BACON, Nathaniel (1546-1622), of Stiffkey, Irmingland, Norf.

Unlike his father, Elizabeth’s lord keeper, and his younger half-brother, Francis, Bacon eschewed high office, and instead devoted much of his life to local administration in his native Norfolk. His surviving papers, which are voluminous, are full of administrative matters, and allow Bacon’s activities as a magistrate and the management of his estates at Stiffkey and Irmingland to be documented in detail. However, they contain little personal correspondence, and are largely silent so far as Bacon’s service in six parliaments is concerned. HMC Townshend, 1-19; Official Pprs.; Suppl. Stiffkey Pprs.; Bacon Pprs. ed. Smith et al. (Norf. Rec. Soc. xlvi, xlix, liii, lxiv); W. Prest, ‘Australian Holdings of Norf. Mss: Bacon-Townshend Pprs at Univ. of Adelaide’, Norf. Arch. xxxvii. 121-3; A. Hassell Smith, ‘A Squire and his Community: the Stiffkey project’, Bull. Local Hist.: E. Midland Region, xvi. 13-18; J.R. Taylor, ‘Nathaniel Bacon: an Elizabethan Squire, his Fam. and Household, and their impact upon the Local Community’ (Univ. E. Anglia Ph.D. thesis, 1989); Counties and Communities ed. C. Rawcliffe et al. 17-18.

Bacon and his four brothers all attended Cambridge and Gray’s Inn, where they received a thorough education in preparation for a life in office. PBG Inn i. 27. This upbringing included entry to Parliament, and in 1571 Bacon’s father arranged for him to represent the Devon borough of Tavistock through the patronage of the 2nd earl of Bedford. Tittler, 163-4. Despite the wishes of his father, who attempted to match him with several Suffolk heiresses, Bacon chose to marry the base daughter of his uncle, Sir Thomas Gresham. Rye, 33-8; Smith, County and Ct. 169. Her portion included the manors of Langham, Marston and Hemsby on the north-east Norfolk coast, and Combs in Suffolk, to which the lord keeper added Stiffkey, an estate adjoining Langham and Marston, and the south Norfolk manors of Stanford and Eccles. Add. Ch. 76333; A. Simpson, Wealth of the Gentry, 96-8; F. Blomefield, Hist. Norf. i. 407-10; ix. 409-11, 426-8; xi. 167. Bacon received thorough instruction in the husbandry of his estates from his father, who encouraged him to build a new hall at Stiffkey. Work had begun by the time the lord keeper died in 1579, when Bacon was left £200 to help with the building works, and sheep stocks for the Stiffkey estates. HMC Townshend, 6. Bacon’s improvements were not limited to building a new house, as he also excavated a private dock among the marshland creeks, changed the course of the river, moved roads, and remodelled much of Stiffkey village. Smith, County and Ct. 16, 170; Smith, ‘Stiffkey Project’, 13-18. It was not until about 1604 that the hall was completed, Norf. Arch. viii. 143-66; x. 143-65; Blomefield, ix. 249-54. and in the meantime Bacon continued to add to his holdings, purchasing the manor of Palling, near Hemsby, in 1588. Blomefield, ix. 334-5.

