The death of Henry VII. and the accession of Henry VIII. tended to
strengthen Kildare's position. He was continued in his office, and
held it until his death in 1513. Accounted one of the handsomest and
bravest men of his time, he was succeeded by his son in the deputyship,
as well as in the family honours, and Gerald, ninth earl, was worthy of
such a parent. For seven years Kildare was the deputy, with the
exception of a brief period in England when Viscount Gormanstown was
vice-deputy. His enemies were secretly trying to undermine his
position, for the rise of the Kildare family was resented by the other
great Anglo-Irish houses.
[Sidenote: Cardinal Wolsey's nominee]
In 1518, shortly after the death of his wife, Kildare was ordered to
repair to London and answer the charges that he had illegally enriched
himself and his followers, and that he had formed alliances with the
native Irish and corresponded with them. Kildare, however, showed no
hurry to obey the summons, and not until 1519 did he arrive in London,
his cousin, Sir Maurice Fitzgerald, looking after his official
responsibilities. While in London, Kildare followed the example of his
father, and married a cousin of the king. {63} This was the Lady
Elizabeth Grey, a grand-daughter of Elizabeth Woodville, Edward IV.'s
wife. The marriage saved Kildare's life, for his most powerful enemy,
Cardinal Wolsey, had resolved that the Irish earl should never return
to his country. Acting on the advice of the Cardinal, Henry VIII.,
suspicious of the loyalty of the Irish nobility, appointed an
Englishman, the Earl of Surrey, afterwards Duke of Norfolk,
Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. Surrey was one of Wolsey's adherents, and
although the Earl of Kildare had, by reason of his valour and bearing
on the famous 'Field of the Cloth of Gold,' risen high in Henry's
favour, the Chancellor insisted upon his being brought to trial. To
make certain of the result, Wolsey inspired the Earl of Surrey to write
from Ireland charging Kildare with having attempted to make the Irish
oppose the authority of the new deputy, but, owing to the influence of
his wife, Kildare secured his acquittal, and returned to Ireland.
The Earl of Ormonde was selected in 1523 to succeed Surrey, principally
because he was Kildare's bitter enemy, but Elizabeth, Henry's cousin
and Kildare's wife, wrote to the king beseeching him to reconcile the
earls and bring peace to their respective families. Henry responded by
sending a commission to try the charges preferred by Ormonde against
Kildare, and, when it found in favour of the latter, he became deputy
once more. But again his enjoyment of the office was brief, further
charges being preferred against him by Ormonde, now Earl of {64}
Ossory. Again Kildare went to London, and was imprisoned in the Tower,
his brother, Sir James Fitzgerald, taking his post. While Kildare was
in the Tower, Wolsey attempted to have him executed without the
knowledge of the king, but at the last moment the Lieutenant-Governor
sought confirmation from His Majesty, and discovered that the
Cardinal's order lacked the king's approval.
The Earl of Ossory was now deputy, Kildare remaining in London after
his release from the Tower. Several noblemen went bail for his good
conduct, and although there was another period of royal disfavour in
1532, he accompanied Sir William Skeffington, the new Lord-Deputy, to
Ireland, and received a welcome that overshadowed that accorded to the
king's representative. It is interesting to note that in 1530 Holbein
painted this remarkable man's portrait, and that in the same year he
was one of the peers who signed the letter to the Pope setting forth
the grounds of Henry's divorce from Catherine.
[Sidenote: Death of "King Kildare"]
In 1532 he was once more deputy, and he gained the adherence of the
Irish by marrying two of his daughters to Irish chiefs. The country
was now at his feet; he was respected and obeyed. But he had enemies
whose pertinacity equalled his, and they soon aroused the suspicions of
a monarch whose chief weakness was a disinclination to trust others or
cultivate loyalty in himself. Henry at once ordered the deputy to come
to him; instead, Kildare sent his wife to act as mediator. The
countess was a clever woman, but Henry's {65} experience of the sex was
extensive, as we know, and he declined to receive her more than once.
He wanted the person of Kildare, and eventually that nobleman obeyed
the summons. The earl appointed his twenty-year old son, Thomas, Lord
Offaly, deputy, and left Ireland, never to return. Lord Offaly was
something of the mould of his father, and, although young, had been
trained from early years to rule. When, therefore, a rumour reached
Dublin that the Earl of Kildare had been executed by Henry's orders,
Lord Offaly immediately resigned his office, and gathered his followers
under his banner with the avowed object of driving the English out of
Ireland. The earl was quickly apprised of his son's rebellion, and a
copy of the youthful lord's sentence of excommunication shown him. The
effect was to hasten Kildare's death, and he died in the Tower on
December 12, 1534. Great as had been his father, Gerald, ninth earl,
was even greater, and Wolsey, although he spoke sarcastically, was not
wrong when he described him as 'King Kildare, who reigned, rather than
ruled, in Ireland.'
Sir William Skeffington, the deputy, was ordered to crush the
rebellion, and he pursued the Kildare faction into their strongholds,
besieging the Castle of Maynooth, while its owner was in Connaught
collecting troops. The castle could have held out until the arrival of
its owner, but the inevitable Irish traitor appeared in the person of
Christopher Parese, a creature who had received many benefits at the
hands of Lord Offaly and his father. Parese betrayed the castle for a
reward, which was {66} promptly paid him, but the deputy immediately
had him executed, because he dare not trust a rogue who had already
betrayed one benefactor. Treachery was again employed by Skeffington's
successor, Lord Grey, and eventually Lord Offaly, tenth Earl of
Kildare, and five of his uncles were executed on Tower Hill. The
ten-year-old heir to the earldom would, doubtless, have perished also,
but he had a remarkable mother, who kept him in hiding for some years,
and succeeded in smuggling him out of the country to France, where his
education was supervised by the famous Cardinal Pole.
