BERRY, James (c. 1610-91), of Lincoln.

We owe what little is known of James Berry’s origins to Richard Baxter, with whom Berry shared service in the household of Richard Foley, a successful west midlands ironmaster. Foley’s ironworking interests took him to sources of wood and iron ore over a number of counties in the west and south-west midlands, so it is not therefore inconceivable that Berry was the James of that name baptised in Grosmont, Monmouthshire, on 1 March 1614, the son of Thomas Berry, although proof of any sort is lacking.28Grosmont par. reg. Baxter tells us that Berry was ‘of very good natural parts, especially mathematical and mechanical’.29Reliquiae, i. 57. According to a source hostile to the protectorate, but not completely unsympathetic to Berry, he was in early life clerk at an ironworks, surely one of Foley’s.30A Second Narrative of the Late Parliament (1658), 24. Berry probably played a greater part in Foley’s household and business affairs than the modern meaning of ‘clerk’ would suggest, for he was the means by which Foley communicated his desire that Baxter should be master of the refurbished school at Dudley in 1638. A letter from Berry to Baxter of that period drips with godly Protestant imagery, is very skilfully written, and is a discourse about spiritual progress. He confides that ‘careful and conscionable performance of the duties of my calling never trouble me, but slackness and carelessness, these carry their sting with them’.31Cromwellian Major General, 7-9. Speculation that Berry’s valedictory phrase ‘yours if his own’ and his mention of being ‘confined ... in prison’ imply that he was physically incarcerated in 1638 seems misplaced, the language more likely referring to Berry’s sense of his body and soul belonging to Christ.

Junior cavalry officer, 1643-7

Berry’s employer, Richard Foley, is known to have held premises near Leadenhall in the City of London, and this is probably the geographical link between the west midlands and Berry’s appearance in Oliver Cromwell’s* own troop of horse as captain-lieutenant, by July 1643. Berry apparently attempted to maintain his links with Baxter by persuading Cromwell to invite Baxter to become chaplain to the troop, but the minister refused.32Reliquiae, i. 51, 57. Berry distinguished himself at the battle of Gainsborough by demonstrating a ruthlessness in pursuit of Colonel-general Charles Cavendish, whom he killed, possibly after he had surrendered.33Writings and Speeches ed. Abbott i. 241, 244, 245; W. Kennet, Mems. of the Fam. of Cavendish (1708), 94. Berry was wounded at the battle of Winceby on 11 October 1643, and by the summer of 1644 had been promoted to captain of the sixth troop of Cromwell’s regiment.34True Relation of the Late Fight (1643), 7 (E.71.5); Firth and Davies, Regimental Hist. i. 9. In February 1645, Berry’s name appeared in the officer list of the newly-constituted New Model army as the most junior of the four captains in the first regiment of horse, commanded by Col. Thomas Fairfax*.35Temple, ‘Original officer list’, 62. As a junior officer in Fairfax’s regiment, Berry is thus likely to have been at the battle of Naseby, and was certainly involved in the crushing of the Dorset clubmen in July 1645.

When the leaders of the clubmen met at Shaftesbury to relieve Sherborne, under siege from Fairfax, troops from the regiments of Charles Fleetwood* and Edward Whalley* were sent against them. The subsequent surprise and capture of the leaders led to a mass rally of the clubmen at Hambledon Hill. Berry, at this point once more under the direction of Oliver Cromwell, but still captain-lieutenant in Fairfax’s troop, was despatched against the clubmen, who beat him back, and were routed only when a third charge against them under John Disbrowe* was launched.36Moderate Intelligencer no. 24 (7-15 Aug. 1645), 187 (E.296.27); Kingdom’s Weekly Intelligencer no. 112 (5-12 Aug. 1645), 896 (E.296.19); Two Letters (1645), 6 (E.296.7). Fairfax’s army stayed in the west country, mopping up the remnants of the royalist forces, and by early 1646 was based in and near Exeter. On 15 February 1646, Fairfax despatched Berry with 200 horse to advance from Chulmleigh to Torrington. A skirmish took place between Berry’s men and troops of Lieut.-Col. Dundasse: a prelude to the battle of Torrington on 16-17 February.37J. Sprigge, Anglia Rediviva (1647), 184.

