Strangways was descended from a fifteenth-century Lancashire gentleman, who obtained a substantial estate in Dorset through marriage, and sat for Bedwyn in 1472. The family acquired Melbury Sampford in the next generation, while Abbotsbury Abbey became its secondary seat following the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
Strangways was still a minor when he succeeded his brother in 1596, and his wardship was sold to the latter’s father-in-law, Sir Henry Newton†, who outbid Strangways’ grandmother, Lady Young.
Strangways’ term as sheriff of Dorset in 1612-13 doubtless reinforced his local profile. In 1614 he was elected knight of the shire, presumably with Suffolk’s backing. He began his Commons career confidently, making three speeches and attracting 11 nominations. Surprisingly for a novice Member, he was named on 8 Apr. to help review old bills from earlier sessions. He was also appointed to six legislative committees, whose topics ranged from Sabbath observance to the naturalization of two Scottish courtiers (7 and 23 May).
During the next few years, Strangways remained an active figure in local government. In 1616 he was appointed to inquire into the Dorset lands held by the former royal favourite, the earl of Somerset, which included the Sherborne estate subsequently granted to Sir John Digby*. Strangways was added a year later to the prestigious West Country oyer and terminer commission, and in 1620 he was chosen to collect the Palatine Benevolence in Dorset. With this track record, he had no problem retaining his seat as a knight of the shire at the election for the 1621 Parliament, serving this time alongside his brother-in-law, Sir Thomas Trenchard.
During the third Jacobean Parliament Strangways made 40 speeches, and received 19 nominations, though he could not yet be accounted one of the Commons’ leading figures. He clearly arrived back at Westminster with some private business to pursue. On 9 Mar. he was the first Member named to the committee for the bill to confirm the foundation of Wadham College, Oxford by his late kinsman. However, this measure, which was apparently intended to clarify the division of Nicholas Wadham’s lands between his heirs and the college, failed to complete its passage. Strangways was possibly also a sponsor of the bill for free trade in Welsh cottons. He was nominated to the committee on 2 Mar., and although he seems not to have attended its meetings, he called unsuccessfully on 20 Mar. for the bill to be engrossed. On 8 May he presented a petition from some clothiers against the Merchant Adventurers.
Strangways drew on his personal experience to complain on 15 Mar. that the government was making it harder for sheriffs, in their official capacity, to write off irrecoverable debts. He was promptly named to the committee for the bill on sheriffs’ accounts. Similarly, his informed proposal on 25 Apr., for a ban on the appointment of inexperienced lawyers as magistrates, earned him a nomination to help consider Sir Dudley Digges’s* petition for reform of county benches.
Strangways echoed conventional wisdom on 26 Feb., when he blamed the current scarcity of coin on the East India Company’s export of bullion, the excessive production of gold and silver lace, and an imbalance in trade with Ireland.
Once Strangways settled on a course of action, he pursued it doggedly. On 14 Feb. he highlighted abuses in the management of the Fleet prison. This prompted the establishment of a committee of inquiry, which in turn led to a tour of inspection by Members (17 Feb.), with Strangways participating prominently in both stages. His initiative was somewhat compromised when it emerged on 19 Feb. that his own brother-in-law, Edmund Chamberlayne, was one of the prisoners. However, he stuck to his task, bringing in a fresh petition against the warden on 26 Mar., and calling for the latter’s arrest on 16 May.
During the Fleet inquiry, Members learnt of slanders against the king and queen of Bohemia by a Catholic prisoner, Edward Floyd. Strangways delivered the first report of these insults on 28 Apr., and three days later he contributed to the vindictive demands for the offender to receive a brutal, exemplary punishment. When doubts were raised about whether the Commons had the power to impose such a sentence on Floyd, Strangways boldly advised Members ‘to make a precedent in this case, if none before’.
