This, of course, was mere byplay, and in a few months Niall Garve discovered that, as the Tower was so convenient for the caging of O’Cahan, he, too, was to be similarly housed. Blameless of aught against the State save the wish to have a living in his own glens, the Queen’s O’Donnell was arrested and deported to London. With him went his son, Naghten, and his two brothers. Everything was done quietly, without trial, charge, indictment, or legal parade. There was no scandal—not even a court martial. Niall Garve and his son, like O’Cahan, spent the rest of their lives in the Tower. His brothers, when the Plantation was complete, were set free, only to find on reaching their native shore that their lands were partitioned among strangers.
In the Tower with O’Cahan and O’Donnell was lodged Sir Cormac O’Neill of Augher Castle, Tyrone, a brother of the fugitive. His crime was that he was the first to inform the Deputy of the Earl’s departure and ask for a “custodium” of his estate while he was away. Sir Cormac was married to Red Hugh O’Donnell’s sister, and as the kinsman of suspects he, too, was deported to London and perished in the Tower. Before the Earl’s flight Chichester had hanged the most brilliant of the young O’Neills, Brian Art, for killing in self-defence a brawler who assaulted him. The humbled Tyrone vainly offered ransom for his kinsman (a brother of Owen Roe), whom he loved, but the Deputy’s justice was the greatest of all his works. So the youth was slain according to law.
This left few notables in the North. Young Sir Cahir O’Doherty, with his taking carriage, was an eyesore for a short time, but he was hunted down and killed without undue commotion. O’Doherty had been brought up by the English, to whom his father presented the site of Derry City. His Patent from King James in 1603 confirmed an arrangement made by Sir John O’Doherty with Queen Elizabeth, whereby in time of war his castle of Culmore, with 300 acres and the fishery of Lough Foyle, should be reserved to the Crown. Chichester took advantage of Sir Cahir’s youth to appoint in time of peace a crony, Captain Hart, Governor of Culmore. In further breach of treaty he gave Hart a “custodium” (or lease) of the castle in 1606, with its 300 acres and the fishery, at 10s. a year for 21 years. This faithless act he turned to his own advantage two years later. In October, 1607, O’Doherty was made foreman of the Grand Jury at Lifford to find the true bill which declared Hugh O’Neill an “outlaw” for the crime of quitting Ireland. Sir Cahir was thanked by King James for this service; but in May, 1608, on visiting Sir George Paulett, the Governor of Derry, about his private affairs, occasion was taken to insult him. The high-mettled stripling resented the affront, whereupon Paulett struck him before the soldiery. Stung to madness, Sir Cahir sought his kinsmen and flew to arms. He attacked Culmore, took Hart prisoner, burnt Derry, and slew Paulett. In July, 1608, he was himself killed by the forces which the Deputy held in readiness.
Chichester’s breach of trust as to Culmore then bore fruit. Hart was sent to London to excuse himself for yielding up the castle, and was removed from the Governorship. To console him he received an adequate scope of ground elsewhere, but the transfer of his “custodium” to the Deputy underlay the exchange. Chichester took possession of Culmore, with its lands and fishery—as, by a like transfer of a “custodium” held by Sir Ralph Lane in 1603 he acquired a Patent for the castle and lands of Belfast. He dispatched Davies to London to crave a grant of O’Doherty’s territory, although Innishowen or Culmore was not the King’s, but the clan’s. James I. “granted” him Innishowen, with its fourteen castles; but in his Patent reserved Culmore to the Crown with the 300 acres and the fishery.
This the Deputy resented, and he removed the blot in his own staunch way. The assignment of Culmore from Hart lay in his coffers, and he applied it to defraud his Majesty of everything the King reserved. In spite of the restraints of the Patent, he brazenly held himself out as the owner of whatever appertained to the O’Dohertys. Their coveted fishery he at once got into his clutches, and it was only rescued later on by the payment of heavy compensation from the Crown. Davies, who had just been knighted for his share in browbeating and banishing Hugh O’Neill, abetted his patrons’ misdeeds.
In circumventing limitations in his own Patents and discovering flaws in those of others there was no such artist as Chichester.
CHAPTER IX.
WAR’S AFTERMATH.
O’Doherty’s destruction, coupled with the imprisonment of O’Cahan, Sir Cormac O’Neill, and Niall Garve O’Donnell, filled up the cup of Chichester’s happiness. The few difficulties remaining in his way in Ulster were easily adjusted. A degenerate Maguire skulked in Fermanagh; but what of him? Having opposed his clan in the war he was promised their seigneuries. When peace came Conor Roe Maguire tasted the common lot of recreants, and found himself bereft of every acre by the Deputy, save a petty ploughland. Such was “the State’s” ingratitude that, among British settlers, an outcry was provoked against the faithlessness of their rulers towards him. A Letter of James I. guaranteed Maguire the entire County Fermanagh. Before that, on 29th July, 1602, the then Deputy wrote to the Privy Council that Queen Elizabeth “hath given the chiefry of the country of Fermanagh” to Connor Roe Maguire, but in a flash the planters carved it up among themselves.
Sir Oghy O’Hanlon owned the Barony of Orier in County Armagh, and had always taken the English side. His son married the sister of Sir Cahir O’Doherty, and had joined in his outbreak. Sir Oghy was deprived of his property and given a pension of thirty shillings a week to thrive upon. His son was shipped to Sweden, where wars were toward.
In Cavan the scion of the O’Reillys was a minor, and naturally his lands were seized by “the State.” His grandfather, Sir John O’Reilly, fell on the English side at the Battle of the Yellow Ford, fighting against Hugh O’Neill. His mother was one of the Ormonde family, who never swerved in loyalty to the Crown. Accordingly the Deputy applotted young O’Reilly out of his estate as much soil as was allowed to any English ploughman who “planted” in Cavan. The purge of the Irishry in Ulster was thereby consummated.