During the attempts by the Presbyterians in Parliament to disband regiments of the army, Berry, by this time a major, signed the Petition and Vindication presented to the House of Commons on 27 April 1647. The petitioners denied that by supporting the demands of the army rank-and-file they had countenanced mutiny, requested indemnity and arrears of pay for the lower ranks, and asserted that those who had volunteered for service should not be sent to Ireland against their wills.38The Petition and Vindication of the Officers of the Armie (1647), sig.B1. As one thus openly sympathetic to the soldiers, Berry was naturally the recipient of a letter from troopers of Sir Robert Pye II* asking him and two other officers, with John Rushworth*, secretary to the officers’ council, to represent their interests to Fairfax.39Clarke Pprs. i. 45. Berry’s radicalism was directed against enemies of the soldiery as well as organised in their defence; in July 1647, he was asked by the council of officers to draw up charges against the 11 Presbyterian Members.40Clarke Pprs. i. 151. Berry was not formally an officer-agitator for his regiment, but his name was linked with others who certainly were, and he received payments in the summer of 1647 ‘for special service’ connected with advancing the army’s case vis-a-vis Parliament.41Pubn. Thoresby Soc. xi. 140-1; Cromwellian Major General, 42-4. In June 1647, with ten other captains, he wrote to the masters of Trinity House to put the case of the army and to try to win over the navy to their point of view.42Cromwellian Major General, 35-8. By the time that Pye’s troopers addressed themselves to Berry, he was a captain in Col. Edward Rosseter’s regiment in Lincolnshire, marking his return to the county in which he was to settle.43E121/3/3/196.

Major and colonel, 1647-55

On 9 November 1647, with the army still at Putney and as a consequence of decisions taken at the celebrated debates there, Berry was invited to be part of the committee which was to ascertain how far the Case of the Army Stated and the Agreement of the People were compatible with ‘engagements’ or commitments of the army. Now with the rank of major again, he was one of those who declared themselves not opposed to parliamentary negotiations with the king, seeking to clarify their position after a letter of the council of officers of 5 November had distanced the officers from any wish to open such discussions.44Clarke Pprs. i. 415-6, 440-1. Berry’s Lincolnshire regiment had recently come under the command of Philip Twistleton, and it was soon to see significant action in the second civil war. Berry was in the thick of the fighting at Preston on 17 August 1648. The regiment pursued the Scots northwards after dispersing them through the town, and Berry was given the honour of reporting the battle to the House of Commons, which awarded him £200 for bringing the good news.45Clarke Pprs. ii. 21; R. Burton, Wars in England, Scotland and Ireland (1684), 157. In October that year, Twistleton’s regiment marched to Scotland under the command of John Lambert*.46Cromwellian Major General, 56. Some time in 1649 or 1650 Berry may have helped secure the passage of supernumeraries from his regiment to Ireland, because he was awarded a gratuity of £48 for having done so. If this were the case, it was an ironic comment on his opposition to the treatment meted out to other regiments in 1647.47CSP Dom. 1649-50, p. 407. Richard Baxter detected a change in Berry’s outlook during these years. While Baxter was chaplain to Edward Whalley’s regiment, his relations with Berry cooled. The soldier, he thought, changed when ‘Cromwell made him his favourite’; success on the battlefield and conversation with sectaries who ‘thought the old puritan ministers were dull, self-conceited men of a lower form’ accounted for the ‘new light’ which had altered him completely.48Reliquiae, i. 53, 57.

