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(2nd E. Sussex)
Born: ABT 1506/7
Acceded: 1542
Died: 17 Feb 1556/57, Canon Row, Westminster
Buried: 26 Feb 1556, Boreham
Notes: Knight of the Garter. 8° B. Fitzwalter The Complete Peerage vol.V,p.488. /vol. XIIp1,p.520-522.
Father: Robert RADCLIFFE (1° E. Sussex)
Mother: Elizabeth STAFFORD (C. Sussex)
Married 1: Elizabeth HOWARD (C. Sussex) BEF 21 May 1524
Children:
1. Thomas RADCLIFFE (3º E. Sussex)
2. Henry RADCLIFFE (4º E. Sussex)
Married 2: Anne CALTHORPE (C. Sussex) BEF 21 Nov 1538 Divorce 1555
Children:
5. Maud RADCLIFFE
Born about 1506, served Cardinal Wolsey on his embassy to France in 1527 as a gentleman attendant. From 1529 till his father's, Robert Radcliffe, death he was known as Viscount Fitzwalter. He was made K.B. on 30 May 1533, and on 31 May 1536 had the valuable grant of the joint stewardship of the royal estates in Essex. On 26 Nov 1542 he succeeded as second Earl of Sussex, and exercised the family office of lord sewer at the coronation of Edward VI. In command against the Scots, 1547. He was one of the lords and gentlemen who put Somerset in the Tower by the order of the council in Oct 1549.
He declared for Queen Mary, and was captain-general of her forces and privy councillor in 1553, and lord sewer at her coronation. He took part in the trials of Lady Jane Grey and Lord Guilford Dudley, and was made knight of the Garter 1554. In Oct 1556 he was engaged in Norfolk in trying to force the gospellers to go to mass. Execution for debt was stayed against him in the Star-chamber the same month by the Queen's orders.
Created him was a Knight of the Garter on 24 Apr 1554, alongside the later Felipe II of Spain, Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy and William Howard, 1st Baron Howard of Effingham.
He married first, before 21 May 1524, Lady Elizabeth Howard, fifth daughter of Thomas, second duke of Norfolk, and by her had three sons, Thomas and Henry, successively earls of Sussex, and Robert who was killed in Scotland in his father's lifetime.
He married secondly, at some point BEF 21 Nov 1538, Anne, daughter of Sir Phillip Calthorpe of Burnham Thorpe and Jane Blennerhassett. The marriage was stormy, and in his will Henry styled Anne his 'unkind wife'.
Henry and Anne had three childs: Egremont; Maud, who died young; and Frances. It is to the descendants of Frances that the barony of Fitzwalter ultimately descended.
He died on 17 Feb 1556/7 in Cannon Row, London, and was buried at the church of St. Lawrence Pountney. His remains were subsequently removed to the church of Boreham, Essex. His estates passed to Sir William Radcliffe of Ordsall.
The funeral of the Earl of Sussex: "Sir Henry Ratclyff erl of Sussex and vyscount FitzWater, lord Egremont and Burnell, knight of the garter, lieutenaunte of the counties of Norffolk and Sussex, and late countrolor to the king and quenes majesties, dyed at sir Harry Sydney's howsse in Chanon Roo at Westmynster on Wensday the 15. [17] of February in the 3. and 4. yere of king Phelyp and queene Mary, 1556, and was beryed at St. Mary Poultney in London on Saterday the 27. of the same mounth". (MS. Harl. 897, f. 79.) The heralds' account of the ceremony is recorded in Coll. Arm. I. 15, f. 225, and printed in the appendix to Wilson's History of the parish of St. Laurence Pountney, 4to. 1831. That author states, (p. 10,) "In the north aisle of this church, originally parochial, then collegiate as well as parochial, and after the surrender again parochial only, were interred several members of the Radcliffe family, particularly Robert Radcliffe, earl of Sussex, who died 27th Nov. 1542, and Henry Radcliffe his son, who died 17th Feb. 1556-7. But at length the remains of these two earls were removed to Boreham in Essex". At Boreham was erected a sumptuous monument (now in ruins) with effigies of the three earls.
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