The son Thomas, with his younger brother, Anthony, matriculated from Hart Hall, Oxford, in 1579, but left the university without taking a degree. In 1585 he accompanied his father and brother to the Low Countries, and on returning home saw some military service in Ireland, where he was knighted by the lord deputy, Sir William Fitzwilliam, on 26 Oct. 1589. Subsequently he visited the court, but in the summer of 1591 he greatly imperilled his prospects by a secret marriage with Frances, daughter of Henry Vavasour of Copmanthorpe, of a younger branch of the Vavasours of Hazlewood, Yorkshire. When the news of the marriage reached the queen's ears, she promptly committed Shirley to the Marshalsea (September). He remained in prison till the spring of 1592. In 1593 he served again in the Low Countries, now holding the rank of ‘captain.’ Meanwhile his father's pecuniary difficulties were increasing, and they involved him, too, in hopeless embarrassment. With a view to securing a means of livelihood, he resolved to fit out a privateering expedition to attack Spanish merchandise. After handing over his company at Flushing to Sir Thomas Vavasour, his wife's kinsman, he in the summer of 1598 made a voyage in the Channel, and seized four ‘hulks’ of Lübeck, the freight of which was reputed to be Spanish. In 1601 he was elected M.P. for both Bramber and Hastings, but sat for the latter place. In 1602 he renewed his privateering adventures, and pillaged ‘two poor hamlets of two dozen houses in Portugal.’ At the end of 1602 he equipped two ships on a more ambitious quest in the Levant. He designed to strike a blow against the Turks. At Florence the Duke of Tuscany gave him every encouragement, but an imprudent descent on the island of Zea, on 15 Jan. 1602–3, led to his capture by the Turks. He was transferred to Negropont on 20 March, and on 25 July 1603 he was carried a close prisoner to Constantinople. News of his misfortunes reached England, and James I appealed to the government of the sultan to release him. The English ambassador to the Porte, Henry Lello, used every effort on his behalf, and at length, on 6 Dec. 1605, after eleven hundred dollars had been paid to his gaolers, he was set free. Retiring to Naples, he was described by Toby Mathew, on 8 Aug. 1606, as living there ‘like a gallant.’ At the end of the same year he returned to England.
In September 1607 he was imprisoned in the Tower on a charge of illegal interference with the operations of the Levant Company. He had ‘overbusied himself,’ it was said, ‘with the traffic of Constantinople, to have brought it to Venice and to the Florentine territories.’ In August 1611 he was confined in the king's bench as an insolvent debtor. The death of his father next year, and his second marriage (on 2 Dec. 1617, at Deptford) with a widow, Judith Taylor, daughter of William Bennet of London, by whom he had a large family, greatly increased his difficulties. Wiston, which had fallen into ruins, was sold, but he continued to sit in parliament as M.P. for Steyning in 1614, 1615, and 1620. Sir Thomas is said to have subsequently retired to the Isle of Wight, and to have died there about 1630. By his first wife, Frances Vavasour, he had three sons and four daughters. Henry [q. v.], the second son, was the dramatist. The only surviving son Thomas was baptised at West Clandon, Surrey, on 30 June 1597, was knighted in 1645 by Charles I at Oxford, was alive in 1664, and was father of Thomas Sherley [q. v.], the physician, By his second wife, Judith Taylor, Sir Thomas had five sons and six daughters.
Shirley left in manuscript a ‘Discours of the Turkes,’ which is now at Lambeth.
[Stemmata Shirleiana, 1873, pp. 248–72; The Shirley Brothers, by One of the same House (i.e. Evelyn Philip Shirley, for Roxburghe Club, 1848); Nixon's Three Brothers, 1607, with the play of John Day, George Wilkins, and William Rowley, which recounts Shirley's adventures in Turkey; other authorities cited in text and under Shirley, Sir Anthony.]
SHIRLEY, WALTER (1725–1786), hymn-writer, fourth son of the Hon. Laurence Shirley and Anne, daughter of Sir Walter Clarges, bart., was born at Staunton Harrold, Leicestershire, on 23 Sept. 1725. His father was youngest son of Robert Shirley, first Earl Ferrers. Laurence Shirley, fourth earl [q. v.], was his elder brother, and Selina Hastings, countess of Huntingdon [q. v.], was his first cousin. In 1742 Walter matriculated from New College, Oxford, graduating B.A. in 1746, and the same year became rector of Loughrea, co. Galway. His family connection with the Countess of Huntingdon brought him into intimate touch with the revivalist movements of the time. He became friendly with the Wesleys and Whitefield, and from about 1758 was one of the most loyal friends they had within the pale of the church, to which he adhered to the end. The practice of the day permitted him to be frequently absent from Loughrea, and he was a familiar speaker at English and Irish revivalist meetings. Southey remarks that his intentions in his advocacy of Wesley were better than his judgment, for he belonged to the narrowest and most dogmatic section of
