Research Notes:
"Walsingham, Sir Francis (c.1532-1590), principal secretary, was born either in London or at Foots Cray, Kent, the only son of William Walsingham (b. after 1480, d. 1534), lawyer and landowner, of Scadbury in Chislehurst, Kent, and his wife, Joyce (1506/7-1560), daughter of Sir Edmund Denny of Cheshunt, Hertfordshire, and his second wife, Mary. He had five sisters, including Mary (1527/8-1577), who married Sir Walter Mildmay (1520/21-1589) on 25 May 1546, Elizabeth (d. 1596), who married Peter Wentworth (1524-1597), and Christiana, who married John Tamworth (c.1524-1569), keeper of the privy purse from 1559 to 1569, in 1562. His uncle was Sir Edmund Walsingham (b. in or before 1480, d. 1550), lieutenant of the Tower of London from 1521 until his death. ... Walsingham's mother died in 1560 and was buried beside his father in St Mary Aldermanbury, London. In 1562 Walsingham married Anne (d. 1564), daughter of Sir George Barne of London, and his wife, Alice, and widow of Alexander Carleill. They had no children. She was a wealthy woman when she died in summer or autumn 1564 (her will dated 28 July and proved 22 November), leaving her children in Walsingham's care. These included the future soldier and naval commander Christopher Carleill (1551?-1593) ... In autumn 1566 he married Ursula (d. 1602), daughter of Henry St Barbe of Somerset and widow of Sir Richard Worseley of the Isle of Wight. ... The couple had two daughters, Frances (c.1568-1632), who married Sir Philip Sidney (1554-1586) on 21 September 1583, and Mary, who died as a child in 1580. After 1566 Walsingham established his household at his new wife's house, Appuldurcombe, on the Isle of Wight, and then nearby at her late husband's house, Carisbrooke Castle. On 6 September 1567 an accidental explosion of gunpowder at the gatehouse at Appuldurcombe killed his two stepsons from his second marriage. ... Walsingham wrote his last will on 12 December 1589, and it was proved on 27 May 1590. ... Walsingham died at his house in Seething Lane on 6 April 1590 and was buried in St Paul's in the same tomb as Sidney at 10 o'clock the following evening in a simple ceremony. The tomb was destroyed during the great fire of 1666, and a plaque now commemorates Sidney but not Walsingham. Ursula Walsingham died suddenly at Barn Elms on 18 June 1602 and was buried near her husband after a simple ceremony the next evening." [1]
A biography of Sir Francis Walsingham was published in the Dictionary of National Biography, 1899. [2]
Robert Hutchinson discusses the career and times of Francis Walsingham. [3]
[1] Simon Adams and Alan Bryson and Mitchell Leimon, "Walsingham, Sir Francis (c.1532–1590)," Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004, online edition, rev. May 2009), [Oxford_Dictionary_National_Biography], [OxfordDNB(UM)].
[2] Sidney Lee, ed., Dictionary of National Biography, Wakeman-Watkins, Vol. 59 (London: Smith Elder & Co, 1899), 231-240, [HathiTrust].
[3] Robert Hutchinson, Elizabeth's Spymaster: Francis Walsingham and the Secret War That Saved England (Macmillan, 2007), [Google_Preview].