[2] During the English Civil War Sands was a colonel with a regiment in the Royalist army.
As acting Governor of Worcester he successfully held the city for the Royalists during the Siege of Worcester (1643) against a Parliamentary army commanded by Sir William Waller.
[3] In 1646 towards the First English Civil War he was governor Hartlebury Castle which, on 14 May 1646, he surrendered to the besieging force under the command of Sir Thomas Morgan.
[4] In about 1654 the family mansion of The Vine, erected by William Sandys, 1st Baron Sandys, in the reign of Henry VIII was either sold, or it passed by forfeiture or composition, to Chaloner Chute, Member of Parliament for Middlesex in the Second Protectorate Parliament of 1656 and briefly its Speaker.
[1][5] Sands married Mary, daughter of William Cecil, 2nd Earl of Salisbury.