DANVERS, Henry (1573-1644)

Originally from Oxfordshire, the Danvers family acquired, by marriage in the late fifteenth century, a large estate in Wiltshire centred on Dauntsey, near Malmesbury.46 F. N. Macnamara, Memorials of the Danvers Fam. 227, 264; VCH Wilts. xiv. 68-9. They subsequently inherited property in Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Cornwall. Sir John Danvers^‡ (d.1594), purchased the borough of Cirencester, where he built a house, and, through his wife, Elizabeth (daughter and coheir of John Nevill^†, 4th Lord Latimer), acquired the castle and manor of Danby in Yorkshire.47 HP Commons, 1558-1603, i. 163-4; ii. 15-16; G.M. Rushforth, ‘Story of Dauntsey’, Trans. Bristol and Glos. Arch. Soc. l. 340; VCH Yorks. (N. Riding), ii. 337-8. Sir John’s marriage brought him into connection with the Cecils, as his wife’s sister married Thomas Cecil^* (subsequently 1st earl of Exeter), the eldest son of the powerful Elizabethan minister, William Cecil^†, 1st Lord Burghley. In 1588 Burghley listed Sir John as sufficiently wealthy to support the status of a baron.48 Lansd. 104, f. 52v.

Early career, 1585-1603

Danvers himself was a younger son and, probably as a result, decided to embark on a military career; he evidently regarded himself as a professional soldier by 1598.49 HMC Hatfield, viii. 340. As a page to Sir Philip Sidney^‡, he probably accompanied his master to the Netherlands in 1585. Sidney was killed the following year, and at his funeral procession Danvers rode a horse trailing a broken lance.50 Lant, 13. After Sidney’s death, Danvers returned to the Netherlands, where he served under Maurice of Nassau.51 Phillipps, 107. An early biographer, David Lloyd, claimed that Maurice appointed Danvers a captain aged 18, but Danvers was not then in the Netherlands (1591). Lloyd also claimed that, at 21, Danvers was knighted by Henri IV and that, aged 25, he was ‘captain of a great ship in the voyages of Cadiz and Portugal, under the [1st] earl of Nottingham [Charles Howard^*] … who professed he was the best sea captain in England’. Neither statement is correct. Nevertheless, it is clear that Danvers saw service ‘both by sea and land’ in the Elizabethan wars.52 D. Lloyd, Memoires of the Lives (1669), 677-8; Phillipps, 107.

Danvers had returned to England by 1589, when he matriculated at Oxford. According to Aubrey, he ‘was a perfect master of the French’ and ‘a historian’, but he only ‘perfected his Latin’ later in life.53 Aubrey, Brief Lives, i. 194. Danvers himself admitted that he was ‘never no [sic] good pen man’.54 Cott. Titus BXII, f. 524. Nevertheless, he was subsequently a generous benefactor to the university, founding the botanic gardens and contributing £100 towards the Bodleian Library.55 J. Newman, ‘The Architectural Setting’ Hist. of Univ. of Oxf. iv. ed. N. Tyacke, 140, 169; A. Wood, Hist. and Antiquities of the Univ. of Oxf. ed. J. Gutch (1796), ii. 896-8. By May 1591 he was in France with the English forces then aiding Henri IV, and the following month was recommended to command a company; his funeral monument suggests that he was appointed.56 Phillipps, 107; CSP For. 1590-1, pp. 29, 189, 343. That autumn he was knighted at the siege of Rouen by Robert Devereux^†, 2nd earl of Essex.

Danvers was back in England by the autumn of 1594, when his career was thrown into crisis by the longstanding feud between his family and their Wiltshire neighbours, the Longs. On 4 Oct. Danvers murdered Henry Long. Accounts of what happened differ. According to one version, Danvers and his elder brother, Sir Charles, accompanied by their retainers, burst into a room in Corsham, where members of the Long family and their friends were assembled, and shot Henry. Danvers’ mother, however, claimed that Danvers merely rescued his brother Sir Charles, who was assaulted after going to Corsham to confront Henry Long. Whichever version was correct, the two brothers were outlawed following the coroner’s inquest. After being temporarily sheltered by Henry Wriothesley^*, 3rd (later 1st) earl of Southampton, they escaped to France.57 Macnamara, 288-90; Reportes del Cases in Camera Stellata ed. W.P. Baildon, 4952, 391-3; J.E. Jackson, ‘Murder of Henry Long’, Wilts. Arch. Mag. i. 320-1.

The Danvers brothers entered the service of Henri IV, who was so impressed with their conduct that he interceded with Elizabeth on their behalf, as did Gilbert Talbot^*, 7th earl of Shrewsbury, who wrote in support of them during his embassy to Paris in 1596.58 CSP Dom. 1595-7, p. 34; Mems. of the Reign of Queen Eliz. i. 248; Illustrations of Brit. Hist. ed. E. Lodge, ii. 496. However, they were not pardoned until July 1598, when they agreed to pay the Longs £1,500 in compensation.59 CPR, 1597-8 ed. C. Smith, H. Watt, S.R. Neal and C. Leighton (L. and I. Soc. cccxxvi), 211; CSP Dom. 1598-1601, p. 78. The pardon was arranged by their mother, who, now widowed, remarried for that purpose, her new husband being a younger son of the lord chamberlain, Henry Carey^†, 1st Lord Hunsdon and cousin to the queen.60 Aubrey, Brief Lives, i. 193; HMC De L’Isle and Dudley, ii. 329.

Danvers was sent to Ireland in early 1599 with the army commanded by Essex. In June he was severely wounded, being shot in the face, the effects of which are visible in the portrait painted by Van Dyck more than 30 years later.61 CSP Carew, 1589-1600, pp. 307, 519; R. Cust, ‘Charles I and the Order of the Garter’, JBS, lii. 359. In the autumn he returned to England to recover but, in February 1600, went back to Ireland with Charles Blount^*, 8th Lord Mountjoy (later earl of Devonshire), who had replaced Essex as commander of the English forces.62 CSP Ire. 1599-1600, p. 499. He remained there until the end of 1601, and so avoided involvement in Essex’s rising, unlike his brother and fellow Essexian, Sir Charles, who was executed.63 CSP Ire. 1600-1, pp. 295-6.

Danvers distinguished himself in December 1601 during Mountjoy’s victory over the Irish and their Spanish allies at Kinsale, where, together with Sir Richard Wingfield, he led the decisive cavalry charge. Following the engagement, Mountjoy sent Danvers, who had received a slight wound, with the official report of the battle in the hope that he would thereby gain the queen’s favour, but Elizabeth reportedly refused to see him.64 CSP Ire. 1601-3, p. 244; CSP Carew, 1601-3, p. 194; Winwood’s Memorials ed. E. Sawyer, i. 370-1; CSP Dom. 1601-3, p. 144. Danvers subsequently returned to Ireland but, by the autumn of 1602, was ‘induced by the necessity of his private affairs to discontinue his service’ there. He was back in England by the following December.65 Moryson, iii. 217; CSP Ire. 1601-3, p. 497; Chamberlain Letters ed. N.E. McClure, i. 174.

