Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr ( /ˈdɛləwɛər/ ( listen ) DEL-ə-wair; [1] [2] [3] 9 July 1577 – 7 June 1618), was an English merchant and politician, for whom the bay, the river, and, consequently, a Native American people and U.S. state, all later called "Delaware", were named. He was a member of the House of Lords from the death of his father in 1602 until his own death in 1618.
There have been two creations of Baron De La Warr, and West came from the second. He was the son of Thomas West, 2nd Baron De La Warr, of Wherwell Abbey in Hampshire and Anne Knollys, daughter of Catherine Carey, Lady Knollys; making him a great-grandson of Mary Boleyn. He was born at Wherwell, Hampshire, England, and died at sea while travelling from England to the Colony of Virginia. Counting from the original creation of the title, West would be the 12th Baron. [4]
As the eldest son of the 2nd Baron De La Warr, Thomas West received his education at Queen's College, Oxford. He served in the English army under Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, and, in 1601, was charged with supporting Essex's ill-fated insurrection against Queen Elizabeth I, but acquitted of those charges. [5] He succeeded his father as Baron De La Warr in 1602. [6] It was said that he became a member of the Privy Council, but this has been disproved. [7]
Lord De La Warr was the largest investor in the London Company, which received two charters to settle colonists in the New World, and furnished and sent several vessels to accomplish that aim. He was appointed governor-for-life and captain-general of the Colony of Virginia, to replace the governing council of the colony under the presidency of Captain John Smith. [8] Subsequently, in November 1609, the Powhatan tribe of Native Americans killed John Ratcliffe, the Jamestown Colony's Council President, and attacked the colony in what became the First Anglo-Powhatan War. [9] As part of England's response, De La Warr recruited and equipped a contingent of 150 men and outfitted three ships at his own expense, and sailed from England in March 1610. [10]
Lord De La Warr contracted malaria or scurvy in 1611. He left the colony on a ship captained by Sir Samuel Argall headed to the West Indies to recover but was blown off course by a storm and forced to return to England. [11]
Later that year, De La Warr published a book titled The Relation of the Right Honourable the Lord De-La-Warre, Lord Governour and Captaine Generall of the Colonie, planted in Virginea. [12] Although attributed to De La Warr, the book was actually written by company employee Samuel Calvert. [7]
In the Autumn of 1616, Baron De La Warr and his wife Cecilia Shirley West, introduced John Rolfe and his wife, Pocahontas, into English society. The visitors from Virginia were in London to raise funds for the Virginia Company of London and to encourage colonization of Virginia. De La Warr remained the nominal governor, and after receiving complaints from the Virginia settlers about Argall's tyranny in governing them on his behalf, he set sail for Virginia again in 1618 aboard the Neptune to investigate those charges. He died at sea on 7 June [5] [13] and it is believed that he was poisoned. [7]
It was thought for many years that Lord De La Warr had been buried in the Azores or at sea. [5] By 2006, researchers had concluded that his body was brought to Jamestown for burial. In October 2017, archaeologists excavated remains from underneath one of the churches at Historic Jamestowne, but it is not yet known if De La Warr's is one of those. [14]
Lord De La Warr's brother, John West, later became governor of Virginia, and married Anne Percy, daughter of George Percy. [15]
On 25 November 1596, De La Warr married Cecily Shirley (died c. 1662), the daughter of Sir Thomas Shirley of Wiston, Sussex, and his wife Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Kempe. [16] They had children:
Earl De La Warr is a title in the Peerage of Great Britain. It was created in 1761 for John West, 7th Baron De La Warr.
William de Berkeley, 1st Marquess of Berkeley was an English peer, given the epithet "The Waste-All" by the family biographer and steward John Smyth of Nibley. He was buried at "St. Augustine's Friars, London" according to one source, but most likely in the Berkeley family foundation of St Augustine's Abbey, Bristol.
Sir Samuel Argall was an English adventurer and naval officer.
The Honourable George Percy was an English explorer, author, and early Colonial Governor of Virginia.
The Jamestown supply missions were a series of fleets from 1607 to around 1611 that were dispatched from England by the London Company with the specific goal of initially establishing the Company's presence and later specifically maintaining the English settlement of "James Fort" on present-day Jamestown Island. The supply missions also resulted in the colonization of Bermuda as a supply and way-point between the colony and England.
