ABSTRACT
Born in 1529 to Sir William Sidney and Anne Pagenham Fitzwilliam, it was William’s position as chamberlain to Prince Edward that afforded Henry such an unusually close association with the prince. Sidney endeavored to repair his relationship with Sussex by naming his youngest son, Thomas, after him. Sussex also stood as Thomas’s godfather along with William Cecil, Lord Burghley, Elizabeth’s key adviser, with whom marital negotiations were underway between Burghley’s daughter Anne and Philip Sidney. The Council of the Marches in Wales was a relatively new institution when Sidney became its president in 1560. Created to facilitate formalization of English control under the Act of Union, though a less formal council had existed since the 1470s, its function was to ensure centralization, royal control, coastal defense, and importantly, to resolve what was deemed to be rampant lawlessness and disorder in Wales.
