Who was Sir Walter Raleigh?
Explorer, Naval Commander, and Historian.
Date and Place of Birth:
1554 Hayes Barton, near Buddleigh Salterton,
Devon, England.
Family Background:
Son of Walter Ralegh, a country gentleman from
Fardell, near Plymouth.
Education:
Oxford University. Middle Temple, London, to
study law.
Chronology/Biography of Sir Walter Raleigh:
1578: Joined a piratical
expedition against the Spanish organised by his half brother Sir
Humphrey Gilbert.
1580: Sent to Ireland
where he brutally put down an uprising. He later became a favourite
of Queen Elizabeth the First and was showered with titles and gifts.
1584: He sent an
expedition to America to take lands in the name of the Queen.
1585: Appointed
Lord Warden of the Stanneries and Vice Admiral of Devon and Cornwall.
He also became a Member of Parliament for Devon.
1587: THe Second
Earl of Essex became Court favourite over Raleigh. and he went to
Ireland and planted Estates in Munster and became a good friends
with the poet Edmund Spenser.
1592: On his return
to England he was committed to the Tower of London for having a
secret affair with Bessy Throckmorton, one of the Queens maids of
Honour. He was kept away from the Queen for four years.
1595: Took five
ships on an expedition and explored the coasts of Trinidad and sailed
up the Orinoco River in South America.
1596: With Charles
Howard and the Earl of Essex he sacked the port of Cadiz in Spain.
1600: Became Governor
of Jersey.
1603: (17th July)
Although he had not taken part in the major plotting at the end
of Queen Elizabeth's reign he was still implicated and was arrested.
He attempted suicide. At his trial at Winchester he defended himself
but was condemned to death. Only on the scaffold was his sentence
commuted to life imprisonment.
1616: He was released
from the Tower of London and went on another expedition to the Orinoco
in search of a goldmine. The mission was a complete failure as many
of his ships were sunk and his son died during the voyage. Breaking
his terms of freedom he razed a Spanish town to the ground.
1618: On his return
to England the Spanish Minister in London invoked the suspended
death sentence and he was sent for beheading at Whitehall.
Written Works:
- 1591:
“The Fight about the Azores.”
- 1596: “The
Discovery of the Empire of Guiana.”
- 1614:
“The History of the World.”
- (1642):
“The Prince or Maxims of State.”
- (1644):
“Today a Man, Tomorrow None.”
Marriage:
1592 to Elizabeth (Bessy) Throckmorton, a Maid
of Honour to Queen Elizabeth the First whom he had got pregnant.
Places of Interest:
LONDON:
The Tower of London.
Date and Place of Death:
29th October 1618, Whitehall, London, England.
Age at Death:
64.
Site of Grave:
St. Margaret's Church, Westminster, London.
St Margaret's Church, Westminster
(© Anthony Blagg)
