Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 61.djvu/420

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drew Edmunds of Cressing Temple, Essex. She died on 25 Oct. 1556, and was buried on 4 Nov. at Ricot, Oxfordshire (Machyn, pp. 118, 354). Williams married, secondly, Margaret, daughter of Thomas, first baron Wentworth [q. v.]; he left no issue by her, and she married, secondly, on 10 Oct. 1560, Sir William Drury [q. v.], and, thirdly, Sir James Crofts; she survived until 1588 (see Acts P. C. vols. xv–xvii. passim). By his first wife Williams had issue three sons: John, who died unmarried, and was buried at St. Alphege, London Wall, on 18 Feb. 1558–9, his funeral sermon being preached by John Véron [q. v.]; Henry, who married Anne, daughter of Henry Stafford, first baron Stafford [q. v.], but died without issue on 20 Aug. 1551; and Francis, who died unmarried. The barony thus became extinct, if it was created by patent; if it was created by writ, it fell into abeyance between his two daughters, Isabel (who married Richard Wenman, great-grandfather of Thomas, second viscount Wenman [q. v.]) and Margaret (who married Sir Henry Norris, afterwards Baron Norris of Rycote [q. v.]).

[Cal. Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, ed. Brewer and Gairdner, vols. iv–xvi. passim; State Papers, Henry VIII, 11 vols.; Cal. State Papers Dom. 1547–80, and Addenda 1547–65; Acts of the Privy Council, ed. Dasent, vols. i–viii.; Hatfield MSS. i. 454; Lit. Rem. of Edward VI (Roxburghe Club); Machyn's Diary; Wriothesley's Chron., Chron. Queen Jane and Queen Mary, and Narr. of the Reformation (Camden Soc.); Strype's Works (general index); Gough's Index to Parker Soc. Publ.; Burnet's Hist. of the Reformation, ed. Pocock, passim; Foxe's Actes and Mon. ed. Townsend; Carlisle's Endowed Grammar Schools ii. 312–15; Off. Return Members of Parliament; F. G. Lee's Hist. of Thame, 1883; Davenport's Lord Lieutenants and High Sheriffs of Oxfordshire, p. 37; Lists of Sheriffs, 1898; G. E. C[okayne]'s Complete Peerage, viii. 140–1.]

A. F. P.

WILLIAMS, JOHN (1582–1650), archbishop of York, came of an ancient Welsh family, the elder branch of which is now represented by Sir Richard Henry Williams-Bulkeley, bart., of Penrhyn, Carnarvonshire (Burke, Peerage). He was the second child of Edmund Williams of Conway, and of his wife Mary, daughter of Owen Wynne of Eglws Bach. He is said to have been born on 25 March, and was certainly baptised on 27 March 1582. He was educated at the grammar school at Ruthin (Beedham, Notices of Archbishop Williams, pp. 3, 4), whence he was transferred to St. John's College, Cambridge, in 1598 (Baker, Hist. of the College of St. John the Evangelist, ed. Mayor, p. 261). Before long he gave offence to the puritans by upholding the discipline and ceremonies of the church, while he gave equal offence to their opponents by attending the sermons of the puritan William Perkins [q. v.] at St. Mary's. This attitude of aloofness from extreme parties was characteristic of him during the whole of his life.

Williams in 1601 took the degree of B.A., and on 14 April 1603 was admitted to a fellowship in his college. He took his degree of M.A. in 1605. He must have been ordained not later than that year, in spite of Hacket's (Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 18) statement that his ordination took place in the twenty-seventh year of his life—that is to say 1608–9—as on 17 Oct. 1605 he was instituted to Honington, a poor living in Suffolk, on the king's presentation (Beedham, pp. 9, 10). James had no doubt been informed of Williams's character, so suitable to his own, and his reputation as a preacher led in 1610 to his being invited to preach before the king. Being in this way brought to the notice of Chancellor Ellesmere, he was offered a chaplaincy in his household. Williams, however, asked that this appointment might be postponed till after he had fulfilled his obligations to his university as proctor in 1611–12, and his request was promptly conceded. Already, in 1610, Archbishop Bancroft had conferred upon him the archdeaconry of Cardigan (Beedham, p. 10), and on 3 Nov. 1611 he obtained the rectory of Grafton Underwood on the king's presentation upon his surrender of Honington. There seems to have been some informality in the grant, as on 10 July 1612 he was presented a second time to the same living by the Earl of Worcester (ib. pp. 11, 17). In the latter year, as soon as his duties as proctor came to an end, he entered Ellesmere's household. The stream of his promotion did not slacken, and on 5 July in that year he became a prebendary of Hereford (ib. p. 11). In 1613 he graduated B.D., and on 10 Oct. he was installed in the prebend of Laffard in Lincoln Cathedral, holding it in addition to that at Hereford. On 29 Dec. 1613 he was installed precentor of Lincoln Cathedral, the prebend of Kilsby being annexed to the office. On the same day, having relinquished the prebend of Laffard, he was also installed in that of Asgarby in the same cathedral (Le Neve, Fasti Eccl. ed. Hardy, ii. 86, 103, 162). On 4 May 1614 he was instituted to the rectory of Walgrave on the presentation of Richard Neile [q. v.], then bishop of Lincoln, holding it in conjunction with his other living of Grafton Underwood. On 15 June 1616 he