EDGECOMBE, Richard II (c.1570-1639), of Mount Edgcumbe and Cotehele, Cornw.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1558-1603, ed. P.W. Hasler, 1981
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

1589
1614

Family and Education

b. c.1570, 1st s. of Peter Edgecombe. educ. M. Temple 1585. m. (1) 1602 (with £2,000), Anne, da. of George Carey of Cockington, Devon, s.p. (2) 1608, Mary, da. of Sir Thomas Coteele of London, 3s. Kntd. 1603; suc. fa. 1608.

Offices Held

Biography

The family standing was sufficient to obtain Edgecombe his borough seats. His father was still steward of Liskeard in 1586, and Totnes had until 3559 been owned by the family outright. There is no definite information about Edgecombe’s parliamentary career in the parliamentary journals. In 1593 a ‘Mr. Edgecombe’ served on three committees. It is probable that Richard, rather than his father Peter, served on at least the legal committee on 27 Feb. by virtue of his legal training. Edgecombe did something to repair the family fortunes through his marriages. Some six months before his first, his sister Margaret Denny, a lady-in-waiting, wrote from the court:

The gentlewoman, though she wants beauty, yet God had instead given her many better parts, for ... she is ... a good housewife and very wary in her expenses.

Edgecombe died 23 Mar. 1639, his inquisition post mortem being taken at Exeter 9 Aug. His heir was his son Piers.

Vis. Cornw. (Harl. Soc. ix), 64; Vivian, Vis. Cornw. 142; W. H. Edgcumbe, Edgcumbe Fam. Recs. 130-9; Roberts thesis; HMC 15th Rep. VII, 38; C142/579/52; D’Ewes, 476, 499, 509, 510.

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: P. W. Hasler

Notes