The musical opens in the workhouse, as the half-starved orphan boys are entering the enormous dining hall for supper. They are fed only gruel, but find some solace by imagining a richer menu ("Food Glorious Food"). Oliver gathers up the courage to ask for more, and is immediately apprehended by parish beadle Mr. Bumble and the Widow Corney, the heartless and greedy caretakers of the workhouse (" Oliver!"). Mr. Bumble and Widow Corney are left alone, and Mr. Bumble begins to make amorous advances ("I Shall Scream!"). Mrs. Corney pretends to resent his attentions, but ends up on Mr. Bumble's lap, as he eventually proposes to her. Mr. Bumble then takes Oliver and sells him as an apprentice to an undertaker, Mr. Sowerberry ("Boy for Sale"). Sowerberry and his wife taunt Oliver and Mr. Bumble ("That's Your Funeral"), causing Mr. Bumble to become angry and storm out. Oliver is sent to sleep in the basement with the coffins (" Where Is Love?"). Worden, Blair (1985). "Oliver Cromwell and the sin of Achan", in Beales, D. and Best, G. (eds.) History, Society and the Churches, ISBN 0-521-02189-8, pp.141–145. Worden, Blair (1977). The Rump Parliament (Cambridge University Press), ISBN 0-521-29213-1, ch.16–17.

a b c d e f "Oliver Cromwell". British Civil Wars Project. Archived from the original on 9 August 2017 . Retrieved 6 August 2017.

Coolidge, Calvin (1929). The Autobiography of Calvin Coolidge. US. p.29. ISBN 978-1410216229. {{ cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher ( link) Manganiello, Stephen, The Concise Encyclopedia of the Revolutions and Wars of England, Scotland and Ireland, 1639–1660, Scarecrow Press, 2004, 613 p., ISBN 9780810851009, p. 539. Fraser, Antonia (1973). Cromwell, Our Chief of Men, and Cromwell: the Lord Protector (Phoenix Press), ISBN 0-7538-1331-9 pp.344–46; and Austin Woolrych, Britain In Revolution (Oxford, 2002), p. 470 In 1631, likely as a result of the dispute, Cromwell sold most of his properties in Huntingdon and moved to a farmstead in nearby St Ives. This move, a significant step down in society for the Cromwells, also had significant emotional and spiritual impact on Cromwell; an extant 1638 letter from him to his cousin, the wife of Oliver St John, gives an account of his spiritual awakening at this time. In the letter, Cromwell, describing himself as having been the "chief of sinners", describes his calling as among "the congregation of the firstborn". [19] The letter's language, particularly the inclusion of numerous biblical quotations, shows Cromwell's belief that he was saved from his previous sins by God's mercy, and indicates his religiously Independent beliefs, chief among them that the Reformation had not gone far enough, that much of England was still living in sin, and that Catholic beliefs and practices must be fully removed from the church. [19] It appears that in 1634 Cromwell attempted to emigrate to what became the Connecticut Colony in the Americas, but was prevented by the government from leaving. [21]

Barry Coward, 1991, Oliver Cromwell, Pearson Education: Rugby, p.74: "Revenge was not Cromwell's only motive for the brutality he condoned at Wexford and Drogheda, but it was the dominant one ..." Cromwell was born in Huntingdon on 25 April 1599 [6] to Robert Cromwell and his second wife Elizabeth, daughter of William Steward. [7] The family's estate derived from Oliver's great-great-grandfather Morgan ap William, a brewer from Glamorgan who settled at Putney and married Katherine Cromwell (born 1482), the sister of Thomas Cromwell, who would become the famous chief minister to Henry VIII. The Cromwells acquired great wealth as occasional beneficiaries of Thomas's administration of the Dissolution of the Monasteries. [8] Morgan ap William was a son of William ap Yevan of Wales. The family line continued through Richard Williams (alias Cromwell), ( c. 1500–1544), Henry Williams (alias Cromwell), ( c. 1524 – 6 January 1604), [b] then to Oliver's father Robert Williams, alias Cromwell ( c. 1560–1617), who married Elizabeth Steward ( c. 1564–1654), probably in 1591. They had ten children, but Oliver, the fifth child, was the only boy to survive infancy. [9] The score of Oliver! has been recorded numerous times. There are cast recordings (on compact disc) available for the original London and Broadway productions as well as for the 1968 film and the 1994 and 2009 London revivals. The 2009 London cast album was recorded live on opening night. Oliver Twist, the main character of the story. He is a lonely orphan boy born in the workhouse who asks for more gruel. Morrill, John (1990), "The Making of Oliver Cromwell", in Morrill, John (ed.), Oliver Cromwell and the English Revolution, Longman, ISBN 0-582-01675-4David Plant. "1643: Civil War in Lincolnshire". British-civil-wars.co.uk. Archived from the original on 11 December 2008 . Retrieved 27 November 2008. Firth, Charles Harding (1888). "Cromwell, Oliver". In Stephen, Leslie (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol.13. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p.156.

Gardiner, Samuel Rawson (1886), History of the Great Civil War, 1642–1649, Longmans, Green, and Company First Anglo-Dutch War". British Civil Wars project. Archived from the original on 15 July 2017 . Retrieved 6 August 2017. John Morrill, (1990). "The Making of Oliver Cromwell", in Morrill, ed., Oliver Cromwell and the English Revolution (Longman), ISBN 0-582-01675-4, p.24.Coulton, Barbara. "Cromwell and the 'readmission' of the Jews to England, 1656" (PDF). The Cromwell Association. Lancaster University. Archived (PDF) from the original on 20 April 2017 . Retrieved 23 April 2017. Westminster Abbey reveals Cromwell's original grave". Westminster Abbey. Archived from the original on 6 April 2012 . Retrieved 29 July 2011. England's overseas possessions in this period included Newfoundland, [118] the New England Confederation, the Providence Plantation, the Virginia Colony, the Maryland Colony, and islands in the West Indies. Cromwell soon secured the submission of these and largely left them to their own affairs, intervening only to curb his fellow Puritans who were usurping control over the Maryland Colony at the Battle of the Severn, by his confirming the former Roman Catholic proprietorship and edict of tolerance there. Of all the English dominions, Virginia was the most resentful of Cromwell's rule, and Cavalier emigration there mushroomed during the Protectorate. [119] In February 1647, Cromwell suffered from an illness that kept him out of political life for over a month. By the time he recovered, the Parliamentarians were split over the issue of the King. A majority in both Houses pushed for a settlement that would pay off the Scottish army, disband much of the New Model Army, and restore Charles I in return for a Presbyterian settlement of the church. Cromwell rejected the Scottish model of Presbyterianism, which threatened to replace one authoritarian hierarchy with another. The New Model Army, radicalised by Parliament's failure to pay the wages it was owed, petitioned against these changes, but the Commons declared the petition unlawful. In May 1647 Cromwell was sent to the army's headquarters in Saffron Walden to negotiate with them, but failed to agree. [38]