Ireland under the Tudors Part 11

[Sidenote: Parliament of 1508.]

Of the remaining years of Henry VII.'s reign but little seems to be recorded, except that the chronic war among the native tribes did not cease. Kildare held a Parliament in 1508, in which a subsidy of 13_s._ 4_d._ was granted out of every ploughland, whether lay or clerical. About the same time a party of the O'Neills took Carrickfergus Castle, and carried off the mayor. In 1509 Kildare again invaded Tyrone in the interests of his grandsons, and demolished Omagh. When the King died he was in full possession of the government, and without a rival in those parts of Ireland which were in any real sense subject to the English Crown.[74]

[Sidenote: Henry endeavoured to separate the two races.]

It was the decided policy of Henry VII. to act in the spirit of the Statute of Kilkenny, and to separate the English and Irish districts.

The well-known name of the Pale, or the English Pale, seems to have come into general use about the close of the fifteenth century. A great number of ordinances remain to prove how necessary it was for the Englishry to bear arms, and the practice of fortifying the home district against the Irish became a subject of legal enactment at least as early as 1429. An Act of the Parliament of 1475 declares that a d.y.k.e had been made and kept up from Tallaght to Ta.s.sagard, at the sole cost of four baronies--Coolock, Balrothery, Castleknock, and Newcastle--and provision was made by statute for its future maintenance. This was an inner line for the defence of Dublin only, but the Parliament of Drogheda made a similar provision for the whole Pale. It was enacted that every inhabitant of the marches or inland borders of Dublin, Meath, Kildare, and Louth, should, under a penalty of 40_s._, make and maintain 'a double ditch of six feet above ground, at one side, which meareth next unto Irishmen,' the landlord forgiving a year's rent in consideration of this work. The legal provision was afterwards enforced by writs addressed to the sheriffs and justices, and the name of Pale was perhaps first given to the district so enclosed. The building of this Mahratta ditch may be considered to mark the lowest point reached by the English power in Ireland.[75]

FOOTNOTES:

[48] _History of St. Canice_, by Graves and Prim, especially pp. 187 and 193; also Mr. Graves's _Presentments_, p. 79; Archdall's _Lodge's Peerage_, art. 'Mount Garrett.'

[49] It is hard to say whether the instructions for John Estrete, attributed by Mr. Gairdner to the very beginning of Henry's reign, are by him or by Richard III. Henry would hardly have promised to make Kildare Deputy for ten years on condition of his going to Court, and the allusions to Edward IV. are more likely to have been made by Richard.--_Letters of Richard III. and Henry VII._, vol. i. p. 91. The three letters in the Appendix cannot be earlier than 1488.

[50] Writing to Morton or Fox, Octavian says, 'Profano coronationis pueri in Hibernia sceleri, me solo excepto, nullus obst.i.tit manifeste.' This hardly gives due credit to the Bishop of Clogher.--_Letters of Richard III. and Henry VII._, vol. i. p. 383. Henry's letter to Pius II. is at p.

94. 'Armachanensis' must be a mistake on the King's part.

[51] Lambert was crowned May 2, 1487.

[52] _Book of Howth_, and an account in _Carew_ (followed by Smith), iv.

p. 473.

[53] Bacon; _Book of Howth_; O'Donovan's _Four Masters, ad ann._ 1485.

The battle of Stoke was fought June 16, 1487.

[54] Henry's letter to Waterford is in Smith's _Waterford_; the letter of the Dublin people in Ware's _Annals_.

[55] Sir Richard Edgcombe's voyage, in Harris's _Hibernica_.

[56] _Book of Howth_; _Letters of Richard III. and Henry VII._, vol. i.

p. 384.

[57] _The Earls of Kildare_; Harris's _Dublin_; _Four Masters, ad ann._ 1492.

[58] Ware; Gairdner's _Life of Richard III._; _Letters of Richard III.

and Henry VII._, ii. 55.

[59] _Irish Statutes_, 10 Henry VII., Dec. 1, 1494.

[60] _Ibid._, chaps. iv. and xxii.

[61] Gilbert's _Viceroys_, p. 454, and Ware. The Act is not in the printed statutes.

[62] _Letters of Richard III. and Henry VII._, vol. ii. pp. lxxvi. 237, 242, 299; _Histories of Waterford_, by Smith and Rylands; _Four Masters and Annals of Lough Ce ad ann. 1505_.

[63] _Letters of Richard III. and Henry VII._, vol. ii. pp. 64 and 67.

[64] Hattecliffe's accounts in _Letters of Richard III. and Henry VII._, vol. ii. pp. 297-318.

[65] Ware; Hattecliffe's _Accounts_; _Earls of Kildare_.

[66] Gairdner's _Richard III._; Smith's _Waterford_, where is given the correspondence between Henry and the city; _Carew_, vol. v. p. 472, where the events of 1487, 1495, and 1497 are mixed up; Sir Piers Butler to the Earl of Ormonde, in Graves's _St. Canice_, p. 193.

