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How Raleigh rose to fame
by Tony Riches
For my Elizabethan series I chose three very different favourites of the queen, who each saw different sides of her personality. Sir Francis Drake showered her with gold and jewels, stolen from the Spanish, in return for the status he longed for. The Earl of Essex was like the errant son she never had, but Raleigh became her protector, Captain of the Guard, and lived to see the last days of the Tudor dynasty.
Much has been written about Sir Walter Raleigh’s downfall, but less is known about his early life, and how he rose to fame. When I began my research I read ‘A Woman of Noble Wit’, a new novel by Rosemary Griggs, about Raleigh’s mother. This led me to explore Walter Raleigh’s relationship with his father, as well as his mother, an aspect of him largely ignored by historical biographers.
The youngest of five sons, Raleigh’s father, also named Walter, had been married twice before he met Raleigh’s mother, Katherine, who came from the well-respected Champernowne family. Her elder sister was Kat Ashley, who’d been governess to the young princess, and was a royal favourite when Elizabeth became queen. As far as I could tell. Young Walter was closer to his mother than his father, who owned a small fleet of merchant ships and was often away at sea.
Like many in the area, the family were Protestant, with a distrust of Catholics, and not well off, as their home at Hayes Barton in Devon was rented. Young Walter may have been tutored by the parish cleric and taught to read and write by his mother, who encouraged his love of poetry. At seventeen he followed his cousin to France on his first adventure, fighting with the Huguenots in civil war. He later wrote of how he nearly starved in one of the worst winters for many years, and the futility of the experience left its mark on him.
When he returned, Raleigh became an undergraduate at Oriel College in Oxford, but failed to focus in his studies, and was sent to study law in London. He found the strict discipline at the Inns of Court stifling, and persuaded his half-brother, explorer Sir Humphrey Gilbert, to give him a place on a sea voyage to the New World as an unpaid ‘adventurer’, with a share of any profits.
Raleigh
proved a poor sailor, and almost died of fever at the Cape Verde islands. He
returned to London and used his contacts to secure a junior commission with the
English army in Ireland. This was a formative time for Raleigh, as he was chosen
to carry dispatches back to Westminster, where he met Sir Francis Walsingham, principal
secretary to the queen, and her secret ‘spymaster’.
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| Sir Francis Walsingham (Wikimedia Commons) |
Raleigh was ambitious, and articulate, and saw a route to a place in the Elizabethan Court. He began to share his first-hand information on the situation in Ireland with Walsingham, and eventually his ideas on how Lord Treasurer, Lord Burghley, could reduce the escalating costs of the Irish occupation. They must have seen some potential in him, for both used their influence to help his career, and he was eventually appointed Captain of the Queen’s Guard.
I found many of the details of Raleigh’s life in his surviving letters, which as well as describing his adventures and disasters, are some of the best examples of the Elizabethan period. They reveal his strengths and weaknesses, as a courtier and failed politician, soldier and poet, a man ready to speak up for the poor and to honour his debts. My hope is that my new book, Raleigh – Tudor Adventurer, will help readers see beyond the myths and half-truths, and have a better understanding of the man who has been called the last true Elizabethan.
© Tony Riches
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| About the Book |
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books written by Helen Hollick
Website: https://helenhollick.net/
Amazon Author Page: https://viewauthor.at/HelenHollick
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| 1066 - the events that led to the Battle of Hastings from Amazon Harold the King (UK edition) I Am The Chosen King (US/Canada edition) 1066 Turned Upside Down - an anthology of alternative stories |
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| Amazon: FREE ebook! (includes a story by Tony Riches) |
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