Portrait of Walter Devereux (1539-1576), First Earl of Essex dated 1572 British Painter Walter Devereux succeeded his grandfather as Viscount Hereford and Lord Ferrers in 1558. He was joint custodian of Mary, Queen of Scots, in 1568. The following year, he helped put down the Northern Rising and was appointed marshal of the army at Leicester. He was lord lieutenant of County Stafford from 1569 until his death. Faithful to Queen Elizabeth I, Devereux was installed as a Knight of the Garter in 1572, and created Earl of Essex the same year. He sailed for Ireland in the summer of 1573 in an attempt to colonize Ulster, a costly venture that ended in failure in the summer of 1575. The earl died in Dublin in 1576 and was succeeded by his son Robert, a royal favorite who was executed in 1601 after attempting to raise a rebellion.This work is among numerous Elizabethan portraits formerly attributed to Federico Zuccaro, who was in London for only six months, from March to August 1575; no paintin