styled 1619-33 Visct. Thurles; suc. grandfa. 24 Feb. 1633 as 12th earl of Ormond [I]; cr. 30 Aug. 1642 mq. of Ormond [I]; cr. 20 July 1660 earl of BRECKNOCK; cr. 30 Mar. 1661 duke of Ormond [I]; cr. 9 Nov. 1682 duke of ORMOND
First sat 27 July 1660; last sat 15 Feb. 1687
b. 19 Oct. 1610, s. of Thomas Butler, styled Visct. Thurles [I] (?1596-1619), s. of Walter Butler, 11th earl of Ormond [I] and Elizabeth (c.1588-1673), da. of Sir John Poyntz of Iron Acton, Glos. educ. sch. in Finchley (Mr Conyers) 1620-22;1 privately in household of George Abbot†, archbishop of Canterbury, 1622-26. m. 25 Dec. 1629, Elizabeth (1615-84), suo jure Baroness Dingwall [S], da. of Richard Preston, 1st earl of Desmond [I] and Lord Dingwall [S], and Elizabeth da. of Thomas Butler, 10th earl of Ormond [I] 8s. d.v.p., 2da. (1 d.v.p.). KG 18 Sept. 1649. d. 21 July 1688; will 8 Apr., pr. 8 Aug. 1688.2
PC [I] 1635-47, 1661-d., PC 1651-d., PC [S] 1661-d., 1661; ld. steward 1660-d.; gent. of bedchamber 1660-66; ld. lt. [I] 1643-7, 1649-50, 1662-69, 1677-85; commr., prizes 1665,3 1672,4 trade 1668-72, plantations 1671-2, trade and plantations 1672-4, 1675-d.; admiralty 19 July 1673-14 May 1679, Tangier 1673-84.5
Cllr. New England 1632; ld. lt. Som. and Bristol 1660-72; kpr. Exmoor forest 1661; gov. Duncannon 1661,6 Passage, co. Waterford 1664;7 high steward, Bristol 1661,8 Westminster 1671,9 Winchester by 167210-?d.; freeman, Dublin 1662,11 Preston 1682;12 steward honour of Tutbury, 1674-83,13 Needwood Forest 1674-1686;14 chief butler of Ire.; ld. of the regalities and liberties of the county palatine of Tipperary 1662-d.15
Capt. of horse 1631; lt. gen. of horse 1638; col. of horse 1640; lt. gen. of army [I] Mar. 1640-May 1641; c.-in-c. Oct. 1641; royal commr. 1643; col. of ft. (Spain) 1656; capt. and col. of foot [I] 1660-85;16 capt. of horse 1660-d.; col. of horse [I] 1660-85.17
Chan. Univ. of Dublin 1645-53, 1660-88, Oxf. 1669-d.; DCL Oxf. 1669, LLD Camb. 1670; gov. Charterhouse by 1674-d.,18 Dublin Hosp. 1683.19
Associated with: Kilkenny Castle, co. Kilkenny; Chelsea;20 Ormond House, St James’s Square, Westminster; Moor Park, Herts. and Clarendon House, Piccadilly, Mdx.
Likenesses: oil on canvas, after Sir P. Lely, c.1665, NPG 370; oil on canvas by Sir P. Lely, 1678, National Trust, Kedleston Hall; oil on canvas, by W. Wissing, c.1680-85, NPG 5559.
Civil wars and Restoration
Ormond had a troubled childhood. His grandfather, the 11th earl, lost out in the machinations of royal policy when the death of the 10th earl in 1614 left the heir to his estate, his daughter, Elizabeth, vulnerable to royal pressure to marry James I’s favourite, Sir Richard Preston, the future Baron Dingwall [S], and earl of Desmond [I]. The 11th earl was incarcerated to prevent him protesting. In 1619, while Ormond’s grandfather was in the Fleet prison, his father, styled Viscount Thurles [I], died at sea. Ormond was taken from the Catholic school he attended at Finchley and from his grandfather in the Fleet and put in the care of George Abbot, archbishop of Canterbury, who raised him a Protestant. His mother remained a devout Catholic and was remarried, to George Mathew (d.1636) of Thurles, providing Ormond with a number of half-siblings. As Ormond was later to remark, ‘my father and mother lived and died papists and bred all their children so. Only I, by God’s merciful providence, was educated in the true Protestant religion from which I never swerved towards either extreme, not when it was most dangerous to profess it and most advantageous to quit it.’21
The family estates were reunited by the marriage in 1629 of the young heir to the earldom of Ormond to the heiress of Desmond, whose wardship had been granted to Henry Rich†, earl of Holland, an arrangement which cost his grandfather £15,000. This merely added to the family debts caused by the long incarceration of the 11th earl, and the extravagance of Desmond, who left debts of between £15,000 and £20,000. When Ormond succeeded his grandfather in 1633, his debts may already have reached as much as £45,000, while his Irish estates were estimated to yield only £8,000 in 1641.22
As the chief royalist commander in Ireland, during the civil wars Ormond faced the dual threat posed by a Catholic insurgency and by the Presbyterian supporters of Parliament. He surrendered his vice-royalty to Parliament in June 1647 and retired to England, moving to the continent in 1648. Ormond was back in Ireland in 1649 rallying the royalist cause. Military defeat saw him sail into exile again in December 1650. There he remained one of the leading counsellors of Charles II and a key adviser during the negotiations that led to the Restoration.23
Following the Restoration, Ormond was an important supporter of the new chief minister, his fellow exile, Edward Hyde, earl of Clarendon from 1661.24 He was named to the king’s Privy Council, but, with George Monck, soon to be duke of Albemarle, taking the lieutenancy of Ireland, Ormond was made lord steward, a post with much patronage at his disposal. Although, as Sir George Lane, Ormond’s longstanding secretary and the future Viscount Lanesborough [I], told one suitor, the multitude of ancient officers ‘that pretended for employment’, prevented him from satisfying all the requests submitted to him.25 Ormond remained one of the king’s inner circle of advisers, serving on the committee of foreign affairs which considered the king’s affairs ‘before they came to a public debate.’26 However, the friendship forged during his exile with Hyde was balanced by the enmities which developed with Richard Talbot, the future earl of Tyrconnel [I], and with James Stuart, duke of York.27
In the faction-ridden English court of 1660, Ormond was seen as an ally of Hyde, and an opponent of the French and Catholic influences focused on the queen mother, Henrietta Maria. As early as June 1660 Mazarin’s English agent suspected Hyde and Ormond of ‘sowing the seeds of dissent between the two courts in order to avoid the danger in which the presence of the queen would put them’.28 Ireland, though, would be the biggest source of contention. In August Samuel Pepys‡ was informed that ‘there was like to be many factions at court’ between Ormond, Albemarle (as Monck had become) and John Robartes, 2nd Baron Robartes (later earl of Radnor), ‘about the business of Ireland.’29 The main cause of contention over Ireland though was the preliminary discussions over the complex Irish land settlement which resulted in the provisional, and impractical, Declaration of 30 November.
Ormond was not an English peer at the Restoration, a fact soon remedied by his creation as earl of Brecknock. He was introduced into the House on 27 July 1660 by the lord great chamberlain, Montagu Bertie, 2nd earl of Lindsey, William Russell, 5th earl (later duke) of Bedford and William Wentworth, earl (later 2nd earl) of Strafford. He attended on 78 days of the 1660 session (48 per cent of the total, although since he missed the first 76 days, 95 per cent of possible sittings). His elevation coincided with legislation to restore Ormond to his Irish estates. Following its rapid passage through the Commons the bill was brought up to the Lords on 23 July by Francis Aungier‡, 3rd Baron Aungier [I] (later earl of Longford [I]), and passed through the Lords with equal speed, receiving the royal assent on 28 July. By this act Ormond was restored to all the land, honours and rights in Ireland of which he was possessed on 28 Oct. 1641. Such legislation must have proved welcome to the duke, whose debts in 1660 have been variously estimated at around £130,000 or £154,000.30 Moreover, he was already strapped for money, writing on 12 June 1660 that his money was ‘at an end, my place yields me yet nothing nor have I any other way to put my self into modest equipage and to eat but by having it from the king’.31
Ormond’s important position in the royal household ensured that he would often be used by the upper House as a conduit of messages and information between peers and the monarch. On 15 Aug. he was appointed to manage a conference on the amendments to the bill of indemnity. On this issue, his influence helped Henry Cromwell‡ in retaining his land after the Restoration, probably in recognition of his assistance to the duchess during Ormond’s exile.32 On 3 Sept. Ormond was one of the commissioners named in the poll bill to consider putting the bill into execution so far as it concerned peers. On 7 Sept. he was named as a commissioner to join with the nominees from the Commons in disbanding the army. He was named to four committees before the adjournment on 13 Sept. 1660.
During the recess, Ormond was nominated to a commission of 34 to try the regicides, which began its proceedings at Hicks Hall on 9 October.33 On 22 Oct. he was one of the laymen present at the Worcester House conference, which drew up the declaration between the Anglicans and Presbyterians which was published three days later.34 During the conference, when ‘Mrs Hyde [i.e. Anne Hyde] fell in labour’, both the duke and duchess were among those despatched to ‘interrogate’ her as to whether York was the father of her child.35 Ormond sought to boost his financial solvency by claiming what was owed to his family by the crown for previous royal service and in December Charles II ordered the Irish lord justices to issue a commission under the great seal of Ireland for the examination of the debts contracted by Ormond in the service of the king or his father. The total sum came to £71,916.36
In the second part of the Convention, after Parliament reassembled on 6 Nov. 1660, Ormond was appointed to a further eight committees. On the 19th he was one of the peers named to wait on the king to discover his pleasure concerning the passage of the bill restoring Thomas Howard, 23rd earl of Arundel, to the dukedom of Norfolk, to which the king duly agreed. On 13 Dec. Ormond signed a protest against the passage of the bill voiding Sir Edward Powell’s fines. On 20 Dec. he was added to the commissioners for assessing peers for the poll tax.
