# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mostyn, Roger (1625-1690)

​MOSTYN, Sir ROGER (1625?–1690), first baronet, royalist, born about 1625, was the son of Sir Roger Mostyn, knight, of Mostyn Hall, near Holy well, Flintshire, by Mary, daughter of Sir John Wynne of Gwydir. Sir Roger the elder (1567-1642) matriculated at Brasenose College, Oxford, on 8 May 1584, entered as a student at Lincoln's Inn in 1588 (Foster, Alumni Oxon.), was knighted on 23 May 1606, served as M.P. for Flintshire in 1621-2, died on 18 Aug. 1642, and was buried at Whiteford.
During the earlier conflicts between Charles I and parliament, the sympathies of the Mostyn family were on the side of the king, and the loyal address of the people of Flintshire, presented to Charles at York on 4 Aug. 1642, was probably inspired by Sir Roger or his father. When the king formally declared war and visited Chester towards the end of September, young Roger Mostyn and Captain Salesbury arrived there with troops of Welshmen, who, after the king's departure, ransacked the houses of supposed parliamentarians (Phillips, Civil War in Wales and the Marches, i. 112, ii. 15). In January 1642-3, Mostyn, described by this time as colonel, brought a large number of Welshmen into Chester, and once more they gave vent to their loyalty by sacking the town-house of Sir William Brereton (ib. i. 142). Being appointed governor of Flint Castle, he repaired it and put it in a state of defence at his own cost, but in the autumn of 1643 after a long siege, during which the garrison were reduced to eating their horses, it was surrendered to Brereton and Sir Thomas Myddelton [q. v.] on honourable terms, as were also both the town and castle of Mostyn (Whitelocke, Memorials, p. 78; The Kingdom's Weekly Intelligencer, No. 23, p. 257). Shortly afterwards, on 18 Nov., a troop of Irish soldiers landed at Mostyn, and the parliamentarians withdrew hastily from that district. Mostyn also raised some Welsh recruits, and combining with the Irish captured Hawarden Castle (Whitelocke, loc. cit.), after a fortnight's siege, and probably proceeded afterwards to Chester. Lord Byron, complaining of the defenceless state of Chester in a letter addressed to Lord Digby on 26 April 1645, stated that he was 'left in the towne only with a garryson of citizens, and my owne and Colonell Mostin's regiment, which both together made not up above 600 men, whereof the one halfe being Mostin's men, I was forced soone after to ​ send out of towne,' owing to their undisciplined conduct (Cal. State Papers, Dom. Ser. 1645). Towards the end of the year Mostyn went over to Ireland to try and muster recruits for the relief of Chester, and returned in January 1645–6 with a 'piece of a regiment,' some hundred and sixty men, and was expected 'to make it up two hundred upon his own credit,' in his own county, where he was a commissioner of array and peace (Letter from Archbishop Williams to Lord Astley, dated Conway, 25 Jan. 1645-6, printed in Phillips's Civil War, ii. 290-1). These troops, and other royalist forces collected in North Wales under Lord St. Paul, were, however, prevented from marching to Chester by Colonel Mytton, who was despatched by Brereton to intercept them, and caused them to retreat to Denbigh and Conway. Mostyn himself succeeded in evading his enemies at the time and for many years after, but in May 1658 was captured by Colonel Carter at Conway. Whitelocke, however, who had married a member of the Mostyn family, procured his immediate release, 'upon his parole to be at his own house at Mostyn' (Memorials, p. 673). At the Restoration he was created a baronet, 3 Aug. 1660.
Mostyn is described by Whitelocke (ib. p. 78) as 'a gentleman of good address, and mettle, of a very ancient family, large possessions, and great interest in the county, so that in twelve hours he raised fifteen hundred men for the king.' He is said to have spent some 60,000l. in the service of the king, and his house at Mostyn stripped of all its valuables, so that after his release on parole he was so impoverished that he had to lie for many years in strict seclusion at a farmhouse called Plasucha; but by 1684 his fortunes were so improved, probably by profits derived from lead and coal mines which he worked by means of large engines (a drawing is given by Dineley in his Beaufort Progress, 1888 ed. p. 95), that he provided on 23 July 1684 at Mostyn a 'very great and noble entertainment' for the Duke of Beaufort and his suite on their official progress through Wales. He was then in command of the Flintshire militia, one company of which was composed of his servants, miners, and other adherents, clothed and paid at his own expense, and he was complimented on their smart manoeuvres (ib. pp. 91-2).
He died in 1690, having been thrice married; his second wife, of whom there is a portrait at Mostyn, being Mary, the eldest daughter of Thomas, Lord Bulkeley of Baron Hill, Beaumaris (Pennant, Hist. of Whiteford and Holywell, pp. 60-3). Sir Roger Mostyn, third baronet (1675-1739) [q. v.], was a grandson.
A portrait of Sir Roger Mostyn, which, according to a recently deciphered inscription, was painted by Sir Peter Lely in 1652, when the sitter is said to have been 28 years of age, is preserved at Mostyn Hall, and a copy of it by Leonard Hughes was presented at Christmas 1887 by Lord Mostyn to the corporation of Flint (Archæologia Cambrensis, 5th ser. viii. 110-13). In this Sir Roger is represented at kit-cat length, in a strange flaxen wig, a breast plate, buff skirts, and antique Roman sleeves a negro holding his helmet (Taylor, Historic Notices of Flint, p. 139).
[For the pedigree of the Mostyn family see Dwnn's Heraldic Visitations, ii. 307-9; Phillips's Civil War in Wales and Marches; Historic Notices of Flint, passim.]
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