The generalist by Didymus
ACROSS
1 Civil War encounter on June 14th 1645 when the Parliamentarian forces decisively beat the Royalists (6,2,6)
8 Mazher Mahmood, nicknamed the “Fake …” (6)
13 Lowered the amount of local tax paid (7)
14 William Pitt the Elder, before he accepted the title of Earl of Chatham (5,8)
15 A negative vote (3,6)
16 Lacking pairs of leafy appendages at the base of a stalk (11)
17 Tropical American palms with spiny trunks and edible nuts (4-5)