In 1640 William Dunch sold the manor of Avebury, Wiltshire [Map] to [his father] John Stawell (age 39). Ralph's estates were sequestered after the Civil War and sold to George Long. Ralph recovered the estates at the Restoration. Ralph's son George inherited the manor in 1662. When George died in 1669 his brother Ralph Stawell 1st Baron Stawell inherited the manor. Ralph died in 1689 and his son [his son] John Stawell 2nd Baron Stawell inherited the manor. He died three years later at which time the manor was sold to Richard Holford.

In 1673 Ralph Stawell 1st Baron Stawell (age 32) was elected MP Bridgwater.

Avebury by William Stukeley. When the Lord Stowell [Note. Ralph Stawell 1st Baron Stawell], who owned the manor of Abury, levelled the vallum on that side of the town next the church, where the barn now stands, the workmen came to the original surface of the ground, which was easily discernible by a black stratum of mold upon the chalk. Here they found large quantities of bucks' horns, bones, oyster-shells, and wood coals. The old man who was employed in the work says, there was the quantity of a cart-load of the horns, that they were very rotten, that there were very many burnt bones among them.