The opening years of the Cavalier Parliament, 1661-2
Ormond remained busy following the dissolution of Parliament. On 29 Dec. 1660 he attended the interment of Princess Mary of Orange in Westminster Abbey.37 On 1 Feb. 1661 he was named to a standing committee of the Privy Council concerning the affairs of the prince of Orange, Charles II’s young nephew.38 His search for financial security was a major preoccupation. In the same month, Ormond informed Roger Boyle‡, earl of Orrery [I], that he had purchased the prizage from Sir William Waller‡, partly ‘to have a foundation of credit, which an Irish estate is not’, although Waller appears to have retained his grant.39 The marriage of his daughter, Mary, also required his attention. On 4 Mar. 1661 a ‘kind of contract’ was sealed between Mary and William Cavendish, styled Lord Cavendish, the future 4th earl, and later duke, of Devonshire, ‘the king joining their hands, and the friends and parents of each party being present, they are not to marry this year and a half, she being but young and little.’40 The marriage eventually took place on 26 Oct. 1662 at Dunmore in Ireland.41 Following his elevation to an Irish dukedom in March 1661, on 15 Apr. Ormond was installed as a knight of the garter, having been nominated in September 1649 during Charles II’s exile at St Germain.42
The Irish land settlement was expected to be enacted by the Irish Parliament, due to open at the same time as the English, in May 1661. Given his place at the apex of Irish society, the land settlement there was inevitably going to have a profound impact upon Ormond. He was astute enough to realize that not all parties could be accommodated, noting that ‘if the adventurers and soldiers must be satisfied, to the extent of what they suppose intended them, by the Declaration [of 30 Nov. 1660]; and if all that accepted and constantly adhered to the Peace of 1648 must be restored’, then there must be ‘discoveries made of a new Ireland, for the old will not serve to satisfy these engagements.’43 Over the summer Ormond would receive regular reports of the progress of discussions from Ireland, and was closely involved in the examination in London of the result.44
Ormond was also closely involved in proceedings in the English Parliament. In May, when his son, Thomas Butler, earl of Ossory [I] (later Baron Butler of Moore Park), was seated for Bristol after a double return, Ormond approached Robert Bulkeley‡, 2nd Viscount Bulkeley [I], in an unsuccessful attempt to obtain the vacant seat at Beaumaris, which had been promised to Ossory, for Sir George Lane.45 Ormond attended the opening day of the Parliament on 8 May 1661, where he carried the sword of state. He attended on 127 days of the session, 66 per cent of the total sittings. On 11 May, Ormond, together with Algernon Percy, 4th earl of Northumberland, introduced the lord chancellor into the House under his new title as earl of Clarendon. The same peers introduced Arthur Annesley, earl of Anglesey, and later in the day Ormond joined with Philip Stanhope, 2nd earl of Chesterfield, to introduce John Granville, earl of Bath. Ormond was named to 15 committees, including on 10 July 1661 to the committee on the bill for regulating the navy, which he reported to the House on 12 July, and on 16 July to draft the sanguinary laws concerning priests. On 11 July Ormond voted for Aubrey de Vere, 20th earl of Oxford, in the case of the great chamberlaincy, and on 17 July he signed a protest against the passage of another bill for vacating the fines of Sir Edward Powell. According to Thomas Carte, Ormond, Clarendon and Thomas Wriothesley, 4th earl of Southampton were responsible for the clause in the act for the safety and preservation of the king which made it praemunire for any person to say that the king was a papist.46
When the House resumed on 20 Nov. 1661, Ormond and the lord chamberlain, Edward Montagu, 2nd earl of Manchester, were appointed to thank the king for his speech. The following day, Ormond reported that they had done so. Also on the 21st he was appointed to attend the king to ask for a proclamation sending suspicious persons out of London. Having done so, on 22 Nov. Ormond and Manchester informed the House that he had appointed that afternoon for the House to wait upon him.
In response to a message from the king on 19 Dec. Ormond was named to a conference with the Commons to consider the peace and security of the kingdom. He was also appointed to report a conference with the Commons on the bill regulating corporations. He was appointed to a further nine committees during the session, including on 24 Jan. 1662 that to prepare a bill repealing some of the 1641-2 legislation placing limitations on the crown. On occasion Ormond was absent from the Lords due to other duties, such as on 16 Jan. when he accompanied York to Deptford.47 On 6 Feb. Ormond signed a protest against the passage of the bill to restore the estates of Charles Stanley, 8th earl of Derby. In March the Lords passed a bill confirming, amongst other acts, the act restoring Ormond to his estates passed in the Convention. On 18 Mar. Ormond was on hand to support Clarendon’s contention, in contradistinction to George Digby, 2nd earl of Bristol, that it was the king’s own policy to allow the crown to dispense with provisions in the Act of Uniformity.48 Ormond last sat during the session on 19 Apr. 1662, his absence thereafter being explained by his duties as a courtier in welcoming the new queen upon her arrival in England. Although perceived by the French as pro-Spanish, and therefore as an opponent of the Portuguese match which had been promoted by France, Ormond’s loyalty to the king outweighed any misgivings he might have had over the affair.49 He registered his proxy with Jerome Weston, 2nd earl of Portland, on 25 Apr. 1662.
Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, 1662-7
With Ormond heavily involved in the debates in the English Privy Council on the Irish settlement bill that dragged on from late August, the king decided, according to Clarendon, at the prompting of the duke of Albemarle, to appoint him lord lieutenant. Ormond’s patent for the lord lieutenancy of Ireland, announced in council on 4 Nov. 1661, was sealed on 21 Feb. 1662.50 The post was of more significance to him than mere prestige – his income from fees allowances and military pay for the year to 3 Nov. 1662 was to be calculated at almost £11,000.51 A further financial boost occurred on 4 Mar. 1662, when the Irish House of Commons addressed the lords justices to prepare a bill for raising £30,000 for his use, ‘as a testimony of the just and grateful sense entertained by his majesty’s good subjects of this kingdom for the duke of Ormond’s extraordinary merits and public services.’52 On receiving news of this, Ormond was quick to ensure the king’s agreement and that nothing should ‘interrupt the transmission of the bill’ to England, and it was duly sent over to the secretary of state, Sir Edward Nicholas‡, on 9 Apr. 1662.53 Upon its return, the bill passed the Irish House of Commons on a single day on 1 May 1662, receiving the royal assent on 14 May.54 In a telling comment on Ormond’s financial woes, Orrery wrote in February 1663 that all this money had been spent before Ormond left London, and that he paid ‘interest or worse on £80,000’.55
In April 1662 Ormond informed the lords justices in Dublin that the king and Privy Council had finally agreed to the Irish settlement bill, and had appointed seven commissioners, the court of claims, for its execution.56 The bill was duly returned to Ireland and passed by Parliament there (although work was immediately begun on a bill of explanation, addressing some of the many problems with the complex land settlement). The Act of Settlement received the royal assent in June 1662. Ormond himself was mentioned in 16 clauses of the act, including the grant of forfeited land in satisfaction of the debt accrued in royal service.57 It soon became clear, however, that the work of the commissioners would not be easy, and that a new act ‘of explanation’ would have to be considered.58
Ormond arrived in Dublin on 28 July 1662.59 He was keen to create a good impression in Dublin, and his daily routine was designed to do so: he was ‘vigilant, industrious, moderate … never sits up late, rises always early, constant at council twice a week. No debauchery obtains the least countenance’.60 Ormond was well aware of the problems caused by the political tensions of the land settlement, the poverty of the Irish government and its inability to maintain an effective army, and the threats posed especially by Protestant nonconformity and radicalism. He knew that the most important decisions regarding Ireland would be taken in England. As he opined to Clarendon in September 1662, ‘our quietness here depends very much upon yours there, for those that would disturb us take heart, or discouragement, from the hopes they receive thence.’61 He was keenly aware, too, of the interaction between Ireland and England, and indeed Scotland (he supported the establishment of episcopacy in Scotland, the better to support the Church in Ireland).62 In response, Clarendon acknowledged the reports that Ormond was known to ‘drudge hourly and wonderfully for the public’, although not every commentator has associated this diligence over detail with any sense of a strategic overview.63 As the Irish court of claims began its work its rulings began to cause unease and then anger, particularly at the restoration of some Irish Catholics to their lands, and resulted in a backlash within the Irish Parliament in early 1663 as well as a growth in conspiratorial activity among radical Protestants.
In the meantime, Ormond was worried by the replacement of Nicholas as secretary of state by Henry Bennet, the future earl of Arlington, so much so that in October 1662 he requested that he be allowed only a public correspondence with the new secretary. Bennet, a man of sharp political antennae, was soon attempting to smooth relations with Ormond. Later in October, Clarendon referred to Ormond’s desire for ‘a cypher’ by which he would be able to impart anything of secret to the king, ‘which, at parting, you told him you would still do by me; and I am sure will still, when you think it best.’ Ormond’s main conduit of influence in England remained Clarendon, especially as regards the vexed question of Irish legislation laid before the Privy Council. On 15 Nov. Clarendon laid down what he thought was the way he should deal with them: ‘when any bills or letters are sent from Ireland hither … I shall conclude, if you say nothing of them to me of your judgment or wishes, that it is all one to you what becomes of them; and therefore I am not at all solicitous in the ‘bill of explanation’, which I do not at all understand.’ No doubt Ormond was reassured by Bennet’s report at the end of December 1662 that the king had expressed his unwillingness to sign papers relating to Ireland without first knowing the duke’s opinion.64
In 1663 Ormond purchased Moor Park, Hertfordshire, a house and park near Uxbridge and within convenient reach of London, although he had to ‘leave part of my estate still in pawn, to be redeemed by the rest, in time’, in order to pay for it.65 The purchase did not initially include the manor, and in November Ormond had to borrow £5,000 from Sir Thomas and Robert Vyner, in order to pay the second instalment.66 In July 1664, the property appears to have been mortgaged for £6,000 and the mortgage was subsequently assigned to John Warner, bishop of Rochester. Clearly a financial encumbrance, in May 1670 the property was conveyed to James Scott, duke of Monmouth, the king having paid £13,200 for the house and furniture.67
