RALEGH (RALEIGH, RAWLEIGH), Carew (Carey) (1605-66), of Kempton Park, Mdx., Horsley, Surr., and St Martin’s Lane, Westminster.

Ralegh, the youngest son of the great Elizabethan courtier and adventurer, was descended from old-established families with extensive connections among the gentry and a record of public service. His Devonian paternal grandfather, Walter Ralegh† (d. 1581) represented Wareham, Dorset, in Queen Mary’s last Parliament and his father, Sir Walter Ralegh† (a younger son with a meagre inheritance), sat in five Elizabeth Parliaments for seats in Devon, Cornwall and Dorset. On his mother’s side, his great-grandfather, Sir Nicholas Carew† of Beddington, sat for Surrey in 1529, while 11 Throckmortons were MPs in Elizabeth’s reign.33HP Commons 1509-1558; HP Commons 1558-1603. But Ralegh himself was born in the Tower of London after the accession of James VI and I and the political downfall of his father. While the death of his elder brother Walter on the ill-fated Guiana expedition of 1617-18 made him, at 13 years old, Sir Walter’s heir, his father’s attainder which followed deprived him of proudly-acquired estates. The quest to restore what had been lost was to dominate his life and shape his career in Parliament.

Early career

The precise residue of wealth remaining in the hands of his mother Lady Ralegh is unclear. Aside from a notional pension of £400 a year she was, for example, engaged in lawsuits over property in Devon and Gloucestershire.34SP16/103, f. 5; C2/JasI/R9/34; C3/331/65 But she had a reputation as a capable, not to say domineering, woman, being ‘of very high spirit’ according to her son, and she seems by her own efforts to have increased her income during the 1620s.35A Brief Relation of Sir Walter Raleghs Troubles (1669), 7; Beer, Bess, 229-51. She had powerful friends and the considerable reputation of her late husband was kept alive by the publication and appreciative citation of his works.36Beer, Bess, 231-3, 240-1, 244, 247. After a period at Wadham College, Oxford, in 1623 or 1624 Ralegh was introduced to the royal court by William Herbert, 3rd earl of Pembroke, and a campaign was launched for his restitution in blood and consequent rights of inheritance. However, the king was alleged to have been disturbed at the sight of one who ‘appeared to him like the ghost of his father’ (evoking, by implication, feelings of guilt over responsibility for Sir Walter’s execution) and the interest of John Digby, 1st earl of Bristol, to whom Sir Walter’s principal estate at Sherborne had now come, helped deny royal assent to a bill of restitution which passed both Houses of Parliament.37A Brief Relation, 9; SP14/163, ff.8, 9; LJ iii. 429b. Advised by Pembroke to travel abroad, Ralegh departed, returning only after the accession of Charles I.38SP16/521, f. 59.

Renewed attempts to prosecute his cause in Parliament once again encountered representations from Bristol, but in May 1628 a compromise was reached: Ralegh secured statutory restitution at the cost of surrendering his claim to Sherborne.39SP16/21, f. 9; SP16/103, f.5; LJ iii. 503-4, 821b. Soon afterwards he married a rich widow and kinswoman of George Villiers, 1st duke of Buckingham, a match which probably assisted him further in the purchase from Thomas Wriothesley, 4th earl of Southampton, of an estate at East Horsley, near Guildford in Surrey.40VCH Surr. iii. 326, 350. Twenty miles from Beddington, the seat of his maternal uncle Sir Nicholas Carew† alias Throckmorton, it underpinned his entry into the county community. In October 1629, designated ‘Sir’, he was placed on the commission of the peace, the mistaken title apparently attributable to confusion with his uncle Sir Carew Ralegh† (d. 1627), whose base had been in Dorset and Wiltshire.41Coventry Docquets, 63.

East Horsley was also a convenient base for pursuing ambitions and claims with his Carew relatives at court. In 1630 Ralegh danced in the masque Loves Triumph, written by his mother’s friend Ben Jonson, while the publication two years later of Sir Walter’s Instructions to his Son, evidently addressed to him and proving highly popular, served to fix him further in the public eye.42Ben Jonson ed. C.H. Herford, P. Simpson, x. 437; Beer, Bess, 244. In 1634 he petitioned for arrears of a pension due to his wife, Lady Philippa, amounting to £2,765 and secured a recommendation that he be allowed land in lieu, although the eventual outcome is unclear.43SP16/260, ff. 136, 138. However, within about a year he was admitted a gentleman of the privy chamber, where gossip reported in January 1637 that his kinswoman Katherine Wotton, the widowed Lady Stanhope, had fallen in love with him.44Knowler, Strafforde Letters, ii. 47-8; ‘Stanhope, Katherine’, Oxford DNB; LJ ix. 520b. He contributed to a collection of verse set to music by court composer Henry Lawes (eventually published in 1653 as Ayrs and Dialogues), while his own position at court attracted the dedication of at least one edition of a work by his father.45LC5/134/50; W. Ralegh, The Life and Death of Mahomet (1637), sig. A4-5. Following the latter’s example, he invested in projects – in fisheries (1636) and by 1639 in the ambitious scheme spearheaded by Sir Edward Stradling* to bring water to London by aqueduct from Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire.46SP16/325, f. 138; CSP Dom. 1639, p. 481; Coventry Docquets, 235.

That year Ralegh served with two horses under Algernon Percy†, 4th earl of Northumberland, in the northern campaign; among fellow courtiers in his troop was the poet and playwright Sir William Killigrew.47SP16/427/71. Anthony Wood later observed waspishly that Ralegh lacked his father’s capacities both in ‘sword’ and ‘pen’, but he seems to have inherited a concern for honour and a quick temper.48Wood, Ath. Oxon. ii. 244-5. In attendance on the king at Oatlands that July, he drew his sword on Sir William St Ravée, for which he was committed for a week to the Fleet prison, temporarily banished from court and compelled to enter a bond of £1,000 for good behaviour.49HMC 4th Rep. 294. The cloud soon lifted, however. By July 1640 he had acquired from the king Kempton Park, a substantial estate conveniently placed for court duties.50SP16/460, f. 194.

