Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 19.djvu/178

  till the cardinal's death in 1594. He strenuously opposed the policy adopted by Father Parsons in reference to English catholic affairs. An instance of this is recorded in the diary of Roger Baynes, a former secretary to Cardinal Allen: 'Father Parsons returned from Naples to Rome, 8 Oct. 1598. All the English in Rome came to the College to hear his reasons against Mr. Nicholas Fitzherbert,'

He never could be induced to take orders. When a proposal was made to the see of Rome in 1607 to send a bishop to England, Fitzherbert was mentioned by Father Augustine, prior of the English monks at Douay, as a person worthy of a mitre. Fitzherbert, however, deemed himself unworthy even of the lowest ecclesiastical orders (, Church Hist. ii. 159). While on a journey to Rome he was accidentally drowned in an attempt to ford a brook called La Pesa, a few miles south of Florence, on 6 Nov. 1612. He was buried in the Benedictine abbey at Florence.

His works are: 1. 'Ioannis Casæ Galathaevs, sive de Moribus, Liber Italicvs. A Nicolao Fierberto Anglo-Latine expressvs,' Rome, 1595, 8vo. Dedicated to Didacus de Campo, chamberlain to Clement VIII. Reprinted, together with the original Tuscan 'Trattato. . . cognominato Galateo ovvero de' Costumi, colla Traduzione Latina a fronte di Niccolò Fierberto,' Padua, 1728, 8vo. 2. 'Oxoniensis in Anglia Academiæ Descriptio,' Rome, 1602, 8vo, dedicated to Bernardinus Paulinus, datary to Clement VIII. Reprinted by Thomas Hearne in vol. ix. of Leland's 'Itinerary,' 1712. 3. 'De Antiquitate & Continuatione Catholicæ Religionis in Anglia, & de Alani cardinalis vita libellus,' Rome, 1608 and 1638, 8vo, dedicated to Pope Paul V. The biography was reprinted at Antwerp, 1621, 8vo, and in Knox's 'Letters and Memorials of Cardinal Allen,' 1882, pp. 3-20.

 FITZHERBERT, THOMAS (1552–1640), Jesuit, was the eldest son and heir of William Fitzherbert, esq., of Swynnerton, Staffordshire, by Isabella, second daughter and coheiress of Humphrey Swynnerton, esq., of Swynnerton. He was a grandson of Sir [q. v.], justice of the common pleas. Born at Swynnerton in 1552, he was sent either to Exeter or to Lincoln College, Oxford, in 1568. Having openly defended the catholic faith, he was obliged to live in concealment for two years, and being at last seized in 1572 he was imprisoned for recusancy. After his release he found it prudent to remove to London, where he was an active member of the association of young men founded by George Gilbert in 1580 for the assistance of the jesuits Parsons and Campion. In that year he married Dorothy, the only daughter of Edward East, esq., of Bledlow, Buckinghamshire. He retired with his wife to France in 1582. There he was 'a zealous solicitor' in the cause of Mary Queen of Scots. After the death of his wife, in 1588, he went to Spain, where, on the recommendation of the Duke of Feria, he received a pension from the king. His name is repeatedly mentioned in the letters and reports preserved among our State Papers. When on a visit to Brussels in 1595 he was charged before the state of Flanders with holding a correspondence with the English secretary of state, and with a design to set fire to the magazine at Mechlin, but was extricated by the Duke of Feria. In 1598 Fitzherbert and Father Richard Walpole were charged with conspiring to poison Queen Elizabeth. For this plot Edward Squire was condemned and executed.

After a brief stay at Milan in the service of the Duke of Feria, Fitzherbert proceeded to Rome, where he was ordained priest 24 March 1601-2. For twelve years he acted as agent at Rome for the English clergy. In 1606 he made a private vow to enter the Society of Jesus. In 1607, when the court of Rome had some thoughts of sending a bishop to England, Fitzherbert was on the list, with three other candidates. He resigned the office of agent for the clergy in consequence of the remonstrance of the archpriest [q. v.] and the rest of the body, who appointed Dr. Richard Smith, bishop of Chalcedon, to take his place. Dodd says 'they were induced to it by a jealousy of some long standing. They had discovered that Fitzherbert had constantly consulted Father Parsons and the Jesuits in all matters relating to the clergy, and that, too, contrary to the express order lately directed to the archpriest from Rome.'

In 1613 he carried into effect his vow to enter the order of Jesuits, and in 1616 was appointed superior of the English mission at Brussels, an office which he filled for two years. In 1618 he succeeded Father Thomas Owen as rector of the English College at Rome, and governed that establishment till March 1639, when he was succeeded by Father Thomas Leeds, alias Courtney. He died in the college on 7 Aug. (O.S.) 1640, and was buried in the chapel. 