[1][2][3] The monument commemorates the heroism of the Civil War Royalist commander Sir Bevil Grenville (1596–1643) of Stowe, Kilkhampton in Cornwall and Bideford in Devon, who on 5 July 1643 fell mortally wounded at the Battle of Lansdowne, leading his regiment of Cornish pikemen.

The Royalists under Lord Hopton attacked the Parliamentarians led by Sir William Waller who occupied a commanding position on Lansdowne Hill.

On the south side is a slate tablet inscribed with a quotation from the account by Lord Clarendon (1609–1674) in his History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England of the Battle of Lansdowne (1643).

[10] Monck was the principal figure behind the Restoration of the Monarchy to King Charles II in 1660, in effecting which he was much assisted by Sir John Grenville, for which services both were elevated to the peerage.

[14] The Elegy on Sir Bevil Grenville by William Cartwright, a fellow Royalist, who died shortly after Sir Bevil on 29 November 1643, is inscribed on the monument:[15] This was not Nature’s courage nor that thing, We valour call which Time and Reason bring, But a diviner fury fierce and high, Valour transported into Ecstasy.