Arthur Mainwaring Arthur Mainwaring Sir Arthur Mainwaring (c. 1580 – 1648) was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1624 to 1626. Mainwaring was the eldest son of Sir George Mainwaring of Ightfield, Shropshire and Ann More, daughter of William More. He was awarded BA from Brasenose College, Oxford on 7 July 1598 and MA on 15 June 1601. He began a rise to prominence working for Sir Thomas Egerton, in whose household he was steward from 1602 to 1617. John Payne Collier published records by Mainwaring relating to a performance of "Othello" for Queen Elizabeth at this
Captain Mainwaring the (fictional) suffragan Bishop of Clegthorpe and her parents look down on Captain Mainwaring for "marrying beneath her"; which may go some way to explaining Mainwaring's extreme class consciousness and slight prudery. Mainwaring talks up his own social background by claiming that his father was a "Master Tailor" but in "My Brother and I" his brother reveals that he merely owned a draper's shop. On occasion Mainwaring has even described some of Wilson's ideas as "Bolshie" (i.e. Bolshevik), when he says something along the lines of "Let's have none of your Bolshie ideas here!". Despite their various issues with each