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'Sir Robert Harley' (1579–1656) was an English statesman who served as Master of the Mint for Charles I and later supported the parliamentarians during the English Civil War.
He was the son of Thomas Harley of Brampton Bryan in Herefordshire. After his first marriage in 1603, he served in various local offices in Herefordshire and Radnorshire, including representing Radnor in Parliament in 1604 and for Herefordshire in 1624 and 1626. In 1623 he married Brilliana daughter of Sir Edward Conway, one of the Secretaries of State, and acted his aid in Parliament. He was rewarded for this by being appointed Master of the Mint. He was deprived of this office in 1635 but reinstated in 1643. During this period, his attitude was more that of a country gentleman than of a courtier.
In religion (like Brilliana), Harley was a puritan, taking an anti-Catholic and later also anti-Arminian line. He was elected to both Parliaments in 1640, where he opposed ship money, Laudian ecclesiastical innovations and the Scottish War. This led him to join the Parliamentary party.
He was an active member of that party both in Parliament and in Herefordshire, Brampton Bryan Castle undergoing siege in 1643 and 1644. On September 30 1642, Parliamentarians led by Harley and Henry Grey, 1st Earl of Stamford occupied the city without opposition. In December, they withdrew to Gloucester because of the presence in the area of a Royalist army under Lord Herbert.
His support for reconciliation with the king led to his being excluded from the House of Commons in Pride's Purge. He and his son Edward were imprisoned until after the king's execution. He resigned as Master of the Mint in May 1649 and took no further part in politics.
He left several sons, his heir Edward being the father of Queen Anne's Lord Treasurer Robert Harley, 1st Earl of Oxford and Mortimer.

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Further reading

★ Jacqueline Eales, 'Harley, Sir Robert (1579-1656)' ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004 (article 12343).