Life

Grew was born at Atherstone

Atherstone

Atherstone is a town in Warwickshire, England. The town is located near the northernmost tip of Warwickshire, close to the border with Staffordshire and Leicestershire and is the administrative headquarters of the borough of North Warwickshire.-History:...

, Warwickshire

Warwickshire

Warwickshire is a landlocked non-metropolitan county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, although the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare...

 on 1 November 1607, the third son of Francis Grew and Elizabeth Denison. He was baptised the same day at the parish church of Mancetter

Mancetter

Mancetter is a village and civil parish on the outskirts of Atherstone in North Warwickshire, at the crossing of Watling Street over the River Anker.-History:...

, Warwickshire. Francis Grew was a layman, originally of good estate but impoverished by prosecutions for nonconformity in the high commission court and Star-chamber. Obadiah was educated at Reading

Reading, Berkshire

Reading is a large town and unitary authority area in England. It is located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the River Thames and River Kennet, and on both the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway, some west of London....

, under his uncle, John Denison, and was admitted a student at Balliol College, Oxford

Balliol College, Oxford

Balliol College , founded in 1263, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England but founded by a family with strong Scottish connections....

, in 1624, his tutor being Richard Trimnell. He graduated B.A. on 12 February 1629, M.A. on 5 July 1632. In 1632 he was elected master of the Atherstone grammar school.

He was ordained in 1635 by Robert Wright

Robert Wright (bishop)

-Life:Wright was born of humble parentage in St Albans, Hertfordshire, in 1560, and probably attended the refounded free school there , where preference was given to poor scholars of the borough. He matriculated at Trinity College, Oxford in 1574 at the age of 14, was elected to a scholarship in...

, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield. He was probably lecturer at Atherstone, as well as master of the school. At the outbreak of the First English Civil War

First English Civil War

The First English Civil War began the series of three wars known as the English Civil War . "The English Civil War" was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations that took place between Parliamentarians and Royalists from 1642 until 1651, and includes the Second English Civil War and...

 he sided with the parliamentary party. Among the thirty parliamentary divines who crowded into Coventry

Coventry

Coventry is a city and metropolitan borough in the county of West Midlands in England. Coventry is the 9th largest city in England and the 11th largest in the United Kingdom. It is also the second largest city in the English Midlands, after Birmingham, with a population of 300,848, although...

 for safety in 1642 were Richard Vines

Richard Vines

Richard Vines was an English clergyman, one of the Presbyterian leaders of the Westminster Assembly. He became Master of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, from 1644 to 1650.-Life:...

, rector of Weddington, Warwickshire, and Grew, his near neighbour. Both were appointed to preach at St. Michael's Church, which the royalist vicar. William Panting, had deserted. At the end of 1643 the solemn league and covenant

Solemn League and Covenant

The Solemn League and Covenant was an agreement between the Scottish Covenanters and the leaders of the English Parliamentarians. It was agreed to in 1643, during the First English Civil War....

 was taken in St. Michael's by all the parishioners. In March 1644 Grew obtained the vicarage from the city corporation. The vestry books of 1645 show some puritan changes; the old font

Baptismal font

A baptismal font is an article of church furniture or a fixture used for the baptism of children and adults.-Aspersion and affusion fonts:...

 was replaced by a new one, and the brass eagle was sold. The bells, however, were kept in order.

In 1646 Grew took part with John Bryan in a public disputation on infant baptism

Infant baptism

Infant baptism is the practice of baptising infants or young children. In theological discussions, the practice is sometimes referred to as paedobaptism or pedobaptism from the Greek pais meaning "child." The practice is sometimes contrasted with what is called "believer's baptism", or...

 at Trinity Church, with Hanserd Knollys

Hanserd Knollys

-Life:He was born at Cawkwell, Lincolnshire, about 1599. He was educated privately under a tutor, was for a short time at Great Grimsby grammar school, and afterwards matriculated at St Catharine's College, Cambridge in 1627 or 1629. Leaving the university, he became master of the grammar school at...

 and another. Towards the end of 1648 Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell was an English military and political leader who overthrew the English monarchy and temporarily turned England into a republican Commonwealth, and served as Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland....

 was in Coventry on his way to London from Scotland; Grew pleaded with him for the king's life. On 10 October 1651 he accumulated the degrees of B.D. and D.D. at Oxford. In 1654 he was made assistant to the Warwickshire commission for removing scandalous ministers. He was a member of the Kenilworth

Kenilworth

Kenilworth is a town in central Warwickshire, England. In 2001 the town had a population of 22,582 . It is situated south of Coventry, north of Warwick and northwest of London....

 classis, which included over twenty churches. He approved the rising of the 'new royalists ' in August 1659 (see George Booth

George Booth, 1st Baron Delamer

George Booth, 1st Baron Delamer , known as Sir George Booth, 2nd Baronet, from 1652 to 1661, was an English peer.-Civil War:...

) and though threatened by John Lambert

John Lambert (general)

John Lambert was an English Parliamentary general and politician. He fought during the English Civil War and then in Oliver Cromwell's Scottish campaign , becoming thereafter active in civilian politics until his dismissal by Cromwell in 1657...

