1. Robert Beatson, A Political Index to the Histories of Great Britain and Ireland, 3 vols. (Edinburgh, 1786). Thomas Cromwell (1485?–1540) was lord privy seal in 1536; see below.
2. “Richard or Sir Richard Cromwell, great-grandfather of Oliver Protector, was … very active in the work of suppressing monasteries;
… and indeed it was on Monastic Property … that he had made for himself a sumptuous estate in those Fen regions. Now, of this
Richard Cromwell there are two Letters to Thomas Cromwell, ‘Vicar-General,’ Earl of Essex, which remain yet visible among
the Manuscripts of the British Museum; in both of which he signs himself with his own hand, ‘your most bounden Nephew’ … One
of them … is dated ‘Stamford,’ without day or year; but the context farther dates it as contemporary with the Lincolnshire
Rebellion, or Anti-Reformation riot, which was directly followed by the more formidable ‘Pilgrimage of Grace’ in Yorkshire
to the like effect, in the autumn of 1536. Richard, in company with other higher official persons, represents himself as straining every nerve to beat down and extinguish
this traitorous fanatic flame, kindled against the King's Majesty and his Reform of the Church; has an eye in particular to
a certain Sir John Thymbleby in Lincolnshire, whom he would fain capture as a ringleader …” (Cromwell, Works 6:28–29).
3. “There is no doubt at all but Oliver the Protector's family was related to that of Thomas Cromwell, Earl of Essex, the Putney ‘Blacksmith's or Iron-master's son, … the Malleus Monarchorum, or, as old Fuller renders it, ‘Mauler of Monasteries,’ in Henry Eighth's time. The same old Fuller, a perfectly veracious
and most intelligent person, does indeed report as of ‘his own knowledge,’ that Oliver Protector, once upon a time when Bishop
Goodman came dedicating to him some unreadable semi-popish jargon about the ‘mystery of the Holy Trinity,’ and some adulation
about ‘his Lordship's relationship to the former great Purifier of the Church,’ and Mauler of Monasteries,—answered impatiently,
‘My family has no relationship to his!’ … I have consulted the unreadable semi-popish jargon, for the sake of that Dedication;
I find that Oliver's relationship to Thomas Cromwell is in any case stated wrong there, not right … I infer therefore that Oliver said to him impatiently, without untruth, ‘You are quite wrong as to all
that: good morning!’—and that old Fuller, likewise without untruth, reports it as above” (Cromwell, Works 6:27–28). Thomas Fuller (1608–61), divine and author of The History of the Worthies of England (1662). Godfrey Goodman (1583–1656), bishop of Gloucester, author of The Two Great Mysteries of Christian Religion, The Ineffable Trinity, The Wonderful Incarnation (1653), dedicated to Cromwell,
