Sir Walter Erle or Earle (22 November 1586 – 1 September 1665) was an English landowner and politician who sat in the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of ...

at various times between 1614 and 1648. He was a vigorous opponent of King Charles I in the

Parliamentary In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

cause both before and during the

English Civil War The English Civil War or Great Rebellion was a series of civil wars and political machinations between Cavaliers, Royalists and Roundhead, Parliamentarians in the Kingdom of England from 1642 to 1651. Part of the wider 1639 to 1653 Wars of th ...

Early life

Erle was the son of Thomas Erle of

Charborough Charborough is an historic former parish and Manorialism, manor in Dorset, England. It survives today as a hamlet, situated on an affluent of the River Stour, Dorset, River Stour, 6 miles west of Wimborne Minster, but without any of its former adm ...

Dorset Dorset ( ; Archaism, archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north and the north-east, Hampshire to the east, t ...

and his wife Dorothy Pole, daughter of William Pole of Columpton, Devon.John Burke ''A genealogical and heraldic history of the commoners of Great Britain, Volume 4''
/ref> He inherited the estate Charborough at the age of 11 on the death of his father. He matriculated at

Queen's College, Oxford The Queen's College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford, England. The college was founded in 1341 by Robert de Eglesfield in honour of Philippa of Hainault, queen of England. It is distinguished by its predominantly neoclassi ...

on 22 January 1602 aged 15. In 1604 he became a student of

Inner Temple The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, commonly known as the Inner Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court and is a professional association for barristers and judges. To be called to the Bar and practice as a barrister in England and Wa ...

. 'Alumni Oxonienses, 1500-1714: Eade-Eyton', Alumni Oxonienses 1500-1714: Abannan-Kyte (1891), pp. 440-479. Retrieved 9 December 2011
/ref> In 1614, Erle was elected Member of Parliament for

Poole Poole () is a coastal town and seaport on the south coast of England in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole unitary authority area in Dorset, England. The town is east of Dorchester, Dorset, Dorchester and adjoins Bournemouth to the east ...

. History of Parliament Online – Erle, Walter
/ref> He was knighted on 4 May 1616, and in 1618 served as

High Sheriff of Dorset The High Sheriff of Dorset is an ancient high sheriff title which has been in existence for over one thousand years. Until 1567 the Sheriff of Somerset was also the Sheriff of Dorset. On 1 April 1974, under the provisions of the Local Governmen ...

. Like many of the other leading citizens of Dorset, he was an early investor in projects to colonise

New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...

. He and his brother

Christopher Christopher is the English language, English version of a Europe-wide name derived from the Greek language, Greek name Χριστόφορος (''Christophoros'' or ''Christoforos''). The constituent parts are Χριστός (''Christós''), "Jesus ...

were both shareholders in the

Virginia Company The Virginia Company was an English trading company chartered by King James I on 10 April 1606 with the objective of colonizing the eastern coast of America. The coast was named Virginia, after Elizabeth I, and it stretched from present-day ...

in 1620, and he attended the meeting of that company on 21 May 1621. He was a friend of John White and became a founder member of the

Dorchester Company The Dorchester Company of Adventurers was a Joint Stock Company established in 1623 in England to enable the English colonisation of North America It was based in Dorchester, Dorset, near the English Channel, and was founded at the instigation of t ...

, being described as "Governor of the New England Plantation".Michael Russell ''Sir Walter Erle''
/ref>

Parliament and imprisonment

In 1621 Erle was re-elected MP for Poole and was elected again in 1624 and 1625. He was also one of the Justices of Peace for Dorset. In 1625, he was elected MP for

Lyme Regis Lyme Regis ( ) is a town in west Dorset, England, west of Dorchester, Dorset, Dorchester and east of Exeter. Sometimes dubbed the "Pearl of Dorset", it lies by the English Channel at the Dorset–Devon border. It has noted fossils in cliffs and ...

. Parliament was dissolved without voting subsidies to the Crown, and the King attempted to shore up the governmental finances by imposing forced loans on the gentry. Erle was one of the four men in Dorset who refused to pay and as a result he was summoned before the Council, and imprisoned for almost a year in the

Fleet Prison Fleet Prison was a notorious London prison by the side of the River Fleet. The prison was built in 1197, was rebuilt several times, and was in use until 1844. It was demolished in 1846. History The prison was built in 1197 off what is now ...

before he was able to obtain a writ of

habeas corpus ''Habeas corpus'' (; from Medieval Latin, ) is a legal procedure invoking the jurisdiction of a court to review the unlawful detention or imprisonment of an individual, and request the individual's custodian (usually a prison official) to ...

. On hearing the case, the judges upheld the prisoners' right to be released, setting a major legal precedent in the restriction of the Crown's autocratic powers. His brother Christopher took his seat at Lyme Regis in 1628.

