Richard Southwell

Sir Richard Southwell PC (c.1502/03 – 11 January 1564) was an English Privy Councillor. Biography He was born at Windham Manor in Norfolk, the son of Francis Southwell, an auditor of the exchequer, and Dorothy (née Tendring). He was the eldest brother of Robert Southwell, Francis Southwell and Anthony Southwell (husband of Anne Le Strange, daughter of Sir Thomas Le Strange). His paternal grandparents were Richard Southwell (d. 1514), Marshal of the Exchequer, and his wife Amy, the coheiress and eldest of the four daughters of Edmund Witchingham of Conningsby, Lincolnshire. His maternal grandparents were William Tendring, Esquire, of Stoke by Naylond in Suffolk and Little Birch in Essex, of whom his mother was coheiress, and his wife Thomasine, daughter of William Sidney. Richard's father died in 1512, and he inherited the estate. Less than two years later he was also to inherit the estate of his uncle Sir Robert Southwell (who had served as seneschal for estates forfeited to Henry VII). In 1515 he became the ward of his uncle's widow and William Wootton, his aunt's husband. Sir Robert’s widow was Elizabeth Calthorpe (d.1517), the daughter of Sir Philip Calthorpe of Burnham Thorpe, Norfolk. She would become the second wife of Thomas Brooke, 8th Baron Cobham. In 1519 Thomas Wyndham acquired the wardship. Wyndham married Southwell to his stepdaughter Thomasin, who was the daughter of Roger Darcy of Danbury in Essex and sister of Thomas Darcy, 1st Baron Darcy of Chiche. They had a daughter. He later married Mary, the daughter of Thomas Darcy of Danbury, and the widow of Robert Leeche of Norwich, Norfolk. They had one legitimate daughter and two illegitimate sons (including Richard Southwell alias Darcy) and two illegitimate daughters. In 1526 he entered Lincoln's Inn. He became tutor to Gregory Cromwell, son of Thomas. For some period Gregory lived with Southwell in Woodrising Manor in Norfolk, which Southwell had inherited from his uncle. In 1531 Southwell became a Justice of the Peace for Norfolk and Suffolk. In the same year, he was involved in the murder of Sir William Pennington and the following year he paid a fine of £1000 to obtain a pardon. In lieu of money he gave King Henry VIII his Essex manors of Coggeshall and Filolls Hall. He had previously bought the manor in 1529 from the cousins Thomas Thursby (d. 1532) of Hillington, Norfolk and Edmund Beaupré.