Ireland under the Tudors, with a Succinct Account of the Earlier History. Vol. 2 (of 3)

by Richard Bagwell

FOOTNOTES:

[196] Sir Francis Englefield to Dorothy Devereux, Domestic Calendar, April 19, 1570; same to the Duchess of Feria, ib., April 20. Roger Hooker, a layman, was Dean of Leighlin in 1580, and probably for some time before: this was a strange experience for the father of Richard Hooker.

[197] John Corbine to Cecil, March 2, 1569; Sidney to Cecil, April 18, 1570; Fitzwilliam to Burghley, April 7 and May 7, 1571.

[198] John Corbine to Cecil, March 21, 1569; Sidney to Cecil, April 18, 1570; Mendoza to Cecil, Nov. 9; Norris to the Queen, Foreign Calendar, Jan. 3, 1571; Viscount Decies to Fitzwilliam, March 28. Note by William Herlle, April. For an account of the spy Herlle, see Froude, chap. xxi.

[199] ‘Istius insulæ rursum erigere et stabilire regale solium.’

[200] Statement presented to the King of Spain by the Archbishop of Cashel, on the part of the Irish Catholics, Spicilegium Ossoriense, i. 59.

[201] For Stukeley’s early life, see Wright’s Elizabeth, i. 40 and 150. Wrothe to Cecil, Nov. 14, 1564; Shane O’Neill to the Queen, June 18 and July 28, 1565; the Queen to Sussex, June 30, 1563, in Haynes; Arnold to the Privy Council, June 23, 1565; Sidney to Cecil, March 7, 1565; Stukeley to same, same date; Cecil to Sidney, March 27, 1566; Queen to same, March 31 and July 6; Sidney to Cecil, April 17; Cecil to Sidney, Oct. 24, 1568; N. White to Sidney, March 10, 1569; Deposition of Richard Stafford, June 10, 1569, as to a conversation with Stukeley one year before; Mendoza to Cecil, Nov. 9, 1570. Stukeley sailed from Waterford, April 17, 1570.

[202] Robert Hogan or Huggins to Sir H. Norris, August 12, 1570, in the Foreign Calendar; Sir H. Norris to the Queen, Jan. 3, 1571, in the same; Memorandum by Archbishop Fitzgibbon, Dec. 16, 1570, in Spicilegium Ossoriense, vol. i.

[203] Sir H. Norris to Cecil, Oct. 29, 1570; Walsingham to same, Jan. 27, Feb. 25, and March 5, 1571; Cardinal Chatillon to same, Feb. 2; Buckhurst to same, Feb. 24; the Queen to Walsingham, Feb. 11. All the above are in the Foreign Calendar. Archbishop Fitzgibbon to Philip II., July 26, 1570, in Spicilegium Ossoriense, vol. i.

[204] According to Froude, vol. x. p. 525, Philip called the Irish ‘salbaxes,’ or savages. Henry Cobham to Burghley, April 27, 1571, in Foreign Calendar. Cardinal Alciati to the Archbishop of Cashel, June 13, 1570, in Spicilegium Ossoriense, i. 64.

[205] Archbishop of Cashel to Cardinal Alciati, Aug. 1570, in Spicilegium Ossoriense, i. 64.

[206] Oliver King to Cecil, Feb. 18, 1571; and Robert Huggins to Walsingham, Jan. 25; both in the Foreign Calendar.

[207] Walsingham to Burghley, April 4; Queen to Walsingham, April 8; Walsingham to Burghley, April 11, 19, and 22; Queen to Walsingham, May 5; Walsingham to Burghley, May 14.—Foreign Calendar, 1571. Brady’s Episcop. Succession, Art. ‘MacGibbon;’ Digges’s Complete Ambassador. Walsingham says ‘Captain Thomas’ was a son of Judge Bathe, and that his brother was receiver of customs at Drogheda.

CHAPTER XXIX.
1571 and 1572.

Fitzwilliam cannot govern without money, 1571.

Sidney was looked upon as the proper Viceroy for stormy times, and to him money and troops were given grudgingly and of necessity, for he would not go to Ireland without them. Fitzwilliam was but a stop-gap, thrown into the place to serve a turn, as he bitterly expressed it. ‘For God’s sake,’ he cried, ‘let me be rid of Ireland or I perish.’ Arthur Lord Grey was chosen for the perilous post, but the appointment did not then take place, because the Queen differed from him as to a sum of 2,000l. It would all, said Fitzwilliam, have been spent in her service, and she would lose ten times the sum by denying it. Of money, indeed, there was a most grievous want. The magazines were empty. The captains were almost openly mutinous. The men were in rags and ready to desert, being forced in the meantime to sell their arms for sheer want. The victuallers were unpaid and had struck work. The Lord Chancellor’s salary was at least two years in arrears. Grey was taken seriously ill at the thought of being forced to go to Ireland on the Queen’s terms, and Sidney positively refused to return. Fitzwilliam had therefore to remain, and to make the best of it. He received the title of Lord Deputy, but neither more men nor more money than when he held the less exalted post of Lord Justice.[208]

Perrott is ill-supported. Ormonde.