Danvers’ return may have been prompted by the need to secure the family estates in the wake of his brother’s attainder. Fortunately for him, his father, Sir John Danvers, had settled all his lands, bar one manor, on his wife. Only on her death were these to descend to his male heirs. This unusual arrangement was probably intended as an insurance policy, in case his sons were ever formally indicted for the murder of Henry Long.66 CPR, 1593-4 ed. S.R. Neal (L. and I. Soc. cccix), 170-2; C142/247/100. However, it meant that, following the execution of Sir Charles Danvers, Sir John’s widow was able to claim that the family estate belonged to her, even though she had, in reality, conveyed significant parts to Sir Charles before Essex’s rebellion. An inquest into Sir Charles’ estate therefore found that property worth only 26s. p.a. was due to the queen. This verdict was subsequently challenged, but without success.67 CSP Dom. 1601-3, pp. 293-5; HMC Hatfield, xi. 500, 510; xii. 39-40, 82; A.H. Nelson, Monstrous Adversary, 398-407. Nevertheless, there was always a danger that a further attempt would be made to establish the crown’s title. As Sir Charles had died unmarried, Danvers was the next heir. Armed with a fulsome commendation from Mountjoy and the Irish Privy Council praising his valiant service, he probably hoped to secure formal assurance of his right to inherit on his mother’s death.68 CSP Ire. 1601-3, p. 516.

The accession of James I and the early sessions of the first Jacobean Parliament, 1603-7

Whatever Danvers’ intentions may have been on returning from Ireland, they were overtaken by the death of Elizabeth in March 1603. Promptly sent back to Ireland to inform Mountjoy officially that James I had been proclaimed king, Danvers arrived at Dublin on 5 April. He quickly returned with instructions from Mountjoy to inform the king of the recent submission of the earl of Tyrone [I], the leader of the resistance to English.69 Chamberlain Letters, i. 190; CSP Ire. 1601-3, p. 651; 1603-6, pp. 10-11, 16; Moryson, iii. 302, 305-10. Armed with this momentous news, Danvers undoubtedly had little difficulty in gaining the ear of the new monarch, despite fierce competition. He evidently made a good impression, as he convinced the king that it was necessary recall base coins then in circulation in Ireland, thereby causing some discomfort to Secretary of State, Sir Robert Cecil^* (later 1st earl of Salisbury), who was left with the task of explaining to James that this was unaffordable.70 HMC Hatfield, xv. 49; J. Cramsie, Kingship and Crown Finance under Jas. VI and I, 68. Indeed, James took such a liking to Danvers that, on 21 July, he raised him to the peerage as Baron Danvers of Dauntsey, his letters patent making particular reference to his service at Kinsale.71 CSP Dom. 1603-10, p. 23. James also promised him (but never paid) a gift of £5,500.72 Hatfield House, CP116/152 The following month Danvers was appointed to meet the newly arrived Spanish ambassador. In November, while the court was at Salisbury, Danvers was appointed to smooth things over after the Venetian ambassador and his staff complained about their accommodation, the affronted diplomats describing him as ‘a gentleman of great importance’ in their dispatches.73 H.V. Jones, ‘Jnl. of Levinus Munck’, EHR, lxviii. 246; CSP Ven. 1603-7, p. 116.

The crown did not formally relinquish its rights to the Danvers estate until 1610. Nevertheless, Danvers’ rise to favour at the start of the new reign put paid to any immediate danger.74 SO3/4, unfol. (Mar. 1610). Danvers seems to have been more concerned about the legal consequences of the Long murder than his brother’s treason. By February 1604 proceedings had been initiated in King’s Bench to reverse his outlawry. Danvers sued out a writ of error, claiming that there were various technical defects in the presentment of the coroner’s inquest. At a hearing the following autumn, all but one of his objections were rejected, but this was enough to have his outlawry overturned.75 Jackson, 319-21. He now took possession of the family’s Cirencester estates and by the end of the year, if not earlier, was living in the house his father had built. Nevertheless, his mother (who retained Dauntsey until her death in 1630) retained an interest in the property and had to be included in the conveyance when Danvers sold it in 1615.76 HMC Var. iii. 134; J.D. Thorp, ‘Hist. of the Manor of Coates’, Trans. Bristol and Glos. Arch. Soc. l. 213-14. Possession of these estates meant that Danvers was able to exercise parliamentary patronage at Cirencester when the first Jacobean Parliament was summoned. He chose to nominate Richard Martin^‡, presumably as a favour to Thomas Arundell^* (later 1st Lord Arundell of Wardour), whose father had been a trustee of the Danvers estate when it was settled in 1594. When Martin chose to sit for Christchurch rather than Cirencester, he was replaced by Edward Jones^‡, who was probably in Danvers’ service. He was certainly subsequently very busy on his behalf.77 HP Commons, 1604-29, ii. 139, 148; CPR, 1593-4, pp. 170-2.

In the 1604 session Danvers is recorded as having attended 46 of the 71 sittings of the upper House, 65 per cent of the total. He was named to 14 of the 70 committees appointed by the Lords, but made no known speeches. His first appointment, on 26 Mar., was to confer with the Commons about wardship, purveyance and respite of homage. On 3 May he was named to attend a further conference about purveyance, although the Journal, perhaps erroneously, fails to record his presence in the chamber that day. The Journal also records that, on 14 Apr., he was named in his absence to a conference with the Commons about the Union, but the committee list is perhaps faulty. The same members, with additions, were instructed to confer with the lower House about the Union a week later, and it is possible that, when the Journal was compiled, the clerk became confused over the composition of the original committee.78 LJ, ii. 266b, 278a, 284a, 290b. Danvers was named to consider seven bills, including measures to naturalize four Scottish courtiers and prohibit the export of artillery. In addition, on 21 May, he was named to the committee to inform the king of the Lords’ proposed resolution of the Abergavenny peerage dispute.79 Ibid. 272a-b, 285a, 303b.

Towards the end of the session, on 24 June, Danvers and the earl of Southampton were among the former members of the Essex faction arrested and accused of conspiracy. However, they were all soon released without charge.80 CSP Ven. 1603-7, p. 16. On 11 July it was reported that Danvers would wed one of the daughters of the 7th earl of Shrewsbury. In fact the lady in question subsequently married Thomas Howard^*, 21st (or 14th) earl of Arundel. In 1608 he appears to have courted the sister of Sir Nicholas Tufton^* (subsequently 1st earl of Thanet), with whom he was already connected by marriage (Sir Nicholas being the husband of Danvers’ cousin) but, on this occasion, his putative bride married Francis Manners^*, 6th earl of Rutland. Danvers was to remain single throughout his life.81 Letters of Philip Gawdy ed. I.H. Jeayes, 148; HMC Rutland, i. 414.

In August 1605 Danvers and Sir John Gilbert were authorized to collect the fines due to the crown from various courts, which they undertook to increase to more than £2,800 p.a. In return, Danvers would receive half the receipts over and above this amount, and Gilbert a quarter. Danvers later indicated that he had initiated work on this project in 1603, which suggests that his patent was probably intended to compensate him for the unpaid gift of £5,500 the king had promised him.82 Hatfield House, CP116/152; HMC Hatfield,, xvi. 331; CD 1621, vii. 372-3.

Danvers was absent from the upper House on 5 Nov. 1605, when the Gunpowder Plot was discovered, but attended on the afternoon of the 9th, when the session was adjourned to January. During this recess, Danvers returned to Cirencester, where he reported to Cecil, by now earl of Salisbury, on the local agitation against the jurisdiction of the council in the Marches of Wales. He advised that either ‘letters or [a] proclamation’ should be issued to justify the council’s powers, but was disregarded.83 Hatfield House, CP191/97.

