Robert Devereux was born in Herefordshire and educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. He succeeded his father, Walter Devereux, as 2nd Earl of Essex. In 1585 he fought in the Low Countries and became a favourite of Queen Elizabeth I. In 1596 he took Cadiz and destroyed the Spanish fleet, but after a quarrel with the queen he was sent to Ireland as Lord Lieutenant and Governor-General to fight against Hugh O'Neill. He garrisoned Newry, Dundalk, Drogheda, Wicklow and Naas, but defied his order to march against O'Neill in Ulster. Various expeditions in Ireland were unsucessful and cost him half his army, though after a defeat, he was said to decimate his own soldiers. In 1599 he met Hugh O'Neill and they concluded a peace, regarded in England as a dishonorable and dangerous treaty. Queen Elizabeth sent him an aggrieved letter and he returned, without her permission, to London where he was detained, a prisoner in his own home. He was tried at Westminster Hall, where his protege and former friend, Francis Bacon, spoke for the prosecution. He was eventually executed. During his lifetime he wrote numerous sonnets.

Born:	10 November 1565
Died:	25 February 1601