Thomas James: The English Consul of Andalucia (1556-ca. 1613)

Abstract

In the summer of 1601 the English ambassador in France, Sir Ralph Winwood, warned Sir Robert Cecil against a merchant named Thomas James, who was ‘a hard and desperate Ruffian, who hath lived in great inwardness with Persons the Jesuit’. To assist in his capture, should he arrive in England, Winwood identified him to be of ‘a convenient stature, red beard, of the age of forty-five years’, born in Staffordshire ‘in a town called Noyall’ but subsequently raised in London where he had been a merchant’s apprentice.The ‘inwardness’ between this Englishman and the Jesuit excites curiosity in itself, but Thomas James deserves investigation in his own right since he exemplifies the major contribution of the resourceful English layman to the survival of the Catholic mission during the late Elizabethan and early Jacobean period. The access of Catholics to the Continent was contingent on the well-placed merchant who facilitated the arrivals and departures of students, priests and other persons in search of asylum. As will be seen, the full confidence of the highly respected Duke of Medina Sidonia in the ability of Thomas James was to provide the Englishman with a unique status in Andalucia.