After his failure at Castlemaine, Perrott said that the work of ‘trotting the mountains’ was not suited to English soldiers. He had been promised two hundred kerne at sixpence a day, but had received neither the men nor the pay. He could not do without them, even if he had to keep them at his own cost. The only real way of restoring order was to be in two places at once, as Governor and as general; that being impossible, he must have such a force as would bear dividing. ‘To follow the kerne from wood to wood your Lordship knows the soldiers are far unable. Therefore, if I should do any good here, I must have kerne against kerne, and gallowglass against gallowglass, and trained men to do what they may for the stand.’ Limerick, the garden of Munster, was too much impoverished to support an army, and the men were in dysentery from always eating beef without bread or vegetables, not forty horsemen being fit for service. The Privy Council, who had promised two hundred kerne, now murmured at being asked for a bare hundred, and the fiery President declared that he would never trust them, nor do anything in their faith again. From Ormonde alone, whom he ‘ever loved and honoured,’ did he get any real help, and he was not always satisfied that even Ormonde did his best to prosecute the rebels, for he urged him to divide his men into four divisions, and then to leave Fitzmaurice no resting-place. But even while chiding the Earl for inaction, Perrott admitted that want of provisions was a fair excuse.[209]

It is proposed to restore the Desmonds. General misery in Munster.

In his extremity Perrott was driven to ask that Sir John of Desmond might be sent over. In the absence of the Earl Sir John would then be leader of the Geraldines, and would draw all away from James Fitzmaurice. The people of the ‘poor, ruinous town of Kinsale,’ as they called themselves, begged for both brothers to help the President in saving them from the fate of Kilmallock. They of Youghal, who had yet to learn of what Desmond was capable, urged the same request. They complained of being shut up within their walls, in hourly fear of assault, and crushed by the cost of a garrison in which they had no confidence. They were worn with watching; no one could spend a night at home. Rich and poor were in the same plight, and the young would soon be as weak as the old already were. Their chance of food depended on the precarious herring fishery.

Desmond and his brother, they said, ‘in their time did right well govern these parts,’ and their return would send James Fitzmaurice beyond the seas. For Sidney they longed no less than for Desmond. Perrott was entirely against the restoration of the Earl, thinking that his further detention in London would secure the good behaviour of his brother. He advised that the Earl and Countess, who were prisoners at large, should be shut up in the Tower for a year, so as to take away all hope of their return. This, he thought, would encourage the Geraldine chiefs to make separate terms. Sir John might then be safely sent over, security having been first taken for his good behaviour. ‘I hear,’ said Perrott, ‘he is a decent gentleman.’ Fitzwilliam, who saw Munster pretty much through Ormonde’s eyes, was equally against both. ‘God keep both Sir John of Desmond and base money out of Ireland, yet are they both at the seaside to come over, if brutes be true.’[210]

Perrott proposes to decide the war by a duel.

Most people who study the acts of Sir John Perrott will probably be of opinion that he was a wise and honest man, if not always prudent for himself. But he now indulged in such an act of folly as can hardly be matched, even in the annals of Irish misgovernment. He could not catch James Fitzmaurice, and therefore he challenged him, resolving, if possible, to end the war at one blow. Had the weapons been those of the tilt-yard, the Queen’s old champion might have been pretty sure of victory, but Fitzmaurice, who at first encouraged the President’s idea, insisted upon sword and target and Irish trousers for both sides. Perrott agreed, and provided a pair of scarlet trousers for himself. Then Fitzmaurice objected to single combat, and proposed that there should be fifty a side. It was finally agreed that each party should consist of twelve horse and twelve foot, ‘with indifferent armour and weapon.’ Edward Butler was one of those picked on the President’s side. Perrott wrote to Ormonde to borrow his horse, and begged him to attend with all his force, evidently thinking that there was a danger of foul play. ‘I trust very shortly,’ he told the Earl, ‘to make end of this war, and to overthrow the rest of these Geraldines, which do so much annoy her Majesty’s subjects. My lord, I have promised that there shall be no hurt done unto him by any of your lordship’s men, until such time as the day be past, and I have promised him peace, that no man shall hurt him, nor none of his, till this matter be tried. And so he likewise hath promised to do the like unto all her Majesty’s subjects.’[211]

Ormonde at his wit’s end. Fitzmaurice refuses to fight.

It is not surprising that Ormonde was ‘almost at his wit’s end’ on receiving this extraordinary letter from his old brother-in-arms. ‘The manner of the President’s dealing herein is strange to me. I will stay his lordship (if I can by any means) from this attempt, and will with all my heart join with him myself and my company, to fight against the traitor and his whole company, rather than he should so barely hazard himself with so few.... God send us a good hour against these villains.’[212] He may have intended treachery and been foiled by Ormonde’s action, or he may have suspected treachery; but the message he sent by his Irish poet gave a very good reason for not coming. ‘If I should kill Sir John Perrott, the Queen of England can send another President into this province; but if he do kill me, there is none other to succeed me, or to command as I do, therefore I will not willingly fight with him, and so tell him from me.’ In the most disturbed times in modern Ireland officials, even policemen, have often been protected by the same consideration. Perrott, however, was very angry, and resolved to ‘hunt the fox out of his hole,’ regretting, as well he might, that he had wasted so much time and played into the hands of his crafty foe.[213]

Colonisation of Ulster. Sir Thomas Smith, 1572.

