# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Scrope, Henry le (1534-1592)

​SCROPE, HENRY le, ninth Baron Scrope of Bolton (1534–1592), was the second and eldest surviving son of John le Scrope, eighth baron (d. 1549), who had been out in the pilgrimage of grace, by Catherine, eldest daughter of Henry Clifford, first earl of Cumberland. John le Scrope, fifth baron Scrope of Bolton [q. v.], was his great-great-grandfather. Born in 1534, Scrope acted as marshal of the army which Elizabeth sent in March 1560 to assist the Scottish protestants in the siege of Leith. Two years later he was appointed governor of Carlisle and warden of the west marches, offices which he held to the end of his life. He served as the intermediary in Elizabeth's secret intrigues against the regent Moray in 1567. When next year the news of Mary Stuart's flight and warm reception at Carlisle reached Elizabeth, Scrope, then in London, was at once ordered back to his post, in company with Sir Francis Knollys [q. v.], to take charge of the too fascinating fugitive. The border position of Carlisle necessitated her removal on 13 July to Scrope's castle at Bolton in Wensleydale, ‘the highest walled castle’ Knollys ‘had ever seen.’ Here she prepared her defence with Lesley and Melville, and received encouraging messages from the Duke of Norfolk through his sister, Lady Scrope, who seems also to have conveyed to her the suggestion of a marriage with Norfolk. On 26 Feb. 1569 Mary was removed to Tutbury. Lady Scrope's relationship to Norfolk, the proximity of Bolton to Scotland, and the catholicism of the neighbouring families, made it an unsafe place of keeping. Local tradition asserts that Mary once escaped and got as far as what is now known as the ‘Queen's Gap’ on Leyburn Shawl before she was overtaken. A few months later the Earls of Northumberland and Westmorland made their ill-starred attempt to rescue her from Tutbury. Though the latter was his wife's brother-in-law, Scrope was active in the suppression of the rising, and forwarded to Cecil an appeal made by Westmorland in a letter to Lady Scrope (Cal. State Papers, 1566–79, p. 210). In the spring of 1570 he ravaged Eskdale and Annandale (Froude, ix. 266). He occurs as a member of the council of the north in 1574 (Cal. State Papers, p. 463), received the Garter on 23 April 1584, and retained the wardenship of the west marches until his death in 1592 (ib. 1591–4, p. 125; Camden, p. 468; Dugdale, i. 657). The date is sometimes—apparently incorrectly—given as 10 May 1591 (Belt, p. clxxxiii). At Bolton Hall are portraits of Scrope (æt. 22) and his two wives. He married, first, Mary (d. 1558), daughter of Edward, first baron North [q. v.], by whom he had a daughter Mary, who became the wife of William Bowes of Streatlam, near Barnard Castle; and, secondly, Margaret (d. 1592), daughter of Henry Howard, earl of Surrey [q. v.] the poet, by whom he left two sons, Thomas and Henry. Thomas (d. 1609) succeeded him ​as tenth baron, and was the father of Emmanuel Scrope (1584–1630), who was created earl of Sunderland on 19 June 1627, and, leaving no legitimate issue, was the last of his line. Some of the family estates passed to Lord Sunderland's illegitimate daughters, Mary, wife of Charles Paulet, first duke of Bolton [q. v.], and Elizabeth, wife of Thomas Savage, third earl Rivers.
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