No evidence has come to light suggesting candidature at either of the parliamentary elections of 1640. Over succeeding months he occasionally came to the notice of the Houses, as in February 1642 when, on the motion of either Sir Henry Vane I or Sir Henry Vane II, he was one of those allowed to stand bail for Killigrew, who had offended against parliamentary privilege in canvassing support for the king in the lead-up to the abortive arrest of the Five Members.51PJ i. 404; ‘Killigrew, Sir William’, Oxford DNB. In March 1641 and May 1642 he and others were summoned to account for £7,000 raised by public lottery for the aqueduct.52LJ iv. 177b; CJ ii. 585b.

Civil wars, 1642-8

On the outbreak of war, if not before, that scheme unravelled.53Black, Docquets of Letters Patent, 345. Ralegh was named by the king to the commission of array, but seems to have taken no action.54Northants. RO, FH133. Colonel Henry Marten* was sufficiently suspicious of him to confiscate his horses, but following investigation, the Lords concluded on 18 August 1643 that Ralegh had provided a satisfactory answer to their examinations, and ordered that the horses be returned to him for use by parliamentary forces in Middlesex.55LJ vi. 186a. Perhaps his status as the son of a man who seemed a martyr of royal tyranny and a champion of parliamentary sovereignty guaranteed him relatively sympathetic consideration.56e.g. [W. Ralegh], The Prerogative of Parliaments in England (1640); The Prince, or Maxims of State (1642, E.132.31); [anon], The Arraignment and Conviction of Sir Walter Rawleigh (1648, E.435.19). It is unclear for how long and to what extent he continued to fulfil his duties in the privy chamber. He kept some form of contact with those around the king but managed to convince Parliament that this was within reasonable limits. Assessed at £200 in Middlesex in March 1644, he was soon discharged on the grounds of his having already subscribed £130 and his wife having been taxed in Gloucestershire.57CCAM 358. In April 1645 the Lords referred to the Commons a request from Mary Stuart, countess of Richmond, for leave to come to Ralegh’s house in Middlesex in order to receive treatment from the royal physician usually resident in London, Sir Theodore Turquet de Mayerne, while in February 1646 Ralegh was allowed to visit his wife’s kinsman the royalist defector Thomas Savile, Baron Savile, confined to the Tower following his accusations against Denzil Holles* and Bulstrode Whitelocke*.58LJ vii. 39a; viii. 146b. In spring 1646 Ralegh had several visits at Kempton Park from the grandson of his wife’s first husband and convert from royalism, Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper*.59Christie, Life of Shaftesbury, i. app. ii, pp. xxxiii-iv. Eighteen months later, in a gesture alternatively friendly, mischievous or deliberately damaging, Charles I, in sorting out his personal effects, very publicly returned to him a picture of Lady Stanhope.60LJ ix. 520b.

Throughout the decade Ralegh evidently remained close to his Carew cousins, who had stayed loyal to the king. Following the death of his uncle Sir Nicholas in 1644, Ralegh inherited, or more probably bought, his estate at West Horsley, funding the acquisition by selling that at East Horsley.61VCH Surr. iii. 326, 350, 354; Evelyn, Diary, ii. 545n.; JRL, NP/39, NP/43, NP/48. Having stood surety for the fine for delinquency imposed on his spendthrift cousin Francis Carew†, when the latter died in April 1649 Ralegh was left with the financial burden and the guardianship of the heir, Nicholas Carew†.62CCC 841; HP Commons 1604-1629, ‘Francis Carew II’; HP Commons 1660-1690, ‘Sir Nicholas Carew’. It was thus against a backdrop not only of his own longstanding quest for recompense from the crown but also of his relatives’ liabilities for their royalism that in July 1649 Ralegh was elected to the Rump Parliament as a Member for Haslemere, some 20 miles south west of Horsley. The issue of confiscated lands was to dominate his parliamentary service and complicate his allegiances, although he also made a substantial contribution to proceedings on a variety of other matters of importance.

The Rump, 1649-53

Admitted to the Rump on 17 July, Ralegh received eight committee nominations in the next eight days, as well as appointment to the Surrey committee and all others relating to the county.63CJ vi. 262a, 263b, 267a, 267b, 269a, 269b, 270a. This suggested many well-wishers, or at least a widespread assumption that he would be useful. He was to be the most visibly active of the new entrants to Parliament.64Worden, Rump Parliament, 391. Around a hundred committee appointments came his way at more or less regular intervals until the dissolution in April 1653, with significant gaps occurring only in December 1649-January 1650 and October-November 1651. A teller in 24 divisions from 7 November 1650, he had an array of partners and opponents. Any attempt to reconstruct his lasting alliances seems fraught with difficulty: while he three times opposed that ‘bulwark against radical tendencies’ Sir Arthur Hesilrige* and never partnered him, his most frequent partners (three times each) were the radical Henry Marten* and the moderate Sir William Masham*; but Masham was also his opponent twice and Marten his most frequent opponent (five times).65Worden, Rump Parliament, 66.

Surprisingly, since there is no previous indication of particular piety and his father was regarded in some quarters as an ‘atheist’, Ralegh’s first nomination was to consider the process of presentations to benefices (18 July 1649) and was soon followed by another to review articles of religion (26 July).66CJ vi. 263b, 270a. Added to the Committee for Plundered Ministers on 5 September (first in a list) and again on 4 July 1650, he was not among the visible core of activists.67CJ vi. 290a, 437a. But he was still named to discuss the act for propagating the gospel in St Albans (5 Sept. 1651) and measures for dealing with Catholic recusants (30 June 1652) and, having been added (again first) to the committee for regulating the universities of Oxford and Cambridge (29 Mar. 1650), was sufficiently committed to act as a teller for the majority who supported the appointment of Independent army chaplain John Owen* as dean of Christ Church (4 Mar. 1651).68CJ vi. 388b, 549b; vii. 12b, 141a, 147a.

