William Monson ( Royal Navy officer ) Sir William Monson ( 1569 – February 1643 ) was an English admiral and politician who sat in the House of Commons in 1601 and 1626 . Life . Monson was the third son of Sir John Monson of South Carlton , Lincolnshire . He matriculated at Balliol College , Oxford , on 2 May 1581 at the age of 14 . Monson ran away to sea in 1585 , being then according to his own account sixteen . His first services were in a privateer in an action with a Spanish ship in the Bay of Biscay , of which he gives an account in his Naval Tracts . In the Armada year he served as Lieutenant of the " Charles , " a small ship of the Queen ' s . There being at that time no regular naval service , Monson is next found serving with the adventurous Earl of Cumberland ( 1558 – 1605 ) , whom he followed in his voyages of 1589 , 1591 and 1593 . During the second of these ventures Monson was taken prisoner by the Spaniards in a recaptured prize after an engagement off Berlengas Islands , and was for a time detained at Lisbon in captivity . He was awarded MA at Oxford on 9 July 1594 and was also a student of Gray ' s Inn in 1594 . His cruises must have brought him some profit , for in 1595 he was able to marry . The Earl offended him by showing favour to another follower , and Monson turned elsewhere . In the expedition to Cádiz in 1596 , he commanded the " Repulse " . From this time till the conclusion of the war with Spain he was in constant employment . He was knighted at the sacking of Cadiz in 1596 . In 1602 he carried out one of the last expeditions of Queen Elizabeth by defeating a Spanish and Portuguese fleet at Sesimbra Bay off Lisbon capturing a rich large carrack . He also took prisoner the same man who captured Monson at Berlengas nearly 10 years earlier . Monson was elected Member of Parliament for Malmesbury in 1601 . In 1602 he commanded the last squadron fitted out in the reign of Queen Elizabeth . In 1604 he was appointed Admiral of the Narrow Seas , the equivalent of the Channel Fleet of modern times . In 1614 he was sent to the coasts of Scotland and Ireland to repress the pirates who then swarmed on the coast . Monson claimed to have extirpated these pests , but it is certain that they were numerous a generation later . After 1614 he saw no further active service till 1635 . He was elected MP for Reigate in 1626 . In 1635 he went to sea as vice - admiral of the fleet fitted out by King Charles I with the first ship money . He spent the last years of his life in writing his " Tracts " . Monson died in February 1643 and was buried at St Martin in the Fields . Legacy . His claim to be remembered is not based on his services as a naval officer , though they were undoubtedly honourable , but on his " Tracts " . These treatises consist in part of historical narratives , and in part of argumentative proposals for the reform of abuses , or the development of the naval resources of the country . They form by far the best account by a contemporary of the naval life and transactions of the reign of Elizabeth I and the beginning of the reign of King James . Monson takes care to do himself full justice , but he is not unfair to his contemporaries . His style is thoroughly modern , and has hardly a trace of the poetry of the Elizabethans . He was the first naval officer in the modern sense of the word , a gentleman by birth and education who was trained to the sea , and not simply a soldier put in to fight , with a sailing master to handle the ship for him , or a tarpaulin who was a sailor only . The one authority for the life of Sir William Monson is his own " Tracts " , but a very good account of him is included by Southey in his " Lives of the Admirals " , vol . v . The Tracts were first printed in the third volume of Churchill ' s " Voyages " , but they have been edited for the Navy Record Society by Mr Oppenheim . Family . Monson ' s elder brother , Sir Thomas Monson ( 1564 – 1641 ) , was one of James I ' s favourites , and was made a baronet in 1611 . He held a position of trust at the Tower of London , a circumstance which led to his arrest as one of the participators in the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury . He was , however , soon released . His eldest son was Sir John Monson , Bart . ( 1600 – 1683 ) , a member of parliament under Charles I , and another son was Sir William Monson ( c . 1607 - 1678 ) , who was created an Irish peer as Viscount Monson of Castlemaine in 1628 . Having been a member of the court which tried Charles I the viscount was deprived of his honours and was sentenced to imprisonment for life in 1661 . Sir John Monson ' s descendant , another Sir John Monson , Bart . ( 1693 – 1748 ) , was created Baron Monson in 1728 . His youngest son was George Monson ( 1730 – 1776 ) , who served with the English troops in India from 1758 to 1763 . The baron ' s eldest son was John , the 2nd baron ( 1727 – 1774 ) , whose son William Monson ( 1760 – 1807 ) served in the Mahratta War under General Lake . William ' s only son William John ( 1796 – 1862 ) became 6th Baron Monson in succession to his cousin Frederick John , the 5th baron , in October 1841 . His son William John , the 7th baron ( 1829 – 1898 ) , was created Viscount Oxenbridge in 1886 . When he died without sons in 1898 the viscounty became extinct , but the barony descended to his brother Debonnaire John ( 1830 – 1900 ) , whose son Augustus Debonnaire John ( b . 1868 ) became 9th Baron Monson in 1900 . Another of Viscount Oxenbridge ' s brothers was Sir Edmund John Monson , Bart . ( b . 1834 ) , who , after filling many other diplomatic appointments , was British ambassador in Paris from 1896 to 1904 .