Ormond missed the entire 1663 session of Parliament, being excused attendance on 23 Feb. 1663 because of his absence in Ireland. According to Orrery, writing from Dublin on 12 Mar. 1663, Ormond had sent his proxy to Portland.68 Following Portland’s death on 17 Mar. 1663, Clarendon suggested that John Egerton, 2nd earl of Bridgwater would be a proper recipient of his proxy, but none is extant.69 Ormond’s economic and political interests ensured that he kept a wary eye on matters under discussion at Westminster. He was alarmed at the resolution of the Commons on 7 Apr. 1663 that ‘a higher custom be laid upon all cattle that shall be brought over from Ireland into England’ between 1 June (later 1 July) and 20 December. To Ormond this measure ‘would indeed amount to a prohibition. This would disappoint all our payments ... so ... that a constant supply must be sent out of England.’70 The resultant bill, for the advancement of trade, was introduced into the Commons on 8 May. Ormond continued to criticize the measure as the bill passed through the Commons and then the Lords. He even harboured hopes that the king would not pass the bill owing to ‘the ruinous consequences of the impositions on Irish cattle.’71
Ormond had another spat with Bennet in April 1663 over allegations that Bennet had told the king that Ormond was ‘not kind to him’. As a result Ormond felt that ‘a letter from the king, upon which depends the redemption of my fortune and posterity from ruin... brought upon them by my service and engagements to and for the Crown, is, notwithstanding it has been often promised, still kept from me.’ To this, Bennet responded by pointing out that this proceeded not from the ‘enmity of the writer, or to lack of kindness in the king, but to the conduct of the Parliament’, and its hostility to the expenditure of money on Ireland.72 Eventually, relations were made up, no doubt helped by the dispatch of the king’s order to pay Ormond over £70,000.73 However, distrust of Bennet remained, and in December 1663, Anglesey cautioned Ormond about the need to write regularly to the king, and to use an alternative route than his official letters to Bennet, because the latter revealed their contents to too many people.74
Ormond wanted to be kept abreast of political developments in England and complained when this was not the case. On 20 June 1663 Daniel O’Neil‡ thought that in ‘not knowing all the results of our juncto and council, you are not friendly nor fairly dealt with. I can with some confidence say, it’s not the king’s sense nor his desire you should be made a stranger to the secretest of his counsels and resolutions.’ Clarendon was not remiss in sending to Ormond in July 1663, the particulars of the articles of high treason and misdemeanours charged against him by Bristol, ‘to which, the good lord averred that you are one of his principal witnesses.’75 In August Ormond was informed of the plan to retrench the expenditure of the royal household, which threatened to reduce his patronage by abolishing a number of posts and also the traditional largesse of the court.76 Ormond responded with a defence of the traditional establishment, which had acquired so ‘much veneration amongst the people’ that it had become ‘a considerable part in the government and greatness of the state’ and a constant reminder ‘to the people of the power and majesty of the king and of the duty and obedience they owe him.’77
At the beginning of October 1663, Ormond hoped Clarendon was ‘busied’ with the consideration of the new draft Irish bill for explanation, designed to overcome the problems with and the opposition caused by the original Act of Settlement. The new legislation, he emphasized, was absolutely necessary for the security and settlement of the people and the good order of the realm.78 At the end of the month, he added that if the bill of explanation was looked upon as his work, ‘they do his skill in law too much honour.’ That he held the bill as capable of amendment was shown by the fact that he had already offered some suggestions for the king’s consideration.79
There were intense pressures within the English court on the Irish settlement, including the concerted campaign waged by the queen mother on behalf of Randal MacDonnell, marquess of Antrim [I].80 Ormond was exceptionally nervous about these. At the beginning of January 1664, he asked the king to be careful with whom he advised upon the land settlement, and to ensure that he read and kept his letters howsoever he may otherwise dispose of them.81 This fear over the Irish settlement may well have prompted Ormond to mention in a letter to Clarendon on 9 Jan. his desire to return to England, leaving Ossory in charge.82 Both Anglesey and Clarendon appear to have concurred with Ormond’s judgment, as apparently did the king and York.83 On 20 Feb. he opined to Clarendon his desire ‘to see and freely confer with you’, and his belief (referring to the possibility of a revival of the earl of Bristol’s attack on Clarendon in the forthcoming session of Parliament) that an ‘accident may happen at the first meeting of your Parliament, as may make me (who have been removed from any direct part in affairs there) of some use; and that if I did no good, I shall do no hurt.’84
Ormond could not be spared from Ireland immediately, so he did not in the end get to the session held in March-May 1664. Absence had its compensations, however, as he was able to write to Bennet on 25 Mar., of his relief that he was removed from all part in the ‘garboyle’ in which Bristol had embroiled himself, having been ‘so long his friend and servant, that it would have been some trouble to see him successful in the disturbance he designs, or miserable for the attempt.’85 On 4 Apr. Ormond was excused attendance in the Lords. By 25 Apr. Ormond was still asking with some urgency for a reply to his request for leave to visit England.86 Bennet duly sent him informal notification of the king’s permission on 3 May.87 Clarendon was of the opinion that the bill under discussion in the council relating to the Irish land settlement would pass much more easily with Ormond present.88 Anglesey predicted that ‘upon the first news of your coming (which yet is kept very private), the race of whispering informers will so vanish that there will be no footsteps of them left.’89 Ormond received notification of his leave to return on 18 May 1664.90
Ormond was preceded by the duchess, who arrived at Chelsea on 19 May 1664, and immediately received visits from ‘most grandees of the court’.91 Leaving Ossory as lord deputy, Ormond left Ireland on 31 May, ‘having arranged his equipage as best he could so as to appear with more show’, but also delaying his arrival ‘so as to have time to be perfectly informed by his friends and emissaries of the state of the court and of matters against which he needs to take measures.’92 He made an appearance at court on 11 June ‘conducted by the greatest part of his majesty’s Privy Council and the nobility in town, who paid this honour out of a respect they bear to the merits of so eminent a personage’.93
Apart from the many questions of Irish policy requiring his attention, Ormond also initiated negotiations for the marriage of his son, Richard Butler, earl of Arran [I], the future Baron Butler of Weston, to Lady Mary Stuart, niece, and potentially heir, of George Villiers, 2nd duke of Buckingham. No sooner had these been completed in September, than in October plans were under discussion for the marriage of Ormond’s youngest son, Lord John Butler, the future earl of Gowran [I], but the negotiations faltered and were finally called off in January 1667.94
In mid-June 1664 Ormond informed the archbishop of Dublin that although much of his time had been spent in visits and in receiving civilities, this had allowed him the opportunity of setting right mistakes on Irish affairs that had taken place by misinformation. Apart from the explanatory bill, he was engaged in promoting a number of draft bills sent for approval in England.95 He was able to call to his assistance the members of the Irish Privy Council resident in England. An order of the Irish Privy Council of 29 July 1664 authorized them to meet to review what had been already deliberated in London ‘in and concerning the affairs of Ireland, and prepare and offer such expedients as they shall think fit.’96 This body met on 1 Aug. and continued deliberating until 26 May 1665.97 The English Privy Council agreed to the act of explanation in July, and it passed the Irish Parliament in December 1665.98
In order to facilitate the revision of the land settlement as proposed in the bill of explanation, Ormond gave up his interest in forfeited lands which he was due to receive as compensation for his losses in the royal service, originally estimated at over £70,000, in return for a payment of £50,000, payable within two years.99 Eventually, this was converted into a payment of £5,000 p.a. over ten years. Obtaining payment for this sum was to preoccupy Ormond in the following years and contribute significantly to souring his relationship with those politicians responsible for the Irish revenue. Delays while the settlement was worked out left Ormond strapped for cash; in March 1665 he was forced to ask Sir Daniel Bellingham, a Dublin alderman, if he would be willing to accept the payment of further interest on his mortgage of £10,000, as he was unable to repay the capital owing to his long stay in England, occasioned by difficulties in the dispatch of the Act of Settlement.100
On 20 Aug. 1664 Ormond was present at the prorogation of Parliament, and although his return for Ireland was originally planned for October, it was soon delayed.101 In advance of the 1664-5 session, on 2 Nov., William Cavendish, 3rd earl of Devonshire, registered his proxy with Ormond. Ormond attended on 27 days of the ensuing session (51 per cent of the total) and was appointed to one committee. On 26 Nov., Charles Stuart, 3rd duke of Richmond, registered his proxy with Ormond.102 On 3 Dec. 1664 Edward Conway, 3rd Viscount (later earl of) Conway, wrote to ask Ormond to accept his proxy, and Ormond’s papers contain a copy or draft of the proxy, dated 12 December.103 The registration of the proxy on 2 Dec. would appear to be the day upon which it was dated.104
Ormond’s ambitious plans for Arran received a setback with the public acknowledgment of the marriage of ‘Northern Tom Howard,’ brother of Charles Howard, earl of Carlisle, to the dowager duchess of Richmond, Buckingham’s sister. That the marriage had taken place before her daughter, Lady Mary Stuart, had married Arran, clearly perturbed Ormond.105 His response was to ask Buckingham to safeguard Arran’s interest by settling his estate on Lady Arran. Buckingham refused saying (as was reported) ‘that if his sister have a son (and by the way she is with child), he thought it more reasonable that should inherit his estate, as well as it will do his honours … I heard one say it was the only thing had gone cross to the duke of Ormond’s grandeur since his return from abroad.’106 Nor were relations with Buckingham improved in April 1665 when Ormond wrote to him concerning Buckingham’s will, which had originally favoured Lady Arran, but which he had apparently altered in view of what he perceived to be Ormond’s failure to act according to the professions of friendship which he had previously made, a reference perhaps to Ormond’s perceived failure to back a revival of the council of the north.107
According to a memorandum produced by the French court in March 1665, Ormond, Clarendon and Southampton were against a war with the Dutch. In May, the French diplomat Hugues de Lionne thought that the Spanish were ‘counting’ on Ormond and Albemarle ‘being entirely in their interest’. Another assessment, sent to Lionne in May, portrayed Ormond as ‘an enemy to Madame Castlemaine, and his interests are linked to the chancellor, from whom he will not separate at this time when they are trying to regulate the affairs of Ireland, because he has much property which was given him through confiscation, and whose owners are demanding its return.’108 At the beginning of June, Louis XIV was informed that as Ormond had ‘more to lose than any of the subjects of the king of England, none … desires peace and quiet more passionately than he’.109
Ormond spent some part of the summer of 1665 at Moor Park, a useful bolt-hole from the plague.110 In August, after reporting the death of his brother-in-law, Donough Maccarty, earl of Clancarty [I], ‘the only person in the world from whom he never did, and never would, conceal the greatest and most important secret of his soul’, Ormond left Moor Park, finally making his way to Ireland via Bristol (where he settled the militia).111 Consequently, he missed the short session of October 1665.
