He was born at
Rainham,
Norfolk in 1605. He was sent to
Queens' College, Cambridge, by
Sir Roger Townshend, 1st Baronet. After seven years at Cambridge, he studied theology at the house of
Herbert Palmer, vicar of
Ashwell, Hertfordshire. He was then for four years chaplain to
Sir William Airmine, 1st Baronet of
Orton, Northamptonshire, and in 1637 was presented by Sir Roger Townshend to the vicarage of Wivenhoe, Essex, where he persuaded his parishioners not to sell fish on Sunday. He married Elizabeth, daughter of William Jenkin, a preacher of
Sudbury, and sister of
William Jenkin, ejected in 1662. Seven years later he became minister of
St Bartholomew-by-the-Exchange, London. He joined in the declaration of the London ministers against the death of Charles, and preached a sermon before the mayor and aldermen at Mercers' Chapel on 25 Feb. 1649, when he prayed for the royal family and Charles II. He was brought before the
council of state, and, refusing to recant, was committed to the
Gatehouse Prison. He was released with other prisoners on 14 August 1649 as a thanksgiving for
Michael Jones's victory at the
Battle of Rathmines. He was concerned with his brother-in-law, William Jenkin, and others, in the plot to support Charles in Scotland, for which Christopher Love was executed on 22 August 1651, and escaped to Holland, where he was chosen pastor of the English church in
Rotterdam. Here he became acquainted with scholars, and took pains to encourage
Edmund Castell's
Lexicon Heptaglotton and
Brian Walton's polyglot bible. In 1658 Charles II addressed a letter to him, requesting Cawton to defend him among the Dutch ministers. Cawton died at Rotterdam on 7 August 1659. His son,
Thomas Cawton the younger, was known as an orientalist. ==Notes==