After the summer recess, Strangways contributed little further to the Commons’ proceedings. On 20 Nov. he queried whether his kinsman Sir Thomas Thynne could still sit in the House, since he had recently been selected as sheriff of Gloucestershire. When Justice Hutton was accused of misdirecting a Dorset jury in a case between the 2nd earl of Castlehaven (Sir Mervyn Audley*) and the rector of Stalbridge, Strangways proposed that the latter be detained while the facts were established, and was promptly appointed to examine the cleric (1 December). On the same day he was named to attend a conference with the Lords on the bill against informers.
Following the dissolution, the Crown launched a new Benevolence to compensate for Parliament’s failure to vote supply on the scale requested. Like many recent Members, Strangways found himself targeted by the government, and when he offered only £50 the Privy Council demanded double. However, he resisted this pressure, and was summoned again for non-payment in July 1623.
In 1624 Strangways was returned to Parliament as a knight of the shire for the third time, but had much less impact on the Commons, making only six speeches, and attracting just nine nominations. This was surprising, given that he confidently moved on 23 Feb. for the prestigious committee for privileges to be appointed, and was himself the first Member named to it.
On 14 Apr. Strangways was appointed to attend a conference with the Lords on the controversial bill to amend the Henrician statute on Welsh governance. In marked contrast to his reticence about monopolies in 1621, he called on 13 Mar. for the referees of the patent for surveying coals to be severely punished, ‘to the terrifying of others from making the like certificates’.
Once Prince Charles became king in 1625, Bristol’s disgrace deepened, and Strangways seemingly suffered by association. In about May, he and his father-in-law were replaced as deputy lieutenants by Sir Walter Earle and Sir Nathaniel Napper, who had also just been elected as Dorset’s knights of the shire in the first Caroline Parliament. Strangways had to settle this time for a seat at Weymouth, seven miles from Abbotsbury, probably also arranging the return of his son-in-law Dyve at Bridport, where the Trenchard family were the dominant patrons.
In the following year Strangways reasserted his local standing. At the parliamentary elections of January 1626 he again opted for a burgess-ship at Weymouth, but this time he blatantly manipulated the Dorset contest to ensure the success of his chosen candidate, Sir George Morton. Dyve also took a seat at Bridport, confounding Buckingham’s bid to place two of his own nominees there.
Strangways spent much of this session on the offensive against Buckingham. On 22 Feb. he attacked the duke’s decision as lord admiral to detain the St. Peter of Le Havre. Disputing the assertion by the Admiralty judge, Sir Henry Marten*, that this incident was not the sole cause of the current French trade embargo, he provocatively called for Marten to be sequestered from the Commons, though the latter was subsequently cleared of any wrongdoing. The next day, Strangways proposed a Remonstrance to the king about the St. Peter case, reminding Members of a speech by James I in 1624 in which ‘the old king said he was in love with Parliaments’ because they informed him of matters which he would not otherwise hear about. This ploy also failed, but Strangways was promptly added to the committee investigating the embargo.
On 27 Feb. he opened a major debate on the current parlous state of the kingdom, condemning the inadequacy of England’s coastal defences, the loaning to France of ships that were used against the Protestants of La Rochelle, and the huge casualty numbers on the Cadiz expedition and Count Mansfeld’s campaigns, which were due in part to inadequate provisioning. Of 500 mariners recruited in Dorset, fewer than 80 had reportedly survived. Arguing that the honour of Parliament itself was besmirched by these military disasters, he demanded that the councillors of war be called to account, to establish why the money voted for war in 1624 had not been employed as the Commons intended.
Strangways served on the so-called committee for the ‘causes of causes’, established on 20 Mar. to prepare impeachment charges against Buckingham. Initially he investigated the misappropriation of government revenues, and on 24 Mar. complained of the Navy’s failure to patrol the English Channel, despite £8,800 being assigned for this purpose. He also inquired into the sale of peerages, informing the committee on 22 Mar. that he himself had been offered an Irish viscountcy.
