Life

Ferrers was the son and heir of Edward Ferrers of Baddesley Clinton

Baddesley Clinton

The moated manor house of Baddesley Clinton , located just north of the historic town of Warwick in the English county of Warwickshire, was probably established sometime in the 13th century. When large areas of the Forest of Arden were cleared and eventually converted to farmland this large...

, Warwickshire, by Bridget, daughter and heiress of William, lord Windsor, and was born in that county on 26 January 1549. He became a student at Oxford, probably as a member of Hart Hall, in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth

Elizabeth I of England

Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...

's reign, but it is not known whether he took a degree. Afterwards he retired to his patrimony, and devoted himself to the study of heraldry, genealogy, and antiquities. Ferrers was apparently the M.P. for Callington

Callington (UK Parliament constituency)

Callington was a rotten borough in Cornwall which returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons in the English and later British Parliament from 1585 to 1832, when it was abolished by the Reform Act 1832.-History:...

 in 1597, and was a Catholic (Charles Dodd, Church Hist. iii.74). He died on 10 October 1633, and was buried in the church of Baddesley Clinton.

Works

He was the earliest collector of materials for the history of his county, with the exception of John Rous

John Rous

John Rous was the senior naval officer on the Nova Scotia station during Father Le Loutre's War . He made a significant contribution to the preservation of Halifax and the defeat of the French, Acadian and Mi'kmaq resistance...

, and he intended to publish a Perambulation of Warwickshire on the model of William Lambarde

William Lambarde

William Lambarde was an antiquarian and writer on legal subjects.-Life:Lambarde was born in London. His father was a draper , an alderman and a sheriff of London. In 1556, he was admitted to Lincoln's Inn...

's Perambulation of Kent, but did not carry out the plan. William Camden

William Camden

William Camden was an English antiquarian, historian, topographer, and officer of arms. He wrote the first chorographical survey of the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and the first detailed historical account of the reign of Elizabeth I of England.- Early years :Camden was born in London...

 says that he was ‘a man both for parentage and for knowledge of antiquity, very commendable and my special friend; who … hath at all times courteously shewed me the right way when I was out, and from his candle, as it were, hath lighted mine’. William Dugdale

William Dugdale

Sir William Dugdale was an English antiquary and herald. As a scholar he was influential in the development of medieval history as an academic subject.-Life:...

, who in writing the Antiquities of Warwickshire made extensive use of Ferrers's manuscript collections, describes him as an eminent antiquary and ‘a man of distinguished worth, reflecting lustre on the ancient and noble family to which he belonged.’ John Guillim

John Guillim

John Guillim was an antiquarian and officer of arms at the College of Arms in London. He is, perhaps, best remembered for his monumental work A Display of Heraldry which was first published in London in 1610....

 writes that Ferrers was ‘a man very judicious in matters of honour.’ Some of his manuscripts are preserved at the College of Arms, others in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, and the British Museum. ‘He had also in his younger days,’ says Anthony Wood

Anthony Wood

Anthony Wood or Anthony à Wood was an English antiquary.-Early life:Anthony Wood was the fourth son of Thomas Wood , BCL of Oxford, where Anthony was born...

, ‘a good faculty in poetry, some of which I have seen scattered in divers books printed in the reign of qu. Elizabeth’ (Athenæ Oxon. ed. Bliss, ii.572; see Ferrers, George).

The writer of the introduction to Archæologia conjectured that Ferrers was the author of "A Motion for erecting an Academy Royal, or Colledge of King James," manuscript written in 1617, but the real author was Edmund Bolton

Edmund Bolton

Edmund Mary Bolton , English historian and poet, was born in 1575.-Life:Nothing is known of his family or origins, although he referred to himself as a distant relative of George Villiers. Brought up a Roman Catholic, he was educated at Trinity Hall, Cambridge. Bolton then lived in London at the...

.

Family

He married, in October 1582, Jane, daughter and coheiress of Henry White, esq., of South Warnborough

South Warnborough

South Warnborough is a small village and civil parish in the English county of Hampshire. In the 2001 census, the population was 542.South Warnborough is approximately south of the village of Odiham and north of the town of Alton...

, Hampshire, son of Sir Thomas White, knight, and by her (who died 7 September 1586, aged 23) he had a son Edward and a daughter Mary.