According to the memoir of his younger brother Sir Thomas Shirley, he attended Oxford University, but no record of this has been found.
In 1627 an absurd squabble with a gentleman of the earl's household led to his imprisonment and house arrest, ended by an embarrassing public apology.
When he was subsequently accused of adultery, his wife 'both for safeguard of her honour, blemished by him scandalously, and for her alimony or maintenance (being glad to get from him) … was forced to endure a suit in the High Commission Court'.
[2] He subsequently boasted that he had been promised a barony as compensation, if he failed to secure a seat in the parliamentary elections, and the lieutenancy of Leicestershire.
[1] Two years later his widow married William Stafford (c.1604–1637) of Blatherwycke, Northamptonshire, in a Roman Catholic ceremony in the Queen's chapel at Somerset House.