Matthew Locke (administrator)

{{Short description|17th-century English politician (1660–1683)}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

{{Infobox officeholder

| honorific prefix =

| name = Matthew Locke

| office = Secretary at War

| monarch = Charles II

| term_start = 1666

| term_end = 1683

| predecessor = Sir William Clarke

| successor = William Blathwayt

| birth_date = 1660

| birth_place = England

| death_date = 1683

}}

Matthew Locke (fl. 1660–1683) was an English administrator, holder of the post of Secretary at War from 1666 to 1683, when he sold it.{{cite book|author=Joseph Haydn|title=The Book of Dignities: Containing Rolls of the Official Personages of the British Empire ... from the Earliest Periods to the Present Time ... Together with the Sovereigns of Europe, from the Foundation of Their Respective States; the Peerage of England and Great Britain ...|url=https://archive.org/details/bookdignitiesco00haydgoog|accessdate=6 August 2013|year=1851|publisher=Longmans, Brown, Green, and Longmans|page=[https://archive.org/details/bookdignitiesco00haydgoog/page/n211 190]}}

Locke was clerk to the "Irish and Scottish Committee" set up in 1651, and later gave evidence against Henry Vane the Younger who was on it.{{cite book |author=Violet A. Rowe|title=Sir Henry Vane the Younger|url=https://archive.org/details/sirhenryvaneyoun0000rowe|url-access=registration|year=1970|publisher=Athlone Press|isbn=0-485-13128-5|pages=[https://archive.org/details/sirhenryvaneyoun0000rowe/page/141 141–2]}} He was a nephew of Sir Paul Davis, also concerned in Irish business as administrator, and was then private secretary to George Monck.{{cite book|author=Aidan Clarke|title=Prelude to Restoration in Ireland|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PmpMDwOtrrEC&pg=PA147|accessdate=6 August 2013|year=1999|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-139-42628-2|page=147}} He was related also, at some distance, to Robert Southwell.{{cite book|author=Nancy L. Rhoden|title=English Atlantics Revisited: Essays Honouring Ian K. Steele|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F9haISuQhOsC&pg=PA36|accessdate=6 August 2013|date=9 August 2007|publisher=McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP|isbn=978-0-7735-6040-6|page=36}}

After the death of Monck (who had become the Duke of Albemarle) in 1670, Locke transformed the role of his secretaryship. It took on a significant share of military movement and supply orders. Locke's tenure consolidated the administrative role of the post.{{cite book|author=Florence M. G. Evans|title=The Principal Secretary of State|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=e0G8AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA324|accessdate=6 August 2013|year=1923|publisher=Manchester University Press|pages=324–|id=GGKEY:ZKG2WRDCS5C}}

The secretaryship was bought from Locke in 1683 by William Blathwayt, who had royal backing.