HOWARD, Thomas (1561-1626)

‘A monument of corruption in a corrupt age’,82 M. Prestwich, Cranfield, 154. Thomas Howard, 1st earl of Suffolk, served successively as lord chamberlain and lord treasurer to James I before spectacularly falling from power in the summer of 1618, the victim of his own venality and political in-fighting. Although disparaged by one of his contemporaries as ‘fitter to part a fray, and compose the differences of a disordered court than a kingdom’, Suffolk was nonetheless the trusted confidant of the king’s chief minister, Robert Cecil^*, 1st earl of Salisbury during the early years of the reign,83 A. Wilson, Hist. of Gt. Britain (1653), 43; A. Cecil, Life of Robert Cecil, First Earl of Salisbury, 365. and a pivotal figure in the factional politics in the years immediately following Salisbury’s death.

Early life and career, 1561-1604

Born during the first few years of Elizabeth’s reign, Howard was the second son of England’s premier nobleman, the 4th duke of Norfolk (Thomas Howard^†). His childhood was scarred by parental loss: his mother died when he was three, and his father was executed six years later for plotting to place Mary, queen of Scots on the English throne. Responsibility for his upbringing thereafter fell to his elder half-brother Philip, who bought his wardship and who, though prevented from inheriting the Norfolk title by his father’s attainder, enjoyed those Howard lands which escaped forfeiture.84 L. Stone, Crisis of the Aristocracy, 423; M.A. Tierney, Hist. and Antiquities of the Castle and Town of Arundel, 743; H.G. Fitz-Alan, Lives of Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel and of his wife, Anne Dacres, 71-2. During the mid 1570s the two brothers attended St John’s College, Cambridge. Thomas, however, was not a natural scholar: when, in later life, he addressed the university as its chancellor, he admitted that ‘I know not Latin’.85 T. Fuller, Worthies of Eng. ed. J. Freeman, 180.

Not until the early 1580s did the brothers’ fortunes markedly improved. In 1580 Philip inherited the earldom of Arundel from his maternal grandfather, so paving the way for his restoration in blood the following year. Soon thereafter Thomas married Katherine Knyvet, one of the coheirs to her father, a wealthy Wiltshire gentleman. By August 1584 Thomas was in favour with the queen, who not only acted as godmother to his first-born son Theophilus Howard^* (later 2nd earl of Suffolk) but also gave him a three-quarter length portrait of herself (known as the Pelican Portrait) by Nicholas Hilliard.86 Layton, 142. The Pelican Portrait remained in the hands of the Howard family until 1934. It now hangs in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. Wilts. Arch. Mag. xlvi. 392-3. Although Philip subsequently fell from grace for converting to Catholicism and attempting to flee abroad (for which offence he was imprisoned and attainted), Thomas went on to carve out for himself a successful naval career, spending large sums in the process.87 L. Stone, Fam. and Fortune, 270-1. Indeed, his enthusiastic prosecution of the war with Spain earned him the admiration of the queen, who described him as ‘good Thomas’.88 CSP Dom. 1595-7, p. 453. Indeed, in 1597 Elizabeth admitted him to the order of the Garter and ennobled him by writ of summons, an honour she seldom bestowed.

Following the death of his father-in-law in 1598, Thomas, now Lord Howard de Walden, inherited extensive property in Wiltshire. He and his wife – who secured appointment to the privy chamber in September 1599 - immediately set about improving and extending the Knyvet family seat at Charlton.89 VCH Wilts. xiv. 41-2; H.M. Payne, ‘Aristocratic Women and the Jacobean Court, 1603-25’ (Univ. of London Ph.D. thesis, 2001), 282. During the faction fighting which characterized the final years of Elizabeth’s reign, Howard sided with his close friend, the queen’s chief minister Sir Robert Cecil, against Robert Devereux^†, 2nd earl of Essex. In the wake of Essex’s abortive rebellion in February 1601, Howard served as both the earl’s gaoler and one of his judges. His loyalty was rewarded with grants of property in north-western Essex that had formerly belonged to his father, and with the restoration of the Howard family’s London mansion, known as the Charterhouse. He was also given the farm of the customs duties on gold and silver thread imported from Venice.90 P. Morant, Hist. and Antiquities of the County of Essex, i. 257; ii. 555; CSP Dom. 1601-3, p. 120; Davies, 153; HMC Hatfield, xxi. 171.

By October 1602 Elizabeth had decided that Howard should succeed the ailing George Carey^*, 2nd Lord Hunsdon as lord chamberlain. However, Hunsdon refused to relinquish his staff, despite his infirmity, so that Howard was obliged to act as his deputy instead.91 Letters and Memorials of State ed. A. Collins, ii. 217, 262. Hunsdon remained incapable of discharging his duties when James I, the son of Mary, queen of Scots, ascended the throne in March 1603, for which reason, in early April, the new king ordered that Howard continue to perform his duties.92 H. Ellis, Orig. Letters (1st ser. iii), 66. At around the same time, Howard served as a member of the short-lived council of accession.93 Pprs. of Nathaniel Bacon of Stiffkey, V: 1603-7 ed. V. Morgan et al. (Norf. Rec. Soc. lxxiv), 25.

Even before he reached the capital, James, perhaps under the influence of Howard’s paternal uncle Lord Henry Howard^* (later earl of Northampton), who had travelled north to greet the king, signified that he wished Howard to be appointed to the Privy Council. On 25 Apr. Howard was duly sworn in.94 Queen Eliz. and Her Times ed. T. Wright, ii. 495; APC, 1601-4, p. 495; Reportes del Cases in Camera Stellata, 180; D. Lloyd, State Worthies (1670), 792. On arriving at Theobalds, the Hertfordshire seat of Sir Robert Cecil, James swiftly promoted Howard to lord chamberlain (4 May), Hunsdon having at last been induced to resign.95 E. Howes, Annales, or A generall Chronicle of Eng. (1631), 822. From there he journeyed to the Charterhouse where, for four days, he and his entourage were entertained by Howard with ‘such abundance of provision of all manner of things as greater could not be’.96 Ellis, 71-2; J. Nichols, Progs. of Jas. I, i. 113-14. There a delighted James evidently promised to restore to Howard many of the lands that had been forfeited to the crown by the attainders of his late father and half-brother Philip, earl of Arundel. Certainly, within three days of the royal visit, Howard’s wife instructed Arundel’s former estate steward to come to London with a list of those properties that had been so lost. Howard was naturally eager to recover these lands, but he was obliged to tread warily, as he was not the only member of the Howard family with a legitimate claim. His half-brother Philip, who had died in the Tower in 1595, had left a son, Thomas Howard^*, now 18 years old and soon to be restored to the earldom of Arundel.97 HMC Var. ii. 249. There was also Lord Henry Howard to consider. Like Howard himself, Lord Henry quickly took advantage of the Stuart succession to establish a dominant position at court. Beginning in June 1603, many of the lands of the late duke of Norfolk were consequently restored to Howard and Lord Henry jointly, leaving only the crumbs for the hereditary claimant, the young earl of Arundel.98 CSP Dom. 1601-3, p. 17; Stone, Fam. and Fortune, 271-2; Stone, Crisis, 413; Hist. of Guildford (1801), 294.

In July 1603, four days before his coronation, James elevated Howard to the earldom of Suffolk. This further mark of favour signified James’s personal liking of his new lord chamberlain, whom the king frequently described as ‘honest’ (but mocked for his expanding girth). It also strengthened the position at court of his friend Sir Robert Cecil, now Lord Cecil, whose advice Howard was apt to follow and who had developed an intimate relationship, perhaps of a sexual nature, with Howard’s wife.99 Letters of Jas. VI and I ed. G.P.V. Akrigg, 221, 234, 250, 257; Spain and the Jacobean Catholics I: 1603-12 ed. A.J. Loomie (Cath. Rec. Soc. lxiv), 7. However, Howard’s elevation was also symbolic, for by raising up the oldest surviving son of the duke of Norfolk to an earldom, James obliquely acknowledged Norfolk’s loyalty to his mother, Mary, queen of Scots, whose memory he proved keen to honour publicly as early as August 1603.100 P. Sherlock, ‘Monuments of Elizabeth Tudor and Mary Stuart: King James and the Manipulation of Memory’, JBS, xlvi. 269. See also Fuller, 180.

Suffolk hoped that his tenure of the lord chamberlain’s staff would only be temporary. As early as July 1603 he fixed his hopes on succeeding as lord high admiral his elderly distant kinsman Charles Howard^*, 1st earl of Nottingham. He enlisted Cecil’s help, and over the autumn he supported a campaign for naval reform led by the Navy’s treasurer, Sir Fulke Greville^* (later 1st Lord Brooke). However, Nottingham was only willing to part with the admiralty on favourable terms, and his marriage in September 1603 to the daughter of James Stuart, 2nd earl of Moray [S] greatly strengthened his bargaining position, as his new wife was distantly related to the king. To make matters worse, Cecil was only lukewarm in his support, since Nottingham, like Suffolk himself, was one of his closest allies. By the end of January 1604 Suffolk had abandoned the struggle.101 R.A. Rebholz, Life of Fulke Greville, First Lord Brooke, 171-2, 174, 349; M. Young, Servility and Service: The Life and Work of Sir John Coke, 29-30. It may have been in order to soothe his wounded feelings that in early February James appointed him one of the commissioners for the office of earl marshal.

Suffolk served as one of judges in the trials held at Winchester of the Main and Bye plotters in November 1603. Following the king’s decision to summon Parliament early the following year, Suffolk exercised his influence as lord of the manor of Malmesbury, situated just two miles from Charlton, to return to the Commons his client Sir Roger Dallison^‡ and the latter’s cousin, Sir Thomas Dallison^‡.102 HP Commons 1604-29, ii. 445. However, at Saffron Walden, in north-west Essex, where he also owned an estate, he encountered more difficulty. His tenants had declared for Sir Francis Barrington^‡ of nearby Hatfield Broad Oak in the race to secure the senior knighthood of the shire for Essex, whereas Suffolk had promised his support for Cecil’s client Sir Edward Denny^* of Waltham Abbey (later earl of Norwich). Dismayed that his tenants had sided with Barrington without either consulting him or waiting for his recommendation, Suffolk fired off an angry letter of rebuke, instructing the freeholders to cast their votes for Denny, or he would make ‘the proudest of you all repent it’.103 Eg. 2644, f. 138.

The parliamentary session of 1604

When Parliament opened on 19 Mar., Suffolk was appointed by the king one of the triers for petitions from the three kingdoms, a largely honorary position. One week later his kinsman, Thomas Howard^*, 3rd Viscount Howard of Bindon, obtained leave of absence and granted him his proxy. Over the course of the session, which lasted until 7 July, Suffolk is recorded as having missed only eight sittings, three of them in the final week. However, the clerk may have overstated his absences, for on two occasions (26 May and 5 June) he was appointed to committees and on a third (26 June) he took custody of a bill. It would seem that in every case Suffolk either entered the chamber after the register was compiled or the clerk erred.104 LJ, ii. 263a, 263b, 307a, 313b, 329b.

Suffolk’s contribution to the Lords’ proceedings is hard to assess, as no account of most of the speeches delivered in the upper House has survived. However, close proximity to the king meant that Suffolk was sometimes employed to convey royal messages to his fellow peers, and, because, he was lord chamberlain it fell to him to complain to the House on 28 May after one of the yeomen of the Chamber (who, like all the king’s household officials, were protected by parliamentary privilege) had been arrested.105 Ibid. 300b, 305b. Moreover, he was named to several conferences with the Commons to discuss important matters of state, such as the Commons’ offer to compound for the abolition of wardship, the projected statutory Union of England and Scotland and ecclesiastical affairs.106 Ibid. 226b, 277b, 282a, 284a. He was also appointed to 13 bill committees, and to the committee to inspect the clerk’s entry in the Journal regarding the House’s proceedings in respect of the disputed right to the barony of Abergavenny.107 On the latter, see ibid. 307a.

Two of Suffolk’s legislative appointments reflected the fact that former Howard lands in Norfolk and Suffolk had recently been returned to him and his uncle Lord Henry Howard, now earl of Northampton. The first of these was to consider a bill to allow Henry Jernegan to sell entailed lands in Norfolk and Suffolk to pay his debts. The second concerned a measure to relieve Capt. Thomas Lovell, who had ruined his finances in a Lincolnshire fen drainage scheme. Suffolk probably served as the chairman of the committee for the Jernegan land bill, as he reported the committee’s proceedings to the House on 24 May. He certainly took a close interest in the Lovell bill, as it was he who moved the House on 3 May to set a time for the committee to meet.108 Ibid. 275a, 280a, 290a, 305a; HP Commons 1604-29, v. 672; CSP Dom. 1603-10, p. 127; HMC Hatfield, xvi. 79. A third committee appointment – to consider a bill to permit Sir Thomas Monson^‡ to exchanges some lands with Trinity College, Cambridge – perhaps held a two-fold interest for Suffolk, as he had succeeded Robert Cecil as steward of the university of Cambridge in 1601 and Monson was a client of Northampton.109 LJ, ii. 281a; HP Commons, 1604-29, v. 354. Suffolk must also have taken a close interest in the bill (never committed) to confirm arrangements made to protect the estates of the countess of Kildare, whose husband, Henry Brooke^†, 11th Lord Cobham, was one of the chief conspirators in the Main Plot. The countess was the daughter of Suffolk’s kinsman the earl of Nottingham, while Suffolk himself was one of the trustees appointed by the king to safeguard her landed estate.110 LJ, ii. 303a; CSP Dom. 1603-10, p. 108.