The failure of colonisation projects in Munster did not prevent the Queen from listening to those who imagined that they could found private principalities in Ireland. The district of Ards, in what is now the County of Down, being almost surrounded by the sea, was by its position well suited for such an experiment. On the north-west a land frontier of barely ten miles might seem to require no great number of defenders. Various offers were made, those of Secretary Smith being accepted by Elizabeth. Tremayne, who foresaw the commotion that would be caused by any scheme of colonisation, was in favour of a more extended experiment; but strongly advised that the Queen should appear as the patroness of a country already her own, and not as a conqueror. The people should be told that their rights would not be infringed, and this should be published everywhere in the Irish language. Had Sir Thomas Smith taken this advice he would still have had many difficulties to encounter; but he did not take it, and the Ulster Irish had their first notice from a pamphlet written in English and published in London. Sir Thomas thought that ‘the little book was evil done,’ but was induced to agree to its being put forth by his son, who was to have the actual direction of the business, and whom he was even content to lose in the glorious work of reconquering the Queen’s land without burden to her or to the English State. The writer of the pamphlet, whether young Smith or another, set forth at length the historical reasons why the English power had waned in Ireland, and proposed to restore it by colonisation. A permanent garrison was to be established, and ‘every soldier to be made master of his own land, to him and his heirs for ever.’ It was supposed that 600 or 700 men would be enough, and that the penniless younger sons, who could no longer fall back on the decent idleness of the abbeys, would seize upon this golden opportunity. The examples chosen to prove how easily a small English force might overcome a larger body of Irish were singularly inapplicable to a plan of colonisation. It was true that Gilbert with 100 men had driven the Munster rebels before him, that Collyer with one company had discomfited 1,000 Redshanks, that Randolph with 300 had beaten 3,000 O’Neills before Derry. But it was equally true that the rebels were as strong as ever when Gilbert’s back was turned, that Scots continued to pour in, and that the settlement at Derry was abandoned. It was argued that 300 horse and 400 foot would be enough to settle the Ards, and their pay would amount to 10,000l. a year. For the first three years they were to pay no rent for their holdings, after which it was estimated that they would be self-supporting. How Sir Thomas Smith could imagine that private adventurers would lend 10,000l. a year without interest for three years, upon the security of Irish land still unconquered, may well puzzle us; but sanguine hope was a characteristic of the sixteenth century.

‘Many shall say,’ the candid pamphleteer admits, ‘that they shall go into a place where they shall want meat, housing, and all things necessary, for that no prince yet hath been able to victual their army ... that the soldier is always constrained to march through the bogs and rivers, and in the night to lodge upon the grass without meat and fire. This is indeed a great misery ... but consider the difference that is between the Deputy’s journey who seeketh to apprehend the rebels’ bodies ... and his enterprise, who desireth the land only.’[214]

The O’Neills are alarmed.

Whatever English adventurers may have thought of Thomas Smith and his pamphlet, there was nothing in the movement which could possibly be pleasing to the Irish. The Norman family of Savage had from early times enjoyed dominion in the Ards, and their title to considerable estates in the southern half had been acknowledged in 1559. It was evidently not intended to interfere with them, and though pretty thoroughly Hibernicised, they seem on the whole to have favoured Smith’s enterprise. Had the plan been strictly confined to the peninsula, and adequately supported until the cultivation of wastes became profitable, a small English Pale might have been created in Ulster. But Sir Brian MacPhelim O’Neill, chief of a clan which had long lorded it over the southern part of Antrim and the northern part of Down, took fright at once. Even in the Ards he claimed superiority, and he rightly guessed that Smith’s operations would extend further. Old Captain Piers at Carrickfergus promptly reminded the Lord Deputy that it was the nature of Irishmen to let land lie idle rather than to see others work, and that the Clandeboye O’Neills had been too long loose to brook the curb easily. Piers circulated a letter purporting to be a copy of one sent by the Lord Deputy, and denying the whole story; ‘but the truth,’ he added, ‘will soon be known, in spite of my feigning.’ He advised Fitzwilliam to gain time by pretending that the intruders were brought in entirely against the Scots, and to take timely pledges from Sir Brian MacPhelim. He would do his best; but when all shifts were exhausted the Irish would revolt, and the result was only too certain.[215]

Sir Brian MacPhelim O’Neill.

Fitzwilliam himself reported that the immediate effect of the pamphlet had been to strengthen the Scots, whose alliance all the Northern tribes now sought, and that a common danger had made O’Donnell and O’Neill friends. The expense of restoring peace was likely to be greater than any private interest could warrant. Sir Brian MacPhelim pleaded his own cause with considerable force. He had served Sussex, Croft, and Sidney faithfully, and had lately borne the whole cost of victualling Carrickfergus; and the Queen, ignorant as he believed of his daily usefulness, was now about to give away his inheritance to Saxons. In her service he had spent more cows and horses than were in any one English county, and so it should always be while he was left in command. Clandeboye had been in the hands of his family for fourteen generations, and he now begged for a royal grant in consideration of faithful service from his childhood. Whatever may have been the Queen’s actual intention towards Sir Brian MacPhelim and the other Irish, it is clear that no good was intended them. Smith covenanted to suppress all rebels not only in Ards but in Clandeboye, to divide the lands among the adventurers, and not to sell to any Irishman or Scot. English settlers were forbidden, except by royal license, to intermarry with Irish or Scots, and they were all bound to attend the Deputy anywhere in Ulster for forty days.

Vain attempts to reassure Sir Brian.

Fitzwilliam vainly tried to explain away Smith’s project: for all answer the unlucky pamphlet was laid before him. Smith himself would fain have counteracted by a letter the mischief done by his ‘books spread in print.’ He said he was not coming to rob Sir Phelim, but to help that loyal chief, and he was willing to have any points in which their interests might differ decided by a lawful judge rather than by an appeal to arms. As a beginning of friendship he begged Sir Brian to be the protector of his people. The language was not ill chosen, and had it been followed by wise action, the scheme might yet have succeeded. The Queen also wrote to Sir Brian, promising, in language which ‘gladded’ him, that his lands should not be taken away. Had Sir Brian and his friends been frankly invited, as Tremayne advised, to co-operate with the Queen in a well-designed scheme for planting some thinly peopled districts within the Earldom of Ulster, they might perhaps have been friendly, though even that is very doubtful: managed as it was, the project was foredoomed to failure.[216]

Fitzwilliam has no money.

