George More (recusant)
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George More (born 1542) was an English supporter of Mary, Queen of Scots, and a participant in the Throckmorton Plot.[1] A Catholic exiled in the Spanish Netherlands, he visited the royal court of Scotland in 1598.
He was the son of Francis More or Moore and Agnes Bozon, a daughter of Sir Richard Bozon of Barrowby and Long Clawson.[2] Francis More's family lived at More Hall, at Bradfield near Sheffield, and he came to own a property at Orston. He was a dependent of the Earls of Shrewsbury. An old ballad, the Dragon of Wantley, refers to More Hall.[3]
Carrying letters for Mary, Queen of Scots, and the Throckmorton Plot
Francis More had offered to help Mary, Queen of Scots. In 1569 he carried a letter from her to the Earl of Northumberland with the gift of an enamelled silver chain for the Countess of Northumberland.[4] Francis More fled England with his son to Milan.[5]
After his father's death George More again carried letters for Mary, Queen of Scots.[6][7] His uncle, Edward More, had a house near Sheffield, conveniently close to Mary's lodgings at Sheffield Manor and Sheffield Castle.[8] Edward More was a prisoner in the Tower of London in March 1584, and Mary hoped the French ambassador in London, Michel de Castelnau would give him some money.[9]
George More was arrested and questioned in the Tower of London in December 1583 about his travels abroad and dealings with Mary, and whether he knew Charles Paget and Thomas Morgan, now known for their roles in the Throckmorton Plot and the subsequent Babington Plot conspiracies.[10][11]
More was released after talking to Francis Walsingham and making a deal. He answered the questions in writing, explaining that his father had sent him to be a student at Douai. He knew Paget, a former Shrewsbury retainer, but not Morgan. He had negotiated a £200 credit deal for Mary with the Earl of Shrewsbury for carrying her letters to Paget.[12][13]
For Walsingham, a key piece of evidence for Mary's involvement in plots against Elizabeth I was a confession made by a servant of George More. The servant said he had carried a letter from Mary to the Earl of Arundel.[14]
Letters in code from Mary, Queen of Scots, sent to the French ambassador Michel de Castelnau, mentioning George More as a letter carrier were discovered in the Bibliothèque nationale de France and deciphered in 2023.[15]
Exile in 1593
Following his involvement with Nicholas Williamson at the 1593 Easter fish weir riot between the supporters of the Stanhopes and the Earl of Shrewsbury,[16] he feared proceedings against him by the Earl of Huntingdon and the Archbishop of York. He left England, and went to Flanders, where he did not wish to associate with Robert Persons. He lived for a time at Liège, and in August 1597 wrote a lengthy letter to William Cecil, seeking religious toleration and the rehabilitation of Charles Neville, 6th Earl of Westmorland. The letter was printed by John Strype.[17]
Richard Topcliffe described More in June 1595 as a friend of Edmund Thurland from Gamston near Tuxford and Bawtry, who had lived near Long Longnedham (Leadenham) between Grantham and Lincoln. Thurland had been brought up in, or spent time in Spain with Isabel de Cárdenas, Duchess of Feria. Topcliffe wrote that More and Nicholas Williamson had fled to the enemy, that More was a pensioner of Spain, and the three were in cahoots.[18] Thurland's house at Gamston on Idle had been a convenient location for traffic with Scotland on the North Road and the lodgings of Mary, Queen of Scots.[19]