Almost immediately upon his arrival in Ireland early in September 1665 Ormond wrote to Clarendon bemoaning the financial shortfall which would make it impossible to meet governmental expenditure ‘unless the freedom of trade (for such it is), be restored to us’, a reference to the restraint placed on the Irish cattle trade by the act of 1663. It was his constant refrain that the financial concerns of Ireland must be heeded in England for there was insufficient money to pay the taxes that were needed to cover the costs of defence.112 However, on 11 Oct. 1665 Arlington quickly disabused Ormond of any notion of relief from Parliament: ‘nothing will be less practical in this session of Parliament than the repeal of the bill against importation of Irish cattle.’ He continued, that Clarendon, Southampton, attorney general Geoffrey Palmer‡ and solicitor general Heneage Finch, the future earl of Nottingham, ‘all assure me that according to their observation a total prohibition will be insisted on.’113 Some observers felt that Ormond’s best hope was to get the Lords or the king to veto the measure. Although the bill fell at the prorogation at the end of October, Ormond was not under any illusions that this was anything but a temporary reprieve, informing George Legge, the future Baron Dartmouth, that ‘it is well we have time to look about us, before the next assault.’114
Ormond was now working on the details of the land settlement as provided for by the Act of Explanation, which he complained would condemn him to a great deal of drudgery.115 While in Ireland he arranged for the disposal of his bedchamber place to Ossory, using Arlington as an intermediary with the king.116 Arlington’s marriage, in April 1666, to Ossory’s sister-in-law, saw a further improvement in relations between the two men. Ormond continued to badger his correspondents in England over the restrictions on Irish trade.117 Arlington’s response in mid-August 1666 was to warn him that the political momentum behind the campaign for prohibition had not declined.118 In return, Ormond argued that the king should exert his authority against its passage, and if that failed (thinking of the impact on his own personal finances), obtain a proviso for the ‘chief governor’ to license a certain number for the king’s use, ‘my aim being by this means to make money of some part of what my tenants can give me for rent.’ Not that Ormond intended to rely exclusively on the king, for he was simultaneously urging Anglesey to use his interest with his friends in both Houses against the bill.119 In August Ormond and the Irish Privy Council had petitioned the king over the bill, employing Richard Boyle*, 2nd earl of Cork [I], and earl of Burlington, Ossory, Anglesey and Conway to offer to the king ‘some of those many reasons, which we humbly conceive may incline your royal heart to protect this your kingdom from being so abandoned to misery and ruin ... the restraint on importation of cattle will only depress the Irish revenue even further’.120
Despite the threat to the Irish economy posed by the bill, Ormond remained in Ireland for the whole of the 1666-7 session and was excused attendance on the Lords on 1 Oct. 1666. He did deem it advisable to protect himself from attack while in Ireland and on 15 Oct. he was granted a free and general pardon by the king.121 Anglesey informed him in late November that ‘I find your grace nibbled at by vermin in the dark, for though I have hunted for them none will appear openly against you.’122 Several of Ormond’s allies attributed the agitation against Irish cattle to Anthony Ashley Cooper, Lord Ashley (the future earl of Shaftesbury), the duke of Buckingham and John Maitland, 2nd earl (later duke) of Lauderdale [S], and their personal hostility towards him.123 On 13 Nov., when Conway was reporting to Ormond on the bill against Irish cattle, he ended with a reminder, ‘we do very much want your grace’s proxy, I beseech you to send it with speed for whensoever the bill passes, it will be but by a few voices’, a point reiterated by Anglesey.124 This no doubt prompted Ormond on 17 Dec. to write to Clarendon pointing out that when he took his leave from the lord chancellor at Salisbury, he had forgotten that the holder of his proxy, Charles Weston, 3rd earl of Portland, was dead, and so he needed his advice on a replacement, suggesting either Burlington or Conway.125 Having dispatched a blank proxy, on 3 Jan. 1667 it was duly registered with Burlington. Later in January, Ormond wrote to Burlington asking him to bestow his proxy as he would his own vote.126
When the bill passed the Commons 165-104 on 13 Oct., Arlington thought that the size of the minority vote would encourage opposition in the Lords, and soon afterwards Allen Brodrick‡ offered Ormond some hope that the king would veto the bill.127 Ormond sought some political advantage by supporting a subscription in Ireland to send over Irish cattle for the benefit of those left destitute by the Fire of London, but the proposal was rejected in the Commons. 128 The most controversial clause of the bill declared illegal imports to be a ‘nuisance’ – a provision intended to prevent the king from using his prerogative to grant licences for individuals to import Irish cattle, as Ormond was hoping to do.129 Arlington hoped that the term would be omitted in the Lords, creating a loophole. However, the king eventually agreed to the bill in January 1667 with the ‘nuisance’ clause retained in order to ensure the passage through the Commons of the poll bill, persuading several peers not to continue in their opposition to it.130 Ormond’s reaction was to declare ‘God send he may always find them as ready to obey him when he would have his prerogative supported by them’.131 He did, however, remember to thank Gilbert Sheldon, archbishop of Canterbury, for his assistance in opposing the bill.132
A prospective marriage between Kelme Maccarty, 3rd earl of Clancarty [I], and a niece of Orrery’s demonstrated Ormond’s religious position in January 1667. His sister, the dowager countess of Clancarty, had been ‘made to believe she cannot consent it should be by a priest of our church without sinning, and my Lady Elizabeth [Boyle], is as much persuaded she shall offend if she shall consent to be married by a popish priest’. Ormond, evidently asked to intervene, wrote that ‘I am not able to remove the scruple from my sister and I am not willing to endeavour to do it with Lady Elizabeth.’133
At the end of March 1667, Anglesey, believing that court politics might be coming to a critical point, suggested that Ormond should come over to England.134 Ormond may have found a visit useful for several reasons. He was in a negotiation with Albemarle over the purchase of the latter’s office of the mastership of the horse, which he intended for Ossory.135 There was also the political pressure on his old ally, Clarendon, which had Ormond at the beginning of July 1667 regretting that being tied to Irish affairs he could not journey to England to serve him. When, after Clarendon’s fall at the end of August, some members of the former chancellor’s family felt that he had not done enough to help him he justified his absence, pointing out that to have travelled to England without the king’s leave ‘would be running himself into a greater crime than the lord chancellor will be found guilty of.’136
Under attack, 1667-9
Ormond was aware that Clarendon’s dismissal showed the ascendancy at court of politicians likely to be unsympathetic towards him, and that as a consequence he might find his own position under attack.137 The king wrote to Ormond on 15 Sept. 1667 to reassure him that his former friendship with Clarendon would be no prejudice to him ‘because it is very probable that malicious people may suggest the contrary.’138 In London, Ossory, too, had picked up intimations that Ormond might be attacked in the forthcoming parliamentary session, but had to confess in September 1667, that he could ‘learn neither the particular persons that contrive the thing; nor upon what grounds they will move’ in it.139 Anglesey and Sheldon also agreed that an attack was likely.140
One avenue of attack on Ormond concerned the land settlement in Ireland, with the appeal of William Barker to the Privy Council over a judgment made in Ireland the possible vehicle for it. The council confirmed the judgment on 11 Oct. 1667 after a long debate. Sir Thomas Clifford, the future Baron Clifford, Anglesey, Lauderdale, Bridgwater, Arlington and York spoke ‘very well to the thing’ in question, whilst Carlisle, Denzil Holles, Baron Holles, John Berkeley, Baron Berkeley of Stratton, Buckingham, and some others, supported the appeal.141 Barker subsequently petitioned the Commons on 31 Oct., ‘touching some wrongs done in Ireland’, and it was referred to the committee of grievances, but there is no evidence of subsequent proceedings on it. This may have been the opening move in an attempt to use Ormond’s Irish land transactions as part of a future impeachment.142 Although the petition was unsuccessful, Ormond worried about it provoking many more complaints from Ireland, which would mean that ‘the Parliament will not want work for some months, even if they should have no other.’143
When Parliament met on 10 Oct. 1667, Ormond was necessarily absent, and on 29 Oct. he was granted leave from attendance on the Lords. With an impeachment against Clarendon in the offing, Ormond prepared to defend his conduct in Ireland, anticipating complaints that the quartering of the army was against the law, although as he pointed out ‘either the king must, by raising the pay of the soldiers, enable them to pay for lodgings; or they must have them free; or there must be no army’. His tactics in the face of accusations were that ‘particulars of all sorts will be best answered, when they are judicially objected, and the weaker the objection is, the less it should be answered beforehand. For the answering of one weak or ill-proved accusation discredits all the rest.’144 Ossory in London was aware of Orrery’s ‘artifices to diminish your reputation’, but could not find any positive proof, only that ‘all his friends find faults within your management of affairs and at the same time extol his.’145 By 15 Oct. 1667, Conway had uncovered more concrete evidence of an attack. He informed Ormond that solicitor general Finch had discovered that certain members of the Commons had privately drawn up 12 articles of impeachment against him.146 Anglesey later added to this by reporting that Edward Seymour‡, ‘in his accusation of the earl of Clarendon, among other bribes, charged him with the sum of £50,000, received from Ireland; and made a transition, how fit it would be for the Commons to take into consideration, in due time the state and management of affairs in that kingdom’.147 By November Orrery thought it certain that Ormond would be recalled and impeached, and had sent for the ‘heads of the articles’ against him, and Pepys had heard of a possible impeachment, to be brought in by Sir Richard Temple‡.148 Ossory added a few days later that he believed the design to have been promoted by Seymour, Sir Thomas Littleton‡, Sir Robert Howard‡, William Garraway‡, ‘and others of the same cabal’.149 According to York this attack ‘was chiefly managed by the duke of Buckingham, at the instigation of the earl of Orrery’.150 Gilbert Burnet*, later bishop of Salisbury, saw Ormond as opposed by a combination of Orrery and Richard Jones‡, 3rd Viscount (and later earl of) Ranelagh [I], on one hand and Talbot on the other.151
By 12 Nov. 1667, Ormond had access to a copy of some of the main accusations against him.152 At the same time, Ormond expressed to Anglesey his view that the heads of the accusation were either ‘drawn by some friend, or by a very ignorant enemy. There is not one of them true, as they are expressed. Some, if they were true, are no crimes. And some are impossible to have been done, by anybody.’153 On 22 Nov. Ormond sent to Conway materials that would help refute one of the allegations against him, namely the quartering of troops in Dublin.154 No impeachment proceedings were instituted in the Commons before the adjournment on 19 Dec., possibly because of the conflict between the Houses on how to proceed in their proceedings against Clarendon.