Fitzwilliam did not cease to beg for his recall or for men and money to do something worthy of the place which he was forced to fill. In his office of Vice-Treasurer he had incurred debt to the Crown, and if only allowed to go back to England he would sell Milton to pay them. In the meantime Ireland lay at the mercy of a foreign enemy. Let but 6,000 Spaniards land, and the loss would be as irrevocable as that of Calais, nor would the Narrow Seas be any longer safe. Fitzwilliam supposed that Sidney was his enemy at Court; but the friendly tone of Leicester’s letters makes this unlikely, and it is probable that the real difficulty was with the Queen. Still the late and present Deputies differed widely about the respective merits of Butlers and Geraldines. Ormonde had often begged Elizabeth not to hear his accusers in his absence; and Sidney may have reported against him, for he was now sent for. This was too much for Fitzwilliam’s endurance. The South, he said, always was tickly, Ormonde only could manage it, and in short he could not be spared.[217]

The Queen reduces the army.

A loyal Irishman.

Ulster was greatly excited by colonisation rumours, and multitudinous hordes of Scots, introduced by Tirlogh Luineach and his wife, or seeking settlement for themselves, kept the scanty English garrisons in constant alarm. Sorley Boy MacDonnell with 700 men beset Carrickfergus. Captain Cheston, a brave and discreet soldier, sallied forth at the head of his company and discomfited his assailants, but received an arrow in his thigh; such surgery as was available failing to extract it, he lingered fourteen days, and then died. This was the moment chosen by Elizabeth to reduce the army in Ireland. 9,400l. was sent over with strict injunctions to discharge 166 men from the foot companies and 70 from the garrisons of Leighlin, Dungarvan, Maryborough, Bunratty, and Ballintober, and to hold 500 more in readiness to go as soon as the money arrived. The news spread fast over Ireland, causing ‘general jollity’ and a universal belief that the days of Saxon rule were over, that an Irish nobleman would be Viceroy, and that all late English settlers would soon be hurrying to the seaside. ‘When all be discharged,’ said the unfortunate Deputy, ‘God send me some rid out of Ireland, for I look to see fire round about in every quarter; but I must confess this medicine is well taken away, for the disease did but putrefy under it without any heal.’ Among the men discharged were several who had been at Derry, and who had received pensions since the abandonment of the post. One of these, Edmond Byrne, deserves a passing notice. He had been in the service of Don Carlos, and on hearing a Spanish gentleman speak evil of Queen Elizabeth, had attacked him at the palace gates, though attended by two armed followers. Having killed his man and beaten off the two underlings, Byrne first took sanctuary, and then fled to Portugal. There the same conduct provoked the same retort, and Byrne wounded the slanderer of his sovereign. This loyal Irishman afterwards received a pension of four shillings a day.[218]

Poverty of the Crown.

The best excuse for Elizabeth’s ill-judged parsimony was the great difficulty which she found in getting money at this time. The breach with Alva had destroyed the credit system of the Netherlands, and English finance had not yet become sufficient to itself. Moreover, the Queen took care that Spain should be fully occupied, and the capture of Brill, which coincided with the discharge of the troops in Ireland, made a Spanish descent on that country exceedingly improbable. Alva had never been able to replace the Genoese treasure detained in England, and it was pretty clear that there would be none to spare for less important services. But by the relaxation of English efforts in Ireland, nearly all that had been done there was neutralised, and it is impossible not to feel some pity for Fitzwilliam.[219]

Fitton in Connaught.

The Presidency of Connaught did not flourish greatly under Fitton’s charge; perhaps no one could have done anything there without a considerable army. He could indict O’Connor Don and MacDermot for high treason, he could lay whole baronies waste, and he could generally take castles. But he could not establish either peace or respect for the common law, and he dared not, while he remained in the province, leave the Brehon law in undisputed possession of the field. The civil and the canon law, as well as the law of England, all declared that a man should be held liable only for his own acts. But Irish custom extended the liability to descendants and to collaterals, and Fitton seems to have thought it possible to play fast and loose with the two systems, and to use their own customs against the Irish, though contrary, as he believed, to all law, human and divine.

Clanricarde’s sons.

The Earl of Clanricarde’s two sons were in open rebellion, and he was bound to answer for them both by Irish law, of which he had accepted the liabilities, and by agreement under his own hand. The Earl was loyal enough, as his whole career showed, but he was unable to control his clan, and was perhaps not sorry to get out of a temporary difficulty by surrendering himself. There were frequent and very circumstantial reports of an intended Spanish descent, and he may well have dreaded the necessity either of joining or of opposing an invader who was under papal patronage. Fitton seems to have had no other case against the old lord than that he levied exactions like his ancestors, a charge which came with remarkably bad grace from the President. Fitzwilliam said openly that he could only be chastised by bringing in the Mayo Burkes, who had always been rebels, and he very justifiably shrank from such a miserable expedient. A more respectable plan was to send Thomond home and encourage him to earn a complete restoration by his service against the Clanricarde rebels.[220]

Fitton and Clanricarde.