In the case of at least two of the legislative committees to which he was named, Suffolk clearly wore his government hat. The first concerned the bill to prevent the export of iron ordnance. This measure, though it apparently did not originate with the Privy Council,111 LJ, ii. 285a. For the Council’s legislative agenda, see SP14/6/99. was nevertheless of considerable concern to the crown. It is certainly significant that the committee was chaired by the lord treasurer, Thomas Sackville, 1st earl of Dorset. On 7 June Dorset announced that he would be unable to attend the committee that afternoon, whereupon the lord chancellor, Lord Ellesmere (Thomas Egerton^*, later 1st Viscount Brackley) handed the bill to Suffolk, the second named member of the committee. Accordingly, it was Suffolk who reported the bill on 11 June.112 LJ, ii. 315a, 318a. The second committee on which Suffolk served in a quasi-ministerial capacity concerned the bill to confirm letters patent granted by the king and his predecessors, which certainly originated with the Council. As in the case of the ordnance bill, this measure was entrusted to the care of Suffolk after Dorset explained that he was too busy to deal with it.113 Ibid. 326b, 329b; SP14/6/99.

Perhaps the main reason that Dorset relinquished the chairmanship of two parliamentary committees to Suffolk was that he was increasingly preoccupied with helping to negotiate a peace treaty with Spain, whose representatives had arrived in London in mid May. Suffolk himself was not one of the peace commissioners but, like his friend Cecil, he warmly supported a negotiated settlement to the Elizabethan conflict with Spain. So too did his wife, who encouraged the Spaniards to believe that she used her influence as Cecil’s mistress to ensure that the king’s chief minister remained well disposed towards peace. (In reality, it seems unlikely that Cecil needed much persuading, as the war in Ireland, coming on top of substantial military commitments in France and the Low Countries, had brought the English crown to the brink of bankruptcy). The countess’ motives for behaving in the way are not difficult to guess. By persuading the Spanish to believe that she was essential for the continuance of Cecil’s goodwill, she ensured that she and her husband were not left out when the Spanish government, desperate to secure peace in order to isolate the Dutch, distributed gifts and pensions around the English court. Consequently, in July 1604 Spain’s representatives recommended that the Suffolks be given a pension of 3,000 felipes, the same amount that they suggested should be paid to Cecil and Dorset. They also advised offering them ‘20 thousand in money as a gift and three jewels worth 16 thousand’.114 A.J. Loomie, ‘Toleration and Diplomacy’, Trans. Amer. Phil. Soc. liii. pt. vi. 53, 55. ‘Felipes de plata’ were coins, presumably made from silver, circulating in the Spanish Low Countries. We are grateful to Pauline Croft and Juan Gelabert for this information.

Whether such large lump sums were ever paid to the Suffolks is unknown. However, following the signing of the peace treaty in August, Suffolk and his wife certainly received a Spanish pension which, by 1617, amounted to 4,000 ducats a year, equivalent to about £1,866.115 Add. 31111, f. 194. At the rate of 9s. 4d. per ducat. Suffolk himself refused to sully his hands with Spanish gold, preferring to leave such sordid matters to his wife or his brother, Lord William Howard.116 S.R. Gardiner, Hist. of Eng. i. 214-15; Loomie, ‘Toleration and Diplomacy’, 49. His wife not only received their pension (which was used to help provide dowries for their daughters) but also acted as agent for Cecil, who could no more afford to be seen accepting a Spanish pension than Suffolk himself.117 Cecil, 364, n. 2. We are grateful to the late Roger Lockyer for help in translating this dispatch.

How far Suffolk’s attitude towards English foreign policy was unduly influenced by Spanish douceurs remains a matter for conjecture. In 1609 the French ambassador claimed that Suffolk was ‘le principal bouclier de l’ambassadeur d’Espagne’,118 Ambassades de M. de La Boderie en Angleterre (1750), iv. 92. and it was widely believed that Suffolk and the rest of the Howards were ‘the principal means about his Majesty’ to draw the king towards Spain and away from alliance with the Protestant Dutch, as Suffolk himself admitted. However, writing to England’s ambassador to The Hague sometime before 1614, Suffolk vowed ‘before God’ that ‘I have no inclination to the Spaniard more than the necessity of my mere service draws me to’. While admitting that he sometimes acceded to Spanish requests, he claimed that this was only out of courtesy and that he was in ‘no way theirs’.119 Winwood’s Memorials ed. E. Sawyer, ii. 175. For evidence of one such favour performed by Suffolk for the Spanish ambassador, see Add. 12506, f. 129. This may, of course, have been deliberate misinformation. There was, after all, no mention here of any pecuniary interest, nor does Suffolk’s disclaimer tally well with the French perception that the lord chamberlain was the chief protector of Spanish interests at court. However, it seems unlikely that Suffolk was grossly distorting the truth. After all, he had enthusiastically fought the Spanish under Elizabeth, and it should not be forgotten that Cecil also received a Spanish pension while doing all within his power to aid Spain’s enemies, the Dutch. Had Suffolk and Cecil been on diametrically opposed sides on such a vital matter, it is hard to believe that their friendship would have remained firm. Of course, none of this takes into account the loyalties of the countess of Suffolk who, as well as being Cecil’s mistress, also served as keeper of the jewels to Anne of Denmark.120 Payne, 281. Gardiner thought it ‘probable’ that, through the countess, Spain’s chief minister, the duke of Lerma, would have gained valuable information on English policy.121 S.R. Gardiner, Hist. of Eng. i. 215. However, he overlooked the possibility that the flow of information might have been controlled by Cecil and Suffolk, and that it might not have been all one way.

If Suffolk and Cecil shared broadly similar views on foreign affairs, they also saw eye to eye on domestic religious policy. In September 1604, in the aftermath of the peace with Spain, the Privy Council debated whether to relax the penal laws. Cecil, now Viscount Cranborne, argued for the lenient treatment of Catholics, ‘for they intend nothing against the state of our country’. This advice was supported by Suffolk, who declared not only that he foresaw little likelihood of Catholic unrest but also that the greater threat to the state lay in the growing size of the puritan community.122 Loomie, 56. However, unlike Cecil, who tempered Protestant conviction with a heavy dose of realpolitik, Suffolk may have spoken out of sympathy for the Catholic religion. After all, his elder brother had died a martyr to the Catholic cause, and almost the entire remaining Howard clan were Catholic, including Suffolk’s wife and younger brother, Lord William Howard of Naworth. Moreover, doubts about Suffolk’s own commitment to the Protestant faith were rife: a rhyme popular in the capital in April 1603 cast Suffolk as the spokesman for the papists, and in September 1605 the papal nuncio in Paris was informed that the lord chamberlain was secretly Catholic. In July 1610 Richard Bancroft^*, archbishop of Canterbury, accused Suffolk, Northampton and the 4th earl of Worcester (Edward Somerset^*) of being Catholic during a meeting of the Council.123 Manningham Diary ed J. Bruce (Cam. Soc. xcix), 168; Gardiner, What Gunpowder Plot Was, 24n.; Spain and the Jacobean Catholics I: 1603-12, p. 157. However, if Suffolk did harbour Catholic sympathies he was careful never to reveal them.

The parliamentary session of 1605-6

Suffolk was one of the first to discover that he had underestimated the threat from within England’s Catholic community. Many Catholics were dismayed that Spain had concluded peace with England, and some now felt driven to take direct action themselves. In late October 1605 the Catholic peer, William Parker^*, 5th Lord Monteagle received an anonymous letter warning him not to be present when Parliament reopened in early November. After Monteagle sounded the alarm, Suffolk carried out an inspection of the ground floor of the Palace of Westminster, which contained several rooms that the keeper of the Parliament House rented out. As lord chamberlain, he was responsible for making ready any building which the king was due to visit, so it was thought that Suffolk’s presence would be unlikely to startle the conspirators if a plot were indeed afoot. This inspection proved to be vitally important, as Suffolk noticed that one of the so-called cellars below the House of Lords contained an improbably large quantity of fuel.124 Nicholls, Investigating Gunpowder Plot, 6, 8-9; Nichols, Progs. of Jas. I, i. 581. A second search, conducted shortly thereafter and led by the Middlesex magistrate Thomas Knyvett^* (later Lord Knyvett), resulted in the dramatic capture of Guy Fawkes and the collapse of the plot.

The discovery of a conspiracy to blow up the king and Parliament caused Parliament to be deferred until the New Year. During the interim Suffolk was one of the most active members of the commission established to investigate the plot.125 Nicholls, Investigating Gunpowder Plot, 74. His zeal is unsurprising, for had the conspirators succeeded, Suffolk himself, being in close attendance on the king as lord chamberlain, would almost certainly have been killed. Among those upon whom the investigating commission turned their attention was Henry Percy^*, 3rd earl of Northumberland, whose kinsman and servant Thomas Percy had been one of the principal plotters. In June 1606 Northumberland was tried in Star Chamber on suspicion of involvement in the plot, and although his guilt was never proven, the circumstantial evidence against him was considerable. Like his fellow judges Salisbury and Northampton, Suffolk called for Northumberland to be imprisoned for life and fined £30,000.126 M. Nicholls, ‘The “Wizard Earl” in Star Chamber’, HJ, xxx. 189. Shortly thereafter, Suffolk succeeded Northumberland as captain of the band of gentlemen pensioners, the body responsible for the physical safety of the monarch.

Early in the New Year Suffolk married off two of his daughters. The eldest, Frances, was matched to Robert Devereux^*, the young 3rd earl of Essex, while the younger, Elizabeth, wed the 61 year old Lord Knollys (William Knollys^*, later 1st earl of Banbury), treasurer of the household and a former supporter of Essex’s father. Both alliances provide further evidence of Suffolk’s close association with Robert Cecil, now 1st earl of Salisbury, whose own daughter was below marriageable age, since they were intended to heal the rift between Cecil and the Essex faction that had dominated the final years of Elizabeth’s reign.127 CSP Ven. 1603-7, p. 308.

Two days after Knollys married Elizabeth Howard, Parliament reopened. As in 1604, Suffolk frequently attended the Lords, despite his official duties. His longest period of absence, between 7 and 12 May inclusive, lasted four working days. It may, in part, be explained by the funeral in Westminster Abbey on 7 May of Charles Blount^*, earl of Devonshire, which Suffolk attended as an assistant.128 Carleton to Chamberlain ed. M. Lee, 81. It may also have been occasioned by the commencement of proceedings in the Exchequer Court against the Levant Company merchant John Bate, a matter in which the lord chamberlain was closely interested, as will be noticed later. However, this seems unlikely, as counsel was not assigned to Bate until 28 May.129 E124/4, f. 8. During the session, Suffolk held the proxies of four of his fellow peers, more than any other nobleman apart from Salisbury, who held six. These belonged to his kinsman, Viscount Bindon, and to the 5th earl of Rutland (Roger Manners^*), the 2nd Lord Willoughby of Parham (Charles Willoughby^*) and the 5th Lord Paget (William Paget*).

Proceedings in both Houses were initially dominated by the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot. On 21 Jan. Suffolk was appointed to help consider whether existing laws for the preservation of the Protestant religion were adequate. Four days later he was named to a committee to debate what punishment should be inflicted on the surviving plotters.130 LJ, ii. 360b, 361a. This latter appointment was timely, for on 27 Jan. Fawkes and seven of his accomplices were arraigned in Westminster Hall before specially appointed commissioners, including Suffolk himself.131 Nicholls, Investigating Gunpowder Plot, 52. As lord chamberlain, Suffolk arranged for seating to be provided for those Members of the Commons who wished to attend.132 Bowyer Diary, 10. Following the execution of the plotters, Suffolk was appointed to help draft a bill for their attainder and also to confer with the Commons about the shortcomings of existing religious legislation.133 LJ, ii. 367a, 367b. On 29 Apr. he was also named to a committee for two bills to enforce the laws against recusants – an inevitable development in the wake of the Gunpowder Plot.134 Ibid. 409b.

During the remainder of the session Suffolk was named to a variety of legislative committees. One, on the bill to prevent unlawful hunting of deer and rabbits, doubtless attracted his attention because the king was a passionate hunter. Another, on the bill to reform purveyance, undoubtedly reflected a concern to protect the king’s interests. This latter measure, which had originated in the Commons, in effect sought to abolish purveyance on the grounds that it was already illegal, and to leave the king with only the right of pre-emption.135 Ibid. 365b, 407b; P. Croft, ‘Parl., Purveyance and the City of London, 1589-1604’, PH, iv. 23. Suffolk certainly demonstrated a close interest in the bill to secure for Sir Thomas Lake^‡ the title to the Middlesex manor of Little Stanmore, as he took custody of the bill on 18 Feb. and reported the committee’s proceedings four days later.136 LJ, ii. 376a, 376b, 379b. His involvement was not surprising, as Lake, one of the clerks of the signet, was reportedly more trusted by James than any other man except Salisbury.137 HP Commons, 1604-29, v. 59-60. Two other bills were assigned to Suffolk’s custody during the session, one concerned with the relief of John Holditch, who had been disinherited by the amendment of a fine, the other with a Chancery decree involving a Norfolk man, William Le Gris of Norwich, which he reported on 3 May.138 LJ, ii. 373b, 374a, 414a, 414b, 423a. On Le Gris, see HP Commons 1604-29, iv. 621. Suffolk’s appointment to a committee to consider two bills to reform the Marshalsea Court reflected his interests as lord chamberlain, as the Marshalsea was an offshoot of the royal household.139 LJ, ii. 436b; G.E. Aylmer, King’s Servants, 45. In March 1606 Suffolk was appointed to a legislative committee (concerning lawsuits over wills and letters of administration) in place of the earl of Rutland, whose proxy he held.140 LJ, ii. 400a.

