Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Cope, Walter

by no contributor recorded

COPE, Sir WALTER, (d. 1614), politician, second son of Edward and grandson of Sir Anthony Cope [q. v.], was M.P. for St. Mawes in 1588, for Weymouth in 1601, for Westminster in 1604, and for Stockbridge in 1614. He was member of the Elizabethan Society of Antiquaries; was knighted 20 April 1603; became chamberlain of the exchequer, where he helped to catalogue the records, in 1609, master of the wards July 1613, and keeper of Hyde Park 1612. In 1607 he built at Kensington a house called Cope Castle (designed by John Thorpe), and bought Kensington manor in 1612. James I stayed with him in November 1612. He died, 27,000l. in debt, 31 July 1614, and was buried at Kensington. His only child, Isabel (by Dorothy, second daughter of Richard Grenville of Wotton), inherited the Kensington mansion, which was renamed Holland House by her husband Henry Rich, earl of Holland. Cope wrote an apology for his friend Salisbury's financial policy, printed in Gutch's ‘Collectanea Curiosa,’ i. 119. Many of his letters are at Hatfield.

[Nichols's Progresses; Cal. State Papers, 1590–1614; Collins's Baronetage, i. 112; Princess Liechtenstein's Holland House; Hearne's Curious Discourses.]