On first arriving in Dublin, Clanricarde had been shut up in the castle. After a month he was released on his own recognisances, and three months later he was again committed on Fitton preferring against him a formal charge of being the counsellor, comforter, and procurer of his son’s doings. A few months before Fitzwilliam had pronounced Fitton a wise and sober man, very conscientious, severely just, and not subject to gusts of passion. He now complained that the President had refused to reveal the charge against Clanricarde at the Council Board. This the Lord Deputy considered a stain on his own loyalty, and he demanded an opportunity of clearing himself. The Earl’s offence, if offence there was, fell far short of treason, and he could be very badly spared from his own country. The Queen rebuked Fitton severely for his secret ways, and for arresting the old Earl, who made his submission to the Lord President of Connaught, only asking that he might in future have the assistance of a councillor to keep order. This was granted, and he was soon sent back to Connaught with a general commission to grant pardons at discretion; a wonderful end to a trial for high treason. The Council patched up a truce between Fitton and Fitzwilliam, but the flame soon burst forth again. Clanricarde’s detention in Dublin lasted about six months, and he never quite forgave Fitton. ‘After being set at liberty,’ he said, ‘I did within one twelvemonth hang my own son, my brother’s son, my cousin-german’s son, and one of the captains of my gallowglasses, besides fifty of my own followers that bare armour and weapons; which the Archbishop of Tuam, the Bishop of Clonfert, and the whole corporation of Galway may witness.’[221]

Fitton driven into a corner.

When Fitton wrote to say that he expected soon to have no place in his power except Galway, Fitzwilliam sneeringly answered that he would be a very old man before the rebels came to seek him at Athlone. For a few weeks longer the President kept the field. Clare Galway was yielded at his approach, and a few kerne were shot here and there, but the young Burkes eluded him as completely as David eluded Saul. On one occasion they were close, and Ulick, taking an axe in his hand, declared that he would lead on; but the captain of gallowglasses, wiser in his generation, advised a fitter opportunity. Lady Mary Burke escaped out of Galway, and went to join her brothers. Then provisions ran short, the Mayo Burkes, whom Fitzwilliam had thought it possible to retain as allies, joined their namesake, and Fitton retired to Athlone, leaving the whole province free from any pretence of settled government.[222]

Even Athlone is not safe.

Fitton was only three months older when he saw his dismal prophecy fulfilled. Having demolished most of the castles in Clanricarde, lest they should offer a refuge to the English, the young Burkes, with a force estimated at from 500 to 2,000, and largely composed of Scots mercenaries, plundered the district between the Suck and Shannon, then crossed the great river, and burned all along the left bank as far as Athlone. James Fitzmaurice was with them, chiefly in the vain hope of relieving Castlemaine, before which Perrott had again sat down. Turning to the east, the wild bands harried Roscommon and Westmeath, burned Mullingar, Meelick, and other places, and then doubled back to Athlone, to which they set fire. In spite of the guns in the castle and the musketeers on the steeple of the church, they approached boldly from the north side, broke into the cloister with the help of masons, and, being aided by a high wind, burned most of the malt and biscuit stored above. Of the 350 soldiers promised by Fitzwilliam not one had arrived, and the President could only look on while the town burned. Meeting with no resistance, the rebels again crossed the Shannon and went to Galway. That town was too strong for them to attempt, but they killed an English captain in a skirmish, and on two separate occasions passed the walls without serious opposition and penetrated into Connemara, where they chastised the O’Flaherties for their adherence to English rule. Fitton could do nothing but beg the Lord Deputy not to pardon the treason after the old fashion of Ireland. ‘It is comforted,’ he said, ‘and fostered from under your own elbows, I mean Dublin itself.’[223]

Fitton is forced to leave Connaught to itself.

Fitton lingered at Athlone for a few weeks and then retired, first to Dublin and then to England. Fitzwilliam announced that Connaught would soon be quiet, for there would be no one left to resist the rebels. The unlucky President was not to be blamed, for he ‘could not work miracles as Moses did.’ After one more attempt to give trouble, which was frustrated by Perrott’s energy, Clanricarde’s sons—the MacIarlas, as they were called—saw that there was no fear of punishment, and that they might as well sue for mercy. They told the Deputy that they were in a wretched and damnable state; and this was true, for they were very vicious young men. They knew not where to turn, and they offered to give themselves up and be good subjects for ever if only they might be assured of the pardon which they feared to ask. Their father was powerless to control them, and he supported their petition on the ground that despair might ‘make them follow young counsels.’ He himself was ready for any service, or even to go to prison, and would welcome any president that had no property in Connaught, ‘excepting always Sir Edward Fitton, who sought my blood.’ A good salary, he added fairly enough, would be the best defence against corruption. Believing that Fitton would traduce him, he sent an agent to England to enter a cross case. The late president’s prayer was so far heard that the young Burkes received no immediate pardon. In the meantime Athlone was held by a scanty garrison. In one of the long nights just after the new year Art Maguire, who had the watch, arranged with some of the O’Kellys to betray the castle. A ladder was planted and thirty-four men scaled the walls unobserved, when a chance noise startled the guard. The assailants called out in English to make way for the Earl of Clanricarde’s sons; but they were worsted in the scuffle and jumped off the battlements, several legs being broken. ‘If the devils had not made great shifts they had broken most of their necks.’ Fitzwilliam attributed the result entirely to God’s providence. The Irish had been two hours inside the castle and were probably waiting for reinforcements, very likely for the graceless young men in whose names they professed to act.[224]

Ormonde goes to England.

Fitzmaurice still at large, 1572.

