Nathanael Richards

[1] A possible relative, Gabriel Richards, is mentioned in William Hammond's letters as a "cousin".

He pointed out the match of his coat of arms, as shown in the portrait engraving of 1640.

[8] Richards was a friend of Thomas Middleton, leading to the suggestion that the William Hammond to whom Middleton gave the manuscript of A Game at Chess in 1625 may have been of St Alban's Court (from the point of view of date, this would be the grandfather of William Hammond who died in 1685).

[12] Richards's major work was the tragedy Messallina (1640), a historical play based on Tacitus, Suetonius, Pliny the younger, and the sixth satire of Juvenal.

It is one of the few plays of the period that have a cast list: it includes William Cartwright senior (Claudius), John Robinson (Saufellus), Christopher Goad (Silius), John Barret (Messalina), and Thomas Jordan (Lepida).