A godly Protestant, Bacon was personally responsible for recommending puritan ministers to several Norfolk parishes. Consequently ‘prophesyings’ flourished in the region. Smith, County and Ct. 170; P. Collinson, Eliz. Puritan Movement, 278, 337-8; Blomefield, ix. 254. During the late Elizabethan period Bacon and his elder brother Nicholas were dominant members of a godly faction among the Norfolk magistracy. This group, which also included their brother-in-law Sir Francis Wyndham†, their cousin Sir Bassingbourne Gawdy*, and another kinsman, Sir Dru Drury†, was opposed by a faction led by Sir Arthur Heveningham of Heveningham in Suffolk. Tittler, 159, 167; Smith, County and Ct., 168-9, 317-9; R.C. Bald, Donne and the Drurys, 89, 137; Letters of Philip Gawdy ed. I.H. Jeayes, 65, 96, 104-5. As a godly magistrate Bacon was conscientious in the regulation of alehouses and the prosecution of moral offences. He also helped search for recusants and campaigned against corruption, particularly in the execution of patents, licences and monopolies. Smith, County and Ct. 230, 241-2; APC 1577-8, p. 314; 1578-80, p. 98; 1580-1, pp. 119, 145, 354; 1581-2, pp. 54, 59, 118, 310, 437; 1586-7, p. 61; 1587-8, pp. 204, 216, 322, 345, 396; 1588, pp. 109, 264; 1588-9, pp. 85, 152, 244, 292, 351; 1589-90, pp. 367, 444; 1590, pp. 33, 354, 383; 1595-6, pp. 113, 174, 404, 413; 1596-7, p. 377; 1597, pp. 113, 260, 263, 320; 1599-1600, pp. 274, 398, 649; CSP Dom. 1547-80, pp. 628, 657, 665, 669, -70; 1581-90, pp. 112, 173, 301, 319, 403, 610, 648; HMC Hatfield vi. 377, xii. 106; Stowe 150, passim. Bacon’s religious austerity was encouraged by his stepmother (née Anne Cooke), who helped to educate his first wife in the early years of their marriage. L. Jardine and A. Stewart, Hostage to Fortune, 33-5. Lady Bacon was the sister of Mildred Cecil, and through this connection Bacon was able to appeal to his ‘uncle’ Lord Burghley (Sir William Cecil†) when the bishop of Norwich, Edmund Freake, dismissed certain preachers in the late 1570s. Lansd. 75, f. 88; Collinson, 203, 256-7. Burghley’s assistance was also required when Bacon and his brother Nicholas fell out with their half-brother Anthony over the execution of their father’s will. Jardine and Stewart, 67-70.

The marriages of his three daughters cemented Bacon’s ties to Norfolk’s other leading families. The eldest, Anne, married Sir John Townshend† of Raynham, while Elizabeth married (Sir) Thomas Knyvett† of Ashwellthorpe, and Winifred married (Sir) Robert Gawdy† of Claxton. Rye, 33-8. Bacon’s own second marriage, to Dorothy Smith, the wealthy and recently widowed daughter of Sir Arthur Hopton, augmented his landholdings in Norfolk. At Dorothy’s ‘instance and request’ he started to build a second mansion at Irmingland in around 1609. Key, 79; Blomefield, vi. 324; Smith, County and Ct. 172. By then Bacon enjoyed an annual income which has been estimated at about £2,000. Roughly half came from rents, and the remainder from wool. Simpson, 96-8. His brother Sir Francis noted him as a potential surety, and borrowed money from him several times, though their relationship was not close.Letters and Life of Francis Bacon ed. J. Spedding, iv. 40. Indeed, Bacon may have disapproved of his flamboyant and illustrious sibling, for he wrote to Sir Michael Hicks* in 1605 that he ‘would be glad to hear that my brother ... were bestowed in marriage: for then I know that his debt and mine to you would come to be discharged’. Lansd. 89, f. 136. Nathaniel is conspicuous by his absence from Sir Francis’s published letters, and in the four parliaments during which they both served there is no evidence that they shared any mutual interests. On the contrary, their political views differed, particularly over the question of supply in 1610.

Shortly after James I’s accession, on 1 Apr. 1603, Bacon announced that he intended to stand for Norfolk in the elections that were widely expected to be held later that year. He wrote to Sir Henry Gawdy† of Claxton that as he had already twice served in the junior seat, and was ‘not like to serve often hereafter in any Parliament’, he hoped ‘that no man shall have just cause to judge amiss of me though I now seek the first’. Simpson, 97. In the event, writs were not sent out until January 1604, by which time Bacon was pitted against his old rival, Sir Arthur Heveningham. Gawdy refused to consider the second seat, so his place as Bacon’s partner was taken by Sir Charles Cornwallis, who had recently bought an estate near Norwich. Fearing that Cornwallis would also insist on the first place, Bacon attempted to persuade the sheriff, Edmund Doyly, to hold the election at Dereham, where his support was strongest. In the event this proved unnecessary, and on 20 Feb. Bacon was elected along with Cornwallis, who was persuaded to accept the second seat to prevent it going to Heveningham. Smith, County and Ct. 153, 329.

