Robert Venables (ca. 1613–1687), is a soldier during the English Civil War and noted angler.

Venables is a lieutenant-colonel in the parliamentary army and is wounded at the siege of Chester in 1645.

He is appointed governor of Liverpool in 1648, then serves with success in Ireland from 1649 until 1654.

Venables is sent as joint commander with Admiral William Penn on the Caribbean expedition against the Spanish in the West Indies in 1654.

The English forces are routed at the Siege of Santo Domingo in 1655, but manage to successfully take the Spanish colony of Jamaica for England later in the same year.

On his return to England he is sent to the Tower of London for failing to wrest the larger prize of Hispaniola from Spanish control, and cashiered in October the same year.

Venables is briefly appointed governor of Chester in 1660.

After the Restoration he buys the estate of Wincham, retires from public life, and remains a nonconformist.

He publishes a treatise on fishing, The Experienced Angler, in 1662.