1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Sutton, Thomas

SUTTON, THOMAS (c. 1532-1611), founder of Charterhouse school and hospital, was the son of an official of the city of Lincoln, and was educated at Eton College and probably at Cambridge. He then spent some time travelling in Europe and appears to have acted as secretary to two or three English noblemen. He became a soldier, and in 1569 was with the troops engaged in suppressing the rising in the north of England; in 1570 he was made master and surveyor of the ordnance in the northern parts of the realm and in this capacity he took part in the siege of Edinburgh Castle by the English in May 1573. Sutton obtained great wealth by the ownership of coal mines in Durham and also by his marriage in 1582 with Elizabeth (d. 1602), widow of John Dudley of Stoke Newington. His wish to devote some of his money to charitable purposes led him in 1611 to purchase for £13,000 the Charterhouse (q.v.) from Thomas Howard, earl of Suffolk. On this spot Sutton erected the hospital and school which he had originally intended to build at Hallingbury in Essex. Sutton died at Hackney on the 12th of December 1611 and was buried in the chapel in the Charterhouse. His wealth was left for charitable uses, but in 1613 James I. ordered his executors to make an allowance to his natural son, Roger Sutton.