on 5 January 1578. They were also at Kirtling on 3 December 1577, Saffron Walden in 1577-8, Ipswich on 24 October 1577, in 1578-9, and perhaps on 8 October 1581, Bristol, where they gave The Queen of Ethiopia, between 31 August and 6 September 1578, Nottingham on 19 December 1578, and Bath and Coventry in 1578-9.
Howard again had players at Court, after he became Admiral in 1585. The first record of them is at Dover in June 1585. Later in the year they were playing in conjunction with the Lord Chamberlain's (Lord Hunsdon's). 'The Lorde Chamberlens and the Lord Admirall's players' were rewarded at Leicester in October-December 1585, and 'the servants of the lo: admirall and the lo: Chamberlaine' for a play at Court on 6 January 1586.[1] During the same Christmas, however, the Admiral's played alone on 27 December 1585, and as Hunsdon's survived in the provinces, the two organizations may have been amalgamated for one performance only. The Admiral's were at Coventry, Faversham, Ipswich, and Leicester in 1585-6. They were reported to Walsingham amongst other London companies on 25 January 1587 (App. D, No. lxxviii), although they did not appear at Court during this winter. In 1586-7 they were at Cambridge, Coventry, Bath, York, Norwich, Ipswich, Exeter, Southampton, and Leicester. By November they were back in London, and on the 16th an accident at their theatre is thus related by Philip Gawdy to his father:[2]
'Yow shall vnderstande of some accydentall newes heare in this
towne thoughe my self no wyttnesse thereof, yet I may be bold to
veryfye it for an assured troth. My L. Admyrall his men and players
having a devyse in ther playe to tye one of their fellowes to a poste
and so to shoote him to deathe, having borrowed their callyvers one
of the players handes swerved his peece being charged with bullett
missed the fellowe he aymed at and killed a chyld, and a woman great
with chyld forthwith, and hurt an other man in the head very soore.
How they will answere it I do not study vnlesse their profession were
better, but in chrystyanity I am very sorry for the chaunce but God
his iudgementes ar not to be searched nor enquired of at mannes
handes. And yet I fynde by this an old proverbe veryfyed ther never
comes more hurte than commes of fooling.'
Possibly the company went into retirement as a result of
this disaster; at any rate nothing more is heard of them