Berry was certainly close to Cromwell in the early 1650s. The part of the regiment not sent to Ireland marched to Scotland in the summer of 1650, and stayed there until it marched south a year later to fight at Worcester. Berry fought at Dunbar in September 1650, but did not stay with the regiment beyond April 1651, when he took command of the regiment which had been raised in the north of England by Sir Arthur Heselrige*.49Cromwellian Major General, 63. The deployment of the regiment was directed by George Monck*, and it moved first against Stirling and then Glasgow and Paisley. Dundee fell to it in September 1651, and after the surrender of Aberdeen on 12 September, Berry was ordered to the west of Scotland to reduce it to total obedience.50Scot. and Commonwealth ed. Firth, 15. By the start of 1653 his regiment was reduced in numbers, presumably through desertion and death. When news of Cromwell’s forcible dissolution of the Rump on 20 April 1653 reached Scotland, Berry represented his own regiment at a meeting in Dalkeith at which the approval of the army in Scotland was expressed.51Firth and Davies, Regimental Hist. ii. 244.

By early October 1653, Berry was marching south, to England, after his regiment had apparently been relieved by that of Nathaniel Rich*.52Scot. and Commonwealth ed. Firth, 238. Baxter named Berry as being second only to Lambert in the drafting of the Instrument of Government of December 1653, and so it is tempting to link his departure from Scotland with his contribution to constitutional change and to suggest that he returned from Scotland with deliberate political intent. There is no evidence that it was so, however, and it cannot be established exactly what part Berry played in the drafting of the Instrument. Baxter, after all, knew Berry more than he knew most other army officers, but was no longer in contact with him, and may have exaggerated his former friend’s importance in the affair. Cromwell himself spoke some years later of the Instrument’s having been drafted by seven army officers, with the title of king as a prominent part of the draft. If this was the case, it is likely that Berry was among them.53Reliquiae, i. 68; Woolrych, Commonwealth to Protectorate, 352-4.

Major-general and critic of Cromwellians, 1655-9

Berry was given no office immediately under the new protectorate. In the spring of 1654, he was made a commissioner for security in parts of London, to quell unrest thought to be fomented by royalist sympathisers. This was Berry’s first taste of police work, and he played a part in examining and registering those suspected by the government.54CSP Dom. 1654, pp. 204-5; Add. 34014, f. 13v. His own troop was based in Nottinghamshire the following year, where it was active in suppressing opposition to the government.55TSP iii. 263, 310. On 11 March 1655, Cromwell directed Philip Jones* to liaise with Berry to monitor developments in the midlands. The so-called Rufford plot had by this time collapsed, and on 12 March the protector wrote to Berry to instruct him to examine suspects taken when the conspiracy was broken.56TSP iii. 220, 222; Cromwellian Major General, 79-87. Berry reported back on his interrogations, and encouraged Cromwell to consider expanding the Lincolnshire troop as a security measure. By 28 March, Berry was back in Lincoln, requesting that military equipment seized in Nottinghamshire should be distributed among his and Francis Hacker’s troops.57TSP iii 240, 263, 310. Berry remained detached from some of his troops, the most notable of which was that of Unton Croke II*, which put down Penruddock’s rising at South Molton in Devon in March 1655. Berry wrote in December that year to Cromwell urging on him the importance of a reward for Croke for his good service while the protector lived. Berry was evidently mindful of the risks Cromwell ran: ‘You know what plotting there is against your person; and if any of them should take, what will become of our preferments?’58Firth and Davies, Regimental Hist. ii. 244-6; TSP iv. 274.

