WRAY, George (d.1594).

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1558-1603, ed. P.W. Hasler, 1981
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

Family and Education

yr. s. of John Wray (d.1577) of North Russel, Devon, and Trebigh, Cornw. by Blanche, da. of Henry Killigrew of Wolston, Cornw.

Offices Held

With Leicester in the Netherlands 1580s.

Biography

Wray was a soldier from a family of sufficient standing to be on the commission of the peace in Devon and Cornwall. A brother was sheriff of Cornwall 1599-1600. Details of Wray’s career are lacking until 1589, when he returned to England from the Low Countries to sue for a command. In December of that year the Privy Council allowed him to replace a Captain Champernown in command of a company of 150 footmen, because ‘we do have a good report both for his sufficiency for such a charge and also for his care to use the soldiers well’. In 1593 there were the usual difficulties over victualling and pay, the responsible merchants accusing Wray of misappropriation and vice versa. He was in England for the 1593 Parliament, and in May the Privy Council permitted him to extend his stay ‘to deal with the merchants for such moneys as are due to him and his company’. In July his company was transferred to garrison Ostend. He was not personally without money during this period, as he was able to lend £50 towards the ransom of one William Ashenden.

In 1593 Wray was returned for Liskeard with Jonathan Trelawny, who lived near his family’s residence of Trebigh. Wray’s brother, Sir William, became recorder of the borough in James I’s reign. His only occurrence in the records of this Parliament is his appointment on 12 Mar. to a committee concerned with the relief of poor maimed soldiers and mariners. In June the next year he was killed at the seige of Groningen, administration being granted 1 July.

Vivian, Vis. Cornw. 564; PCC 12 Daughtry; CSP For. 1589 (Jan.-Jul.), 51, 396; 1589-90, pp. 114, 135, 136, 137, 144, 171, 178; CSP Dom. 1591-4, p. 340; APC, xviii. 252, 253; xxiv. 233, 423; HMC Hatfield, iv. 293, 295; xiii. 499; D’Ewes, 499; J. Allen, Hist. Liskeard, 237; Lansd. 79, f. 37; C. Markham, The Fighting Veres, 194; PCC admon. act bk. 1594, f. 104.

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: Irene Cassidy

Notes