Danvers was present when the session reconvened on 21 Jan. 1606 but, in all, was only recorded as attending 39 of the 85 sittings of the session, 46 per cent of the total. He was appointed to just 12 committees (out of a possible 72), all legislative, and again made no recorded speeches. He may have been particularly interested in bills to settle the estates of Edmund Brydges^†, 2nd Lord Chandos, many of which were situated in Gloucestershire and Wiltshire, and Sir Christopher Hatton^‡, heir of Sir William Hatton^‡, whose widow was Danvers’ first cousin. He was appointed to committees on both on 3 March. Another measure in which he may have taken a personal interest was the bill to confirm the sale of a manor in Gloucestershire by the recently deceased Mountjoy, for whom Danvers was an executor. His personal interest in the measure may explain why he was appointed despite not being recorded as present when the measure was committed on 15 May.84 LJ, ii. 386a, 433b; PROB 11/108, f. 2v.

Danvers attended the upper House on 15 Feb., when a bill was introduced to establish him as his father’s heir, despite his brother’s attainder. He was also present at the second reading three days later, when the measure was ordered to be engrossed without the need for a committee stage, and at the third reading on the 22nd.85 LJ, ii. 374b, 376b, 379b. The passage of this bill through the Commons was less smooth, for at its second reading on 13 Mar., William Wiseman^‡ argued that it should not be allowed to pass ‘in regard of a grant which he [Danvers] hath, being so much to the grievance of the king’s subject’. As Wiseman was steward to Robert Rich^*, 3rd Lord Rich (later 1st earl of Warwick), it is possible that his objections stemmed from disagreement over the Hatton bill, as Lord Rich’s son had married the daughter of Sir William Hatton. Whatever his motives may have been, Wiseman was unsuccessful, as the bill was reported from committee on 12 Apr. with a saving clause protecting any rights that the crown or others might have had in the estate before the attainder. (The new version of the bill also deleted a passage, repeated three times in the original, which stated that Danvers was to be treated as though his elder brother had died in their father’s lifetime, presumably on the grounds that this was obvious). The changes were approved by the Lords and the measure was enacted.86 Bowyer Diary, 78; CJ, i. 283, 297; HP Commons, 1604-29, vi. 829; PA, HL/PO/PB/1/1605/3J1n35. Nevertheless, three days earlier, the Commons formally voted to include Danvers’ patent – the ostensible grounds for Wiseman’s complaint - among the grievances to be presented to the king.87 Bowyer Diary, 112-13.

Danvers fought a rearguard action to defend his patent, describing the opposition in the Commons as an ‘unjust and untrue complaint framed in the Parliament House by a man malicious against me’. He cited his ‘surrender of £5,500’ promised by the king, asserted the legality of the grant and complained that his counsel had not been given a hearing by the Commons. Nevertheless, he was unsuccessful and was obliged to relinquish his patent on 19 August. The following month, by way of compensation, the king granted him a pension of £500 a year for himself, and a further £500 a year for his younger brother, John^‡.88 Hatfield House, CP116/152; SP14/20/23; E214/247; SO3/3, unfol. (13 Sept. 1606); CJ, i. 316. However, he was clearly dissatisfied with this new arrangement, and quarrelled with Salisbury (‘my heart overrun[s] with the bitter remembrance by [sic] our yesterday discourse’). He now regretted his elevation to the peerage: ‘my creation amongst so many could with indifferency have been forborne’. He would have been satisfied with £5,500 ‘for recompense’ instead. Seeking some unnamed preferment (possibly the presidency of Munster), he stated that he knew ‘very few of our country, and no one un-officed, that hath so long been [a] soldier, and passed through so many places of command with maims but no disgrace’.89 Hatfield House, CP118/135.

Danvers was only recorded as attending 32 of the 106 sittings of the 1606-7 session, 30 per cent of the total, absenting himself from the upper House after 19 March. His proportion of the committees appointed by the Lords during the session was even lower, six out of 41. All of his appointments were legislative, including a measure concerning a manor in Gloucestershire. On 16 Feb. he was among those to whom the bill to confirm defective titles was committed. Those appointed were required to consider a new bill on the same subject on 23 Mar., but by that date Danvers was absent.90 LJ, ii. 454a, 471b, 494a.

President of Munster, 1607-14

In the summer of 1607 Danvers entered into negotiations for the presidency of Munster, a position he had apparently been promised in 1603. In return for this post, he agreed to surrender not only his own pension but also the one granted to his younger brother. Appointed in November, he travelled to Ireland at the end of the year.91 HMC Hatfield, xix. 176, 190; CSP Ire. 1606-8, pp. 364, 408. The Venetian ambassador assumed that his appointment was intended to bolster the defences of Ireland following the flight, in September 1607, of the Gaelic leaders, Tyrone and Tyrconnell.92 CSP Ven. 1607-10, p. 41. In fact, agreement had been reached long before the Irish earls fled.

In January 1608, Danvers, expecting that Parliament, prorogued until 10 Feb. 1608, would soon reconvene, offered Salisbury his proxy. In the event, however, the assembly was again prorogued.93 CSP Ire. 1606-8, p. 395. In March, Danvers complained to Salisbury that the profits of his new office covered only half his expenses. He therefore sought the restoration of his pension, a request reiterated in April, but he was evidently successful, as his pension is included in a list of annuities payable by the crown drawn up in October 1614.94 Ibid. 431, 490; SP14/78/6.

Danvers returned to England in the summer of 1609 and was present when Parliament resumed the following February.95 CSP Ire. 1608-10, pp. 184, 189, 277. Edward Jones having died in October 1609, he secured the return for Cirencester of his friend, Sir Anthony Mayney^‡, at a by-election shortly before the session started.96 HP Commons, 1604-29, ii. 139; iv. 913; v. 312-13. He apparently missed the first day of the session, but attended 60 of the 95 sittings, 63 per cent of the total. He again received only a meagre number of committee appointments, eight out of 58, one of which required him to attend the conference with the Commons held on 15 Feb., at which Salisbury outlined the parlous state of the royal finances. His six legislative committees included a measure concerning a Wiltshire manor. He made no recorded speeches.97 LJ, ii, 551a, 624b. Danvers failed to attend the fifth session held later that same year, although there is no evidence to suggest that he returned to Ireland.

Danvers’ friends included Sir Thomas Overbury, confidant of the favourite, Robert Carr^*, Viscount Rochester (later earl of Somerset). Overbury may once have been in his employ, as Aubrey claims that Danvers ‘gave to Sir Thomas Overbury cloth’.98 Aubrey, Brief Lives, i. 194. This connection with Overbury suggests that, in the spring of 1613, Danvers may have been party to Southampton’s attempts to use Overbury’s influence with Rochester in order to secure the office of secretary of state for Sir Henry Neville^‡, a former adherent of the 2nd earl of Essex arrested with Danvers and Southampton in 1604. These efforts proved unsuccessful, however, and in April 1613 Rochester turned against Overbury, who was imprisoned in the Tower, where he died from poisoning the following September.99 Stowe 173, f. 273r-v; HP Commons, 1604-29, v. 497.

Early in 1613 Danvers agreed to sell for £3,000 the presidency of Munster to his deputy, Sir Richard Moryson^‡. As he later told the earl of Somerset, ‘age [which] doth every day increase my infirmities … together with a broke estate’, made it impossible to spend any length of time in Ireland.100 SP63/232/45 (miss-assigned to 1614 in CSP Ire. 1611-14, pp. 531-2). In April 1613 Danvers, far from resuming his duties in Ireland, was described as a ‘diligent attendant’ on Anne of Denmark, accompanying her to Bath that month. On the king’s orders he subsequently returned to Ireland, but he was back in Bath by early September, where he quarrelled with the earl of Rutland. It was reported that the two men intended to go to the Netherlands to fight, but by the 9th the dispute ‘was already, or upon the point of, compounding’.101 Chamberlain Letters, i. 408, 446, 450, 474; APC, 1613-14, p. 156; J. Nichols, Progs. of Jas. I, ii. 671; Egerton Pprs. ed. J.P. Collier (Cam. Soc. xii), 463.

