Robert Greville, 2nd Baron Brooke

Robert Greville, 2nd Baron Brooke
Robert Greville, 2nd Baron Brooke
Parliamentarian Commander Staffordshire and Warwickshire
In office August 1642 – March 1643
Lord Lieutenant of Warwickshire
In office April 1642 – March 1643
Member of Parliament for Warwick
In office January 1628 – May 1628
Personal details
Born	May 1607 Helpringham, Lincolnshire
Died	2 March 1643(1643-03-02) (aged 35) Lichfield
Resting place	Collegiate Church of St Mary, Warwick [1]
Political party	Parliamentarian
Spouse	Catherine Russell (1630–his death)
Children	Francis (1637–1658), Robert (1638–after 1680) and Fulke (1643–1710)
Alma mater	Cambridge University
Occupation	Puritan activist, author and politician
Military service
Battles/wars	First English Civil War Relief of Warwick Castle Brentford Siege of Lichfield  †

Robert Greville, 2nd Baron Brooke (May 1607 – 4 March 1643) was a radical Puritan activist from Lincolnshire. A leading opponent of Charles I of England, when the First English Civil War began in August 1642, he was appointed Parliamentarian commander in Staffordshire and Warwickshire. He was killed by a Royalist sniper at the Siege of Lichfield on 2 March 1643.

Greville was adopted at the age of four by his childless distant cousin Fulke Greville, 1st Baron Brooke, inheriting both his title and Warwick Castle in 1628. A religious Independent, he was closely associated with other Puritan opponents of the Stuart regime, including John Pym, John Hampden and Arthur Haselrig. From 1640 to 1642, he and Lord Saye were central to securing support in the House of Lords for legislation passed by the Commons.

Although not as famous as Pym and Hampden, both of whom also died in 1643,Greville's death was viewed as a significant loss by his contemporaries. Many initially preferred him as commander of the Parliamentarian armies to the Earl of Essex, while his conviction "true religion" required belief in God, rather than a specific form of worship, prefigured later divisions between Presbyterians and Independents like Oliver Cromwell.