The stately Benedictine Abbey of St. Lawrence, Ampleforth, in the Vale of Mowbray, will long perpetuate the memory of the Fairfaxes, of Gilling; H. C. Fairfax-Cholmeley, Esquire, J.P., of Brandsby Hall, now represents this ancient family.
[83] — See “Condition of Catholics under James I.,” by the Rev. John Morris, S.J., pp. 256, 257 (Longmans). The charge of complicity was based on an alleged reception of Father John Gerard, S.J. (the friend of Sir Everard Digby, and author of the contemporary Narrative of the Plot), by Sir John Yorke at Gowthwaite Hall, after the Gunpowder Treason. Gerard left England in 1606, and there is no evidence whatever that he had anything to do with the Plot. I do not know, for certain, how Sir John Yorke fared as to the upshot of his prosecution. But I strongly suspect that the tradition that obtains among the dalesmen of Nidderdale to the effect that the Yorkes, of Gowthwaite (or Goulthwaite, as it is styled in the Valley), were once heavily fined by the Star Chamber for acting in the great Chamber of Gowthwaite a political play, wherein the Protestant actors were worsted by the Catholic actors, sprang from these proceedings against Sir John Yorke anent the Gunpowder Plot. For long years after the reign of James I., the Yorkes, like the Inglebies their relatives, were rigid Catholics. This ancient and honourable family of Yorke is still in existence, being represented by T. E. Yorke, Esquire, J.P., of Bewerley Hall, Pateley Bridge. The old home of the Yorkes, Gowthwaite Hall, where doubtless many priests were harboured “in the days of persecution,” is about to be pulled down to make way for the Bradford Reservoir. I visited, about 1890, the charming old Hall built of grey stone, with mullioned windows. A description of this historic memorial of the days of Queen Elizabeth and James I. is to be seen in “Nidderdale,” by H. Speight, p. 468 (Elliot Stock); also in Fletcher’s “Picturesque Yorkshire” (Dent & Co.), which latter work contains a picture of the place, a structure “rich with the spoils of time,” but, alas! destined soon to be “now no more.”
Ripley Castle, the home of the Inglebies, at the entrance to Nidderdale (truly the Switzerland of England), still rears its ancient towers, and still is the roof-tree of those who worthily bear an honoured historic name for ever “to historic memory dear.”
“From Eden Vale to the Plains of York,” by Edmund Bogg, contains sketches of both Ripley Castle and Gowthwaite Hall. Lucas’s “Nidderdale” (Elliot Stock) is also well worth consulting for its account of the dialect of this part of Yorkshire which, like the West Riding generally, retains strong Cymric traces. There are also British characteristics in the build and personal appearance of the people, as also in their marvellous gift of song. The Leeds Musical Festival and its Chorus, for example, are renowned throughout the whole musical world.
[84] — It is, moreover, possible that Mounteagle may have met his connection, and probably kinsman, Thomas Warde, at White Webbs, about the year 1602. Mounteagle, at that time, like the Earl of Southampton and the Earl of Rutland, was not allowed to attend Elizabeth’s Court on account of his share in the Essex tumult. He was, in fact, then mixed up with the schemes of Father Robert Parsons’ then-expiring Spanish faction among the English Catholics. If a certain Thomas Grey, to whom Garnet at White Webbs showed the papal breves (which the latter burnt in 1603, on James I. being proclaimed King by applause), were the same person as Sir Thomas Gray, he would be, most probably, a relative of Thomas Warde. For the Wardes, of Mulwith, certainly were related to a Sir Thomas Gray. — See “Life of Mary Ward,” vol. i., p. 221, where it is said that, “through the Nevilles and Gascoignes,” the Wards were related to the families of Sir Ralph and Sir Thomas Gray.[A]
As to father Garnet showing the breves to Thomas Grey, see Foley’s “Records,” vol. iv., p. 159, where it says: — Garnet “confesseth that in the Queen’s lifetyme he received two Breefs (one was addressed by the Pope to the English clergy, the other to the laity) concerning the succession, and immediately upon the receipt thereof, be shewed them to Mr. Catesby and Thomas Winter, then being at White Webbs; whereof they seemed to be very glad and showed it (sic) also unto Thomas Grey at White Webbs before one of his journies into Scotland in the late Queen’s tyme.”
It will be remembered that Thomas Percy, who married Martha Wright, Ursula Warde’s sister, was one of those who waited upon James VI. of Scotland before Elizabeth’s death, in order to obtain from him a promise of toleration for the unhappy Catholics. James, the English Catholics declared, did then promise toleration, and they considered that they had been tricked by the “weasel Scot.” Fonblanque, in his “Annals of the House of Percy,” vol. ii., p. 254 (Clay & Sons), thinks that Percy was a man of action rather than of words, and that the reason he entered into the Plot was that he was stung by the reproaches of the disappointed Catholics, whom he had given to understand James intended to tolerate, and that his vanity (or rather, I should say, self-love) was likewise wounded at the recollection of the proved fruitlessness of his mission or missions into Scotland. I think this is a very likely explanation. For, according to “Winter’s Confession” — see Gardiner’s “Gunpowder Plot” (Longmans), and Gerard’s three recent works (Osgood & Co. and Harper Bros.) — Thomas Percy seems to have shown a stupendous determination “to see the Plot through,” a fact which I have always been very much struck with. But if, in addition to other motives, Percy had the incentive of “injured pride,” we have an explanation of his extraordinarily ferocious anger and spirit of revenge. For well does the Latin poet of “the tale of Troy divine” insist with emphasis on the fact that it was “the despised beauty” — “spretæque injuria formæ” — of Juno, the goddess, that spurred her to such deathless hatred against the ill-starred house of Priam. What a knowledge of the springs of human action does not this portray!
[A] Were Sir Ralph and Sir Thomas Gray of the Grays (or Greys), of Chillingham, Northumberland? It may be remarked that, about the year 1597-98, Marmaduke Ward and his wife and some of his family went to live in Northumberland, maybe at Alnwick; and as Thomas Percy was connected with Marmaduke Ward, it is at least possible that Marmaduke Ward went himself into Scotland on the mission to King James VI. in the company of his brother-in-law, Thomas Percy.
But the Wards may have gone to Chillingham about 1597-9, and not to Alnwick. Sir Thomas Gray, of Chillingham, married Lady Catherine Neville, one of the four daughters of Charles Neville sixth Earl of Westmoreland, whose wife was Lady Jane Howard, daughter of Henry Howard Earl of Surrey. Lady Margaret Neville was married to Sir Nicholas Pudsey, of Bolton-in-Bowland, Yorkshire, I think. Lady Anne Neville was married to David Ingleby, of Ripley, a cousin of Marmaduke Ward and of Ursula Wright. Lady Margaret Neville conformed to the Establishment, but afterwards, I believe, the lady relapsed to popery. — See the “Hutton Correspondence” (Surtees Soc.), and “Sir Ralph Sadler’s Papers,” Edited by Sir Walter Scott.
[85] — Interesting evidence of the connection of Mounteagle with not only these great northern families of Preston and Leybourne (whose places that once so well knew them now know them no more), but also with the Lords Dacres of the North and with the Earls of Arundel, is contained in Stockdale’s book on the beautiful and historic Parish of Cartmel, on the west coast of Lancashire, “North of the Sands.” — See Stockdale’s “Annales Caermoelenses,” p. 410, a work, I believe, now out