In an assembly where law reform was high on the agenda, Ralegh – with no legal education but with experience of being at the receiving end of justice – was placed on several committees in this area, including the key committees for receiving the representations of civil lawyers (25 July 1649), law proceedings (25 Oct. 1650), nominating commissioners for reform (26 Dec. 1651), establishing a high court of justice (1 Jan. 1652) and receiving the commissioners’ report on ‘the inconveniencies of the law’ (19 Mar. 1652).69CJ vi. 270a, 488a; vii. 58b, 62a, 107b. He was appointed to committees dealing with subsidiary issues such as the renewal of the poor laws (1 Mar. 1650) and the building of a new gaol for Surrey (12 Mar. 1651).70CJ vi. 267b, 301a, 374b, 548b. An interest in charitable reform or regulation may be indicated by his inclusion on committees dealing with hospitals (21 July 1649; 2 May 1651).71CJ vi. 267b, 569b.

Ralegh’s experience as a projector doubtless underlay his appointments to committees to consider monopolies relating to metal ore (22 Jan. 1651) and soap (29 May).72CJ vi. 527a, 581a. Although not formally recorded as a member, he attended at least one meeting of the committee for Fen drainage. Sufficiently exercised about its deliberations to utter ‘passionate words’, he was imprisoned in the Tower for a week before his submission was accepted and he was readmitted to the House (May 1650).73CJ vi. 413a, 413b, 416 Like other Surrey members, he was nominated to discuss the scheme for improving navigation on the river Wye (26 Feb. 1651).74CJ vi. 542a. His father’s legacy may account for engagement in other business. 1650 was a notable year for editions of Sir Walter Ralegh’s work, including Excellent observations and notes concerning the royal navy, His Apologie for his Voyage to Guiana and the compilation of various papers on maritime matters that was Maxims of State, the last dedicated by Humphrey Moseley to the MP.75Also A Discourse of the Originall and Fundamentall Cause of Warre (1650), The Marrow of Historie (1650), All is not Gold that Glisters (1651), Sir Walter Raleigh’s Sceptick (1651). Having received among his earliest nominations one to prepare remuneration for the governor of the naval town of Portsmouth (21 July 1649), Carew was subsequently added to the Navy Committee for specific purposes (4 Sept. 1649; 9 Mar., 6 June 1650) and named to the committee for the supply of stores and magazines on land and sea (11 Feb. 1651).76CJ vi. 267a, 290a, 379b, 420a, 533b; vii. 210a. Failure to gain a permanent place on the Navy Committee might be attributed to differences of opinion with established grandees: he told for the minority against Sir Henry Vane II* that a bill for settling the admiralty be read a second time (26 June 1651) and for the majority of one against Thomas Chaloner* and Denis Bond* disallowing a dispensation from the terms of the Navigation Act (3 Feb. 1652).77CJ vi. 592a; vii. 81b. However, he sat on committees to encourage adventurers in the Caribbean (25 July 1649) and consider a petition from the East India Company (27 Feb. 1652).78CJ vi. 270a; vii. 100a. His father had been obliged to sell extensive holdings in Ireland, but Ralegh maintained an interest in the country, rejecting a motion to cut expenditure there (19 Nov. 1650); named first to the committee set up to review plantations (20 Dec.), he reported in spring 1652 on the Adventurers’ propositions.79CJ vi. 499a, 512b, 530a, 541b; vii. 80b, 107b, 115b.

As a former courtier with wide horizons and a recognisable name, Ralegh was named to delegations receiving foreign ambassadors and was among those appointed to deliberate on the bill prohibiting government ministers and agents taking money from foreign states (7 Aug. 1651).80CJ vi. 516b, 517a, 618b; vii. 99a, 130a, 135a, 146a, 230a, 262a, 276b. He appears to have established his own loyalty to the commonwealth from the outset. First-named (24 July 1649) to the committee charged with settling £2,000 a year on John Bradshawe*, president of the council of state and Ralegh’s neighbour in Middlesex, he was placed on committees regulating the election of officials (2 Aug.) and suppressing scandalous news (9 Aug.), and then to administer the Engagement to MPs (12 Oct.) and to ensure subscription among the general population (24 Oct., 9 Nov.).81CJ vi. 269a, 273b, 276a, 307b, 313a, 321b. He maintained an interest in local officeholding – for example, attempting unsuccessfully to block the appointment of controversial money-lender and former court of wards official Hugh Audley as sheriff of Wiltshire (7 Nov. 1650) – and was named to committees on managing the militia (28 May 1650; 28 Jan. 1651).82CJ vi. 327a, 417a, 432b, 492b, 528b. Sufficiently identified with the republic to be nominated (second) to the committee working on a bill to abolish titles of honour created by Charles I after the outbreak of civil war (16 Apr. 1651), he was included on committees to prepare a justification for the thanksgiving held for the victory over royalist forces at Worcester (19 Sept. 1651) and to reward local supporters.83CJ vi. 562b; vii. 15a, 20a, 50a. A member of committees addressing the political union with Scotland (13 Apr., 6 Oct. 1652), he was among Members who negotiated with Scottish deputies in London (15 Dec.).84CJ vii. 118b, 189a, 229b.

