TROUGHTON, Nicholas, of Great Linford, Bucks.

The identification of Nicholas Troughton of Great Linford as the 1601 Queenborough MP is based only on the fact that no other likely candidate has been found. Troughton’s father, a younger brother of the head of the family, may have been a servant of (Sir) William Cecil in Edward VI’s reign. His mother’s father was a clerk of the jewel house to four sovereigns and owned estates in Hertfordshire. None of Troughton’s three wives was an heiress. He himself had some sort of clerkship in Chancery. No connexion with Queenborough has been discovered. The blank return was presumably completed according to the instructions of Sir Edward Hoby, constable of Queenborough castle, on his own behalf or for a friend at court.1Vis. Bucks. (Harl. Soc. lviii), 217-18; VCH Bucks. iv. 353, 363, 366, 391; VCH Herts. iii. 60 n.44; Clutterbuck, Herts. i. 519; Nichols, Leics. iv. 201; CSP Dom. 1547-80, p. 7; C219/34.