DANVERS, Henry (1608-43/4), of Baynton, Wilts.

Danvers’ father, Charles, was a grandson and nephew of Elizabethan sheriffs of Wiltshire, and a first cousin of Henry Danvers†, 1st earl of Danby, and Sir John Danvers*.11Aubrey, Wilts. Top. Collections, 217. A Middle Temple barrister, he had been MP for Ludgershall in 1614 and joined the county’s commission of the peace in 1616, becoming a bencher of his inn in 1623.12M. Temple Bench Bk. 183; C231/4, f. 14v; HP Commons 1604-1629. He inherited a moiety of the manors of Baynton and West Coulston in north west Wiltshire from his elder brother John, who had been an ‘idiot’ since birth, only seven months before he died, but by this time he had purchased the other moiety and acquired property in Steeple Aston through his wife.13Wilts. IPMs Charles I, 48-9; VCH Wilts. viii. 239-50. However, the survival of five sons and eight daughters, only one of whom was married at the time of his death on 21 October 1626, made substantial calls on his financial resources.14Wilts. IPMs Charles I, 49-50. In his will he requested that the earl of Danby petition for the wardship of his 18-year-old eldest son, the earl’s namesake.15PROB11/152/12. The patronage of the earl and his brother Sir John appears to explain why several of his daughters married well, in particular Elinor to Sir John Osborne and Jane (in 1629 and as her father had wished) to George Herbert†, then living with the earl prior to taking up his living at Bemerton.16Aubrey, Wilts. Top. Collections, 217; HP Commons 1604-1625. It also provides a likely backdrop to Henry Danvers’s brief political career.

Admitted early to the Middle Temple when his father was autumn reader, Danvers went on to Christ Church, Oxford, but it is not known how long he studied at either place.17M. Temple Admiss. i. 114; Al. Ox. In 1625 he and his next two brothers were co-accused in a chancery suit brought by Sir Edward Bayntun* alleging that Charles Danvers had conspired with Sir John Danvers to persuade Bayntun’s mother and Sir John’s sister, Dame Lucy Bayntun (d. 1621), to leave her property to the Danvers family. Although Charles claimed that, as his cousin’s steward in the last few years of her life, he had a legitimate right to certain leases in Bremhill, the case was unresolved at his death. Not unreasonably, Henry Danvers (still a minor) answered to the court on 14 February 1629 that he and his siblings had been too young to be privy to events that had taken place eight or nine years previously.18C2/ChasI/B53/50; C2/ChasI/B126/60.

While still a ward, Danvers married Elizabeth, younger daughter of William Bower of West Lavington, where Sir John Danvers had recently made his home.19Wilts. RO, 746/1; Vis. Wilts. 1623, 24-5; Coventry Docquets, 319. Elizabeth’s sister Anne was the wife of William Calley of Burdrop, who with his father Sir William Calley became a receiver-general of crown rents in Oxfordshire and Berkshire.20Wilts. Arch. and Nat. Hist. Mag. xxxi. 173, 178. Henry Danvers appears to have had warm relations with both Bower and the Calleys, whose court friends included Francis Cottington, 1st Baron Cottington, and Endymion Porter. In 1638 the latter agreed to forward a petition that Danvers’ child might be touched for the king’s evil, although in the event nothing seems to have come of it.21CSP Dom. 1637-8, pp. 169, 506; 1638-9, p. 68.

On 13 December 1639 Danvers was admitted with Edward Bayntun*, son of Sir Edward, as a burgess of Devizes, the closest town to his estates.22Wilts. RO, G20/1/17, f. 138. Both were elected to represent the borough in the Short Parliament, but neither made any recorded contribution to proceedings. Danvers did not sit again, being replaced as Bayntun’s partner in the autumn election by Robert Nicholas*. However, he became a capital burgess and councillor of Devizes on 18 June 1641, and four days later was placed on the commission of the peace for Wiltshire.23Wilts. RO, G20/1/17, f. 145; C231/5, p. 454. Earlier the same month William Calley the younger reported that Henry was about to accompany a servant of Sir John Danvers on an errand to Holland.24CSP Dom. 1641-3, p. 1. Danvers’ place as a justice of the peace was confirmed in August 1642, and he was named in codicils to the will of his cousin the earl of Danby dated 23 November and 3 December 1643, but he was dead by the time his father-in-law William Bower made a will on 14 September 1644.25Harl. 3990, f. 16; PROB11/194/124; PROB11/195/314. Letters of administration of his estate were granted on 27 October 1646 to his widow, who by this time had married William Yorke* of the Inner Temple, a native of Bassetts Down, Wiltshire.26Wilts. N and Q i. 326. Danvers’ sons Charles and John followed their stepfather to the Inner Temple, but neither sat in Parliament.27Al. Ox. In 1673 John sold the manor of Baynton to John Long of Little Cheverell, who already held the mortgage.28VCH Wilts. viii. 239-50.