At this juncture a new front opened up in the campaign against Buckingham. On 30 Mar. the Lords ruled that the earl of Bristol, who had been under house arrest for two years, should receive his writ of summons to the Upper House, which had previously been denied him by the king. Charles could now prevent him from sitting only by accusing him of high treason, but Bristol intended to retaliate with similar charges against the duke.
Meanwhile, the impeachment articles against Buckingham were now ready, and on 2 May Strangways helped to persuade the Commons to transmit them to the Lords, rather than submitting them to Charles, or waiting until Bristol’s trial was concluded. The next day he was named as assistant to Christopher Wandesford, who had been entrusted with presenting the article about the duke’s alleged interference during James I’s final illness.
Whatever concerns Strangways felt about Bristol’s long detention resurfaced when the king unexpectedly arrested Digges and Sir John Eliot over their actions during Buckingham’s impeachment. On 16 May, supporting Kirton’s call for Eliot’s name to be cleared, he moved for Sir Richard Weston to explain his statement that Eliot had actually been imprisoned for matters ‘extra-judicial’ to Parliament. He was equally alarmed by Sir Dudley Carleton’s warning on 12 May that Charles might resort to ‘new counsels’ if Parliament persisted in confronting the Crown. Appealing on 5 June for the continuance of traditional patterns of government, he recalled a speech from 1610 in which James I stated that those who advised a monarch to act outside the law were ‘vipers fitting to be cast out, and pests of the commonwealth’. Expressing the hope that Charles would ‘inherit his father’s virtues as he did the Crown’, he appealed to the king to dispense with any advisors who advocated ‘new counsels’.
Strangways clearly viewed Buckingham as the prime candidate for dismissal. On 3 June he and Kirton informed the House that the duke was continuing to receive fresh honours, despite the fact that he was officially still on trial in the Lords. Strangways highlighted the favourite’s election as chancellor of Cambridge University, and further questioned Buckingham’s religious orthodoxy by mentioning his patronage of the Arminian cleric, Richard Montagu. When Members voted on 13 June whether to consider a letter in which Sir John Savile* criticized the duke’s impeachment, Strangways was a teller for the yeas, who carried the day.
On 28 June the king ordered Sir Robert Heath* to examine Strangways, Kirton, Dyve, George, Lord Digby† and others in connection with Bristol’s campaign against Buckingham. How long they were detained is unclear, but Charles considered that they deserved ‘exemplary punishment’ for ‘stirring up of the disaffection of divers of the Members of both Houses for the furtherance of their private ends’.
Set at liberty in January 1628, Strangways was once more elected as a knight of the shire in the following month, serving with his fellow refuser, Earle. He doubtless also arranged Dyve’s return at Weymouth.
Understandably, Strangways took a close interest in the early debates about infringements of the subjects’ liberties. Having persuaded Members on 25 Mar. to give priority to the issue of arbitrary imprisonment, he reminded them the next day of his own confinement for Loan refusal, and rounded furiously on Sir Francis Nethersole when the latter argued that kings could break the law if impelled by necessity: ‘if [he] had lain a while where I lay lately, he would have known more, searched records, and studied the cause’. Returning to this point on 3 Apr., he revealed: ‘I myself was told because I refused the Loan, ... that shortly we should not have the protection of the law. I see not the gentleman [that] told me so, but he is of the House’. Later that day he was named to committees to frame a bill on compulsory military service and foreign employment, and to plan the Commons’ next steps in securing liberties.
When secretary of state Sir John Coke requested the House on 26 Mar. to consider the Crown’s propositions for supply, Strangways was so determined to prevent this that he suggested sending the propositions out for consultation around the country. However, he responded positively to the king’s subsequent assurances about liberties, and on 4 Apr. agreed in principle to a generous grant of five subsidies. This stance placed him at odds with Eliot and Earle, who interrupted him on 11 Apr. when he seconded Sir Edward Coke’s motion to fix the payment dates as a further incentive to Charles. Undeterred, Strangways countered: ‘we have many petitions, and I doubt not but this may help them on’.
