James Temple
[1] Born in Rochester, Kent, to a well-connected gentry family, he was the second of two sons of Sir Alexander Temple, although his elder brother died in 1627.
As a child, Temple moved with his father from Rochester to Chadwell St Mary in Essex and then to Etchingham in Sussex, where he settled.
He rose to become a colonel and commanded Tilbury Fort, an important defensive position on the approach to London by river.
His uncles included Sir Thomas Temple, 1st Baronet, of Stowe and William Fiennes, 1st Viscount Saye and Sele.
In the early 1620s, as a result of his father's marriage to Mary Bankworth (who was previously married to John Busbridge), he moved, this time to Haremere Hall in Etchingham, Sussex.
[7] His father's third marriage gave him step siblings, including his stepsister, Mary Busbridge to whom Temple was married in March 1627.
[8] In June 1627, George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham led an expedition to the island of Île de Ré to support the Huguenots besieged in La Rochelle by King Louis XIII of France.
Temple had a relatively meagre inheritance – no grand country house, no great estate and certainly no large fortune.
He was appointed captain of a troop of horse raised by Lord Saye and Sele and commanded by Temple's cousin, John Fiennes.
[14] In December 1643, Temple was prominent in the defence of the crossing of the River Adur at Bramber Castle against a Royalist attack during Lord Hopton's attempt to obtain control of Sussex for the King.
"[16] As the war progressed, Temple was promoted to colonel and became governor of Tilbury Fort in Essex, a post that had previously been held by his father.
The fort was close to Temple's childhood home at Longhouse Place and was of strategic importance because it controlled the approach to London by river.
In 1648, he was ordered by the House of Commons to respond to the legal action of one Elizabeth Willan who had attempted to serve him with two writs in connection with a bond for £400.
[23] A few years later, he was accused of improperly benefiting from administering the estate of a prominent Sussex catholic – Sir John Shelley – whose heir was a minor.
[25] This investment made by Temple's father for the benefit of his children had apparently become valueless when Edward Whalley fled to Scotland in the late 1630s.
However, with the death of Oliver Cromwell and the subsequent restoration of Charles II, both regicides were faced with the possibility of execution and the case appears to have been unresolved.
He tried to avoid the death penalty by saying that he had only acted as a judge in Charles I's trial in order to give information to the Royalists.
[27] William Winstanley described him as "not so much famous for his valour as his villainy, being remarkable for nothing but this horrible business of the king's murther, for which he came into the pack to have a share in the spoyle.