Ormonde was summoned to England at the beginning of 1572, and there were not wanting detractors to say that he was unwilling to go, and that he was playing a game of his own. Some thought him too merciful, and one of his followers asked Burghley to give him a private hint inculcating severity. But neither Perrott nor Fitzwilliam could do without him, and he was certainly not idle. The pursuit of Fitzmaurice was but a wild-goose chase, and every now and then some new Geraldine partisan arose and gave local trouble. Edward Butler, with five hundred men, went to Aherlow, killed a few kerne, and drove off some cattle which had been stolen from Kerry; but he never saw Fitzmaurice, though he reported that he was weak and might be easily attacked. The difficulty was to find him. Meanwhile Rory MacShane, with a small band, swept away what he could find in the meadows about Clonmel. The townsmen were disinclined to follow, but their sovereign threatened to denounce them as traitors, and they accompanied him into the hills near the town. The foolhardy sovereign, who had refused Ormonde’s offer of a garrison, allowed himself to be drawn into rough ground, and lost his life. Then came Edward Butler, who killed twenty-one of Rory’s men. The solitary prisoner was promptly hanged, drawn, and quartered. Besides these services performed through his brother, Ormonde was able at this time to make head against Rory Oge O’More, while Kildare, with six hundred kerne of his own and a hundred of the Queen’s, pressed that chief from the North.

The Lord President reports progress.

At another time Fitzmaurice threatened Youghal, but the Viscount of Decies sent timely aid. If to keep the Queen’s peace was the object of government, it had very indifferent success. Yet Perrott did not despair. Wales and Northumbria had been settled by Presidents, and why not Munster? ‘Came it to perfection elsewhere in one year? No, not in seven.’ The Irish were subtle, fond of license, and ready for anything as long as it was not for their good. But he claimed to have laid a sound foundation. Munster was no longer governed by letters from Dublin which no one obeyed. Before he came no man could go a mile outside Cork, Limerick, Youghal, Kinsale, Kilmallock, Dingle, or Cashel. No one helped but Ormonde, yet the country had become fairly safe, and English fishermen fished in peace. The rebels had dwindled from 1,000 to ‘fifty poor kerne, and ten or twelve bad horsemen.’ The decentralising system might be carried much further, and Perrott recommended a President for Ulster. The Lord Deputy might then spend some part of his time at Athlone. The advice was probably good, but the poverty of the Crown hindered all comprehensive reforms.[225]

Castlemaine taken. Perrott cannot catch Fitzmaurice.

Early in June Perrott again besieged Castlemaine. Most of the MacCarthies, O’Sullivans, and other West Munster clans furnished contingents, as well as the Barrys and Roches, and some of the walled towns. James Fitzmaurice having failed to bring the Scots from Connaught to its relief, the castle surrendered after a three months’ blockade, ‘through the want of provisions,’ say the annalists, ‘not at all for want of defence.’ This being the only place which resisted the English arms, and the most convenient spot for foreigners to land, the success was a considerable one in spite of the time it had taken. When it was just too late Fitzmaurice, with Ulick Burke and Shane MacOliver, passed the Shannon near Portumna, with the help of the O’Maddens, and marched down the left bank towards Limerick, the fears or sympathies of the citizens again swelling their numbers to 1,000. The sheriff attempting to withstand them was slain with thirty of his men, and Perrott, who besides his own servants had only 160 English soldiers, at once proceeded in search of them. He was accompanied by several native lords and chiefs, but seems to have set but little store by their services. Fitzmaurice lurked in the wooded and boggy plain between Limerick and Pallas, and MacBrien Coonagh sent word to Perrott that the Scots would certainly fight in the neighbourhood of Ballinagarde. The floods were out, and the President found his enemy, apparently about 600 strong, advantageously posted on ground inaccessible to cavalry, and unapproachable even by foot soldiers marching more than two abreast. Perrott threw forward a few musketeers to skirmish, and then quitting the saddle led the way on foot to encourage the Irish lords, the attack being covered by a body of musketeers. The Scots threw their spears at the skirmishers and seemed disposed to charge, but a second and better-directed volley broke them, and they fled in disorder towards the Glen of Aherlow, leaving a few dead on the field. Perrott followed through a frightful country, but could not get a second chance. Clancare and Cormac MacTeige, MacCarthies who in their soul hated the Desmonds, did good service, but the other allies were lukewarm. Perrott blamed Lord Roche for keeping aloof with the cavalry, but if the President’s own description of the ground be true, his lordship had little choice. Ormonde was in England, and his presence alone would have done as much as all his forces without him; but Sir Edmund Butler co-operated zealously enough with the President, and the penitent Edward exhorted him to fresh exertions. ‘Remember,’ he said, ‘my dear brother, that though you did never so much service, it is but your duty, and far less than her Majesty deserved at our hands.’ On one occasion the Butlers brought in fifty heads, and Perrott allowed that they served most willingly in the field, though he does not seem to have had a high opinion of their actual achievements.[226]

Perrott cannot pay his soldiers. A mutiny.

There were rumours of a second invasion of Scots from Connaught, but they did not come, and Perrott was left free to follow those already in his province. The indefatigable man made such preparations as he could for a grand attack on Aherlow with the help of the two Butlers, and he set out from Kilmallock in advance of his army. When he had gone a few miles the captains overtook him in hot haste to say that their men had mutinied and had returned to Kilmallock. The Irish auxiliaries were not bound to serve without English soldiers, and they immediately deserted the President, glad enough, no doubt, of the excuse. A few of the gentlemen remained, and Perrott retraced his steps to find his soldiers still under arms, clamouring for the Queen’s pay, and complaining of the endless and thankless toil to which they were condemned. He reminded them that he had already offered some money on account, that more was on the way, that they had but slender excuse for their insubordination, and that he had a mind to hang the ringleaders. The men answered firmly but respectfully that if he hanged one they would all swing together for company, and in the end he was forced to temporise. Crippled as a general, the President went off to hold assizes at Cork, where he found the people willing to prosecute and the juries ready to convict, so that the pleasures of hanging were not altogether denied him. The garrison of Kilmallock, in a fit of repentance, or persuaded by their officers, made a raid into Aherlow and killed some thirty of Fitzmaurice’s men sleeping in their cabins. ‘I am ashamed to write of so few,’ said the Lord President, ‘but considering their cowardliness and the continual watch which they use to keep, it is accounted as much here to have the lives of so few, as 1,000 in some other country. If I might have but one trusty gentleman of the Irishry I would not doubt I should in short time bring the country to good quiet.’ That one trusty gentleman was not to be had, but Ormonde’s brothers did what they could to prove that they were not, and, in spite of recent transgressions, never had been Irishry. Without any help from Perrott they attacked Fitzmaurice in his camp near Tipperary, and killed 100 of his men. That was the last important success of the campaign, which had proved beyond doubt that the rebels had no chance in the field against English soldiers or even against the Butler gallowglasses; but it had also proved that they could not be followed with advantage, and that the problem of Irish government was as far from solution as ever.[227]

