Richard Shireburne 

(c1587-1667/8) - the 3rd Richard

Richard’s adult life was largely lived in the crises of Tudor and Stuart England. 

He was born around the middle of reign of Elizabeth I and lived through the challenges to the Stuart monarchies, the Civil War, the execution of Charles I, and endured the perils of England’s only republican experience under Oliver Cromwell, in which all he held dear was threatened by a hard-line protestant regime. The Restoration of the monarchy in 1660 offered short-lived optimism but by the time of Richard’s death in 1667/8 the limitations on Charles II’s powers were already evident. 

Richard was a devout and active supporter of Charles I and was known as “The Eminent Sufferer” in his cause.

Richard married twice. His first wife was Elizabeth Molyneux, a close relative of the Earl of Derby, and his second was Elizabeth Walmsley, daughter of Thomas Walmsley of Dunkenhalgh, Lancashire. She gave birth to one child, the fourth Richard Shireburne in  c1616. Elizabeth died in 1666.

The tomb of Richard (the 3rd) is one of the four linked altar tombs along the north wall of the Shireburne chapel.