The Walsingham years

The Walsingham family may have originated in Little Walsingham in Norfolk. Thomas Walsingham (d.1457) was a vintner in the City of London. He owned a house at St. Katherine's by the Tower and may well have used that as his primary residence. How much time he spent at Scadbury is unclear but his will of 1456 mentions “Sr Thomas Sutton my prest atte Scatbury”, which seems to show that there was a chapel there. Thomas and his wife were buried at a church at St. Katherine's which was demolished when the London docks were being excavated.

The manor was inherited in 1459 by Thomas's son, Thomas II (d.1467), and then by his son James (1462-1540), who was Sheriff of Kent in 1497 and accompanied King Henry VIII to the Field of the Cloth of Gold (about 11 km from Calais, between Guînes and Ardres), where the King and Francis I of France met to arrange an alliance against Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire in 1520. James and his wife, Eleanor Writtle, had unusually long lives for the time, celebrating their diamond wedding.

James's son Sir Edmund Walsingham (c.1480-1550) was knighted in 1513 for his part in the battle of Flodden. Sir Edmund became Lieutenant of the Tower of London in 1540, and had custody of many of the prisoners of Henry VIII including Sir Thomas More, and Anne Boleyn. It was to Sir Edmund that Sir Thomas More addressed the well-known words, "I pray you, Master Lieutenant, see me safe up, and for my coming down let me shift for myself" when preparing to mount the scaffold for his execution. He was succeeded by his son Thomas III (1526-1583/4), who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth I at Rye in 1573 and held the post of Sheriff of Kent. He married Dorothy Guildford about 1555. After his death in 1584 the Scadbury estate passed firstly to his son Edmund, who died unmarried in November 1589 and then to a younger son Thomas IV.

One of Thomas III’s daughters married Sir Thomas Pelham and the Townshends are descended from them.
His cousin Sir Francis Walsingham was born at Scadbury in c.1532 but did not live there. He went on to become Elizabeth I’s Secretary of State. He became involved in gathering intelligence from abroad and built up a spy network which had agents in several foreign courts.

Sir Thomas Walsingham IV was visited twice at Scadbury by Queen Elizabeth I, the second time being in 1597. This is the visit commemorated on the Chislehurst village sign. He purchased the Royal Manor of Dartford in 1611 and sold most of it except the Chislehurst Manor. He was the patron of playwright Christopher Marlowe. Following his death in 1630, Scadbury passed to his son Sir Thomas V.

Thomas Walsingham V was the last of the Walsinghams to be Lord of the Manor of Scadbury, and lived through the Civil War and into the Commonwealth. He was knighted by James I at the age of 13. During the Civil War he showed an ability to keep on the winning side. He held the post of Vice-Admiral of Kent for 25 years from 1627. He not only retained the post during the Commonwealth but was appointed Militia Commissioner for Kent as well.
In a letter to Sir Thomas Pelham he relates how he ‘killed a buck which ran seven miles on end, and so ended the best sport in the world with a lean deer,’ which gives an idea of the open nature of the countryside around Scadbury.
Sir Thomas Walsingham V retired to Saffron Walden and on his death in 1669 was buried in St Nicholas’ Church, Chislehurst, the last of the Walsinghams to be laid in the family vault there.