Bacon and the north Norfolk gentry had achieved a significant victory against Heveningham, who was unpopular in East Anglia for abusing his powers as a deputy lieutenant and for his activities as a patentee for highways. Ibid. 329; APC, 1591, pp. 245-7. Monopolies, against which Bacon had laboured for many years at a local level, like purveyance, were issues that were high on his list of grievances to be raised in Parliament. APC 1587-8, p. 216; APC 1591-2, p. 87; HMC Townshend, 8-9; Smith, County and Ct. 237, 250-1, 294-5, 299-303. In a personal memorandum, Bacon observed that ‘purveyance, [which] the king now claimeth as his right and due from the subject ... by Acts of Parl[iament] may be proved to have been got rather by encroachment’. He also reminded himself ‘to have it debated if it be not fit to make it praemunire or treason for any person to maintain or hold opinion that the Parliament may not bind both king and subject even in matter of prerogative’. Norf. RO, ms 1620i (1C9). Before setting off to Westminster, Bacon collected a sheaf of petitions from across the county. The fishermen of Wells requested that Parliament take action to relieve their town, ‘as in your good discretion shall seem fit and convenient’, while the inhabitants of Marshlands Fen, whom Bacon had previously tried to help after their lands were inundated by the sea, sought financial help to build new flood defences. Individuals like Thomas Baker, a corn merchant of King’s Lynn, asked Bacon to propose amendments to statutes regulating the export of corn, and a consortium of 25 master bakers likewise contacted him suggesting reforms to the 1563 Statute of Artificers regulating apprenticeships. Norf. RO, Bradfer-Lawrence Bacon mss, Box VI b (v).

Bacon took up at least some of these issues once Parliament opened, as he was thanked for sending ‘friendly advertisements’ of proceedings to one neighbour in April 1604. D. Hirst, Representative of the People?, 180. Moreover, on 5 June, when the bill to continue or repeal expiring statutes was discussed, Bacon offered a proviso ‘to bring in use the old law, touching transportation of corn at certain prices’. After further debate on 19 June, Bacon’s proviso was passed by 159 votes to 105. CJ, i. 232b, 986a, 994b. The following day Bacon found an opportunity to further the interests of his Wells constituents, when he was appointed to a fishing bill committee. He seems to have been chosen as its chairman, as he reported back on 22 June, proposing various amendments, which were then engrossed. Ibid. 243a, 244b. The inhabitants of Marshlands contacted him again when a measure to build flood defences in the Severn Estuary was introduced in 1607. Bacon was appointed to the bill committee on 3 Mar., and perhaps urged that the bill be extended to cover the Fens. However, nothing further was heard of it thereafter. Norf. RO, Bradfer-Lawrence Bacon mss, Box VII b (i); CJ, i. 346a.

Bacon kept a keen eye on measures that would affect Norfolk, being appointed to bill committees concerning shipping (12 Apr. 1604), press money (29 June 1604), sewers (31 Jan. 1606), kerseys (5 Feb. 1606), beer exports (27 Mar. 1606), unlawful fishing (3 Apr. 1606), free trade (3 Apr., 26 Nov. 1606), and piracy (21 Apr. 1610). CJ, i. 169a, 248b, 262a, 264a, 290b, 292b, 325a, 419b. He presumably chaired the committee concerning beer exports, as he reported its proceedings and proposed amendments to the bill. Ibid. 291b, 292a. He was also named to consider numerous private bills relating to Norfolk estates, among them a measure to sell lands belonging to Edward Downes of Buckenham Castle, for whom Bacon had acted as surety; the bill was committed on 2 May 1604, and eventually passed both Houses. Ibid. 195a; HLRO, O.A. 3 Jas. I c. 48. Bacon reported from the committee of a bill for Thetford grammar school (6 Mar. 1606), and was appointed to consider another bill on the same subject four years later (15 June 1610). CJ, i. 259a, 278a, 440a. In March 1607 he intervened in the proceedings of the committee for a bill concerning Lechlade manor in Gloucestershire, staying its consideration until word had been obtained from an interested party, Sir Christopher Heydon† of Baconsthorpe in Norfolk. Ibid. 350b, 354b; Lansd. 486, f. 118v; Cott. Titus F.IV, f. 98. Finally, although not named to the committee, Bacon argued in favour of a bill concerning ‘surrounded grounds in Norfolk and Suffolk’ (20 Mar. 1610). CJ, i. 413a.