Berry was by 1655 established in Lincoln on the basis of his purchases of confiscated lands. From that city in June 1655 he wrote Cromwell an account of his security measures: ‘Our ministers are bad, our magistrates idle, and the people all asleep’. This was a classic exposition of the problems that Cromwell’s ‘reformation of manners’ were to address. Two months later, Berry was named as a commissioner in Lincolnshire for ejecting scandalous ministers, and in November was reporting to John Thurloe* with Edward Whalley, major-general for the region, that they had used the lists of Lincolnshire compounders at Goldsmiths’ Hall to compile the list of decimation tax payers. They asked for guidance on how to proceed against suspicious persons.59A. and O.; TSP iv. 185. By the autumn of 1655, Berry had been engaged in security operations on a more-or-less full time basis for 18 months, and it was natural, if not inevitable, that he should be called upon to play a leading part in the experiment or expedient of the major-generals. On 16 October, Thurloe reported to Henry Cromwell* that the territories of the major-generals had been settled. On the 24th, Berry was described as presiding over Herefordshire, Shropshire and north Wales, and this region, which also included Worcestershire, was evidently the same as that he covered in a reform of the militia the previous August.60TSP iv. 88, 117; CSP Dom. 1655, p. 275.

He was slow to leave Lincolnshire, and was involved in mediating between factions of the Lincoln city government early in November 1655, but by 17 November had arrived at Worcester. His main concern in the first few weeks of his tour of duty was to promote suitable candidates for the shrievalty. The field in all his counties appeared to him to be distinctly unpromising, and he sought, in a frank exchange with Secretary John Thurloe, to have exempted the best choice for Worcestershire, Thomas Foley*, on the grounds that he had little estate in that county, and was Berry’s friend.61TSP iv. 211, 215, 237, 272, 282. The sectarian preacher, Vavasor Powell, was in Worcester when Berry arrived, having been brought there by troops who had arrested him in Montgomeryshire. Powell was alleged to be circulating a paper critical of the protectorate; to Berry’s questioning, he replied that it was a petition solely intended to satisfy the consciences of those that signed. Although he thought Powell’s protestations of innocence were somewhat disingenuous, Berry judged the preacher to pose no threat to security. He was happy to allow Powell to preach four times in one day at Worcester, and continued to send semi-jocular expressions of sympathy with the ‘poor’ Welsh people to Thurloe as he proceeded on his itinerary from Worcester to Hereford, Shrewsbury, Wrexham (where he stayed for over two weeks) and Welshpool.62TSP iv. 211, 228, 272, 287, 316, 358-9.

Berry had been born in the Welsh marches, but had not lived there for over a decade. He may have misread the evidence presented to him about developments in Wales, and may have ignored, or have been unaware of, evidence that Powell’s opposition to the protectorate had been openly declared from December 1653.63T. Richards, Religious Developments in Wales (1923), 204-14. He admitted he had been rather late starting his work in Wales and the marches, and in December and January was still hoping for a break in Lincoln, so it is even possible that he was rather reluctant to address all the issues facing him.64TSP iv. 211, 358, 393-4. Powell’s paper was in Cromwell’s hands by 31 November 1655, and was published as A Word for God by 17 December. It was a bitter denunciation of the protectorate, and sparked off an intense public debate about the legitimacy of the regime. Berry’s faith in the credibility of rumours that many signatures were attached without consent did nothing to limit the potential of the petition for damage.65TSP iv. 272.

Early in 1656, after the leave he eventually took without permission, Berry moved back to Shrewsbury, and from thence launched a tour of south Wales, which had been added to his fiefdom on 8 January.66CSP Dom. 1655-6, p. 102; TSP iv. 498. Between 11 February and 6 March he visited Monmouthshire, Breconshire and Carmarthenshire, where his main concerns were the poor quality of government in towns, and the lack of an adequate preaching ministry. He spoke favourably of the possibility that the Independent ministers Walter Cradock and John Owen* might help supply men for vacant livings, which had remained unfilled while in the protector’s gift.67TSP iv. 525, 545, 565, 582. There is little doubt that Berry supported a state-supported parochial ministry, but was more sympathetic to sectaries than some of his army colleagues. Back in Worcestershire by 14 March 1656, Berry was drawn into disputes between civic authorities in the county, and the emerging Quaker sect. In August 1655, the Evesham Quakers had written to the protector to provide a narrative of their sufferings at the hands of the leaders of the corporation, among them Samuel Gardner*, and to complain of their loss of liberty to meet under the terms of the Instrument of Government. Berry was given the task of conveying the protector’s puzzlement at the persecution of the Evesham Quakers, and like Cromwell, could not ‘understand ... either their faults or their fines’.68J. Besse, Sufferings of the Quakers (1753), ii. 51-2; TSP iv. 613.

