Robert Corbet (1542–1583) was an English landowner, diplomat and politician of the Elizabethan period, a Member (MP) of the Parliament of England for Shropshire, his native county.P.W. Hasler (editor): History of Parliament Online: Members 1558-1603 - CORBET, Robert (1542-83), of Moreton Corbet, Salop - Author: A. M. Mimardière , accessed September 2013.

Background and education

Robert Corbet was the eldest son of Sir Andrew Corbet of Moreton Corbet, Shropshire.The Corbets had a history as Marcher lords in Shropshire stretching back to the Norman ConquestS.T. Bindoff (editor): The History of Parliament: Members 1509-1558 - CORBET, Roger (Author: Alan Harding) , accessed September 2013 and were the leading landed gentry family in the county, although they were never ennobled. Their seat was at Moreton Corbet Castle, although they had very large property holdings across Shropshire and in many other parts of the country. Jane Needham the daughter of Sir Robert Needham of Shavington Hall, Shropshire. The Needhams were another important Shropshire gentry family and close neighbours of the Corbets.

Sir Andrew was to emerge in the 1560s as a pillar of the Elizabethan Religious Settlement. He was a member for a quarter of a century of the Council in the Marches of Wales, of which he became vice-president and effective leader in his last years.P.W. Hasler (editor): History of Parliament Online: Members 1558-1603 - CORBET, Sir Andrew (1522-78) - Author: N. M. Fuidge , accessed September 2013. However, when Robert was born he was still a youth of about nineteen, not yet a knight. Like his father, Roger Corbet, Andrew underwent a prolonged wardshipS.T. Bindoff (editor): History of Parliament Online: Members 1509-1558 - CORBET, Sir Andrew (1522-78) - Author: Alan Harding, accessed September 2013. although he was fortunate that the wardship was purchased by his uncle Richard Corbet. Richard was responsible for arranging his marriage to Jane Needham and it is likely that they had been married for only a very short time before the conception of their first child. Robert was born more than a year before Andrew could take livery of his estates. He was one of at least eleven children of the marriage, including six sons. Robert had been a favourite name for Corbet heirs for centuries but had been demoted in recent generations. Elizabeth Corbet, née Vernon, Robert's great-grandmother, who survived until 1563, may have had a decisive say in the choice of name.

Augusta Corbet, the family historian,Corbet, Augusta Elizabeth Brickdale: The family of Corbet; its life and times, Volume 2, p.279, 283, 287, 292-297 at Open Library, Internet Archive, accessed July 2013. maintains that Robert Corbet was educated at Shrewsbury School and cites a known payment of 3 shillings and ninepence by Sir Andrew to the school for his three sons. While plausible, there is no other evidence. The Corbet family did have a close association with the school: Reginald Corbet, Robert's great-uncle and recorder of Shrewsbury played an important part in getting permission to establish it in 1548. However, if Robert did get his schooling at Shrewsbury, it would have been in the very early days, as the school was opened only in 1552. From the outset, it had a distinctly Calvinist ethos, and under Thomas Ashton, its head appointed in 1561, it developed a reputation as a centre for humanistic learning and drama. It is quite possibly where Corbet developed an international outlook and facility for languages that would be useful in his later career.

Political and diplomatic career

Member of Parliament for Shropshire Many Corbets had been knights of the shire for Shropshire over the centuries and it was to replace one of them that Robert Corbet became a member of parliament in 1566. The parliament had been called as long before as November 1562 and assembled in January 1563. It showed much concern with the succession question and the queen prorogued it, only recalling it in 1566 to seek a financial bail-out.

Richard Corbet, brother of Reginald and a great-uncle of Robert Corbet, had been duly elected in 1562 but died in July 1566.P.W. Hasler (editor): The History of Parliament: Members 1558-1603 - CORBET, Richard I (Authors: Patricia Hyde / A. D.K. Hawkyard), accessed September 2013 The young Robert was slotted into his uncle's place and held the seat until the parliament was dissolved in January 1567. He was listed as "junior" in the parliamentary record to distinguish him from his uncle Robert of Stanwardine, near Baschurch. Shropshire's second MP was Edward Leighton (died 1593),P.W. Hasler (editor): The History of Parliament: Constituencies 1558-1603 - Shropshire (Author: P.W. Hasler) , accessed August 2013 an older and more experienced man and a close colleague of Sir Andrew in the military organisation of the county and the Council in the Marches, and he was a member of the committee investigating the succession question, which continued to preoccupy parliament. However, Leighton was granted leave of absence on 16 November,P.W. Hasler (editor): History of Parliament Online: Members 1558-1603 - LEIGHTON, Edward (by 1525-93) - Author: J.J.C., accessed September 2013. leaving Robert Corbet as the county's sole representative for the closing stages of the parliament.

Travels

During the 1570s Robert Corbet travelled widely in mainland Europe, sometimes in company with Philip Sidney, an alumnus of Shrewsbury School whose father, Sir Henry Sidney, was president of the Council in the Marches and a close friend of Sir Andrew Corbet, who was formally recognised as his deputy in 1574.

