453038. Sir Richard Rich
1st Baron Rich, Lord Chancellor(114)
(336)
(179)(686) was born in 1496
in Basingstoke, Hampshire. He died in 1568 in Rochford Hall, Rochford, Essex.
Sir Richard Rich, 1st Baron Rich, Lord Chancellor of England, is perhaps the
least attractive of all my ancestors to have died in bed. The Dictionary of National
Biography, not a work given to overly harsh judgments, describes him as "A
time-server of the least admirable type, he was always found on the winning side,
and he had a hand in the ruin of most of the prominent men of his time, not a
few of whom had been his friends and benefactors--Wolsey, More, Fisher, Cromwell,
Wriothesley, Lord Seymour of Sudeley, Somerset, and Northumberland." Still,
one can hardly help but admire the skill with which he navigated through the
treacherous politics of Tudor England and emerged, unscathed, with vast wealth,
a peerage, and an undeniable place in history.
Richard Rich came not from the landed aristocracy but rather from the commercial
aristocracy of London and he married into another family with same background.
He apparently attended Cambridge University (in 1539 he was an unsuccessful candidate
for Chancellor of the University, losing to the Duke of Norfolk). He certainly
attended the Middle Temple and studied the law. At the Middle Temple he made
the acquaintance of Sir Thomas More.
Years later, Sir Thomas, at his trial for treason, remembered Rich. "You
know," he told him, "that I have been acquainted with your manner of
life and conversation a long space, even from your youth to this time; for we
dwelt long together in one parish, where, as yourself can well tell (I am sorry
you compel me to speak it), you were always esteemed very light of your tongue,
a great dicer and gamester, and not of any commendable fame either there or at
your house in the Temple, where hath been your bringing up."
Regardless of his eat-drink-and-be-merry ways at the Temple, however, Rich became
deeply learned in the law. He was soon named to various commissions and in 1529
became a reader at the Middle Temple. That year he was elected to the "reformation"
Parliament, which sat until 1536. In Mar 1532 he was granted the clerkship of
recognisances of debt taken in London--a patronage plum--and was appointed Attorney
General for Wales and the counties of Flint and Chester. The following year he
was appointed Solicitor General and was knighted.
In these offices Rich was in the thick of Henry VIII's transformation of the
English power structure and he made care to always seek the main chance. His
own advancement and profit always came before any ties of loyalty or friendship.
When Bishop John Fisher, a noted theologian who rejected Henry VIII's assertion
of supremacy, was sent to the Tower, Rich visited him there. Endeavoring to ascertain
Fisher's views, he assured him that the king had promised that nothing ill would
come of anything he said. Regardless, the conversation formed the basis of the
prosecution's case at Fisher's trial, at which he was condemned, and Fisher denounced
Rich at the trial for having broken his word.
Equally, he visited Sir Thomas More in the Tower and then testified as to what
he had been told by Sir Thomas at that time, saying that More had denied the
power of Parliament to make the King supreme head of the Church in England. More
strongly denied saying this and accused Rich of perjury. "In good faith,
Mr. Rich," More stated at his trial, "I am more sorry for your perjury
than mine own peril; and you know you that neither I nor anyone else to my knowledge
ever took you to be a man of much credit as either I or any other could vouchsafe
to communicate with you in any manner of importance."
Whether Rich's testimony at More's trial was perjurious can never be known, although
it undoubtedly accorded with More's actual beliefs. But it certainly was a powerful
factor in More's conviction and execution. This episode in Rich's life is vividly
depicted in "A Man for All Seasons." And Rich certainly received his
reward from the King, being made overseer of liveries of lands--an extremely
profitable office--and chirographer of common pleas.
Even more profitable in the long run, Rich was appointed Chancellor of the Court
of Augmentations of the Revenue of the Crown, a committee of the Privy Council,
to which he was also appointed at that time, in 1536. This court was to deal
with the dissolution of the smaller monasteries. He was also elected that year
to the new Parliament and elected as Speaker of the House of Commons. At this
point, except for Thomas Cromwell, Rich was the most powerful of the King's ministers.