When Parliament was again summoned, in 1614, Danvers secured the re-election of Mayney at Cirencester.102 HP Commons, 1604-29, ii. 139. Not recorded as present at the start of the session on 6 Apr., he apparently did not take his seat until 7 May. He missed at least two further sittings, on 9 and 28 May, and may also have been absent on 6 June, as Henry Hastings^*, 5th earl of Huntingdon, records that he was excused for ‘ill health’. However, the Journal states that he was present. Assuming he was absent on the 6 June, he appears to have attended only 13 of the 29 sittings, 45 per cent of the total. He was appointed to no committees but made one recorded speech, on 24 May, when he challenged the argument of the lord chancellor, Thomas Egerton^*, Lord Ellesmere (subsequently 1st Viscount Brackley), that the Lords could not confer with the Commons about the impositions because they lacked the legal advice of the attorney general, Sir Francis Bacon^* (subsequently Viscount St Alban), then sitting in the Commons. Danvers observed that if the lower House were informed of the impediment, Bacon would undoubtedly be permitted to assist the Lords. Like Southampton, Danvers seems to have been in favour of hearing the Commons’ case.103 HMC Hastings, iv. 263, 282.

Following the dissolution, it was reported that Danvers was negotiating to buy the presidency of the north. If this report was correct, it indicates that Danvers was not as eager to retire from public life as his earlier letter to Somerset suggests. Danvers certainly received a promise that he would succeed the present incumbent Edmund Sheffield^*, 3rd Lord Sheffield (subsequently 1st earl of Mulgrave). In the event, he relinquished his claims to Emanuel Scrope^*, 11th Lord Scrope (later earl of Sunderland) four years later. In March 1615 Danvers finally sold the presidency of Munster. However, the buyer was not Moryson but Donough O’Brien, 3rd earl of Thomond [I], who offered the sum of £3,200.104 Chamberlain Letters, i. 550, 591; Add. 34727, f. 35.

The later Jacobean period, 1614-25

By the time he sold his Irish office, Danvers was establishing himself in England. In 1613 he had obtained the reversion to the keepership of St James’s Palace after Mary, Lady Cheke, the elderly widow of Edward VI’s tutor, Sir John Cheke^‡. By August 1614 Danvers had taken up residence at St James’s, suggesting that Lady Cheke sold her interest to Danvers before her death in 1616.105 Carew Letters, 64. Danvers also purchased from Sir Francis Fortescue^‡ the offices of ranger of Wychwood forest in Oxfordshire and keeper of nearby Cornbury Park. Although he did not receive a confirmatory patent until October 1615, Danvers was in charge of Wychwood by March of that year. From at least 1617 Cornbury served as Danvers’ principal country residence. In 1631 he commissioned Nicholas Stone to build a new south-western wing, one of the first examples in England of a private house in the classical style.106 V.J. Watney, Cornbury and the Forest of Wychwood, 108; C. Tyzack, Wychwood and Cornbury, 32, 35-6; CSP Dom. 1611-18, p. 279.

Danvers’ lodgings in St James’s became his London residence and enabled him to establish a good relationship with the primary occupant of the palace, Prince Charles (Stuart^*, later prince of Wales). In October 1616 he helped procure ‘curious[ly] wrought engines’ for the prince from the Netherlands. The following April, he wrote to Sir Dudley Carleton^* (subsequently Viscount Dorchester) from St James’s of the ‘great happiness of this house in our hopeful young prince’.107 SP14/88/118; 14/91/48. The prince subsequently employed Danvers in his dealings with foreign ambassadors, and Danvers was responsible for acquiring a self-portrait of Rubens for Charles’s collection.108 Add. 72254, f. 1v; Finetti Philoxenis (1656), 76; T. Longueville, Policy and Paint, 78.

In 1617 Danvers supported his cousin, Lady Hatton, in her struggle with her estranged husband, Sir Edward Coke^‡, over the marriage of their daughter, Frances, to Sir John Villiers^* (later Viscount Purbeck), the elder brother of the new favourite George Villiers^*, earl (subsequently 1st duke) of Buckingham.109 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 77; HMC Bath, ii. 64-5; HMC Downshire, vi. 300. By November, Lady Hatton was in great favour, leading another of her supporters, John Holles^*, Lord Houghton (later 1st earl of Clare), to conclude that Danvers would benefit. However, Danvers received no preferment.110 Harl. 6055, f. 31. In October 1618 it was reported that Danvers had offered Buckingham’s mother £4,000 for the place of lord deputy of Ireland, but he was out-bid by Mervyn Tuchet^*, 2nd earl of Castlehaven [I] and 12th Lord Audley. All dealings had to be called off, however, because the king was furious that negotiations were taking place without his consent.111 HMC Ancaster, 393.

In February 1619 Danvers wrote a paper for Buckingham, newly appointed lord admiral, about the proposed naval expedition to the Mediterranean. He urged the favourite not to despise the ostensible target, the Algerian pirates, who were ‘infestive and fearful to all [the] commerce of Christendom’, but also argued that the despatch of a fleet to the Mediterranean would check ‘the potent preparations in Spain’, thereby assisting the Protestant cause in Europe. Danvers pressed Buckingham to command the expedition in person, which would provide the lord admiral with the ‘reputation and experience’ he needed ‘for the better government of so great a charge as the admiralty of England’. Danvers himself promised to serve Buckingham on the voyage ‘either employed or as a private person’.112 Bodl., Clarendon 2, f. 108r-v.

Danvers’ paper indicates that his foreign policy outlook was anti-Habsburg, and, later that year, he apparently received approaches from representatives of the king’s daughter Princess Elizabeth and her husband, Frederick V, the Elector Palatine, who, in August, was elected king of Bohemia, thereby igniting a war with the Austrian Habsburgs. Elizabeth and Frederick offered him the command of the English volunteers raised to help their cause should the earl of Southampton turn them down. In the event, however, Sir Horace Vere^* (subsequently Lord Vere of Tilbury) was employed instead.113 SP84/100, f. 203. In October Danvers contributed £200 towards the benevolence to protect the Palatinate and, the following January, he was appointed to a commission to examine proposals for its defence.114 SP14/117/2.

By the time the third Jacobean Parliament was summoned, at the end of 1620, Danvers had sold his property in Cirencester. He was nevertheless connected with both borough Members, Sir Thomas Roe^‡ and Thomas Nicholas^‡, the latter being a trustee for his brother, Sir John Danvers^‡, with whom Roe was associated in the Virginia Company.115 HP Commons, 1604-29, ii. 139. Sir John Danvers also obtained a seat, albeit belatedly, for on 29 May he was returned at a by-election for Oxford University. This may have been because Lord Danvers had recently donated £250 to the university for purchasing the lease of land for a botanical garden, for which the university’s convocation voted him thanks on 11 April. According to Anthony Wood, over the following 11 years Danvers went on to expend £5,000 in constructing the garden, for which reason a grateful university returned Sir John Danvers at every general election, except that of 1624, until the Long Parliament.116 S. H. Vines, Acct. of the Morisonian Herbarium … and the Early Hist. of the Physic Garden (1914), pp. xi; HP Commons, 1604-29, ii. 323-5; A. Wood, App. to the Hist. and Antiquities of the Colleges and Halls in the Univ. of Oxf. ed. J. Gutch (1790), 191.

