Family and Education

b. 1560, o.s. of Henry Fane I of Hadlow. educ. Brasenose, Oxf. 1577. m. (1) bef. June 1580, Mary, da. of Thomas Fane of Burston, Hunton, s.p.; (2) 21 Feb. 1585, Margaret (d. Aug. 1630), da. of Roger Twysden of East Peckham, at least 2s. 2da. suc. fa. June 1580.1

Offices Held

J.p. Kent from c.1592, q. by 1596.

Biography

Though still a minor when his father died in June. 1580, Fane was already married to a cousin, Mary Fane, whose father, Thomas, was appointed overseer of the young man’s estates, but not guardian of his person. In his will Fane’s father asked William Brooke alias Cobham, 10th Lord Cobham ‘to accept my son Henry Fane into his rule, order and government, until [he] shall accomplish the age of 22 years’. Cobham continued his favour towards the son, securing his return to Parliament for Hythe, a seat he had occupied himself before his elevation to the peerage. Fane’s only mention in the extant records of the 1593 Parliament is his request to depart before the end of the session (24 Nov.).2

Like his father before him, Fane was a soldier. He held a minor command in the camp at Tilbury in 1588, and in 1595 was an officer in the army sent to France to assist Henri IV. He died at Rouen on 14 Oct. 1596 aged 36, whether from wounds or disease is not known. ‘Like the good King Hezekiah’ he had ‘put his house in order’ before his departure. His will was made on 4 Sept. 1595, leaving £400 to each of his daughters when they married or came of age, some land to his younger son Ralph, and the rest of his property to his heir Henry. His second wife Margaret, a member of an old Kent family, was expecting a fifth child when the will was made; she was to live at Hadlow until the heir was 21. Fane’s past and present fathers-in-law were appointed overseers. In a codicil, added at Rouen the day before his death, he made provision for debts he owed to relatives.3

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: J.E.M.

Notes

• 1. Genealogist, n.s. xiii. 85, 86 table; C142/189/107.
• 2. PCC 6 Rowe; Townshend, Hist. Colls. 73.
• 3. Collins, Peerage, iv. 503; C142/246/128; PCC 45 Cobham.