Short and Long parliaments

After King Charles ruled without parliament for eleven years, Erle was elected MP for

in the

Short Parliament The Short Parliament was a Parliament of England that was summoned by King Charles I of England on 20 February 1640 and sat from 13 April to 5 May 1640. It was so called because of its short session of only three weeks. After 11 years of per ...

in April 1640. On the day after the dissolution of Parliament, he was one of the six men arrested on the King's orders under suspicion of treasonable correspondence with the Scots, with whom England was by this time at

war War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organi ...

. In November 1640, Erle was returned as MP for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis for the

Long Parliament The Long Parliament was an Parliament of England, English Parliament which lasted from 1640 until 1660, making it the longest-lasting Parliament in English and British history. It followed the fiasco of the Short Parliament, which had convened f ...

, and was appointed one of the managers of the prosecution in the impeachment of Strafford, but entrusted with proving the charge that Strafford had plotted to bring over the Irish army to suppress unrest in England he bungled his case so that the hearing was at first adjourned on the grounds that the "evidence was not ready" and then the article was in effect dropped altogether. This failure may have contributed significantly to the decision to abandon legal process and proceed against Strafford by

Act of Attainder A bill of attainder (also known as an act of attainder, writ of attainder, or bill of pains and penalties) is an act of a legislature declaring a person, or a group of people, guilty of some crime, and providing for a punishment, often without a ...

Civil War

On the outbreak of the Civil War, Erle became a Colonel in the Parliamentary army. He succeeded

John Pym John Pym (20 May 1584 – 8 December 1643) was an English politician and administrator who played a major role in establishing what would become the modern Westminster system, English Parliamentary system. One of the Five Members whose attempte ...

as Lieutenant of the Ordnance in 1643, and was also appointed military governor of Dorchester. However, when he led his forces to besiege

Corfe Castle Corfe Castle is a fortification standing above the Corfe Castle (village), village of the same name on the Isle of Purbeck peninsula in the English county of Dorset. Built by William the Conqueror, the castle dates to the 11th century and ...

in 1643 he was repulsed after six weeks having lost a hundred men, and he fled Dorchester by sea at the approach of a superior Royal army under

Lord Carnarvon Earl of Carnarvon is a title that has been created three times in British history. The current holder is George Herbert, 8th Earl of Carnarvon. The town and county in Wales to which the title refers are historically spelled Caernarfon, having b ...

. In 1645 he received the thanks of the Commons for deciphering some intercepted letters, and the following year was one of the four commissioners sent to negotiate peace with the King. He continued to sit in Parliament until 1648, when he was excluded in

Pride's Purge Pride's Purge is the name commonly given to an event that took place on 6 December 1648, when soldiers prevented members of Parliament considered hostile to the New Model Army from entering the House of Commons of England. Despite defeat in the ...

Later parliamentary career

Erle was returned as MP for

in 1654 for the

First Protectorate Parliament The First Protectorate Parliament was summoned by the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell under the terms of the Instrument of Government. It sat for one term from 3 September 1654 until 22 January 1655 with William Lenthall as the Speaker of the H ...

and in 1659 for the

Second Protectorate Parliament The Second Protectorate Parliament in England sat for two sessions from 17 September 1656 until 4 February 1658, with Thomas Widdrington as the Speaker of the House of Commons (United Kingdom), Speaker of the House of Commons. In its first sess ...

. In April 1660, he was elected again as MP for Poole in the Convention Parliament. Erle died at the age of 78.

Family

Erle married Ann Dymoke daughter of Francis Dymoke, and sister of Sir Henry Dymoke, and through her acquired the manors of Erckington and Pipe, Warwickshire, which he sold to Sir Walter Devereux, Bt. Their son

Thomas Thomas may refer to: People * List of people with given name Thomas * Thomas (name) * Thomas (surname) * Saint Thomas (disambiguation) * Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, and Doctor of the Church * Thomas the A ...

was also an MP in the Long Parliament with his father, and the latter's son, also called

was a distinguished general.

References

*First Earl of Birkenhead, "The trial of Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford" in ''Famous Trials'' (London: Hutchinson & Co, no date) * C.V. Wedgwood, ''The King's Peace, 1637-1641'' (London: Collins Fontana, 1971)

External links

Biography of Sir Walter Erle at freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com
, - {{DEFAULTSORT:Erle, Walter 1586 births 1665 deaths Military personnel from Dorset High sheriffs of Dorset Inmates of Fleet Prison Roundheads Politicians from Dorset English MPs 1614 English MPs 1621–1622 English MPs 1624–1625 English MPs 1625 English MPs 1640 (April) English MPs 1640–1648 English MPs 1654–1655 English MPs 1659 English MPs 1660 Members of the Parliament of England for Dorset Members of the Parliament of England for Poole Members of the Parliament of England (pre-1707) for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis Members of the Parliament of England (pre-1707) for Lyme Regis