Denzil Holles, 1st Baron Holles

Colonel Denzil Holles, 1st Baron Holles was an English politician and army officer who was one of the Five Members whose attempted arrest by Charles I in January 1642 sparked the First English Civil War. When fighting began in August, Holles raised a Parliamentarian regiment which fought at Edgehill before it was nearly destroyed at Brentford in November 1642. This marked the end of Holles' military career and he became leader of the Parliamentarian 'Peace Party', those who favoured a negotiated settlement with the king. A social conservative from a wealthy family, he came to see political radicals like the Levellers and religious Independents like Oliver Cromwell as more dangerous than the Royalists.