Carew, who was
then engaged in prosecuting his claims to his Irish property. Carew held
various posts in that country, and remained there, save for visits to
England and the Low Countries, until 1592, when he entered upon his
duties as Lieutenant-General of the Ordnance, to which office he had
been appointed in 1591. He took part in the expeditions of Essex to
Cadiz in 1596, and to the Azores in 1597, and in 1599 returned to
Ireland as Lord President of Munster, a post he held until 1603. In 1605
he was made Vice-Chamberlain to Queen Anne, and in the same year was
created Baron Carew. Three years later he was made Master of the
Ordnance, and in 1611 he again went to Ireland as 'Sole Commissioner for
the reformation of the army and improvement of his majesties revenew.'
On the 5th of February 1626, Carew, who had been knighted in 1585, was
created Earl of Totnes, and later in the year received the appointment
of 'Treasurer and receaver-general to queene Henriette Marie.'

He died at London on the 27th of March 1629, and was buried in the
Church of Stratford-on-Avon, where a monument was erected to his memory
by his widow, a daughter of William Clopton, of Clopton House, near
Stratford-on-Avon. He left no children by her.

Carew, who was much attached to antiquarian pursuits, maintained a large
correspondence with Camden, Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Robert Cotton, and
Sir Thomas Bodley, and many of his letters have been printed by the
Camden Society. He bequeathed his books and manuscripts, of which he had
acquired a considerable number, to Sir Thomas Stafford, who was said to
be his illegitimate son. They afterwards became the property of
Archbishop Laud, who placed forty-two of the volumes of manuscripts,
which principally relate to Irish history in the time of Queen
Elizabeth, in the Archiepiscopal Library at Lambeth, and four in the
Bodleian Library. Others are preserved in the Department of M., British
Museum, the State Paper Office, and at Hatfield.

SIR ROBERT BRUCE COTTON, BART., 1571-1631

Sir Robert Bruce Cotton, who is styled by Sir Symonds D'Ewes 'England's
Prime Antiquary,' was born in 1571. He was the eldest son of Thomas
Cotton, of Connington, Huntingdonshire, by his first wife, Elizabeth,
daughter of Francis Shirley of Staunton-Harold, Leicestershire. He
received his early education at Westminster School, and in 1581
matriculated at Jesus College, Cambridge, where four years later he
took the degre