Soon afterwards, in late March or April 1656, the Quakers, encouraged by Berry’s response to their plight, requested a meeting with him through the mediation of Thomas Wells, captain-lieutenant of the Worcestershire militia. After some typical banter by Berry about the custom of appearing before the ‘Great Turk’ without shoes (alluding to the difficulties Quakers had experienced arising from their insistence on keeping their hats on before their social superiors), he expressed great sympathy with the sectaries and promised to convene a meeting of the Friends and their adversaries in Evesham. At this second meeting, according to a Quaker account, Berry promised ‘if there was any thing further then to do for us, he would do it, for we should and must be protected in our religion, being a peaceable people’. He insisted that the state ministry should not be disrupted by them, however, and at the end of the meeting, when he, the Quaker leader Edward Bourne, and Richard Baxter were the last ones left in the room, told Bourne that the Friends should have done better to have written privately to the protector rather than to have published their sufferings, and thereby created a widespread fuss.69First Publishers of Truth ed. N Penney (1907), 281-5. Berry’s relaxed attitude to the Quakers seems to have persisted; in the spring of 1657, Quakers in the army in Scotland, though few in number, were to be found in Berry’s own troop in his regiment. Other troops of the regiment were reported as being free of the sect.70TSP vi. 136, 241.

Berry was just as tolerant in his view of political enemies of the regime. Henry Townshend, the royalist chronicler of Worcestershire, recorded that when Berry arrived in the county, the arrested suspects Sir Ralph Clare†, Samuel Sandys* and others, were released from custody.71Diary and Pprs. of Henry Townshend ed. Porter, Roberts, Roy (Worcs. Hist. Soc. n.s. xxv), 275. By April 1656, any lingering doubts Berry had harboured about his own calling had evaporated. He spoke of his intention to ‘go on circuit’ in his region, and his adoption of the official, judicial jargon was accompanied by a request to Thurloe that he be allowed to renovate Ludlow Castle, the former seat of the council in the marches of Wales, as his headquarters.72TSP iv. 742. On 16 July, he wrote from Shrewsbury to Thurloe about the start of the campaign to secure MPs for the second protectorate Parliament, and expressed the hope that a good choice would be available. A little under a month later, he wrote to the protector himself to report on progress in the electioneering. There was ‘some church work’ in hand, which Berry hoped would not produce ‘a public breach’: he probably alluded to another remonstrance on religious matters, recalling the furore generated by A Word for God. He went on to complain that some critics of the government were attempting to be elected. Men of this stamp sought a Parliament simply to provide their political views with legitimacy; they were hoping that if the protector would ‘make them lords, they would give [him] leave to be king.’73TSP v. 303.

In this letter, the begetters of the proposals on the church and the enemies of the state bent on elevating Cromwell are separate people, but are linked in Berry’s train of thought. He could not have been discussing the pro-Cromwellian Humble Representation and Address, presented to Cromwell on 4 February.74Humble Representation and Address (1656, E.866.3); TSP iv. 505; Richards, Religious Developments, 180. He may, however, have been thinking of the Remonstrances of Churches, from Worcestershire, Gloucestershire, Warwickshire and Oxfordshire congregations, which was presented to Cromwell when rumours began to circulate that the major-generals were to be voted down. The petitioners, who included two Worcester ministers, supported the regime of the major-generals as having protected the godly, and disapproved of suggestions that Cromwell should be raised ‘to a greater title and style of regal power’. This is a possibility which links, as Berry did, concern for the church and disapproval of notions of Cromwell’s becoming king.75Original Letters ed. Nickolls, 139-41.

