William Clarke (English politician)

William Clarke (c. 1623 in London, † June 14, 1666 ) was a British politician.

Clarke was a lawyer. He studied from 1645 at the Inner Temple in 1653 and received his approval. He was from 1647 to 1649 secretary of the Council of the Army and from 1651 to 1660 secretary of General George Monck and the commanders of the parliamentary army in Scotland. 1661 to 1666 he was Secretary of War. Clarke was also a favorite of Charles II, who knighted him and left him on a large estate in Marylebone Park live. He was on the flagship of Admiral Royal Charles Monck, as he (ie June 12 ) lost his leg on the second day of the four-day battle by a cannonball and two days later died.

The Clarke Papers of 1623 / 24-1666 serve as an important source for the English Civil War and its aftermath. They were left to Clarke's son George (1660-1736) Worcester College, Oxford. From the extensive inventory ( only 51 bound volumes ) were published later selections. The diary is in the British Museum.

He was with Dorothy Hyliard ( co-heiress of the estate owner Thomas Hyliard in Hampshire ), who married the friend of John Milton and doctor in the army of George Monck Samuel Barrow ( 1625-1682 ) in a second marriage. She died 1695th His marriage to Clarke, there was a son George.