BARKER, Sir Anthony (c.1557/8-1630), of the Rectory, Sonning, Berks.

Barker’s great-uncle acquired Holme Park in Sonning, three miles from Reading, as steward of the bishop of Salisbury, and also leased the rectory there from the dean and chapter. VCH Berks. iii. 213, 223. Barker himself was living in the rectory by 1588, perhaps after the death of his elder brother, William. STAC 8/196/22. For the elder bro. see Vis. Berks. (Harl. Soc. lvii), 64; PROB 11/55, f. 241. In 1609-10 he served as Berkshire’s sheriff, but seven years later £24 4s. 8d. remained outstanding on his account. BL, Royal C.17.XXXVI, ff. 29v-30. Shortly after he became a magistrate he was accused of encroachment on the royal manor of Sonning by its tenant, Sir Richard Lydall. STAC 8/196/22. He enjoyed the patronage of the local magnate, William Knollys†, Viscount Wallingford, who in 1620 nominated him for election at Reading, where he was high steward. The records of the Parliament show no mark of his presence, but he remained in Wallingford’s favour, and in 1623 was appointed a deputy lieutenant at his request.CSP Dom. 1623-5, p. 5. Admonished two years later for failing to proceed as a deputy against Lydall for ‘divers rebellious contempts’, he nonetheless continued in office. APC, 1625-6, p. 163. Appointed a commissioner for the Forced Loan, Barker, like many of his Berkshire colleagues, failed to attend a meeting at Reading in December 1626, and was consequently not included on the commission when it was reissued in the following February. SP16/40/39; Rymer, viii. pt. 2, p. 144.

Barker was ‘infirm and weak in body’ when he made his will on 29 Mar. 1630, and died on 1 April. He left £10 to a younger son, Nathaniel, rector of Stoke Talmage, Oxfordshire, ‘to buy him some books’, and provided £600 each for his three surviving daughters. PROB 11/157, f. 310; C142/497/144. Another of his younger sons, Anthony, was returned for Wallingford to the Long Parliament.