Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 1.djvu/29

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THE FOUNDERS
15

an account of his voyage of 1595 to Guiana in 1596, and sent a voyage there under Captain Keymis, and another under Berry. 1596-97; in 1597 he sailed on the celebrated voyage to the Azores; member of parliament for Dorset 1597-98; governor and captain of Jersey, August 26. 1600: member of parliament for Cornwall, 1600-1601; sends Mace on a voyage to America and his nephew Bartholomew Gilbert, 1602; gives permission to Martin Pring to make a voyage in 1603; upon the accession of King James he lost his influence at Court, was stripped of his preferments, and accused, tried and condemned for high treason, as a participator in Lord Cobham's plot for placing Lady Arabella Stuart on the throne; was confined in the Tower from 1603 to January 30, 1616, during which time he wrote "The History of the World." down to the end of the Macedonian war. B.C. 167; in 1616 he was temporarily released by the King and sent to find a gold mine in Guiana; when he returned empty handed he was arrested on the complaint of the Spanish ambassador and sentenced to death, and executed October 29, 1619, on the verdict of the jury seventeen years before, now recognized to have been based on charges trumped up by political enemies. He was buried in St. Margaret's, Westminster. He was the most accomplished gentleman of his age, and to him is due more than any other man the popularizing of colonization. He introduced into general use the potato, which he planted on his estate in Ireland, and tobacco, which he taught the courtiers to smoke. He left an only surviving son. Carew Raleigh, who was a member of the Virginia Company of London, April 2, 1623.

Amidas, Philip, said to have been born at Hull. England, 1550; was sent by Raleigh with Arthur Barlow to explore the coast of North Carolina or Virginia. He left the west of England, April 27, 1584. visited North Carolina and explored Pamlico Sound, which he found dotted with many islands, the largest of which was Roanoke. When he returned and reported his new discovery, the Queen called the country in honor of herself. Virginia. He died in 1618.

Barlow. Arthur, employed by Sir Walter Raleigh with Philip Amidas to lead an exploring expedition to North Carolina in 1584.

Grenville, Sir Richard, son of Sir Roger Grenville, and his wife Thomasine, daughter of Thomas Cole, Esq., of Slade, in Devonshire, was born in 1540, and at an early age acquired much distinction in fighting the Turks; member of parliament for Cornwall, 1571, and for Launceston. 1572-83; knighted at "Windesore," in 1577; sheriff of Cornwall, 1578; became greatly interested in foreign discoveries; aided Raleigh in sending out Amidas and Barlow to America. 1584; member of parliament for Cornwall, 1584-85, and served on committee for conferring Raleigh's patent of colonization; took the first colony to Virginia, April to October, 1585; went on a second voyage bringing supplies. April to December, 1586; took Spanish prizes on each voyage; member of council of war to resist the Spanish Armada, 1587, and fought in the great sea fight 1588; 1591, vice-admiral of the fleet under Sir Thomas Howard, and lost his life in a sea fight near the Azores, in which his single ship withstood for many hours five Spanish galleons supported at intervals by ten others. An old chronicler asserts that it was "the stoutest sea fight ever waged." He married Mary, daughter of Sir John St. Leger, and their eldest son was Bernard Grenville.