Barrow (Barrowe), Henry

BARROW (BARROWE), HENRY: English Separatist; hanged at Tyburn, London, Apr. 6, 1593. He came of good family in Norfolk, studied at Clare Hall, Cambridge, 1566-70, studied law, and was admitted a member of Gray’s Inn in 1576. He 491 belonged to the court circle and is said to have led a dissolute life until converted by a chance sermon. Probably through the influence of John Greenwood (q.v.) he adopted the views of the Brownists. After Greenwood’s arrest, Barrow visited him in prison and was himself illegally detained, Nov., 1586, and kept in confinement thenceforth till his execution. While in prison, in collaboration with Greenwood, he wrote several books and pamphlets, including A True Description out of the Word of God of the Visible Church (1589; cf. W. Walker, Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, New York, 1893, 28-40) and A Brief Discovery of the False Church (1590). Dr. Dexter’s suggestion (Congregationalism of the Last Three Hundred Years, New York, 1880, 192-202) that he wrote the Marprelate Tracts (q.v.) has not met with general acceptance. He differed from Robert Browne in placing the government of the Church in the hands of elders rather than the entire congregation, fearing too much democracy. See Congregationalists, I, 1, § 3. After the erratic leader of the Separatists had submitted to the Church, he turned his invectives against Barrow and Greenwood, who remained Separatists consistently to the end (see Browne, Robert).

Bibliography: Egerton Papers, ed. J. P. Collier for Camden Society, pp. 166-179, London, 1840; DNB, iii. 297-298 (has excellent list of references); Champlin Burrage. The True Story of Robert Browne, pp. 48-60, Oxford, 1906.