Person:Robert Cary (17)

Devon Carys, Vol. 1, pp. 144-162
Chapter Eight: 'THE COMPOSTELA PILGRIM'
« There is a strong contrast to the turbulent, unsatisfied life of Sir William Cary of Cockington, of the tenth generation, in that of his eldest son Robert Cary of Clovelly (1457-1540).
...
Robert Cary was born, as he says in his will,(fn) at Hinton St. George, the seat of his maternal grandfather, Sir William Paulet, in Somerset.(fn) As his father was already married to his second wife in 1458, we may fix the date as not later than 1457. By reason of his father's absence after the first few years of his infancy, he grew up among his mother's people, a fact which is indicated by the several evidences of his strong affection for the Paulets. It was a family like the Carys themselves, seated in the west of England soon after the Conquest, taking their name from that of their first manor, producing knights and squires for many generations, and finally
flowering into the peerage.(fn)
...
Robert Cary made his chief residence during a long life at Clovelly, and there erected a monument to his father, although for several generations Cockington had been the chief seat of his ancestors. Perhaps the explanation of this is that his grandmother, the widow of Philip Cary, was still in possession of Cockington in right of her dower when Robert Cary recovered his father's estates and so that charming seat did not
come into his possession until his affection had already been fastened upon Clovelly. At all events, Robert Cary salved his conscience for his desertion of Cockington by building the church there in 1490 after he got possession. The font of this chapel of ease still bears an inscription of his dedication.(fn)
At the time of his father's death Robert Cary would be fourteen years of age. ...
...
After some litigation with his father's widow, Alice Fulford, now the wife of John Anthony, and with his half-brother, Thomas Cary, her son,^ Robert Cary, now restored in estate, proceeded to live the quiet life of a prosperous country squire. He became, says Pole,(fn) "a grave lerned man in the lawes and Justice of Peace in Devon." Twice he was on the sheriff roll, in 1510 and 151 1, when each time the king picked another, but in the latter year, like the Chief Baron, he served in a Commission of Array.'(fn)
During a long life he married three times: first, Jane, daughter of Sir Nicholas Carew;(fn) second, Agnes, daughter of Sir William Hody, who was chief baron of the exchequer from 1486 to 1516;- and third, about 1512, Margaret, widowed daughter of William Fulkeram (or Fulkroy) of Dartmouth.(fn) We get no further glimpse of Robert Cary until April 11, 1518, when at the age of sixty-one he made a will(fn) declaring therein that his action was preparatory to a pilgrimage to Compostela during the
ensuing summer. We may fix the date as being two years before Henry VIII's Field of the Cloth of Gold, at which Robert Cary's nephew William was to win a jousting reputation.
... [Here on this and the following pages Fairfax Harrison writes about the practice of pilgrimages , leading us to that undertaken by Robert Cary - which was, as Fairfax Harrison writes:
... The chief foreign resort of Englishmen (which) (being) to Santiago de Compostela: no one knows how many went,(fn) but they swelled the throng which made of the road to St. James, el camino de Santiago, the proverbial name which Spaniards have for the Milky Way. So much was Compostela the habit of the well-to-do in England that one who examines medieval English tombs is almost persuaded that the cockle-shell was a badge of all pilgrims: as a matter of fact it was the sign of pilgrimage to Compostela alone.
So while Robert Cary was somewhat late in time as well as in life when he undertook his pilgrimage, for he went in the very teeth of the Reformation, he was still in the English fashion in choosing the object of his devotions. ...
...
On his return from Compostela, Robert Cary protracted a long and uneventful life at home. Perhaps his faith won for him, from that experience, the miracle of persistent good health. On April 12, 1535, he executed a long deed of settlement of his estate(fn) and five years later he died. He was buried in Clovelly Church, where in the chancel a sepulchral brass perpetuates his name. This noble monument, marking the end of an era, has been well described as follows:
"The figure is arrayed in very rich armour : the breast-plate is fluted: from the waist are suspended two narrow taces, to which are appended two ornamental tuilles reaching to the bend of the thigh, a tunic of mail hangs below the elbow and the knee plates are very rich. The legs are enclosed in plate and large rowelled spurs are fastened on the heels with long straps. The offensive arms are a sword and dagger suspended from a curiously arranged belt. The head is without covering, and the hands are bare and joined, as if in devotion, on the breast."
The inscription on the tomb is:
"Praye for the soule of Master Robert Cary, Esquire, Sonne and heyre of Sir William Cary, Knight, which Robert decessyd the XVth day of June in the yere of our Lord God MVXL, on whose soule Jesus have mercy."
Robert Cary lived beyond the age to which he belonged and into the modern world. "The spacious times of great Elizabeth" were near. Doubtless he had relations with his prosperous young kinsman the Bristol merchant, who was soon to be a mayor, and felt an uneasy stir moving his pulses as he heard from him the new ideas engendered by participation in a roaring foreign trade. He heard of the discovery of America and of the golden conquests of Cortez and Pizarro in Mexico and Peru, of Luther and the Reformation, of the Renaissance of art and. letters. He saw printing come into general use and doubtless heard the Scriptures read from a printed English Bible, though he might not approve that practice. He saw Henry VHI, like Henry V, established in the power won by his father, turn to foreign politics to consolidate the opinions of a people distracted by civil strife, and he lived to see and lament the consequent
breach with Rome, the establishment of a national Church and the dissolution of the monasteries. But he died a staunch Roman Catholic and a survivor of the middle ages.  »
Source:Harrison, Fairfax. Devon Carys