BARRINGTON, Francis (c.1565-1628), of Hatfield Broad Oak, Essex.

Barrington succeeded his father to extensive landed property, including the former priory of Hatfield Broad Oak. In 1588 he served in camp as captain of one of the trained bands, and soon became an active county official. The Queen herself stated her good opinion of him ‘both for being of honourable blood and for the sundry good services which he doth her in the county where he resideth’. In his one Elizabethan Parliament he was named to committees concerning a procedural point (11 Nov.), privileges (8 Dec.), and silk weavers (10 Dec.). In addition, as knight of the shire for Essex, he could have served on the main business committee (3 Nov.), and on committees concerning clothworkers (18 Nov.) and monopolies (23 Nov.). He spoke in the subsidy committee (7 Nov.) and in support of the bill against blasphemous swearing (30 Nov.).3HMC 7th Rep. 539; APC, xxxii. 264; D’Ewes, 624, 635, 642, 649, 658, 673, 676; HMC Hatfield, xi. 485.

Though his mother was suspected of recusancy, Barrington had a number of puritan friends, including Robert Rich, 3rd Baron Rich, who intervened in his favour in the 1604 election. Barrington helped emigrants to New England and in Charles I’s reign openly opposed the government. He died 3 July 1628 and was buried at Hatfield Broad Oak, requesting in his will no ‘pomp or solemnity’, and recommending his children to follow ‘a holy and unspotted course all their days’.4Essex Rev. lviii. 160; Trans. Essex Arch. Soc. n.s. ii. 2-3; GEC Baronetage; PCC 70 Barrington.