Francis Tregian

Francis Tregian

Confessor, b. in Cornwall, 1548; d. at Lisbon, 25 Sept., 1608. He was son of Thomas Tregian of Wolveden, Cornwall, and Catherine Arundell; and inherited property worth three thousand pounds a year, the whole of which was confiscated by Elizabeth becaused he had harboured Blessed Cuthbert Mayne (q.v.). Previously he had resided at Court in order to help the persecuted Catholics, and he is said by his biographer to have incurred the queen's displeasure by refusing her improper advances. After suffering imprisonment at Windsor and in various London prisons for twenty-eight years, he was liberated by James I, who banished him. Having visited Douai he retired to Madrid, where the King of Spain assigned him a pension. Seventeen years after death his body was found incorrupt, and miracles are stated to have been wrought by his intercession. He married Mary, daughter of Charles, seventh Lord Stourton, by whom he had eighteen children.

PLUNKETT, Heroum speculum de vita D.D. Francisci Tregeon (Lisbon, 1655); ANONYMOUS, Great and Long Sufferings for the Catholic Faith of Mr. Francis Tregian, contemporary MS. printed by MORRIS in Troubles of Our Catholic Forefathers, I (London, 1872); CHALLONER, Memoirs of Missionary Priests, I (London, 1741); CAMM, Lives of the English Martyrs, II (London, 1905); Third Douay Diary in Catholic Record Society Publications, X (London, 1911); GILLOW, Bibl. Dict. Eng. Cath., s.v.; COOPER in Dict. Nat. Biog., s.v.

EDWIN BURTON