Commonwealth of England The Commonwealth , or Commonwealth of England , was the period from 1649 onwards when England , along later with Ireland and Scotland , was ruled as a republic following the end of the Second English Civil War and the trial and execution of Charles I . The republic ' s existence was initially declared through " An Act declaring England to be a Commonwealth " , adopted by the Rump Parliament on 19 May 1649 . Power in the early Commonwealth was vested primarily in the Parliament and a Council of State . During the period , fighting continued , particularly in Ireland and Scotland , between the parliamentary forces and those opposed to them , as part of what is now referred to as the Third English Civil War . In 1653 , after the forcible dissolution of the Rump Parliament , Oliver Cromwell was declared Lord Protector of a united " Commonwealth of England , Scotland and Ireland " under the terms of the Instrument of Government , inaugurating the period now usually known as the Protectorate . After Cromwell ' s death , and following a brief period of rule under his son , Richard Cromwell , the Protectorate Parliament was dissolved in 1659 and the Rump Parliament recalled , the start of a process that led ultimately to the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 . The term Commonwealth is sometimes used for the whole of 1649 to 1660 – a period referred to by monarchists as the Interregnum – although for other historians , the use of the term is limited to the years prior to Cromwell ’ s formal assumption of power in 1653 . 1649 – 1653 . Rump Parliament . The Rump was created by Pride ' s Purge of those members of the Long Parliament who did not support the political position of the Grandee s in the New Model Army . Just before and after the execution of King Charles I on 30 January 1649 , the Rump passed a number of acts of Parliament creating the legal basis for the republic . With the abolition of the monarchy , Privy Council and the House of Lords , it had unchecked executive , as well as legislative , power . The English Council of State , which replaced the Privy Council , took over many of the executive functions of the monarchy . It was selected by the Rump , and most of its members were MPs . Ultimately , however , the Rump depended on the support of the Army with which it had a very uneasy relationship . After the Execution of Charles I , the House of Commons abolished the monarchy , the House of Lords , and the established Church of England . It declared England a republic , known as the Commonwealth , under the leadership of Oliver Cromwell . Structure . In Pride ' s Purge , all members of parliament ( including most of the political Presbyterians ) who would not accept the need to bring the King to trial had been removed . Thus the Rump never had more than two hundred members ( less than half the number of the Commons in the original Long Parliament ) . They included : supporters of religious independents who did not want an established church and some of whom had sympathies with the Levellers ; Presbyterians who were willing to countenance the trial and execution of the King ; and later admissions , such as formerly excluded MPs who were prepared to denounce the Newport Treaty negotiations with the King . Most Rumpers were gentry , though there was a higher proportion of lesser gentry and lawyers than in previous parliaments . Less than one - quarter of them were regicides . This left the Rump basically a conservative body whose vested interests in the existing land ownership and legal systems made them unlikely to want to reform these . Issues and achievements . For the first two years of the Commonwealth , the Rump faced economic depression and the risk of invasion from Scotland and Ireland . ( By 1653 Cromwell and the Army had largely eliminated these threats ) . There were many disagreements amongst factions of the Rump . Some wanted a republic , but others favoured retaining some type of monarchical government . Most of England ' s traditional ruling classes regarded the Rump as an illegal government made up of regicides and upstarts . However , they were also aware that the Rump might be all that stood in the way of an outright military dictatorship . High taxes , mainly to pay the Army , were resented by the gentry . Limited reforms were enough to antagonise the ruling class but not enough to satisfy the radicals . Despite its unpopularity , the Rump was a link with the old constitution , and helped to settle England down and make it secure after the biggest upheaval in its history . By 1653 , both France and Spain had recognised England ' s new government . Reforms . Though the Church of England was retained , episcopacy was suppressed and the Act of Uniformity 1558 was repealed in September 1650 . Mainly on the insistence of the Army , many independent churches were tolerated , although everyone still had to pay tithes to the established church . Some small improvements were made to law and court procedure ; for example , all court proceedings were now conducted in English rather than in Law French or Latin . However , there were no widespread reforms of the common law . This would have upset the gentry , who regarded the common law as reinforcing their status and property rights . The Rump passed many restrictive laws to regulate people ' s moral behaviour , such as closing down theatres and requiring strict observance of Sunday . This antagonised most of the gentry . Dismissal . Cromwell , aided by Thomas Harrison , forcibly dismissed the Rump on 20 April 1653 , for reasons that are unclear . Theories are that he feared the Rump was trying to perpetuate itself as the government , or that the Rump was preparing for an election which could return an anti - Commonwealth majority . Many former members of the Rump continued to regard themselves as England ' s only legitimate constitutional authority . The Rump had not agreed to its own dissolution when it was dispersed by Cromwell , and legislation from the period immediately before the Civil War — the Act against dissolving the Long Parliament without its own consent ( 11 May 1641 ) - - gave them the legal basis for this view . Barebone ' s Parliament , July – December 1653 . The dissolution of the Rump was followed by a short period in which Cromwell and the Army ruled alone . Nobody had the constitutional authority to call an election , but Cromwell did