During the session Suffolk was subjected to vigorous lobbying by the corporation of Oswestry, in Shropshire, where he was lord of the manor. Three years earlier the corporation had incurred Suffolk’s displeasure for petitioning the lord president of the council in the Marches of Wales (Edward La Zouche^*, 11th Lord Zouche) against his manorial official,141 Oswestry Town Hall, A75/1/5. but they now sought his help to promote a bill that would allow the survival of Oswestry’s weekly cloth market. This bill had been drafted by the Shrewsbury drapers’ company, and was designed to frustrate the London alnager, John Tey^‡, who was trying to ensure that cloth manufactured in Wales and the Marches was subject to the provisions of the 1601 Cloth Act, which prescribed the precise weight and dimensions of various kinds of cloth. On 1 Mar. 1606, while the Welsh cottons bill was making its passage through the Commons, the London factors of the Shrewsbury drapers advised Oswestry’s corporation to persuade ‘some of the chiefest in Oswestry, whom my lord of Suffolk doth best favour’, to write to the lord chamberlain ‘to certify his lordship, either by petition or otherwise’, that it was impossible to subject Welsh cottons to the sort of quality control envisaged by the 1601 Act without ruining the industry. Previously these same factors had petitioned Suffolk themselves, but he had not believed that he would suffer in his own pocket, having received no complaint from Oswestry himself. However, his concerns were now aroused, for on 8 Mar. the London factors reported that Suffolk had questioned Tey. Moreover, when the Welsh cottons bill was sent to the Lords, Suffolk not only secured appointment to the committee but also helped neutralize the influence of the committee’s chairman, Lord Treasurer Dorset, on whose behalf Tey had been acting, with the result that the measure was subsequently enacted.142 Salop RO, 1831/14; LJ, ii. 408b; HP Commons 1604-29, ii. 340-1. It was probably also his Shropshire interests which explains why Suffolk was included on the committee for the bill to elucidate the 1542/3 Act which allowed the crown to make law for Wales by proclamation.143 LJ, ii. 406b.

The Welsh cottons bill was not the only matter that came before Parliament in 1606 that had implications for Suffolk’s finances. In 1604 Suffolk had been granted the right to collect a duty of 5s. 6d. on every hundredweight of imported currants for ten years, to the dismay of the Levant Company, which, until 1600, had laid this duty on aliens and non members in order to pay for the English embassy in Constantinople. Suffolk paid handsomely for the privilege, of course, but the duty nevertheless yielded him an annual income of around £3,000, which was paid to him by a syndicate that included his client Sir Roger Dallison, to whom he agreed to sublet the farm.144 CSP Dom. 1603-10, pp. 92, 161; 1623-5, p. 532; WYAS, Temple Newsam mss, WYL100/PO/6/II/7/2, 3; A.F. Upton, Sir Arthur Ingram, 7; P. Croft, ‘Fresh Light on Bate’s Case’, HJ, xxx. 525-6; M. Epstein, Early Hist. of the Levant Co. 42-5. Suffolk evidently shared the proceeds with his friend Salisbury, who may originally have helped him obtain the grant.145 Croft, ‘Fresh Light’, 529. Together the two men ensured that the king was not persuaded to return collection of these duties to the Levant Company merchants, despite vigorous lobbying.146 CSP Ven. 1603-7, pp. 217, 225. In frustration, the Company decided that the impost was illegal, as it had not been laid with the consent of Parliament. They accordingly resolved to take their complaint to the House of Commons. At first they were dissuaded from doing so by Salisbury, who agreed in October 1605 to issue them with a new charter. However, in February 1606 a bill concerning impositions was laid before the lower House.147 Croft, ‘Fresh Light’, 532; CJ, i. 274a.

Fortunately for Suffolk, the Commons at first showed little interest in the impositions bill, which disappeared for some time after 19 Mar., when it was placed in committee. This was probably because the London-based Levant Company was not popular in a Commons dominated by the free trade lobby.148 CJ, i. 287a; P. Croft, ‘Parliamentary Preparations, Sept. 1605’, PH, vi. 129. Matters might have rested there were it not for the fact that on 2 Apr. the leading Levant merchant John Bate refused to pay the 5s. 6d. duty. His cause was taken up one week later by the London lawyer Nicholas Fuller^‡, who complained in the Commons that the impost upon currants was so excessive that many London merchants had given up building ships. It was not long before the unparliamentary nature of the impost aroused widespread sympathy in the Commons for the Levant Company. Shortly thereafter Bate’s complaint was added to the Commons’ draft petition of grievances.149 Croft, ‘Fresh Light’, 534; Bowyer Diary, 105, 109.

Like Salisbury, Suffolk now had grounds for concern. However, the rent paid by the farmers of the duty was too valuable for the king to forgo, and the Privy Council was advised by the crown’s law officers on 5 May that the impost was perfectly legal.150 ‘Jnl. of Sir Roger Wilbraham’ ed. H.S. Scott in Cam. Misc. X (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, iv), 86-7. Charges were therefore laid against Bate in the Exchequer Court on 7 May, to the dismay of the Commons, which responded by ordering the article relating to the impost on currants (described incorrectly in the Journal as a bill) to be engrossed.151 Croft, ‘Fresh Light’, 535; CJ, i. 307b; Bowyer Diary, 153-7. On 14 May the king was handed the Commons’ petition of grievances. No doubt to the relief of Suffolk and Salisbury, James was so dismayed at the length of this document that he declared that he would not answer it until the next session. When he did so, on 18 Nov., he ignored most of the Commons’ complaints, and instead harangued the lower House about the Union. At around the same time the Exchequer Court ruled against Bate,152 Bowyer Diary, 185; CJ, i. 314b; Croft, ‘Fresh Light’, 536. thereby removing an immediate threat to Suffolk’s finances.

Suffolk could ill afford to suffer a significant drop in his income. Between 1604 and 1608 he spent £13,000 in purchasing land in East Anglia and the West Country.153 Stone, Fam. and Fortune, 272. He also provided large dowries for his daughters - Frances’ portion alone amounted to £6,000154 A. Somerset, Unnatural Murder, 27. – and paid for the education of his sons, the eldest of whom, Theophilus Howard, Lord Howard de Walden (later 2nd earl of Suffolk), toured France and Italy between1603 and 1605. To make matters worse, in about 1605 Suffolk embarked on the construction of a vast new palatial residence near Saffron Walden, modelled on (but dwarfing) the house that he and his wife had commenced building at Charlton in the late 1590s.155 Wilts. Arch. Mag. xlviii. 255. No expense was spared by Suffolk, who was eager to emulate the lavish building work undertaken by his uncle the earl of Northampton at Charing Cross, and to outshine Hatfield House in Hertfordshire, the stately home erected by his friend Salisbury between 1607 and 1611 at a cost of £40,000. Contemporary estimates of the final bill for Audley End, including furnishings, vary wildly. Sir Roger Wilbraham^‡, who died in 1616 before the House was completed, thought that Suffolk laid out £80,000 ‘at the least’, while a foreign visitor believed in 1610 that the work had already cost £100,000 (‘and it is supposed that the remainder will not come to less’).156 ‘Jnl. of Sir Roger Wilbraham’, 115; P.J. Drury, ‘“No other Palace will Compare”: the Evolution of Audley End, 1605-1745’, Architectural Hist. xxiii. 3. In 1618 the Venetian ambassador claimed that Audley End had cost more than 800,000 crowns (£240,000).157 CSP Ven. 1617-19, p. 309. Whatever the true figure may have been (and the house was still not finished as late as 1621), Audley End was clearly the most expensive house to have been erected in England since Wolsey built Hampton Court.158 Stone, Crisis, 554; Drury, 31; R. Coke, Detection of Court and State (1719), i. 85. For the evidence that the house was still not finished in 1621, see Bodl. MS Eng.Poet.c.50, lines 5-9. Not surprisingly, Suffolk was obliged to borrow heavily to keep afloat.159 See, for instance, Bodl. MS.Eng.hist.c479, ff. 107, 109.

The parliamentary sessions of 1606-7 and 1610

When Parliament reassembled in November 1606, the main item of business before both Houses was the Union rather than the impost on currants. This may have come as a relief to Suffolk, whose attendance in the Lords became more sporadic: he is recorded as having missed 22 of the session’s 102 morning sittings, around a fifth. It was presumably because he was absent that, on 30 May, Suffolk was not named to the committee for the bill to convey Salisbury’s manor of Theobalds to the king. As in the previous meeting, Suffolk held four proxies, though in place of Lord Paget’s he now held the proxy of the 1st Lord Gerard (Thomas Gerard^*) who, like himself, was one of Salisbury’s few friends.160 HP Commons, 1558-1603, ii. 185.

Suffolk’s legislative appointments once again reflected his local interests, his position in the king’s administration and the concerns of his clients. He presumably chaired the committee for the bill to permit the sale of entailed lands belonging to the late Sir Francis Gawdy^‡ of Wallington and Shouldam, in Norfolk, as he reported the measure as unfit to proceed on 9 December. His membership of the committee for the bill to enable Sir William Smith^‡ to confirm a purchase of land in Leicestershire from All Souls’ College, Oxford was almost certainly prompted by Sir John Townshend^‡, his steward of Oswestry manor, who opposed the bill in the Commons.161 LJ, ii. 468a; HP Commons 1604-29, vi. 355, 545. Likewise, the lord chamberlain’s appointment in May 1607 to the committee for the bill to allow Edward Downes to sell lands for payment of his debts reflected the fact that Downes was one of his servants.162 LJ, ii. 421b; Norf. RO, WLS XVII/2, 410X5, ff. 3v-4. Suffolk was reappointed to the committee for the bill to remedy abuses in the Marshalsea Court bill, which was reintroduced and received a second reading on 1 June 1607. He was also appointed to consider bills to preserve timber, confirm grants of copyhold land made by the king and abolish the hostile laws directed towards Scotland – the one part of the Union project that the Commons were prepared to countenance. Among his other legislative appointments were committees to consider measures concerning defective titles to land, Parliament’s power to confirm ecclesiastical Canons and the true making of woollen cloth.163 LJ, ii. 471b, 473a, 494a, 503a, 514b, 520a, 524b.

Following the appointment of Salisbury as lord treasurer in May 1608, the impost on currants was reduced by 2s. per hundredweight as a concession to the Levant merchants in the wake of their defeat in Bate’s Case.164 Croft, ‘Fresh Light’, 537. Moreover, Suffolk’s agents, Dallison and Richard Wright^‡, were required to surrender their sub-lease to Suffolk, which they did in the autumn of 1609.165 WYAS, Temple Newsam mss, WYL100/PO/6/VII/5. On the face of it, Suffolk’s financial interests were sacrificed by Salisbury. In fact, Suffolk benefited from a fresh arrangement made in November 1609, when he sublet the farm of the reduced impost for 22 years to a new syndicate, whose members included the City financier Sir Arthur Ingram^‡. Initially it was agreed that the syndicate would pay Suffolk a lump sum of £20,000, but it was later decided to give him an annuity instead. In 1610 this annuity amounted to £3,000, and by 1612 it had evidently risen to £5,000.166 Stone, Fam. and Fortune, 273; E214/1342. The account in Upton, 7, is misleading.

Suffolk’s relationship with Salisbury was, if anything, closer than ever, for in the summer of 1608 the lord treasurer agreed to a marriage between his eldest son William Cecil^* (later 2nd earl of Salisbury) and Suffolk’s third daughter, Katherine.167 Chamberlain Letters, i. 259. The couple wed in the following December, and in September 1609 Suffolk and Salisbury, now tied by blood as well as friendship, planned to spend time together in the country.168 HMC Hatfield, xxi. 137. In January 1610 it was rumoured at court that Suffolk, together with Salisbury, Northampton and Scotland’s lord treasurer George Home, earl of Dunbar [S], would be elevated to the rank of marquess to celebrate the 16th birthday of Prince Henry on 19 February. In the event, however, the only honour to be bestowed upon the Howards was to summon Suffolk’s eldest son Theophilus to the Lords in right of his father’s barony on 8 February.

The first parliamentary session of 1610 was dominated by negotiations over the Great Contract. Surprisingly, perhaps, Suffolk played little recorded role in these proceedings, although his recorded absences were infrequent. However, on 14 Feb. he was appointed to attend the initial conference with the Commons at which Salisbury set out the parlous state of the royal finances, and on 18 Apr. he was named to the committee that was instructed to attend James to discover whether the king liked the proposals for compounding for tenures. Moreover, on 17 July, after the Commons resolved to offer the king an annual income of £180,000 in return for the surrender of various prerogative revenues, he was sent to Theobalds with three other peers to lay the matter before James.169 LJ, ii. 550b, 579b; Procs. 1610 ed. E.R. Foster, ii. 283, 285. The other main business of the session was the legal status of impositions, to which subject the Commons now returned in earnest. Although the fate of these duties had a direct bearing on Suffolk’s own finances, the matter was not debated by the Lords in 1610. Suffolk’s only recorded role in this business was to usher into the king’s presence the representatives sent by the Commons to Greenwich on 25 May to persuade James to let them debate the issue.170 Procs. 1610, ii. 114-15.

