Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 58.djvu/246

 dawn on the morning of 13 May 1625. The English marched along the dyke with dauntless resolution, threw in fireballs, and after a sharp engagement captured the redoubt. Spinola thereupon sent strong reinforcements to the threatened point, and, after a gallant struggle and incurring a very heavy loss, the English were forced to retire, which they did in perfect order (cf., Relation of the Famous Siege of Breda, Delft, 1637; cf. Egerton MS. 2596, f. 163). Upon his return to England that summer Vere, who now stood head and shoulders above any living Englishman in military reputation, was created Baron Vere of Tilbury (24 July 1624). The supporters granted to the peerage were dexter, a boar azure with a shield of the arms of Holland round its neck, and sinister, a harpy with a shield of the arms of Zeeland.

His next enterprise in the Netherlands was in connection with the siege of Bois-le-Duc, one of the chief military positions in Brabant, undertaken by Prince Frederic Henry in April 1629. A large number of Englishmen who were afterwards distinguished served under Vere in the trenches at Bois-le-Duc, among them Thomas Fairfax and Philip Skippon, the future organisers of the 'new model,' Jacob Astley, Thomas Glemham, the future royalist generals, Sir John Borlase, and Henry Hexham, the historian of the Dutch wars (see his Relation of the Famous Siege of Busse [Dutch 's Hertogenbosch, shortened sometimes to 's Bosch], Delft, 1630), who had learned the military art while a page to Sir Francis Vere at Ostend. Vere's distant kinsman, Sir Edward Vere, was mortally wounded in the lines on 18 Aug., a few weeks before the place was finally surrendered. Two months previously a false report had reached London that Lord Vere himself was killed. The services of the Veres in the Netherlands were closed by the siege of Maastricht, May-August 1632. Vere commanded a powerful brigade, and posted his headquarters opposite the Brussels Gate. Among those killed during the operations were Vere's kinsman, Robert, nineteenth earl of Oxford, and Sergeant-major Williamson, while among the wounded were his nephew, Sir Simon Harcourt [q. v.], and Sir Thomas Holles.

After the surrender of Maastricht, Vere returned to England. While dining with Sir Harry Vane, The Hague envoy and his diplomatic friend, at Whitehall on 2 May 1635, he was seized with an apoplectic fit and died within two hours (Strafford Letters, i. 423); he was sixty-nine at the time, and had been in good health previously, but 'no doubt,' says Fuller (Worthies, p. 331), 'he was well prepared for death, seeing such was his vigilancy that never any enemy surprised him in his quarters.' He was buried with military pomp on 8 May in Westminster Abbey, where the same tomb serves for him and his brother, Sir Francis. With his death the barony of Vere of Tilbury became extinct (, Ext. Peerage, p. 553).

Vere married, in October 1607, Mary, daughter of Sir William Tracy, kt., of Toddington, Gloucestershire, and widow of William Hoby. He left issue five daughters, who were his coheirs: (1) Elizabeth, who married John Holles, second earl of Clare [q. v.], grandfather of the first Duke of Newcastle; (2) Mary, who married, first, Sir Roger Townshend, bart., of Raynham in Norfolk, whence are descended the Marquises of Townshend, and secondly, Mildmay Fane, second earl of Westmorland [q. v.]; (3) Catherine, who married, first, Oliver St. John of Lydiard Tregoze (Bolingbroke was thus her great-grandson), and, secondly, John, lord Paulet; (4) Anne, who married Sir Thomas (afterwards Lord) Fairfax [q. v.]; and (5) Dorothy, who married John Wolstenholme, eldest son of Sir John Wolstenholme, bart., of Nostell, Yorkshire (see, Ext. Baronetage, 1844, pp. 578–9). Lady Vere continued to live at Clapton until the death of the widow of Lord Vere's eldest brother, John, when she succeeded to Kirby Hall, where she died on Christmas eve 1670, aged 90. For a short while in the spring of 1645, after the death of the Countess of Dorset, the king's children, Elizabeth and Henry, duke of Gloucester, were entrusted to her care. The old lady, whose religious views, according to Clarendon, were of a Dutch complexion, was much in the parliament's favour; but she was by no means ambitious of the charge, despite the handsome allowance, and managed to transfer it to the Earl and Countess of Northumberland (, Princesses, vi. 335 sq.)

Vere, according to Fuller, had 'more meekness and as much valour as his brother; as for his temper, it was true of him what is said of the Caspian Sea, that it doth never ebb nor flow, observing a constant tenor neither elated or depressed.' While Sir Francis was held in awe, Sir Horace is said to have been loved by his men (Biogr. Brit.), and his manner was characterised by a courtierlike deference which was lacking in his brother. Prince Maurice extended to him a cordial friendship in place of the profound though cold respect he had entertained for