Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 23.djvu/222

Grey was appointed to complete the delivery of Hume Castle. On the 28th he was knighted by the Protector Somerset at Berwick. The protector returned to England, and Grey was left as governor of Berwick, warden of the east marches, and general of the northern parts. On 18 April 1548 Grey and Sir Thomas Palmer again crossed the border, and advanced to Haddington, which they took and elaborately fortified. After spending six weeks in improving the defences of the place, they left a garrison of 2,500 men in charge and departed. Firing Dalkeith, and wasting the country for six miles round Edinburgh at their leisure, they fell back upon Berwick.

Upon the commotions of July 1549, Grey was despatched at the head of fifteen hundred horse and foot into Oxfordshire, where he immediately restored tranquillity, though not without using considerable severity against the priests. He then marched into the west country,and joining the Earl of Bedford, rendered signal service in the pacification of Devonshire and Cornwall. In 1551 Grey was committed to the Tower as one of the partisans of the Duke of Somerset, but after the execution of the protector was set at liberty. Having recovered the royal favour, Grey was appointed governor of the castle of Guisnes in Picardy. Upon the death of Edward VI, Grey joined the Duke of Northumberland in his abortive attempt to place Lady Jane Grey upon the throne. The movement in favour of Lady Jane collapsed, and on 21 and 22 July 1553 Grey and other compromised persons obtained pardon. Nevertheless an act of attainder was passed.

A few days after his submission Grey received a commission to array 350 footmen and fifty horsemen demi-lances in the counties of Middlesex and Kent, and the city of London, for the garrison of Guisnes. When war was formally declared by the French in 1557, Guisnes was so poorly garrisoned that Grey reported that unless he was reinforced he was at the mercy of the enemy. A small detachment was sent over; but although Grey had more than a thousand men, a part only of these were English, the rest being Burgundians and Spanish. By the middle of winter moreover there was a scarcity of food at Guisnes and Calais. On 1 Dec. Grey announced a successful expedition for the destruction of a French detachment. 'The commander of Guisnes was a fierce, stern man,' says Froude, 'and his blood being hot he blew up the church of Bushing, with the steeple thereof, and all the French soldiers entrenched there perished.' A formidable French force having appeared at Abbeville on 22 Dec., Grey and Wentworth wrote an urgent joint letter to the queen. Orders were at length given for reinforcements, but these were foolishly countermanded on a report that the alarm was ill-founded. The French appeared under the walls of Guisnes on the 31st; Calais was invested on 1 Jan. 1557-8. Grey made a brave effort to save Guisnes. On the night of the 4th he sent a letter urgently begging for reinforcements. But Calais fell on 6 Jan. All the English counties were thereupon called on by proclamation to contribute their musters. Thirty thousand men were rapidly on their way to the coast, and on the 10th came the queen's command for the army to cross to Dunkirk, join the Duke of Savoy, and save Guisnes. But severe weather was experienced in the Channel, and the fleet was either destroyed or dispersed. Meanwhile Guisnes was left to its fate. Grey, with his eleven hundred men, abandoned the town, burnt the houses, and withdrew into the castle. The French, under the Duke of Guise, bombarded the place, and on the third day (19 Jan.) attempted a storm. Grey was wounded by accidentally treading on a sword, and the first line of defence was taken. His soldiers refused to fight longer, and Grey was soon forced to surrender.

The Duke of Guise transferred Grey to Marshal Stozzy, who in turn passed his prisoner to Count Rouchefoucault, and he remained in captivity until ransomed by the payment of twenty thousand crowns, which considerably impaired his fortune, and entailed the selling of his ancient castle of Wilton-upon-Wye. Grey was elected a knight of the Garter in April 1558; but being then a prisoner in France, Garter king-at-arms was sent to notify his election. He was installed on 19 April 1558 by his proxy, Sir Humphrey Ratclyffe. On an extension of the armistice with France in January 1559, Grey was sent over to England with proposals for a secret peace. Grey received summonses as a peer of parliament from Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary, and Elizabeth. But his honours, which were forfeited by the Act of Attainder of 1553, were not fully restored till after Elizabeth's accession (1558).

In December 1559 Grey was constituted governor of Berwick, warden of the middle marches towards Scotland, and warden of Tynedale and Ryddesdale. He went down to the border with two thousand men nominally to reinforce the Berwick garrison, but at first with large latitude of action. He was soon made general of the English army sent 'in aid of the Scots against the French, who had made an invasion there with great forces.' On 28 March 1560 Grey, with Lord Scrope, Sir Henry Percy, and others, crossed the