At an early stage, possibly as a result of his own calculated manoeuvring, Ralegh was appointed to the committee dealing with pensions given by and petitions reaching Parliament (19 Sept. 1649).85CJ vi. 298a. Nominated to another such committee three years later (27 Aug. 1652), he was ordered to report from it towards the end of the Parliament (18 Feb. 1653; in three weeks).86CJ vii. 171b, 260b Placed early in his career on the committee to investigate bribery (18 Sept. 1649), he reported the investigation which resulted in the expulsion from Parliament of Edward Howard*, Baron Howard of Escrick (20 June 1651).87CJ vi. 469a, 589a, 590b. In the meantime he was involved in addressing a succession of individual or collective petitions, some of which merged seamlessly with business surrounding his major preoccupation, the sale of confiscated lands.88e.g. CJ vi. 296b, 302b, 398b, 515b; vii. 9b. Although he was occasionally named to committees related to the public revenue or accounts generally, land forfeitures and settlements detained him more.89CJ vi. 360a, 369b, 459b, 498a, 513a; vii. 222b. Nominated on 7 February 1650 to the committee preparing the bill for the sale of crown lands, he was appointed a commissioner under the Act for disposing of delinquents’ lands on 16 July 1651 and to a succession of committees addressing delinquents’ estates and goods or dean and chapter lands, and also the claims made upon them.90CJ vi. 358b, 393b, 390b, 403b, 430b, 441a, 455b, 457b, 528a, 546b, 563b; A. and O.

Clearly, influence over petitions and lands afforded Ralegh ample opportunity to promote his own interests, both among fellow MPs and more widely; so too, in the first regard, did his membership of the committee for lodging Members in Whitehall (14 Feb. 1651).91CJ vi. 534b. As implied previously, it is difficult to identify with precision his circle of friends and allies. He corresponded in June 1652 with Edward Conway, 2nd Viscount Conway, in terms of cordiality with both the former secretary of state and his then host, Algernon Percy, earl of Northumberland, who had retired from public office in Surrey and elsewhere after the regicide.92SP18/24/1, f. 83. It is conceivable that Ralegh was among those who, on the committee to consider the earl’s petition against being declared a delinquent (25 Apr. 1651), had successfully argued on his behalf.93CJ vi. 567a.

His own petition for the restitution of Sherborne surfaced in the Commons at around the same time. That the report of Augustine Garland* on 25 March from the committee for the sale of delinquents’ estates was summarised in the Journal is an indication of the importance accorded to a petition which invoked the injustice done to a national hero, but that the immediate response – predicated on an acceptance of that injustice – was a decision not for outright restoration of the estate but rather for payment (with interest) of the £400 annuity in lieu promised in 1628, indicates to a reluctance in the Commons to overturn previously negotiated agreements.94CJ vi. 552b. In his petition, later published, Ralegh pleaded ‘the impossibility of contesting with kingly power’, ‘splendid promises of great preferment in court’ and his own youth and vulnerability as explanation for having accepted what was then offered, but he also admitted that Charles had ‘use[d] him with great civility’ and denied an ‘inclination’ to point the finger at those of ‘perchance noble families’ who had injured him.95A Brief Relation, 9-10. Attempting to make the best of his partial victory, he applied to the Committee for Compounding to recoup his annuity as a tenant on the Sherborne estate, but this encountered counter-requests from others (23 Apr.).96CCC, 2169. After further debate in the House, he could get no further than a promise of settlement of an unspecified ‘so much’ of Bristol’s estates ‘as shall amount to the clear yearly value of £500’, expressed as a proviso to the bill for the sale of delinquent lands passed that July; the acquisition of land belonging to the earl at Clevedon in Somerset the following March may represent a recognition that Sherborne was, at least in the short term, beyond his reach.97CJ vi. 582b, 595a, 601a; A. and O.; CCC, 2170. In January 1653 he bought two Gloucestershire manors that had belonged to William Craven, 1st Baron Craven.98CCC, 1624.

Ralegh now had a vested interest in the commonwealth and in the continued re-allocation of land. He continued to be prominent in related business. Several times he was named to consider whether delinquents and others might sell land to pay debts (13 June, 29 July 1651; 20 May, 15 Sept. 1652).99CJ vi. 587a, 611b; vii. 134a, 182b. A teller with Marten on the losing side of a division on the act settling lands on Major-general Philip Skippon* (1 July 1651), he was listed first on the committee addressing a potential reward for Thomas Grey*, Lord Grey of Groby (with whom he had been a teller in favour of explicitly linking numbers of soldiers to monthly assessments, 15 Apr.), for his services during the Scottish invasion (7 Aug.).100CJ vi. 561b, 595a, 618b. As further measures were taken to facilitate sales, the ever-present Ralegh reported on 3 February 1652 from the committee for removing obstructions.101CJ vi. 598b; vii. 46b, 112a. Later he sat on committees for raising money by sales of land forfeit for treason (15 July 1652, 1 Mar. 1653) and, still apparently in possession of the royal estate at Sunbury, was one of the former courtiers on the committees for the preservation and improvement of the parks at Hampton Court (15 Oct. 1652) and for reviewing the proceedings of commissioners for the sale of the king’s goods (25 Jan. 1653).102CJ vii. 154b, 191b, 250b, 263a. Presumably because he was critical of their conduct, he was a teller with Algernon Sydney* for the minority against the referral of a petition from the contractors for the sale of bishops’ lands to committee (6 Apr. 1652) and he evidently had strong views about the fate of particular royal properties.103CJ vii. 115a. Whereas he was among the minority who thought the (relatively remote) manor of York should be sold, he was a teller for the majority who wanted Hampton Court and Windsor Castle to be kept for the use of the state (29 Dec. 1652).104CJ vii. 237a.

Personal interest may be detected in some of the positions he adopted. He was against the inclusion in the Act of Pardon and Oblivion of clauses endorsing land seized lawfully since 1625 (29 Jan. 1652), placing a time-limit on claims to sequestrable land (20 Feb.) and linking the legitimacy of the Act to the authority of the Rump Parliament (24 Feb.), although only in the last did he carry the vote.105CJ vii. 78b, 95b, 96b. All had the potential either to block any future claims he might make to his father’s lost estates or undermine the progress he had made thus far. Among the welter of petitions business that continued to come his way, he seemed to promote those of his kin Dame Mary Wotton and Lord Stanhope (the latter son to the previously mentioned lady, and a friend remembered in Ralegh’s letter to Conway) and his wife’s kinsman William Sheldon, while opposing that of leading Rumper John Weaver (25, 28 May; 8 July 1652).106CJ vii. 135a, 135b, 137a, 151b; SP18/24/1, f. 83. He tried to prevent the referral of representations from radical Southwark to the commissioners for removing obstructions (15 Oct.), but supported the referral of Henry Howard (13 Jan. 1653).107CJ vii. 191a, 212b, 246b, 248b, 257b, 260b.

