asking for a book recommendation: collection of documents relating to British Civil War period (tag: Charles I, Oliver Cromwell, Henry Ireton, Putney Debates, Levellers, the Protectorate)

by rja2021

Hello. I am looking for a published volume that includes the full text of the following, and other such key documents of the era in question. Does such a collection exist?

  1. Grand Remonstrance
  2. Agreement(s) of the People
  3. Heads of Proposals
  4. transcript of the Putney Debates
  5. transcript of the trial of Charles I
  6. Instrument of Government
  7. Humble Petition and Advice
  8. Declaration of Breda

Thank you.

WoozyBrush

Hello. I’m a Masters student in the UK who’s has done a dissertation of the Levellers (with a heavy focus on the Putney Debates) and now doing my Masters on sedition in the reign of Charles I (with a chapter which will be dedicated to the Trial of the King). As far as I am personally aware I do not believe such a volume exists. However I would highly recommend J. P Kenyon ‘The Stuart Constitution’ which has a lot of primary documents for this team including some you have mentioned here, and it can usually be picked up second hand online for about £3. Also the the Levellers I would recommend Andrew Sharp’s ‘The English Levellers’ for most of the main Leveller texts. The Putney Debates and Trial of Charles are rather long documents (and both rather repetitive) so the segments you normally get in such collections should suffice for general reading, however if you want the full text then looking on Early English Books online should be your best option for the Trial of Charles I. For the Putney debates full transcript you would be best searching through the Clarke Papers which were edited and published by CH Firth. All the documents you’ve asked for though are available online for free (I believe) so not completely out of luck! Sorry I couldn’t exactly help when it comes to a complete collection, but hopefully this helps you track down the texts you wanted in some capacity.