Berry himself was a candidate in the 1656 election, and was returned for Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Monmouthshire.76CJ vii. 432a. He may have elected to sit for Worcestershire to provide support for the government against men like John Nanfan*, who was excluded by the council of state, and Edward Pytts*, who had previously been a royalist, and had been alleged to have been critical of the protectorate. The other county Members, Nicholas Lechmere and Sir Thomas Rous, were both more Presbyterians than anything else, and Berry was certainly the most radical of them.77Diary and Pprs. of Henry Townshend ed. Porter, Roberts, Roy, 274. In the early months of the first session of the Parliament, Berry was named to a number of committees dealing with matters relating to the structure of government. One was the committee to annul the title of Charles Stuart to the crown (19 Sept.); another (26 Sept.) was on the mechanisms for presenting bills to the lord protector.78CJ vii. 425a, 429a. On 27 September, he was named to a committee for revising and codifying the sum of extant legislation, and on 7 October to another committee with a broad remit, to consider laws on artificers, labourers and servants.79CJ vii. 429b, 435a. Some of his concern for the ‘reformation of manners’ may be detected in his appointment to committees on alehouse reform (29 Sept.), modifications to the laws of grain distribution (7 Oct.) and on registries for conveyances (18 Oct.), the last-named an interest of his when a major-general, in the context of the monitoring of the populace.80CJ vii. 430a, 435b, 441b, 445b; TSP iv. 287, 316.

Berry was not appointed to these committees as part of a Worcestershire bloc. In many of the larger committees, rather, he was listed with many other major-generals and other military figures. The question of the succession was in his mind by late November, as he was reported by John Bridges*, who had himself sat for Worcestershire in 1654, then to be in earnest discussions on the topic with another Member. Berry’s earnest discussion in the Speaker’s rooms was interrupted by Bridges, who was then curtly invited by Berry to summarise his ‘scattered notions’ on the succession. This he did in the form of a letter to Berry, copied by Bridges to his ally in Ireland, Henry Cromwell*. Bridges argued that as the Instrument left open the question of the succession, the death of the lord protector would produce a division of the nation into interest groups, and in those circumstances an acceptance of Charles Stuart would then offer the best hope for political stability. The only alternative to this would be a return to the hereditary principle of succession, what Bridges called ‘the old bottom’. Berry’s views on the topic are not clear, but evidently Bridges was trying to move him from a more republican point of view.81Henry Cromwell Corresp. 186-9. It is thus likely that Berry was opposed to those clauses of the Remonstrance, later the Humble Petition and Advice, that promoted the hereditary principle, and that he was among those who attended the protector on 27 February 1657 to dissuade him from it.

Nevertheless, while Cromwell agonised over the kingship, Berry was named to committees to consider clauses in the Remonstrance on the regulating of membership of the House of Commons by commissioners (10 Mar. 1657), and on another clause, which appears not to have been incorporated in the final version, on liberties of the people (16 Mar.). Berry’s involvement in work on both of these clauses suggests that he was still opposed to the ‘kinglings’ in March 1657: Henry Cromwell* considered him at the very least unreliable in his views.82CJ vii. 501b, 505a; Gardiner, Constitutional Docs. (Oxford, 1906), 451; Henry Cromwell Corresp. 245. On 9 April he was one of the large committee appointed to confer with Cromwell about the doubts he might have about the new constitution, and once the protector had made his position clear on the kingship, Berry was named to a committee to tidy up the implications of his decision.83CJ vii. 521b, 535a. As late as two days before the end of this first session of the Parliament, Berry was working on last-minute drafts of the protector’s oath and other details of the Humble Petition. That he walked in Cromwell’s procession when he was re-installed as lord protector on 26 June suggests that Berry would have been pleased with the final compromises reached over the constitution.84Cromwellian Major General, 198.