Ormond was aware that a successful attempt to remove him from his government in Ireland ‘at this time and conjuncture of my private affairs, would be to my irreparable inconvenience and damage, and may be to my utter ruin in my fortune, if the remove should be otherwise, than by appointing one or more governors, and that only in my absence.’ The only means left to redeem his estate from the weight of debt that lay upon it was the £50,000 allocated to him under the Act of Explanation, ‘which will hardly be brought in, but by my own presence or the great friendship of the chief governor, and may be utterly lost under the discountenance of any other kind of remove, or by the coldness of a successor’.155 At least the Adventurers (those who had acquired forfeited land in Ireland under the terms of a 1642 Act) had failed to ‘overthrow all that has been a-doing this seven years towards the settlement of this kingdom by petitioning the Parliament for the benefit of the acts of 17 and 18 of the last king, which, they suppose, no acts passed in this kingdom could alter or repeal.’ When their petition was presented to the Commons on 10 Dec. 1667 it ‘was laid aside without question’.156 Ossory had feared that rather than a direct attack on his father, the petition would have been used to initiate a more general discussion of Irish matters.157
Despite Anglesey’s view, following Clarendon’s flight at the end of November 1667, that although ‘whispers go still up and down’ the danger to Ormond had been averted, Ormond was increasingly inclined to protect his position by a visit to England.158 To do so he needed to ensure that Ossory was in Ireland ready to act as his deputy. And he had to be careful of the timing, for, as Arlington made clear, a visit while proceedings against Clarendon were in progress would be interpreted much to Ormond’s prejudice.159 By 11 Jan. 1668, Arlington had obtained the king’s consent for Ormond’s return.160 Ormond probably did not intend to attend the Lords until after the proceedings against Clarendon had been completed.161 With this in mind Conway suggested on 14 Jan. that he leave his proxy with Arlington, ‘for I know not whether your danger will come this way or some other, though I am confident the affairs of Ireland will be brought into Parliament this session, at least I have been told so, by the considerable men of both Houses.’162 Two further concerns inclined Ormond to a visit: financial insecurity and his need to ensure his retention of the lord steward’s staff.163
With Parliament due to resume on 6 Feb. 1668, on 25 Jan. Ossory reported that Ormond’s position was still under threat because the king was under pressure to comply with the undertakers in Parliament, ‘who being creatures of the duke of Buckingham are consequently unfriendly to you’. Not that Ormond lacked for influential supporters: on 1 Feb., when Ossory told him about the report to the Privy Council of the committee examining into Irish affairs, he went on to extol the efforts of York ‘who took occasion to speak of you in the most favourable terms that could be when the Irish business was under consideration’. On 17 Feb. Ormond was again excused from attending the Lords. On the following day Ossory reported that Buckingham and his party continued ‘in their malice and intentions of accusing you’, although some of the charges they had concocted ‘for executing mutineers, and for permitting popery’, were ‘so evidently frivolous’ that they would be left out, ‘lest they should discountenance other charges’.164 Ormond was aware that Buckingham’s ascendancy made it difficult for him to visit England in complete comfort because of his refusal to concur in the latter’s ‘expedients to gratify the worst part of the Parliament, at the irreparable charge of the crown and the Church.’ Either Buckingham ‘and his undertakers will succeed, or fail: if the first, I am well pleased to have no part in the honour; if the last, his and their credit with the king and the world will soon vanish’, which it should do given ‘all the indulgences (to say no worse) offered as the price of a supply’.165
At the end of February 1668 Edward Cooke reported on a ‘confederacy offensive and defensive’ concluded between Buckingham and Albemarle, to whom Ormond was ‘a kind of a common enemy’. Ormond’s position had been so undermined that at the end of February 1668, Ruvigny reported, that his erstwhile ally, Arlington, had attempted ‘to regain’ Buckingham by offering either ‘the office of viceroy of Ireland or that of grand master, both of which are the duke of Ormond’s’.166 On 7 Mar. Arlington referred to an ‘indiscreet and unreasonable’ reflection, thrown upon Ormond by Sir Charles Wheeler‡ in the Commons, effectively suggesting that Ormond’s £50,000 be used for the public.167 Another petition from the Adventurers, which had been expected as early as 12 Feb., was presented on 14 Mar. but although there were proceedings during April and May, they failed to reach a conclusion.168
Conversely, Ormond saw the attack of Edward Brabazon, 2nd earl of Meath [I], as opportune because it had alerted his friends to his arguments against him.169 Meath had arrived in London with complaints he wished to present to the king, but Buckingham had declined to countenance him.170 At the end of April 1668 Ruvigny still thought that Ormond would be attacked ‘there being much evidence against him … it being a question of 300,000 pounds sterling which he costs the king his master every year, which are to his profit and to that of several individuals.’ However, he continued, Arlington was endeavouring to keep the matter out of Parliament, and it was one reason why he was pressing for an adjournment.171
Consultations with Ossory upon his return to Ireland seemed to leave Ormond uncertain, but by 12 Mar. 1668 he was edging towards a decision to visit England.172 He arrived in London on 6 May, in time to attend the last three days of the session.173 In this he may have been following Arlington’s advice to delay his arrival because ‘complaints are reviving again very warmly in the House of Commons’.174 He left Ossory as his lord deputy, an indication that he remained in favour with the king.175Orrery was soon reported to be following Ormond over to England ‘between whom there is great [clashing]’.176 At the beginning of May 1668, Sir William Penn‡ had told Pepys that if the Parliament continued then Ormond must fall, through the enmity of ‘some great men’ including Orrery, ‘and that this will try the king mightily, he being a firm friend to my lord lieutenant.’177 On 19 May Ormond wrote that ‘if the faction against me should prevail in the Parliament, it is not sure, but it must upon him [the king]’.178
The summer of 1668 saw reports of reconciliation between the various protagonists. In June Theobald Taaffe, earl of Carlingford [I], reported a ‘new-settled friendship’ between Ormond and Buckingham.179 That same month, George Morley, bishop of Winchester, was the main means by which Ormond attempted to secure a reconciliation with Burlington, upset at perceived snubs from Ormond over the non-payment of his salary as lord treasurer, omission from a commission to inspect the Irish accounts and ignoring him when a long-promised troop of horse became available, which was effected early in July.180 In June Ormond attended ‘a private council’, held at the home of the lord keeper, Sir Orlando Bridgeman‡, where it was resolved to call an Irish Parliament as soon as the commissioners had finished their work on the Irish land settlement.181 Nor did he neglect his defence; a paper was drawn up on 18 June, entitled ‘A Memoir on the Services, and on the Losses, of James, Duke of Ormond as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland’, specifically referencing the articles against him ‘sent out of England’.182
Ormond was also weighing up the reliability of Arlington as an ally, ‘whenever my Lord Buckingham and I should come to declared enmity’. At the end of June 1668 he had concluded that Arlington would endeavour to prevent an attack from Buckingham, or failing that he would give reasonable notice of it and would assist with all the interest he had in Ormond’s defence.183 Another potential source of conflict with Buckingham arose at the beginning of July 1668, when the countess of Arran died with her portion of £5,000 still unpaid. Ormond was sufficiently affected by her death to retire to Moor Park.184
Ormond was still under threat, for as was said in July 1668 ‘Orrery works covertly not openly. My Lord Meath and others prosecute it, but the duke of Buckingham is [Ormond’s] great enemy’.185 Orrery’s greatest asset was his perceived financial acumen, which could be employed, seductively, to suggest that, if properly managed, Irish finances could meet governmental expenditure.186 That same month, while at Moor Park, Ormond received information that Buckingham and Orrery, amongst others, had been appointed to examine ‘the malversations of the government and revenue of Ireland’, a worrying development which he could not bring himself to believe had been sanctioned by the king.187 On reflection, Ormond felt that Anglesey was the intended target of any investigation into the revenue, and that the king intended no prejudice towards himself.188 The commission had resulted from a conference between Buckingham and the lord keeper.189 Buckingham claimed that he had no thoughts of prejudicing Ormond ‘howsoever he takes me not to be his friend, or to have dealt well with him in the marriage of his niece.’190 Nevertheless, on 3 Aug. Ormond announced his intention to remain in England until the spring in order to defend himself from any accusations.191 There followed a struggle over the nomination of Sir Thomas Osborne, the future earl of Danby, to the commission on the Irish revenue, with Ormond objecting to his presence as a ‘great confidant’ of Buckingham, but Osborne’s name was inserted back in the commission by the king when it was opened on 20 August.192 On the positive side, Ruvigny reported at the end of August 1668 that Ormond had received the support of his old enemy, Lauderdale, whom, it seemed, had fallen out with Buckingham over the attack on Ormond.193
Financial concerns still played an important part in Ormond’s calculations. Money was required to keep both him and the duchess in England until the spring. He planned to find it ‘out of rents and entertainments, and if neither of these ways will serve, then by mortgage’, since the ‘vast sums’he was expecting to receive as a result of the land settlement would not obtain credit of even £500.194 Retention of office was essential if he was to secure the money owing to him from the crown. In mid-September Ormond was again concerned to ensure that the new vice treasurer, Sir George Carteret‡, had been instructed to remove a recent prohibition on ordering the payment of that part of £50,000 now due from the crown.195
On 12 Sept. 1668 the duchess reported that Ormond had gone to wait upon the king, while Arlington had gone into the country ‘to put preparations on foot when the court returns to prosecute all the designs that are laid against my lord and the lord of Anglesey; so as a very little time will make a full discovery of what my lord’s enemies are able to do against him.’196 Ormond remained pessimistic: ‘all that can be said of the public is that discontent and despondency were never more high or universal; nor was ever any court fallen into so much contempt, or governed with so little care to redeem itself. ... The meeting of the Parliament is become dreadful to those who taught it to fly upon ministers of state’.197
Buckingham was still hankering after the dismissal of Ormond at the beginning of October 1668, but in this he was opposed by Arlington.198 A possible compromise was mooted when Osborne informed Buckingham of the lord keeper’s view that Ormond should not return as lord lieutenant, but that ‘it might be best for some time at first to send justices into Ireland, whereof he would have my Lord Ossory to be one, for the more easy and fair parting with my Lord Ormond.’199 Ormond interpreted this manoeuvre as a design ‘first to unfasten me and then to lay me totally aside.’200 Attack and counter-attack continued for several months. Arlington’s support became increasingly questionable, for, as the French ambassador Colbert pointed out, ‘whatever desire Milord Arlington may have to save him, he will be obliged to abandon him so as not to break with the duke of Buckingham.’201 For his part Buckingham was convinced that Ormond’s disgrace was the one thing that would demonstrate his credit with the king.202
Meanwhile, Ormond continued to command attention regarding Irish affairs, attending the treasury in August, October and November 1668 concerning proposals for the farm of the Irish revenue.203 On 10 Nov. he attended the further adjournment of Parliament. On 19 Nov. he had a meeting with ‘Mr Treasurer’ and Arlington to discuss the government of Ireland. They again put forward the idea of lords justices with Ormond retaining the lieutenancy, but Ormond countered that in his view this ‘would be understood to proceed from the king’s dissatisfaction with my service, would inevitably bring ruin and disgrace upon me, would be matter of triumph to my enemies and of dejection to my friends’. Indeed, he knew ‘nothing, fit for the king to do in Ireland, that I am not as well able to do, as any he can employ’. Ormond continued that he did not think he could be held responsible for Anglesey’s shortcomings and told Arlington that ‘my removal did not arise from my conduct in Ireland but here’. Arlington told him in reply that Ormond was seen as too close to Buckingham’s real targets, namely York and Sheldon.204 Ormond clung on, and in mid-December 1668 sought reassurance from the king over his position as lord lieutenant, and seemed satisfied by the answer he received.205
Early in February 1669, according to Colbert, Ormond was sufficiently confident of his position to risk speaking ‘to the king very heatedly against the duke of Buckingham; that he [Buckingham] had treated him [Ormond] as a traitor and a rascal, and that this might not happen without blood being spilt’.206 However, on 13 Feb. Ormond received intimation that the king would announce a change in the government of Ireland, and on the next day, at the committee of foreign affairs, the king announced Ormond’s replacement by Robartes.207 In itself this appointment was a defeat for those of his rivals who had attempted to supplant him, especially Orrery.208 Ormond’s subsequent deliberate insults to Orrery and Buckingham led to fears ‘that the affair will end in bloody quarrels’ at court.209
Out of office, out of favour, 1669-73
Ormond was now in a quandary, given his precarious financial position. He had already told Arlington that he could not live in England.210 But before he could contemplate withdrawal, Ormond needed to secure his finances. There remained £48,000 owing to him under the Irish Act of Settlement and the more recent Act of Explanation. Ormond proposed to give up his interest in this sum for a payment of £5,000 p.a. from the exchequer, or secured on a reliable part of the revenue, preferably the Irish quit rents, which was agreed in May 1669.211 Actually getting paid was another matter.