On the other hand, for all Ralegh’s engagement with naval affairs and prominence in greeting foreign agents, his stance in 1652 on the war against the Dutch is elusive. Perhaps the publication in 1653 of Sir Walter Ralegh’s Observations touching Trade and Commerce with the Hollander, which advocate an aggressive pursuit of British interests, provides a pointer. Likewise, Carew Ralegh’s relations with the army as tensions mounted during that year and into the following are obscure. His inclusion on the committee of 15 August which, under the chairmanship of his distant kinsman John Carew*, gave a sympathetic hearing to the army’s request for further reform and new elections, might be indicative, but Ralegh’s endorsement of the majority view cannot be taken for granted.108CJ vii. 164b. He was against reprieving the pocket borough of Queenborough, due to be abolished under the Rump’s plans for electoral reform (16 Mar. 1653).109CJ vii. 268a. The fact that he was a consistent presence more or less to the end of the Parliament – his last committee appointment was on 19 April to consider a petition from Edward Bayntun*, by this juncture a relatively conservative figure – suggests that he was not touched by the disillusionment with proceedings that kept other notable Members away, but precisely what this betokened is uncertain.110CJ vii. 280a.

Protectorate retirement

Following the dissolution on 20 April, Ralegh seems to have retired to Middlesex. Then if not before he rebuilt a water mill at Kempton Park and that August he and his neighbour John Bradshawe agreed to a scheme to run the New River through Hanworth, despite some local opposition.111HMC 7th Rep. 77; VCH Mdx. iii. 57-8. He played no discernible part in national politics during the protectorate of Oliver Cromwell and for a while probably kept a low profile in Surrey. After spending money on buying manors in the west on the strength of his parliamentary pension, he may have been experiencing financial difficulty: in July 1655 he wrote of the difficulties of securing a proper price for a property at Flanchford, near Reigate, while in December 1656 raised a mortgage of £1,000 on the estate at West Horsley.112HMC 4th Rep. 300; JRL, NP/40.

But perhaps he also retreated to cultivate the aristocratic connections of his youth: the recipient of his 1655 letter was Richard Sackville, 5th earl of Dorset, son of the 1630s courtier. Ralegh also used his leisure to take up cudgels again in defence of his father. The Compleat History of the Reigns of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her son James (1656), from the pen of an estranged kinsman, William Sanderson, provoked Carew to furious response. It was ‘not a history, but a libel against all good men and good actions of those times’.113C. Ralegh, Observations upon some particular persons and passages (1656 [?1657]), 1, 21 (E.490.2). Sir Walter was not, as alleged, a madman who had financed his last Guiana voyage with the money of others, but had ‘spent every farthing’ of his own money on the expedition.114Ralegh, Observations, 10-11. Among others, Carew defended the conduct of the 3rd earl of Pembroke and his brother, Philip Herbert*, the 4th earl; once again in his narrative, King James emerged as much more culpable than King Charles – the former left the crown

poor and in debt, whereby his successor was often put to his shifts, and forced to open the purse-strings of his subjects, whereby he shut their hearts towards him, and encouraged them to demand such things, as nothing but extreme poverty and necessity could enforce a king to grant.115Ralegh, Observations, 7, 13-15.

Ralegh was not the only reader to attack Sanderson’s rehabilitation of James’s reputation, and his view of a Charles who was unfortunately circumstanced was shared by a good many moderate parliamentarians and royalists. That Ralegh was on cordial terms with the latter is suggested, for example, by the fact that John Evelyn the diarist dined with him twice at Horsley in 1658.116Evelyn, Diary, iii. 219.

Third protectorate Parliament

Elected to Parliament early in 1659 for the nearby borough of Guildford, like his partner Robert Parkhurst II* he might have been regarded by voters as having royalist sympathies. However, his first recorded action in the Commons was to defend former New Model army officer and clerk of the ordnance Major Lewis Audley* (2 Feb.) when, worsted in the poll at the Surrey seat of Gatton, the latter presented himself at Westminster to complain of malpractice by the sheriff and was then sucked into a quarrel with the successful candidates. While leading civilian and commonwealths man Sir Arthur Hesilrige – perhaps the only Member against whom Ralegh was consistently ranged through his career – took up the cause of Audley’s adversaries, Ralegh asserted the probity of his reforming ‘countryman’ and fellow magistrate: ‘I never heard him said to be an oppressor of his country’; ‘I never knew him do anything on the bench unworthy’.117Burton's Diary, iii. 41, 43.

Thanks to diary evidence, with greater clarity than during the Rump Ralegh emerges as a leading advocate of a robust commercially-driven foreign policy. Like his former colleague there, Robert Reynolds*, he pushed for a statement of the current establishments of the army and navy as compared to their state in the past (3 Feb.).118Burton's Diary, iii. 62. It was not that he was eager for a war in the Baltic, but he considered that ‘he that is master of the Sound, is master of all the trade of Europe’; the Swedes required English help to keep it from the Danes and the Dutch, ‘and we may guess how far our interest is concerned in it’ (21 Feb.).119Burton's Diary, iii. 399-400. Taking on Hesilrige again and defeating him, he supported the bringing in of candles on 24 February so as to prolong debate on the matter, and secured a vote to request Protector Richard Cromwell* to set forth the fleet.120CJ vii. 607a, 607b. The importance of the matter to him was revealed later when, during a discussion of unauthorised printing, he moved for the issue of a warning to Members not to publish parliamentary debates for fear of undermining their power and safety, and adduced as justification his ‘knowledge of the speeches, and persons’ names that were sent into Holland in letters, and in letters sent back again, touching the debate of the business of the Sound’ (13 Apr.).121Burton's Diary, iv. 415.

