Life

He was the younger son of William Tracy

William Tracy (JP)

William Tracy was an English justice of the peace and prominent early Lutheran convert. After his death both his will and his remains became caught up in the struggle around the Protestant Reformation in England.-Life:...

, a noted Lutheran convert, graduated B.A. at Oxford on 27 June 1515, and was admitted student of the Inner Temple

Inner Temple

The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, commonly known as Inner Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court in London. To be called to the Bar and practise as a barrister in England and Wales, an individual must belong to one of these Inns...

 in 1519. In 1529 he was elected to the ‘reformation’ parliament as member for Wotton Basset

Wootton Bassett (UK Parliament constituency)

Wootton Bassett was a parliamentary borough in Wiltshire, which elected two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons from 1447 until 1832, when the rotten borough was abolished by the Great Reform Act.-History:...

, Wiltshire

Wiltshire

Wiltshire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire. It contains the unitary authority of Swindon and covers...

. For the next few years he was engaged in the struggle over his father's will.

In February 1533 he was granted Stanway

Stanway

-People:* Mark Stanway , a British musician* Peter Powers , a British television personality who purports to be a hypnotist-Other:* Stanway House, a Jacobean manor house near Stanway, Gloucestershire...

, a manor belonging to Tewkesbury Abbey

Tewkesbury Abbey

The Abbey of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Tewkesbury in the English county of Gloucestershire is the second largest parish church in the country and a former Benedictine monastery.-History:...

, which he made the home of his family. He adopted his father's religious views, and appears to have written a short treatise by 1533. In 1535 Tracy's works were classed as dangerous with those of Luther, Melanchthon, William Tyndale

William Tyndale

William Tyndale was an English scholar and translator who became a leading figure in Protestant reformism towards the end of his life. He was influenced by the work of Desiderius Erasmus, who made the Greek New Testament available in Europe, and by Martin Luther...

, and John Frith

John Frith

John Frith was an English Protestant priest, writer, and martyr.Frith was an important contributor to the Christian debate on persecution and toleration in favour of the principle of religious toleration...

. In 1537 Tracy had been placed on the commission of the peace for Gloucestershire, and employed in work connected with the visitation of the monasteries in his shire.

In 1538 he was nominated for the shrievalty, but Henry VIII preferred Robert Acton, and in December 1539 he was appointed one of the squires to attend at the reception of Anne of Cleves

Anne of Cleves

Anne of Cleves was a German noblewoman and the fourth wife of Henry VIII of England and as such she was Queen of England from 6 January 1540 to 9 July 1540. The marriage was never consummated, and she was not crowned queen consort...

. His reforming zeal led his friend and neighbour Hugh Latimer

Hugh Latimer

Hugh Latimer was a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, Bishop of Worcester before the Reformation, and later Church of England chaplain to King Edward VI. In 1555, under Queen Mary, he was burnt at the stake, becoming one of the three Oxford Martyrs of Anglicanism.-Life:Latimer was born into a...

 to express a wish that there were many more like him. With Thomas Cromwell's fall Tracy lost favour at court, and on 7 July 1546 his books were ordered to be burnt.

In 1548 he was appointed, under the act for the abolition of chantries, one of the commissioners of inquiry for Gloucestershire. In May 1551 he was imprisoned in the Tower for a letter, probably an attack on Warwick's government. He was released on 17 November 1552. On 9 June 1555 his religious views brought him under the notice of Queen Mary's council, but he cleared himself. On 19 September following, however, he again appeared on a charge of having behaved stubbornly towards the Bishop of Gloucester

Bishop of Gloucester

The Bishop of Gloucester is the Ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Gloucester in the Province of Canterbury.The diocese covers the County of Gloucestershire and part of the County of Worcestershire and has its see in the City of Gloucester where the seat is located at the Cathedral Church...

, and in January 1557 he was in trouble for refusing to pay a forced loan. After Elizabeth's accession Tracy served as High Sheriff of Gloucestershire

High Sheriff of Gloucestershire

This is a list of High Sheriffs of Gloucestershire.The High Sheriff is the oldest secular office under the Crown. Formerly the High Sheriff was the principal law enforcement officer in the county but over the centuries most of the responsibilities associated with the post have been transferred...

 in 1560-1, and in 1565 wrote a protest to William Cecil

William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley

William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley , KG was an English statesman, the chief advisor of Queen Elizabeth I for most of her reign, twice Secretary of State and Lord High Treasurer from 1572...

 against the queen's retaining a crucifix

Crucifix

A crucifix is an independent image of Jesus on the cross with a representation of Jesus' body, referred to in English as the corpus , as distinct from a cross with no body....

 in her chapel.

Works

Probably his ‘Profe and Declaration of thys Proposition: Fayth only iustifieth’, dedicated to Henry VIII, but with no date, place, or printer's name, was Tracy's earliest work. It was followed in 1544 by ‘A Supplycation to our most Soueraigne Lorde, Kynge Henry the Eyght.’

In November 1548, during the discussions in convocation and parliament which preceded the issue of Edward VI's first Book of Common Prayer

Book of Common Prayer

The Book of Common Prayer is the short title of a number of related prayer books used in the Anglican Communion, as well as by the Continuing Anglican, "Anglican realignment" and other Anglican churches. The original book, published in 1549 , in the reign of Edward VI, was a product of the English...

, Tracy published ‘A Bryef and short Declaracyon made wherebye euery Chrysten Man may knowe what is a Sacrament,’ London. He quotes largely from Augustine of Hippo

Augustine of Hippo

Augustine of Hippo , also known as Augustine, St. Augustine, St. Austin, St. Augoustinos, Blessed Augustine, or St. Augustine the Blessed, was Bishop of Hippo Regius . He was a Latin-speaking philosopher and theologian who lived in the Roman Africa Province...

.

Besides these, Tracy is said to have written ‘The Preparation to the Crosse and to Death .... in two bookes,’ 1540. This treatise, bound up with two by John Frith, was found in a cod's belly in Cambridge market in 1626 (see Vox Piscis

Vox Piscis

Vox Pisces, or The Book-Fish, contayning three treatises which were found in the belly of a cod-fish in Cambridge market, on Midsummer Eve last. is a book published in 1627 with a very unusual origin....

), and was reprinted in that year by Boler and Milbourne.

Richard Tracy was rumored to be a playable character (a kickboxer) in the first Mortal Kombat game as an unlockable secret character. It was later revealed as a creation of Electronic Gaming Monthly as part of an April Fool's Day joke.

Family

By his wife Barbara, daughter of Sir Thomas Lucy (died 1525), Tracy had issue three sons and three daughters. The eldest surviving son, Paul Tracy of Stanway, was created a baronet in 1626. In 1543 Bartholomew Traheron

Bartholomew Traheron

-Life:Born about 1510, he is said to have been a native of Cornwall. Bartholomew was early left an orphan, and was brought up under the care of Richard Tracy of Toddington, Gloucestershire....

, who had been educated at Tracy's expense and was called his son, dedicated to him his translation of John of Vigo

John of Vigo

John of Vigo was a Spanish Renaissance pioneer of chirurgy....

's Surgery.