While Ormond negotiated about his personal finances, he continued to engage in public affairs, attending regularly at the committee for foreign affairs, and at the treasury when Irish matters were under discussion, especially the Irish farm.212 On 1 Mar. 1669 Ormond attended the prorogation of Parliament. He retained his suspicions of Buckingham, being ‘confident he not only undervalues but hates the king’s person, and his brother’s; and has designs apart, – if not aimed at the ruin of them both.’213 The duchess returned to Ireland, departing from Beaumaris on 12 May 1669.214 The purpose of her visit was to look into Ormond’s Irish affairs, which would then allow him to make a settlement on Ossory. She returned at the beginning of July. 215 Ormond met her at Oxford, where on 15 July he was made a DCL, as a prelude to being chosen chancellor of the University on 4 Aug. at the recommendation of Sheldon.216
Ormond had also decided to deal with the earl of Meath, whose touting of articles accusing him of various misdeeds had been a thorn in his side for months. On 9 July, Ormond petitioned the king asking that Meath be summoned before the Privy Council to substantiate the allegations he had made against Ormond in his conduct as lord lieutenant. Meath refused to do so for fear of a suit of scandalum magnatum.217 Ormond clearly believed that Buckingham and Orrery were behind Meath’s accusations. He felt vindicated when on Meath’s refusal to bring his charge against him before the Privy Council, he was banished the court and turned out of the Irish Privy Council.218
Ormond expressed uncertainty at the end of July 1669 about the new lord lieutenant’s measures, an important consideration given that he would play a significant role in any investigation of Ormond’s conduct as viceroy. He took it for granted that he would experience continuing enmity from Orrery. He thought that when Parliament met as scheduled in October, difficulties in managing it and continuing disputes between the Houses would force a dissolution. Such things, he wrote, were ‘doubtless’ the subject of ‘frequent consultations held at my Lord of Orrery’s’, where Buckingham, Osborne and John Wilkins, bishop of Chester ‘make their cabal.’219 Ormond was present on the opening day of the session on 19 Oct. 1669 and attended on every subsequent day (36 in all). Also on 19 Oct., he was deputed by the House (with Arlington) to give the thanks to the king for his speech. He was named to five committees during the session. It seems likely that the proxy given to Ormond by Henry Jermyn, earl of St Albans, filed amongst those granted in 1667, but with a smudged date, belongs to 1669, when Ormond was present in the House and St Albans absent. On 21 Oct. John Ellis‡, who would later be Ormond’s secretary, rather optimistically considered that Ormond’s reputation ‘increases so much amongst the Commons that the torrent begins to turn, or at least, to lose much of its violence.’220 On 4 Nov. Ormond was one of three peers named to attend the king to discover when he would receive their thanks for his proclamation against conventicles. On 15 Nov. he reported that the committee for privileges could not proceed any further in preparing a bill concerning privilege and judicature in Parliament until the House had decided whether there should be a clause inserted relating to the trial of peers, which they resolved in the affirmative. Ormond introduced the bill on the following day.
On 20 Nov. 1669 it was reported that ‘there is talk of an impeachment coming in’ against Ormond, and ‘some say another against the earl of Orrery. Things begin to grow high.’221 According to Colbert on 25 Nov. ‘the friends of the duke will not spare Milord Orrery, or even the duke of Buckingham.’222 The Church and cavalier party were determined to ‘adhere to the duke of Ormond against all opposition’, and to prosecute Orrery as an enemy to their principles. A motion for Orrery’s impeachment passed the Commons on 25 November.223 On 2 Dec. Colbert reported that Orrery had been reprieved by the Commons by two votes (the king not being happy at his prosecution) and that the king had made Buckingham and Orrery ‘give him their word that they would not take any proceedings, direct or indirect, against the duke of Ormond’.224 No impeachment was brought in against Ormond, and the committee of grievances of the House of Commons refused to receive a petition from Meath.225
According to Edward Montagu, earl of Sandwich, on 10 Dec. 1669, at a late night meeting ‘of the king and junto’, Ormond was one of those, along with York, Arlington and Prince Rupert*, duke of Cumberland, who carried a vote for the prorogation of Parliament. At this date Buckingham was trying, but failing, to prise Arlington away from the Ormond faction, which consisted of ‘the duke of York’s friends, the Church, the old cavaliers, and the Clarendonians.’226 At the end of December 1669 Colbert described the two competing ‘factions’ at court, one led by York, Ormond and Arlington and the other by Buckingham and Orrery.227
Having missed the opening two days of the 1670-1 session, Ormond first sat on 21 Feb. 1670. He attended on 35 days of the session, before its adjournment on 11 Apr. 1670 (87.5 per cent of the total). He was named to ten committees, including a small subcommittee to prepare a clause for the conventicles bill (23 March).228 On three occasions (10, 21, 24 Mar.), Ormond (as steward) was deputed to wait upon the king with messages from the House. He opposed the bill permitting John Manners, then styled Lord Roos, later duke of Rutland, to remarry, signing protests against its passage on 17 and 28 March. On 30 Mar., 2 and 5 Apr. he was named to report conferences with the Commons on the amendments made to the conventicles bill. Towards the end of the session, on 21 Mar. 1670, Sir Robert Southwell‡ thought that at court ‘all regard my Lord of Ormond’s interest as much strengthened and amended’.229 Certainly, during March Ormond continued to attend meetings at the treasury concerned with Irish financial matters, as he did in May and July.230 In July he intervened to recommend Bristol’s son, to Sir Richard Rainsford‡ for the vacant seat at Northampton, ‘his friendship for that family being long and great’.231
Following the sale of Moor Park, Ormond moved his main residence to Clarendon House in late June 1670.232 The lack of a country retreat meant that he led a more peripatetic existence when away from London. It was while on a visit to Gorhambury (seat of Sir Harbottle Grimston‡) on 22 Aug. that he penned a letter to the Irish lord lieutenant, now Lord Berkeley, defending himself from a ‘false information’ which had suggested that Ormond was censorious of his proceedings in Ireland concerning the ‘Remonstrants’ (those supporters of the remonstrance to the pope).233 The next day Ormond was at Ampthill, the seat of Robert Bruce, earl of Ailesbury, en route for Derbyshire. He moved on via the earl of Bedford’s, Northampton and Leicester before arriving at the earl of Chesterfield’s. From there he intended to visit Chatsworth, and by 16 Sept. he was at Hardwick, writing to ask the king whether he wished him to attend the commission into the Irish revenue in London, or the king himself at Newmarket, ‘being prepared for either attendance’.234 On 25 Sept. he wrote from Kimbolton (Manchester’s residence in Huntingdonshire), stating that he was returning to Newmarket, after being absent from court for a month.235 In early October he was at Euston with Arlington and the queen.236
Ormond was in attendance on the opening day of the adjourned session, on 24 Oct. 1670, attending in all on 105 days, 84 per cent of the total. He was missing on 14 Nov. when he was excused attendance following a call of the House, but was present on the following day. His rate of attendance must be considered even more impressive considering that the bulk of his absences were the result of his abduction on 6 Dec. by a gang of men led by Thomas Blood.237 Ormond was able to free himself relatively unharmed, but the assault was the subject of an investigation by a committee of the Lords appointed on 14 Jan. 1671, which reported on 9 Mar., and led to a bill being brought in to convict the perpetrators of the crime unless they surrendered themselves. It was widely thought that either Buckingham or the duchess of Cleveland was behind the attempt.238
The removal of his official responsibility for Ireland freed up more of Ormond’s time for parliamentary duties. He was named to 27 committees during the session. His committee work included chairing on 21 Mar. 1671 the committee investigating the printed version of the notorious speech on supply delivered by John Lucas, Baron Lucas, in February. In the committee on the bill to prevent the growth of popery, on 13 Apr., Ormond was named to a subcommittee to draw up the test and oath according to the debate in the committee, but it appears not to have met. On 14 Apr. he took the chair of two committees for the purposes of their adjournment, on the bill taking account of the money paid to loyal, indigent officers and on the bill preventing the planting of tobacco in England and for regulating the plantation trade.239
On 3 Mar. and again on 10 Mar. 1671 Ormond was appointed to a conference on the petition to the king against the growth of popery. He was then appointed to find out from the king when the two Houses could present their petition and address to him, reporting back on the following day. On 13 Mar. Ormond signified to the House that the bill allowing the guardians of the duke of Norfolk to make leases of Arundel House had been agreed to by the king. He was then nominated a reporter the conferences on the Boston-Trent navigation bill and the bill to prevent merchant ships being delivered up to pirates. On 15 Mar. he entered his dissent against a resolution to suspend the judgment against John Cusack in the case of Cusack v. William Usher, an appeal against a decree in the Irish court of claims, and on the following day he was one of four peers to enter his dissent against the resolution to suspend it for two months. On 27 Mar. Ormond informed the Lords that the king intended a recess of Parliament on 8 Apr. (although the House continued to sit until 22 April). On 17 Apr. he was ordered to ask the king when he would receive the joint address of both Houses for the encouragement of wearing domestic manufactures, reporting back on the 20th, and being deputed on the 22nd to thank the king for his favourable response.
Meanwhile, Ormond was busy in defence of the Irish land settlement, in a manner which eventually impinged upon Parliament. In January 1671 Ormond opposed a petition presented to the Privy Council by Richard Talbot on behalf of the Catholic nobility and gentry against the land settlement, which was referred to a committee including Ormond on 18 January.240 On 1 Feb. attorney general Finch, who was ordered to report on the petition, recommended maintaining the settlement.241 Nevertheless, a new committee was appointed on 4 Feb., which excluded Ormond. On 20 Feb. Colbert reported that Ormond,
who has the greatest interest in this inquiry, and has seen it as being strongly supported by his enemy the duke of Buckingham, has moved all the friends he has in Parliament to attack the whole religion, and by this attack, so agreeable to the people of England, to divert all the harm with which the Irish affair could threaten him. His intrigue has produced a committee in the lower chamber which has proposed the renewal and execution of the most severe penalties against Catholics, and above all against the priests.242
This was a reference to the report, on 17 Feb., of the Commons committee on the growth of popery which contained several resolutions about Ireland. Despite several other committees of council being named to deal with Talbot’s petition, nothing conclusive was proved against Ormond’s management and the affair petered out in 1673, amid renewed pressure from the Commons in support of the existing land settlement.243
Perhaps because of all this activity around the land settlement, Ormond adopted a relatively low profile. He did participate in the usual ceremonial rituals, such as the installation of a new batch of Garter knights in May 1671.244 However, when Dr William Denton was discussing political alignments in mid-September, he added ‘but I hear nothing at all of Ormond.’245 By early October 1672, Ormond had ‘taken J. Speaker’s [Sir John Lenthall’s‡] house at Burford for the health of his lady’ from whence on 2 Dec. he wrote that ‘there has seldom been a conjuncture of affairs whence greater alterations could reasonably be expected.’246 Finances were still a problem and his duchess considered that Ormond ‘must resolve either to betake himself to live in the country here or go into Ireland, for impossible it will be for him to subsist at London.’247
Ormond spent much of February 1673 engaged in correspondence with the representatives of the Stanley family, working towards a marriage between the young William Richard George Stanley, 9th earl of Derby, and Ormond’s granddaughter, Lady Elizabeth Butler.248 Ormond became Derby’s legal guardian on 26 June, and the marriage took place on 10 July.249 This alliance led to fresh complications, for soon Ormond was involved in a dispute over the portion to be paid to John Murray, 2nd earl and future marquess of Atholl [S], husband of Derby’s aunt.