Bacon was among those puritans who evidently hoped that King James would revise England’s religious settlement. During the 1604 session his appointments included a general committee on religion (16 Apr.), and measures concerning bishops’ lands (19 May), popish books (6 June), clerical reform (12 June), simony (18 June), suits against clergy (19 June) and church attendance (27 June). Ibid. 173a, 214b, 233b, 237a, 241a, 241b, 247b, 994b. On 8 June, fearing that the bishops in the Lords would thwart the Commons’ reforming intentions, he proposed ‘for all matters induced [sic] into the Church savouring of Popery, we might proceed in a petition by ourselves’. Ibid. 989a. On 28 June he urged that the simony bill, which had just completed its passage through the Commons, ‘might specially be recommended to the Lords’. Ibid. 999a. As this plea evidently fell on deaf ears, he reintroduced the measure during the second session (1 Mar. 1606). Ibid. 276a. Bacon was named to consider six more bills of a religious nature in 1606, one of which concerned Norwich preachers, and was included on both committees appointed to deal with the Gunpowder plotters (21 Jan., 30 April). Ibid. 257b, 261b, 267b, 277b, 279a, 286b, 294b, 303a. On 15 Mar. he supported Nicholas Fuller’s plea to restore 260 deprived ministers, demanding ‘that they may be suffered to preach again, and that there may be no more any such course be taken by the bishops hereafter’. Ibid. 285b. In the third session (1606-7) he was named to a further seven committees for religious measures, and in 1610 he was again named to a general committee on religion (22 Mar.), plus three bills on pluralism, non-residence and excommunication. Ibid. 326b, 329b, 347b, 350b, 374a, 374b, 375a, 396b, 413b, 418b, 424b. He supported Fuller’s calls for ecclesiastical grievances ‘to be proceeded in’ on 23 Apr. 1610, and in a debate about recusancy on 25 May he moved for a committee to prepare a petition. Ibid. 420b, 433a. Bacon’s puritanical outlook, combined with his dedication to law enforcement as a magistrate, are furthermore reflected in his appointments to bill committees for alehouses (23 May 1604; 3 Dec. 1606), drunkenness (8 Dec. 1606), and bastardy (9 Dec. 1606; 16 May 1610). Ibid. 222b, 258b, 327a, 328b, 429a.

On 23 Mar. 1604 Bacon was appointed to help consider the grievances raised by Sir Robert Wroth I, including wardship, the subject of a joint conference which he was appointed to attend three days later. Ibid. 151a, 154b, 222b; HMC Hatfield, xvi. 42-3. On 16 Apr. he was named to consider a long-anticipated monopolies bill, which aimed to explain the Common Law ‘in certain cases of letters patents’. This measure probably resembled a bill that Bacon had seconded in 1597. CJ, i. 172b; Procs. Eliz. ed. T.E. Hartley, iii. 232. Named to the purveyors’ bill committee on 6 Jan. 1606, Bacon became a member of the general committee for grievances on 8 Apr. 1606. The following day he argued that the duchy of Lancaster’s greenwax patent, held by a royal favourite, Sir Roger Aston*, should be condemned. CJ, i. 262a, 295a, 295b. Bacon was also involved in the Commons’ deliberations over the proposed Union with Scotland. In 1604 he took part in debate (18 Apr.), was twice named to help confer with the Lords (14 Apr., 4 May), and was appointed to a committee to discuss the bishop of Bristol’s controversial book on the Union ahead of a further conference with the peers (1 June). Ibid. 172a, 176b, 199a, 230a. In the third session Bacon was appointed to a Union conference with the Lords on 25 Nov. 1606, and the following day pressed the Commons to send the Lords an answer. CJ, i. 324b, 1005a; Harl. 6850, f. 61v; Bowyer Diary, 197. He was then appointed to a select committee (11 Dec.) to prepare for a further conference. CJ, i. 329b. After the Christmas break, he interrupted the naturalization debate of 20 Feb. 1607 to insist that the lawyers’ objections be answered before it be put to the question. Ibid. 1019a. His lack of enthusiasm for the king’s proposals became apparent in the heated debates on 7 Mar. when he insisted that the Scots must ‘be subjected to the same taxes and payments as [the] English...[and] be liable to the laws and justice of England, as if they were resident here’. SP14/26/73; CJ, i. 350a. Appointed to help manage a conference that afternoon, with special responsibility for the matter of ‘lands, possessions and carrying forth of treasure’ between England and Scotland, he perhaps came out in support of Sir Edwin Sandys’ proposals for a ‘perfect Union’; but Robert Bowyer* recorded only that Bacon ‘spake so low, that he was not to be heard where I stood’. Bowyer Diary, 224, 227.

