His father was a younger brother of Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick, a Puritan and later the commander of the Parliamentarian navy during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms.
[1] In 1618 his grandfather Robert Rich was created Earl of Warwick by King James I, who in 1624 granted his father the earldom of Holland.
[1] A close friend of Charles I, the first Earl of Holland held important positions at court during the 1630s and was made a Knight of the Garter.
When the First English Civil War began in August 1642, his cousin Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex, was commander-in-chief of the Parliamentarian army, and he and his son did not join the Royalist forces until July 1643.
[3] In theory, Rich thus gained a seat in the House of Lords on 9 March 1649, succeeding his father as Earl of Holland.