Robert Bolton

1572-1631. Puritan preacher. He went to Lincoln College, Oxford, in 1592 and became a fellow of Brasenose in 1602. He took part in a disputation before James I in 1605. Before entering the ministry, Bolton was brought to an experience of conversion. He became rector of Broughton, Northamptonshire, in 1610 and remained there for the rest of his life. He was a typical Jacobean Puritan. Baxter* later named him with others of his contemporaries such as Preston and Sibbes as “an excellent sort of conforming ministers.” They were men who accepted the basis of the national church in episcopacy and a liturgy, but preached Puritan theology which they applied in their pastoral work, and desired the reform of some of the ceremonies. Robert's son, Dr. Samuel Bolton, conformed at the Restoration and became a prebend of Westminster and chaplain-in- ordinary to Charles II.