CAREY, HENRY, first Lord Hunsdon (1524?–1596), governor of Berwick and chamberlain of Queen Elizabeth's household, born about 1524, was only son of William Carey, esquire of the body to Henry VIII, by his wife Mary, sister of Anne Boleyn and daughter of Sir Thomas Boleyn [q. v.] Through his mother he was first cousin to Queen Elizabeth. His father died of the sweating sickness in 1528, and his mother remarried Sir William Stafford, who died 19 July 1543.
Carey first comes into notice as member of parliament for Buckingham at the end of 1547; he was re-elected for the same constituency to the parliaments of April and November 1554, and of October 1555. In 1549 Edward VI granted him the manors of Little Brickhill and Burton in Buckinghamshire. He was knighted by his relative Queen Elizabeth soon after her accession, and was created Baron Hunsdon on 13 Jan. 1558-1559, receiving on 20 March following a grant of the honour of Hunsdon and manor of Eastwick in Hertfordshire, together with other lands in Kent. Hunsdon was prominent in all the court tournaments and jousts of 1559 and 1560. With Leicester he held the lists against all comers in a tournament at Greenwich 3 Nov. 1559. On 18 May 1561 he was installed a knight of the Garter and was sworn of the privy council about the same time. He also became captain of the gentlemen-pensioners. On 28 May 1564 he went to France to present the order of the Garter to the young French king Charles IX, and on 5 Aug., while in attendance on Elizabeth at Cambridge, he was created M.A. The queen lost no opportunity of testifying to her affection for her cousin. When on what she imagined to be her deathbed in 1562, she specially commended Hunsdon to the care of the council.
In August 1568 Hunsdon became warden of the east marches towards Scotland, and governor of Berwick. In September 1569 he went to Scotland to discuss the possibility of sending Mary Stuart back to her own country while excluding her from the throne. Later in the same year the outbreak of the northern rebellion threw on him a heavy responsibility. He was entrusted with the duty of protecting not only Berwick but Newcastle and the rest of Northumberland. He moved rapidly first to Doncaster (20 Nov.), thence to Hull (23 Nov.), and subsequently to York (24 Nov.), where he joined the Earl of Sussex, the commander-in-chief of the government forces. Hunsdon resisted an order (22 Jan. 1569-70) of the government to reduce the garrisons on the Scotch frontiers, which was issued while the rebellion in the more southerly counties was unsuppressed. On 20 Feb. 1569-70, with an army of fifteen hundred men, he defeated, near Carlisle, a rebel army of twice the number of men under Leonard Dacres. He despatched a spirited account of the engagement to Sir William Cecil on the same night, and received a letter of thanks from the queen, part of which, written in her own hand, was couched in the most affectionate terms. Hunsdon was a member of the commission appointed to try the rebel leaders of the counties of York, Durham, and Cumberland, early in 1570. In the following year the queen paid him many attentions. She visited him at Hunsdon House in September; allowed him new and extensive privileges as lord of the manor of Sevenoaks, a portion of his property in Kent; and granted hin further lands in Yorkshire and Derbyshire.
Meanwhile, Scotch affairs occupied him in the north, and he was directed to grant all assistance in his power to James against the supporters of his dethroned mother. In May 1572 he prayed Lord Burghley to procure his recall from Berwick, on the ground that his salary was unpaid, and that his private resources could not endure the constant calls which his office made on them. In the following month the Scots handed over to him Thomas Percy, earl of Northumberland, who had escaped from England while charges of treason were pending against him. Hunsdon was directed to bring the earl to York and there to have him executed, but he declined to convey him beyond Alnwick, the boundary of his jurisdiction. He wrote to Burghley urging the lord treasurer to'obtain the earl's pardon, but he was compelled finally to surrender the earl to Sir John Forster, who hanged him at York on 22 Aug. 1572. Hunsdon rigorously suppressed marauding on the borders, and according to popular report he took as much delight in hanging Scotch thieves as most men take in hawking or hunting. On 24 May 1580 he was appointed a commissioner for the redress of grievances on the border; six months later he became captain-general of the forces on the border, and was at Newcastle in January 1580-1. He wrote to Walsingham at the time that he declined to interfere further in Scotch affairs, since his advice was systematically neglected. He desired permission to visit the queen and to look after his private affairs.
Hunsdon, still on good terms with Elizabeth, gave her every new year very valuable presents. He favoured her projected marriage with the Duc d'Anjou, and was present at the consultations respecting it held in Octo-
