Early Life of John Milton - Parents

Parents

Milton's parents were John Milton, Sr. (1562–1647), a composer and scrivener, and his wife Sara Jeffrey (1572–1637). John Milton, Sr.'s business owned many properties and was involved in making loans. He was from a yeoman family and was raised in Oxford where he trained as a chorister. However, when Richard Milton, his father and a staunch Roman Catholic, discovered that John Milton, Sr. had Protestant leanings, he disinherited his son. John Milton, Sr. left for London and became a scrivener apprentice in 1583. Little is known about Sara Jeffrey besides that Paul Jeffrey, her father, was a tailor and her mother was Ellen, who lived with the Miltons until her death in 1611. The two married around 1600 and buried an unnamed child on 12 May 1601.

John Milton, Sr. ran his business from his home on Bread Street. He was constantly at work, and only took a partial day off the day his son was born. In 1633, John Milton, Sr. became warden for the Chapel of St Paul. He continued his job as a scrivener until 1636, when he left the Company of Scriveners's Court of Assistants and he moved his family from Hammersmith to Horton. While not working as a scrivener, John Milton, Sr. composed music, which brought him into a close relationship with other musicians and composers including Henry Lawes, who proved influential in commissioning the young Milton's masques. At least twenty of his compositions survived, and most of them contain a religious theme. His works were published in many collections, including Thomas Morley's Triumphs of Oriana (1601), William Leighton's The Tears or Lamentations of a Sorrowful Soul (1612) and Thomas Ravenscroft's The Whole Book of Psalms (1621), amongst others. He also composed poetry, and two poems, never published, are known to have existed: a sonnet and a poem dedicated to John Lane.