Henry Ferne

Henry Ferne, bishop of Chester, is buried in St Edmund's chapel in Westminster Abbey. His grave consists of a low grey marble plinth inset with an engraved cartouche of arms surmounted by a mitre with engraved shields in each corner (his arms are "a bend indented, a crescent for difference"), all in brass. The inscription is on a brass strip around the edge and the Latin can be translated:

Here lies Henry Ferne, D.D., 8th son of Sir John Ferne, Kt. of the City of York, head of Trinity College, Cambridge and at the same time Bishop of Chester, in which he sat but five weeks and died 16 March A.D. 1662 in the 59th year of his age.

The brass was originally flat on the chapel floor before being raised on the plinth for better preservation in the 19th century so some of the brass is rubbed.

His mother was Elizabeth (Needham) and he had nine brothers and two sisters. Educated at Oxford and Cambridge he became chaplain to Thomas Morton and was later archdeacon of Leicester and chaplain to Charles I. He accompanied the king on his travels and preached to him just before his trial. During the Civil War he lived quietly in Yorkshire and continued his writings. At the Restoration of Charles II he was Master, and later Vice Chancellor, of Trinity College, Dean of Ely and bishop of Chester although he died, unmarried, before he could take up this latter post.

Further reading

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography