Cooke, Sir Knight of the Shire for Essex in Parliament Anthony

Cooke, Sir Knight of the Shire for Essex in Parliament Anthony

Male 1504 - 1576  (72 years)


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  • Name Cooke, Anthony 
    Title Sir Knight of the Shire for Essex in Parliament 
    Birth May 1504  Gidea Hall, Romford, Essex, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening 1505  Gidea Hall, Romford, Essex, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    Name The Scholar 
    Occupation Sheriff of Hertford 
    Occupation 1545 
    High Sheriff of Essex 
    Occupation 8 Nov 1547 
    Member of Parliament for Lewes 
    Occupation 1573 
    Custos Rotulorum of Essex 
    Will 22 May 1576 
    _AMTID 122722690815:1030:207924248 
    _COLOR 21 
    _COLOR1 27 
    _FSFTID LZVT-6FJ 
    _UID 6E954B88620E473282AF4133C8F25280F0CF 
    Death 10 Jun 1576  St Gregory by St Paul, London, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Burial 21 Jun 1576  St Edward the Confessor, Romford, Essex, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Person ID I2215  Charles Banks and Jon Ray Family Tree
    Last Modified 8 Aug 2025 

    Father Cooke, Sir John,   b. Apr 1473, Gidea Hall, Romford, Essex, England Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 10 Oct 1516, London, Middlesex, England Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 43 years) 
    Mother Cooke, Gourney,   b. 1475, Braintree, Essex, England Find all individuals with events at this locationd. Apr 1536, Cold Norton, Essex, England Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 61 years) 
    Marriage 1500  Burnham, Essex, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Family ID F228  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  • Event Map
    Link to Google MapsBirth - May 1504 - Gidea Hall, Romford, Essex, England Link to Google Earth
    Link to Google MapsChristening - 1505 - Gidea Hall, Romford, Essex, England Link to Google Earth
    Link to Google MapsDeath - 10 Jun 1576 - St Gregory by St Paul, London, England Link to Google Earth
    Link to Google MapsBurial - 21 Jun 1576 - St Edward the Confessor, Romford, Essex, England Link to Google Earth
     = Link to Google Earth 

  • Notes 
    • His Daughters are: Mildred, Anne, Elizabeth, Margaret and Catherine. Thre is no Alice
      Not the Father of Mr. John Carewe Cook

      Visitation of Essex 1552: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.32044024284549&view=2up&seq=62&q1=cook
      Anthony Cooke
      From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

      Sir Anthony Cooke [1] (1504 - 11 June 1576) was an eminent English humanist scholar. He was the tutor to Edward VI.

      Contents
      1 Family
      2 Career
      3 Marriage and issue
      4 Notes
      5 References
      6 Sources
      Family
      Anthony Cooke was the only son of John Cooke (died 10 October 1515), esquire, of Gidea Hall, Essex, and Alice Saunders (died 1510), daughter and coheiress of William Saunders of Banbury, Oxfordshire by Jane Spencer, daughter of John Spencer, esquire, of Hodnell, Warwickshire.[1][2] His paternal grandparents were Sir Philip Cooke (died 7 December 1503) and Elizabeth Belknap (died c. 6 March 1504).[3] His paternal great-grandparents were Sir Thomas Cooke, a wealthy member of the Worshipful Company of Drapers and Lord Mayor of London in 1462-3, and Elizabeth Malpas, daughter of Philip Malpas, Master of the Worshipful Company of Drapers and Sheriff of London.[1][3]

      Career
      Cooke served as High Sheriff of Essex in 1545.

      He was never officially described as tutor to Edward VI. It is now thought he may have been more a companion and guide than a formal teacher. However, in 1555 Caelius Secundus Curio, in his dedication letter to Cooke of Sir John Cheke's De Pronuntiatione Graecae, wrote that "the boyhood of King Edward was handed over and entrusted to the two of you for instruction in letters, behaviour and religion... from you that divine boy drank in that learning, than which not Cyrus, nor Achilles, nor Alexander, nor any king ever received more wholesome and sacred."[4] Peter Martyr, in dedicating to Cooke his Commentaries on St Paul's Epistle to the Romans (published 1558), wrote: "I for my part doubtles have, ever since that the time that I dwelt in England, borne a singular love and no smal or vulgar affection towards you, both for your singular piety and learning, and also for the worthy office which you faythfully and with great renoune executed in the Christian publike wealth, in instructing Edward, that most holy King..."[5]

