304
THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
guardians, and had been a Court favourite of Henry VIII, and his executor.
He was the son of Edmund Denny, of Cheshunt, and was born in 1500,
knighted by Henry VIII, and made a Privy Councillor, Chief Gentleman
of the Privy Chamber and Groom of the Stole ; Fuller tells us that "alone
of all the Courtiers Sir Anthony Denny was bold and faithful enough to-
acquaint King Henry truly with his dying condition, to dispose his soul
for another world." So great a favourite was he that he performed this
duty with impunity, and the King presented him with a magnificent pair
of gloves worked in pearls. His learning and virtues are recorded in the
verse of Surrey and the Latin prose of Roger Ascham, schoolmaster to
Queen Elizabeth. In an epitaph preserved in the Harleian MSS. in the
British Museum he is described as :—
Maecenas to the learned, an anchor to relygion,
To these an open haven that were for Christe opprest."
He married Joan, daughter of Sir Philip Champernoun, of Modbury, in
Devonshire, "a lady of ancient lineage and great piety" as Lodge describes
her in his Biographies of Royal and Illustrious Personages. She was the
aunt of Sir Walter Raleigh and Sir Humphrey Gilbert. Sir Anthony
died at Cheshunt 10th September, 1549, being succeeded by his eldest
son Henry, who died 24th March, 1573-4. Robert, his eldest son, nine
years old at the time of his father's death, only lived a further two years,
when the estates came to his brother Edward, who was born 14th August,
1569, knighted in 1589, and in his capacity of High Sheriff of Hertfordshire
met James I. on his journey from Scotland to London to occupy the
throne of the joint kingdoms, with 140 men, as Stow says, "In blue livery
coats and white doublets, hats and feathers, and all well mounted on
horses with red saddles," and made him a present of a fine horse with rich
accoutrements. On the 27th October, 1604, he was summoned to Parlia-
ment by the title of Baron Denny of Waltham, and advanced by patent
of 24th October, 1626 to the degree of Earl of Norwich. He died 24th
October, 1637, leaving by his wife Mary, daughter of Thomas, 1st Earl of
Exeter, a daughter, Honora, who married, 6th Jan., 1604, James, 1st Earl
of Carlisle, and died 1614, when the estates were inherited by her son,
who, dying in 1660, by his will, dated 8th March, 1660, appointed William
Earl of Bedford and others as trustees for the sale of the manors of Seward-
stone and Woodredon. Thomas Reeve, then incumbent of Waltham
Abbey, preached his funeral sermon, which was subsequently published in
London under the title of "A Cedars Sad and Solemn Fall. Delivered in
a sermon at the Parish Church of Waltham Abbey in Essex. At the
Funeral of James, late Earl of Carlisle."
It is Sir Anthony Denny's fifth and youngest son, Sir Edward Denny,
who is buried in Waltham Abbey, where his tomb may still be seen. He
was never Lord of the Manor of Sewardstone, but having, with his cousins
Raleigh and Gilbert, served against the rebel Earl of Desmond, the Irish
and the Spaniards, as Fuller says, "was dubbed a Knight Banneret on the
field of battle and by God's favour, Queen Elizabeth's bounty and his own.
valour, achieved a fair estate in the County of Kerry in Ireland at this
day enjoyed by his descendants." This fair estate consisted of 6,000
acres of Desmond's forfeited land, including the Earl's chief castle of
Tralee.