Nicholas Bacon (abt. 1510 - 1579)

Born about 28 Dec 1510 in Drinkstone, Suffolk, England

Ancestors

Husband of Jane (Fernley) Bacon — married 5 Apr 1540 in West Creeting, Suffolk, England

Husband of Anne (Cooke) Bacon — married Feb 1553 in London, England

Descendants

Died 20 Feb 1579 at about age 68 in York House, Charing Cross, London, England

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Biography

Sir Nicolas Bacon was a lawyer and a minister in the governments of several Tudor sovereigns, most notably Lord Keeper of the Great Seal for Queen Elizabeth I and acting Lord Chancellor.

Family

Nicholas Bacon (1510-1578/9) was the second son of Robert Bacon, sheep-reeve of the Abbey of Bury St Edmund's, and his wife Isabella Cage. He was born on Childermas Day, December 28, either 1509 or 1510, probably at Drinkstone, Suffolk (other sources have Chislehurst, Kent). ^{[1] [2]}

Both his brothers became successful: Thomas Bacon MP was a citizen and Salter of London,^[3] and in Parliament from 1547. He died some time between 1573 and 1580. James Bacon, the youngest brother, was citizen and Fishmonger, Alderman of Aldersgate in 1567, Sheriff in 1568.^[4] He died in 1573.^{[5] [6]}

On 5 April 1540, Nicholas Bacon married (1) Jane Fernley, daughter of the merchant William Fernley of West Creting, Suffolk and London. ^{[7] [8]} Jane's sister Anne married the financial expert Sir Thomas Gresham, who became a valuable connection for Nicholas Bacon. His second son Nathaniel married Gresham's daughter.

They had six surviving children - three sons and three daughters, two of whom were incongruously named Elizabeth (although the youngest is sometimes erroneously called Jane):^{[9] [10] [11] [12] [13]}

John - b. 1540, died young

Elizabeth(I) - b. aft 1540, d. 1621, m. (1) Sir Robert Doyley, (2) Sir Henry Neville, (3) Sir William Perriam

Anne - b. aft 1541, d. 1624, m. Sir Henry Woodhouse

Sir Nicholas - b. c 1543, d. 12 Nov 1624, m. Anne Butts

Sir Nathaniel - b. c 1546, d. 7 Nov 1622, m. (1) Anne Gresham, (2) Dorothy Hopton

Edward - b. c 1548, d. 8 Sept 1618, m. Helen Little

Elizabeth (II) - b. 21 Sept 1551,^[14] m. Francis Wyndham

Jane Fernley Bacon died in 1552, and the next February Nicholas married (2) Anne Cooke- a noted scholar, daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke and Anne FitzWilliam. After at least two daughters who died young, they had two surviving sons: ^{[15] [12]}

Mary - b. c 1553, died young

Susan - b. aft 1554, died young

Anthony - b. 1558, d. 1601

Francis - b. 22 Jan 1560/1, d. 9 April 1626

Henry VIII through Mary I

While all three Bacon brothers may have attended the Bury grammar school, it was Nicholas who was chosen to go further in his formal education - his attainment of a Bible scholarship suggests he was originally intended for the church. The school had become a center of the Reformed religion, as was Benet College at Cambridge(later Corpus Christi),^[16] where Nicholas entered as a Scholar in 1523, when he would have been about twelve or thirteen years of age. He took the BA in 1526/7 - ranking third in his class.^[1] He was afterward admitted to Gray's Inn^[17] and called to the Bar in 1533. ^[18] It is possible that in the interval he went to Paris for further study, but he spent some early time in one of the Inns of Chancery in preparation for his legal career. He kept a lifelong interest in the affairs of Gray's Inn, becoming Bencher 1550 and Treasurer 1556.^[1]

For an aspiring young bureaucrat in King Henry VIII's England during the early days of the Reformation, there were plentiful and remunerative opportunities, if he had the necessary patronage. Fortunately for Nicholas Bacon, his years at Cambridge had introduced him to other young men with influential connections - among them the future Archbishop of Canterbury, Matthew Parker, and the future Secretary of State William Cecil.^[19]] It is not clear how he first made the acquaintance of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, but he received a noble recommendation: "of such towardness in the law, and of so good judgment touching Christ's religion, that in that stead he should be able to do God and the king right acceptable service."^[11]