Nominated on 28 February to the small and potentially very influential committee charged with regular perusal of the Journal to check that it kept an appropriate record of proceedings, he had not always been harshly disposed to those who compromised the secrecy of the chamber.122CJ vii. 608b. When on 5 February a pamphleteer was discovered in the midst of Members, Sir William Wheler* (also appointed 28 Feb.) considered it ‘a matter of great contempt’, but Ralegh argued against the offender being sent to the Tower.123Burton's Diary, iii. 79. Perhaps, however, this was the product of a personal antipathy towards that particular prison.

The appointment to review the Journal was presumably a sign that Ralegh enjoyed the confidence of many colleagues, but whether he was chosen as a representative of a particular faction or as someone editorially competent or reliably even-handed is difficult to determine. He was of sufficient standing to be named to prepare the declaration justifying a national fast day (30 Mar.) and to a delegation to the lord protector (1 Apr.).124CJ vii. 622a, 623a. In debate on political settlement he seconded the motion that the House ‘recognise a single person to rule over us’, expressing the conviction that he saw ‘scarce ... one man against’ the proposition (8 Feb.).125Burton's Diary, iii. 139. Once Parliament had resolved on a course of action in foreign policy, for instance, he was happy to refer the execution to the chief magistrate (21 Feb.), but it is not obvious how he thought that magistrate should be chosen or bounded.126Burton's Diary, iii. 400. Persuaded that the right to sit in the former House of Lords had rested on inheritance rather than on writ of summons (which might be withheld), he thought it a matter of urgency to decide whether or not the new Other House should be hereditary (22 Feb.).127Burton's Diary, iii. 415. Establishment of its status was for him a prerequisite to resolution of the question of the chief magistracy: he was ‘not free to give a vote until this stumbling block, this House of Lords, be removed out of the way. If you admit that the legislature is here, I shall know how to give my vote’ (18 Feb.).128Burton's Diary, iii. 332. His preference, it seems, was either for a traditional House of Lords, or none at all, and his line on the magistracy would follow accordingly. While conceding that ‘there is a great necessity, for the present, to transact’ with the Other House (28 Mar.), he could

see no reason for doing so hereafter. If there were any body else to transact with, I should not transact with these. If we go away, and do not transact, I shall expect nought but confusion ... but to perpetuate them, and make them and their heirs Lords over us, I can never agree.129Burton's Diary, iv. 289.

Most likely this was the sentiment of a man whose first choice was for a return to the old order, but who was a realist determined to make the best of the status quo while ensuring that it did not become irrevocably entrenched: as he observed with regard to raising revenue, ‘I believe the laws that settle these things to be of force, till you repeal them’ (29 Mar.).130Burton's Diary, iv. 298. There are some opaque indications that Ralegh had contact with or sympathy for individual royalists. He was named first to a committee to investigate the detention in Italy of Thomas Howard, 16th or 23rd earl of Arundel (it being suspected that this might owe less to insanity than to his having forsaken his family’s Catholicism) and the alleged misdemeanours committed by his younger brother Henry Howard, later 6th duke of Norfolk, at parliamentary elections (8 Apr.).131CJ vii. 632a. It was through Ralegh that Henry Howard’s step-mother-in-law, the countess of Worcester (whose husband had been, like Ralegh’s father, an inventor confined to the Tower), proffered a petition regarding the confiscated Worcester House (10 Mar.), used for the committee for removing obstructions.132Burton's Diary, iv. 119. Despite, or even because of, having bought lands from the estate of Lord Craven, he moved that the crown’s greatest creditor should have liberty to come to England to sort out his by now desperate financial affairs (11 Apr.).133Burton's Diary, iv. 391. On the other hand, Ralegh expressed suspicion of his parliamentary colleague Robert Danvers alias Villiers* when the latter denied having been forced to compound on the Oxford Articles (12 Feb.). Ralegh argued that the young man’s guardian and father-in-law Sir John Danvers* would not have spent his money in this way unless compelled to do so; that he did not testify to having known young Danvers at Oxford might be taken to indicate that Ralegh himself had not been in attendance on the king there, except that, if he had, he could hardly admit it.134Burton's Diary, iii. 242.

Equally, Ralegh was identified with measures against some of the more militant and oppressive aspects of the protectorate regime. On at least two occasions he expressed his scorn for the farmers of the excise – ‘pitiful fellows, and deserve all extremity’ (12 Mar; 11 Apr.).135Burton's Diary, iv. 141, 399. Added on 25 March to a committee investigating an assault on former Major-general William Packer* (by this time a political dissident) by former royalist army officer Henry Wroth, Ralegh had previously argued that Wroth should not be subjected to close confinement (4 Mar.).136CJ vii. 619b; Burton's Diary, iv. 7. He was also named to the committee investigating abuses in Northamptonshire by Major-general William Boteler* (12 Apr.).137CJ vii. 637a. In contrast, he was one of the seven Members appointed to consider how the arrears due in 1647 to the Presbyterian Major-general Richard Browne II*, who had been secluded in 1649 and later imprisoned, might finally and speedily be satisfied (26 Mar.).138CJ vii. 621a. As before, he seems to have exhibited a particular affinity for those who had suffered unjust or excessive imprisonment – John Lilburne and Robert Overton being further cases in point (28 Feb.; 6 Mar.) – just as he once again came to defence of someone – here Henry Neville* – charged with atheism (16 Feb.).139CJ vii. 600a; Burton's Diary, iii. 298, 509; iv. 160.

