Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, died at Cornbury, Oxfordshire, on 4 September 1588. He was 56 and had been one of the closest figures to Elizabeth I throughout almost her entire reign.

His death came only weeks after the defeat of the Spanish Armada. During the crisis, Elizabeth had appointed Dudley Lieutenant and Captain-General of her forces. He helped organise the army assembled at Tilbury against a possible Spanish landing and was with the Queen when she visited the troops there in August.

Dudley’s health was already poor. After the immediate danger passed, he planned to travel to Buxton in Derbyshire, where he hoped the waters would improve his condition. He did not complete the journey. He became seriously ill at Cornbury and died there.

Shortly before his death, Dudley wrote to Elizabeth from Rycote. The letter concerned both his health and hers, and he hoped the baths at Buxton would cure her.

Elizabeth kept the letter, so it survived. After she died in 1603, it was found in a box beside her bed. She had marked it as Dudley’s last letter.

The exact cause of Dudley’s death is uncertain. Malaria has often been suggested, although cancer has also been proposed. His health had been deteriorating before his final journey.

Dudley had known Elizabeth since before she became Queen and had been her favourite from the beginning of her reign in 1558. Their relationship generated political rivalry, gossip and repeated speculation about marriage; it survived decades of disagreements and changes at court.

His death removed a figure who had occupied an unusual position in Elizabethan politics for nearly 30 years. Dudley was buried the following month in the Beauchamp Chapel at the Collegiate Church of St Mary in Warwick.