Perhaps through Cranmer, Nicholas must have come to the attention of Lord Privy Seal Thomas Cromwell, because in 1538 he obtained a position with the Court of Augmentations - a body established to administer the sale of confiscated monastic property after its seizure by the crown. By 1540, he advanced to become the Court's Solicitor. This was a perfect position for an active lawyer of Reformist views. It also gave its members inside information about properties coming up for sale, as well as opportunities to buy at an advantageous price. Nicholas Bacon, during this period, began to build up a landed estate, acquiring manors mostly confiscated from Bury St Edmunds. In 1545, he bought the property at Redgrave in Suffolk and began to construct a country house for his young family there.^{[1] [11] [20]}

In 1542, Nicholas Bacon served as MP for Westmoreland and in 1545 for Dartmouth. These were not constituencies in which he had any natural interest; he was sponsored for these seats by local magnates, undoubtedly for his services as legislator, his knowledge of the law becoming widely known.^[21]

In 1546, Nicholas moved up to the remunerative position of Attorney for the Court of Wards and Liveries,^[1] a position he held through the next two reigns, as Henry VIII was succeeded in 1547 by his young son Edward VI. He became an intimate at Edward's court, with such colleagues as William Cecil and Sir Anthony Cooke, as the institutionalization of the reformed protestant church was worked out. His business at court made it desirable for him to have a closer residence, and in 1550 he acquired the estate of Gorhambury in Hertfordshire, where he began to build a larger house.^[1] After the death of his wife Jane in 1522 left him with six children under twelve years, he married the intellectual Anne Cooke the next year.^[22]

The brief, hopeful period of protestant reformation under Edward VI came to an abrupt and unexpected end at the death of the young king on 6 July 1533. Edward and his advisors attempted to alter the succession from his Catholic elder sister Mary to his protestant cousin, Lady Jane Grey. Nicholas Bacon, with his friend William Cecil, were concerned about the legality of this move. It happened that Anne Cooke had served the Lady Mary in her court during Edward's reign and had gained her confidence, despite her firm protestant convictions. ^[23] Upon learning that Mary intended to take the throne, she rode to Kenninghall in Norfolk, where Mary had just proclaimed herself Queen, to pledge her support. This saved her protestant husband and brother-in-law.^[24] Throughout the brief reign of Mary I, Nicholas Bacon continued quietly in his post at the Court of Wards, conforming outwardly in religion while such men as Cramner were burned at the stake for heresy.^[25]

Queen Elizabeth I

At the accession of Elizabeth, Nicholas Bacon's political career reached its peak. Owing largely to the recommendation of his good friend Cecil, whom Elizabeth had appointed Secretary of State, Nicholas was named Lord Keeper of the Great Seal - in effect acting Chancellor; Elizabeth apparently felt the title of Chancellor was not fitting for a man of common birth. He was also knighted (15 December)^[26] and named to the Privy Council. All these posts he would retain until his death.^{[1] [27]}

It was probably about this time that he adopted his Senecan motto: mediocria firma: "the middle way is stable".^[28] He might have had in mind the meteoric rise of his mentor Thomas Cromwell, from origins quite like those of Bacon himself, and his even more sudden and drastic fall. His career typically showed the avoidance of extremes.

Among Sir Nicholas's first duties was assisting in the consolidation of Elizabeth's 1559 religious settlement, presiding over the Westminster Conference summoned to dispute the issues, and it was intended to promote the protestant position, which Sir Nicholas brought about by the expedient of imprisoning two of the Catholic bishops. Protestantism was established in the English church, if the means were not fair. But at the same time, he rejected the arguments of the more extreme puritan faction, led by his own father-in-law Sir Anthony Cooke.^[29] ". . . the queen was content for many years following to leave 'the ordering of church matters for the most part' in the hands of Bacon and Cecil."^[11]

While as acting Chancellor, Sir Nicholas Bacon was the official spokesman of the monarch to the House of Lords, his primary duty in this office was legal: he presided over the Court of the Star Chamber and the Court of Chancery - the Supreme Courts of the era - to which he made numerous substantial reforms to professionalize and bring them into the modern age.^[30]