Sir Thomas Dale was an English naval commander and deputy-governor of the Virginia Colony in 1611 and from 1614 to 1616. Governor Dale is best remembered for the energy and the extreme rigour of his administration in Virginia, which established order and in various ways seems to have benefited the colony, although he was criticised for high-handedness. He is also credited with the establishment of Bermuda Hundred, Bermuda Cittie, and the Cittie of Henricus.
William West, 1st Baron De La Warr of the second creation was the elder son of Sir George West (d.1538), second son of Thomas West, 8th Baron De La Warr, by his third wife, Eleanor Copley, and Elizabeth Morton, widow of Robert Walden, and daughter of Sir Robert Morton of Lechlade, Gloucestershire. He was a nephew and adopted heir of his uncle of the half blood, Thomas West, 9th Baron De La Warr, eldest son of the 8th Baron's second wife, Elizabeth Mortimer.
Baron West is a title created in the Peerage of England in 1402. The title has been in abeyance since 1554, although it is possible to argue that it has been merged.
Richard West, 7th Baron De La Warr and 4th Baron West was the son of Reginald West, 6th Baron De La Warr, by his first wife, Margaret Thorley, daughter of Robert Thorley, esquire, of Tybesta, Cornwall, and his first wife, Anne de la Pole, widow of Sir Gerard de Lisle, and daughter of Michael de la Pole, 1st Earl of Suffolk.
Thomas West, 8th Baron De La Warr and 5th Baron West, KB, KG was an English courtier and military commander during the reigns of Henry VII and Henry VIII.
Thomas West, 9th Baron De La Warr and 6th Baron West, KG was the eldest son of Thomas West, 8th Baron De La Warr, by his second wife, Elizabeth Mortimer, daughter of Sir Hugh Mortimer of Martley and Kyre Wyard, Worcestershire, by Eleanor Cornwall, daughter of Sir Edmund Cornwall.
Thomas West, 2nd and 11th Baron De La Warr of Wherwell Abbey, Hampshire, was a member of Elizabeth I's Privy Council.
Sir Thomas Gates (fl.?–1622), was the governor of Jamestown, in the English colony of Virginia. His predecessor, George Percy, through inept leadership, was responsible for the lives lost during the period called the Starving Time. The English-born Gates arrived to find a few surviving starving colonists commanded by Percy, and assumed command. Gates ruled with deputy governor Sir Thomas Dale. Their controlled, strict methods helped the early colonies survive. Sir Thomas was knighted in 1596 by Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex for gallantry at the Capture of Cadiz. His knighthood was later royally confirmed by Queen Elizabeth I.
Francis West was a Deputy Governor of the Colony and Dominion of Virginia.
John West was an early member of the Virginia General Assembly and acting colonial Governor of Virginia from 1635 to 1637, the third West brother to serve as Governor and one of the founders of the West Family of Virginia, which would include many politicians.
Anne West, Lady De La Warr was a lady at the court of Queen Elizabeth I of England.
Mary Somerset, Baroness Grey de Wilton was born in after 1515 to Charles Somerset, 1st Earl of Worcester and his second wife, Elizabeth West, daughter of Thomas West, 8th Baron De La Warr and Elizabeth Mortimer, daughter of Sir Hugh Mortimer.
Thomas Burgh, 3rd Baron Burgh KG 3rd Baron Borough of Gainsborough, de jure7th Baron Strabolgi and 9th Baron Cobham of Sterborough was the son of William Burgh, 2nd Baron Burgh and Lady Katherine Clinton, daughter of Edward Clinton, 1st Earl of Lincoln and Elizabeth Blount, former mistress of King Henry VIII. He was one of the peers who conducted the trial of the Duke of Norfolk in 1572.
Sir John Clinton, 7th Lord Clinton, KB was an English peer. He was also known as John Fiennes.
Anthony Earbury was a minister in late Elizabethan and early Stuart England, who represented puritan interests while remaining within the Anglican ministry. He is notable for his involvement in the puritan group at the Hampton Court Conference and his confrontation with Archbishop Richard Bancroft soon afterwards, and in later life for his resistance to a challenge to his ministry brought on personal grounds by Sir Edward Powell, Master of Requests. Associated with various groups and patrons interested in the emigrant puritan ministry in America, he was prebendary of Wherwell in Hampshire, under the patronage of the Barons De La Warr, and vicar of Westonzoyland, Somerset for most of his career, and is thought to have been a chaplain to George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham.