Early parliamentary career and succession question In 1584, Bromley was elected Member of Parliament for
Plymouth, along with Christopher Harris. Plymouth was a great port, closely involved in the
Anglo-Spanish War, with a tendency to support "godly" Protestants. Other MPs of the period included
Arthur Champernowne,
Francis Drake,
Humphrey Gilbert, and
John Hawkins. The MPs were elected by a "privy council," consisting of the mayor and 12 aldermen, but
Francis Russell, 2nd Earl of Bedford had great influence in the town. He was a close ally of Bromley's father, the Lord Chancellor. Harris was one of his employees, so clearly he dominated the elections on this occasion. Bedford died in 1585 but Bromley was re-elected MP for Plymouth in 1586, along with
Hugh Vaughan, the earl's secretary and a relative by marriage of Hawkins. Bedford's influence was largely backed by the powerful Champernowne and Hawkins trading dynasties, who probably approved of Bromley because of his father's close connection to the faction of
Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester. The first two parliaments in which Henry Bromley sat were preoccupied with the trial and execution of
Mary, Queen of Scots, in which Thomas Bromley played a central role. Henry Bromley was appointed to a committee which consulted with the queen on the issue on 11 November 1586. In 1593 Bromley was elected MP for
Worcestershire, his own county, along with William Walsh, a member of a long-established Worcestershire gentry family. The MPs were almost always chosen from the county gentry and in this period, the Protestant Russell family, who claimed kinship with the
Earls of Bedford were the leading political dynasty. Both Bromley and Walsh were known to be Protestants by conviction. , was for long seen as a likely ally by Puritans and Catholics alike. Bromley and Walsh were soon recruited by Richard Stephens, another
Puritan MP, to support the proposal of
Peter Wentworth to bring the
question of succession before the House of Commons. Wentworth, then MP for
Northampton, had a long history of defending free speech in the chamber of the House of Commons and of promoting Puritanism, and had previously been imprisoned in the
Tower of London. A book he had written on the succession came to the authorities'notice in 1591 and he had written to
Burleigh that "neither church nor commonwealth can possibly overlive Her Majesty's days, without settling the succession of the Crown." Wentworth wished Burleigh a long life, as he feared "the State will be greatly weakened when his Lordship is called away." At this point Wentworth favoured recognition of
James VI of Scotland as
Elizabeth's successor. The Cecil faction were trying to keep the question open for as long as possible to prevent erosion of Elizabeth's personal authority. A small group of MPs met at
Lincoln's Inn on 21 February to consider Wentworth's plan. While they hesitated, they were betrayed to the
Privy Council and arrested the following afternoon. Bromley, Stephens and Walsh spent most of the session in the
Fleet Prison, and were not released until late April, after the end of Parliament. Wentworth refused to apologise or give pledges of good behaviour and died in the Tower in November 1596. Meanwhile, Bromley reinforced his commitment to the cause of James VI by making direct contacts in
Edinburgh. In 1597 Bromley was elected MP for
Shropshire, and thus became one of the few MPs to be
Knight of the Shire for two counties. Shropshire was gentry-dominated and the main external influence came from the
Council in the Marches of Wales, which represented central government in the border counties. Sir Henry had land in Shropshire and his uncle
Sir George Bromley and his cousin
Francis Bromley had previously represented the county. The president of the council was a political ally,
Henry Herbert, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, son-in-law of the previous president,
Sir Henry Sidney. He was JP for Shropshire from about 1598 and was collector for the loan in 1598. He was active in campaigns against
recusancy. In 1598 he helped search for the escaped
Jesuit priest
John Gerard and in the following year served on a commission with his brother-in-law, the Warwickshire MP Edward Greville, to search out recusants' goods and lands. In 1600 he was assessed, as of Shropshire, to furnish one horse for service in Ireland. This was for the expedition of
Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex.
Essex rebellion At least by the time of his imprisonment, Bromley had been closely associated with Essex, offering to "do him service" in a letter he wrote jointly with his brother-in-law,
Sir John Scott. between Essex and
Robert Cecil, with the queen herself increasingly indecisive and remote. It was a struggle to control royal policy between the queen's favourite and her most trusted minister, in which the latter had the major political and institutional advantages, including continuous direct access to Elizabeth and use of the powerful government intelligence network. Essex inherited the following of many individuals and families who had supported Leicester, including the Sidneys and regional Puritan politicians like Bromley. By promoting his image as a Protestant hero and patronising Puritan clergy, as well as taking up the cause of James VI, he hoped to appeal to wide circles of support in London and in Parliament. However, as recent evaluations make clear, Essex also had a strong cultural appeal for men like Bromley: more than a mere playboy, he projected himself as a cultivated nobleman, with a following that was strongly focussed on classical learning and martial honour. In July 1600, Bromley wrote to
Henry Cuff, one of the militant, classically educated men in the earl's household, expressing his whole-hearted commitment, in a letter that was intercepted and copied for Cecil: :"My dear Brother, I may not omit this opportunity to urge you to let me hear what is done or what hope there is of doing good for our lord. If nothing be done yet, my hope will be very small that it will be very shortly. It were good in my poor opinion that an end of his expectations were urged. The summer is half done, time is precious, opportunity may be lost; I am and will be as I have promised. I expect but direction, for I am wholly his that you are. Let us not lose the start that we have gotten, but bethink of some means either to be winners or savers. I doubt of the forbearing hand by former experience, for vile natures will ascribe that patience to pusillanimity that the noble would to contempt. For my part I am ready to undergo what he doth, and none that have been most tied to him by benefits are or shall be more tied in affection. Let this suffice, and lose I pray you no time to perform those offices that you have undertaken and I have promised. – From my house at Holt Castle, 29 July." Bromley was also tied to Essex also through family and regional networks. His brother-in-law which he regarded as his "own country", and had his seat at
Chartley Castle. However, Lyttelton was well known to have Catholic sympathies. but significantly without specifying the sum involved. Later in the month he wrote to Cecil from the Tower, complaining that he had made some sort of admission when short of sleep, and hoping "that he may rely on Cecil for satisfying her Majesty of his loyalty, and for his entire liberty in time convenient." A month later, with apparently little progress made, he wrote again, thanking Cecil for accepting his earlier letter, but pointing out he needed to be released if he were to provide further satisfaction – presumably a fine or bribe, the two being not entirely distinguishable – and that "without Cecil's charitable consideration, he, his wife and children will be ruined." On 14 November, still in the Tower, his tone was still more desperate: :"Join with the other lords in intercession to her Majesty for my enlargement. I am ready to redeem her favour with the last drop of my dearest blood. In the meantime I pray God to send you your heart's desire." On 9 February 1602 he again implored Cecil from the Tower: :"I beseech you to have my miseries in remembrance, and procure my deliverance from this captivity, drawing with it the ruin of my poor wife and children. Be the means of my enlargement with such convenient speed as may give some life to my languishing estate." By 1 March, however, he had begun to get down to practicalities. Cecil, unlike his father, was notoriously involved in the "scramble for profits" From his estates, almost ruined by his father, Lyttelton had pledged a portion to guarantee the fines of Bromley, Humphrey Perrott and
Charles Danvers. This arrangement was now threatened by a counter-claim for the land from another of Lyttelton's brothers-in-law, Thomas Cornwall. Bromley knew the location of documents disproving Cornwall's claim: they were lodged with Richard Davies, the treasurer of the Inner Temple, and so could be recovered in the next term. This seems to have done the trick. He was fined, deprived of his position as JP and released in May 1602. Bromley was certainly made a gentleman of the privy chamber and thus a confidant of the king, but there is no evidence that he actually had a concrete program of reform to put before James. His influence, exercise partly through connections with Scottish
courtiers, was real but limited; he counted for little against the real holders of power in London and Westminster.
Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox, prevailed on the king to promise Bromley the
Receiver Generalship of London,
Middlesex, Herefordshire and
Essex but the appointment never materialised A warrant to obtain Crown lands was granted to him in 1604 but almost immediately revoked, and it took the intervention of
John Erskine, Earl of Mar, to get the grant restored to Bromley. Bromley was out of his depth in dealing with the power-brokers of central government but continued as an effective politician regionally.
The 1604 parliament Bromley stood for election in Worcestershire in 1604. This election was unusually and bitterly contested, as Bromley's candidacy was opposed by the recusant
John Talbot of Grafton. and was replaced by
Sir Samuel Sandys. The 1604 parliament was to last for seven years and his son
Thomas Bromley was elected to its successor in 1614. There was little aristocratic influence now over the county and Bromleys and Lytteltons were to dominate the representation of Worcestershire in the Parliaments of James I and
Charles I. In the first session of the parliament, Bromley was fairly active.
Robert Wroth proposed a package of reforms to the House, some apparently sponsored by Cecil, including the vexed issue of
wardship. Bromley was appointed to the committee to deal with Wroth's programme, and took part in a conference with the Lords about wardship, He also took part in three committees on religion, including consideration of two bills to forbid pluralism, the simultaneous holding of several
benefices. Importantly, in April he took part in a conference to ascertain the Lords' proposals on the Union of the two realms.
The Gunpowder Plot Following the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, the king instructed Bromley to assist local authorities in apprehending conspirators in his home county, a task he undertook with dedication. The Sheriff, Sir Richard Walsh, whose daughter Anne was married to Bromley's son and heir, led the assault on
Holbeche House on 8 November 1605. Bromley took charge of those captured and conveyed twenty three of them to London. Some of the plotters were Lytteltons and it seems that Bromley used family connections to find them. In January Bromley's servant, William Bradley, raised a posse to arrest
Robert Wintour and Stephen Littleton, the owner of Holbeche, at
Hagley Hall, the home of Bromley's sister, Muriel, apparently on a tip-off from her cook, John Finwood. Around 20 January, Bromley was ordered to search
Hindlip Hall for Catholic priests: “to pull down the wainscoat, bore the ground, drill the boards and chimney corners, examine the attics and roof, &c., in search of concealed hiding-places.” He was having great difficulties when two of concealed men,
Nicholas Owen and Hall, broke out and were captured. It was another week before
Henry Garnet and
Edward Oldcorne emerged, and even then the priests were misidentified. He took the prisoners to London, after a suitable delay to allow Garnet to recover his strength: Garnet later reported the kind treatment he had received at Bromley's hands throughout the stay and the journey, although he was on his way to brutal execution. Bromley was not able to return to parliament until early March, well into the next session. He was initially fairly active and was a member of the committee dealing with the attainder of the Gunpowder plotters. Thereafter, his parliamentary activity steadily lessened. ==Landowner==