Howard of Effingham, Charles, Lord High Admiral.
The extracts which follow will show the reasons for the belief that Lord Howard was a Protestant, possibly at the time of the Armada, and certainly at a later period.
1559. December 17.—He was an invited guest at the consecration of Matthew Parker at Lambeth, as Archbishop of Canterbury, “and many years after, by his testimony, confuted those lewd and loud lies which the Papists tell of the Nag’s Head in Cheapside.”—(Fuller’s “Worthies,” quoted in Notes and Queries, 1st S. Three, 244.)
1604. February.—He was “at the head of a commission to discover and expel all Catholic priests.”—(Memorials of the Howard Family, quoted ibidem, Three 309.—The quoter adds that Howard “was certainly a Protestant in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.”)
1604. May (?) “Only we forewarn you that in the performance of these ceremonies (ratification by King of Spain of treaty of peace with England), which is likely to be done in the King’s Chapel, you have especial care that it be not done in the forenoon, in the time of Mass, to the scandal of our religion, but rather in the afternoon, at what time their service is more free from note of superstition.”—(King James the First to Lord Howard, then Earl of Nottingham and Ambassador to Spain. Biographies Brit, page 2679; quoted in Notes and Queries, 1st S., Three 244.)
1604. “On Friday, the last of this Month, His Catholick Majesty ratified the Peace upon Oath in a great chamber of the Palace... It was pretended that the Clergy would not suffer this to be done in a Church or Chapel where neglect of reverence of the Holy Sacrament should give scandal.”—(Collins’ Peerage, Four 272, quoted ibidem.)
(It may be urged that Lord Howard, as Ambassador of a Protestant King, would feel himself obliged to act on behalf of his master, showing no more nor less reverence than James would have done himself. But is it at all likely that, had such been his wish, James would have selected for this office a man who could not act according to the belief of his master without committing sacrilege according to his own? The want of reverence must have been expected from Lord Nottingham or his suite, for there was no one else present who was not a devout Romanist).
1605. When Lord Monteagle delivered the anonymous letter winch revealed the Gunpowder Plot to Lord Salisbury, the second person to whom the latter confided the transaction was Lord Nottingham.—(Baker’s “Chronicle,” page 508.)
1605. He sat as one of the Commissioners for the trial of Garnet and other conspirators, after the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot—(Archaeologia, volume fifteen.)
1613. He stood sponsor for the Countess of Salisbury’s daughter. (Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, 1611-1618, page 170; quoted in Notes and Queries, 2nd S., Seven 364.)