On 15 April 1574 Sidney, residing in Venice, recommended Corbet in a letter to Hubert Languet, a Huguenot who acted as diplomatic representative of Augustus, Elector of Saxony and who was at that time at the court of Maximilian II, the Holy Roman Emperor in Vienna:

"In a few days you will see two noble Englishmen, to whom I shall give letters of introduction to you, and therefore it seems well to write a few words to precede their arrival, and prepare you to receive them with your wonted courtesy. The one whom I especially commend to you is Master Robert Corbet, my very greatest friend, a man of high birth, but one who, as Buchanan says, ‘in excellence of parts outdoes his birth’. He is of the right side in religion and not unpractised in the art of war; he speaks only Italian The other is Master Richard Shelley, my cousin, as also is Corbett, but nearer to me in blood as the other in friendship."William Aspenwall Bradley (editor) (1912): The Correspondence of Philip Sidney and Hubert Languet, p.56-7 at Open Library, Internet Archive, accessed July 2013.

Shelley, Corbet's travelling companion on this occasion was last grand prior of the Knights of St. John in England, a Catholic notable who resided in Venice acting informally as the queen's trade representative and even less formally as a spy for the English government. Corbet set out for Vienna on 27 May, without his servant, who was too ill for the journey,William Aspenwall Bradley (editor) (1912): The Correspondence of Philip Sidney and Hubert Languet, p.74-5 at Open Library, Internet Archive, accessed July 2013. but carrying a portrait of Sidney for Languet.William Aspenwall Bradley (editor) (1912): The Correspondence of Philip Sidney and Hubert Languet, p.88 at Open Library, Internet Archive, accessed July 2013. After a brief stay in Vienna, Corbet and Shelly set out with letters of introduction from Languet to friends in Prague, Nuremberg and Augsburg. However, Corbet was soon writing back from Prague to Languet that Shelley was too ill to proceed, which Languet initially put down to Shelley's hypochondria. However, wrote Languet: "alas he made a more just calculation of his danger than the physicians, as I learn from a second letter from our friend Corbet, who writes in despair of Richard's condition. He was at the point of death, given over by his physicians...Corbet's letter shows that he is greatly disturbed, and I do not wonder at it. He consults me about his own affairs, and asks whether he shall pursue his journey when he has lost his companion as he hears that troops are being raised in the places through which his road lies, and that all the country about the Rhine and Lorraine is in a state of great confusion. But as he intimates that he will not leave Prague until he receives my reply, I have written to him to say what I think he should do."William Aspenwall Bradley (editor) (1912): The Correspondence of Philip Sidney and Hubert Languet, p.96-7 at Open Library, Internet Archive, accessed July 2013.

The regions mentioned as being in turmoil suggest that Corbet and Shelley were now making for England. Shelley survived his illness and Corbet arrived home the following year, receiving a present valued at £1 13s. 4d. from the borough of Shrewsbury on his return.

The journeys that can be reconstructed from the Sidney-Languet correspondence may be typical rather than exhaustive. A tribute in Shrewsbury's manuscript chronicle after his death says that Corbet was "of great estimation with the Queen’s Majesty and the nobility because he could speak perfectly sundry foreign languages by reason of his long absence in his youth out of England in foreign countries and especially trained as it were in the Emperor’s court, who was like to have come to great worship had he lived."

Ambassador

Corbet's earlier travels had not been officially sponsored, although he was clearly involved in promoting English and Protestant interests. However, in 1575, he received a government commission to act as an emissary to the Spanish governor of the Netherlands, Luis de Requesens y Zúñiga, known to the English as the Commendator. Requesens held the post only briefly and had shown considerably more flexibility in confronting the Dutch Revolt than the Duke of Alba, his predecessor. After significant victories, his funds had run out and he was now attempting to find common ground with the rebels under William the Silent, with the Emperor Maximilian acting as mediator: this may have been the background to Corbet and Shelley's journey to Vienna in the previous year. The English government was determined to push the negotiations towards a truce and, beyond that, to a permanent peace.

Corbet was sent as part of a three-pronged diplomatic assault, with the slightly older and considerably more experienced Henry CobhamP.W. Hasler (editor): History of Parliament Online: Members 1558-1603 - BROOKE, alias COBHAM, Henry I (1538-92) - Author: J.E.M. , accessed September 2013. taking responsibility for the direct approach to Spain, and John Hastings, who probably had Dutch connections,P.W. Hasler (editor): History of Parliament Online: Members 1558-1603 - HASTINGS, John (c.1525-c.85) - Author: N. M. Fuidge, accessed September 2013. approaching the rebels. Corbet's detailed brief, dated 29 October, is preserved in the State Papers. It strongly stressed the queen's concern for England's commercial interests: "the recovering and better settling of the ancient intercourse between her subjects and those of the Low Countries." He was told to emphasise the shared interest of England and Spain in keeping the French out of the Netherlands, with their fine ports and shipping. However, there was a red line: the queen might even support Spain "if she perceived that the King would permit his subjects to enjoy their liberties and be governed peaceably." In other words, England would not abandon the Protestant cause.