Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick
by Van Dyck

Behind the Pilgrims were powerful figures in England, led by Robert Rich, Earl of Warwick. Warwick was a profoundly religious man. Together with other like-minded Puritan gentry, he wanted to reform England. But it that proved impossible he wanted the alternative option of a reformed colony in the Americas. Throughout the 1620s he was busy organizing groups of religious settlers, mainly from the West Country, East Anglia and Essex, and London - where strict Protestantism was strongest - to undertake the American venture.