In June 1657, Berry was sufficiently distanced from government office-holding groups to vote, and act as teller against, a motion to bestow a gratuity of £1,500 per annum on Lord Deputy Charles Fleetwood*. He did so even when his former colleagues, Major-generals Whalley and William Goffe, supported the proposal by Bulstrode Whitelocke* and Walter Strickland*.85Burton’s Diary, ii. 197. Despite this independent stance, he was considered reliable and loyal enough to merit appointment to the new Other House, as James, Lord Berry, and was installed on 21 January 1658.86HMC Lords, iv. 508. Hostile observers thought this represented a substantial change of political opinion by Berry.87Second Narrative of the Late Parliament (1658), 24. Shortly after he took his seat there, Berry and other officers who, according to Thurloe, ‘could not be supposed to have any prejudice’ towards Col. William Packer*, were present when Packer was cashiered for his opposition to the protectorate.88TSP vi. 806. Those closer even than Thurloe was to the House of Cromwell were suspicious of Berry’s conduct in the lord protector’s dying days; at a prayer meeting of officers, Berry was reported by Thomas Belasyse*, 2nd Viscount Fauconberg, brother-in-law of Henry Cromwell, to have prayed only ‘notionally’, and then for the interest of God’s own people, not for the protector or his successor.89TSP vii. 365. The Cromwellians’ suspicions of Berry continued after Oliver’s death. On 21 September, Berry was reported as being an author of a petition called The Armie’s Address. The following month, he spoke to the petition, which demanded a return to the Good Old Cause, and on 19 October, he and junior officers were said to be meeting daily.90TSP vii. 406, 450.

Wallingford House and after, 1659-91

The question of membership of Richard Cromwell’s* council of state became a tussle between Cromwellians and army officers, the latter proposing Berry, though unsuccessfully, as one of four nominees for positions.91Baker, Chronicle, 639. Cromwell surrendered power to the cabal of officers of which Berry was one.92Henry Cromwell Corresp. 509. He was considered by Baxter to be a principal ‘executioner’ in bringing to an end the protectorate of Richard Cromwell, the minister believing that Berry was deluded into thinking of himself as an unerring agent of God’s providence.93Reliquiae i. 57; Cromwellian Major General, 214 -5. Baxter’s personal disappointment at the fall of Richard Cromwell was apparent in the postscript and prefaces to his A Holy Commonwealth, an expression of confidence in the second lord protector. That Berry was one of the council of officers which turned Cromwell out goes a long way to account for Baxter’s disapproval of his former friend.94R. Baxter, Holy Commonwealth ed. Lamont (Cambridge 1994), ix, x, 3-17, 231- 47.

On 3 May 1659, Berry was one of the principal authors of a letter to George Monck* and his officers in Scotland, justifying their actions in defence of the Good Old Cause.95Clarke Pprs. iv. 4. Berry was by this time a leading member of what became known as the Wallingford House party, and represented the army in negotiations with the leading figures in the Long Parliament.96Ludlow, Mems. ii. 74. On 7 May 1659, Berry signed the invitation to Members of the restored Rump to take their seats, and on the 9th was added to its committee of safety as one of three members who were not MPs.97CJ vii. 644b; 646b; Henry Cromwell Corresp. 512. Four days later, Berry was proposed and appointed as a commissioner for the army, and on the same day was made a councillor of state.98CJ vii. 650b, 651a, 652b. Ten councillors of the 31 were not MPs. John Mordaunt thought Berry well disposed to a restoration of Richard Cromwell, but Mordaunt himself admitted that he was speculating.99Bodl. Clarendon 61, ff. 114-5.