A number of Suffolk’s legislative appointments during this session reflected the interests of his allies at court. He was twice named to consider bills to erect a school and hospital at Thetford in Norfolk, where Northampton exercised a degree of electoral influence. He was also appointed to the committee for the bill to assure Salisbury’s title to certain lands.171 LJ, ii. 569b, 600a, 616a. His inclusion on the committee for the bill to allow the 18th earl of Oxford (Henry de Vere^*) to sell some minor properties presumably owed much to both Salisbury and Northampton, as Salisbury was named as one of the trustees for the sale and Northampton, who evidently chaired the committee, was Oxford’s cousin. Northampton may also have been behind Suffolk’s membership of the committee to allow Edward Neville^*, 8th (or 1st) Lord Abergavenny, to sell land, as Northampton was a relative of the Fane family, who stood to inherit the Neville estates should the male line fail. Suffolk’s own interests, as well as those of Northampton and Arundel, may have been directly involved in the bill to drain marshland in Norfolk and Suffolk, to which committee all three Howards were named on 19 July.172 Ibid. 595b, 611a, 639a.

Bills concerned with the affairs of members of the East Anglian gentry once again featured among Suffolk’s legislative appointments. The measure to allow Charles Waldegrave to sell lands to pay his debts and provide for his younger children certainly falls into this category, as the Waldegraves were settled at Sudbury in Suffolk. So too does the bill to permit the Suffolk gentleman Reginald Rous to sell land to his nephew.173 Ibid. 553b.

Suffolk was a member of the committee appointed on 27 Feb. to confer with the Commons over the legal dictionary entitled The Interpreter, whose author, the civil lawyer Dr John Cowell, had upset the lower House by arguing that kings were entitled to make laws without reference to parliaments. He was also a member of the committee ordered to present the king with a petition from both Houses concerning James’s safety and the danger posed by his Catholic subjects, a matter which had resurfaced with the news that the French king, Henri IV, had been assassinated by a Catholic fanatic. Similar fears underlay a bill to require those who had been naturalized or restored in blood should take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy. Having been restored in blood himself in 1584, Suffolk was not surprisingly named to the committee on 2 June.174 Ibid. 76a, 603a, 606b. As in 1607, Suffolk was a member of the committee for the bill to prevent ecclesiastical Canons from being promulgated without the consent of Parliament. In his capacity as lord chamberlain, Suffolk played a central role in the ceremony which saw the king’s eldest son created prince of Wales in Parliament on 4 June. Carrying the prince’s robes, he and the earl of Worcester led the procession into the hall, and during the ceremony he stood on the prince’s left.175 Parl. Debates 1610 ed. S.R. Gardiner, 49; HMC Downshire, ii. 316; Procs. 1610, i. 96.

In March 1610, while Parliament was still sitting, William Compton^*, Lord Compton (later 1st earl of Northampton), became temporarily deranged after learning that he had inherited a vast fortune from the London alderman Sir John Spencer. Since his own finances were severely stretched, Suffolk begged from the king the right take custody of Compton’s estate, whereupon he and Worcester were granted letters of administration. However, on arriving at Compton’s house in Islington the two men were met by Compton’s mother, the dowager countess of Dorset, who ‘railed’ at them, refused to let them in, and scratched their faces with her fingernails.176 HMC Buccleuch, i. 87, 272; HMC 10th Rep. VI, 83; Bodl., Carte 74, f. 398. Shortly thereafter, and no doubt to Suffolk’s intense disappointment, Compton made a full recovery.

Suffolk played little recorded part in the final session of the first Jacobean Parliament, which saw the collapse of the Great Contract, although he was recorded as absent on only seven occasions. Four days after the Commons declined to proceed any further with the negotiations, Suffolk was among those who were ordered to confer with the Commons the following day. At this conference on 14 Nov., the lord treasurer offered the Commons a scaled-back version of the Great Contract. Over the next few days Suffolk, in conjunction with Salisbury, Northampton and Worcester, communicated with the king, then at Royston, over this mini-Contract.177 LJ, ii. 678a; Procs. 1610, ii. 341n. However, all hope for an agreement with the Commons was quickly dashed.

During this short session, Suffolk was named to two bill committees that dealt with matters that he had previously been asked to help consider: a measure to preserve and increase timber and another to prevent the export of iron ordnance. His only other legislative appointments of the session were concerned with the temporary erection of brewhouses along the route of the king’s progress (a matter that doubtless concerned him as lord chamberlain), land bequeathed in wills and leases made by Prince Henry.178 LJ, ii. 669a, 670a, 675a, 677a.

The death of Salisbury and the rise of Rochester, 1611-14

Suffolk may have offended Prince Henry in January 1611 after he leaped to the defence of his cousin Sir Robert Carey^* (later 1st earl of Monmouth). Henry wanted to replace Carey as governor of the young duke of York (Charles Stuart^*, later prince of Wales) with his own nominee, Sir James Fullerton^‡, and was angry when Suffolk intervened on Carey’s behalf. With characteristic diplomacy, James decided that the duty of caring for the duke should instead be divided between Carey and Fullerton.179 Mems. of the Life of Robert Carey (1759), 171-4.

In May 1611 Suffolk, perhaps under increasing financial pressure due to the cost of building Audley End, sold the Charterhouse for £13,000 to Thomas Sutton, the wealthiest commoner in England and perhaps Suffolk’s most important creditor.180 Davies, 160; Prestwich, 73. This sale left Suffolk without a London residence, and therefore, with the help of Salisbury and Northampton, he obtained from the bishop of Durham (William James^*) the loan of Durham House, on the Strand.181 Harl. 7002, f. 111; Chamberlain Letters, i. 319. Durham House probably remained Suffolk’s London abode until June 1614, when he inherited the earl of Northampton’s palatial residence in Charing Cross known as Northampton House, described by the Spanish ambassador as one of the finest in Europe.182 Spain and the Jacobean Catholics, II, 39; Chamberlain Letters, i. 541.

In January 1612 Suffolk was afflicted with a peritonsillar abscess, or quinsy, a complication of tonsillitis. Although his condition was described as serious, he quickly recovered. Shortly thereafter, however, his friend Salisbury fell gravely ill. Suffolk was among those who watched anxiously over the lord treasurer on his sick-bed in February, but Cecil’s condition was ultimately terminal.183 Chamberlain Letters, i. 331, 336. Following Salisbury’s death in May 1612, the king decided to place the office of lord treasurer in commission for the time being. Suffolk was appointed to serve as a commissioner, as was Northampton, the favourite to succeed Salisbury. Outwardly at least, Suffolk supported his uncle’s candidacy for the treasurer’s staff, even though Northampton’s overt Catholicism weighed heavily against him.184 HMC Mar and Kellie, ii. 42.

As well as serving on the treasury commission, Suffolk briefly took over Salisbury’s responsibilities as secretary of state, all packets being delivered to him in the first instance.185 Chamberlain Letters, i. 359. However, it was not long before the functions of this office were assumed by the king’s Scottish favourite, Viscount Rochester (Robert Carr^*, later earl of Somerset), whom Suffolk despised. Writing to Sir John Harington^* (later 2nd Lord Harington) in about 1607, the lord chamberlain caustically remarked that although Rochester (then plain Robert Carr) was being taught Latin by James, ‘I think someone should teach him English too’ for, being a Scot, ‘he hath much need of better language’.186 J. Harington, Nugae Antiquae ed. T. Park, i. 359. The succession to Salisbury’s offices soon became the subject of bitter rivalry between Rochester and his partisans on the one hand and those characterized by one contemporary as ‘the house of Suffolk’ on the other.187 Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton ed. L. Pearsall Smith, ii. 19.

Even before Salisbury’s death, the deteriorating state of the royal finances led to a widespread expectation that another Parliament was imminent. Over the winter of 1612/13 it was rumoured that James would order Parliament to meet after his daughter Elizabeth married the Elector Palatine.188 CSP Ven. 1610-13, pp. 491-2. Suffolk evidently attached some credence to this rumour, for in March, one month after the wedding took place, he reportedly tried to persuade the king to buy out his head lease of the impost on currants, plus the farm of the customs on gold and silver thread imported from Venice, which he shared with his son-in-law William Cecil, now 2nd earl of Salisbury. However, he was successfully opposed by the master of the Rolls and former Speaker of the House of Commons, Sir Edward Phelips^‡, who pointed out that impositions were likely to be the object of complaint in the next Parliament, as they had been in the last, and that the king would be ill advised to buy the ‘envy’ that Suffolk and Salisbury had incurred ‘and transfer it upon himself’.189 Chamberlain Letters, i. 441. Suffolk was consequently obliged to change tack, and in December 1613 he sold his interest in the farm of the customs duties on currants to a syndicate for £10,000.190 Dietz, 347.

In April 1613 Suffolk canvassed support for the king’s cousin, Ludovic Stuart^*, 2nd duke of Lennox [S] (later duke of Richmond in the English peerage), who wished to obtain for himself an English title. On the face of it, this was an unlikely pairing, as Lennox was a fervent supporter of a marriage alliance with France, while Suffolk was pro-Spanish. However, Lennox was conducting an affair with Frances Howard, daughter of Suffolk’s relative, the late 3rd Viscount Bindon, who had left his estates to Suffolk’s eldest son Theophilus two years earlier. As her husband, Edward Seymour^*, 1st earl of Hertford was elderly, it was likely that it would not be long before Frances remarried, whereupon Lennox and Suffolk would become kinsmen. Aside from these purely domestic considerations, Suffolk may have supported Lennox for another reason. The succession crisis that followed the death of Prince Henry in November 1612 made it desirable that Lennox, the king’s closest surviving adult male relative, should be capable of sitting in the English Parliament were the king to die while Prince Charles was still a minor. However, Lennox was widely hated at court because of his French leanings. Although Suffolk obtained a few signatures to the petition he prepared on Lennox’s behalf, most of the peers he approached, including his son-in-law Salisbury and his uncle, Arundel, refused to append their names.191 Chamberlain Letters, i. 444-5.

Suffolk was soon preoccupied with more pressing matters. His own daughter Frances had married the 3rd earl of Essex in 1605, but the couple had never consummated their union. During the lifetime of the 1st earl of Salisbury, Suffolk, either through ignorance of Essex’s shortcomings in the bedroom or out of respect for Salisbury, for whose benefit the marriage had in part been arranged, remained silent. However, now that Robert Cecil was dead he felt free to speak out. In May 1613 he persuaded the king to issue a commission to annul the marriage on the grounds that Essex had ‘no ink in his pen’. At around the same time he also arranged for the couple to separate.192 Somerset, 118; Harl. 39, f. 416r-v; CSP Dom. 1611-18, p. 183; State Trials, ii. 805. However, his hope for a swift resolution of the problem soon ran into difficulty as Essex was unwilling to admit publicly that he was impotent. Moreover, Suffolk proved unable to suborn George Abbot^*, archbishop of Canterbury, the head of the commission appointed by James.193 Harl. 39, f. 428; State Trials, ii. 805-6. Suffolk’s position nevertheless remained strong, as Frances wished to marry the royal favourite, Viscount Rochester, with whom she had fallen in love. Such a marriage was an attractive proposition to the king, as it would bring an end to the faction fighting between Carr on the one hand and the Howards on the other. Consequently, shortly before the matter was heard in court, James appointed additional commissioners to counteract the partiality of Abbot.194 Somerset, 141; HMC Mar and Kellie, ii. 53.

Although Suffolk detested Rochester, a union between his daughter and the favourite would strengthen his position at court, which had been weakened following the death of Robert Cecil. Under pressure from Northampton, who arranged a meeting, Suffolk entered into negotiations with Rochester sometime over the spring or summer of 1613.195 Somerset, 119. These discussions were initially kept secret, as Suffolk admitted to Sir Arthur Ingram that ‘I have and may have some interest in my lord of Rochester’ that he was not yet willing to avow publicly. Consequently, during this period the partisans of both sides remained at one another’s throats.196 Upton, 69. For evidence of the continuing faction fighting, see Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton, ii. 24; HMC Mar and Kellie, ii. 51. However, the talks were probably well advanced by the time Frances’ marriage was annulled on 18 Sept. 1613, as it was announced only one month later that Frances and Rochester would marry at Christmas.197 Newsletters from the Archpresbyterate of George Birkhead ed. M.C. Questier (Cam. Soc. 5th ser. xii), 238. The wedding, which was performed in the Chapel Royal at Whitehall on 26 Dec., was a magnificent and costly affair, but for Suffolk, who presumably bore most of the expense, it must have seemed that it was worth every penny. One well informed observer remarked that the lord chamberlain ‘now guides the rudder of state’, while a Catholic newsletter-writer commented, no less accurately, that Suffolk had become one of the most powerful men in England.198 HMC Downshire, iv. 285; Newsletters from the Archpresbyterate of George Birkhead, 260.

The Addled Parliament, 1614

Ironically, Suffolk’s alliance with Rochester – who was elevated to the earldom of Somerset in November 1613 – did little to check Scottish influence at court, which was widely resented by the English. This was because Scottish influence at court was personified not by Somerset (who was generally hated by his fellow Scots, and who regarded himself as an honorary Englishman) but by Lennox who, in October 1613, finally overcame English opposition and obtained an English peerage. To the dismay of Suffolk and most other members of the English Privy Council, Lennox favoured a French marriage for Prince Charles rather than an alliance with Spain or her satellite, Savoy. Suffolk and his Council colleagues feared that such an alliance would weaken their influence, as France was Scotland’s traditional ally. However, throughout 1613 the king enthusiastically pursued a French marriage in the hope that France would offer him a dowry large enough to reduce his debts to manageable proportions. It was not until the beginning of 1614 that Suffolk and the other anti-French members of the Council were offered a glimmer of hope, as the French failed to offer concrete terms by the deadline set by an impatient James. On 7 Jan., the day after the deadline elapsed, Suffolk and William Herbert^*, 3rd earl of Pembroke, pressed the king, then a guest at Audley End, to summon a Parliament instead. They reasoned that if Parliament voted supply, the king would no longer need to pursue a French marriage.199 A. Thrush, ‘The French Marriage and the Origins of the 1614 Parl.’ in Crisis of 1614 and the Addled Parl. ed. S. Clucas and R. Davies, 27-8.