Lord Grey continued in office until 1540, and although, from the
English point of view, he ruled well and successfully, on his return to
England he was imprisoned and subsequently executed, the ostensible
reason being his partiality for the Kildares.
Grey was replaced by a remarkable man, Sir Anthony St. Leger, whose
three terms of office covered thirteen years. Sir William Brereton, a
foolish person, was the deputy until St. Leger arrived, and
distinguished himself by leading a vast army in search of a phantom
enemy. St. Leger, from the moment he arrived in Ireland, set about
restoring some order in the country, and he succeeded so well that the
historians of the period call attention to the amazing fact that the
sight was actually seen of English lords and Irish chiefs meeting in
the same chamber and proclaiming Henry VIII. King of Ireland. St.
Leger went further than this, and {67} actually paid the debts incurred
during his viceroyalty.
[Sidenote: Religious persecution]
In 1548 he was recalled, and Sir Edward Bellingham ordered to act as
deputy and to punish those Irish who had not become Protestants by Act
of Parliament. This was a new feature in Irish politics, but
Bellingham found diplomacy, force, and threats, and persecution equally
ineffective, and he retired in disgust. Sir Francis Bryan followed as
deputy in 1550, but he died the same year, and Brabazon, hastily
elected in his stead, retired when Sir Anthony St. Leger returned, to
be welcomed by all classes. He held office until 1556, save for a
period between 1551-52, when Sir James Croft represented him, and when
he retired he had the satisfaction of knowing that he left Ireland
better off than when he found it.
The appointment of the Earl of Sussex, however, undid all St. Leger's
good work, and the new deputy had immediately to take the field. He
was lucky, however, to find the Irish chiefs quarrelling amongst
themselves, and in the circumstances victory was achieved easily. The
O'Neills, headed by the famous Shane, advanced against him, but Sussex
defeated them with great slaughter, and the chieftain escaped the
battlefield to die a dishonourable death in a drunken brawl.
England had greater attractions for the earl than Ireland could offer,
and he returned there in 1557, nominating Sir Henry Sidney and the Lord
Chancellor as vice-deputies. Elizabeth, {68} immediately after her
accession, sent the viceroy back, but he returned again to London.
Hugh Curwen, Archbishop of Dublin, anxious to retain his office as well
as that of joint representative with Sir Henry Sidney of the absent
viceroy, conveniently changed his religion now that a Protestant was on
the throne, and to show the genuineness of his conversion he had the
pictures that adorned the walls of Christ's Church and St. Patrick's
whitewashed.
[Illustration: Earl of Essex]
When the Earl of Sussex was recalled in 1564, Sir Henry Sidney was
appointed deputy or viceroy, and he acted for fourteen years. What he
thought of the appointment may be inferred from a letter he wrote on
his return after a brief absence in 1575. Sir William Fitz-William had
acted as his deputy, and no doubt Sidney hoped that Elizabeth might
give him a more congenial task. He declares that he 'took on for the
third time that thankless charge, and so, taking leave of Her Majesty,
kissed her sacred hands, with most gracious and comfortable words,
departed from her at Dudley Castle, passed the seas, and arrived
September 13, 1575, as near the city of Dublin as I could safely, for
at that time the city was grievously infected with the contagion of the
pestilence.' In the depth of winter he went to Cork, and passed
Christmas there. The following February he visited Thomond, Earl of
Clanricarde, and caused two of his sons to make public confession of
their rebellion and sue for his pardon. Sidney, in recounting this,
adds fervently, 'whom would to God I had hanged!'
{69}
Sidney's interview with Grace O'Malley is historic. The English
warrior, unaccustomed to Amazonian women, out of curiosity granted an
audience to Grace, who came to him in state. This is how the viceroy
describes the incident:
'There came to me also a most famous feminine sea-captain, called Grace
O'Malley, and offered her services to me wheresoe'er I would command
her, with three galleys and two hundred fighting men. She brought with
her her husband, for she was as well by sea as by land more than
master's mate with him. He was of the nether Burkes, and called by
nickname "Richard in Iron." This was a notorious woman in all the
coasts of Ireland. This woman did Henry Sidney see and speak with. He
can no more at large inform you of her.'
On May 26, 1578, Sidney retired from office, broken in health and
fortune. Describing his condition, he says that he was 'fifty-four
years of age, toothless and trembling, being five thousand pounds in
debt.' Later he declared that he was twenty thousand pounds poorer
than when he had succeeded to his father's estate--a commentary on his
inability to take advantage in a pecuniary sense of his viceroyalty.
His wail is dated 'from Ludlow Castle, with more pain than heart, March
1, 1582.'
[Sidenote: English colony absorbed]
But Sidney was the victim of his time. There was no English colony
now; it had been absorbed by the native Irish families, and to make war
against the natives was to make war against the {70} Fitzgeralds, the
Butlers, and other great families better known by their titles.
Happily for England, Ireland was never united, and if Sidney gained no
great conquests he was, by reason of the schisms amongst his enemies,
enabled to maintain the sovereignty of Elizabeth in Ireland. It was a
purely nominal sovereignty, but it sufficed for the time being.
{71}