Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 27.djvu/257

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friends included Bishops Henchman and Morley, and Pepys. The latter spoke of him as 'a good-natured but very weak man,' 'a simple priest, though a good well-meaning man, yet a dean and a man in great esteem' (Diary, 29 June, 6 Aug. 1664). Dr. Crackenthorpe [q. v.], another friend, gratefully records help received from him in his work on logic (cf. an autograph letter in a presentation copy of the book in Lincoln Cathedral Library). Honywell died unmarried at his deanery on 7 Dec. 1681, aged 85. Walker describes him as 'a holy and humble man, and a living library for learning.' He gave 100l. towards the rebuilding of St. Paul's Cathedral.

[Dibdin's Bibl. Decam. iii. 261; Nichols's Leicestershire, vol. iii. pt. ii. pp. 851, 856; Kennett, Lansdowne MS. 257 No. 14, p. 21; Kennett's Register, p. 237; Proceedings of Cambr. Ant. Soc. ii. 155; Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy; Pepys's Diary, 11. cc.]

E. V.


HONYWOOD, Sir ROBERT (1601–1686), politician and translator, born at Hollingbourn, Kent, on 3 Aug. 1601, was eldest son of Sir Robert Honywood of Pett's Court, in the parish of Charing, Kent, and of Alice, daughter of Sir Martin Barnham of Hollingbourn. He served on the continent in the wars of the Palatinate, having the rank of colonel, and became steward to the queen of Bohemia, who in her letters refers to him as Sir Robin. He was knighted on 15 June 1625. In May 1659 he was among those appointed to the council of state who had not seats in parliament, and in the following July, with Thomas Boone, Edward Montague, and Algernon Sidney, he was sent on an embassy to Sweden. At the Restoration (May 1660) he obeyed the royal proclamation recalling him. In 1673 he translated and published (London, fol.) ‘The History of the Affairs of Europe to this present Age, but more particularly of the Republick of Venice, written in Italian by Battista Nani.’ In the dedication to his ‘Dear Brother’ Sir Walter Vane the translator says that ‘the circumstances of an uncomfortable old age and ruined fortunes,’ brought about ‘rather by public calamity than private vice or domestick prodigality,’ have induced him to undertake the work of translation; the allusion may be to the troubles of his son, who failed to obey the proclamation of April 1666 recalling Englishmen who were serving in the army of Holland, and lost his property at Charing in consequence. Honywood was married to Frances, daughter of Sir Henry Vane, by whom he had nine sons and seven daughters. He died on 15 April 1686, and was buried at Charing, where a monument commemorates himself and his wife, who survived till 17 Feb. 1687–8.

[Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. iv. 322; Cal. of State Papers, Dom. passim; Whitelocke's Mem. 678, 680, 698; P. Parsons's Monuments of Kent, p. 121; Hasted's Hist. of Kent, iii. 212; Collins's English Baronetage, 1741, iii. 1, 106.]

R. B.


HONYWOOD, Sir THOMAS (1586–1666), parliamentarian, born at Betchworth Castle in Surrey on 15 Jan. 1586, was son of Robert Honywood (d. 1627) of Charing in Kent and Marks Hall in Essex, by his second wife, Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Thomas Browne of Betchworth (d. 1631). Michael Honywood [q. v.] was a younger brother. An elder half-brother Robert inherited from the father Charing and his Kent estate, Thomas taking Marks Hall, where he chiefly lived. He was knighted in 1632.

When the civil war broke out, Honywood sided with the puritans, and Marks Hall became a headquarters for the roundheads in Essex. Throughout 1643 he, with other deputy-lieutenants, was busily raising troops for the parliament, and carrying out the orders of the leaders in London (cf. the correspondence preserved among the manuscripts of Mr. G. A. Lowndes, App. to 7th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm. pp. 551–66). In 1648, with Colonel Whalley and two thousand horse and foot of the district, he effected a junction with Fairfax, advanced upon Colchester, and was present at its surrender on 27 Aug. In the course of the next year Honywood and Colonel Cooke received orders to dismantle the fortifications of the town, which they did not obey.

On 21 Jan. 1650 a commission was granted to Honywood to be colonel of a regiment of foot for the eastern division of Essex; in December of the same year he again garrisoned Colchester, and on 19 Feb. following he had a commission as captain of horse. In March 1651, while in Colchester, he probably had to meet large expenses out of his own estate, and wishing to send away the garrison, he was met by a refusal from the council on the ground that the fortifications had not been dismantled, as had long ago been ordered. When, however, on 5 July he certified that the place could no longer be held by troops, he was allowed to dismiss the soldiers. The same year Honywood hurried from Essex with all the troops he could gather, in company with Colonel Clarke, to Worcester, where he took part in the battle at the head of his Essex regiment. After the battle Honywood and his Essex friend, Colonel Cooke, passed through Oxford, and were created doctors of civil law.