ARUNDELL, John II (d.1696), of Trevedarte, Duloe, Cornw.

John Arundell II was the elder son of the MP for West Looe, Thomas Arundell, and his first wife, so must have been born some time between 1619, when his parents married, and 1624, when his bereaved father remarried. At the time of his election as a recruiter for the same seat, in January 1647, John was thus probably in his mid-twenties.8Underdown, Pride’s Purge, 366. He was present in the Commons on 9 June 1647, when he took the Covenant, but on 16 September he was given leave to go into the country, and that permission was extended on 20 November.9CJ v. 203a, 306a, 364b. In 1648, Arundell was again at Westminster, and was named to the committee appointed on 10 June to consider the way of proceeding against the Welsh gentleman, Sir John Owen, who had led the royalist insurgents in north Wales during the second civil war; but on 27 November he was again allowed to go into the country.10CJ v. 593a; vi. 89a. Arundell was secluded from the Commons after Pride’s Purge in December 1648.11A List of the Imprisoned and Secluded Members (1648, 669.f.13.52); Underdown, Pride’s Purge, 366.

Arundell succeeded to the main family estates on the death of his father in November 1648, although other properties in Moore Winstow parish went to his younger brother, Francis.12PROB11/206/146. On 11 April 1649 he was recognised as heir to his father’s freehold interest in West Looe, and during the 1650s he continued to enjoy the town rents on the payment of £4 a year.13Cornw. RO, B/WLO/63/1, f. 30; B/WLO/32, 35, 36. Although there is no indication that he actively collaborated with the Cromwellian regime, he remained an influential figure at West Looe, and in January 1659, when the borough elections were decided, he entertained the burgesses with wine at Duloe, and in March the corporation returned the compliment.14Cornw. RO, B/WLO/35. In March 1660 Arundell was appointed as a militia commissioner for Cornwall, and in October he was confirmed as a freeholder of West Looe in his own right.15A. and O.; Cornw. RO, B/WLO/63/1, f. 74. Thereafter, he seems to have played little part even in local affairs. He died in 1696 and was buried at Duloe. The family pedigree refers to a ‘John Arundell junior’, who was probably his son and heir.16Vivian, Vis. Cornw. 14.