[2] Dove's influence within the county and at Westminster enabled him to acquire a considerable fortune, with which he was able to purchase sequestered royalist and episcopal estates at Fountell in Hampshire,[5] Blewbury in Berkshire,[6] and Winterbourne Earls in Wiltshire.
In 1655, whilst serving as Sheriff of Wiltshire, he was captured at Salisbury during the Penruddock uprising, narrowly escaping being hanged thanks to the intervention of some of the rebels.
[2] On 29 March 1655, Dove wrote to Secretary Thurloe that he had heard there was to be a commission of oyer and terminer for the trial of "rebels" (Royalists captured during and after the Penruddock uprising) in the west of England.
He promised that there should be no juror chosen for either jury who could not be depended upon to be well disposed to the government of the day and recommended Thurloe to proceed capitally against the "chief actors that were commissionated, as they said, by Charles Stuart".
[1] Dove was removed from the Salisbury corporation under its new charter of 1656, but was restored in 1659, when he also resumed his seat in the Rump Parliament.