about 1559, and at an early age succeeded, on his father's death, to extensive landed estates. While travelling with the royal license on the continent he was reconciled to the catholic church by Father Robert Parsons at Rome in 1579. On his return to London he, in conjunction with Thomas Pound of Belmont, formed a 'Catholic Association,' consisting of young men of birth and property without the incumbrance of wives or offices. They promised 'to content themselves with food and clothing and the bare necessities of their state, and to bestow all the rest for the good of the catholic cause.' The association was solemnly blessed by Pope Gregory XIII on 14 April 1580. Its members lodged together in the house of Norris, the chief pursuivant, in Fetter or Chancery Lane. Norris had great credit with Aylmer, bishop of London, and was liberally paid by Gilbert. At Fulham the bishop's son-in-law, Dr. Adam Squire, was in Gilbert's pay. Through the connivance of these men the members of the association were able to receive priests and to have masses celebrated daily in their house until, after the arrival of the Jesuits Parsons and Campion in England, the persecution grew more severe. In 1581 Gilbert deemed it prudent to withdraw to the English College at Rheims, where he was cordially welcomed by Dr. William Allen, who described him as 'summus patrum presbyterorum patronus' Proceeding afterwards to Rome, he entered the English College as a pensioner, and devoted himself to promoting the catholic cause in England. Gregory XIII frequently consulted him on a matter of high importance that necessitated his going to France. Gilbert was so eager about his preparations for departure that he was seized with a fever, which terminated fatally on 6 Oct. 1583. While on his deathbed he was admitted into the Society of Jesus. The pope declared that his death would be a serious blow to Catholicism in England.
Gilbert incurred great expense by covering the walls of the English College at Rome with frescoes of the English martyrs. He left the superintendence of this work to Father William Good [q. v.], who had the pictures engraved and published, under the title of 'Ecclesiae Anglicanae Trophaea,' Rome, 1584, fol.
Gilbert's portrait has been engraved by W. P. Kiliam, from a drawing by J. G. Hemsch.
[Foley's Records, iii. 658–701; More's Hist. Missionis Anglicanæ Soc. Jesu, p. 83; Oliver's Jesuit Collections, p. 104; Simpson's Life of Campion, p. 123; Tanner's Societas Jesu Apostolorum Imitatrix, p. 180.]
GILBERT, Sir HUMPHREY (1539?–1583), navigator, was the second son of Otho Gilbert of Compton, near Dartmouth. Sir Walter Raleigh was his step-brother by the second marriage of his mother, Catharine, daughter of Sir Philip Champernowne. He was educated at Eton and Oxford, and devoted himself to the study of navigation and the art of war. His first public service appears to have been under Ambrose Dudley [q. v.], earl of Warwick, at Havre in Normandy, where he was wounded in fighting against the French catholics, 26 Sept. 1563 (Stow, p. 654; Cotton. MS. Aug. I. ii. 78 a). In July 1566 he served as captain under Sir Henry Sidney in Ireland, and in the ensuing autumn took part in the operations against Shane O'Neil. In November, being sent home with despatches by the lord deputy Sidney, he took the opportunity of presenting to the queen a petition for privileges 'concerning the discoueringe of a passage by the North [west] to go to Cataia,' as an alternative to an earlier one presented by Anthony Jenkinson and himself in the previous April for discovery by the North-east (Morgan and Coote, ii. 177-9). The queen found other employment for both petitioners. Early in 1567 Gilbert was sent back to Ireland in order to assist Sidney in establishing an imported colony of West of England men near Lough Foyle in Ulster, with Gilbert for president. The undertaking failed, however, and Gilbert returned once more to soldiering.
Sent back to England in the summer of 1568, Gilbert there fell dangerously ill. The queen told Sidney that he was to have his full pay during his absence, and promotion on his return to Ireland. In October 1569, after defeating the celebrated McCarthy More, Gilbert was placed in entire charge of the province of Munster, where he had to keep the Irish chieftain and his followers in subjection. In December he wrote to the lord deputy saying that he was determined to have neither parley nor peace with any rebel, as he was convinced that no conquered nation could be ruled with gentleness. Thereupon Sidney knighted him at Drogheda, 1 Jan. 1570. Shortly afterwards Gilbert returned to England and married Anne, daughter of Sir Anthony Ager of Kent, by whom he had five sons and one daughter. In 1571 he was returned as M.P. for Plymouth. While in parliament he was' sharply rebuked by Peter Wentworth for 'untruly informing her majesty of a motion made in the house on the queen's prerogatiue,' and was called 'a flatterer, a lyer, and a naughtie man,' and when he would have spoken in self-defence, 'had the denial of the