He worked closely with Cromwell in the dissolution of the remaining monasteries
and was able to obtains vast lands for himself in the process. But he deserted
Cromwell when the latter made the mistake of pushing for Anne of Cleves to become
Henry's fourth Queen. After Cromwell's downfall (Rich, needless to say, testified
at his trial as one of the chief witnesses), Rich gained still more power and
influence. He accompanied King Henry to France to negotiate a treaty, adding
some aspects of foreign affairs to his responsibilities.
In 1546, when Anne Askew, the Protestant martyr, was sent to the Tower, Rich
and Sir William Wriothesley took part in her examination and were present when
she was tortured. Indeed, according to her own testimony, Wriothesley and Rich
themselves "took pains to rack me with their own hands till I was well nigh
dead."
When Henry VIII died, in Jan 1547, he made Rich in his will one of his executors,
left him two hundred pounds, and instructed that he be made a peer. He was created
Baron Rich of Leeze (spelled Leighs today), Essex on Feb 26 1548. That October,
Wriothesley was deprived of the Lord-Chancellorship, undoubtedly owing to Rich's
machinations, and Rich was appointed in his place. Again, Rich maneuvered always
to be on the winning side of the dog-eat-dog politics of the reign of Edward
VI, and Lord Seymour of Sudeley, the Duke of Somerset the Lord Protector, and
the Duke of Northumberland all suffered by his shifting alliances.
Illness forced him to relinquish the Great Seal and the Lord Chancellorship in
1551, but he was back in the councils of power by the end of 1552. On Jul 9 1553,
after the young king's death, Rich signed the Privy Council's answer to Mary
Tudor's remonstrance, which pronounced her a bastard and proclaimed Lady Jane
Grey as Queen. But with typically artful lack of concern for consistency, immediately
left London for Essex, his home base--indeed the manors he had acquired in the
dissolution of the monasteries covered a good portion of the county--and declared
for Queen Mary.
He entertained Queen Mary at his manor of Wanstead on her way to London and his
wife accompanied the Queen on her entrance into London. Rich was at once sworn
into her council and officiated at her coronation. Rich took little part in the
government under Queen Mary, however, and rarely attended Privy Council meetings.
But he vigorously pursued the government's policy of restoring the Catholic religion
in Essex. He persecuted numerous heretics, often examining them himself, and
Foxe in his book of martyrs attributes the high number of burnings in Essex to
Rich's zeal.
But, still again, when the winds of change blew through English poltics, Rich
bent expertly with them. He accompanied Queen Elizabeth I to London and was placed
on a commission to inquire into the granting of lands in the late reign, a place
from which, undoubtedly, he was able to enrich himself still further.
Rich was buried in Felsted Church where his effigy is still to be found and his
portrait by Holbein is among the Holbein drawings in the Royal Collection at
Windsor. He endowed many institutions in Felsted including a grammar school that
Oliver Cromwell's sons attended, and built the tower of Rochford Church. His
London residence, now known as Warwick House, still stands.
As Rich and his wife had five sons and ten daughters (and he had as well four
illegitimate children) his progeny is vast. His grandson Robert Rich, 3rd Baron
Rich, was created Earl of Warwick in 1618, a title that went extinct in 1759.
He was married to Elizabeth Jenks.
453039.
Elizabeth Jenks(114) died on
Dec 15 1558. Children were:
i.
Sir Hugh Rich(687) died on Nov 1
1554.
ii.
Frances Rich(688).
226519 iii.
Mary Rich.
iv.
Margaret Rich(689).
v.
Etheldreda Rich(690).
vi.
Agnes Rich(691).
vii.
Robert Rich 2nd Baron Rich(692) was
born about 1538. He died Fen 27 1582.
viii.
Edward Rich(693) died young.
ix.
Dorothy Rich(694).
x.
Elizabeth Rich(695).
xi.
Richard Rich(696).
xii.
William Rich(697) died young.
xiii.
Winifred Rich(698) died after
Nov 1578.
xiv.
Anne Rich(699).
xv.
Barbara Rich(700). Barbara Rich
became a nun.