Chaloner, Sir Thomas
the younger, the son of
the former by his wife Ethelreda, daughter of Mr. Frodsham of Elton in Cheshire, was born in 1559, and being
very young at the time of his father’s decease, and his
mother soon after marrying a second husband, he owed his
education chiefly to the care and protection of the lordtreasurer Burleigh, by whom he was first put under the
care of Dr. Malim, master of St. Paul’s school, and afterwards removed to Magdalen college in Oxford, where he
closely pursued his studies at the time when his father’s
poetical works were published; and as a proof of his veneration for his father’s friend, and gratitude for the many
kindnesses himself had received, he prefixed a dedication
to this work to his patron the lord Burleigh, He left the
college before he took any degree, but not before he had
acquired a great reputation for parts and learning. He
had, like his father, a great talent- for poetry, which he
wrote with much facility both in English and in Latin, but
it does not appear that he published any thing before he
left England, which was probably about the year 1580.
He visited several parts of Europe, but made the longest
stay in Italy, fprmed an acquaintance with the gravest and
| wisest men in that country, who very readily imparted to
him their most important discoveries in natural philosophy,
which he had studied with much diligence and attention.,
At his return home, which was some time before 1584, he
appeared very much at court, and was esteemed by the
greatest men there, on account of his great learning
and manners. About this time he married his first
wife, the daughter of his father’s old friend sir William
Fleetwood, recorder of London, by whom he had several
children. In the year 1591 he had the honour of knighthood conferred upon him, as well in regard to his own personal merit“as the great services of his father; and some
years after, the first alum mines that were ever known to
be in this kingdom, were discovered, by his great sagacity,
not far from Gisborough in Yorkshire, where he had an
estate.* The time when this discovery was
made is not fixed but from a comparison of circumstances it appears to
have been about 1600, or perhaps
a little earlier. Very considerable
sums of money were spent before the
project was brought to bear; which
probably was owing to the difference
of climates, and that different manner
of working, which this rendered necessary. But at length, by the bringing
over privately Lambert Russell, a
Walloon, and two other workmen,
smployed in this business at Rochelle
in France, the matter was completed,
but very little to the profit of the proprietors, since upon this it was adjudged to be a mine royal, and so
came into the hands of the crown. It
was then granted to sir Paul Pindar,
under the following rent, viz. twelve
thousand five hundred pounds a year
to the king, one thousand six hundred
and forty pounds a year to the earl of
Mulgrave, and six hundred pounds a
year to sir William Pennyman. But
notwithstanding these high rents, and
that no less than eight hundred persons
were employed in the manufacture at
a time, the farm of the alum mines
produced a vast profit to sir Paul Pindar, who kept up the commodity at
the rate of twenty-six pounds a ton.
The Long Parliament voted this a
monopoly, and restored the alum works
to their original proprietors.
Biog. Brit. Lodge’s Illustrations, vol. III. —Ath. Ox. vol. 1, Birch’s Prince Henry