As a Member of long experience, Bacon’s interests in the first Jacobean Parliament encompassed various aspects of procedure and privilege. On 27 Mar. 1604 he was appointed to the committee concerned with the arrest for debt of the Member for Steyning, Sir Thomas Shirley I, and later went with Sir Francis Hastings to persuade the warden of the Fleet to release him. CJ, i. 155b, 208b, 936b. At around the same time, Bacon was enlisted to help draft resolutions on the Buckinghamshire election controversy (30 Mar.), and to attend a conference with the judges on the same subject (5 April). Ibid. 160a, 166b. He was also included on a committee to prevent outlaws from serving in the House (31 Mar.), an issue which arose directly out of the Buckinghamshire dispute. On 16 Apr. he was asked to consider ‘how committees should be appointed, upon a motion ... that they should be randomized’. Ibid. 160b, 172b. In the second session Bacon was named to hear the case of Roger Brereton, a Welsh Member arrested during the adjournment (6 Feb. 1606), and on 21 Feb. he spoke in defence of Sir Edwin Sandys’s servant, who had been imprisoned and denied bail. Ibid. 263a, 272b-273b. He was added to the privileges committee in the third session in order to consider the problem posed by Members’ absenteeism (19 Nov. 1606), and continued in this capacity for the duration of the Parliament. Ibid. 291a, 316a, 352a, 354a, 386a. On 14 Feb. 1610 he argued that Sir George Somers, admiral of Virginia, who had been returned for Lyme Regis, should remain a Member. Ibid. 393a; Procs. 1610, ii. 7.

Bacon was among the majority of Members who expected the Commons’ grievances to be addressed before it considered voting supply. G.R. Elton, Studs. in Tudor and Stuart Pols. and Govt. ii. 107; Notestein, 8, 164. In the first session he objected to James’s request for an immediate subsidy, and was one of the select committee responsible for drafting the Commons’ ‘Form of Apology and Satisfaction’ in June. CJ, i. 242a, 393b, 433b, 985a, 995a; Notestein, 131. During the second session he proved more willing to grant supply, but was anxious to avoid fifteenths, which, as he pointed out on 10 Feb. 1606 were burdensome to the poor. Consequently, on 25 Mar. he moved for ‘one entire [subsidy] in Michaelmas term, two in Midsummer and Hilary’. CJ, i. 266a-b, 289b; Notestein, 185. His lack of enthusiasm for fifteenths incurred an admonishment from the earl of Salisbury (Robert Cecil†) in 1608 for his failure, as knight of the shire, to appoint collectors in Norfolk. Stowe 150, f. 220. By 1610 Bacon’s willingness to vote supply was cooler still, as impositions had become another major grievance which he vigorously opposed. CJ, i. 430b, Procs. 1610 ed. E.R. Foster, ii. 107. On 14 June, during the negotiations over the Great Contract, he urged the House to ‘stay, and pause, till the grievances be proceeded in’, provoking his brother Sir Francis to retort that he had ‘great hope’ of success, and that they should therefore continue. Procs. 1610, ii.147; CJ, i. 439a; Notestein, 411, 419.

Following the collapse of the Contract in November 1610, Bacon summed up the dejected mood of the Commons, in a speech which seems to have been widely reported. On 16 Nov. he complained that the monopoly for licensing wines had been allowed to continue during the lifetime of the lord admiral (Charles Howard†) and his son, despite James’s promise to cancel it, ‘by which time that may be forgotten and a new grant made’. Bacon also grumbled that no decision had been reached regarding the fate of the patent for the New Draperies, a particular concern in Norfolk where cloth-making was a major industry. Even if it were to be revoked, he added, ‘it is said that it will be upon the point of mis-pledging, so that there shall be no judgment for the right of the subject’. He was disappointed that during the Contract negotiations with the Lords there had been no discussion of ‘matters ecclesiastical, [the use of] proclamations, or such like’, but only of problems he considered less urgent. Lastly, he bemoaned the generosity of Parliament, arguing that multiple subsidies had never been granted before by a single Parliament, a precedent which should only have been broken for an ‘extraordinary cause’. Procs. 1610, ii. 336-8; Parl. Debates 1610 ed. S.R.Gardiner, 135-7; HMC Rutland i. 424, ii.389; Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, iv. 232. That afternoon Bacon and his brother Sir Francis were among 30 Members summoned to attend the king at Whitehall. James had evidently been informed of the contents of Nathaniel’s speech, for he singled him out and demanded to know ‘whether they think it fit to relieve him?’ Procs. 1610, ii. 337. Nathaniel replied that since ‘contribution depended upon retribution, supply upon support’, the ‘time was unseasonable’ for further taxation. HMC Hastings iv. 226. Sir Francis, presumably horrified at his brother’s blunt response ‘began to speak in a more extravagant style’, but James cut him short. Winwood’s Memorials ed. E. Sawyer, iii. 235-6. The unofficial audience of the ‘thirty doges’, as James later termed them, was deeply resented by the Commons, and on 21 Nov. William Hakewill argued that it set a dangerous precedent; however, calls for those involved to be reprimanded ultimately came to nothing. Procs. 1610, ii. 342; Parl. Debates 1610 ed. S.R. Gardiner, 139-41; Notestein, 396-7.

