Leonel Sharp

Leonel Sharp (1559 – 1631) was an English churchman and courtier, a royal chaplain and archdeacon of Berkshire, imprisoned for sedition in 1614. As a writer he took a strong anti-papal and anti-Spanish line.

He was second son of Robert Sharpe, a merchant, of London, and of Julian, eldest daughter of Sir Richard Mallorie, lord mayor. He entered Eton College in 1576, and proceeded as fellow to King's College, Cambridge. He graduated B.A. in 1581, M.A. in 1584, and received from the university the degree of D.D. before 1603.

In 1588 he was present at Tilbury camp in the capacity of chaplain to Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, and was chosen, as he states, to repeat Queen Elizabeth's oration to the whole army assembled there. In 1589 and in 1596 he accompanied Essex in his expeditions to Cadiz and Portugal. In 1590 Sharp became rector of Malpas, Cheshire, and in 1597 of Tiverton and Stoke-in-Teignhead in Devon. When Essex was executed for treason, Sharp was banished to his Devon parishes. In May 1601, in a letter to Robert Cecil, he excused himself, and was soon after appointed a royal chaplain. Sharp celebrated the commencement of James I's reign by a laudatory sermon on Solomon and the queen of Sheba, at St. Mary's. He obtained the patronage of Henry Howard, 1st Earl of Northampton. In 1605 he became archdeacon of Berkshire and rector of North Moreton in that county. He was also about this time appointed chaplain to Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, and addressed to him a congratulatory epistle to him on his escape from the Gunpowder Plot.

...
Wikipedia