and on 3 Aug. 1626 succeeded his brother as lord chamberlain of the household.
Like his brother, Montgomery interested himself in New England and other colonial settlements. He was a member of council for the Virginia Company in 1612, and was one of the incorporators of the North-West Passage Company (26 July 1612), and of Guiana, South America, 19 May 1626. He became a member of the East India Company in 1614 (Alexander Brown, Genesis of the United States, 1890, ii. 920). On 2 Feb. 1627-8 he received a grant of certain islands between 8 and 13 degrees of north latitude, called Trinidado, Tobago, Barbadoes, and Fonseca, with all the islets within ten leagues of their shores, on condition that a rent of a wedge of gold weighing a pound should be paid to the king or his heirs when he or they ‘came into those parts’ (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1627-8, p. 573). Montgomery's rights were soon disputed by James Hay, earl of Carlisle, who sent out ships to take possession of Barbadoes in 1629. In 1628 he was with Buckingham at Portsmouth, when the duke was assassinated by Felton, and protected Felton from the violence of the duke's retainers immediately after the murder. Two years later he became fourth earl of Pembroke, on the death (10 April 1630) of his brother William, the third earl [q. v.], and succeeded him as lord warden of the Stannaries (12 Aug. 1630). According to Clarendon, he extended the jurisdiction of that office ‘with great fury and passion,’ to the oppression of the people of Cornwall and Devonshire. The third earl had also been chancellor of Oxford University, and Philip desired to succeed to the dignity. His religious views, which do not seem to have much affected his conduct, inclined to Calvinism, and his candidature was opposed by Laud, who was elected by a narrow majority. He accompanied Charles to Oxford in August 1636, when Laud entertained the royal party, and until the civil war Pembroke entertained the king every summer at Wilton, where he was engaged in elaborate building operations, which greatly interested Charles. But Pembroke's rough manners continued to make him numerous enemies at court. In February 1634 he broke his staff over the back of Thomas May (Strafford Letters, i. 207). The queen disliked him, and he was generally credited with strong popular sympathies. When with the expedition against the Scots in 1639, he strongly recommended peace, and in 1640 was one of the commissioners appointed to negotiate a pacification with the Scots at Ripon. In October he, with two fellow-commissioners, Holland and Salisbury, laid before Charles at York the terms offered by the Scots and recommended their acceptance. The king directed Pembroke to return to London and raise 200,000l. to meet the expenses of the northern expedition.
Pembroke's alienation from the court was thenceforth rapid. At the elections to the Longparliament (November 1640) he used his influence to secure the return of many popular burgesses, and in 1641 he voted against Strafford. In the summer of 1641 he quarrelled violently with Lord Maltravers, son of the Earl of Arundel, while both were attending a committee of the House of Lords (cf. report of quarrel in Hist. MSS. Comm. 10th Rep. pt. vi. p. 143). The House of Lords committed the disputants to the Tower. The king resented Pembroke's attitude towards Strafford; the queen recommended his dismissal from the office of lord chamberlain, and in July 1641 advantage was taken of his recent outburst of temper to remove him from the post (23 July 1641). He was succeeded by the Earl of Essex. Pembroke thenceforth identified himself with the parliamentary opposition. Clarendon, who states that he had ‘a great kindness’ for the earl on account of civilities shown him in early life, attributes his action to cowardly fear that the royalists were a losing party and to the persuasions of his friend Lord Say. But he was chiefly influenced by personal pique, and the flattery of his new allies doubtless carried him further in opposition to the king than he at first intended (Clarendon, Hist. iii. 214, vi. 399-401). Before the end of the year the commons petitioned the king to appoint him lord steward, but the request was refused (December 1641).
On 9 March 1641-2 Pembroke and Holland were sent to the king at Royston to lay before him the parliament's ‘declarations of his misgovernments and actions.’ In July 1642 Hyde endeavoured to win him over to the king's cause, and Pembroke availed himself of the opportunity to send assurances of his loyalty to Charles (Clarendon StatePapers, ii. 144-9). In the same month Pembroke was nominated a member of the committee of safety. On 8 Aug. 1642 a parliamentary ordinance appointed him governor of the Isle of Wight in the place of the Earl of Portland, the king's governor. ‘Pembroke,’ says Clarendon, ‘kindly accepted the post as a testimony of their favour, and so got into actual rebellion, which he never intended to do’ (cf. his speech to citizens of London after Edgehill in Old Parl. Hist. xi. 481, 488). On 11 Nov. 1642 he and Northumberland, with three members of parliament, were deputed to present a petition to the king at Colnbrook, Buckinghamshire, entreating him to join