This plan was thrown into jeopardy at the end of January by the unexpected arrival at Theobalds of England’s ambassador to Paris, Sir Thomas Edmondes^‡, who brought with him terms from the French government. Suffolk was furious and tried to have Edmondes arrested for leaving Paris without permission. However, the ambassador was protected, not only by Lennox but also by Somerset who, rather surprisingly, decided to switch sides.200 S. Adams, ‘The Protestant Cause: Religious Alliance with the West European Calvinist Communities as a Political Issue in Eng. 1585-1630’ (Oxford Univ. D.Phil. thesis, 1973), 261; Add. 32023B, f. 185r-v. In the event, Suffolk need not have worried, for although Edmondes brought with him terms acceptable to James, the king decided not to pursue the French negotiations for the time being. Undoubtedly the main reason for this decision was that it was now apparent that France was on the brink of civil war.201 Thrush, ‘French Marriage’, 31-2. Moreover, Suffolk and Pembroke, despite widespread scepticism on the Privy Council at the prospect of a successful meeting between the king and his subjects, managed to persuade James that that they were capable of ensuring that Parliament would satisfy his financial demands.202 For the Council’s scepticism, see Cott., Titus F.IV, f. 340.

Suffolk and Pembroke pinned their hopes for a successful Parliament on the former diplomat Sir Henry Neville^‡, whose ambition to succeed the late Robert Cecil as secretary of state had led him to offer to manage a Parliament for the king as early as 1611. Neville was well connected to many of the men who had sat in the first Jacobean Parliament,203 HP Commons, 1604-29, v. 497-8. and therefore received encouragement from Suffolk. However, the lord chamberlain had no intention of honouring the verbal assurances he made to Neville and his fellow ‘undertakers’, as he wished to install as secretary his own client, the crypto-Catholic Sir Thomas Lake^‡, rather than Neville. Indeed, he confided to Somerset that ‘if we may do our master the service we wish by our dissembling I am well contented to play the knave a little with them’.204 Cott., Titus F.IV, f. 341. This deliberate deception was entirely self-defeating, however, for once Neville realized that he would not be made secretary ahead of the Parliament it became impossible to reach an agreement with him. Moreover, Suffolk’s support for Lake evidently alarmed the staunchly Protestant earl of Pembroke, the only other member of the Council who endorsed his call for Parliament to be summoned. At any rate, those whom the Spanish ambassador described as the ‘Protestants and puritans’ on the Council informed James that ‘nothing that he wanted would be accomplished in Parliament’ if Lake were chosen.205 Spain and the Jacobean Catholics II: 1613-24 ed. A.J. Loomie, 34. Lake’s candidacy also annoyed Somerset, who had already demonstrated a worrying tendency to disregard the wishes of his father-in-law. Between them, Somerset and the Protestant members of the Council persuaded James to appoint as secretary Somerset’s client Sir Ralph Winwood^‡, previously ambassador to The Hague and a man of unimpeachable Protestant credentials. Suffolk regarded Somerset’s support for Winwood as an act of betrayal, and for a short while relations between the two men were severely strained.206 HMC Downshire, iv. 385. See also PRO31/3/47, de Buisseaux’s dispatch of 16/26 Apr. 1614. However, his anger may have been abated by James’s decision to admit the defeated Lake to membership of the Privy Council.

Despite having been outmanoeuvred by his son-in-law, Suffolk remained committed to a Parliament, which James summoned to meet in early April. In earlier assemblies Suffolk had made little effort to secure seats in the Commons for his family and clients, but with his credit on the line the lord chamberlain now pulled out all the stops. As a result, perhaps as many as 17 of his friends, clients and kinsmen found seats in the Commons.207 For a list, see HP Commons 1604-29, i. 177-8. However, note that Sir Thomas Vavasour (Horsham) has been omitted in error. In 15 cases Suffolk may have had some hand in their election. At Cricklade, in Wiltshire, for instance, he used his influence as steward of the borough to secure both seats for his clients Sir Thomas Monson and Sir John Eyre^‡; and at Morpeth, in Northumberland, his younger brother Lord William Howard conferred the town’s burgess-ships on his clients, Sir William Button^‡ and Arnold Herbert^‡. However, Suffolk’s servant Sir Richard Wynn^‡ was returned for Caernarvonshire on his own interest, while Sir Henry Rich^‡, having failed to secure a knighthood of the shire for Norfolk with Suffolk’s help, came in for Leicester on the nomination of Henry Hastings^*, 5th earl of Huntingdon.

As one of the principal architects of the 1614 Parliament, it is perhaps not surprising that Suffolk attended the Lords assiduously. Indeed, he is recorded as having missed only one day of proceedings, on 7 Apr., despite the fact that on 16 Apr. he is said to have been unwell.208 HMC Downshire, iv. 376. He was nevertheless appointed to only a handful of committees. The first, on 11 Apr., was to consider a bill to prevent the wasteful consumption of gold and silver, and the second, five days later, was to ensure that the succession passed to the children of the Elector Palatine in the event that Prince Charles, who was still a boy, died without producing heirs of his own. That same day he was also appointed to consider a bill to prevent lawsuits over land bequeathed in wills. His fourth and final appointment, on 3 May, was to the committee for the bill to preserve timber, a hardy perennial that he had helped consider in the previous Parliament. His only other nomination, made by the king, was as one of the triers of petitions for the three kingdoms, a largely honorific appointment.209 LJ, ii. 686b, 691a, 692a, 694a, 697b. During the Parliament he held the proxy votes of five other peers.

Suffolk’s hope that he and Pembroke would be able to ensure a successful Parliament was quickly dashed. Rumours of the existence of a secret undertaking to manage the lower House for the king poisoned the atmosphere in the Commons, whose Members refused to allow themselves to be manipulated. Although no such undertaking existed, responsibility for the distrust engendered by these rumours ultimately lay with Suffolk who, along with Pembroke, had tried to enter into just such an arrangement with Sir Henry Neville ahead of the Parliament. However, the rock on which the Parliament ultimately foundered was not the rumour of a secret undertaking but the issue of impositions. Incredibly, in making their preparations for the Parliament, neither Suffolk nor Pembroke had made any provision for dealing with this explosive subject. Instead, they had hoped to persuade the Commons to vote supply by offering a number of grace bills. These were intended to address many of the grievances raised during the last Parliament. Suffolk’s decision to ignore impositions is particularly difficult to understand, as he had recently sold his interest in the farm of the customs duties on currants precisely because he feared that impositions would come under attack in the Commons.

Matters came to a head on 23 May, two days after the Commons asked the Lords for a conference on impositions. Suffolk was among those who thought that the upper House should first seek a legal opinion from the judges. He argued that this would ensure that this would enable peers to reply when the Commons inevitably ‘wounded’ the royal prerogative with their criticism. However, it seems more likely that he was hoping that the judges would furnish them with reasons for refusing to join in a petition against impositions for, as he later admitted, ‘I am not of opinion that the king hath no power to impose’. Suffolk was therefore probably taken aback when the judges declined to offer an opinion on the legality of impositions. Like other peers who did not sympathize with the Commons, he was left with no alternative but to press his colleagues not to confer with the lower. When the 3rd and 1st earl of Southampton (Henry Wriothesley^*) protested that this would mean not hearing ‘the just complaints of the people’, Suffolk retorted, on 24 May, that ‘our refusal will make them surcease their suit’.210 W. Petyt, Jus Parliamentarium (1739), 342; HMC Hastings, iv. 252, 261-2, 277.

Suffolk’s belief that the Commons would be forced to vote supply once the Lords declined to confer was little more than wishful thinking. In the short term, the Commons, far from turning their attention to subsidies, vented their anger on the bishop of Lincoln (Richard Neile^*, later archbishop of York), who was reported to have said that if the Lords conferred with the Commons about impositions ‘they should hear nothing but undutiful and seditious speeches’. Suffolk, who counted the bishop among his friends, leapt to Neile’s defence, declaring on 28 May that he had been present when the bishop spoke and had heard no such words uttered. It was dangerous, he warned, to allow a man to be charged on the basis of common rumour. Three days later, after Neile explained that he had never intended to cause offence, Suffolk declared himself satisfied with his friend’s submission and said that it was Neile who had been wronged by the Commons rather than vice versa. Indeed, had the bishop’s words come into his own mind, he would have been tempted to say almost as much himself.211 HMC Hastings, iv. 270, 276.

It was not until 6 June, with the threat of an imminent dissolution hanging over them, that the Commons debated subsidies. Suffolk would have preferred to dissolve the Parliament forthwith, and queried whether Lord Chancellor Ellesmere was entitled to delay executing the commission that had been issued for this purpose. However, as the morning progressed, he interpreted the lack of any message from the Commons as a hopeful sign, ‘for if they would give nothing we should have [had] a speedy answer’.212 Ibid. 280, 281. His initial instincts nevertheless proved correct, as the following day a majority in the Commons resolved not to give until they had first received satisfaction in respect of impositions, whereupon the Parliament was dissolved.

Lord treasurer, 1614-18

Although Suffolk had played a significant part in persuading James to summon Parliament, he suffered no loss of standing with the king for its failure. On the contrary, just one month after the dissolution he was advanced to the office of lord treasurer. Much of the blame for the failure of the 1614 Parliament may have attached itself instead to Suffolk’s ally, Pembroke. Suffolk’s friends and clients in the lower House had taken no part in the Commons’ attack on impositions, whereas Pembroke’s dependant Sir James Perrot^*, after initially promoting the grace bills, had thrown in his lot with those seeking to abolish impositions.

Suffolk not only sought to distance himself from Pembroke in the wake of the Parliament, he also exploited his former ally’s discomfiture to further the interests of Somerset. Back in January 1614, when they had decided to work together to bring about a Parliament, Suffolk and Pembroke had evidently agreed to share power following the death of Northampton, who was by then in failing health. Suffolk would become lord treasurer, while Pembroke would succeed him as lord chamberlain. Somerset, who held no formal office, would succeed the earl of Worcester as master of the horse.213 HMC Downshire, iv. 296. However, see also Chamberlain Letters, i. 502. However, following the Parliament and the death of Northampton, which occurred just nine days after the dissolution, Suffolk reneged on this agreement, as it was Somerset, not Pembroke, who became lord chamberlain. From Suffolk’s point of view this change of heart was entirely sensible, for as one observer remarked, ‘if my lord of Suffolk should remove from the king’s privacy to a place of much distraction and cumber, without leaving a friend in his room, he might peradventure take cold at his back, which is a dangerous thing in a court’.214 Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton, ii. 41. However, Suffolk’s perfidy earned him and Somerset the bitter enmity of Pembroke, who tried without success to compound with Worcester for the mastership of the horse.215 T. Birch, Ct. and Times of Jas. I, i. 337, 339.

Suffolk was now the king’s chief minister. From the outset it was apparent that in some key respects he was very unlike his predecessor, the 1st earl of Salisbury. On handing him the treasurer’s staff on 10 July, the king admitted as much when he announced that he had chosen Suffolk ‘not for his Latin and Greek’, of which he had little or none (unlike the scholarly Cecil), but ‘for his approved integrity and fidelity’.216 Chamberlain Letters, i. 548. However, the differences between the two men were not merely educational. Salisbury had been notoriously hard working, whereas Suffolk always made time for recreation and his own domestic affairs. When Sir Julius Caesar^‡, the chancellor of the Exchequer, tried to get him to return to London from Audley End in August 1613, Suffolk replied that he could think about new schemes for raising money just as well from where he was as from Whitehall, and that ‘to pull me from many of my domestic affairs when we shall do no good but talk idle were to little purpose’.217 Add. 36767, f. 346. Salisbury, who often stayed in London over the summer attending to the king’s business, would never have written so dismissively. However, in one important respect Suffolk and Salisbury were very similar, as both men regarded it as legitimate to exploit to the full the office of lord treasurer – which carried with it only a token salary - to line their own pockets.

The chief problem which faced Suffolk on taking office was the size of the royal debt which, in May 1614, stood at £680,000. As ordinary expenditure also exceeded ordinary receipts by £61,650 per year, this sum was set to rise still further.218 Lansd. 165, f. 257; 169, f. 141. Suffolk therefore approved of the Benevolence that was raised in the wake of the Addled Parliament. However, his expectation that this levy would produce ‘good store of money’ was frustrated for, being raised without parliamentary approval, it yielded only £65,000.219 Add. 36767, f. 362; 39245, f. 32v. Suffolk subsequently cast about for new schemes, and in March 1615 he presented several proposals for raising additional funds to the Council for their consideration.220 HMC Mar and Kellie, ii. 59. Among the most important of these was a plan to enrich the king by £47,500 a year by requiring England’s cloth merchants to export finished rather than unfinished cloth. This project, the brainchild of the London alderman Sir William Cockayne, was warmly endorsed by Suffolk, who convincingly argued the case for reform before James in May 1615.221 Holles Letters ed. P.R. Seddon (Thoroton Soc. xxxi), 69. The Company of Merchant Adventurers was subsequently dissolved and a new company erected in its place in August. Heading the list of founding members was Suffolk himself.

