He appears to have thought himself higher in the good graces of the royal coquette, than was actually the case, and finding himself somewhat slighted by her and by other friends at Court, we are told he grew ‘troubled in mind, and to wear off his grief, asked leave to travel.’
Accordingly, he went abroad, returned for a short time, and then repaired to Italy, where he resided for some years. He contracted ‘a great fondness for foreign fashions,’ and on coming home introduced many, and in particular the use of coaches, the first known in England being the property of the Earl of Arundel.
He remained unemployed until the year 1569, when he was named one of the Commissioners to inquire into the murder of Henry Darnley, King of Scots. He pleaded Mary’s cause, (believing firmly in her innocence,) and spoke out boldly in her behalf to Elizabeth herself, at the Council table when he considered the proceedings unjust. He never failed in his loyalty to the English Queen, although the intercourse he held with ‘Mary’s friends,’ as they were called, rendered him an object of distrust.
In 1572 he suffered a brief imprisonment in the Tower, and on his release found he had forfeited the royal favour, which he did not go the right way to regain, by his resolute opposition to the proposed marriage with the Duke of Anjou.
He continued in retirement until the beginning of the year 1580, when, says Camden, ‘Henry Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel, rendered his soul to God—in whom was extinct the surname of this most noble family, which had flourished with great honour for three hundred years and more’—from the time, indeed, of Richard Fitzalan, who, in the reign of Edward I., received the title of Earl of Arundel without any creation, from being possessed of the castle and lordship of Arundel, in Sussex. Henry married, first, Catherine Grey, daughter of Thomas, second Marquis of Dorset, (and aunt to Jane Grey,) by whom he had three children, who all died before their father, viz.:—
Henry, died unmarried at Brussels; Joan, married to John Lord Lumley; and Mary, the wife of Thomas Duke of Norfolk, in right of whose descent the present Duke of Norfolk enjoys the title of Earl of Arundel. Henry Fitzalan’s second wife was Mary, daughter of Sir John Arundel of Lanherne, county Cornwall, by whom he had no children.
No. 86.
SIR RICHARD GRESHAM.
Dark coat. Yellow sleeves. Black cap. Chain.