Stratagems of Fitzmaurice.

On one occasion (we are not told the date or place) the hunter nearly became a prey to his quarry. A pretended deserter brought news that Fitzmaurice was hard by with only thirty persons, and offered to be the President’s guide, tendering his own life as security. With characteristic rashness Perrott followed the man with about thirty soldiers, and at the break of day came upon Fitzmaurice accompanied by 400 or 500 foot and 80 horse. Trewbrigg, the President’s secretary, who rode in advance, charged the Irish and Scots with three or four men, and lost his own life and a purse containing 100l., which served as a military chest. Nothing daunted, Perrott followed with the rest of his men. He jumped a bank and unhorsed one of the rebels. Another came behind him with his spear, held by the middle as in an Indian boar-hunt, and he was barely rescued by George Greame, afterwards famous in the Irish wars. Outnumbered by ten or twelve to one, the English soldiers were nearly overwhelmed, when Captain Bowles, not much more prudent than his chief, galloped up with three or four fresh men. Supposing these to be the advanced guard of a larger body, Fitzmaurice drew off. Even this lesson did not teach Perrott prudence. Fitzmaurice, being closely pursued, faced about near a bridge leading to a wood, and sent a man with a white cloth on the top of his spear. The Lord President allowed himself to be drawn into a parley, and while he wrangled about terms Fitzmaurice got his men over the water and escaped.[228]

The Irish in Spain. Stukeley.

The incessant rumours of Spanish invasion led to nothing, but these foreign intrigues are worth following for the light which they throw upon Elizabeth’s policy. Stukeley, finding that the Archbishop of Cashel’s party would not accept him as the champion of Irish Catholicism, went to Rome, where he walked barelegged and barefooted about the churches and streets. Fitzwilliam derisively reported that the man who had given up the kingdom of Florida and the dukedom of Ireland only for holiness’ sake was about to have a red hat, and that the superstitious people of Waterford really believed in his sanctity. Constant communication was kept up between Ireland, Spain, and the Low Countries, and there was scarcely a southern chief or lord who was not supposed to be in correspondence with Stukeley or with some other of the exiles. Many probably sympathised with the idea of a Spanish invasion, though not to such an extent as the sanguine Fitzgibbon had represented, and others may have thought it prudent to make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness. The adventurer, after his return from Rome, was attracted by the somewhat kindred spirit of Don John of Austria, and served under him either at Lepanto or in some smaller encounter with the Turks, after which he retired to Madrid, and ‘for his many deeds’ became more of a favourite than ever. A pension of 1,000 ducats per week was thought a suitable entertainment for the Duke of Ireland, and one Cahir O’Rourke obtained the command of forty men. The Bishop of Cadiz received orders from Philip to punish those who refused passages to the Irish refugees, friars, and others, and one Cormac, calling himself provincial of the Irish Dominicans, busied himself in seeing that the order was carried out. The French captains under one pretence or other refused to carry these emissaries; but the Portuguese were more subservient, and many Irishmen sailed from Lisbon as well as from the Spanish ports. Meanwhile loyal Englishmen were subjected to every inconvenience. Five ships were stopped at San Lucar and three at Seville, and many of Elizabeth’s subjects were closely imprisoned. The Inquisition worked harder than ever. Rumours of a fleet to be commanded by Stukeley were again rife, and some talked of as many as fifty ships. Philip II.’s slow mind was quite unequal to the task of coping with such statesmen as Cecil and Walsingham, and they were able to watch every move. English merchants and sea-captains, even Compostella pilgrims, took a pride in thwarting the despot, who seldom travelled further than Aranjuez, and imagined that he could rule all mankind by making silly marginal notes on despatches. Waterford having been recommended in 1569 as the best point for attacking Ireland, Philip, who apparently heard of the place for the first time, could only wonder in manuscript ‘whether the Duke of Feria knew anything of that port.’ Considering that Philip had been King of England, this is a fine illustration of the aphorism as to the small amount of wisdom with which the world is governed.[229]

Effects of St. Bartholomew in Ireland.

The day of St. Bartholomew could not but have its effect in Ireland. In Connaught and other Irish districts ‘the godly,’ as the few Protestants esteemed themselves, thought it prudent to hide. The rest of the people triumphed ‘as though the kingdom of Antichrist were once again erected.’ There was talk of the Spanish Inquisition, but little or no actual violence is recorded to have been done. Suspicion filled the air, and the sudden appearance of innumerable friars seemed to bode some great foreign movement. They came out of Ulster and traversed Connaught in companies of twenty at a time. Cormac, the so-called Provincial of the Dominicans, brought a budget of indulgences to Sligo, and published them openly. Friars preached at Galway before the ex-mayor and other leading townsmen, and held councils at Adare, Galway, and Donegal. They came and went between Ireland and France, and Fitzwilliam’s informant held that the preaching of Ulster friars ‘must naturally tend to rebellion.’ Their evident desire, he thought, was to subvert the English Government, and ‘set up their own wickedness.’ In Galway the mendicants bore themselves like princes, so that the Pope might be thought King of England and Ireland. Clanricarde himself dared not say a word, and Limerick threatened to be soon as bad as Galway.[230]

Rise of Rory Oge O’More.