Danvers appears to have attended the 1621 Parliament more frequently than its predecessor, suggesting that he may have been attempting to impress Prince Charles, now sitting in the upper House himself, with his diligence. According to the Journal, he attended 40 of the 44 sittings before Easter (91 per cent) and at least 39 of the 43 sittings between Easter and the summer recess (also 91 per cent). However, he also sat on the afternoon of 28 May, when he testified that Sir Robert Kerr^‡, seeking naturalization, had received communion, though he was not marked as present.117 LJ, iii. 138b. He missed the adjournment meeting on 14 Nov., but was marked as present at every sitting after the session reconvened on the 20th. However, on 1 Dec. he was recorded as both present and excused.118 Ibid. 177a.

At the start of the session Danvers was appointed by the crown to the largely honorary position of trier of petitions from Gascony and England’s overseas territories. He was thereafter named to 16 of the 28 committees appointed by the upper House before Easter. During that time he made four recorded speeches.119 Ibid. 7a. Appointed to the privileges committee on 5 Feb., nine days later he was instructed to confer with the Commons about the petition against recusancy preferred by the lower House.120 Ibid. 10b, 17a. His legislative appointments included a committee to consider bills to prevent the export of artillery and improve the arms of the militia, to which he was appointed, apparently in absentia, presumably because of his military experience.121 Ibid. 13a. He was also named to the committee for the bill to enable Prince Charles to make leases of duchy of Cornwall lands. On 21 Mar. he informed the upper House that Charles was absent because ‘having been at tilt, [he] hath been in such heat, that he cannot come’. He also informed his colleagues that the prince thought they should adjourn for Easter on the following Monday.122 Ibid. 26b; LD 1621, 1625 and 1628, p. 32.

On 3 Mar. Danvers was named to attend a conference with the Commons about apprehending the monopolist, Sir Giles Mompesson^‡, who had recently fled.123 LJ, iii. 34a The Commons subsequently transmitted charges against Mompesson to the Lords, and on 15 Mar. Danvers was appointed to the committee for examining Mompesson’s patent for gold and silver thread. A week later he moved that the Lords should not appoint a day for the Commons to hear judgement against Mompesson because the matter ‘still depends before us’. On 26 Mar., the day appointed by the upper House for passing sentence on Mompesson, Danvers queried whether a message should be sent to the Commons before the Lords had made up their minds. The House agreed, on Arundel’s motion, to decide on Mompesson’s punishment first. In the ensuing debate, Danvers argued that Mompesson’s estate should be seized by the crown, but that the king should be advised to safeguard his wife’s jointure.124 Ibid. 34a, 47a; LD 1621, 1625 and 1628, pp. 35. 42, 46; LD 1621, p. 136.

Between Easter and the summer recess, Danvers was appointed to 15 out of 46 or 47 committees and spoke on five recorded occasions (including giving testimony on behalf of Kerr on 28 May). On 26 Apr. he drew the House’s attention to complaints that Mompesson’s associate, Matthias Fowle, had imprisoned several women on suspicion of infringing the gold and silver thread patent.125 LD 1621, p. 32; HMC 3rd Rep. 26. The following day, after new evidence had emerged against another patentee, Sir Francis Michell, he joined James Hamilton^*, 2nd marquess of Hamilton [S] and 1st earl of Cambridge, in reminding the House that they had already told the Commons to expect Michell to be sentenced that afternoon.126 LD 1621, p. 37. On 28 Apr. Danvers was appointed to a committee to attend the king concerning Sir Henry Yelverton^‡, the former attorney general, who stood accused of libelling Buckingham. He subsequently supported Dudley North^*, 3rd Lord North, who argued that although the king had the right to take Yelverton’s case into his own hands, the Lords should ask him to refer it to them.127 Ibid. 57. In the debate on 8 May about the Floyd case, in which the Commons had encroached on the judicature of the Lords, Danvers again worked with Hamilton, seconding his motion to send a message to the lower House.128 Ibid. 75. His legislative appointments included a bill concerning a property exchange made by Prince Charles, and a measure for Southampton’s cousin, Anthony Maria Browne^*, 2nd Viscount Montagu.129 LJ, iii.126b, 139b.

In March 1621 Danvers was appointed governor of Guernsey, having bought out the previous incumbent, George Carew^*, Lord Carew (later earl of Totness).130 Harl. 1580, f. 421. He nominated as his deputy his brother-in-law, Sir Peter Osborne^‡, and during the summer recess visited the island, where he was formally sworn in on 25 August.131 Oxford DNB, xv. 99. He had returned to England by October and was appointed to all but one of the 11 committees appointed by the Lords after the session reconvened the following month, including another bill concerning Prince Charles, this time to confirm the prince’s purchase of Kenilworth Castle. Danvers made no recorded speeches.132 CSP Dom. Addenda 1580-1625, p. 638; LJ, iii. 173b.

Worried that Guernsey’s defences would prove inadequate as Europe descended into war, Danvers lobbied for extra resources to improve the island’s defences. He obtained a favourable report from a committee of the Privy Council in June 1622, which recommended speedy payment of more than £1,000 for that purpose. However, despite a Council order for payment, Danvers complained in July 1623 that he had not received the money from the lord treasurer, Lionel Cranfield^*, 1st earl of Middlesex.133 APC, 1621-3, pp. 73-4, 256-8; CSP Dom. Addenda 1580-1625, pp. 638, 656. There is no evidence that Danvers contemplated following Charles and Buckingham to Madrid in 1623 in their fruitless quest to conclude the Spanish Match, possibly because he was not one of the prince’s household servants.

Danvers did not attend the 1624 Parliament until 25 Mar., the last sitting before the Easter recess. When the House was called on 23 Feb., it was recorded that he had leave of absence, but the cause is not stated. During his absence he granted his proxy to Prince Charles. He subsequently attended 90 per cent of the remaining sittings (54 of 60).134 LJ, iii. 214b. It is likely that it was Danvers who persuaded Lady Hatton to nominate his brother-in-law, Sir Peter Osborne, at Corfe Castle.135 HP Commons, 1604-29, ii. 110.

Danvers was appointed to 27 of the 105 committees of the upper House and made three recorded speeches. On 1 Apr., when the session resumed after Easter, he was added to the committee for munitions, on which he was eminently qualified to serve, both in respect of his military experience and his adherence to the prince.136 PA, HL/PO/JO/5/1/3, f. 3. The following day, he was named to a subcommittee to investigate charges against Middlesex concerning the accounts of the Ordnance Office. Following the report of the subcommittee’s findings on 12 Apr., the same members, with one addition, were ordered to draw up charges against Middlesex. The Commons presented their own charges against the lord treasurer on 15 Apr., which were referred to Danvers and his colleagues the following day. As a member of the committee Danvers was kept busy taking evidence from witnesses for the remainder of the month and on into early May. In addition, he was among those ordered, on 1 May, to consider Middlesex’s petition setting forth his defence.137 LJ, iii. 286a, 301b, 311a, 329a, 346a-8b, 353a-7b, 365a; C65/188.

When it came to the debates on Middlesex’s guilt, Danvers’ contributions were relatively innocuous. On 12 May he observed that the lord treasurer had originally been appointed master of the great wardrobe during the king’s pleasure but, ‘when he found the profit’, had procured a new patent for life. The following day he said that James Hay^*, 1st earl of Carlisle, the previous master, had received only £3,000 of the £20,000 he had been promised by James I for surrendering the office to Middlesex, ‘though recompensed otherwise by his Majesty’.138 LD 1624 and 1626, pp. 77, 89.

