One page, 8 1/2 x 7 1/2 in. (216 x 191 mm), central vertical fold, minor staining to right side partially affecting text. Framed and matted with an engraved portrait, overall, 16 x 21 in. Unexamined out of frame.

In part: "I have written to Whitgrave certain instructions how to use the game at Chartley and if he do break any of them I will assuredly put him out of the parse whereof I pray you take some care that I receive some present advertisements of any faultes that are committed. Thus in haste I bid you farewell the court this 18th of Decem. 1585. Your very loving friend..."

Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, departed his home of Chartley Manor in September 1585 at the request of his mother, who wished for him to begin his career as a courtier in Queen Elizabeth I's court. Though unnoticed by the queen at first, Devereux gained attention throughout England following a successful engagement against Spanish forces during the Anglo-Spanish War at the Battle of Zutphen and returned to the court a royal favorite. Young and very attractive, Devereux and the queen were often sighted together, with one of his servants boasting that "[Even at night] my lord is at cardes or one game or another with her, that he commeth not to his owne lodginge tyll the birdes singe in the morninge."

During this period, Queen Elizabeth I was involved in an intense power struggle with her cousin, Mary, Queen of Scots, who had spent nearly eighteen years imprisoned at Elizabeth's orders to prevent any attempts Mary might make to gain control of the English crown. One week after Devereux sent the present letter from Elizabeth's court, Mary arrived at Chartley Manor to begin an eight-month period of imprisonment. Letters written during this time by Mary were smuggled out of Chartley by Elizabeth's secretary, Francis Walsingham, implicating her in the 1586 Babington Plot to assassinate Elizabeth. This plot was the final straw for Elizabeth, who ordered that Mary be tried for treason. She was convicted on 25 October 1586 and executed on 7 February 1587.

Devereux's brashness and competitiveness with other members of the court eventually led to him falling out of favor with Elizabeth. Following a trial for dereliction of duty in 1599, Devereux's primary source of income was stripped from him. Desperate, he gathered a group of nobles and knights and attempted to force an audience with Elizabeth. He was tried for treason and executed on 25 February 1601. Many of Essex's confederates were later implicated in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605.