Suffolk fell seriously ill with chronic diarrhoea in June 1615. His symptoms were so violent that it was feared that he might die. This was not the first time he had come close to death – he had fallen gravely ill in 1597 – but now, as then, he staged a rapid recovery.222 Chamberlain Letters, i. 602, 604; HMC Downshire, v. 259. The state of the royal finances remained parlous, and over the summer and early autumn of 1615 the Council debated whether to summon another Parliament. Despite having been an advocate of the previous assembly, Suffolk was now firmly in the camp of those who opposed any further meetings between the king and his subjects. His hopes for financial relief, like those of the king, now rested on a large dowry for Prince Charles rather than on a Parliament which, on recent form, would seek to reduce rather than increase the king’s income by abolishing impositions. This was because, in the wake of the 1614 Parliament, the king had begun to explore the possibility of a marriage alliance with Spain rather than France, an option favoured by both Suffolk and his son-in-law Somerset. However, Suffolk was careful not to express his opposition to a Parliament in forthright terms. On the contrary, in September 1615 he outwardly appeared to side with the advocates of a Parliament. Instead, he disguised his opposition, declaring that he ‘could not but move a doubt, that struck deeply with him, which was that the taking away of impositions de facto would not satisfy the Parliament, but that the point of right would be insisted on’.223 CSP Ven. 1613-15, pp. 512-13; Letters and Life of Francis Bacon ed. J. Spedding, v. 204.

It was clear that while Suffolk and Somerset were in the ascendant, Parliament was unlikely to meet. However, in October 1615 James learned that Somerset and his wife were implicated in the murder of the favourite’s former friend Sir Thomas Overbury. Somerset was thereupon confined to his Whitehall apartments, and in early November he was dismissed from office and imprisoned in the Tower. For a short while Suffolk himself was suspected of involvement and, though no charges were ever brought against him, the king was displeased that he tried to obstruct the investigation.224 CSP Ven. 1615-17, p. 53; Letters of Jas. VI and I, 343-4. Suffolk, however, was not the only member of his family to try to defend Somerset and his wife. His second son, Sir Thomas Howard^‡, sent James ‘an unmannerly and seditious’ message on the subject, for which offence he was briefly imprisoned. The countess of Suffolk, too, was rusticated to Audley End in late November.225 HP Commons, 1604-29, iv. 819; HMC Downshire, v. 371, 387. By December Suffolk was so depressed that, although he continued sit in Council, he refused to attend to his other official duties.226 Cal. Wynn Pprs. 116. For his Council attendance, see APC, 1615-16, pp. 348, 350, 353, 356, 363. Later that same month, his misfortunes increased still further, as Pembroke was appointed lord chamberlain in succession to Somerset. In addition, over the winter of 1615-16 the king came under renewed pressure to summon Parliament. Indeed, in mid January James nearly ordered the issue of new writs. The fact that he did not do so was not down to Suffolk but to the Dutch, who offered to buy back the Cautionary Towns of Flushing [Vlissingen] and Brill.227 A. Thrush, ‘Personal Rule of Jas. I’, Pols., Religion and Popularity ed. T. Cogswell et al, 90-2.

Although now thoroughly disheartened, Suffolk was not permitted to languish in the doldrums for long. At the end of March 1616 England’s ambassador to The Hague, Sir Dudley Carleton^* (later Viscount Dorchester), reported hearing that ‘those that were at the bottom of fortune’s wheel ... are halfway up again’. Moreover, in mid June Sir John Holles^* (later 1st earl of Clare) reported that ‘my lord treasurer holds up his head again’.228 HMC Downshire, v. 459; Holles Letters, 132. Nevertheless, neither Suffolk nor his wife could bear to attend the trials of the earl and countess of Somerset in May.229 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 1.

Following the condemnation of Somerset and his wife, Suffolk approached the queen and the new royal favourite, Sir George Villiers^* (later 1st duke of Buckingham), to intercede with the king to spare their lives.230 Autobiog. of Sir Simonds D’Ewes ed. J.O. Halliwell, 85-6. Suffolk’s request was perhaps surprising, as Villiers had been raised up from obscurity by Pembroke (among others) the previous year with the specific intention of toppling Somerset. However, for the time being at least Suffolk considered it prudent to cultivate Villiers, perhaps in the hope of obtaining pardons for his daughter and her husband. Consequently, when Villiers was elevated to the peerage in August 1616, Suffolk was one of his sponsors.231 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 22; ‘Camden Diary’ (1691), 20.

Although he had now been restored to royal favour, Suffolk’s position remained precarious. The Cockayne Project, which the lord treasurer had trumpeted as his own, had failed to live up to expectations, and in early November James angrily accused Cockayne of having misled him.232 A. Friis, Alderman Cockayne and the Cloth Trade, 352, 479-80. For Suffolk’s close association with the Cockayne Project, see Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, v. 171. The following month Suffolk fled to Audley End, ‘as much to avoid the importunate clamour for money as for recreation’. When he re-emerged in January, it was to announce that the king’s ordinary annual income now exceeded his ordinary expenditure by £1,000. However, if Suffolk thereby hoped to defuse James’s anger over the Cockayne Project he was to be disappointed, as the chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Fulke Greville^* (later 1st Lord Brooke) revealed that Suffolk’s figures were incorrect.233 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 41, 49. Suffolk’s claim may have been based upon Harl. 3796, ff. 67-8, which shows a surplus of £393 on the ordinary account. Suffolk was made to look not only foolish but also incompetent, as a revenue balance drawn up later that same year indicated that ordinary spending still exceeded ordinary income by nearly £32,000 p.a.234 Lansd. 169, ff. 146-8.

Suffolk remained in England when the king visited Scotland in the spring and summer of 1617. On the homeward journey, Lord Howard de Walden, Suffolk’s eldest son and captain of the band of gentlemen pensioners, attempted to sow dissension between Villiers, now earl of Buckingham, and the 3rd marquess of Hamilton [S] (James Hamilton^*, later 1st earl of Cambridge).235 Birch, Jas. I, ii. 31. It may have been for this reason that, shortly after Buckingham returned to London in mid September, it was reported that Suffolk was ‘not in such friendship with our great man as he was’. The king, too, had grown cool towards Suffolk and was contemplating placing the treasury in the hands of commissioners once again. No wonder that one observer remarked that ‘the lord treasurer is in some danger’.236 HMC Mar and Kellie, ii. 80; Harl. 1581, f. 155v. However, Suffolk may not have been unduly perturbed, as rescue in the form of a large Spanish dowry appeared to be near at hand. Confident that the marriage negotiations would soon bear fruit, in February 1618 he not only bought himself a Spanish primer but also ‘applies it hard’. Suffolk’s belief in his ability to survive was shared by Viscount Fentoun [S], the groom of the stole, who observed in April that removing the lord treasurer from office was likely to prove more difficult ‘than some apprehends’ [sic].237 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 147; HMC Mar and Kellie, ii. 82-3.

Suffolk was nevertheless in very real danger, for early in 1618 he committed the cardinal error of trying to displace Buckingham in the king’s affections. He and his allies introduced to court William Monson^‡, the 18-year-old son of Suffolk’s former colleague in arms, Sir William Monson^‡. The Howards took great care to primp and preen the handsome young man, even washing his face daily in ‘posset-curd’. The king, however, saw through their tactics and banished Monson from court in February.238 R. Lockyer, Buckingham, 35; HP Commons 1604-29, v. 357. Unsurprisingly, it was not long before there was open warfare between Buckingham and the Howards.239 CSP Dom. 1611-18, p. 533; Add. 31111, f. 206; Lockyer, 36. It was probably as a result of this factional conflict that, in early April, Suffolk’s long-serving client Sir Roger Dallison was arrested. Dallison was the lieutenant of the Ordnance, and had been embezzling departmental funds to pay off his own large debts, aided and abetted by Suffolk, who had paid him £6,500 from the Exchequer without proper authority. At about the same time it was discovered that there were serious irregularities in the management of the alum farm, and that these were directly attributable to Suffolk.240 APC, 1618-19, p. 99; A.P. Perceval Keep, ‘Star Chamber Procs. against the Earl of Suffolk and Others’, EHR, xiii. 718, 719. There can be little doubt that responsibility for uncovering these frauds lay with Buckingham and his supporters: in early July the Spanish ambassador remarked upon ‘the opposition and loathing’ that characterized relations between the favourite and the lord treasurer.241 Documentos Inéditos para la Historia de España, ii. 38. Perhaps the most devastating blow to Suffolk’s chances of survival, however, was delivered not by Buckingham but, ironically enough, by Spain, for in May the king learned that the marriage negotiations were deadlocked.242 Thrush, ‘Personal Rule’, 95.

Matters came to a head in July. On the 10th the damning evidence concerning Dallison and the management of the alum farm was laid before James, who was so alarmed that he established a commission of inquiry, headed by Suffolk’s enemy, Pembroke.243 Add. 29974, pt. 1, f. 44r-v; CSP Dom. 1611-18, p. 552. The commissioners immediately set about examining the Exchequer’s officers on oath.244 HMC Downshire, vi. 447, 452. It did not take long for further incriminating evidence to surface, as Suffolk’s secretary Michael Humfrey^‡, fearing prosecution unless he cooperated with the investigation, now accused his employer of extortion.245 ‘Camden Diary’, 34; Chamberlain Letters, ii. 167. On the 19th, following an examination of the records in Humfrey’s custody, Suffolk was required to explain, inter alia, why a certain William Turner and his partners had been obliged to give the countess of Suffolk £2,600 for payment of money owing to them by the king. He was also confronted with the fact that, until eight days ago, he had detained in his own hands £3,000 of the money paid by the Dutch to redeem the Cautionary Towns.246 Wilts. and Swindon Hist. Centre, 88/9/21, unnumbered item, ‘Lord Treasurer’s declaration’, in his own hand. Unable to admit that years of living well beyond his means had made him spectacularly corrupt, and without any immediate prospect of a Spanish marriage - the Spanish ambassador had left England three days earlier without any further progress having been made in the negotiations – Suffolk was forced to surrender his staff of office to a tearful James that same day.247 Add. 34727, f. 31; HMC Downshire, vi. 451.

Trial and punishment, 1618-20

Dismissal from office marked the beginning rather than the end of Suffolk’s troubles. Years of extravagant living and building work meant that Suffolk had, by his own estimation, racked up debts of nearly £40,000. Since it was now widely believed that he also owed the king a great sum, the likelihood that he would be able to borrow money to pay off these private debts was negligible. Realizing that he faced financial ruin in addition to the disgrace he had already suffered, Suffolk appealed to Buckingham, in many ways the principal agent of his destruction, to dispel the rumour that he was heavily indebted to the king. He also petitioned James to be readmitted to favour ‘after this just correction’.248 Fortescue Pprs. ed. S.R. Gardiner (Cam. Soc. n.s. i), 50-1; Harl. 1581, f. 140r-v. However, the king had at long last decided to put his financial house in order, and any hope that Suffolk might have had of deflecting the treasury commissioners from their task of determining the extent of his corruption and maladministration quickly vanished. Indeed, in August it was rumoured that the commissioners had uncovered wrongdoing on such a monumental scale that Audley End would be seized to pay the debt.249 CSP Ven. 1617-19, p. 309. Suffolk was consequently reduced to selling off some of his outlying properties to satisfy his creditors.250 WYAS, Temple Newsam mss, WYL100/BS/A/15, 16.

Following his dismissal, Suffolk was, in effect, suspended from the Privy Council, as he was barred from the king’s presence. He spent much of the next six months trying to gain access to the king in the hope that an interview would allow him to satisfy James concerning ‘some things misreported of me’. Indeed, he appealed to Buckingham to mediate on his behalf, and employed his friend Lennox to carry letters to James.251 Bodl., Add. D110, ff. 74, 124, 126. However, his efforts proved unavailing, for on 10 Jan. 1619 James informed the Privy Council that, on the recommendation of the treasury commissioners, he had decided to prefer charges against Suffolk and his wife in Star Chamber.252 APC, 1618-19, pp. 341-2; HMC 2nd Rep. 55. Reluctantly, the king had come to the conclusion that it was necessary to demonstrate to the wider world that Suffolk’s dismissal had been justified.253 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 199; CSP Dom. 1619-23, pp. 7, 15. Suffolk responded by writing to James denying that he had ever knowingly yielded to any ‘base abuse of you of disbursing of your treasure, or any other way’. Indeed, instead of confessing his guilt, Suffolk characterized his disgrace as the result of the conjunction of an ‘evil constellation’.254 Fortescue Pprs. 79.

Following the formal laying of charges at the beginning of February, Suffolk and his wife sought permission to delay submitting their answers until the next term, but were refused. His wife proved truculent and only relented when the attorney general, Sir Henry Yelverton^‡, threatened to issue an attachment against her goods.255 Birch, Jas. I, ii. 130-1, 136, 149. The strain of the case soon began to take its toll on Suffolk’s health, and in April the former lord treasurer was permitted to return to Audley End to recuperate.256 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 227-8; ‘Camden Diary’, 44. When the trial resumed in early May, Suffolk again applied for a postponement, this time arguing that many of his witnesses were far off in Ireland. The court initially dismissed this request as prevarication, but subsequently agreed to defer further consideration until the start of Michaelmas term after Suffolk observed that he would need to have copies made of numerous official documents in order to prepare detailed answers.257 CSP Dom. 1619-23, p. 43; Chamberlain Letters, ii. 238, 240; Lansd. 151, f. 362.

