John was born on 29 August 1628 at Kilkhampton in Cornwall, the third son of Sir Bevil Grenville (1596–1643) and Grace Smythe (died 1647). His aunt Elizabeth Smythe was the mother of George Monck who played a leading role in the 1660 Stuart Restoration and it was this connection that later resulted in Grenville being raised to the peerage as Earl of Bath.^[2]

One of thirteen children, John's two elder brothers died prematurely, making him heir to his father's considerable estates when Sir Bevil was killed at the Battle of Lansdowne in 1643.^[3]

During the 1638 to 1651 Wars of the Three Kingdoms, Granville fought in the regiment raised by his father for Charles I (1625–1649).^[4] Created a knight after the Storming of Bristol in 1643, he was appointed Gentleman of the Bedchamber to the future Charles II and accompanied him into exile. When the Second English Civil War began in 1648, Charles appointed him Governor of the Scilly Isles, which had rebelled against its Parliamentary garrison. As a base for Royalist privateers attacking English and Dutch vessels in the Western Approaches, this was a vital source of funding for the exiled Court; in May 1651, Parliamentary forces under Robert Blake retook the islands and Granville was captured.^[5]

On his release, Granville remained in England and continued to be active in Royalist conspiracies. In 1660, he served as an intermediary in the negotiations between Charles and his distant relative George Monck that led to the Restoration. To his disappointment, the Dukedom of Albemarle went to Monck, whom Charles also rewarded with the then-enormous pension of £7,000 per year. Instead, he was created Baron Granville, Viscount Granville and Earl of Bath in 1661, and a Privy Councillor in 1663.^[6]

In 1665, he was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, although he never went there and spent large sums of time and money on rebuilding the family home of Stowe House in Cornwall. Widely admired, it was dismantled in 1739, although many of its ornamental features, including entire rooms, can be seen at the Guildhall in South Molton, Devon.^[7] Albemarle also expanded his own ancestral seat of Potheridge, about 18 miles to the east; unfinished on his death, it was badly damaged by fire and demolished in 1734.^[8]

Granville was a signatory to The Several Declarations of The Company of Royal Adventurers of England Trading into Africa, a document published in 1667 which led to the creation of the Royal Africa Company.^[9][10] This is speculated to have been influenced by the fact that Granville was close friends with the Royal African Company's leader, the Duke of York (and future King James II), who was brother to Charles II.^[11]

Under James II, Granville served as colonel of the Earl of Bath's Regiment, later 10th Foot, first during the June 1685 Monmouth Rebellion and again in 1688. During the November 1688 Glorious Revolution, he commanded the key ports of Exeter and Plymouth but defected to William III on 18 November.^[12][13]

He was rewarded by being made Lord Lieutenant of Devon but again failed to gain the title of Albemarle and the legal dispute over the Albemarle estate almost bankrupted him. Two weeks after his death in August 1701, his son Charles shot himself, apparently overwhelmed by the debts he had inherited.^[14]

In October 1652 at Kilkhampton John Granville married Jane Wyche, a daughter of Sir Peter Wyche, English ambassador to the Ottoman Empire.^[4] By his wife, he had five children:

Sons edit

• Charles Granville, 2nd Earl of Bath (1661-1701), eldest son and heir. He died from a gunshot wound during the preparations for his father's funeral, possibly suicide. He was twice married, firstly to Lady Martha Osborne, daughter of Thomas Osborne, 1st Duke of Leeds (d. 11 September 1689, aged 25), and secondly, on 10 March 1691, to Isabella van Nassau (bapt. 20 April 1668, d. in childbirth on 30 January 1692 at London), sister of Henry Nassau d'Auverquerque, 1st Earl of Grantham. He had no children by his first wife, but by his second wife was the father of:
  • William Henry Granville, 3rd Earl of Bath (30 January 1692 – 1711) who died of smallpox aged 19 without progeny when the earldom became extinct.
• John Granville, 1st Baron Granville of Potheridge (1665–1707). Potheridge in Devon was the ancient seat of the Monck family, where the 1st Earl of Bath's cousin, close friend and collaborator in the Restoration of the Monarchy, George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle (1608–1670) had built a grand mansion. It was settled on the 1st Earl of Bath by the Duke's childless son Christopher Monck, 2nd Duke of Albemarle (1653–1688),^[15] and eventually passed to the Leveson-Gower family (see below).

Daughters edit

• Lady Jane Granville (d. 27 February 1696), wife of Sir William Leveson-Gower, 4th Baronet and mother of John Leveson-Gower, 1st Baron Gower. The progeny of this marriage were co-heirs to the 3rd Earl of Bath. Her great-grandson was Granville Leveson-Gower, 1st Marquess of Stafford (1721–1803) one of whose younger sons was Granville Leveson-Gower, 1st Earl Granville (1773–1846).
• Lady Catherine Granville, wife of Craven Peyton, Member of Parliament for Boroughbridge 1705–1713. Without progeny.

• Lady Grace Granville, suo jure 1st Countess Granville (3 September 1654 – 18 October 1744), wife of George Carteret, 1st Baron Carteret of Haynes Park, Bedfordshire, and mother of John Carteret, 2nd Baron Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville. The progeny of this marriage, Barons Carteret, Earls Granville, and Marquesses of Bath (Thynne), were co-heirs to the 3rd Earl of Bath.

He died in London in 1701, one week before his 73rd birthday.^{[citation needed]}

The armorials of the family of Granville / Grenville of Glamorgan, Devon and Cornwall are of certain form but uncertain blazon. The charges appear in the form of musical pipes of a wind instrument, similar to pan-pipes. Authoritative sources on heraldry suggest the charges to be variously "clarions" (used by Guillim (d. 1621)), the most usual blazon, which are, however, generally defined as a form of trumpet; "rests" is another common blazon, denoting lance-rests supposedly used by a mounted knight; "organ-rests" is also met with, a seemingly meaningless term (Gibbon (1682)). Other terms are "clavicymbal", "clarichord" and "sufflue" (used by Leigh in his Armory of 1562 and by Boswell, 1572),^[16] the latter being a device for blowing (French: souffler) air into an organ.^[17] Guillim suggested the charge may be a rudder,^[17] but in which case it is shown upside down, when compared to that charge used for example on the tomb at Callington of Robert Willoughby, 1st Baron Willoughby de Broke. Certainly in the brasses on the chest tomb of Sir John Bassett (d. 1529) in Atherington Church, Devon, the charges are engraved in tubular forms with vents or reeds as used in true organ pipes.

• Round, Horace (1930). Page, William (ed.). Family Origins and Other Studies. Constable & Co.
• Stater, Victor (2004). "Grenville, John, first earl of Bath". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/11492. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)