Richard Bancroft

Richard Bancroft rose through the Church of England to become Bishop of London and, from 1604, Archbishop of Canterbury. He was an energetic defender of ecclesiastical conformity and played a prominent role in policy towards Puritans, Separatists and other religious dissenters during the closing years of Elizabeth I’s reign and the opening of James VI & I’s English rule.

Richard Bancroft was a senior Church of England cleric who served as Bishop of London and then Archbishop of Canterbury under James VI & I. Richard Bancroft was born in Farnworth, Lancashire, England and died in London, England.

In Karen Haden’s Naming the Dead, Physician Alexander Baxby has fled England with Separatist friends and hopes to build a new life beyond the reach of his former spymaster and Archbishop Richard Bancroft. In Karen Haden’s Paying in Blood, Elizabeth I, James, Robert Cecil, Robert Devereux and Richard Bancroft appear within the historical setting, while Baxby, his patron Geoffrey and the Crackleton murder investigation are fictional.