Early Life and Family
Born about 1505 or 1506, Petre was one of the sons of John Petre, a farmer and tanner of a family long established at Tor Newton in Torbryan, Devon, by his marriage to Alice Colling, from nearby Woodland. Both of his grandfathers were franklins.
In 1519 Petre matriculated at the University of Oxford as a law student. He is claimed as a member of Exeter College, of which he was later a benefactor, but there is no evidence of him there as an undergraduate. In 1523 he became a Fellow of All Souls, of which he was law bursar in 1528/9. On 2 July 1526 he graduated Bachelor of both laws, and in 1527 and 1528 practised as a lawyer in Oxford.
One of his brothers, John Petre, later became the 'customer' (the comptroller or collector of customs) of the ports of Dartmouth and Exeter and was a member of parliament for Dartmouth in the Parliament of November 1554. Another brother, Richard, entered the church and became Archdeacon of Buckingham, while another, Robert Petre, became an auditor of the Exchequer.
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