Danvers was appointed to confer with the Commons on 3 Apr. about the lower House’s proposed petition against recusants.139 LJ, iii. 287b. His legislative appointments included committees for a fresh measure about arming the militia and a bill making Middlesex’s lands liable for his debts.140 Ibid. 293a, 386a. In addition, he was at some point added to the committee, originally established on 14 May, for the bill to continue or repeal expiring statutes. The members of the augmented committee were presumably the unnamed members instructed to attend a conference with the Commons about that bill on 22 May. After the conference was reported to the upper House that same afternoon, Danvers argued that the Commons were wrong to use the bill to abolish wine licences, as James had promised that licensing would cease with the death of Charles Howard^*, 1st earl of Nottingham, and ‘we need not bind him to it by a law’.141 PA, HL/PO/CO/2/3, f. 28; LJ, iii. 400b; LD 1624 and 1626, p. 103.

One measure that interested Danvers never reached the Lords. During his absence early in the Parliament, a bill was laid before the Commons concerning the manor of Goathland, in Yorkshire. It was promoted by several tenants who wished to purchase their farms from Robert Carey^*, Lord Carey of Leppington (later 1st earl of Monmouth), to whom the king had granted part of the manor early in the reign. The tenants had employed the manorial steward, Sir Richard Etherington to purchase the farms on their behalf. However, they complained that Etherington had made the purchase in his own name. As a result, their properties were liable to be seized by Etherington’s creditors, one of whom was Danvers. The measure was committed on 15 March. Eight days later, Sir Arthur Ingram^‡ moved that Danvers be asked to send a representative to the committee. On 2 Apr. Sir Henry Poole^‡, a Wiltshire landowner whose kinsman and namesake had purchased Cirencester from Danvers in 1615, moved that Danvers, now attending the Parliament, should have a copy of the bill. It is possible that Danvers, fearful that if the bill passed he would be unable to recoup the money Etherington owed him, played a significant part in ensuing that the measure was never reported. If so, he was perhaps aided by his brother-in-law, Sir Thomas Walmesley^‡, who was added to the committee on 20 Apr. and subsequently attended four meetings.142 CJ, i. 736b, 747a, 752a; HMC 4th Rep. 122; PA, HL/PO/JO/10/13/7, ff. 126-35, 138, 139v; C.R. Kyle, ‘Cttee. Attendance Lists’, PPE 1604-48 ed. Kyle, pp. 196-8. Aubrey, Wilts. ped. facing 217.

The accession of Charles I and the early Caroline parliaments, 1625-9

Following the accession of Charles I, it was reported that Danvers carried the sword before the new king when the latter went to chapel. Shortly thereafter it was rumoured that he would be added to the council of war, which was reconstituted, with additional members, in April 1625.143 T. Birch, Ct. and Times of Chas. I, i. 3; Add. 72255, f. 174; Rymer, viii. pt. 1, p. 18. Although this report proved to be unfounded, Danvers remained on intimate terms with the new monarch, as a letter he wrote to William Trumbull^‡, the English agent in the Spanish Netherlands, about his conversations with Charles makes clear.144 Add 72370, f. 134.

Danvers was presumably responsible for ensuring that Sir Peter Osborne was re-elected for Corfe Castle when a fresh Parliament was summoned in 1625.145 HP Commons, 1604-29, ii. 110. Danvers himself missed the early sittings of this assembly. When the House was called on 23 June it was recorded that he was sick. According to the Journal, he was again excused two days later. However, the assistant clerk’s manuscript minutes do not include him in the list of excused Lords and, in fact, indicate that he was actually present. In total, he attended 13 of the 31 sittings (42 per cent of the total), including five after the session resumed at Oxford in August. By the time the House was called on 5 July, Danvers had the proxy of Edward Denny^*, 1st Lord Denny (later earl of Norwich), whose wife was Danvers’ first cousin.146 Procs. 1625, pp. 45, 52-4, 89, 590; Vis. Northants ed. Metcalfe, 80. Danvers was named to ten of the 25 committees appointed by the upper House in 1625, including measures concerning leases of duchy of Cornwall properties, the Sabbath and fishing in American waters. He made only one recorded speech, on 5 July, when he excused Thomas Howard^*, Viscount Andover (later 1st earl of Berkshire), whose wife was related to Danvers.147 Procs. 1625, pp. 58, 72, 179.

Following the dissolution, Trumbull reported that one of Danvers’ servants (not, as has been suggested, Danvers himself), was among those Englishmen detained in the southern Netherlands as war between England and the Habsburg powers commenced.148 SP77/18, f. 229v; Original Unpublished Pprs. Illustrative of the Life of Sir Peter Paul Rubens ed. W.N. Sainsbury, 49, n.79. Danvers did not attend Charles I’s coronation on 2 Feb. 1626.149 SP16/20/8. Nevertheless, five days later - possibly in his absence - he was one of eight earls created at Whitehall, the letters patent having been dated two days earlier.150 Procs. 1626, i. 25; Rymer, viii. pt. 1, pp. 199-200; C231/4, f. 195. He presumably took the title Danby to emphasize his descent from the Nevill lords Latimer, the former owners of Danby Castle. The second Caroline Parliament was convened the day before the creation ceremony, but Danby never attended the assembly, instead giving his proxy to Denny.151 Procs. 1626, iv. 11. His only surviving letter from this period – a recommendation for an impoverished soldier - was written from Cornbury on 26 February. It is not evidence that Danby was actually well enough to conduct business, as only the signature is in his hand.152 SP16/21/69. It seems likely that the new earl was detained at his country residence by illness. Poor health may explain why, despite his experience as a soldier and the favour of the king, he was not more prominent in the later 1620s. He was not, for instance, named to the reconstituted council of war created in May 1626, or the special commission of inquiry into the Navy appointed at the end of the year, despite being qualified to serve on both bodies.

On 11 Jan. 1627 Danby, still at Cornbury though perhaps now returned to health, complained to the Privy Council that few of the extra resources assigned to the defence of the Channel Islands during the last years of James I’s reign had actually been provided.153 CSP Dom. Addenda 1625-49, p. 191. By June he was back in London, from where, following the outbreak of war with France, he expressed concern for the defence of Guernsey, and on 4 July, shortly after Buckingham sailed with an expeditionary force to France, it was reported that he would be sent to the island.154 Ibid. 216; HMC Buccleuch, iii. 319. In August, it was rumoured that Danby would be given a squadron of ships to blockade nearby St Malo, but shortly thereafter it was decided to confer the command on Robert Bertie^*, 1st earl of Lindsey, instead.155 Holles Letters ed. P.R. Seddon (Thoroton Soc. xxxv), 366-7. In the event, the squadron was abandoned, as Sir Henry Mervyn^‡, admiral of the narrow seas, protested that the proposed naval command would encroach on his commission. It was still envisaged that Danby would go to Guernsey but the earl wanted to be excused from the now diminished mission, arguing that it would be dishonourable to be shut up in a castle. By 8 Sept. Charles, now wholly focussed on relieving Buckingham’s army on the Île de Ré, had decided to let Danby decide for himself whether to go or stay. However, Danby dithered, for it was not until mid October that he announced he would remain in England.156 CSP Dom. 1627-8, pp. 296, 300, 321-2, 337; CSP Dom. Addenda 1625-49, p. 230. Strikingly, it was not until 2 Oct. that Danby paid his contribution to the Forced Loan, despite having been ordered by the Council the previous July to pay within ten days.157 E401/1388, rot. 1; APC, 1627, p. 420.

