Editing Everard Digby (section)

==Early life==
Everard Digby was the eldest son of Everard Digby, Esquire (who died in 1592)<ref name="ODNB Digby">{{Cite ODNB | last = Nicholls | first = Mark |title=Digby, Sir Everard (c.1578–1606) | orig-year = 2004 | year = 2008  | doi = 10.1093/ref:odnb/7626}}</ref> and his wife Maria (née Neale), daughter of Francis Neale of [[Tugby and Keythorpe|Keythorpe]] in [[Leicestershire]].{{#tag:ref|Maria Neale remarried to the recusant antiquary [[Sampson Erdeswicke]] in 1593, by whom she had 3 children in addition to the 14 she had borne to Everard Digby, as is shown by the inscription on Erdeswicke's monument at [[Sandon, Staffordshire]]. Erdeswicke died in 1603: his stepson Everard Digby was then living.|group="nb"}}<ref>S. Erdeswicke (ed. T. Harwood), ''A Survey of Staffordshire'' (1820), pp. xxxiii-xxxv: Inscription at [https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_WZPRAAAAMAAJ/page/n49/mode/2up p. xxxv] (Internet Archive).</ref> The conspirator was a cousin of [[Anne Vaux]], who for years placed herself at considerable risk by sheltering [[Society of Jesus|Jesuit]] priests such as [[Henry Garnet]].<ref>{{Cite ODNB | last = Nicholls | first = Mark |title=Vaux, Anne (bap. 1562, d. in or after 1637) |orig-year = 2004 | year = 2008 | doi = 10.1093/ref:odnb/28159}}</ref> He was probably a near kinsman of the 16th-century scholar [[Everard Digby (scholar)|Everard Digby]], but it is clear that the scholar, who died in 1605,<ref>N. Orme, 'Digby, Everard (d. 1605), Church of England clergyman and author', ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (OUP 2004), [https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/7625 online]</ref> was not his father, because as a Fellow of [[St John's College, Cambridge]] (a [[celibate]] calling) he could not have been married at the time when the young Everard and some of his 13 siblings were born, nor was he "Esquire", as the father is named in his ''[[inquisition post mortem]]'' of 1592.<ref>{{cite DNB |wstitle= Digby, Everard (fl.1590) |volume= 15 |last= Lee |first= Sidney |author-link= Sidney Lee |year=|pages= 50-51 |short= 1}}</ref>

In 1596, while still a teenager, he married [[William Moulsoe|Mary Mulshaw]] (or Mushlo),<ref>{{Citation | last = Moshenska | first = Joe |title=A Stain in the Blood | publisher = William Heinemann: London |year=2016}}</ref> a young heiress who brought with her [[Gayhurst House]] in [[Buckinghamshire]].<ref>{{Harvnb|Fraser|2005|p=168}}</ref> By all accounts their marriage was a happy one,<ref name="Fraserpp176177">{{Harvnb|Fraser|2005|pp=176–177}}</ref> and they had two sons; [[Kenelm Digby]] was born in 1603 at Gayhurst,<ref>{{Cite ODNB | last = Foster | first = Michael |title=Digby, Sir Kenelm (1603–1665) | orig-year = 2004 | year = 2009 | doi = 10.1093/ref:odnb/7629}}</ref> and John in 1605.<ref>{{Cite ODNB | last = Foster | first = Michael |title=Digby, Sir John (John Salisbury) (1605–1645) | orig-year = 2004 | year = 2009 | doi = 10.1093/ref:odnb/24540}}</ref> Unlike other English Catholics, Digby had little first-hand experience of England's [[recusancy]] laws. Following the death of his father he had been made a [[Ward (law)|ward of Chancery]] and was raised in a Protestant household.<ref name="Fraserpp176177"/> His wife Mary was converted to Catholicism by the Jesuit priest [[John Gerard (Jesuit)|John Gerard]]. When Digby fell seriously ill, Gerard used the occasion to convert him also, and the two subsequently became close friends, "calling eachother{{sic}} 'brother' when we wrote and spoke". Gerard was [[godparent|godfather]] to Digby's eldest son, Kenelm, and the Digbys also built a hidden chapel and [[sacristy]] at Gayhurst.<ref>{{Harvnb|Fraser|2005|p=169}}</ref>

Digby frequented the court of [[Elizabeth I of England|Elizabeth I]], and became informally associated with the Elizabethan [[Honourable Corps of Gentlemen at Arms|gentlemen pensioners]].<ref name="ODNB Digby"/> His marriage had significantly expanded his holdings, however, and possibly for this reason he left court to manage his estates. He was apparently an unforgiving landlord, as his tenants in Tilton petitioned the Crown for redress when he failed to honour the expensive leases granted them by his father. He added to his property in [[Buckinghamshire]] by buying land in [[Great Missenden]], and a month after the queen's death his social station was elevated when on 24 April 1603 he was knighted by [[James VI and I|James I]] at [[Belvoir Castle]].<ref name="DigbyThomasp7">{{Harvnb|Digby Thomas|2001|p=7}}</ref>{{#tag:ref|Digby Thomas gives the date as 23 April instead.<ref name="DigbyThomasp7"/>|group="nb"}} Four days later he was present for Elizabeth's funeral in London.<ref name="ODNB Digby"/>