Sir Gilbert Pickering, 1st Baronet, 10 March 1611 to 17 October 1668, was a member of the landed gentry from Northamptonshire, and a religious Independent who supported Parliament in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms.

[2] Pickering graduated from Emmanuel College, Cambridge in 1625, entered Gray's Inn to study law in 1629, and shortly after his 1638 marriage purchased a baronetcy in Nova Scotia.

He later became a religious Independent, one of those who rejected any State religion, and was suspected of being an Anabaptist, a sect viewed as heretical by other Protestants, and widely persecuted in both Europe and the New England Colonies as a result.

In late 1644, he supported Oliver Cromwell's criticisms of Essex and Manchester, the former for his defeat at Lostwithiel, the latter for failing to exploit victory at Marston Moor and bungling the Second Battle of Newbury.

Although Pickering largely avoided involvement, as an Independent he was generally viewed as an Army supporter,[b] and thus kept his seat in the Rump Parliament established after Pride's Purge in December 1648.