By 7 Mar. 1628, as the fleet was about to sail to relieve the Huguenots of La Rochelle, Charles had given Danby a direct order to go to Guernsey. After expressing his readiness to obey, Danby was given leave to be absent from the forthcoming Parliament. Once again he granted his proxy to Denny, now earl of Norwich, who informed the Lords on 2 Apr. that Danby was willing to yield precedence to William Knollys^*, earl of Banbury, whose patent of creation, although issued in August 1626, had ranked him above Danby and the other earls created the previous February.158 CSP Dom. Addenda 1626-49, pp. 270-1; Lords Procs. 1628, pp. 87, 26, 137.

Despite the king’s order, Danby remained in England, writing to Buckingham from Cornbury Park on 21 Apr., to complain about the activities of the saltpetre men in Oxfordshire.159 CSP Dom. 1628-9, p. 81-2. On 5 May he took his seat in the Lords, when he was formally introduced as an earl. However, he was excused nine days later because of poor health. He returned to the House on the 19th and was again excused on 6 June, resuming his seat three days later. In all, he is recorded as having attended 39 of the 94 sittings, 41 per cent of the total.160 Lords Procs. 1628, p. 590. Named to no committees, he made one recorded speech, on 6 May, when he informed the House that he had recently sought to give evidence in Chancery on his honour rather than on oath, but had been persuaded to be sworn ‘for satisfaction of the poor man whom it concerned’.161 Ibid. 384. On 22 May, Lord North moved that privilege be granted to Danby’s chaplain, John Randall, whereupon the earl of Norwich asked the privileges committee to consider whether the chaplain of a peer not then present was eligible. As Danby was by then attending the upper House, Norwich may have been seeking to ensure that his friend’s chaplain would be protected should Danby absent himself again.162 Ibid. 500, 503.

Danby seems to have suffered no loss of favour from his failure to go to Guernsey. On the contrary, on 20 July, four weeks after the prorogation, he was sworn a member of the Privy Council. According to Clare, his admission was not without incident, for on being summoned to attend, the Council forget to call him in. ‘Going away chafing’, he was met by the 4th earl of Dorset (Edward Sackville^*) who, ‘understanding the cause, told Buckingham and the king’, whereupon Danby was called in and sworn. A grateful Danby is thereupon said to have offered Dorset £1,000, but the gift was refused. Clare also claimed that Danby was now being considered for appointment as lord deputy of Ireland. Indeed, in October it was reported that he had secured the post and would be sent over.163 Holles Letters ed. P.R. Seddon (Thoroton Soc. xxxvi), 386; Birch, i. 409.

In early December, reports that the French were planning an attack on the Channel Islands led to fresh plans to send Danby to Guernsey, initially with reinforcements for the garrison. However, after an intervention from the Venetian ambassador, who was keen to promote peace between France and England, Charles decided to send the earl without extra soldiers. Moreover, his departure was delayed until March, enabling Danby to attend most of the 1629 session, which started on 20 January.164 CSP Ven. 1628-9, pp. 438, 457-9; Birch, i. 443; APC. 1628-9, p. 259. Recorded as present at 17 of the 23 sittings, 74 per cent of the total, he was excused on 7 Feb. but returned for the next sitting two days later.165 LJ, iv. 23a. He failed to attend on 23 Feb., despite still being in London, but as he explained the following day, he had only stayed in town to make final preparations for his departure. He probably left soon after - he was certainly in Hampshire by 1 Mar. - and consequently missed the final three sittings of the session.166 CSP Dom. 1628-9, pp. 478, 485. He left no other trace on the parliamentary records.

Danby arrived in the Channel Islands on 6 Mar. 1629, and returned to England early the next month.167 Ibid. 491, 514. Shortly thereafter peace was concluded with France, whereupon Danby was nominated special ambassador to witness the ratification of the treaty. He was an excellent choice: the Venetian ambassador observed that he continued to cherish the memory of his service to Henri IV, was ‘very discreet’, spoke French fluently and was ‘excellently disposed’, having supported the peace in the Council. Moreover, Danby had promised to subsidise the expenses of the embassy out of his own pocket. As a reward, he would finally be appointed lord deputy.168 SP84/139, f. 114v; CSP Ven. 1629-32, pp. 36-7.

Just when it seemed that Danby had reached the pinnacle of his career, things started to unravel. The French also had to appoint an extraordinary ambassador to witness the ratification of the treaty in England, but in early May it became doubtful whether their representative would be of corresponding status to Danby as protocol demanded. Moreover, it became clear that the English mission would have to follow the French king to southern France, or possibly Italy, which would make the embassy much more expensive for Danby. On 7 May Danby, who had been having second thoughts, informed Carlisle that his health had collapsed and that he would have to depart for the country, having found by previous experience that ‘nothing saved my life, but the quiet of Cornbury Lodge’. He promised to continue making preparations for his journey, but it was rumoured that it had been the thought of the cost of the embassy that had made him ill. Charles, suspecting that Danby was feigning illness, sent his own doctors to Cornbury, who reported that Danbury was suffering from consumption and was genuinely too ill to travel. By 20 May it had therefore been decided to send Sir Thomas Edmondes^‡ to France instead.169 CSP Ven. 1629-32, pp. 52, 76; SP16/142/41, 54; HMC Cowper, i. 386; Birch, i. 357 (letter misdated to 1628); SP84/139, ff. 149v-50.

Despite the doctors’ report, Danby suffered a major blow to his reputation as a result of his failure to go to France. In a letter dated only ‘this Sunday morning’, Danby told Carlisle that he ‘hate[d] the memory of this French employment, which hath procured me reproof in recompense of my merit’. Moreover, Charles now refused to appoint Danby lord deputy. However, having evidently promised him that he would be the next to hold that post, the king was reluctant to appoint anyone else until Danby agreed to relinquish his claims. In the interim, Ireland was ruled two lord justices.170 SP16/147/86; Harl. 7000, f. 255v; CSP Ven. 1629-32, p. 95; Add. 15914, f. 84; Sheffield Archives, WWM/StrP8, p. 126. It may not have been until early 1630 that Danby recovered the favour of the king, who appointed him as his representative at the christening of the son of Danby’s kinsman, John Paulet^*, 5th marquess of Winchester.171 C115/105/8122.

Later life, 1630-44

On the death of his mother in 1630, Danby assumed full control of the family estates. By then, however, as his earlier offer to finance the special embassy to France indicates, he was already ‘well supplied with money’. Described by Aubrey as ‘a great economist’, who kept ‘sober and wise’ servants, he was ‘a great improver of his estate, to £11,000 per annum at the least’.172 Aubrey, Brief Lives, i. 194. His wealth, taken in conjunction with his military career, explains why he was made a knight of the Garter in November 1633, alongside William Douglas, 7th earl of Morton [S]. Charles certainly expected both men ‘to ride in pomp’ to their installation ‘at their own charge’. This prospect may initially have distressed Danby, as George Garrard^‡ observed that it ‘seemed grievous at first to one of them, who naturally loves not these pompous charges’. However, when it came to the point, Danby was evidently willing to open his purse strings, possibly because he and Morton began competing over whose cavalcade would be the most magnificent. Garrard thought that Danby ‘carried it sheer; for he clothed fifty men in tissue doublets and scarlet hose, thick laced, twelve footmen, two coaches set out bravely, and all the ancient nobility of England that were not of the Garter rode with him’. The royalist writer David Lloyd, however, contrasted the ‘rich, plainness, and gravity of his habit’ with that of Morton, ‘adorned with all arts and costliness’.173 Strafforde Letters (1739) ed. W. Knowler, i. 166, 242; Lloyd, 678; Cust, 358, 363-4.

