He was born at Chamberhouse Castle, Crookham, near Thatcham, Berkshire, into a minor gentry family, the Docwras (there are several variant spellings of the name, including Dockwra and Dowkra), who came originally from Yorkshire.

[5] The Docwras seem to have lacked influential relatives, and this was to be a considerable difficulty to Henry throughout his career, in an age when family connections were of great importance.

Like many ambitious young courtiers of the time, he entered the service of the Earl of Essex, the royal favourite, and fought beside him in the war against Spain.

[2] The following year he saw military service under Sir Francis Vere in Maurice of Nassau's campaigns in Brabant, and spent much of the late 1590s in the Netherlands where he distinguished himself at the Battle of Turnhout.

[6] In 1599, to his "unspeakable contentment", he was sent back to Ireland to serve with Essex during the Nine Years War, acting as his chief adviser on Irish military affairs.

These negotiations produced a set of terms called the Cessation, which was attacked by Essex's enemies as a total English capitulation to the Irish.

[8] The Cessation led quickly to Essex's disgrace, and this, in turn, caused his rebellion against Queen Elizabeth I, which ended with his execution as a traitor in February 1601.

[2] He constructed Dutch-inspired star-shaped bastion forts, each with a strong earthen rampart, surrounded by a ditch, at the three sites of Culmore, Derry and Dunnalong.

His most notable diplomatic coup was to win for the Crown, at least for a time, the loyalty of Niall Garve O'Donnell, cousin and brother-in-law of Red Hugh.

In fact, Docwra, who was a sensible man, had no expectation of any of the chieftains remaining loyal "if the Spaniards should approach these shores", or if the English suffered any decisive military defeat at the hands of the Irish.

His attitude was simply that, so long as it lasted, the support of men like Niall Garve was a political asset which the English should exploit to its fullest extent.

This gave him control of most of what is now County Londonderry, and led O'Cahan to switch sides, depriving O'Neill of a large portion of his remaining force.

Docwra had hoped that his services to the Crown in the Nine Years' War would produce rich rewards, and he seems to have set his heart on being created Lord President of Ulster; but he had never been popular, even it seems with his own soldiers.

It was said that there was nothing which the Queen and her Council dreaded more than yet another verbose letter from Docwra, angrily replying to any criticism of his conduct; and despite his later military success, a certain reputation for timidity and indecision remained with him.

Following the Flight of the Earls, and the O'Doherty rebellion, the English Crown no longer saw any advantage in conciliating the chieftains of Ulster: Docwra's Irish allies were ruined, and many of them, including Donnell O'Cahan, Niall Garve O'Donnell, and his son Neachtain, died as prisoners in the Tower of London.

During his retirement in England, Sir Henry Docwra protested bitterly to King James I that he had been unfairly accused of incompetence, and of his meagre rewards for his services to the Crown: in particular, he complained of the failure to make him Lord President of Ulster.

[15] As Treasurer he avoided the temptation, to which so many of his contemporaries succumbed, of using his office to enrich himself; in 1618 the English Council commended him to the Lord Deputy of Ireland for his care and diligence in carrying out his duties.

[3] His fellow Irish councillors sent a petition to their English colleagues, praising him as "an excellent civil servant", who died (relatively) poor, and recommended his widow and surviving children to their care.

Little is known of him except that he was obliged to sell his Ranelagh estate and was living in poverty when he died in England in 1647: since his brother Henry had predeceased him, the title became extinct.

[3] As a soldier Docwra was brave, skilful and ruthless; even the Irish reportedly admired him as "an illustrious knight of wisdom and prudence, a pillar of battle and conflict".