nauta, D., De Nederlandsche Gereformeerden en het Independisme in de zeventiende eeuwe (Amsterdam, 1936), pp. 43–4 (24 Sept. 1643).Google Scholar

27 See Nauta, D., De Nederlandsche Gereformeerden, p. 43 (30 Jul. 1643).Google Scholar

28 Resolutien van de Heeren Staten van Hollandt ende West-Vrieslant, petition heard 1 Oct. 1643 and collection granted 17 Oct. 1643.

29 For the decision of the classis of Walcheren, see Nauta, D., De Nederlandsche Gereformeerdm, p. 44 (12 Nov. 1643)Google Scholar and Resolutien van de Heeren Staten van Zeeland, 13 Nov. 1643Google Scholar: The limitations on what the money could be spent on are heavily emphasized, ‘omme Broodt ende andere Nootdruftigheden te koopen voor de benaude Protestanten in Yerlant; met verseeckeringe, dat alles daer toe getrouwelyck zal werden geemployeert’, 21 Nov. 1643; 23 Nov. 1643.

30 See D. Nauta, De Nederlandsche Gereformeerdm, passim and W. J. op't Hof, , Engelse Pietische Geschriften in het Nederlands, 1598–1622 (Rotterdam, 1987).Google Scholar

31 Resolution van de Heeren Staten van Zeeland, 24 Nov., 25 Nov., 26 Nov. 1644Google Scholar and Nauta, D., De Nederlandsche Gereformeerdm, pp. 44–5.Google Scholar

32 Gemeentlijke Archiefdienst van Amsterdam, MS P.A. 376, no. 7, fos. 536–7.

33 C.S.P.Dom.Charles I, DI, 256. See also Sprunger, , Dutch puritanism, pp. 380, 384.Google Scholar

34 See the account by Brenner, , Merchants and revolution, especially pp. 400–10.Google Scholar

35 British Library Add. MS 4771, fos, 35r, 22r.

36 Sheffield University Library, Hartlib papers MS 50H 43/19B and 20A (8 Feb. 1644).

37 For Hugh Peters in the Netherlands, see Sprunger, , Dutch puritanism, pp. 163–7, 384Google Scholar. For the response of the classis of Walcheren, see Nauta, D., De Nederlandsche Gereformeerden, p. 45 (7 Jan. 1644)Google Scholar. For the promise of the Committee for Irish Affairs, see British Library Add. MS 4771, fo. 43V. Others, who like Hugh Peters had been involved in the English collections for the German Palatinate during the Thirty Years' War, such as John Rulice, who by 1644 had become minister to the German Reformed church in Amsterdam, were also trying to organize collections for Irish protestants in the Netherlands, see Turnbull, G. H., Hartlib, Dury and Comenius (Liverpool, 1947), pp. 241–2.Google Scholar

38 C.S.P. Dom. Charles I, 1644, p. 256Google Scholar. For Walter Strickland, see Sprunger, , Dutch puritanism, p. 380Google Scholar. Walter Strickland's wife, Dame Anne Morgan, was a member of Austin Friars, see Grell, , Dutch Calvinists, p. 52.Google Scholar

39 Resolutien van de Heeren Staten van Zeeseland, 29 May and 30 May 1645Google Scholar. See also Resolutien van de Heeren Staten van Holland, 5 Jul. 1645.Google Scholar

40 For the sum collected, see Resolutien van de Heeren Staten van Holland, 5 Jul. 1645Google Scholar. For the number of ships dispatched from the Netherlands, see Knuttel, , Synoden van Zuid-Holland, 504 (Woerden, 1645)Google Scholar. For William Watson's role in organizing the convoys, see British Library Add. MS 4771, fos. 14r, 16v, 29V, 35r.

41 For English figures, see Grell, , Dutch Calvinism, p. 223.Google Scholar

42 See Wedgwood, , The king's war, pp. 241–5, especially p. 245Google Scholar. For Irish adventurers, see Brenner, , Merchants and revolution, pp. 400–10.Google Scholar

43 See the complaint of Irish ministers, C.S.P.Dom. Charles I, 1644, p. 256Google Scholar. See also the answer of the Irish Committee to the inquiries of the commissioners, Adam Lawrence and Nicholas Corselis, British Library Add. MS 4771, fo. 35r: ‘And whereas you intimate that it is not well likened, that all the provisions should be intrusted to one man alone, and he a souldier, but it was rather thought meete, that to the Gouvenour of Carrickfergus some good Ministers and magistrates might be added to distribute them, and give an Accompt of their doings.’