      Of his preceptors, Edward is reputed to have said,

      "Randolph the German spoke honestly, Sir John Cheke talked merrily, Dr. Coxe solidly, and Sir Anthony Cooke weighingly."[6]

      At Edward's coronation Cooke was created a Knight of the Bath. On 8 November 1547 he was returned to Parliament for Lewes, and in the same year was one of the visitors commissioned by the crown to inspect the dioceses of London, Westminster, Norwich, and Ely; the injunctions drawn up by him and his companions are printed in John Foxe's Acts and Monuments. Two years later he served on two ecclesiastical commissions, of Protestant tendencies. In November and December 1551 he attended the discussion held between Roman Catholics and Protestants at the houses of Sir William Cecil and Sir Richard Moryson, and his public services were rewarded (27 October 1552) with a grant of land. On 27 July 1553 he was committed to the Tower of London on suspicion of complicity in Lady Jane Grey's movement.[7]

      After his release he went into self-imposed exile to avoid Mary's attempt to reintroduce Catholicism. He travelled widely, spending most time in Strasbourg where he was in contact with leaders of the Reformed faith, and returned following the death of Mary and the accession of Elizabeth I in 1558.[7]

      Memorial to Cooke at the Church of St Edward the Confessor, in Romford
      Cooke then served on several religious commissions, and sat as a knight of the shire for Essex in parliament in 1559 and again in 1563; but he took little or no further part in national affairs. He was appointed Custos Rotulorum for Essex in 1572, but the work resulting from this post was performed by his steward, Francis Ram.[8] He died on 11 June 1576, aged seventy-two, and was buried in St Andrew's, Romford. There is an elaborate memorial to him in St Edward the Confessor Church, Romford.[9] This notes his "exceptional learning, prudence and piety”.[10] However, Marjorie McIntosh describes him as “a strong protestant of a dark and unforgiving colour”.[11]

      He was one of the co-owners of Burton Dassett in Warwickshire and conducted a lengthy, but ultimately unsuccessful legal campaign to block the sale of part of the estate to Peter Temple.[12]

      Cooke is particularly remembered because he educated his daughters, who were taught both Latin and Greek. Anne published translations from Italian and Latin and Elizabeth a translation of a Latin treatise on the sacrament.[7]

      Marriage and issue
      Cooke married Anne Fitzwilliam, the daughter of Sir William Fitzwilliam, Master of the Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors and Sheriff of London, by his first wife, Anne Hawes, daughter of Sir John Hawes, by whom he had four sons and five daughters:[3][13]

