Sir George Peckham (died 1608) was an English merchant venturer.
He was third son of Sir Edmund Peckham. George succeeded to the paternal estate at Denham, and was knighted in 1570.
In 1572 he was appointed High Sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire. In 1574 he, together with Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Sir Richard Grenville, and Christopher Carleill, petitioned the queen to allow them an expedition into unknown lands. In the enterprise, which finally took form in 1583, Peckham alongside Thomas Gerard was the chief adventurer, Gilbert assigning to him large grants of land and liberty of trade. In November 1583 he published A True Reporte. [1] [2] A major factor behind this plan was to allow Catholics to emigrate following the increase of fines imposed on those who failed to attend Anglican services in 1581. [3]
Whether by unsuccessful ventures or otherwise, he afterwards became embarrassed in his circumstances, and in 1595 the estate and manor of Denham came to the queen by reason of his debt to the crown. They were conferred on William Bowyer. He[ clarification needed ] died in 1608. He married, in 1554, Susan, daughter and heiress of Henry Webbe. She died in childbed, at the age of seventeen, on 11 December 1555. By a second wife two sons are mentioned: Edmund the elder, who would seem to have predeceased him; and George, who was his heir.
Sir Walter Raleigh was an English statesman, soldier, writer and explorer. One of the most notable figures of the Elizabethan era, he played a leading part in English colonisation of North America, suppressed rebellion in Ireland, helped defend England against the Spanish Armada and held political positions under Elizabeth I.
Sir Francis Walsingham was principal secretary to Queen Elizabeth I of England from 20 December 1573 until his death and is popularly remembered as her "spymaster".
Sir Humphrey Gilbert was an English adventurer, explorer, member of parliament and soldier who served during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I and was a pioneer of the English colonial empire in North America and the Plantations of Ireland. He was a maternal half-brother of Sir Walter Raleigh and a cousin of Sir Richard Grenville.
Richard Hakluyt was an English writer. He is known for promoting the English colonization of North America through his works, notably Divers Voyages Touching the Discoverie of America (1582) and The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation (1589–1600).
Sir Richard Grenville, also spelt Greynvile, Greeneville, and Greenfield, was an English privateer and explorer. Grenville was lord of the manors of Stowe, Cornwall and Bideford, Devon. He subsequently participated in the plantations of Ireland, the English colonisation of the Americas and the repulse of the Spanish Armada.
The Muscovy Company was an English trading company chartered in 1555. It was the first major chartered joint stock company, the precursor of the type of business that would soon flourish in England and finance its exploration of the world. The Muscovy Company had a monopoly on trade between England and Muscovy until 1698 and it survived as a trading company until the Russian Revolution of 1917. Since 1917 the company has operated as a charity, now working within Russia.
Sir Hugh Willoughby was an English soldier and an early Arctic voyager. He served in the court of Henry VIII and fought in the Scottish campaign where he was knighted for his valour. In 1553, he was selected by a company of London merchants to lead a fleet of three vessels in search of a Northeast Passage.
The Company of Merchant Adventurers to New Lands was an early joint stock association, which began with private exploration and enterprise, and was to have been incorporated by King Edward VI in 1553, but received its full royal charter in 1555. It led to the commencement of English trade with Russia, Persia and elsewhere, and became known informally, and later formally, as the Muscovy Company.
The historical record in North America begins in the second half of the 16th century, with ongoing European exploration.
Events from the 1580s in England.
Ralph Kettell (1563–1643) was an English college head, the third President of Trinity College, Oxford. In a long tenure he built up the college both in terms of architecture and its academic reputation.
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Thomas Lancaster was an English Protestant clergyman, Church of Ireland Archbishop of Armagh from 1568.
Sir William Pelham was an English soldier and Lord Justice of Ireland, which was a military and political role rather than a judicial one.
Sir James Stewart, 1st Baronet was a Scottish lawyer and politician.
Sir Henry Lee KG, of Ditchley, was Queen's Champion and Master of the Armouries under Queen Elizabeth I of England.
Sir William Chester was one of the leading English Merchants of the Staple and Merchant Adventurers of the mid-16th century, five times Master of the Worshipful Company of Drapers, Lord Mayor of London in the year 1560–61 and Member of Parliament for the City of London. He should not be confused with his contemporary, William Chester, merchant of Bristol, M.P.
Sir Edward Lewknor or Lewkenor was a prominent member of the puritan gentry in East Anglia in the later Elizabethan period, and an important voice on religious matters in the English Parliament.
Sir Leonard Chamberlain or Chamberlayne was an English soldier and politician, the Governor of Guernsey from 1553.
Edward Lewknor was the representative of a branch of a prominent Sussex family, in an armigerous line descending in the distaff side from the Camoys barony. Having attained standing as a member of parliament and by a position of service in the royal household, his career was ended abruptly by his involvement in Henry Dudley's conspiracy against Queen Mary I, and his consequent attainder. His children were restored in blood by Queen Elizabeth I.