Independents

In the 16th and 17th centuries in England, nonconformists who espoused total autonomy for local congregations from both the state and any established church. Independents rejected episcopacy outright and by the time of the Civil War the term meant those who even opposed a Presbyterian form of a national church. The main Independent groups were the Congregationalists and the Baptists though there were also smaller fringe groups such as the Anabaptists and the radical fifth monarchy men. Independents dominated the New Model Army.