Nominated on 13 April to the committee considering a petition from disbanded forces in Lancashire, Ralegh was plausibly identified with those who opposed the council of officers’ demands for indemnity from prosecution for their actions over the previous decade.140CJ vii. 638a. Later that day he and Sir Walter Erle* brought acting Speaker Thomas Bampfylde* to the chair as permanent replacement for the once ailing and now deceased Chaloner Chute I*.141CJ vii. 640a. His final recorded contribution to the Parliament, as it debated the reorganisation of the army on 21 April, was a speech arguing that since ‘he that has the sword’ would [de facto] ‘be chief magistrate’, ‘the safest way is to pass this power into the protector and the two Houses of Parliament’.142Burton's Diary, iv. 473.

Restored Rump

Following the dissolution on 22 April, as the Rump re-assembled on 7 May, Ralegh was to the fore in the Commons. He had evidently made some sort of peace with Hesilrige and his republican allies over shared distrust of the army. On 13 May he was a teller with Thomas Lister* for the majority in favour the question for inclusion of non-MPs on the new council of state.143CJ vii. 652b. With Hesilrige, Sydney and Thomas Scot I* he counted votes for MP councillors (14 May) and non-Member councillors (16 May).144CJ vii. 653b, 654a, 655a. Over the first five months of the session, he received nearly 30 committee appointments and, excluding the enumeration for the council, was seven times a teller. That he was not elected a councillor perhaps suggests that he did not consistently represent any particular viewpoint which might garner the requisite support, but he was among the 16 Members named to prepare a narrative for public consumption justifying the change of regime (20 May) and was included among those discussing the settlement of a pension on Richard Cromwell (25 May), agreement on which was a necessary formality to end the protectorate.145CJ vii. 661a, 665a. On 14 July he was among the MPs granted lodgings in Whitehall.146CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 27.

His first nomination was in the familiar area of naval affairs, to prepare an act of admiralty commissioners (18 May).147CJ vii. 656b. With international tensions now significantly reduced, he was still a regular choice for deputations receiving foreign ambassadors (24 May, 14 June, 14 July, 26 Aug., 7 Oct.).148CJ vii. 663a, 663b, 685a, 718a, 769a, 793b. As before, he was periodically a nominee to committees relating to commercial and legal matters and occasionally revealed an interest in religion.149CJ vii. 656b, 670b, 679a, 697b, 722a, 763b. Responding to a petition for the abolition of tithes, on 14 June he joined Sir William Brereton* as a teller in seeking to refer the question of an alternative form of maintenance for the ministry of the church to grand committee rather than to a small committee which might accept the radical position. With Hesilrige and Colonel William White on the opposing side, they carried it only with the Speaker’s casting vote.150CJ vii. 683b. Ralegh’s opponents were named, like him, to investigate defects in the law regarding punishment for disturbing public worship (1 July).151CJ vii. 700b, 767b.

As before, Ralegh was appointed to key fiscal committees – to prepare the assessment bill (14 June); to establish the powers of treasury commissioners (20 July) – as well as to committees for the sale of delinquents’ lands (additional legislation being prompted by the rebellions of the spring and summer) and other money-raising expedients.152CJ vii. 684b, 691a, 726a, 748b, 769a, 791b. On the whole he appears to have been trying to avoid harsh measures on all sides. In debate on the latest bill of indemnity he was a teller for the majority who rejected a clause requiring those covered by it to pay 40 shillings to the state (12 July), while he was named to the committee which again addressed ‘a comfortable subsistence’ for Lord Craven (11 Aug.).153CJ vii. 714b, 756b. Added first to the committee tasked with an inventory of goods at Whitehall and Hampton Court to establish which belonged to the state (rather than the Cromwell family; 16 July), he was also the first nominee – perhaps as a result of his previous role in Lady Worcester’s petition – to a committee to review the continued use of Worcester House as a base for the commissioners for removing obstructions (30 Aug.).154CJ vii. 720b, 763b.

However, as Parliament tried to manage its relations with the army against a backdrop of unrest, Ralegh most frequently appeared in the Journal in connection with military matters, where he seemed committed to building up alternative forces to those of the army, yet ready to countenance some radical and some crypto-royalist elements, perhaps because of personal amities. Named to committees addressing militias for Westminster (24 May), the Isle of Wight (12 Aug.) and for the counties generally (27 June), he was himself made a militia commissioner for Gloucestershire (15 July) and Northamptonshire (21 July), both shires where his connection was genuine but weak.155CJ vii. 664b, 694b, 719a, 727a, 757b. Three times a teller in divisions on military appointments, he partnered Richard Salwey (who shared his admiralty and foreign policy interests) against Neville in securing the return of Colonel Thomas Sadler to what had been an effective command in Ireland (28 June); John Bingham (an associate of Ashley Cooper) in a failed attempt to get Philip Howard* (a covert Catholic at odds with both the republicans and the army) made a militia commissioner in Yorkshire (19 July); and Sir Michael Livesay (a civilian republican) in another failed attempt to add to Middlesex militia commissioners (10 Aug.)156CJ vii. 696a, 724b, 754b.

Whatever the complexities of his position and his alliances, perceived loyalty to the commonwealth over against the protectorate presumably underlies his inclusion on the committees to make Thomas St Nicholas* clerk of Parliament in succession to Henry Scobell (24 Aug.) and to draw up an oath of engagement to the new regime (6 Sept.).157CJ vii. 767a, 774b. He was sufficiently trusted to be given custody of horses confiscated from Philip Smythe†, 2nd Viscount Strangford [I], who had been arrested for complicity in the rising of Sir George Booth* (24 Aug.).158CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 140. The sentiment that saw him support a fine of £20 on former protectorate insider Sir Thomas Widdrington* for unauthorised extension of his leave of absence from the House also pitched him against both Hesilrige and Neville (30 Sept.), but like them he opposed the ‘interruption’ of the sitting by the army a fortnight later.159CJ vii. 790a.

