Talk:Robert Brewster (Roundhead)

"General" in the Parliamentary Army?

I can find no indication whatever that Robert Brewster MP of Wrentham Hall was a General in the Parliamentary army during the English Civil War, as claimed in former edits (which I have removed) and as suggested by the page's title. So far as I can see, this is rot. There is room for a confusion (?possibly deliberate) with Lt-General Robert Brewster in Terminator 3. If, as I suspect, this page is contaminated in this way it will have to be moved and all the links revised. One would think a General in the Civil War period would show up at least once in a Google search? Naaaah... Eebahgum (talk) 00:37, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

The statement that he was a General in the Parliamentary Army seems to have been in the article, without any supporting reference, since its creation by Motmit in 2011, and (apparently on the strength of that unsupported statement) was moved from "Robert Brewster (MP)" to new page "Robert Brewster (Roundhead)" by User:PBS, presumably as a gf disambiguation exercise, in January 2015. "Roundhead" is not a very good description for this MP but might pass: but unfortunately "Gen Robert Brewster" (several times) in Dunwich (UK Parliament constituency), and whatever clones that may have spawned, has to be corrected, and a page move might help to straighten this out. Quite a few pages link to the present Robert Brewster article, and there may be some double redirects.Eebahgum (talk) 00:52, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

Roundhead has nothing to do with whether the person was a soldier or not. It is a far better disambaguation than MP or "Parliamenterian" as it indicates the person's political support for the Parliametary cause. A man might sit on a Parliametry comittee, such as Committee for Compounding with Delinquents, and do more for the good old cause than some army officers. -- PBS (talk) 17:42, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

Indeed after the Self-denying Ordinance with a few notable exceptions like Cromwell one could not be an MP and a soldier. This of course was a device mainly to clear the nobility out of the army as unlike an MP men like Earl of Manchester could not resign their seat in the Lords. The fact he was made an MP in the middle of the war clearly shows his political allegiance. BTW did he vote for the trial of Charles I and was he asked to serve as a commisioner at the trial? -- PBS (talk) 18:04, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

The entry in the constituency and this page was created by user:Motmit 5 November 2011. Motmit was very active creating lists of MPs during the Civil War and the Commonwealth and the entries are usually accurate. It seems that the book used for this entry was {{Cite Notitia Parliamentaria}} see for example page 266 however there is no mention that he was a general, so I am not sure where (s)he obtained that fact. Of course the volume History of Parliament online 1640-1660 will be a far better source than Notitia once it is published (later this year according to the link). -- PBS (talk) 18:34, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

• I think the anomaly is to be explained by a careful reading of page 148 in Burke's Landed Gentry, edition as cited and linked in the article, which says (without source) that Robert's son Francis Brewster (who has his own article here as well) had a daughter "Amy", who married Sir Philip Skippon, MP for Dunwich, "son of Major-General Skippon the Republican General." (for whom see BCW Project). The Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology and Natural History Vol 4 p. 146 (1874), in Richard Almack's article on "Kedington and the Barnardiston Family", remarks that Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Barnardiston, married Sir Philip Skippon, Kt., of Wrentham, Suffolk, "son of the celebrated Parliamentary General who commanded the infantry for the Parliament at the battle of Naseby." (The wikilinks are obviously mine, but the identifications I suggest by them agree in date and identity.) (Almack was a distingushed antiquary who restored and surveyed the heraldic windows at Long Melford.) Paula Watson, for the younger Skippon, in History of Parliament 1660-1690 (Henning 1983), accepts both marriages, making Amy Brewster the first and Ann Barnardiston the second wife; and Skippon survives to 1691 and D.W. Hayton's article in the next volume, which also agrees. Furthermore I find that there are said to be Skippon memorials in Wrentham church, which unfortunately was still closed to visitors when I went there for the purpose of finding out that point yesterday. Putting all this together with the fact that no authority I can find refers to Robert Brewster as a military General, leads me to think it very likely that the identification of Robert Brewster as a Parliamentary General, in the former version of the WP article, arose from a misreading of Burke's Landed Gentry. I have been waiting for that vol of Hist Parl for too long to hold my breath now! But fingers crossed. Thanks for response - do you agree? Eebahgum (talk) 01:15, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
  • P.S. The Skippon-Brewster marriage (1669) (and offspring) is verified from the Skippon family bible in J.J. Howard (ed.), Miscellanea Genealogica et Topographica, New Series Vol. I (Hamilton, Adams & Co., London 1874), pp. 37-40, at p. 39 (Google). Eebahgum (talk) 01:56, 13 August 2020 (UTC)