Ormond attended on the opening day of the 1673 session, 4 February. He did not attend between 5 Feb. and 8 Mar. and was excused on 13 Feb. but even so he was present for 22 days of the session, 54 per cent of the total, and was named to six committees. On 8 Mar. Ormond was named to ask the king when the House could wait on him to give thanks for his speech earlier in the day. On 19 Mar. Arthur Capell, earl of Essex, registered his proxy with Ormond. On 24 Mar. Ormond was named to report a conference on the bill against popish recusants. On 26 Mar. he was one of those delegated to ask the king when the committees of the two Houses should wait on him to ask him to wear English manufactures and on the following day he was nominated to attend the king on the matter. On 29 Mar. he was appointed to report two conferences on the bill for the ease of Dissenters. Ormond took the sacrament at St Martin’s on 6 Apr. to qualify under the Test Act.250 In June, Ormond was involved in marriage negotiations for his son, Lord John Butler (the future earl of Gowran [I]).
Return to favour, 1673-7
The weakening of the Cabal saw the return to influence of Ormond. By June 1673 he had returned to the cabinet council.251 According to Ranelagh, this was ‘intended only as a feather in the cap.’252 However, by July a correspondent of William Williamson‡ referred to Ormond’s ‘greatness in the management of affairs’, and Colbert wrote of his reunion with Arlington and admission into ‘la jonte’ (the junto) and the king’s secrets.253 In July Ormond was attending the committee of the council dealing with Irish affairs, and coming into conflict with Anglesey at the full council.254 Ormond appears to have been in a constant battle of wits with Ranelagh over the payment of what was due to him under the Irish land settlements, with Ranelagh questioning further payments in September and again in December 1673.255
Ormond attended the prorogation on 20 Oct. 1673. Around this date, but before the start of the 1673 session on 27 Oct., Ormond, Shaftesbury (as Ashley had become), Arlington and Secretary Henry Coventry‡ advised the king to send York away from the court.256 According to Sir William Temple‡ on 25 Oct. ‘Ormond is in great credit with all parties and firmly principled for religion and against the war, and so is Prince Rupert, but, for the rest, engaged in no parties.’257 When Parliament resumed Ormond attended on the opening day of the new session, 27 Oct. 1673, and on each of the four days it sat. Also on 27 Oct. Ormond was one of those peers appointed by the House to give the king thanks for his speech. He was named to three committees. On 30 Oct. Colbert explained the attack on Speaker Seymour in the Commons as being promoted by Arlington’s friend Littleton, and by the interests of Shaftesbury and Ormond.258
According to Colbert, on 10 Nov. 1673, Ormond, Prince Rupert and ‘all their cabal witnessed by their sad countenance the displeasure they had at the disgrace of their friend’, Shaftesbury, following news of his dismissal from the chancellorship.259 In Ormond’s case this unusual expression of empathy with Shaftesbury may have been due to a belief that his dismissal had been accomplished by French influence.260 Relations between Ormond and the new lord lieutenant of Ireland, Essex, were cordial and in December 1673 Ormond wrote approvingly of Essex’s policy towards the Irish Catholics, although he also felt that Essex should exercise more of an oversight over Irish revenue matters.261
Relations among other ministers were not so good, however, and the decision to let Parliament sit in January 1674 in an attempt to extricate England from the war with the Dutch made the divisions among them even worse. On 6 Jan. 1674 in council Arlington and Ormond opposed the ‘proposition’ the king wanted to make to Parliament on the following day, presumably a reference to allowing a small parliamentary committee to inspect the treaty with France.262 Ormond attended on the opening day of the 1674 session, 7 Jan., when he was named to thank the king for his speech. He attended on all 38 days of the session, being appointed to three committees. Also on 7 Jan., he was variously described as speaking ‘heatedly’ or in ‘plain English’ concerning Buckingham’s dalliance with the countess of Shrewsbury.263 On 8 Jan. he was named to attend the king to find out when the House should attend him with their address for the removal of papists from London. A rumour that he would face impeachment proved to be unfounded.264 On 10 Jan. 1674 Conway informed Essex that Ormond faced impeachment in the Lords, while Arlington would suffer the same fate in the Commons.265 Although an attempt was made to impeach Arlington, albeit without success, no move was made against Ormond. It was testimony to the difficulty of keeping track of the constantly changing factional alliances at court that whilst on 1 Jan. 1674 Ruvigny was confident that Ormond and Arlington had ‘got the duke of York on their side’, by 11 Jan. he was equally confident that York had turned against them. York now believed that they had deceived him into joining against Buckingham, holding out the hope that it would soften Parliament’s view of him, but that instead he would be attacked and not protected.266 On 12 Jan. Ormond was named to attend the king to ask when the Houses should attend him with their petition for a fast. When Buckingham appeared before the Commons on 14 Jan., he named Ormond and Arlington as having procured vast grants from the crown, in Ormond’s case £500,000 ‘which was upon record’.267 On 19 Jan. Ruvigny reported that Arlington’s fate lay in the balance, but that he was being supported by ‘the cabals of the court, of the duke of Ormond, of the Spanish and of the Dutch’.268
On 24 Jan. 1674 Ormond was named to ask the king when the House could wait upon him to give thanks for his speech communicating the letter and articles of the States General for a peace. On 29 Jan. Ormond reported from the committee of the whole on the bill regulating the trial of peers. On 3 Feb. Essex registered his proxy with Ormond. That day Ormond was named to report on the conference on giving advice to the king about a treaty with the States General and was then one of those named to ask the king when he would receive the joint address of the Houses on the matter. On 6 Feb. he was one of the peers named to consider the conditions under which Buckingham and the countess of Shrewsbury were to give £10,000 security to abide by the order of the House that they not converse or cohabit together. On 11 Feb. he was one of the peers deputed to ask the king when the House could attend him with their thanks for his speech that day on the peace. On 16 Feb. Ruvigny reported that Ormond and Arlington preferred to continue Parliament, rather than prorogue it as was favoured by York and Danby.269 On 18 Feb. Ormond reported progress from the committee of the whole considering the security of Ireland. According to Ruvigny the Lords had asked Ormond, amongst other things, to prepare memoranda to explain the state of Ireland, but the committee did not meet again before the sudden prorogation on 24 February. Ruvigny believed the secrecy and surprise with which the prorogation was carried out may have been to prevent the delivery of a report into Arlington’s activities, also supposed to contain accusations of ‘capital things’ against Ormond.270
At the beginning of March 1674 Verney reported that Ormond would be travelling to Ireland to inspect his estates, ‘but not with any public character’.271 Such a report did not prevent rumours that Ormond’s real intention was to replace Essex in Ireland. Some reassurance was offered to Essex by the king but William Harbord‡ nevertheless told Essex that he needed to maintain the animosity between Ranelagh (who was much in the king’s favour) and Ormond; ‘for though Ormond be more a man of honour, yet he is very desirous to my knowledge to go into Essex his place, and did employ Carlingford to [the] duke [of York], for that purpose.’272 Ormond intended to travel to Ireland in about mid-May, but before he went he held three meetings at the treasury with Danby and Lord Keeper Finch.273 By 1 July he had arrived at Kilkenny, where he remained apart from a brief visit to Dublin to wait on Essex, receiving an ‘obliging’ reception.274
Ormond expressed some doubts as to whether his removal into Ireland would actually improve his private affairs, but he also believed that there was no need of him in England, where Ossory could keep a watching brief over his affairs and give him ‘timely notice’ if his presence in England were required.275 He was worried, though, over his retention of the lord stewardship. In November 1674, Lane reported rumours that Buckingham’s friends were taking advantage of the absence from court of both Ormond and Ossory to reconcile him to the king, which would result in Ormond’s replacement by Buckingham as lord steward.276 In January 1675 Ormond was perturbed by the marriage of Philip Herbert, 7th earl of Pembroke, to the sister of the duchess of Portsmouth and the influence it might allow him, given that the Herberts had previously held the lord stewardship. At the same time he was pondering the acquisition of a higher English title, now that Lauderdale had received an English earldom (of Guilford), although he feared that Lauderdale’s power might be able to block it.277
By mid January 1675 Ormond was contemplating a sojourn at Bath for his health, and Lane was encouraging his return to England for the parliamentary session in order to defend himself against Lauderdale’s ‘malice’, and other opponents such as Berkeley of Stratton and Orrery.278 By mid-February he was asking his steward, James Clark, to consult Sir Stephen Fox‡ on keeping the lord steward’s table during a Parliament, but with due economy, as the duchess would be remaining in Ireland.279 On 10 Feb. 1675 Essex was so uncertain about Ormond’s intentions to attend Parliament that he wrote to Secretary Coventry to find out upon whom he should bestow his proxy.280 This may indicate a cooling of relations, but overall Ormond’s relations with Essex were much better than with his predecessors, even if occasionally Essex felt it necessary to express jealous misgivings about Ormond’s financial rewards.281 There were some, though, like Conway, who were trying to undermine the relationship. Conway told Essex that he had told Danby that the way to unite the court behind Danby’s Anglicanism, while sacrificing the Presbyterians and papists, was to remove Ormond and Arlington. Danby had asked him why Essex ‘would not write to him his apprehensions of Ormond, the danger of his interest in Ireland and the insecurity to all by reason of Arran’s regiment, that if he would write to him but one word of it, it should be all removed.’282
Ormond arrived back in London on 12 Apr. 1675, the day before Parliament sat.283 By this date Ormond was perceived as in the opposite camp to Danby. On 13 Apr., in the debate on the Address, two alternative questions were proposed. The motion for thanks to be given to the king for his speech was carried. Ormond and Arlington were apparently for the alternative proposal which would thank the king only for the gracious expressions in his speech rather than the speech itself. They did not sign the ensuing protest but their actions nevertheless caused ‘great wonder that two such officers as they, with two principal white staves, should act at that rate’.284 Ormond was then ordered to attend the king with the vote of thanks. He was named to seven committees during the session. On the 14 Apr. St Albans registered his proxy with Ormond, but it was cancelled a week later. On 29 Apr., Ormond was excused attendance on the Lords. This was one of the few days on which he failed to attend, being present on 39 days of the session (95 per cent of the total). Ormond’s disaffection from Danby was perhaps further reflected in Ruvigny’s report in mid May that Arlington and Ormond had sometimes voted with ‘the quick-tempered cabal in the upper chamber’.285
During June 1675, when the dispute between the House over Sherley v. Fagg was at its height, Ormond was named to report two conferences, both on questions of the Lords judicature: Stoughton v. Arthur Onslow‡ (2 June) and Crispe v. Thomas Dalmahoy‡ (3 June). On 4 June he was one of the peers named to address the king to appoint a new serjeant at arms to attend the Commons, following the Lords’ action in ordering Serjeant Topham into custody. He was then ordered to present the vote of thanks and address to the king to remove the lieutenant of the Tower for refusing to deliver up to the Lords the prisoners sent there by order of the Commons.