Sir Nicholas was not immune to the perils of infighting among the courtiers, and the most sensitive issue was Elizabeth's potential successor - one that she preferred to avoid. Probably at the instigation of favorite Robert Dudley, soon made Earl of Leicester, he was temporarily banished from court in 1563 when Elizabeth concluded he was supporting Catherine Grey for the succession.^{[1] [31]} Several years later, he also found himself involved in the tangled affairs of Mary Queen of Scots and her complicity in Catholic attempts to replace Elizabeth on the English throne.^{[1] [32]} Yet by 1572, his relations with the queen were on such a firm footing that she paid him a visit during her summer progress, and a longer stay in 1577 - a mark of high favor that cost him £600.^[1]

Even in the 1560s, Sir Nicholas Bacon was not in good health. He suffered from gout and from kidney stones, and the gross corpulence which was mentioned by his contemporaries left him short of breath.^[33] In his last decade, his vigor was increasingly diminished.^[34] He began to withdraw from national affairs, leaving the growing menace of war with Spain to younger men.

He died 20 February 1578/9 and was laid to rest in a massive tomb within St Paul's Cathedral. "Betwixt the Quire and the South Ile rested, under a very noble Monument, the Body of Sir Nicolas Bacon Knt. (of the ancient Family of Bacons in Suffolk) who was made Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England, 22 December, 1 Elizabeth, and died 20. Feb. 21 Eliz."^[35] His funeral was a grand event that cost £900, with three hundred marchers following the remains to the internment, all clothed in funereal black.^[36]

It was largely destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666.

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 1.9} "Bacon, Sir Nicholas (1510–1579)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/1002
2. ↑ Tittler, Robert. Nicholas Bacon: The Making of a Tudor Statesman London: Cape, 1976. pp. 16-18.[1]
3. ↑ History of Parliament Online Thomas Bacon
4. ↑ Alfred P Beaven, 'Notes on the aldermen, 1502-1700', in The Aldermen of the City of London Temp. Henry III - 1912 (London, 1908), pp. 168-195. British History Online James Bacon.
5. ↑ PROB 11/55/374 Probate
6. ↑ Tittler, pp. 17-18. [2]
7. ↑ The Visitations of Suffolk, 1612. Exeter: W. Pollard, 1882. p. 29. Fernley
8. ↑ Tittler, p. 33. [3]
9. ↑ "Bacon, Sir Nathaniel. Nathaniel
10. ↑ Tittler, pp. 17-18.[4]
11. ↑ ^{11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3} Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 02: Bacon, Nicholas by Sidney Lee [5]
12. ↑ ^{12.0 12.1} Letters from Redgrave Hall, Diarmaid MacCulloch, ed. The Boydell Press: Suffolk Records Society, 2007. pp. xxviii-xxix.
13. ↑ Kingsley, Nicholas. Landed families of England and Ireland: Bacon of Redgrave Hall. Bacon
14. ↑ England Births and Baptisms 1538-1975 Elizabeth
15. ↑ Tittler, pp. 17-18.[6]
16. ↑ Tittler, p. 19.[7]
17. ↑ The Register of Admission to Gray's Inn, 1521-1889. Foster, Joseph, ed. London: Hansard Pub Union, p. 9, folio 429. Register
18. ↑ Venn, J. A., comp. Alumni Cantabrigienses, vol I. London, England: Cambridge University Press, 1922-1954. p. 65. Nicholas Bacon
19. ↑ Tittler, p. 23.[[8]
20. ↑ Tittler, pp. 34-37. [9]
21. ↑ History of Parliament Online: Bacon, Nicholas (15110-1579) Parliament
22. ↑ Tittler, p. 49. [10]
23. ↑ Mair, Katherine Alice. Anne, Lady Bacon: A Life in Letters. PhD Thesis 2009. pdf. p. 8.
24. ↑ Bacon, Lady Anne Cooke. The Letters of Lady Anne Bacon. Gemma Allen, ed. Cambridge University Press, 1014.
25. ↑ Tittler, pp. 52-55.[11]
26. ↑ Shaw, William Arthur. The Knights of EnglandLondon: Sherratt and Hughes, 1906. p. 70.
27. ↑ Tittler, pp. 69-71. [12]
28. ↑ Tittler, p. 57. [13]
29. ↑ Tittler, pp. 90-92. [14]
30. ↑ Tittler, p. 71. [15]
31. ↑ Tittler pp. 115-126. [16]
32. ↑ Tittler, pp. 127-132. [17]
33. ↑ Tittler, pp. 125-6. [18]
34. ↑ Tittler, p. 187. [[19]
35. ↑ Dugdale, William. The History of St. Paul's Cathedral in London, From its Foundation. (Edward Maynard, Northamptonshire, England, 1716) Page 50
36. ↑ Tittler, pp. 188-193.[20]

