Indemnity and Oblivion, Act of

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Indemnity and Oblivion, Act of, 1660. Restorations after long exiles usually disappoint the loyalists since there are so many claims to be rewarded. In the declaration of Breda, Charles II had promised a general amnesty and the Act of 12 Car. II c. 11 put it into effect, ‘to bury all seeds of future discords’. Fifty persons who had signed the death warrant of Charles I and those who had been involved in the Irish rising of 1641 were expressly excluded. But the many changes in landownership which had taken place during the Commonwealth were ignored, leading royalists who had suffered severely to jeer that it was indemnity for enemies, oblivion for friends.

J. A. Cannon

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