Edward Vaux, 4th Baron Vaux of Harrowden

Edward Vaux, 4th Baron Vaux of Harrowden (13 September 1588 – 8 September 1661) was an English peer. He was the son of George Vaux (1564–1594) and his wife Elizabeth Vaux (née Roper, born about 1564), and the grandson and heir of William Vaux, 3rd Baron Vaux of Harrowden. He succeeded his grandfather as Baron Vaux of Harrowden in August 1595, just before his seventh birthday.

The Vaux and Roper families were Catholics, and the third Baron Vaux was convicted of recusancy several times during the reign of Elizabeth I. As a minor heir to a barony, Edward Vaux became a ward of the queen on his grandfather's death. His widowed mother, known as the "Dowager of Harrowden" or (incorrectly, as her husband was never Lord Vaux) as the "Dowager Lady Vaux", devastated by the loss of her beloved husband, vowed to never remarry and devoted the rest of her life to religion. During a remodelling of the family estate at Great Harrowden in young Edward's name, she incorporated hidden rooms for the harbouring of Catholic priests including her confessor, the dashing Jesuit John Gerard. Her activities were closely watched by the authorities, and both Edward and his mother were investigated in the aftermath of the Gunpowder Plot of 1605.

For refusing to take the 1606 Oath of Allegiance to James I, entailing a denial of the pope's authority over the king, Edward was committed to the Fleet prison. He was sentenced in the Kings Bench to perpetual imprisonment and loss of property on 1 March 1612, but he was transferred to the custody of the Dean of Westminster and had a grant of his forfeited lands in October 1612. He was later released on surety of £1000.

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