See Also:

• Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology and Natural History. United Kingdom, G. Thompson, 1886. p. 41 ff. "The Family of Bacon" Pedigree, critical examination
• Tittler, Robert. "Sir Nicholas Bacon and the Reform of the Tudor Chancery." The University of Toronto Law Journal 23, no. 4 (1973): 383-95. Accessed November 21, 2020. doi:10.2307/824897.
• Letters from Redgrave Hall, Diarmaid MacCulloch, ed. The Boydell Press: Suffolk Records Society, 2007.
• Biographia Britannica, Or The Lives Of The Most Eminent Persons Who Have Flourished in Great Britain and Ireland From The Earliest Ages Down To Present Times, Volume The First, pp. 364-369, Edward Gibson, Presented At The Court of King George, September 26, 1774, The University of Lausanne Collection.
• Kingsley, Nicholas. Landed families of England and Ireland: Bacon of Redgrave Hall. Bacon
• Wikipedia: Sir Nicholas Bacon [21]
• Chalmers, Alexander. The General Biographical Dictionary (London: J. Nichols and Son, 1812-1) [ https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/14543257/person/1497710574/facts]
• 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Bacon, Sir Nicholas Bacon

Further Reading:

• Klein, Arthur Jay, 1884-. Intolerance In the Reign of Elizabeth, Queen of England. Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin company, 1917. babel.hathitrust.org Accessed 7 Dec 2020.
• Simonds d'Ewes. "Speakers and clerks of the two Houses," in The Journals of All the Parliaments During the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, (Shannon, Ire: Irish University Press, 1682), xiv. Pg 8 British History Online, accessed November 21, 2020, http://www.british-history.ac.uk/no-series/jrnl-parliament-eliz1/xiv.
• Simonds d'Ewes. "Journal of the House of Lords: January 1559," in The Journals of All the Parliaments During the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, (Shannon, Ire: Irish University Press, 1682), 1-18. British History Online, accessed November 27, 2020, http://www.british-history.ac.uk/no-series/jrnl-parliament-eliz1/pp1-18.
• Collinson, Patrick. "Sir Nicholas Bacon and the Elizabethan Via Media." The Historical Journal 23, no. 2 (1980): 255-73. Accessed November 21, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2638669.
• Sandeen, E. R. "THE ORIGIN OF SIR NICHOLAS BACON'S BOOK-PLATE." Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 2, no. 5 (1958): 373-76. Accessed November 21, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41155325.
• Ide, Arata. "CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE IN 1577: READING THE SOCIAL SPACE IN SIR NICHOLAS BACON'S COLLEGE PLAN." Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 15, no. 2 (2013): 279-328. Accessed November 21, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24391729.
• Hearn, Karen. "Sir Nathaniel Bacon I: Horticulturalist and Artist." The British Art Journal 1, no. 2 (2000): 13-15. Accessed November 21, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41614957.
• Hamilton, Rosanna, comp. British Chancery Records, 1386-1558. Original data - Lists of Early Chancery Proceedings. Public Record Offic Lists and Indexes Volumes. Original data: Lists of Early Chancery Proceedings.
• UK, Extracted Probate Records, Electronic databases created from various publications of probate records.
• Suffolk, England, Extracted Parish Records, Electronic databases created from various publications of parish and probate records.
• Burke's American Families with British Ancestry