In the years immediately following the Parliament’s dissolution, Bacon became preoccupied with litigation. After much hesitation he initiated proceedings against his friend Sir Thomas Knyvett over their children’s marriage settlement of 1592, which should have seen him receive lands worth £300 a year from the estate of Sir Thomas Parry*, Knyvett’s father-in-law. Bodl. Tanner 285, f. 89. Chancery finally resolved that Knyvett should make up the jointure out of his own lands. C78/318/6. In the meantime Bacon launched suits in Star Chamber against a neighbour for fishing on his property at Stiffkey, STAC 8/68/15. and in Chancery against his tenants at Langham. Add. 12504, f. 124; C2/Jas.I/B13/9. He also undertook litigation on behalf of his stepson Owen Smith, concerning the latter’s property in Suffolk, much of which Bacon had leased out. C2/Jas.I/B15/76; Norf. RO, ms 20396 126X6; CSP Dom. 1603-10, pp. 208, 232; CSP Dom. Addenda, 1580-1625, pp. 459, 464, 532. In these wrangles he sought the advice of his brother Sir Francis, and of several eminent lawyers whom he counted as friends, including Sir Edward Coke*, and Sir Julius Caesar*. Stowe 743, f. 18; Add. 12504, f. 124; Bodl. Tanner 285, f. 89.

Fearing he was dying, Bacon drafted his will in the spring of 1614, and commissioned a monument for himself and his first wife in Stiffkey church. SP15/40/61. However, he recovered from his illness, and, perhaps in response to growing popular outrage against monopolies and other grievances, stood for re-election to Parliament for Norfolk in early December 1620. Univ. Chicago, Bacon Pprs. 4205A; APC, 1613-14, p. 265; 1615-16, p. 644; 1616-17, p. 29; 1619-21, p. 180. Knowing that he faced tough competition from Sir Hamon L’Estrange* of Hunstanton, he attempted to conceal the writ and keep the day of the election a secret, but to no avail as he was defeated. Norf. RO, Walsingham (Merton) XVII/2, 410X5, f. 31. He remained involved in local affairs, albeit increasingly as an advisor to his grandson and heir, Sir Roger Townshend*. In April 1622 he responded wearily to the Privy Council’s instructions for the collection of the Palatinate Benevolence, remarking that ‘it will be some labour to effect this if it be performed accordingly’. HMC Townshend, 20.

Bacon died in early November 1622, and was buried at Stiffkey on the same day as his eldest daughter, Anne Townshend. Despite wishing for ‘peace and quietness after my death between my wife and children’, bitter legal disputes ensued over the division of his estates. PROB 11/141, ff. 12v-15; C2/Jas.I/B6/78; 2/Jas.I/B41/37; WARD 10/24, unfol. To his widow he left Irmingland, noting that ‘besides I have given my wife £400 a year more that I assured her before marriage ... I hope that God may turn the heart of my wife not to wrong me’. She resided at King’s Lynn until her death in August 1629, when she was buried with her first husband at Great Cressingham. Key, 80. Stiffkey Hall passed to Townshend, who had already begun the construction of his own mansion at Raynham, where Bacon’s papers were eventually housed. A late-seventeenth century copy of a portrait thought to depict Bacon sometime between 1610 and 1615 survives at Gillingham Hall in Norfolk. Bacon’s life was also commemorated in an epitaph by William Camden. Bodl. Lat. Misc. e. 88, p. 43; Smith, County and Ct., facing p. 170.