# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Rush, Anthony

​RUSH, ANTHONY (1537–1577), dean of Chichester, born in 1537, was apparently son and heir of Arthur Rush of Sudborne, Suffolk, and grandson of Sir Thomas Rush of that place, who was knighted in 1533 for his services to Henry VIII (Metcalfe, Knights, p. 65; Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, ed. Gairdner, passim). The ‘Visitation of Essex’ in 1634 represents him as third son of Sir Thomas and brother of Arthur. Anthony was a ward of Thomas Wriothesley, earl of Southampton [q. v.], who bequeathed to him his leasehold estates in Suffolk. He was educated for seven or eight years at Canterbury grammar school, and was sent thence, at the charge of Nicholas Wotton, dean of Canterbury, to Oxford, where in July 1554 he was admitted probationer-fellow of Magdalen College. He graduated B.A. on 4 July 1555, and M.A. on 20 June 1558 (Boase, Reg. Univ. Oxon. i. 224). His views appear to have been protestant, and on 18 July 1557 he was ‘punished for disobedience to the vice-president,’ apparently in refusing to attend mass (Bloxam, Reg. Magdalen Coll. vol. ii. p. lx). In 1561 he was appointed master of Canterbury grammar school, and was licensed to preach by Archbishop Parker, which he did frequently in a florid style (Wood, i. 429). In 1565 he was made chaplain to Thomas Radcliffe, third earl of Sussex [q. v.], who presented him in the same year to the rectory of Woodham-Walter, Essex. On 29 July he was made canon of Windsor, and in the same year commenced D.D. at Cambridge, and was presented to the rectory of Calverton, Buckinghamshire. On 7 Feb. 1566–7 Sussex ineffectually recommended his promotion to the deanery of York, and in 1568 he was appointed chaplain to the queen, rector of Osgarwick, Kent, and canon of Canterbury. In 1569 he was presented to the rectory of St. Olave's, Southwark, and resigned the prebendal rectory of Brightling, Sussex, to which he had been appointed in 1565. On 10 June 1570 he was installed dean of Chichester. He died on 1 April 1577, and was buried in St. George's, Windsor, where a monument erected by his widow is still extant, with a memorial inscription. Archbishop Parker, writing to Cecil on 5 June 1566, declared Rush to be studious, and ‘his quality of utterance to be ready and apt’ (Parker Corresp. pp. 144, 283). He left no issue.
Rush was author of ‘A President for a Prince, wherein is to be seene by the testimonie of auncient writers the Duetie of Kings, Princes, and Governours, collected and gathered by Anthonie Rushe,’ London, 4to; licensed to H. Denham in 1566, and dedicated to Queen Elizabeth (Brit. Mus.).
[Lansd. MS. 981, f. 167; Strype's Works, passim; Cal. State Papers, Dom.; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. i. 429; Cooper's Athenæ Cantabr. i. 363–4, 565; Pote's Windsor, p. 367; Newcourt's Repertorium, ii. 685; Le Neve's Fasti, ed. Hardy, passim; Trevelyan Papers (Camden Soc.), pp. 211, 213, 216; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib.; Ames's Typogr. Antiq. ed. Herbert, pp. 1619, 1620; Arber's Transcript of Stationers' Reg. i. 329; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714; Visitation of Essex, 1634 (Harl. Soc.), p. 481; Metcalfe's Visitation of Suffolk, p. 63; Morant's Essex, ii. 300; Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. vi. 498.]
A. F. P.