not want to impose a military dictatorship . Instead , he ruled through a ' nominated assembly ' which he believed would be easy for the Army to control , since Army officers did the nominating . Barebone ' s Parliament was opposed by former Rumpers and ridiculed by many gentry as being an assembly of ' inferior ' people . However , over 110 of its 140 members were lesser gentry or of higher social status . ( An exception was Praise - God Barebone , a Baptist merchant after whom the Assembly got its derogatory nickname . ) Many were well educated . The assembly reflected the range of views of the officers who nominated it . The Radicals ( approximately forty ) included a hard core of Fifth Monarchists who wanted to be rid of Common Law and any state control of religion . The Moderates ( approximately 60 ) wanted some improvements within the existing system and might move to either the radical or conservative side depending on the issue . The Conservatives ( approximately 40 ) wanted to keep the status quo ( since Common Law protected the interests of the gentry , and tithes and advowson s were valuable property ) . Cromwell saw Barebone ' s Parliament as a temporary legislative body which he hoped would produce reforms and develop a constitution for the Commonwealth . However , members were divided over key issues , only 25 had previous parliamentary experience , and although many had some legal training , there were no qualified lawyers . Cromwell seems to have expected this group of ' amateurs ' to produce reform without management or direction . When the radicals mustered enough support to defeat a bill which would have preserved the status quo in religion , the conservatives , together with many moderates , surrendered their authority back to Cromwell who sent soldiers to clear the rest of the Assembly . Barebone ' s Parliament was over . The Protectorate , 1653 – 1659 . Commonwealth government by a Council of State and Parliament , was divided in two by The Protectorate when the executive was vested in a Lord Protector , who governed under a written constitution that mandated that the Lord Protector summon triennial parliaments that should sit for several months each year . In 1653 , Oliver Cromwell became Lord Protector under England ' s first written constitution Instrument of Government , and then under the second and last written constitution , known as the Humble Petition and Advice of 1657 . On 12 April 1654 , under the terms of the Tender of Union , the " Ordinance for uniting Scotland into one Commonwealth with England " was issued by the Lord Protector and proclaimed in Scotland by the military governor of Scotland , General George Monck , 1st Duke of Albemarle . The ordinance declared that " the people of Scotland should be united with the people of England into one Commonwealth and under one Government " and decreed that a new " Arms of the Commonwealth " , incorporating the Saltire , should be placed on " all the public seals , seals of office , and seals of bodies civil or corporate , in Scotland " as " a badge of this Union " . On the death of Oliver Cromwell in 1658 , his son , Richard Cromwell , inherited the title Lord Protector , but internal divisions among the republican party lead to his resignation , the end of the Protectorate and a second period of Commonwealth government by a Council of State and Parliament . 1659 – 1660 . The Protectorate might have continued if Cromwell ' s son Richard , who was made Lord Protector on his father ' s death , had been capable of carrying on his father ' s policies . Richard Cromwell ' s main weakness was that he did not have the confidence of the New Model Army . After seven months the Grandees in the New Model Army removed him and , on 6 May 1659 , they reinstalled the Rump Parliament . Charles Fleetwood was appointed a member of the Committee of Safety and of the Council of State , and one of the seven commissioners for the army . On 9 June he was nominated lord - general ( commander - in - chief ) of the army . However , his power was undermined in parliament , which chose to disregard the army ' s authority in a similar fashion to the pre – Civil War parliament . The Commons on 12 October 1659 , cashiered General John Lambert and other officers , and installed Fleetwood as chief of a military council under the authority of the Speaker . The next day Lambert ordered that the doors of the House be shut and the members kept out . On 26 October a " Committee of Safety " was appointed , of which Fleetwood and Lambert were members . Lambert was appointed major - general of all the forces in England and Scotland , Fleetwood being general . Lambert was now sent , by the Committee of Safety , with a large force to meet George Monck , who was in command of the English forces in Scotland , and either negotiate with him or force him to come to terms . It was into this atmosphere that General George Monck marched south with his army from Scotland . Lambert ' s army began to desert him , and he returned to London almost alone . On 21 February 1660 , Monck reinstated the Presbyterian members of the Long Parliament ' secluded ' by Pride , so that they could prepare legislation for a new parliament . Fleetwood was deprived of his command and ordered to appear before parliament to answer for his conduct . On 3 March Lambert was sent to the Tower , from which he escaped a month later . Lambert tried to rekindle the civil war in favour of the Commonwealth by issuing a proclamation calling on all supporters of the " Good Old Cause " to rally on the battlefield of Edgehill . But he was recaptured by Colonel Richard Ingoldsby , a regicide who hoped to win a pardon by handing Lambert over to the new regime . The Long Parliament dissolved itself on 16 March . On 4 April 1660 , in response to a secret message sent by Monck , Charles II issued the Declaration of Breda , which made known the conditions of his acceptance of the crown of England . Monck organised the Convention Parliament , which met for the first time on 25 April . On 8 May it proclaimed that King Charles II had been the lawful monarch since the execution of Charles I in January 1649 . Charles returned from exile on 23 May . He entered London on 29 May , his birthday . To celebrate " his Majesty ' s Return to his Parliament " May 29 was made a public holiday , popularly known as Oak Apple Day . He was crowned at Westminster Abbey on 23 April 1661 .