ABSTRACT
The impact of the Civil War on overseas merchants was mitigated by the greater range of economic options open to them compared to other sectors of London society. They could more readily disengage from the domestic economy because it was relatively easy for them to move their capital out of the country. Importers were able to redirect their shipments to foreign markets. It is possible that cloth exporters compensated for their inability to obtain stocks from royalist controlled regions by establishing alternative sources of supply in the Netherlands.2 None of these options would have been as profitable as their pre-war trade. Because of the Thirty Years' War, which continued until 1648, the economic situation in much of Europe was probably worse than in England. In 1643 the East India Company lamented to their agents in India that not only was trade bad in England but 'all Europe in little better Condition, but in a turmoyle either forraighne or domestique warr' .3 In 1644 one London merchant wrote that 'all Christendome is now in Combustion and wars is the Ruyne of all' .4
