Thomas Stafford (MP)

{{Short description|English courtier, politician and historian}}

{{For|other MPs of this name|Thomas Stafford (disambiguation)}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2017}}

{{Use British English|date=January 2017}}

Sir Thomas Stafford ({{circa|1574}} – 1655) was an English courtier, politician, and historian of the Irish Wars. He sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1593 and 1625.

Stafford was the illegitimate son of Sir George Carew. In 1593, he was elected Member of Parliament for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis. He was knighted in 1611. By 1619 he was a Gentleman Usher of the Privy Chamber to Queen Anne. In 1621, he was elected MP for Helston. He was elected MP for Bodmin in 1624. He was also Gentleman Usher to Queen Henrietta Maria.[http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1558-1603/member/stafford-thomas-1574-1655 History of Parliament Online - Thomas Stafford]

Stafford married Lady Mary Killigrew (floruit 1621–55), widow of Sir Robert Killigrew of St. Margaret Lothbury, London, and daughter of Sir Henry Woodhouse of Waxham, after 1633. She was also the niece of Sir Francis Bacon, a friend of John Donne, and Sir Constantijn Huygens.See Huygens's letters to Lady Stafford here; [http://resources.huygens.knaw.nl/briefwisselingconstantijnhuygens/brieven?zk_correspondentid=1134&order=order_by_date 'Woodhouse, Mary', Briefwisseling van Constantijn Huygens 1607-1687, Huygens ING]/

Stafford's will was made in 1653 and proved by his widow in February 1655. He was buried in the same tomb as the Earl of Totnes in the Church of the Holy Trinity, Stratford-upon-Avon, with a Latin inscription mentioning military service in Ireland.[https://archive.org/details/antiquitiesofwar00dugd/page/518 William Dugdale, History of Warwickshire (London, 1656), p. 518].