Many a jest has been levelled at the Irish family of Morres for seeking and obtaining permission from the Crown, some eighty years ago, to assume the glorious name of 'De Montmorency', in lieu of their own, as having been originally that of their family.[1] They have since borne, as is well known, not merely the name, but even the arms and the proud device of that illustrious house. Moreover, the introduction of the name Bouchard, borne by the present Lord Mountmorres, proves the determination of the family to persist in their lofty pretensions.
I am not aware whether these pretensions have ever been regularly exposed: they seem to have been thought too fantastic for serious criticism. At the same time, it must be remembered that they have been formally and officially recognized by Sir W. Betham as Deputy Ulster, by the English crown (on the strength of his statement) and by the Chevalier De la Rue, 'garde-général des archives du Royaume', on the French side, in 1818. On the other hand, it must not be forgotten that MM. de Montmorency at the time, in spite of the repeated and strenuous appeals of the Morres family, declined to admit their claim to be members of the house of Montmorency.
To the indignant protest of Col. Hervey Morres (styling himself 'de Montmorency-Morres') against this action of the French house, we owe the most complete exposition of the case on behalf of his family.[2] On it, therefore, my criticisms will be based. Nor will these criticisms be destructive only: they will show that the pedigrees upheld by Col. Morres and his opponents were both alike erroneous, and will establish the real facts, which, it will be found, completely vindicate the accuracy of Giraldus Cambrensis.
The controversy hinged on a well-known personage. 'Herveius de Monte Mauricii', as Giraldus terms him. The French house, taking their stand on the historians of their family, insisted that he was the only Montmorency who had gone to Ireland in his time, and that as he had, admittedly, left no legitimate issue, the Morres claim was untenable. The Irish house contended that, on the contrary, others of the family had come over also, and that they were lineally descended from one of Hervey's brothers, but the whole story undoubtedly sprang from the mention of this Hervey—the sole connecting link—and from the curious form in which Giraldus chose to latinize his name.
Now Duchesne, the historian of the house of Montmorency, whose version Desormeaux and Père Anselme did but follow in the main, wrote thus of Hervey:
Il espousa Elizabeth de Meullent veuve de Gislebert de Claire, Comte de Pembroc en Angleterre et mère de Richard de Claire, surnommé Strongbow, Comte de Pembroke, dompteur de l'Hibernie, duquel à raison de cette alliance un Autheur du temps le qualifie parastre ou beaupère (p. 92).[3]
But this 'Autheur' is Giraldus Cambrensis, on whom Duchesne based his account, and who, we find, does not speak of Hervey as stepfather, but as paternal uncle of Strongbow:
Herveius de Monte Mauricii, vir quoque fugitivus a facie fortunæ, inermis et inops, ex parte Richardi comitis cujus patruus erat, explorator potius quam expugnator advenit (i. 3).
Duchesne's version, therefore, is out of court, although it was repeated by Père Anselme, and even adopted in the Genealogist by so skilled and able a genealogist as Mr G. W. Watson.[4]
Col. Hervey Morres went so far as to accuse Duchesne and Desormeaux 'd'adulation, d'immoralité, et de mauvaise foi' in giving this account of his great namesake; and he proceeded to substitute a version of his own, severing the hapless man and converting him into two! To make this clear, I must print the essential part of the pedigree as given by him.