[227] R. Cowley to Cromwell, Sept. 8, 1539; James, Earl of Ormonde, and Ossory to Cromwell, Oct. 19; to Wriothesley, Oct. 21.
[228] Ormonde to Cromwell, Dec. 20, 1539; Travers to Mr. Fitzwilliam, same date. Dromaneen is five miles above Mallow.
[229] Lord Deputy and Council to the King, Feb. 13, 1540.
[230] Brereton to Essex, May 17, 1540 and May 7; Council of Ireland to Essex, April 30; Ormonde to Essex, May 1; Alen and Brabazon to Essex, May 8; the King’s letter to Grey and Brereton is dated April 1. For the dispute about Travers, see Council of Ireland to Cromwell, March 14.
[231] The charges against Grey may be gathered from the Articles, &c., by Aylmer and Alen in S.P., vol. iii. No. 237, and their letter to St. Leger, June 27, 1538; Ormonde to Cowley, July 16 and 20; the Council of Ireland’s Articles, Oct. 1540; Stanihurst. The Articles of the Council seem to have been carefully scrutinised by Wriothesley. In his letter to the King of July 20, 1540, O’Neill says Grey, ‘guerras et contentiones in partibus istis seminavit sui lucrandi causâ.’ On June 20, 1538, Lord Butler writes to Cowley that ‘our governor threatens every man after such a tyrannous sort, as no man dare speak openly or repugn against his appetite;’ and on July 20, his father says, ‘the Lord Deputy is occupied without the advice of the Council, for his own private lucre and gain.’ On the trial of Strafford Oliver St. John—the man who said that ‘stone-dead hath no fellow’—cited Grey’s case as a precedent for trying in England treasons committed in Ireland. Grey was Viscount Grane in Ireland, but he was declared no peer, and tried as a commoner in England; see Howell’s State Trials. As to Grey’s private hoards, see a letter from R. Cowley to Norfolk, printed by Ellis, second series, No. 126, and wrongly placed under 1538; it belongs to 1540.
CHAPTER XIII.
1540 and 1541.
The O’Neills. Scottish intrigues.
With the usual plundering inroads on the Pale Brereton was able to cope; and the greater chieftains were quiet, for Gerald of Kildare was safe. O’Donnell, who may have resented his treatment by Lady Eleanor, readily reverted to his father’s policy, and no difficulty was made about his pardon. O’Neill held aloof, but again professed himself ready to come to Carrick Bradagh. Again he failed to appear, and pleaded that he dared not approach Dundalk through fear of Grey’s manifest treachery. He offered to come to Magennis’s Castle at Narrowater, a beautiful spot near the mouth of the Newry river and the foot of the Mourne Mountains. Brereton agreed, and a meeting at last took place. O’Neill declared his readiness to perform all that he had promised to Skeffington, to send a trusty messenger to the King, and to leave pardon or punishment for the past to the royal discretion. Till the answer came he was content to be at peace with the Government, and to keep his neighbours quiet. He was at this time intriguing with Scotland, and his secretary was actually at Edinburgh. Cromwell had received information that eight Irishmen had been with the Scottish King, to whom they had brought sealed letters from the principal chiefs, containing offers to take him as their lord and to do homage to him. It was even said that James meditated an invasion of Ireland in person. O’Neill probably waited for the result of these negotiations before sending a confidential servant with a letter to Henry. He begged the King not to send his enemies into his country, where Grey had, as he affirmed, sowed dissensions from selfish motives. He was willing to do anything he was asked unless the new Lord Deputy should prove very extortionate, and he advised the King not to waste his money in Ulster. Henry answered graciously, and acknowledged some trifling presents which accompanied the chief’s letter. Future royal favours, his Majesty was careful to point out, must depend on performance and not on promises. Pardon in the meantime would be granted for the heinous offences committed.[232]
Murder of James FitzMaurice, Earl of Desmond, 1540.