Berry was an energetic member of the restored Rump’s council of state, attending regularly from August to October 1659. He was one of the seven commissioners charged with reviewing commissions in the army, and his and the other army officers’ tendentious use of their authority became a bitter source of contention between the republican civilians and themselves.100CJ vii. 670a; Ludlow, Mems. ii. 88. In June, Berry was confirmed as colonel of his regiment.101CJ vii. 679a. Among other council committees on which Berry was active were those for Dunkirk, then an English possession, the militia, Irish and Scottish affairs, and trade with the West Indies.102CSP Dom. 1659-60, pp. 110, 135, 150, 157, 233; CSP Col. 1574-1660, p. 475. After playing a significant part in the quelling of the rising of Sir George Boothe* in August 1659, Berry was implicated in unrest among the leading army officers in October, and was reported as playing a leading part in criticism of Sir Arthur Hesilrige*.103Cromwellian Major General, 231-2; Clarendon SP iii. 573. A promoter of the Humble Representation and Petition of the army to Parliament, Berry was cashiered along with Lambert*, Disbrowe* and others on 12 October, after a vote in the House of 50-15, once the assurances of Monck in support of the assembly had been received.104True Narrative of Proceedings in Parl. (1659), 4-17 (E.1010.24); CJ vii. 796a; Cromwellian Major General, 235-6. The following day, Berry was among the officers who put a stop to the sitting of the Long Parliament for a second time, by using force to prevent Members from taking their seats.

Power now passed to an interim executive, comprising those members of the Rump’s council of state prepared to continue, augmented by nominees of the army officers. Berry was prominent among them, and he also continued on the council of state. On 19 October the council of officers included Berry on a committee for approving army commissions.105True Narrative, 21, 24; Cromwellian Major General, 241-2. On 26 October, the day after the council of state surrendered power, Berry was nominated by the council of officers as one of the 23 members of a ‘committee of safety’ charged with managing public affairs.106True Narrative, 41. On 1 November, he was among the 14 officers and civilian republicans charged with recommending a form of government for the future, and proposals were mooted for a committee of 19, including representatives of army and civilian interests in the three nations. Berry was to be one of these, but the discussions were vitiated by the tide flowing in favour of Monck and a restoration of monarchy.107True Narrative, 63; Ludlow, Mems. ii. 149; Clarke Pprs. iv. 133, 136, 219-20. Berry, Disbrowe and Sir Henry Vane II* managed on 22 December to prevent Fleetwood from seceding to the pro-monarchy faction, but two days earlier, troops of Berry’s regiment had declared their support for the Rump. After the assembly had re-convened on 26 December, it brought the English regiments under its control. Berry was arrested at Windsor on 4 January 1660, and on the 9th, was confined with other officers to house arrest in the country.108Cromwellian Major General, 246-7; Clarke Pprs. iv. 210, 216; CSP Dom. 1659-60, 299, 305; CJ vii. 806b.

By 23 March, Berry was in prison at Monck’s behest, and was still in confinement in London in September.109TSP vii. 867; CJ viii. 34b; CSP Dom. 1660-1, p. 423. Although he was listed in April 1661 among those who were to be apprehended if discovered at large, it is unlikely that he ever escaped from custody. He was sent to the Tower and in July 1662 to Scarborough Castle by yacht. He shared part of his ten years’ imprisonment there with the Quaker leader George Fox before his release in January 1672.110Cromwellian Major General, 262-6. It seems plausible that Baxter was correct in stating that Berry after leaving detention became a market gardener. He was to be found among numerous ex-Independent members of John Owen’s congregation at Stoke Newington, Middlesex: he had joined Owen’s congregation in March 1659.111Cromwellian Major General, 268; Orme, Life of Dr John Owen, 277; R.L. Greaves, Enemies under His Feet (Stanford, Ca. 1990), 128; Henry Cromwell Corresp. 475; Oxford DNB. Although he was subsequently monitored closely by the government, there is no evidence that he was active in any serious plotting.112SP29/375/104; 379/50; 385/112; 398/131. He died on 9 May 1691; three of his descendants are known to have become nonconformist ministers.113Cromwellian Major General, 272.