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 buried in St. Edmund's, Lombard Street, on 10 Dec. 1558 (, Eccl. Mem. i. 22, ii. 174, Annals, i. 46; Cotton MS. Titus B. ii. f. 206; Cal. State Papers, For. 1547–53, p. 294; Acts P. C. 1554–6, p. 383; Notes and Queries, 8th ser. i. 23, 150). His son Sir Thomas owed his fortunes largely to his Lincolnshire neighbour, Sir William Cecil, who secured his appointment to the fourth stall in Worcester Cathedral in 1559, and sent him as travelling companion to his son Thomas (afterwards Marquis of Exeter). Many of Windebank's letters, describing his vain efforts to keep his charge straight and teach him French, and their travels in France and Germany during 1561 and 1562, are extant in the Record Office. He also took every opportunity of sending his patron lemon trees, myrtle trees, and tracts on canon and and civil law (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1547–1580, pp. 177–202). After his return he was made clerk of the signet, and occasionally acted as clerk of the privy council. He continued his friendly relations and correspondence with Burghley until the latter's death, and afterwards with Sir Robert Cecil (cf. Harl. MS. 6995, arts. 31, 39, 47, 49, letters wrongly ascribed to Sir Francis Windebank). He was knighted by James I on 23 July 1603, settled at Haines Hall, Berkshire, and died on 24 Oct. 1607. He left one son, Francis, and three daughters, of whom Mildred (d. 1630) married Robert Read of Linkenholt, Hampshire, and was mother of Thomas Read or Reade [q. v.] the royalist (Inq. post mortem, 6 James I, pt. ii. No. 200; Harl. MS. 1551, f. 57 b; Egerton Papers, pp. 134–5;, Gresham, i. 422 sqq.; Court and Times of James I, i. 175; Cal. State Papers, 1547–1610, passim; Cal. Hatfield MSS. vols. i–vii. passim).

Francis was baptised at St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, London, on 21 Aug. 1582 (Register, Harl. Soc., p. 15), and on 18 May 1599 matriculated from St. John's College, Oxford. He graduated B.A. on 26 Jan. 1601–2, and in the same year was entered a student in the Middle Temple. While at St. John's Windebank came much into contact with Laud, who exercised great influence upon his views and subsequent career. On 21 Feb. 1604–5 his father procured for him a grant of a clerkship of the signet, in reversion after Levinus Munck and Francis Gage, who themselves held only a reversionary interest in the office; and this somewhat distant prospect was no bar to a few years' sojourn on the continent. In the autumn of 1605 Windebank was at Paris, which he proposed to leave on 29 Jan. 1605–6 ‘to avoid the profligate English;’ the summer he spent in Germany, and the following winter in Italy; he was at Lucca in July 1607, and at Piacenza in October, returning to England in February 1607–8. Though the clerkship of the signet did not fall to him for some years, he was almost at once employed in that office. In 1629 he spoke of having served ‘nigh three apprenticeships’ (probably nearly twenty-one years) in the clerkship, and having passed through ‘the active and strict times of Lord Salisbury without check’ (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1628–9, p. 252), and he first got access to the king in 1611 (ib. 1611–18, p. 71). He was placed on the commission of the peace for Berkshire, and became clerk of the signet before 1624. He also served on various other commissions, in one of which George Wither [q. v.] was a colleague (12 Feb. 1627–8; ib. 1627–8, p. 557), and was able to befriend John Florio [q. v.] and Laud, who afterwards spoke of Windebank's ‘great love and care’ during his ‘great extremity,’ probably in 1614 (ib. 1619–23 p. 101, 1629–1631 p. 297).

Windebank's political importance had, however, been very slight, and the court was considerably surprised when, on 12 June 1632, Sir John Coke [q. v.] informed him that the king had ‘taken notice of his worth and long service,’ and selected him as Coke's colleague in the secretaryship in succession to Dudley Carleton, lord Dorchester [q. v.] He was sworn in ‘in the inner Star Chamber,’ took his seat at the council on the 15th, and was knighted on the 18th. Sir Thomas Roe [q. v.], himself a disappointed candidate, wrote, ‘There is a new secretary brought out of the dark.’ Windebank owed his appointment partly to Laud's friendship, but more to the influence of Richard Weston, first earl of Portland [q. v.], and Francis, lord Cottington [q. v.], with whose Spanish sympathies and Roman catholic tendencies he was in partial if not in full accord. The three formed an inner ring in the council, by whose advice Charles was mainly guided till 1640, and with whose help he frequently carried on negotiations unknown and in opposition to the rest of the council. He was one of those of whom Fontenay said in 1634, ‘L'interest les fait espagnolz, tirans plusieurs notables avantages du commerce et des passeports que le Cte d'Olivarès accorde aux marchands qui négotient pour eux’ (, v. 447). In 1633 he, Portland, and Cottington were appointed to negotiate in secret with the Spanish ambassador Necolalde (see Addit MS. 32093, ff. 57–91), and in March 1635 with Richelieu's envoy, the Marquis of Seneterre. On Port-