By the end of May Suffolk was reportedly ‘so dejected in mind and body’ that his friends feared for his life. He was certainly desperate to reach an accommodation with the king.258 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 240, 243. In mid June he pleaded with James not to proceed against him any further ‘according to the strict rules of justice’ but ‘to refer the errors, weakness and imperfections of your old servant’ to the consideration of ‘indifferent persons’. Shortly thereafter, he confessed in writing to having been ‘very unfit’ to hold office as lord treasurer; that his weakness had occasioned ‘many errors and oversights’; and that his wife had taken, without his knowledge, ‘divers sums of money, for which I have justly deserved your displeasure, and she your Majesty’s censure’. He also admitted that James had been left with no choice but to proceed against him in Star Chamber, and that, were the case to continue, he would certainly be found guilty.259 Wilts. and Swindon Hist. Centre, 88/9/21, submission endorsed 25 June 1619. In the wake of this submission, there was a widespread expectation that the case against Suffolk would now be dropped. However, for several reasons this did not happen. In the first place, Suffolk had, in his submission, stopped short of confessing to having plundered the Exchequer, an omission which certainly told against him in July, when the king and Council debated whether to drop the Star Chamber case. He had also harmed his case by stating that he had been ill suited to hold the treasurer’s staff, for by pleading inadequacy, Suffolk had necessarily ‘set an imputation on his Majesty’ for making choice of ‘so weak an instrument’. However, the main reason the king decided to reject Suffolk’s submission was that the former lord treasurer had already sworn under oath in Star Chamber that he was not guilty.260 Add. 72253, f. 49; 34324, f. 105; Chamberlain Letters, ii. 251.

The trial entered its final phase on 20 Oct. and lasted until 13 Nov. 1619, when judgement was delivered. From the outset Suffolk mounted a robust defence. For instance, he argued that he had worked hard to make the alum farm a success, and had achieved substantial yearly profits. So far as the charge of extortion was concerned, ‘he denieth it all’.261 Add. 12497, f. 92. He also refuted claims that he had helped himself to royal funds, accusing Michael Humfrey, whose records showed that the lord treasurer had paid himself several four figure sums from the Exchequer, of error and false accounting.262 SP14/111/17. His attempts to clear his name were nimbly supported by his legal team. Heneage Finch^‡, for instance, maintained that Suffolk stood accused of mis-employing no more than £6,160, ‘whereof all is so answered that as that the lord treasurer oweth not thereof one twelve pence’.263 Add. 12497, f. 79v. Thomas Richardson^‡, too, poured scorn on the charge of extortion, which he characterized as involving no more than £3,000 over four years. Divided between 17 individuals, this was ‘a light burden among so many and not worth the speaking of’.264 SP14/111/8. Richardson thereby succeeded in shaking ‘the world’s opinion’ concerning Suffolk’s guilt in respect of the charges concerning the Ordnance Office and the alum farm.265 HMC Hatfield, xxii. 100. He also advanced the inventive argument that Suffolk’s wife was incapable of extortion because she held no office, being ‘married to the earl of Suffolk, not [the] lord treasurer’; her offence, he declared, was merely that of accepting gratuities.266 SP14/111/8; Add. 12497, f. 79. Between them, Finch and Richardson mounted such a well argued defence that, by the end of the trial, it was reported that ‘many auditors of good judgement thought all devils not so black as they are painted’.267 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 273.

Ultimately, no amount of clever legal footwork could disguise the fact that Suffolk and his wife were guilty of malfeasance on a stupendous scale. On 12 Nov. Attorney General Yelverton tore Suffolk’s defence to ribbons. The plain fact of the matter, he said, was that Suffolk had issued money to Dallison without proper authorization, that he had detained £3,000 from the sale of the Cautionary Towns and employed a further £3,000 that had been earmarked for Ireland to pay his own debts. In addition, he had resorted to extortion, demanding £3,000 from Sir William Courteen and £600 from Sir Miles Fleetwood^‡ before he would pay them what they were owed. He was guilty of ‘supine negligence and unfaithfulness’. Yelverton then proceeded to weigh into the countess of Suffolk, whose threatening letters were ‘impious in style and odious in manner’. It was clear that she valued no friend ‘but money’. Yelverton calculated that the king had lost by Suffolk’s misconduct more than £17,000. His colleague, Sir Edward Coke^‡, put the figure far higher, at £51,000.268 Add. 12497, f. 72r-v; HMC Hatfield, xxii. 98, 105-9. In reaching these estimates, neither man took account of one of the main charges levelled against Suffolk and his wife: that the couple had embezzled £140,000 worth of crown jewels, the care of which had been briefly entrusted to them early in James’s reign. This was because the Suffolks were able to produce an acquittance, issued in May 1607, exonerating them from any losses incurred during the movement of these precious stones.269 HMC Hatfield, xxii. 94-5; Chamberlain Letters, ii. 269. For the acquittance, see SO3/3, unfol. (May 1607). For their temporary custody of the jewels, see CSP Dom. 1603-10, p. 8; HMC Hatfield, xv. 66, 75, 380.

By the end of the trial it was widely believed that Suffolk was less guilty than his wife. James was certainly of this view, for in February 1619 he was heard to condemn the authority that some men gave to their wives, a reference not only to Suffolk but also to Somerset.270 Add 72253, ff. 14, 71. It is also an opinion shared by at least one historian, who has drawn a distinction between the offences committed by Suffolk, who was ‘probably more foolish, incompetent and morally lax as lord treasurer than shrewdly dishonest’, and those perpetrated by his wife.271 Rebholz, 242. However, while it was the countess rather than her husband who assumed the role of chief extortioner, it seems unlikely that her culpability was really any greater than his. After all, the countess’ willingness to do the dirty work– it will be recalled that it was she who received the pension payments from Spain – conveniently afforded her husband the luxury of being able to deny any involvement in matters sordid or corrupt. Thankfully for the judges involved in the case, it was not necessary to apportion blame so precisely: the pair were fined £30,000, ordered to repay the sums they had stolen or extorted, and imprisoned (separately) in the Tower at their own cost.272 CSP Dom. 1619-23, p. 96; Add. 72253, f. 73.

The political wilderness, 1619-25

The Suffolks were afforded one week’s grace before being taken to the Tower, and spent only ten days in custody before their release on 30 November.273 Diary of Lady Anne Clifford ed. K.O. Acheson, 119, 120; ‘Camden Diary’, 51; Add. 72253, f. 75. They owed their freedom largely to Buckingham, who was inclined to be merciful now that he had triumphed, and also to Sir George Goring^* (later earl of Norwich), whose kinsman by marriage, the Exchequer official Sir John Bingley^‡, had been tried for corruption alongside the earl and his wife. Until recently a dependant of the Howards, Goring acted as intermediary between Suffolk and Buckingham, whose service he may already have entered.274 Harl. 1580, f. 411r-v; Fortescue Pprs. 97. On Goring’s relationship with Bingley, see HP Commons, 1604-29, iv. 437.

As well as being granted their liberty, the Suffolks were informed that their fine had been reduced by £20,000. In return for this magnanimity, however, the king expected Lord Howard de Walden, captain of the gentlemen pensioners, and Sir Thomas Howard, master of the horse to the prince of Wales, to relinquish their posts.275 CSP Ven. 1619-21, p. 78; Chamberlain Letters, ii. 277; Add. 72253, f. 81v. Suffolk was mortified, and pleaded with James and Buckingham not to compel him to ‘bury my sons alive’.276 Cabala, Sive Scrinia Sacra (1691), 333-4. See also Harl. 1580, ff. 415, 417. However, the dismissal of his sons had been a condition of his release, and early in the New Year both men were removed from their offices.277 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 278.

Although he had reduced Suffolk’s fine, the king nevertheless expected payment of the residue. In January 1620 orders were accordingly issued for the seizure of Suffolk’s property. However, Suffolk had anticipated just such an eventuality and so had conveyed his lands to his brother Lord William Howard and his client and chief creditor, Sir Arthur Ingram. He also emptied his houses at Charing Cross and Audley End of most of his goods. James was so furious that he ordered that charges of fraudulent conveyance be laid in Star Chamber against the Suffolks. However, he relented after Suffolk apologized in writing and offered to pay what was owed. In early February he also announced that he would cause the extent of Suffolk’s debts and possessions to be examined in order to determine what the earl could afford to pay.278 Ibid. 281, 283-4; ‘Camden Diary’, 53; Fortescue Pprs. 118; CSP Dom. 1619-23, p. 116.

One reason why James adopted this conciliatory tone was that in mid January Buckingham resumed negotiations with Francis Manners^*, 6th earl of Rutland for a marriage between himself and Rutland’s daughter, Katherine.279 CSP Dom. 1619-23, p. 113; ‘Camden Diary’, 52. This young lady’s mother was Rutland’s first wife, Frances Knyvet, sister to the countess of Suffolk. Were Buckingham to marry Katherine he would necessarily become a kinsman to the Howards. In late January it was believed that such a wedding was imminent.280 Add. 72253, f. 90. Consequently, Buckingham now began to pave the way for the Howards’ rehabilitation at court. In early February he persuaded James not only to reinstate Sir Thomas Howard and Lord Howard de Walden, but also to grant Suffolk a brief interview.281 Archivio di Stato, file 4193, Salvetti dispatches of 4/14 Feb. and 3/13 Mar. 1620; Add. 72253, f. 93v. Suffolk was delighted, and on 16 Feb. he entered London ‘very honourably attended’ and in high hope that he would soon be restored to favour.282 Add. 72253, f. 64. This letter is erroneously dated 16 Feb. 1618/19. He also thanked Buckingham, assuring him of ‘the hearty acknowledgement of a whole family, and all theirs, that shall serve and honour you as the best of those that would succeed them’.283 Lockyer, 65.

Suffolk’s hopes that his fortunes were on the mend quickly faded, despite the fact that Buckingham married Katherine Manners in the spring. In April 1620 he was accused of understating his annual income by the Council (which a note among his papers put at around £3,800). The following month he protested to James that ‘all I have is taken from me’, that ‘nothing [is] left to me to maintain food and raiment’ and that his younger sons were ‘not suffered to enjoy their poor annuities’.284 Wilts. and Swindon Hist. Centre, 88/9/21, docs. endorsed 12 Apr. and 16 May 1620, plus undated abstract of Suffolk’s estate; Add. 34324, f. 109v. His plight evidently aroused the king’s sympathy, for in July his fine was reduced to just £7,000.285 ‘Camden Diary’, 60; SO3/6, unfol. (July 1620). Stone incorrectly dates this reduction to 1618: Crisis, 442. Payment appears to have been made in September, and in October he promised to donate (but did not immediately pay) £1,000 towards the relief of the Palatinate.286 Fortescue Pprs. 138-9; CSP Dom. 1619-23, p. 179; Add. 34324, f. 128v; Add. 72275, f. 94v; APC, 1619-21, p. 330. His willingness to cooperate kindled the expectation that he would soon be permitted to resume his place at the Council table.287 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 321.

Suffolk attended the 1621 Parliament, which began in February, but he was frequently absent and did not sit at all between 24 May and the adjournment on 4 June. On 5 Feb. he was appointed to the committee for privileges, a body that had not previously existed in the Lords and which was established on the motion of his nephew, the earl of Arundel. He was subsequently named to two committees regarding a petition to be presented by both Houses to the king on recusancy (14 and 15 February).288 LJ, iii. 10b, 17a, 18b, 75a. His main legislative interest in this Parliament was undoubtedly the Welsh cottons bill. Supported by his Oswestry tenants, this measure was intended to break the stranglehold of Shrewsbury’s drapers over the Welsh cloth trade. On 30 Apr. the lord president of the council in the Marches, William Compton^*, 1st earl of Northampton, tried to delay commitment of the bill until the House was fuller, only to be thwarted by Suffolk, who went on to chair the committee and to report its conclusions eight days later.289 Ibid. 101b; Add. 40085, ff. 82, 126; HP Commons 1604-29, ii. 343-4.

Following the flight of the monopolist Sir Giles Mompesson^‡, Suffolk was among those required to confer with the Commons about how best to apprehend him. When John Holles, then Lord Houghton, suggested that copies of James’s proclamation abolishing Mompesson’s monopolies be sent in transcript form to all the market towns of the kingdom, Suffolk pointed out that the clerical work involved would not be necessary, as ‘it will be printed’.290 LJ, iiii. 34a; LD 1621, 1625 and 1628, p. 51. Suffolk was understandably wary about investigating the activities of another monopolist, Sir Edward Villiers^‡, as the latter was Buckingham’s elder half-brother. Indeed, when the matter was debated on 17 Apr. he advised that they should ‘attend to what the lower House will do’. However, it is unlikely that Suffolk was solely concerned to avoid antagonizing Buckingham, as he himself was implicated in the matter of monopolies. On 26 Apr. Claude Durelle, who had introduced the trade of spinning gold and silver thread to England, claimed that he had been imprisoned on a warrant signed by Suffolk, who thereupon declared that he could remember no such thing. Four days later the former attorney general Sir Henry Yelverton, once Suffolk’s client, told the House that it had been Suffolk who had instructed him to renew the gold and silver wire thread patent. It may have been because he was personally implicated in the misdemeanours of the monopolists that Suffolk was inclined to take a lenient view of some of their offences. On 27 Apr. he charitably remarked that the use of white lead and arsenic in dyeing silk might be lawful, ‘for that there is no loss in the washing’. On learning that same day that the monopolist Sir Francis Michell had leased a room from the gaoler of Finsbury to hold his prisoners, he described the offence as ‘no great fault’.291 LD 1621, pp. 2, 34, 36.