Given his constructive behaviour, he was doubtless embarrassed to find himself three days later at the centre of a major dispute between the two Houses. On 12 Apr., while visiting the Lords on private business, he was told by the 2nd earl of Suffolk (Theophilus Howard, Lord Walden*) that John Selden* deserved to be hanged for razing a record. This outburst, which was prompted by a misheard exchange in the Lords during Selden’s recent presentation of legal precedents for subjects’ liberties, took Strangways by surprise. Probably reluctant to offend Suffolk, his local lord lieutenant, he kept quiet about the episode until Kirton raised it in the Commons on 14 Apr., citing Strangways as the prime witness. Selden promptly demanded that his name be cleared, but when the Lower House made a formal complaint to the Lords, Suffolk denied making the offending remarks. Strangways, who by this time had given written testimony, was obliged on 15 Apr. to defend his own reputation. Reminding Members that he was merely a witness, not the earl’s original accuser, he stood by his version of events, alluding proudly to the aristocratic blood in his own veins, and called on the House to uphold his honour. A committee chaired by Eliot duly affirmed its confidence in him on 17 Apr., and a further complaint was sent up to the Lords, but the matter was then allowed to drop.
On 23 Apr. Strangways was appointed to attend a meeting with the Lords to hear their latest views on subjects’ liberties, while five days later he was named to help frame a bill on this topic. When the king demanded on 1 May to know whether the Commons would accept his undertakings to uphold liberties, Strangways responded with a moderate appeal for an end to arbitrary government. While praising Charles’s latest pronouncements, ‘wherein his goodness appears in its own lively colours and proper lustre’, he attacked those royal advisers who had recently striven
to break asunder that chain which links and ties and unites the hearts and affections of the prince and people together. What has been acted to the prejudice of the liberties of the subject of late, had it been in former ages, had been sufficient to have shaken the frame and foundation of the kingdom. But ... our religion teaches us obedience, by lawful means and humble courses to seek redress of our grievances.
Ibid. iii. 44, 124, 196-7.
Accordingly, on 2 May he urged the House to persevere with the bill of liberties, but also to reassure the king that no restriction of his powers was intended. No doubt disappointed that Charles then refused to accept this bill at all, he moved on 6 May for the alternative strategy of a Petition of Right to be put to a vote, and he was probably on the drafting committee for that document.
Strangways was restored to the Dorset bench in December 1628, and to the western oyer and terminer commission a month later. Perhaps mollified by these olive branches, he barely contributed to the proceedings of the 1629 session. He was named to just three bill committees, one of which addressed an old concern from 1621, the begging of forfeitures prior to the confirmation of attainders (23 January). In his only speech, on 21 Feb., he sought to avoid confrontation between king and Commons over John Rolle’s* case, mistakenly arguing that when the latter’s goods were confiscated for non-payment of Tunnage and Poundage, it must have been the customs farmers who benefited: ‘we hear the king hath disclaimed his right to the customs, and we must not then make an imaginary case to suppose the king hath a right’.
The apparent rapprochement between Strangways and the government proved to be short-lived. By 1630 Strangways had been removed from the Dorset bench again, and he lost his place as an oyer and terminer commissioner in 1632. Two years later the king refused him permission to spend Christmas in London, while in 1637 Strangways and Dyve were sued in Star Chamber for taking too much gold overseas when visiting the earl of Bristol over a decade earlier. Not surprisingly, Strangways also cultivated ties with another dissident peer, the 4th earl of Bedford (Sir Francis Russell*).
Elected for Weymouth to both the Short and Long Parliaments, Strangways initially sided with the reformers. However, remaining true to the principles of ‘constitutional Royalism’ that he had enunciated in the 1620s, he came to view radicals like John Pym* as a greater threat than Charles to subjects’ liberties.