      Anthony Cooke (c. 1535 - 1604).
      Sir Richard Cooke, who married Anne Caunton.[14]
      Edward Cooke (1557-1584), father of Francis Cooke, a Mayflower passenger and an original settler of Plymouth Colony.
      William Cooke (died 14 May 1589), who married Frances Grey, daughter of Lord John Grey of Pirgo, by whom he had four sons, including William Cooke of Highnam, Gloucestershire, who married Joyce Lucy, granddaughter of Sir Thomas Lucy of Charlecote, and three daughters.[15][1][16][17]
      Mildred Cooke (1526-89), who in December 1545 married, as his second wife, William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, by whom she was the mother of Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury.
      Anne Cooke (c. 1528 - 1610), who married, as his second wife, Sir Nicholas Bacon, by whom she was the mother of Sir Francis Bacon and Anthony Bacon.[18]
      Catherine Cooke (c. 1530 - 1583), who married Sir Henry Killigrew.[19]
      Elizabeth Cooke (1527-1609), who married firstly Sir Thomas Hoby and secondly John, Lord Russell (c. 1553 - 1584), second son of Francis Russell, 2nd Earl of Bedford.
      Margaret Cooke (died 3 August 1558), who was a lady in waiting to Mary I, and in 1558 married, as his second wife, Sir Ralph Rowlett.[1][20][21]
      Notes
      Calkins 2004.
      Richardson IV 2011, p. 144.
      Richardson IV 2011, pp. 144-5.
      De Pronuntiatione Graecae potissimum linguae disputationes cum Stephano Vuintoniensi episcopo, septem contrariis epistolis comprehensae (N. Episcopium iuniorem, Basel 1555), (at sect. a 4).
      (Original in Latin), Epistle Dedicatory, in In Epistolam S. Pauli Apostoli ad Romanos D. Petri Martyris Vermilii Florentini (Apud Petrum Pernam, Basel 1558) (see 1613 Heidelberg edition); English translation by Sir Henry Billingsley, Most learned and fruitfull commentaries of D. Peter Martir Vermilius Florentine, Professor of divinitie in the Schole of Tigure, upon the Epistle of S. Paul to the Romanes (John Daye, cum Privilegio, London 1568): see translation in J.G. Nichols, Literary Remains of King Edward VI, Roxburgh Club, 2 vols (J.B. Nichols & Sons, London 1857), I, pp. 50-51, note.
      'Observations on the Life of Sir Anthony Cooke', in D. Lloyd (ed. C. Whitworth), State-Worthies: Or, The Statesmen and Favourites of England from the Reformation to the Revolution (New edition) 2 vols, (J. Robson, London 1766), I, pp. 249-62, at p. 262.
      Lee 1887.
      Ram, Ronald (2010). The Thread of Identity. Amberley. p. 175.
      Parish Church of St Edward the Confessor, Havering, British Listed Buildings, accessed 10 July 2016.
      quoted in Marjorie Keniston McIntosh, Sir Anthony Cooke: Tudor Humanist,
      139. Anthony7 COOKE (Sir) (John6, Eleanor or Elizabeth5 Belknap, Henry4, Hamon3, Robert2, John1), born 1505 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 11 Jun 1576 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; buried 21 Jun 1576 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England. He married bef 1523 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England Anne FITZWILLIAM, born abt 1504 in Milton, Northamptonshire, England; died 5 Jun 1588, daughter of William FITZWILLIAM and Anne HAWES.

      Children of Anthony COOKE (Sir) and Anne FITZWILLIAM were as follows:

      208 i Mildred8 COOKE, born 24 Aug 1524 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 4 Apr 1589 in Burghley House, Strand, Middlesex, England; buried 21 Apr 1589 in Westminster Abbey, Middlesex, England. She married on 21 Mar 1545/46 William CECIL (Lord Burleigh or Burghley), born 18 Sep 1520 in Bourne, Lincolnshire, England; died 4 Aug 1598.

      + 209 ii Anne8 COOKE, born 1533 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 27 Aug 1610; buried in St. Michael's Church, St. Albans, Hertfordshire, England. She married Nicholas BACON (Sir).

      210 iii Elizabeth8 COOKE, born abt 1528 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died May 1609 in Bisham, Berkshire, England; buried 2 Jun 1609 in Bisham, Berkshire, England. She married (1) on 27 Jun 1558 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England Thomas Hoby (SIR), born 1530 in prob. Leominster, Herefordshire, England; died 13 Jul 1566 in Paris, France, son of William HOBY; (2) on 12 Dec 1574/74 John RUSSELL, died abt 1584.

      211 iv Anthony8 COOKE, born 1535.

      + 212 v William8 COOKE, born 1537 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 14 May 1589; buried 19 May 1589 in St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Middlesex, England. He married Frances GREY.

      213 vi Richard8 COOKE, born bef 1530 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 3 Oct 1579 in Gobrons, Essex, England. He married bef 1559 Anne CAUNTON, born abt 1531 in Gainspark Hall, Essex, England, daughter of Richard CAUNTON and Jennie (---).

      214 vii Edward8 COOKE, born 1539 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 1576.

      215 viii Catherine8 COOKE, born abt 1530 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 23 Apr 1609. She married on 4 Nov 1565 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England Henry KILLIGREW, born abt 1528; died 1603.

      216 ix Margaret8 COOKE, born 1541 in Giddy Hall, Romford, Essex, England; died 8 Dec 1551. She married Ralph (Robert) ROWLETT.

  • Reference  Charles Banks. "Cooke, Sir Knight of the Shire for Essex in Parliament Anthony". The families of Charles Banks and Jon Ray. https://familytree.banksray.com/getperson.php?personID=I2215&tree=banksray (accessed April 20, 2026).