[67] _Four Masters_, with O'Donovan's notes, under 1485. The 'Annals' of Andreas and the 'Douze triomphes de Henri VII.,' are in _Memorials of Henry VII._, ed. Gairdner.

[68] Sir Piers Butler to the Earl of Ormonde, in Graves's _St. Canice_, p. 193. Stanihurst says Sir Piers waylaid his enemy.

[69] All the authorities bearing on this event are collected in Graves's _St. Canice_, pp. 193-198.

[70] The Acts of this Parliament (supposed lost) are printed by Mr.

Gilbert in his _Facsimiles of Irish National MSS._, vol. iii., from the English Patent Rolls. Ware; _Four Masters_.

[71] _Four Masters_ and O'Donovan's notes, under 1487, 1488, and 1498.

[72] Ware; _Four Masters_.

[73] Sidney to Leicester, March 1, 1566, in the _Irish State Papers_. The account of the battle of Knocktoe is made up from Ware, Stanihurst, the _Four Masters_, and the _Book of Howth_. The _Four Masters_ seem to have thought that the forces of the Pale were not engaged, and O'Donovan rather countenances them, but the _Annals of Lough Ce_ say Kildare mustered 'all the foreigners and Irish of Leinster and of Northern Ireland.' (_Ad ann. 1504._) The details in the _Book of Howth_ may not be all correct, though there is nothing antecedently improbable in Lord Gormanston's truculent speech.

[74] _Irish Statutes_, 24 Hen. VII.; _Letters and Papers of Henry VIII._, Oct. 7, 1515.

[75] The statutes referred to are printed in Hardiman's _Statute of Kilkenny_. See Gilbert's _Viceroys_, p. 459.

[Ill.u.s.tration: IRELAND ABOUT 1500.

_London: Longmans & Co._]

CHAPTER IX.

FROM THE ACCESSION OF HENRY VIII. TO THE YEAR 1534.

[Sidenote: Accession of Henry VIII., 1509. Kildare remains in power.]

Henry VIII. was proclaimed without opposition, and amid great rejoicings in all the princ.i.p.al towns, but his accession made no immediate difference to Ireland. Kildare prepared to go to the new King, but the Council, who felt their helplessness without him, chose him Lord Justice, and constrained him to stay. His patent as Lord Deputy was not long withheld, and other official men were for the time continued in authority. The Earl was summoned to Court, but excused himself on the grounds that he could not be spared, and, as the Council sustained him, the King made no objection. Attended by the chief men of the Pale he invaded Munster, and, being joined by O'Donnell, penetrated into Desmond and took Castlemaine, as well as the so-called palace of the MacCarthies near Killarney. He met with scarcely any resistance, and seems to have had no higher object than plunder. Near Limerick, Kildare was joined by Desmond's eldest son with the main force of the southern Geraldines and the MacCarthies of Carbery and Muskerry. The Lord Deputy pa.s.sed into Clare by a wooden bridge which the O'Briens had erected near Castleconnell, and which he broke down behind him. Here he was met by Tirlough O'Brien, the chief's son, accompanied by the Macnamaras and the Clanricarde Burkes. The hostile armies bivouacked at such close quarters that they could hear each other talking at night. At daybreak Kildare retired along the right bank of the Shannon, and reached Limerick in safety with the bulk of his plunder. The Munster Geraldines, with their Irish auxiliaries, marched in the van as not being over trustworthy.

In the rear, the post of honour in a retreat, were the O'Donnells and the men of the Pale. Such was the settlement of differences between Geraldines and De Burgos, which the chief governor had alleged as the main obstacle to his attendance upon his sovereign. It was indeed his interest to be always at war, for he had obtained a grant in tail of all such possessions as he could recover from any rebel in Ireland.[76] This method of paying a viceroy with letters of marque cost the Crown nothing, but the greatest ingenuity could hardly have devised a plan more fatal to an unfortunate dependency.

[Sidenote: Activity of Kildare, 1512, 1513.]

During the next year Kildare kept pretty quiet, but was soon again in the field. Crossing the Shannon at Athlone he plundered and burned all before him to Roscommon, where he placed a garrison, and then prolonged his destroying course to Boyle. Here he met O'Donnell, who came to him over the Curlew Mountains. This chief had lately made a pilgrimage to Rome, and spent four months in London going and as many more on his return. He was well received by Henry VIII., but we have unfortunately no details.

In this same year Kildare invaded Ulster, took the castle of Belfast, and spoiled the land far and wide. In the following summer he marched against Ely O'Carroll, but while watering his horse in a stream near his own castle of Kilkea he was shot by one of the O'Mores, and died soon afterwards.[77] His son Gerald was at once chosen Lord Justice by the Council, and the King continued him in authority[78] on the same terms, and with a similar grant of all lands he could recover from the rebels.

[Sidenote: The Earldom of Ormonde in abeyance.]