Back at Westminster promptly following the restoration of the Rump on 26 December, Ralegh was one of the ten members of the committee to bring in a bill for indemnifying those soldiers who defied army commanders to return to the obedience of Parliament (28 Dec.).160CJ vii. 798b. He was also among those deputed to decide into whose hands money borrowed for the use of the state should be paid (30 Dec.) and this time came within a whisker of election to the new council of state.161CJ vii. 800a. Joint twentieth with Luke Robinson* in a poll for 20 places, he lost out when the latter’s name was drawn from a hat (31 Dec.).162CJ vii. 800b. In the longer term, however, this was probably a lucky escape, and in the short term it still left him as a person of influence. Eight committee nominations in the next five weeks included those to put forward candidates to be commissioners of the great seal, to manage the admiralty, to constitute army commissioners and treasurers at war, and to make a financial settlement on the emerging man of the moment, General George Monck*.163CJ vii. 805a, 806a, 807a, 808b, 811a, 813a, 818a, 833b. Appointed a navy commissioner himself on 28 January 1660, he was soon at work negotiating with the army the apportionment of funds.164CJ vii. 825b; CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 517.

By the second week of February Ralegh was at last associated with a position clearly distinct from that of Hesilrige and his friends. When on 11 February the House divided on whether the question should be put to proceed with the appointment of army commissioners, Ralegh and his admiralty colleague (Sir) John Lenthall* tried to block it, but were convincingly defeated by Hesilrige and Marten. Hoping to salvage the selection as a commissioner of Ashley Cooper (who before playing a part in the ending of the ‘interruption’ had been under a cloud as a suspected royalist), Ralegh (this time with Robert Goodwin*) was again defeated, this time by Marten and Neville.165CJ vii. 841a. With the Speaker’s support he at least managed (with Colonel Thomas Hutchinson*) to prevent the appointment of as a regimental major of Thomas Lilburne*, who had been an adherent of the ‘interruption’s’ leader, John Lambert* (13 Feb.).166CJ vii. 842b. Alongside Hutchinson, Goodwin and Ashley Cooper, he was named to a committee to review the deliberations of the committee of safety that had been set up following the army’s dissolution of the Rump in October (13 Feb.).167CJ vii. 841b.

When, following his arrival in London, General Monck invited leaders of rival groupings at Westminster for talks intended to resolve differences between Rumpers and those who had been secluded in 1648, Ralegh was invited with Ashley Cooper and Attorney-general Reynolds to accompany Lord Chief Justice Oliver St John* (15 Feb.).168Clarke Pprs. iv. 264. According to Edmund Ludlowe II*, Ralegh was one of those who, in contrast to the impatient and reluctant Hesilrige, ‘stayed till the discourse was ended’.169Ludlow, Memoirs, ii. 228. The action signified his willingness (like Ashley Cooper) to accept the return of the Long Parliament and contributed to his good standing with the general in weeks to come.

Restored Long Parliament and last years

On 21 February, the day the Members secluded in 1648 re-entered the Commons, Ralegh and Ashley Cooper were among six nominees to formally obliterate the votes that had kept them out.170CJ vii. 847a He was also named to the important committees discussing a bill for yet another council of state (21 Feb.), identifying appropriate qualifications to serve as MPs (22 Feb.) and preparing a new militia bill (23 Feb.).171CJ vii. 847b, 848b, 849a. Chosen on 25 February as one of three to take to General Monck a commission to be commander-in-chief of all land forces in the three kingdoms, four days later Ralegh was rewarded by being appointed governor of Jersey, a position all the sweeter for once having been held by his father.172CJ vii. 852a; Whitelocke, Diary, 573. His last nomination – appropriately enough, given the importance the issue had had in his parliamentary career – was to a committee addressing the repeal of sequestrations acts (1 Mar.).173CJ vii. 856b.

Ralegh disappeared from the Journal a fortnight before Parliament’s dissolution. How far he committed himself to service in Jersey is unclear, although he was certainly engaged in preparations in May and early June.174CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 575; 1660-1, p. 40. But the restoration of the monarchy nullified such appointments and before the end of August he had lost the prize that, perhaps more than anything, had drawn him to parliamentary service. On the 23rd the Convention passed in the restored House of Lords an act which required him to reimburse the earl of Bristol to the tune of £6,500 for the pension he had been awarded from the earl’s estate.175LJ xi. 115a, 131b, 137a.

Ralegh’s assistance to Monck is said to have earned him the offer of a knighthood, which he declined in favour of his elder son Walter, who received the honour on 15 June only to die three years later.176Shaw, Knights of Eng. ii. 228; Rowse, Ralegh and the Throckmortons, 333. Finding a £2,000 portion for his daughter Anne placed him in financial difficulty.177JRL, NP/47. Having failed in April 1663 to interest Bulstrode Whitelocke in buying his house at West Horsley, in July 1664 he sold it for £9,750 to the former secretary of state Sir Edward Nicholas†.178JRL, NP/39, 48; VCH Surr. iii. 354. Meanwhile, his wife Philippa attempted to reclaim her own arrears of pension.179SP29/89, f. 2. The couple retired to St Martin-in-the-Fields, where on 28 December 1666 Ralegh made a brief nuncupative will in the presence of his wife and executrix, his son-in-law Sir Peter Tyrrell† and his daughter Frances Cox.180PROB11/323/43. He died within a few days and was buried at St Margaret’s, Westminster on 1 January; the register there described him as having been ‘killed’, although whether by accident or assault is not specified.181Reg. of St Margaret Westminster (Harl. Soc. lxxxix), 5.

Through publication the Raleghs remained in the public eye. Not only did the Brief Relation appear in 1669, but Sir Walter’s History continued to be read and, a few years before his death in 1705, Carew’s younger son Philip issued an edition of some of his discourses.182Rowse, Ralegh and the Throckmortons, 334. But while Tyrrell sat for Buckingham in 1679, none of Carew’s male descendants sat in Parliament.183HP Commons 1660–1690.