Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Cave, Sir Ambrose
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
c. 1503-1568
History
Son of Richard Cave of Stanford, Northamptonshire and his second wife Margaret, daughter of John Saxby of Northampton. Spent five years from late 1524 to 1529 in convent of the Order of St John of Jerusalem in Europe, being made a Knight of the Order in 1525. From 1529 was commander of the Order in Yeaveley and Barrow in Derbyshire. He was summoned back to Malta in 1535, but only got as far as Vienne before being sent back to England by the new Grand Master for an urgent meeting with Henry VIII. Cave's hopes of transferring to the more prestigious commandery of Shingay in Cambridgeshire were disappointed when the English Grand Prior's nephew was elected instead. The order was dissolved in 1540 and Cave committed to Protestantism. He was given a pension and the use of a house in London, became a servant to the King, focussed on his family's wool business, and when former religious were permitted to marry, married a wealthy widow, Margaret Holte, née Willington. He was MP for Leicestershire during Edward VI's reign and lived quietly under Mary I, serving as MP for Warwickshire in her last parliament and in 1553 becoming manager of one of her sister Elizabeth (later Elizabeth I)'s estates. He was immediately appointed to Elizabeth's Privy Council and made Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. He was MP for Warwickshire in 1559 and 1563, visited the north in 1561 to report on problems there, and served on numerous commissions including those to enforce the Acts of Uniformity and Supremacy.
Cave had one child, Margaret, who in 1565 married Sir Henry Knollys at a ceremony attended by the Queen. His extended family at the Savoy included his nieces, whose fathers, Cave's brothers, had died, and the children of other deceased relatives whose wardships he had acquired. His wife probably died in 1561. He died on 2 April 1568 and his funeral service was conducted at the Savoy Chapel, although he was buried at Stanford.