Those parts of Ireland which were supposed to be tolerably well settled were pervaded by a sense of insecurity, and gave Fitzwilliam no help. King’s County, under the wise government of Henry Cowley, noted by an eminent lawyer as being the only Englishman who ruled by law, was long an exception; but the Queen owed the constable near 2,000l., and such disinterestedness could not be expected from every officer. Cowley had but twenty-three men, and, though others praised him, he was himself dissatisfied with the state of his district. Cosby was less successful in the Queen’s County, where Rory Oge O’More still kept an armed remnant of his tribe together. Kildare and Ormonde combined their forces but could not catch him, and he refused to cross the Barrow except in the company of the former Earl, who accordingly brought him to his castle of Kilkea. Rory said he would make no war against the Queen, but must be assured of life and living before he would submit; nor would he disperse his men, who were his only protection against many enemies. After consulting with Cosby, the two Earls gave him protection for a fortnight, on his undertaking not to damage the corn. When Ormonde went to England Rory broke out again, and found his neighbours willing enough to help him. Bands of fifty or a hundred invaded the Pale nightly with music and torches, as Fitzwilliam bitterly observed, ‘lest they should be heard or seen,’ yet he would not blame Cosby, for he had neither men nor money.[231]

The O’Byrnes.

In Wexford a gentleman named Browne was murdered by the O’Byrnes, among whom Feagh MacHugh was rising into distinction as a guerilla chief. Agard, the seneschal of Wicklow, took immediate vengeance on some of the mountaineers, and was then inclined to hold out hopes of mercy as the best chance of catching the most guilty parties, such as Matthew Furlong and others, who had employed the O’Byrnes. But Nicholas White, the seneschal of Wexford, went ‘thundering’ about saying that the Queen would never pardon anyone who had a hand in Browne’s murder. Fitzwilliam wished devoutly that White had stayed in England. The revenge already taken might have been severe enough even for White’s taste. Led by a mountaineer whom he had captured, and whose life was the price of his service as guide, Agard entered the south-west corner of Wicklow, where he burned sixteen villages, then passed through the valley of Imail, where he killed a foster-brother of James Eustace, afterwards the famous rebel Lord Baltinglass. A sister of Simon MacDavid’s was captured, ‘whom, if she do not stand me in stead, I mean to execute.’ Had plunder been the main object a very large number of cattle might easily have been driven off, but the guide, who may have had a quarrel of his own to avenge, offered to take the soldiers where they might ‘have some killing.’ Captain Hungerford and Lieutenant Parker preferred killing to kine, and went in at the head of Glendalough. ‘They slew many churls, women, and children,’ brought away much kine, and lost 500 more ‘while they were killing.’ Feagh MacHugh just escaped, but two of his sisters and two foster-brothers were slain. Much blood was destined to be shed before the blood of Robert Browne should be finally expiated. Sometimes the English officers seem to have set a very indifferent example. Robert Hartpole, sheriff of Carlow and constable of the Castle, and his sub-sheriff were accused upon oath of having seized a vast number of cattle on all sorts of pretences, of forcing labourers to work, and in general of every sort of violence and corruption. These misdeeds were said to have been committed by virtue of letters from the Earl of Ormonde. In the following year, Hartpole was one of those licensed by the Lord Deputy to cess Ormonde’s lands for protection against the O’Mores and O’Connors. No particular notice seems to have been taken of the charges against him, for he remained in Carlow to found a family, and to be remembered as a chief actor in one of the most horrible tragedies recorded even in Irish history.[232]

Bad effects of reducing the army.

Fitzwilliam had reduced the army much against his will, and the disturbances which he had foreseen followed as a matter of course. He asked for reinforcements, unless the Queen wished deliberately to leave the whole country to the native Irish. Her answer was that she marvelled at the stir in Ireland, and that she would not send the 800 soldiers he asked for; and she reminded him that Mr. Smith had been ready to bring over that number if Fitzwilliam had not opposed the enterprise. Smith was, however, now really coming, and might give some help. The poor Deputy could only answer that the 800 men were much wanting, that double that number of Scots had landed in Connaught, and that Ormonde, on whom alone he could depend, had been sent for to England. But to Burghley he passionately poured out his griefs. ‘I pass over,’ he said, ‘usual matters, such as killing, burning, spoiling;’ though they pricked his conscience daily, and though he feared that God would demand the innocent blood at his hand. The English name was hateful, and he would rather die when Ireland was lost than live in England to bemoan it. He could but shake the scabbard, for he had no sword to draw, and yet military government was the only government possible for a ‘people so long nursled in sensual immunity.’ The great men ‘all, tooth and nail, whatsoever semblance they bear, do spur, kick, and practise against regular justice.’ The fear of Ormonde kept some quiet, but in his absence their enforced frowns at the rebels were changed to winking. For himself, he could bear all if the Queen would only give him credit for doing his best, instead of blaming him more and more for not doing what he had long since declared impossible. ‘A hard word of a prince,’ he said, ‘is a dart to a true subject—much more, a nipping, a checking, and a taunting.’[233]