Richard Ottley

Sir Richard Ottley (5 August 1626 – 10 August 1670) was an English Royalist politician and soldier who served as a youth in the English Civil War in Shropshire. After the Restoration he played a prominent part in the repression of Parliamentarians and Nonconformists and was MP for Shropshire in the Cavalier Parliament. Background, early life and education Richard Ottley was the eldest son of Sir Francis Ottley of Pitchford, Shropshire, who was military governor of Shrewsbury for part of the English Civil War Lucy Edwards, daughter of Thomas Edwards of the College, Shrewsbury. She was the widow of Thomas Pope, another Shrewsbury resident. The Ottley family were part of the landed gentry of Shropshire and claimed descent from the more ancient Ottleys of Oteley, near Ellesmere, Shropshire. However, Thomas Ottley, the ancestor who bought Pitchford Hall in 1473, was a Merchant of the Staple with a house in Calais as well as in Shrewsbury. The Ottleys of Pitchford owed their status to wealth made as merchants of the thriving county town, with its monopoly in the finishing of Welsh cloth.