Sir John King, Kt.

Seen as brother of Rt. Rev. Edward King, D.D.

Sir John King (c.1560-4 January 1637) was an Anglo-Irish administrator, politician and landowner. He sat in the Irish House of Commons and was a member of the Privy Council of Ireland. He was one of the most valued Irish Crown servants of his generation. Several of his children were notable in their own right. He was the ancestor of the Earl of Kingston.[1]

Summary

King, Sir John (d. 1637), politician and landowner. By Gordon Goodwin revised by Terry Clavin. Published online:23 September 2004. < ODNB >

King, Sir John (d. 1637), politician and landowner, was born of a Yorkshire family, although the name of his parents and details of his early years remain unknown. He is first recorded in Ireland in July 1585 as secretary to Richard Bingham, governor of ...

Biography

Wikipedia contributors, "John King (died 1637)," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=John_King_(died_1637)&ol... (accessed July 25, 2022).

Career

His background and parentage are obscure, but he is generally thought to have been born in Yorkshire, probably at Northallerton.[1] He is first heard of in Ireland in 1585 as secretary to Sir Richard Bingham, Lord President of Connaught. For his good services to the English Crown, Elizabeth I rewarded him with the lease of Boyle Abbey and the office of Constable of Boyle, in which capacity he commanded a small garrison. John began the construction of the castle at Boyle, and the settlement of the surrounding district. The King family was associated with the town of Boyle for centuries. John seems to have divided his time between Boyle and a house in Dublin near Baggotrath Castle, on present day Baggot Street.[1]

Boyle Abbey, which John King leased from the Crown Under King James I, having gained the reputation of being an exceptionally useful and versatile public servant, John enjoyed many profitable offices, and by the end of his life held land in twenty-one counties.[1] From 1603 he held the office of Clerk of the Crown and Hanaper for life: from 1606 he held it jointly with Francis Edgeworth, ancestor of the celebrated Edgeworth family of Edgeworthstown, whose most famous member was the novelist Maria Edgeworth.[1] In 1603 he also became Receiver of revenues, and subsequently Deputy Vice-Treasurer of Ireland. He became Muster-master for Ireland and Clerk of the Cheque in 1609, with a reversion in favour of his eldest son Robert, and a Commissioner for Compositions in 1611. He sat on commissions for the Plantation of County Wexford and County Longford. He became a Commissioner of the Irish Court of Wards in 1611. He sat on the Council of Munster, and at different times was authorised to act as temporary governor of Connacht, Leinster and Ulster.[1]

He was knighted and sworn in as a member of the Privy Council in 1609. In the Parliament of Ireland of 1613-15 he was one of the two MPs for County Roscommon.[1]

Marriage and children

John King married, before 1599, Catherine Drury, daughter of Robert Drury and Elizabeth Carew. Robert was the son of Edmund Drury, and nephew of Sir William Drury, President of Munster, and had come with his uncle William to Ireland and settled there. Elizabeth Carew's background is obscure, although she appears to have been born at Old Leighlin in County Carlow; her father's name is variously given as George and Thomas.

Catherine King died in 1617. She and John had nine children, several of them distinguished: all three of his daughters, especially Dorothy, are said to have been exceptionally well educated women for their time.

His children included:

1. Sir Robert King MP (died 1657);[2]
2. Edward King (1612-1637), the poet and friend of John Milton, who wrote Lycidas in his memory after his early death from drowning;
3. John King, who married Margaret Edgeworth (died 1676), daughter of Francis Edgeworth, his father's colleague in the Hanaper office, and Jane Tuite; after his death she remarried John Bysse, Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer, by whom she had an enormous family, most of whom died young;[3]
4. Dorothy King (c.1613-1664), a noted writer on the education of women; she married firstly Arthur Moore, a younger son of Garret Moore, 1st Viscount Moore, and secondly the leading Scots Calvinist preacher John Dury;[4]
5. Mary King (died July/August 1663), who married William Caulfeild, 2nd Baron Charlemont;
6. Margaret King (died 1658), who married Sir Gerard Lowther, Chief Justice of the Irish Common Pleas.[1]

He died at Lichfield, Staffordshire in January 1637. His body was brought back to Boyle for burial, apparently against his own wish, which was to be buried in Lichfield.[1]

Family

Father of nine children with Catherine Drury, including Edward King. Other children include: "...Of his brothers and sisters the most prominent were Robert King (who became a member of Cromwell's council of state), John (who became clerk of the hanaper), Mary (later Lady Charlemont), Margaret (later wife of Sir Gerald Lowther, chief justice of common pleas in Ireland), and Dorothy Durie (whose second husband was the protestant divine John Durie, a friend of Milton)."