's soldiers, then holding Coventry, refused to read the proclamation against Booth, as required by authority. He welcomed the Restoration

English Restoration

The Restoration of the English monarchy began in 1660 when the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were all restored under Charles II after the Interregnum that followed the Wars of the Three Kingdoms...

.

Unable to comply with the Uniformity Act of 1662, he resigned his living. His bishop, John Hacket

John Hacket

John Hacket was an English churchman, Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry from 1661 until his death.-Life:He was born in London and educated at Westminster and Trinity College, Cambridge. On taking his degree he was elected a fellow of his college, and soon afterwards wrote the comedy, Loiola , which...

, was anxious to retain him, and gave him leave to preach a month beyond the appointed day (24 August) without conforming; at the end of September he preached his farewell sermon. The corporation seems to have continued some allowance to him. In 1665, when the alarm of the plague thinned the pulpits throughout the country, Grew, like other nonconformists, began to hold public meetings for worship. The enforcement of the Five Mile Act, which took effect on 25 March 1666, compelled him to move from Coventry. He returned on the indulgence of 15 March 1672, took out a license, and, in conjunction with Bryan, founded a presbyterian congregation. On the withdrawal of the indulgence (1673) the conventicle

Conventicle

A conventicle is a small, unofficial and unofficiated meeting of laypeople, to discuss religious issues in a non-threatening, intimate manner. Philipp Jakob Spener called for such associations in his Pia Desideria, and they were the foundation of the German Evangelical Lutheran Pietist movement...

 was connived at by the corporation in spite of Lord Arlington

Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington

Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington KG, PC was an English statesman.- Background and early life :He was the son of Sir John Bennet of Dawley, Middlesex, and of Dorothy Crofts. He was the younger brother of John Bennet, 1st Baron Ossulston; his sister was Elizabeth Bennet who married Robert Kerr,...

's remonstrances.

On Bryan's death (1675) his brother, Gervase Bryan, took his place. Grew began to train youths for the ministry, one of his pupils being Samuel Pomfret. Captain Hickman of Barnacle, Warwickshire, unsuccessfully appeared as an informer against Grew, claiming a fine of £100 in the recorder's court. At length in 1682 Grew, who had lost his eyesight, was convicted of a breach of the Five Mile Act, and imprisoned for six months in Coventry gaol. While in prison, and in his retirement from Coventry after his release, he every week dictated a sermon to an amanuensis, who read it to four or five shorthand writers, each of whom got several copies made for use in twenty clandestine meetings. On 8 January 1685 nearly two hundred persons were imprisoned at Coventry for frequenting these conventicles.

James II's declaration for liberty of conscience (11 April 1687) restored Grew to his congregation, who obtained a grant of St. Nicholas' Hall (the 'Leather Hall') in West Orchard

West Orchard

West Orchard is a small village in the rural Blackmore Vale area of north Dorset, England, adjacent to East Orchard, from which it is separated by a stream, and situated half way between Shaftesbury and Sturminster Newton. The village has a population of 77 .- External links :*...

, and fitted it up as a presbyterian meeting-house. Here Grew officiated till September 1689. He died on 22 October of that year, and was buried in the chancel of St. Michael's.

Family

He married (25 December 1637) Helen (born February 1603, died 19 Oct. 1687), daughter of Gregory Vicars of Treswell, Nottinghamshire, widow of William Sampson of South Leverton, Nottinghamshire, and mother of Henry Sampson, M.D. His only son was Nehemiah Grew

Nehemiah Grew

Nehemiah Grew was an English plant anatomist and physiologist, very famously known as the "Father of Plant Physiology"...

; he had also a daughter Mary (d. 1703), married to John Willes, M.A., a nonconformist scholar, who though ordained never preached, and retired after Grew's death to his estate at Spratton

Spratton

Spratton is a village and civil parish in the English county of Northamptonshire. The local government authority is Daventry District Council. At the time of the 2001 census, the parish's population was 1,099 people. Spratton is 7.1 miles north of Northampton, 6.5 miles from Long Buckby and 11.4...

, Northamptonshire

Northamptonshire

Northamptonshire is a landlocked county in the English East Midlands, with a population of 629,676 as at the 2001 census. It has boundaries with the ceremonial counties of Warwickshire to the west, Leicestershire and Rutland to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshire to the south-east,...

.

Grew's eldest brother Jonathan (died before June 1646) was father of Jonathan Grew (1626–1711). The latter was educated at Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, was preacher at Framlingham, Suffolk, and tutor in the family of Lady Hales, first at Coventry, and afterwards at Caldecote Hall, Warwickshire. Bishop Hacket offered him in 1662 a prebend at Lichfield in addition to the rectory of Caldecote, but he declined to conform, kept a school at Newington Green, and finally became the first minister (1698–1711) of the presbyterian congregation at Dagnal Lane, St. Albans, Hertfordshire. He was buried in the abbey church there.

Works

He published:

• His 'Farewell Sermon,' 1663, Acts xx. 32.
• 'A Sinner's Justification,', &c.,1670, 1698, 1785 (in Welsh).
• 'Meditations upon Our Saviour's Parable of the Prodigal,' &c., 1678.