been born "bereft of his wits" and died unmarried and without children at the age of 59. With his death the Baronetcy created for Willis became extinct. In literature Richard Willis appears as a character in Act II of the play Cromwell by Victor Hugo, published in Paris in 1828. In his afterword to An Instance of the Fingerpost, Iain Pears explains that much of the book's plot was inspired by the career of Willis, and his family's later, unsuccessful attempts to clear his name. Notes References 1614 births 1690 deaths Cavaliers English spies Baronets in the Baronetage of England Alumni of Christ's College, Cambridge Members of Gray's Inn 17th-century spies People from Fen Ditton Royalist military personnel of the English Civil War Prisoners in the Tower of London