Dictionary of National Biography, Volumes 1-20, 22

Birth, Marriage & Death

Buried in the Church of Boyle on March 30th following.

Name Sir John King

Biography

Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/King, John (d.1637) < link >

KING, Sir JOHN (d. 1637), Irish administrator, came of a family formerly seated at Feathercock Hall, near Northallerton, Yorkshire. By July 1585 he was acting as secretary to Sir Richard Bingham [q. v.], governor of Connaught (Cal. State Papers, Irish, 1574–85, p. 571). His services were rewarded by Queen Elizabeth with a lease of the abbey of Boyle, co. Roscommon. Under James I he enjoyed many profitable offices and privileges, and had lands granted to him in twenty-one different counties (ib. 1603–6, pp. 113, 269, &c.). On 12 July 1603 he was made clerk of the crown in chancery and clerk of the hanaper, both of which places he surrendered on 20 Jan. 1606, and with Francis Edgeworth had a new grant thereof on 29 Jan. (ib. 1603–6 p. 430, 1606–1608 pp. 81, 387). In 1603 he was receiver of the revenue (ib. 1606–8, p. 54), and in March 1605 deputy vice-treasurer (ib. 1603–1606, p. 429). In May 1607, being then constable of the abbey of Boyle, he commenced to build, along with John Bingley, a massive castle on the river Boyle, and to cultivate much of the surrounding district (ib. 1606–1608, pp. 87, 150, &c.). On 11 May 1609 he was appointed mustermaster-general and clerk of the cheque for Ireland, with a reversionary grant of both offices to his eldest son; in June of the same year he was sworn of the privy council (ib. 1608–10, pp. 202, 218, 507), and on 7 July following he was knighted (Metcalfe, Book of Knights, p. 161). In October 1611 he was a commissioner for compositions; in 1613 was returned M.P. for co. Roscommon by the aid of Vice-president Oliver St. John's soldiery, and in 1614 was appointed to assist in the plantation of Wexford (Cal. State Papers, Irish, 1611–14, pp. 138, 362, 496). On 20 May 1615, when living at Baggotrath, near Dublin, he was appointed one of the council for the province of Munster; and on 9 June following he was authorised, with Sir Thomas Rotherham, to act as governor of Connaught during the absence of the president and vice-president. On 24 Sept. 1616 he was joined in commission with Lord-deputy St. John and others to aid in the settlement of the British ‘undertakers’ in Ulster. On 23 Sept. 1617 he was nominated a commissioner of the court of wards in Ireland, and on 18 Jan. 1621 was made, with Francis Edgeworth, receiver of the fines of that court, and of all other fines upon letters and grants.

By privy seal (8 Aug. 1619) King was appointed a commissioner for the plantation of co. Longford and the territory of Elye O'Carroll in King's County, and on 15 July 1624 was constituted a commissioner, justice, and keeper of the peace in Leinster and Ulster during the absence of Lord-deputy Falkland. By commission dated 9 Dec. 1625 he was authorised, with four others, to examine abuses committed in the army in order to their redress, and to take a general muster of all the forces throughout the kingdom.

King died in the Close at Lichfield, Staffordshire, on 4 Jan. 1636–7, and was buried in the church of Boyle on 30 March following. He married Catherine (d. 1617), daughter of Robert Drury, nephew of Sir William Drury, lord deputy of Ireland. Of his six sons, Sir Robert King (1599?–1657) and Edward King (1612–1637), Milton's friend, are separately noticed. Of three daughters, Mary (d. 1663) married William Caulfeild, second baron Charlemont, and Margaret married Sir Gerard Lowther, chief justice of the common pleas in Ireland.

[Lodge's Peerage of Ireland (Archdall), iii. 223; Cal. State Papers, Irish, 1585–1625; Carew MSS. 1603–24.]

G. G.

Capt William and Blanche Mainwaring King are the parents of 3 sons: John, who married Ann Daniel; Ralph and Thomas. So this John King was not his son. Capt. William King