Thomas Sutton (1532 – 12 December 1611) was an English civil servant and businessman, born inKnaith, Lincolnshire. He is remembered as the founder of theLondon Charterhouse and ofCharterhouse School.
Sutton was the son of an official of the city of Lincoln, and was educated atEton College and atSt John's College, Cambridge.[1] For much of his life he held the prestigious role of Master of the Ordnance in the North, which meant that he was responsible for military supplies and fortification in the north of England. He also obtained the lease of the manors ofWhickham andGateshead, just south ofNewcastle, in 1578, and so gained much of his early wealth from the coal mines in the area and from the sale of this lease five years later.[2]
In 1582, he married Elizabeth, the daughter of John Gardiner ofChalfont St Giles, Bucks and the widow ofJohn Dudley ofStoke Newington. Dudley was a distant cousin of the earls ofWarwick andLeicester, who had amassed a considerable fortune[3] and this marriage more than doubled Sutton's annual rent income.[2]
Sutton's connections to the Dudley family were strong throughout his life. Early in his career, Sutton had held a post under the Earl of Warwick, who then helped him to the post of Master of Ordnance in the North in 1569, and the Earl of Leicester, a favourite ofElizabeth I, was instrumental in gaining Sutton the lease of Whickham and Gateshead.[2]
Sutton bought Howard House from theEarl of Suffolk, which occupied the site of a formerCarthusian Monastery on the outskirts of theCity of London. Although dissolved byHenry VIII, parts of the monastery still survived. Sutton also purchased the manor ofCastle Campes inCambridgeshire,[4] which had been in possession of thede Vere family[5] for over five hundred years, and, among other landholdings, he also owned the manors of Haddock, Littlebury, and Balsham, all nearSaffron Walden inEssex.[2]
In 1588 Sutton contributed £100 to defend the realm against theSpanish Armada, and it has been suggested he owned, and perhaps commanded,The Sutton, a barque of seventy tons and thirty men out ofWeymouth, which captured a Spanish vessel and her cargo (estimated value of £20,000).[6]
Later in his career, Sutton became one of the chief moneylenders in England, securing loans worth as little as a few shillings and as much as thousands of pounds to everyone from farmers to some of the most prominent courtiers, businesspeople, and politicians of his era, includingLord Burghley,Sir Edward Coke,Sir Percival Willoughby,Lord Compton, and theEarl of Sussex, among others, generally at the standard rate of ten percent per annum.[2]
Sutton died on 12 December 1611[7] at his house inHomerton.[8] He was then considered one of the richest individuals in England, with an estate worth approximately £4,836 per annum; and his accounts showed that he was personally worth over £50,000, mostly in the form of outstanding obligations and recognizances from the many people in debt to him. This immense wealth earned Sutton the nicknames among his contemporaries of "Croesus" and "Riche Sutton".[2]
Sutton left part of his fortune to be invested in establishing analmshouse for 80 impoverished gentlemen, combined with a school for 40 boys, on the site of his house offCharterhouse Square, on the outskirts of the City of London. This institution was to be named the Hospital of King James in Charterhouse, although it later became known asSutton's Hospital in Charterhouse. The almshouse survives on the original site; while the school, nowCharterhouse School, relocated toGodalming,Surrey, in 1872. The London buildings were badly damaged by bombs during theSecond World War, but were restored during the 1950s.
Sutton's personal arms, blazonedOr, on a chevron between three annulets gules three crescents of the field, are still used by the school.
John Aubrey is responsible for the almost certainly spurious legend that Sutton was the original of Volpone the fox inBen Jonson's playVolpone.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| People | |
| Other | |
