Ireton, Henry

Related Category: British and Irish History: Biographies

(´rtn), 1611–51, English parliamentary general; son-in-law of Oliver Cromwell. He held various commands in the parliamentary army during the first civil war (see English civil war) and in 1646 married Cromwell's daughter Bridget. A conservative reformer and advocate of limited monarchy, he opposed the radical constitutional demands of the Levelers and drafted the peace settlement known as the Heads of the Proposals, presented to the king by the army in 1647. In 1648 he took the part of the army against Parliament, became a republican, and signed (1649) the death warrant of Charles I. Appointed (1650) lord deputy of Ireland, he sternly carried out Cromwell's policy of dispossessing the Irish and settling Englishmen there.