Suffolk took a less indulgent view of the disgraced lord chancellor, Francis Bacon^*, Viscount St. Alban. On 24 Apr. he declared that Bacon’s confession was insufficient, and vehemently opposed the suggestion of the earl of Southampton, that Bacon be allowed to receive the charges against him at home rather than at the bar of the House. When the duke of Lennox, now earl of Richmond in the English peerage, reminded the House that they had promised to give Bacon ‘sufficient time’, Suffolk retorted that he was only thinking of the honour of the House, which would not be upheld if Bacon was allowed to receive his charge at home. However, although Suffolk was seconded by Lord Saye and Sele (William Fiennes^*, later 1st Viscount Saye and Sele), it was generally felt that Bacon, having only been accused rather than condemned, should be sent the charges rather than be forced to undergo the humiliation of being arraigned at the bar. This decision clearly irritated Suffolk who, the following afternoon, insisted that Bacon’s submission should be delivered ‘in person’ rather than in writing.292 Ibid. 14, 16-17, 23. Having been so publicly humiliated himself two years earlier, he may have considered it only right and proper that Bacon, his former colleague on the Council, should suffer the same fate.

Suffolk played only a minor role in the quarrel between the two Houses over the Commons’ claim to judicature. On 7 May he seconded the earl of Cambridge, who proposed that the two Houses should appoint a subcommittee to resolve the dispute. The following day he agreed with Southampton, who suggested telling the Commons that the Lords did not find their arguments convincing but would be willing to listen to others.293 Ibid. 70, 75. Suffolk may have been more closely involved in trying to settle the quarrel over precedence between rival supporters of the two universities, a perennial problem which plagued both Houses whenever a subsidy bill was drafted. Although he was chancellor of Cambridge University, having succeeded Northampton in this post in 1614, Suffolk suggested on 20 Mar. that Oxford and Cambridge should be granted equal status in the bill, in which Oxford had been listed first. However, this conciliatory gesture went unheeded, and therefore three days later he proposed that a final decision be deferred until the next session. In the meantime he called for the relevant historical records to be searched to establish which university was oldest. This suggestion, though approved, appears never to have been acted upon.294 PA, HL/PO/JO/5/1/1, f. 5; LJ, iii. 52b, 66b.

Suffolk did what little he could to protect his former client Yelverton who, on 30 Apr., rashly likened Buckingham to Hugh Despenser^† and thus inadvertently cast the king in the unflattering role of Edward II. When the Lords turned their attention to this matter on 12 May, Suffolk admitted that Yelverton had spoken foolishly, but argued that they should not deal with the aspersion that had supposedly been cast on the king until they had first heard Yelverton in his own defence. Four days later, Suffolk was one of a handful of peers who tried to persuade the House, before it proceeded to judgement, to examine the witnesses that Yelverton could produce to substantiate the charges he had made against Buckingham, but to no avail. During the ensuing debate on Yelverton’s punishment, Suffolk suggested that the question of damages should be left to Buckingham, ‘who I doubt not will remit it’.295 LD 1621, pp. 78, 89, 90.

His attempts to protect the hapless Yelverton help to explain why, on 8 May, Suffolk even quarrelled with his own nephew, the earl of Arundel. The latter, a client of Buckingham, wished to deny Yelverton a hearing to explain his outburst on 30 Apr., at which the 1st Lord Spencer (Robert Spencer) expressed surprise, two of Arundel’s ancestors – the 4th duke of Norfolk and the 20th (or 13th) earl of Arundel – having been condemned without first being heard. Arundel interpreted this reference to members of his family who had been attainted for treason as a slur on his own reputation, and therefore proceeded to cast aspersions on Spencer’s own ancestry. Although the surviving parliamentary records contain no mention of the fact, Suffolk thereupon rounded on Arundel, declaring that he did not feel affronted by Spencer’s remark even though he was more closely related to those whom Spencer had mentioned. (This latter claim was not entirely true, of course, as Arundel was the son of the 20th earl). According to one account, Suffolk was the first to call for Arundel to be brought to the bar.296 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 374-5.

Suffolk played little recorded part in the winter sitting of the 1621 Parliament, though he evidently attended the House most days. He nevertheless took a close interest in the case of Sir John Bourchier^‡, the previous owner of a manor in Yorkshire that Suffolk now possessed,297 HP Commons 1604-29, iii. 263. who complained to the Lords that as a litigant he had been dealt with in an unsatisfactory manner by Lord Keeper Williams (John Williams^*, later archbishop of York). On 3 Dec. Suffolk announced that it would be inappropriate to refer Bourchier’s petition to the committee for petitions as the petitioner had appealed to the whole House. He also asked Williams directly whether he had given Bourchier a full hearing. When the House showed little inclination to resolve the matter speedily, Suffolk reminded them of the case, telling them more than once that Williams stood accused of reaching a verdict without hearing any of Bourchier’s witnesses. However, Suffolk’s support for Bourchier ultimately came to nothing as the House ruled that Bourchier had maligned the lord keeper. To his credit, Suffolk was among those peers who called for the petitioner to be censured.298 LD 1621, pp. 107, 109, 113, 118.

Another individual whom Suffolk may have tried to assist was his impoverished distant kinsman, Edward Stafford^*, 4th Lord Stafford, whose estates he had controlled ever since 1609. Stafford incurred the House’s displeasure after it was discovered that he had abused parliamentary privilege by issuing letters of protection to men who were not his servants. On 8 Dec. several peers complained about Stafford’s behaviour, whereupon Suffolk intervened, informing the House that the matter had already been referred to the privileges committee.299 Ibid. 111.

Suffolk was named to just three committees during the course of the sitting. The first concerned the bill against monopolies, to which he was added on 27 November. The second, the following day, was to consider a bill to confirm Prince Charles’s title to the manor and castle of Kenilworth, in Warwickshire. The third, on 6 Dec., concerned the Merchants of the Staple.300 LJ, iii. 172b, 173b, 184a.

During the course of the Parliament, Suffolk had refrained from throwing in his lot with Buckingham’s critics, although he had defended his former client Yelverton, one of the favourite’s most bitter enemies. It may have been partly because of this that in January 1622 Buckingham proved willing to allow Suffolk’s son, Sir Thomas Howard, to be elevated to the peerage as Viscount Andover. However, undoubtedly the main reason for the latter’s advancement was the sale to Buckingham of Wallingford House, a property situated close to Whitehall near Charing Cross, by Suffolk’s son-in-law, Lord Knollys, now Viscount Wallingford.301 Chamberlain Letters, ii. 421; Add. 72360, f. 24v. Either way, Suffolk was deeply grateful, and wrote to Buckingham that ‘no man is prouder of your favour, neither shall any man be more desirous to hold it, than I am and will be’.302 Lockyer, 119. Buckingham was evidently pleased by this response, and in June obtained for Suffolk immunity from any further prosecution in respect of contracts made by him on behalf of the king while in office.303 Bodl., Add. D.111, f. 207; CSP Dom. 1619-23, p. 409. A grateful Suffolk reciprocated the following year by agreeing to make available his house in Charing Cross –renamed Suffolk House - in the event that Prince Charles returned from Madrid with a Spanish bride, as expected.304 CSP Dom. 1619-23, p. 567. Relations between Suffolk and Buckingham, who was elevated to a dukedom in May 1623, were now entirely harmonious, and in November their friendship was cemented by the marriage of Suffolk’s son Sir Edward Howard^‡ to one of Buckingham’s nieces.305 HP Commons 1604-29, iv. 809; Negotiations of Sir Thomas Roe (1740) ed. S. Richardson, 204.

Suffolk secured seats for three of his sons ahead of the 1624 Parliament (Sir Edward^‡, Sir William^‡ and Sir Robert Howard^‡), but he himself took little part in the proceedings of this assembly, even though Edward Wotton^*, 1st Lord Wotton, entrusted him with his proxy. Aside from the committee for privileges on 23 Feb., he was appointed to just two committees, one concerned with a bill to abolish trial by battle and the other for a bill to avoid lawsuits. Suffolk’s most notable contribution that session was to oppose a measure designed to confirm the title of Henry de Vere, 18th earl of Oxford to a valuable estate in Aldgate, London. Ownership of this property was disputed by Magdalene College, Cambridge, which had been founded by Suffolk’s maternal grandfather in 1542. However, despite being chancellor of the university, Suffolk proved unable to prevent the bill from being committed as ‘the affection of the House was strong for my lord of Oxford’.306 LD 1624 and 1626, p. 23; ‘Hastings 1621’, p. 35. Suffolk was more in tune with the general mood of the House a few weeks later, when he spoke against Caleb Morley, who was accused of libelling Star Chamber. Even though it had been this same court which had destroyed his own reputation, Suffolk thought that Morley should be condemned out of hand.307 LD 1624 and 1626, pp. 39, 43.

Suffolk evidently fell ill soon thereafter, for although Parliament continued to sit until 29 May, he did not attend the Lords again. He subsequently complained of soreness in one leg, but the condition was evidently more serious than that, as both legs required surgery. He was still unwell in June, when the king asked him at short notice for the use of Suffolk House, which was needed to accommodate the French ambassador, whose arrival in London was expected hourly. In view of his condition Suffolk was understandably reluctant to comply with this request, but James insisted, with the result that Suffolk was obliged to retreat to one wing of his house. Despite his ‘lingering sickness’, he proved unable to tolerate this situation for long, for by early July he had fled to Audley End. From there, on the 11th, he penned a letter asking for his house to be returned to him, the period for which it had been demanded having now expired.308 HMC Hatfield, xxii. 195; CSP Dom. 1623-5, pp. 281, 284, 298; Finetti Philoxenis (1656), 140. However, his plea was ignored, as the French ambassador was still in possession as late as the beginning of September.309 Holles Letters ed. P.R. Seddon (Thoroton Soc. xxxv), 293. See also CSP Ven. 1623-5, pp. 410-11.

The temporary loss of his London house marked the beginning of renewed difficulties for Suffolk. In October 1624 the wife of Buckingham’s deranged brother, John Villiers^*, Viscount Purbeck, gave birth to a son. It was widely believed that the father was not Purbeck himself but Suffolk’s son Sir Robert Howard. Since Buckingham had not yet produced a male heir, the new-born boy, unless declared illegitimate, stood to inherit the latter’s lands and titles.310 Lockyer, 285; HP Commons 1604-29, iv. 814. Not surprisingly, a furious Buckingham initiated legal proceedings, and in March 1625 Sir Robert was arraigned before High Commission on a charge of adultery. Shortly thereafter, on the death of the king, Suffolk was formally excluded from membership of the Privy Council (to the dismay of his nephew Arundel, who proposed in late March that he be reinstated), thereby bringing to an end his hopes of political rehabilitation.311 CSP Ven. 1625-6, p. 12; Chamberlain Letters, ii. 609; Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, AT-OeStA/HHStA LA Belgien PC 55-1, unfol. (anon. to della Faille, Mar. 1625). We are grateful for this latter reference to Tom Cogswell.

Suffolk played no part in the first Parliament of the new reign, but instead appointed a proxy, presumably his eldest son, Lord Howard de Walden.312 Procs. 1625, p. 48. Over the late summer and autumn of 1625, war with Spain having now broken out, he was kept busy by his duties as lord lieutenant of three counties, which included compiling the names of those individuals living within his lieutenancies wealthy enough to lend to the king.313 CSP Dom. 1625-6, pp. 97, 110, 138, 150, 186; HMC 13th Rep. IV, 444. By 1626 his health had evidently deteriorated, for in January his wife wrote on his behalf to the master of King’s College, Cambridge, concerning the provision of parliamentary seats for his younger sons.314 King’s Coll. Camb. Lib., KCAR/1/2/16, vol. IV, no. 59. He certainly did not attend the king’s coronation early the following month, nor the Parliament which assembled a few days later, despite travelling to the capital in mid January.315 Manner of the Coronation of King Chas. I ed. C. Wordsworth (Henry Bradshaw Soc. ii), p. l. For evidence that he journeyed to London at this time, see Add. 39245, ff. 97, 100. Instead he assigned his proxy to Lord Howard de Walden, who ensured that his father’s views, at least in respect of the descent of the office of lord great chamberlain, were heard in the Lords.316 Procs. 1626, i. 143, 234.

The most likely reason Suffolk journeyed to London early in 1626 was to inspect the condition of Suffolk House, which he had again been obliged to lend to the French ambassador the previous spring. He subsequently claimed that £150 worth of damage had been caused, for which he received a warrant for payment.317 Finetti Philoxenis, 146; CSP Dom. 1625-6, p. 562. Although he took no part in the Parliament, Suffolk may have paid close attention to its proceedings, in particular the Commons’ attempt to impeach Buckingham, whom he now undoubtedly counted once more among his enemies. On discovering that Lord Howard de Walden had sided with the duke, he allegedly transferred his proxy to his second son, Thomas Howard, now earl of Berkshire.318 T. Birch, Ct. and Times of Chas. I, i. 106.

Suffolk died in the early hours of the morning on 28 May at his house in Charing Cross.319 Ibid. 107; CSP Dom. 1625-6, p. 346: CP. He left no will, only a mountain of debt, and was buried six days later in the parish church of Saffron Walden, near Audley End.320 Layton, 143. Ironically, his death provided his enemy Buckingham with an opportunity for further advancement, as the latter succeeded Suffolk as chancellor of Cambridge University shortly thereafter.