MORGAN
,
Sir
CHARLES
(
1575?
-
1643?
),
soldier
,
was the fourth son of
Edward
Morgan
(
1530
-
1585
) of
Pen-carn, Mon.
, and of
Frances
Leigh
of
London
. His family, a younger branch of the
Morgan
s
of
Tredegar
(q.v.)
, had acquired
Pencarn
through the marriage of his great-grand-father. Following the military bent of his uncle,
Sir
Thomas
Morgan
‘
the Warrior
’ (d.
1595
) (q.v.)
, and his elder brother
Sir
MATTHEW
MORGAN
(
knighted
by
Essex
at
Rouen
,
1591
,
Member of Parliament
for
Brecon
,
1593
), he served in
Flanders
, then as
captain
in
Essex
's
Cadiz expedition
of
1596
(where
Sir
Matthew
was
lieutenant-colonel
), and at
Ostend
again in
1601
. The widespread disaffection and recusancy among his connections (including his mother, an uncle, brother, and brother-in-law and many ‘allies and tenants’) fostered hopes that he would lead an armed rising against the accession of
James
I
, but he refused and was rewarded with a
knighthood
(
23 July 1603
). He then went back to
Ostend
till its capitulation to
Spinola
(
20 Sept. 1604
), when he came home and was made a
justice of the peace
. After the outbreak (
May 1605
) of ‘popish’ riots in
Herefordshire
and
South Wales
(in which his brother-in-law,
Rice ap Price
, was reputed a ringleader) he was imprisoned in the
Fleet
for ‘
neglecting his place
’ by decamping to
London
‘
in a time of such disorder
,’ but afterwards helped to ‘clean up’ the area. When the
Dutch
truce ended in
1620
he went out with the volunteer force of
Sir
Horace
Vere
(an old comrade in arms),
commanded the British contingent
at
Bergen
till
1622
and helped in the defence of
Breda
,
1625
. Next year, with money advanced by
Sir
Thomas
Myddelton
(q.v.)
and others, he
led a British force
to the aid of the
king of Denmark
on the
lower Elbe
, but despite naval aid from
Sir
Sackville
Trevor
(see under
Trevor
of
Trefalun
) and feats of energy and improvization in holding together a force starved of supplies, he had to yield
Staden
to
Tilly
in
1628
. By
1629
he was back in
Holland
, for some years, in constant fear of arrest by creditors who had supplied his forces in the
Staden
campaign. He helped in the siege of
Breda
(
Aug. 1637
) and ended like his uncle ‘
the Warrior
’ as
governor
of
Bergen-op-Zoom
. As late as
1642
he was asking leave at home to recruit for the depleted company of one of his
Welsh
captains; soon afterwards ‘
this honest and brave captain
’ (as
Essex
called him) d., and was buried at
Delft
. While abroad he had m.
Elizabeth
, daughter of the
Belgian
nobleman
Philip de
Marnix de Ste. Aldegonde
(d.
1598
),
William
the Silent
's
coadjutor
in the
Netherlands Revolt
. Their only child,
ANN
MORGAN
(d.
1687
), came home and m. (1)
Sir
Lewis
Morgan
of
Rhiwpera, Mon.
(
Member of Parliament
for
Cardiff
,
1628
,
knighted
1629
, d.
1635
), and (2)
Walter
Strickland,
who became a Member of
Cromwell
's
Council of State
and ‘
Other House
,’ and (3)
John
Milborne
of
Wonaston, Mon.
She obtained naturalization on
18 Feb. 1651
, acquired lands in
Monmouthshire
and m. her
daughters into local families, but on her death at
Chelsea
in
1687
she asked to be buried at
Delft
.
Bibliography:
-
Oxford Dictionary of National
Biography
, xxxix, 13-14, and sources therein cited;
-
G. T. Clark
,
Limbus Patrum Morganiae et
Glamorganiae
, 1886
, 310, 319-20, 326-7;
-
Reports of the ‘Historical
Manuscripts Commission
, 5
th
R., 75,
-
Reports of the ‘Historical
Manuscripts Commission
, vi, 165, 205, 361, xi, 291, xvi, 207, xvii, 235,
-
Cowper
, i, 309, 311, 340, 378, 391, 448, ii, 28, 34-5;
-
The Journals of the House of Lords
, v, 7;
-
Acts of the Privy Council
. Record
Commission, 1834–7; Record Publications
,
1626
(483),
1627
(229-30, 421);
-
Rushworth
,
Historical Collections of Private Passages
of State
, 1721
, i, 421, 637;
-
Bradney
,
A History of Monmouthshire
, i, 381, ii, 123;
-
The Transactions of the Honourable Society
of Cymmrodorion
,
1937
(213, 222),
1945
(17, 35-6).
Author:
Emeritus Professor Arthur Herbert Dodd, M.A., (1891-1975), Bangor
