Career
He settled as a bookseller at Bulkeley Hall, since incorporated into Oriel College, Oxford. At the beginning of Edward VI"s reign he purchased many libraries from the suppressed monasteries, some of which subsequently entered the Bodleian Library. As early as 1551 he regularly supplied books to Magdalen College.
In addition to his bookselling business he also sold stationery, becoming official stationer to the University, and in 1546 was licensed to sell wine as well.
His will, made on 5 August 1592, was proved on 3 May 1596. Harkes had a number of sons, some of whom carried on the bookselling business in the later years of the century.
Richard Garbrand was admitted a bookseller at Oxford 5 December 1573, and was alive in 1590. Thomas, born in 1539, was probationary fellow of Magdalen College from 1557 to 1570 (Bachelor 1558, Master of Arts 1562), and was senior proctor 1565-1566.
John Garbrand, born 1541/2, was a cleric and the literary executor of John Jewel.
William, born in 1549, was also fellow of Magdalen from 1570 to 1577 (Bachelor 1570, Master of Arts 1574), when he seems to have been suspended for insubordination. Ambrose, born at Oxford in 1584, received the privileges of an Oxford citizen in 1601, and in 1616 was a chief officer of the London Stationers" Company. John, born in 1585, was a scholar of Winchester College in 1596, fellow of New College, Oxford, from 1606 to 1608 (Bachelor in 1603-1604, Master of Arts in 1608), and pursued the bookseller"s trade at Oxford, dying about 1618, when his widow Martha remarried Christopher Rogers, principal of New Inn Hall.
The eldest son of Richard was the Reverend Tobias Garbrand (1579-1638).
A Demy of Magdalen in 1591, earning an Master of Arts and a Bachelor of Divinity, he was elected a Fellow of the College in 1605 and Vice-President in 1618. In 1619 he became vicar of Findon in Sussex, a post he held for the rest of his life.
His will was proved on 13 November 1638
Richard"s youngest son Nicholas Garbrand, born in 1600, was also at Magdalen. He was demy 1614-1619, fellow from 1619 to 1639 (Bachelor 1618, Master of Arts 1621, Bachelor's Degree 1631).
Vicar of Washington, Sussex, 2 September 1638 to 1671, vicar of Patching, Sussex, 1660-1671, prebendary of Chichester 1660-1669.
As late as the end of the seventeenth century the family name was often written Garbrand, alias Herks.
