If, like me, you come to Act of Oblivion with no knowledge of what happened to Whalley and Goffe (both real people), then I would strongly advise against looking up the details until you’ve finished reading. It’s better not to know and be kept in suspense wondering whether or not they’ll be caught. However, the book wasn’t quite as exciting as I’d expected based on others I’ve read by Robert Harris; although some of the ‘chase’ sections are very gripping, a lot of time is also spent on a memoir Whalley has been writing about the events of the Civil War and his relationship with Oliver Cromwell, and I felt that this slowed the pace down a lot. The year is 1660. The Act of Oblivion has been passed. Charles II has been restored as King of England after a decade of puritan rule by Oliver Cromwell. In the midst of this political upheaval, the question of what to do with the 51 men who signed the death warrant of Charles I remains unanswered. Until the Act of Oblivion.

A lot of the book is a cat and mouse game, as Ned and Will have to scurry from one hiding place to another. Much of their time is spent in wilderness conditions. They also encounter various examples of religious fanaticism. In England, their family does not have an easy time of it since they refuse to give up the location of the two fugitives. They also have to cope with a plague and fire. One of the challenges of writing about this period is that the intricacies of religious faith and faction can seem distant and abstruse to a modern audience. Goffe is a religious man – he had wanted to become a minister before the war intervened – but Harris doesn’t allow himself to become hung up on the niceties of Christian doctrine. Rather, he makes a broader point about the position of the colonels in New England: the simplicity of their faith and anti-monarchical feeling finds a natural home among the dissenters and Puritans of the New World. The impulses that would animate the revolution a hundred years hence were all there in the English civil war. This does not, alas, mean that the men have an easy time of it in Massachusetts. Cannon, John (21 May 2009). Indemnity and Oblivion, Act of. ISBN 978-0-19-955037-1 . Retrieved 16 March 2022.

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A disappointing one for me, then, though most people seem to be loving it, so as usual it clearly comes down to subjective taste. The act is often viewed from the perspective of those who were not pardoned and thus condemned to death. However, the debate in Parliament continued almost every day for over two months and names were added and taken off the list of those who were not to be pardoned. Initially, there were only seven on the list: [6] [7] Thomas Harrison, William Say, John Jones Maesygarnedd, Thomas Scot, John Lisle, Cornelius Holland, and John Barkstead. On 7 June, the Commons, mindful of the Declaration of Breda, stated they as the Commons could add to the list others who would not be covered by the general pardon. They immediately added John Cooke, Andrew Broughton, Edward Dendy, and the "Two Persons who were upon the Scaffold in a Disguise" (i.e. the executioners). [8] On 8 June, the Commons voted "That the Number of Twenty, and no more, (other than those that are already excepted, or sat as Judges upon the late King's Majesty) shall be excepted out of the Act of general Pardon and Oblivion, for and in respect only of such Pains, Penalties, and Forfeitures, (not extending to Life) as shall be thought fit to be inflicted on them by another Act, intended to be hereafter passed for that purpose". [9] August 1660 Bills passed, British History On-line House of Lords Journal Volume 11 (www.british-history.ac.uk)

England. General Edward Whalley and his son-in law Colonel William Goffe board a ship bound for the New World. They are on the run, wanted for the murder of King Charles I—a brazen execution that marked the culmination of the English Civil War, in which parliamentarians successfully battled royalists for control. VI. The like by reason of any Commission by the late or present King, or by Colour of any Ordinance of one or both Houses of Parliament, or the late Protector, &c. Harris is a master of historical fiction, a compelling author who brings to life the recent and ancient past -- Justin Warshaw * TLS *The lands of the Crown and the established Church were automatically restored, but lands of Royalists and other dissenters confiscated and sold during the Civil War and interregnum were left for private negotiation or litigation, meaning that the government would not help the Loyalists in regaining their property. Disappointed Royalists commented that the Act meant "indemnity for [Charles'] enemies and oblivion for his friends". [3] Historians, on the other hand, have generally praised the King and Clarendon for the generosity and clemency of the Act, in an age not normally noted for mercy. [4] Twenty years later, during the Popish Plot, Charles tried unsuccessfully to stand against the relentless demand for the execution of Catholic priests, and reminded the public sharply of how many of them had previously benefited from his reluctance to shed blood. [5] One of Harris's most compellingly paced to date . . . it is his best since Fatherland * Sunday Times * Harris pays much attention to historical details throughout the novel. Dates, names, and locations are historically accurate to the true story of Whalley and Goffe story, with the above mentioned exception of the antagonist, Richard Nayler. He’s done a marvelous job of this. Whalley, Goffe and Nayler are vividly drawn, their decisions and actions consistent with the worldviews he has created for them. The arc of the story is well designed, with the focus shifting between New England and London, where Goffe’s wife (Whalley’s daughter) is the primary focus. A fictional memoir drafted by Whalley is an excellent device for filling in details about Cromwell’s rise - and fall. The execution of the king was the defining event of this struggle. Harris chooses to focus instead on the lives in exile of two of the regicides, Goffe and Edward Whalley. In 1660, they fled to America, where many of the colonists were Puritans with no love for the king. Both men were distinguished soldiers. Whalley was Oliver Cromwell’s cousin, a trusted member of the Lord Protector’s inner circle, and Goffe was Whalley’s son-in-law. We know tantalisingly little about their lives in America. They lived in hiding, in constant fear of arrest by the royalist agents who were searching for them.

August 1660 Lords reminded of Bills, British History On-line House of Commons Journal Volume 8 (www.british-history.ac.uk) Harris certainly seems to have done his research and he brings the time period to life convincingly enough with lots of detail. You know how sometimes people say they learn more about history through reading historical novels than actual history books? I can see people saying that about Harris’ historical novels like this one. Part of the novel is written from the perspective of Nayler and part from the points of view of Ned Whalley and Will Goffe. This means that the reader knows from the beginning exactly where Ned and Will have gone – they have crossed the Atlantic to America, to build new lives for themselves in the like-minded Puritan colonies of Massachusetts and Connecticut. When Nayler arrives in pursuit, however, the two regicides are forced to move from one hiding place to another, never able to relax, knowing that they could be betrayed by anyone at any time.July 1660 Pardon and Oblivion, That the Title of this Bill be, "An Act of free and general Pardon, Indemnity, and Oblivion" Passed and was sent to the House of Lords. [15]