the peace of Troyes was signed between England and France. Smith remained two years longer in France, following the court. In May 1564 he set out to visit Geneva; in November he was at Tarascon, and in January 1564–5 was ill at Toulouse. He returned to England in May 1566. Between three and four hundred letters from him describing his embassy are calendared among the foreign state papers, and these are supplemented by numerous references in the ‘Lettres de Catherine de Médicis,’ 5 vols., printed in ‘Collection de Documents inédits,’ 1880–95. On 22 March 1566–7 Smith was again sent to France to make a formal demand for the surrender of Calais, returning in June.
After an ineffectual suit for the chancellorship of the duchy of Lancaster, which was given to Sir Ralph Sadler [q. v.], and after spending three years in retirement in Essex, Smith was on 5 March 1570–1 readmitted a member of the privy council. In the autumn of that year he was commissioned to inquire into the conspiracy of the Duke of Norfolk, and in the examination of two of the duke's servants torture was used, much to Smith's disgust. Early in 1572 Smith was once more sent as ambassador to France to discuss the marriage of D'Alençon with Elizabeth, and the formation of a league against Spain. During his absence he was in April made chancellor of the order of the Garter in succession to Burghley, and on the 15th of that month was elected knight of the shire for Essex. Soon after his return he was on 13 July appointed secretary of state. In the same year he persuaded Elizabeth to send help to the Scottish protestants. During the following years, besides his official work, Smith was engaged in his project for a colony at Ards, co. Down (cf. A Letter … wherein is a large discourse of the peopling … the Ardes … taken in hand by Sir T. Smith, 1572), and his experiments for transmuting iron into copper. For the latter purpose he formed a company, called the ‘Society of the New Art,’ which was joined by Burghley and Leicester, but was soon abandoned, after involving all the parties in considerable loss. In 1575 he accompanied the queen in her progress, and in the same year procured an act ‘for the better maintenance of learning’ (Fuller, Hist. Cambr. p. 144). His health failed in March 1575–6, when his attendance at the council ceased, and he died at Theydon Mount, Essex, on 12 Aug. 1577. He was buried in the chancel of the parish church, where a monument was raised to his memory, with inscriptions printed by Strype. By his will, dated 18 Feb. 1576–7, and printed in Strype, he left his library (of which Strype prints a catalogue) to Queens' College, Cambridge, to which he had in 1573 given an annuity for the maintenance of two scholars. Verses to Smith are in Leland's ‘Encomia’ (p. 87), and Gabriel Harvey [q. v.], apparently a kinsman, published in 1578 a laudatory poem on him, entitled ‘Gabrielis Harveii Valdinatis Smithus vel Musarum Lachrymæ pro obitu clarissimi Thomæ Smyth’ (cf. Harvey's Letter-book, Camden Soc. 1884).
A portrait of Smith, by Holbein, is at Theydon Mount, and a copy made in 1856 by P. Fisher was presented to Eton College by Lady Bowyer Smijth. An engraving by Houbraken was prefixed to Birch's ‘Lives,’ another by James Fittler, A.R.A., after a drawing by William Skelton, to Strype's Life, 1820, and a third to Gabriel Harvey's ‘Lachrymæ pro Obitu,’ 1578. Another portrait is at Queens' College, Cambridge.
Smith was twice married, first, on 15 April 1548, to Elizabeth, daughter of William Carkek or Carkyke, who, born on 29 Nov. 1529, died without issue in 1552; and, secondly, on 23 July 1554, to Philippa, daughter of John Wilford of London, and widow of Sir John Hampden (d. 21 Dec. 1553) of Theydon Mount, Essex; she survived him, dying without issue in 1584. Smith's principal heir was his nephew William (d. 1626), son of his brother George, a draper of London. It has been suggested that he was the ‘W. Smithe’ to whom has been attributed the authorship of ‘A Discourse of the Common Weal,’ 1581; but there is no evidence to support the conjecture (Lamond, Discourse, p. 35; cf. art. Stafford, William, (1554–1612)). William's son Thomas was created a baronet in 1661, and was ancestor of the present baronet, whose family adopted the spelling Smijth. Sir Thomas's illegitimate son Thomas, born on 15 March 1546–7, accompanied his father on his French embassies, and was subsequently placed in charge of his father's colony at Ards, where he was killed, in an encounter with the Irish, on 18 Oct. 1573, leaving no issue.
Smith has generally been considered one of the most upright statesmen of his time. He adhered to moderate protestant views consistently through life, and his fidelity to Somerset is in striking contrast with the conduct of most of his contemporaries. That his morals were somewhat lax is proved by his confession that his illegitimate son was born just a year after he took priest's orders. He shared the prevailing faith in astrology, a volume of his collections on which subject is extant in Addit. MS. 325. Nor was he quite free from the prevailing
