Robert Melville Grindlay

Grindlay was born on 23 October 1786, one of eight children,[b][c] to The Reverend Dr John Grindlay DCL LLD (1756–1818) and his wife Elizabeth (d.1843) in the village of St. Mary-le-Bone (now Marylebone) near London, and baptised on 17 November of that same year at St Marylebone Parish Church.[d]

His grandparents James (died 1765) and Christina Grindlay (née Govan), attorneys at law, had emigrated to Charleston, South Carolina from Glasgow, Scotland during the early 18th century, after previous generations had resettled in Lanarkshire from the North Midlands. However, his father returned to the United Kingdom and attended Emmanuel College, Cambridge, before taking up various ecclesiastical positions at Oxford Chapel, Marylebone, Bishop's Caundle Church, Dorest, and the Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Horne, Surrey, as well various charitable enterprises, including The Philanthropic Society.

Grindlay was educated in London and left school at the age of 17, having secured a position as a cadet in the Honourable East India Company (HEIC).

Grindlay returned to England from India in 1820 and married Maria Susannah Commerell on 20 July 1821 at St Marylebone Parish Church. Maria was the daughter of John William Commerell, of Strood Green near Horsham, a Sheriff of Sussex, whose family originated from Heilbronn in Swabia, Germany,[e] where they were privy councillors and confidents of the Dukes of Württemberg; and his wife, Mary (nee Bosanquet) of Dingestow Court.

The couple established themselves at their principle London home at North Bank, Regent's Park, in the parish of St. Marylebone, and had a son, Robert Melville Grindlay, born on 12 September 1821 and baptised on 24 September 1821 at St Marylebone Parish Church, but who died in infancy later that same year.

Grindlay was uncle-in-law to Sir John Edmund Commerell, Admiral of the Fleet and William Augustus Commerell, a first-class cricketer.