As the 1630s wore on, Danby seems to have become increasingly detached from the Caroline regime. He rarely attended the Council and consequently his annual attendance never reached double figures after 1633. Part of his detachment can be attributed to increasing age and infirmity. However, he was healthy enough to return to Guernsey in the summer of 1636.174 CSP Dom. 1636-7, pp. 97, 124. Frustrated ambition may have been another cause of his disillusionment. By May 1630 he seems to have believed that he had regained the king’s favour sufficiently to secure the lord deputyship, but Charles still refused to appoint him and by the summer of 1631 he had evidently agreed to surrender his pretensions, it having been decided to appoint Thomas Wentworth^*, Viscount Wentworth (later earl of Strafford) instead.175 H.F. Kearney, Strafford in Ire. 26. He also found other avenues of advancement blocked. In the summer of 1633 it was rumoured that he would be made lord admiral, and in late 1635 he put himself forward as a candidate for the governorship of the king’s eldest son, Prince Charles (Stuart^†, prince of Wales). In neither case did he prove successful.176 CSP Dom. 1633-4, p. 180; Strafforde Letters, i. 490.

Aside from these personal considerations, Danby may have been disaffected with the policies of the 1630s, worrying that they were causing dangerous levels of popular discontent. In December 1636 he reportedly wrote to the king protesting against Ship Money as ‘repugnant to the fundamental laws of the realm’ and urging Charles to summon a Parliament.177 CSP Ven. 1636-9, pp. 110-1. Moreover, as governor of Guernsey, he opposed attempts by William Laud^*, archbishop of Canterbury, to bring religious worship in the Channel Islands into conformity with the Church of England, despite the fact that he was an early patron of the Laudian cleric, Peter Heylyn.178 CSP Dom. Addenda 1625-49, p. 556; Ath. Ox. iii. 552-4. Finally, Danby criticized Wentworth’s harsh treatment of Richard Bourke^*, 4th earl of Clanricarde [I] (1st earl of St Albans in the English peerage), over the Connaught plantations. This criticism may have arisen from resentment of Wentworth for having secured the office which Danby had coveted, but it may also have derived, in part, from loyalty to a fellow veteran of Kinsale.179 Sheffield Archives, WWM/StrP15/279.

Danby seems to have concluded early in the Personal Rule that a Parliament was needed. In March 1630, while dining with Henry Elsyng, clerk of the parliaments, he ‘had some speech of his Majesty’s desire to gain his people’s loves’. Elsyng argued that this goal could be achieved by a new Parliament, whereupon Danby asked Elsyng to draft a memorandum on the subject. Drawing on precedents from the reign of Edward III, Elsyng suggested that Charles should summon a Parliament and allow it to occupy itself with issues such as trade rather than ask it for taxes. This would serve to reconcile the people to their monarch, to whom they would therefore be willing on a subsequent occasion to vote large sums of money.180 E.R. Foster, ‘Painful Labour of Mr Elsyng’, Trans. Amer. Phil. Soc. n.s. lxii. 46-50, 60-4. However, while Danby shared Elsyng’s desire for a new Parliament, he was also concerned at the policies pursued by the leaders of the Commons in the 1620s. Writing to Wentworth in January 1635, he expressed the hope that, following the successful management of the Irish Parliament by the lord deputy, people would be ‘made sensible of the folly and falsehood practised in our late parliaments’.181 Strafforde Letters, i. 369.

Aged 65 Danby unsurprisingly preferred to pay £1,000 in March 1639 rather than attend the king at York for the First Bishops’ War.182 CSP Dom. Addenda 1625-49, p. 605. By early June 1642 he was listed among those peers ‘not commonly coming to Parliament’.183A catalogue of the right honorable and noble lords, earles, viscounts, and barons, that have not absented themselves from the high and hon: house of the peeres of Parliament (1642), 2. In the latter part of that year he advanced £523 to Sir Hugh Cholmley^‡, the parliamentarian governor of Scarborough.184 CSP Dom. Addenda 1625-49, p. 644. However, by early 1643 Danby had committed himself to the royalist cause.185 J. Ashburnham, Narrative, ii. appendix, pp. vii. ix, xxxiii. On 24 Jan. 1643 the Lords gave permission to one Mr Yates to go to Danby, ‘being sick’, in Oxfordshire. The earl survived for another year, dying, according to the diary of Sir William Dugdale (then living in Oxford), at Cornbury on 27 Jan. 1644. However, his funeral monument states that he died the next day, while a petition from his sister says he expired on the 29th.186 LJ, v. 570a; Phillipps, 107; HMC 6th Rep. 113. He was buried, in accordance with his wishes, in the north transept of the parish church of Dauntsey in a white marble altar tomb with an inscription including verses by George Herbert^‡, the stepson of the earl’s brother, Sir John.187 Phillipps, 107.

Danby made his will on 19 Dec. 1640, adding codicils on 3 and 10 Dec. 1643, and a nuncupative codicil about ten days before his death. It was proved on 9 Oct. 1645. However, on 12 Jan. 1646 Danby’s brother, Sir John Danvers, elected to the Commons the day after the will was proved, petitioned the Commons complaining that Danby had disinherited him for adhering to Parliament. This claim was misleading, as witnesses subsequently testified that Danby, confident that the king would be victorious, had merely sought to ensure that the family estates would not be confiscated on account of Sir John’s parliamentarianism.188 PROB 11/194, ff. 100-6v; HMC 6th Rep. 93, 113; HMC Lords, n.s. xi. 359. Moreover, it was probably Sir John’s heavy debts, rather than his allegiance, which caused Danby to try to keep his lands out of his brother’s hands. It is also significant that the will concerned only those properties which Danby or his mother had acquired. There is no evidence that Danby tried to prevent his brother from inheriting any of their father’s lands.189 PROB 11/194, ff. 103v-4, 106.

Danby bequeathed his ‘principal George and Garter’ to Sir John, ‘which I entreat him to entail as an heirloom upon my family owners of Dauntsey forever’. He left the ‘collar and George’ which he had received from William Compton^*, 1st earl of Northampton, evidently as security for a loan, to Northampton’s son, Spencer Compton^*, the 2nd earl, ‘without demand of any money due by my lord his father’s bill’. He gave his ‘little George and Garter’, which had been bequeathed to him by Thomas Butler, 10th earl of Ormond [I], and his ‘St George robes with cap’ to the royalist general, Henry Wilmot^†, Lord Wilmot (subsequently 1st earl of Rochester).190 Ibid. ff. 104v, 105v.

Danby’s original will included no religious preamble and is an almost entirely a secular document. Nevertheless, he subsequently added, in a codicil, a fulsome declaration of allegiance to ‘the beliefs of the English Church wherein I was both born and bred’, suggesting that he wished to dissociate himself from the parliamentarian demands for reformation of the Church. Aside from adding a spiritual element to his testament, the codicils were mainly concerned with personal bequests. However, they also record his decision to replace William Lenthall^‡, Speaker of the Commons in the Long Parliament, whom he had originally appointed one of his overseers, with Sir Edward Hyde^† (subsequently 1st earl of Clarendon), the royalist chancellor of the Exchequer. In addition, he gave a watch to the secretary of state, Sir Edward Nicholas^‡.191 Ibid. ff. 105v-6v. Having never married, Danby’s titles became extinct on his death.