John Russell, 1st Earl of Bedford

John Russell, 1st Earl of Bedford (drawing by Hans Holbein the Younger )

John Russell, 1st Earl of Bedford , KG , PC (* 1485 in Kingston Russell , Dorset , England ; † March 14, 1555 in Russell House, Strand , London , England) was an English statesman who was a member of the lower House ( House of Commons ) was and 1542-1555 Lord Privy Seal (Lord Privy Seal) , and between 1552 and his death in 1555 Lord Lieutenant of Devon , Cornwall , Somerset and Dorset was. On March 9, 1539 he was raised to Baron Russell and January 19, 1550 to the 1st Earl of Bedford .

Life

Offices at the court of Henry VII and Henry VIII.

Russell, son of James Russell and Alice Wyse, entered the service of Philip I , King of Castile , and his wife Joan of Castile in January 1506 after she was shipwrecked off Weymouth and accompanied them to the royal court of Henry VII. , King of England . In the following year he became chamberlain to King Henry VII and took over this office under his successor Henry VIII , who became King of England on April 21, 1509 after the death of his father. In 1513 he accompanied King Henry VIII on his campaign against France during the conquest of Thérouanne and Tournai .

After Russell in the conquest of Morlaix in Brittany had lost by an arrow his right eye, he was born on July 2, 1522 by Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey for Knights defeated. In 1523 he became Knight Marshal and thus representative of Earl Marshal Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk , the father of the Earl of Surrey. On February 23 and 24, 1525 he was an observer of the Battle of Pavia , a battle in the context of the Italian wars for hegemony in Europe between the Habsburgs under Charles V and the Valois under Francis I of France . In 1528 he became both sheriff of Somerset and Dorset.

Member of the House of Commons and promotion to baron

Coat of arms of John Russell, 1st Earl of Bedford, as Knight of the Garter

In 1529 Russell became a member of the House of Commons and represented the interests of Buckinghamshire in this until 1536 . As the successor to William Paulet he was in 1537 Examiner of the Royal Household (Comptroller of the Household) and held this post until his replacement by William Kingston on March 9, 1539. In addition, he became in 1538 a member of the Secret Privy Council ( Privy Council ) appointed.

In 1539 he was awarded a property in Amersham , owned by Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham , who was sentenced to death for a conflict with the king, beheaded on Tower Hill on May 17, 1521 and on July 31 1523 was declared dishonorable by a parliamentary resolution.

By a letters patent dated March 9, 1539 Russell was raised to the hereditary nobility of the Peerage of England as 1st Baron Russell . Six weeks later, on April 24, 1539, he was also knight of the Order of the Garter (KG), the most exclusive order in the United Kingdom and one of the most respected in Europe. In July 1539 he also succeeded Henry Courtenay, 1st Marquess of Exeter as Lord Warden of the Stannaries and thus exercised legal and military functions in Cornwall until his replacement by his son Francis Russell in 1553 . At the same time he took over the position of High Steward of Cornwall in July 1539 .

After the dissolution of the monasteries . By King Henry VIII Baron Russell received for himself and his heirs in addition to the Cistercian - Abbey in Dunkeswell , the abbey in Tavistock and the lands of the place to which more than thirty farms and several church patronage belonged. In addition, further property in Devon, Cornwall, Somerset and Dorset fell to him, as well as parts of the also dissolved Abbey of St Albans .

Great Officer of State and Elevation to Earl

John Russell, 1st Earl of Bedford

In 1540 Russell took over from William Fitzwilliam, 1st Earl of Southampton, the office of Lord High Admiral and thus for the first time one of the nine offices of the Great Officers of State . He remained in this post until 1542 and was then replaced by Edward Seymour .

He then took over as successor to William Fitzwilliam, 1st Earl of Southampton, the function as in October 1542 Lord Privy Seal (Lord Privy Seal) , and practiced this with only brief interruptions until his death in 1555 - was succeeded by William Paget . In addition, between 1543 and his death he also acted as high steward of the University of Oxford and was thus representative of the university's chancellor . During the fourth Italian war in 1544 he carried out an unsuccessful siege of Montreuil . In 1545 he was captain general of the vanguard during the attack on Boulogne-sur-Mer . After the death of King Henry VIII on January 28, 1547, he was one of his executors.

Russell acted as Lord High Steward at the coronation of his successor King Edward VI in 1547 . From this additional land, he was awarded as the seat of the Preceptor of the Sovereign Order of Malta in Mitchelburn, the Cistercian Abbey Woburn , the Benedictines - Abbey Thorney and the Dominicans - Priory in Exter . On August 4, 1549 he was in command of the royal troops at the Battle of Woodbury Common .

Baron Russell was promoted to 1st Earl of Bedford by letters patent dated January 19, 1550 . Most recently, in 1552, he took over the functions of Lord Lieutenant in the counties of Devon , Cornwall , Somerset and Dorset and exercised them until his death. John Bourchier, 2nd Earl of Bath, succeeded him as Lord Lieutenant of Cornwall, Devon and Dorset . On May 4, 1552, he was awarded Long Acre in Middlesex , seven acres of land previously owned by Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset , who on October 16, 1551 at the instigation of John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland was arrested for treason and beheaded on January 22, 1552 on Tower Hill . Covent Garden was born from this property .

Marriage and offspring

Chenies Manor , the residence of John Russell built in 1460

Russell married Anne Broughton in 1526, whose first husband John Broughton had died in 1518 and whose second husband Sir Richard Jerningham had died in 1526. She was the daughter of Sir Guy Sapcote and his wife Margaret Wolston. Through this marriage, the estate of Chenies Manor House, inherited from Sir John Cheyne in 1460, became his property.

From this marriage his only son Francis Russell emerged, who was his successor as Lord Warden of the Stannaries in 1553 and after his death inherited the title of 2nd Earl of Bedford and the subordinate title of 2nd Baron Russell.

Web links

• Entry in Cracroft's Peerage
• Entry in Leigh Rayment Peerage
• John Russell, 1st Earl of Bedford, on thepeerage.com , accessed October 9, 2016.

predecessor	Office	successor
New title created	Earl of Bedford 1550-1555	Francis Russell
New title created	Baron Russell 1539-1555	Francis Russell