Ormond made a somewhat ill informed intervention into Lancashire politics following the death of Sir Gilbert Ireland‡, member for Liverpool in April 1675. He originally recommended a Mr Fleetwood (probably Edward‡), only to backtrack in May once he found out that William Banks‡, another client of the Stanleys, had a much better claim to the seat.286 Ormond was in contact with Derby again over another vacancy at Liverpool, following the death of Banks in early July 1676, particularly over the wisdom of backing the candidature of Thomas Savage, styled Lord Colchester (d.1679) if success seemed doubtful.287
By the summer of 1675, Essex was coming into increasing conflict with Ranelagh over the Irish revenue. Harbord was of the opinion that if Ormond were in London he would do Essex ‘some good and no harm’ on the issue.288 In July Ormond took the opportunity to ask the king to investigate ‘the performance or failure of my Lord of Ranelagh and his partners’ undertaking’, because ‘use was made of that undertaking as of a strong argument to prove that the revenue was ill managed in the time of my government.’289 The possibility of being vindicated delayed Ormond’s return to Ireland after the prorogation. The king finally put an end to this controversy in May 1676, by declaring in council that he was ‘entirely satisfied with the conduct of’ Ormond and Ossory ‘as to the good management of the revenue during their government’.290
On 4 Sept. Ormond wrote to Arlington that his plans to return to Ireland had been changed because his presence was required to secure his £5,000 p.a., which the new farm of the Irish revenue might bring into ‘an inconvenient state of uncertainty.’291 Ormond attended on the opening day of the session, 13 Oct. 1675. He attended on 11 days of the session (52 per cent), and was named to two committees. On 14 Oct. he registered the proxy of his son, Arran, which was cancelled on 15 Nov., when Ormond entered his own proxy with Ossory. On 8 Nov. he was named to the committee to enquire into the publication of A Letter from a Person of Quality to his Friend in the Country. On 10 Nov. he was absent for the first time during the session, but was not listed as absent at the call of the House on that day.
With relations between Ormond and Ranelagh at least patched up by the king in May 1676, there was a concomitant rapprochement between Ormond and Danby.292 The ever suspicious Harbord presumed from this that ‘Ormond is in great hopes of succeeding Essex’. The lord treasurer ‘works upon this fable that way, for he is come into him; and [the] treasurer [Danby] doth desire [the] king to make a good understanding between him, Arlington and Secretary Coventry that so all may join to get money. And there is no manner of care or art wanting to win men to it.’293 However, in the accompanying debate over whether or not to dissolve Parliament, Ormond pressed for a dissolution, only to lose the argument to Danby and his allies.294 Orrery still thought the news of a friendship between Danby and Ormond was ‘but talk’, although the town discourse was that Danby would allow Ormond to be lord lieutenant both to ‘ruin’ him and ‘send him away’ from London. Williamson recorded more than one meeting in June 1676 ‘about the preparations for the Parliament’ involving Ormond, Finch, Danby and Lauderdale.295 Orrery, too, referred to a meeting between Finch, Danby, Ormond, Coventry, and Humphrey Henchman, bishop of London, which ‘is like to come to nothing’.296
Meanwhile, on 30 June 1676 Ormond found Cornwallis not guilty of murder at his trial by the court of the lord steward.297 By August another crisis was brewing over the Irish revenue, with Sir Henry Capell, the future Baron Capell of Tewkesbury, writing to Ormond of the failure of Ranelagh and his partners to make the specified payments and Essex’s response in letters to the council. Capell thought that Ormond’s ‘counsel and assistance’ to Essex was now important.298 As Anglesey reported to Essex on 8 Aug. 1676, ‘Ormond hath spoken plain English’ against Ranelagh.299 In November, the Irish revenue farmers appear to have resumed payment of Ormond’s money which had been stopped at Michaelmas.300
Ormond attended on all 49 days of the session of 1677-8, before its adjournment on 16 Apr. 1677. Essex registered his proxy with Ormond on 13 Jan. 1677, cancelling it on 3 Dec., and St Albans registered his proxy with Ormond on 10 Feb. 1677, cancelling it on 12 March. On the opening day of the session, 15 Feb., following the debate upon whether Parliament was dissolved, Ormond supported Danby’s suggestion that the House consider how to proceed against those peers that had asserted the dissolution, by moving that his old enemy Buckingham be questioned. On 17 Feb. it was Ormond who moved that Buckingham should be sent to the Tower.301 Over the course of the session, he was named to 30 committees, chairing several, including the last meeting on the bill to augment small vicarages, which he reported on 2 Mar.; the bill for the better payment of church rates and small tithes (2 Mar); the estate bill of Sir Trevor Williams‡ (17 and 20 Mar.), which he reported on 22 Mar.; and the bill for encouraging seamen and ordering watermen on the Thames (28 and 29 Mar.), which he reported on 29 Mar. as not to be proceeded with.302 By the end of February 1677 Ormond wrote to the Irish lord chancellor, Michael Boyle, archbishop of Armagh, ‘it is plainly observable that since the commitment of the Lords and the prosecution of the pamphlets which asserted that this Parliament was dissolved, the nonconformists of all sorts have been disappointed in their expectations, and that a proportionable dejection of spirit has seized them, and we have a very hopeful prospect of a good session in Parliament’.303 Ormond seemed to be maintaining good relations with Essex, for the latter wrote to thank Ormond on 6 Mar. 1677 for ‘the good character which his grace has been pleased to give to the writer, upon occasion of the debates relating to the affairs of Ireland,’ referring to events which took place in council in February.304
On 1 Mar. 1677 Ormond confirmed to the House details of the account given by Danby of the interrogation by the king of Dr Nicholas Carey concerning the publication of The Grand Question concerning the Prorogation of this Parliament. Ormond was lobbied by Justin McCarty to secure an exemption from the bill for recalling troops from French service, which subsequently was lost in the Lords.305 On 12 Mar. Ormond was named to draw up reasons to be offered at a conference on the address sent up by the Commons on the need to preserve the Spanish Netherlands, and was then named as a manager of the conference on the 13th and 15th, the second of which he reported back to the House. The upshot of this conference was a joint address to the king, Ormond being one of those appointed to attend the king on the matter. On 20 Mar. his report from the committee for privileges resulted in a resolution that ‘noblewomen and widows of peers ought to enjoy the privilege of Parliament’. Also on the 20th he was named to mediate between the parties in the dispute between the Howards and Henry Pierrepont, marquess of Dorchester.306 On 3 Apr. he was named to a conference on the bill for the naturalization of the king’s subjects born abroad during the late ‘troubles’. Also on 3 Apr. he was named to mediate between Lady Leigh and her husband, Thomas Leigh, 2nd Baron Leigh. During April he was named to the several conferences on the Lords’ amendments to the supply bill for building 30 men-of-war. The last of these took place on the 16th, when Charles Hatton recorded that ‘Ormond was a manager but spoke not.’307 The Lords did not insist upon their amendments but appointed a committee, which included Ormond, to draw up an address to the king explaining that this was due to their ‘duty and fidelity’ to him, and that, for his service, they had ‘laid aside for this time so great a right’. On 14 Apr. he was one of the peers appointed to mediate in the dispute between John Manners*, 8th earl of Rutland and Sir Scrope Howe‡, in the hope of producing a settlement before the House considered the case.
Lord Lieutenant of Ireland 1677-85
Sir Cyril Wyche‡ informed Essex in March 1677 that the two parties contending to replace him in Ireland had cancelled each other out: ‘Ormond labours hard for himself, but is hindered by Ranelagh’, who in turn favoured Monmouth, with Conway as his deputy. Danby and the duchess of Portsmouth were also against Ormond, although others thought that ‘the services of Ormond this session to treasurer and party must be rewarded with that government’, especially because he was ‘now very well with’ the duke of York. Ormond was, though, victorious in the battle to succeed Essex. He attempted to smooth things over with his predecessor, writing to him on 20 Apr. 1677 that ‘there has been so much contrivance during the time of your government to do me ill offices with your excellency that I cannot doubt but on your leaving it and my succeeding at least the same art will be continued.’308 A conciliatory Ormond also accepted the king’s attempts to reconcile him with Ranelagh, thinking himself ‘sufficiently vindicated against his papers and orations,’ and expecting that the lord chancellor and lord treasurer would examine the accounts so that they could be eventually closed.309 Despite his apparent triumph, Essex’s brother seems to have continued to believe that Ormond might be thwarted in his quest for the lieutenancy, particularly because Danby and Ormond had come into conflict over claims that the lord treasurer had set the farm of the excise at too low a rate, at £30,000 p.a. Both York and the king both encouraged the reconciliation during May.310 Claims that it was successful and that ‘all are friends’ proved to be an exaggeration, for on 21 Aug. Ranelagh acknowledged that ‘though my lord of Ormond and I parted with great professions, yet I have more than a little reason to conclude he will lose no opportunity to destroy me’.311
Ormond attended on all of the five days on which the House sat between 21 and 28 May 1677. On the 29th, the day following the adjournment of the House to the middle of July, James Cecil*, 3rd earl of Salisbury asked for Ormond’s advice and assistance in procuring his release from the Tower, which was effected shortly afterwards.312 Despite announcing his intention to leave London on 5 July, Ormond was still in London on the 16th when he attended the further adjournment of Parliament, following which it was reported that he would ‘very suddenly begin his journey for Ireland’.313 One of the reasons for the delay was undoubtedly the vexed question of the Irish revenue, with Ormond attending the treasury on four occasions in July 1677.314
At about this date Shaftesbury classed Ormond as thrice vile; despite this indication of his firm value to the court in Parliament, and although in December 1677 Danby had asked the king if he would command him to attend the ensuing session on 15 Jan. 1678, Charles II thought that he would be more useful in Ireland.315 Thus, on 16 Feb., Ormond was excused attendance on the Lords, having sent in his proxy to Essex. He kept a close eye on manoeuvring in London, noting in February of Buckingham’s return to favour that ‘I shall attend the consequences, until they show themselves, with as little disturbance as any man on either side of the water, though I have had the fortune, good or bad, not to be in his grace’s favour’.316 More practically, also in February 1678, Ormond was corresponding with Danby on English complaints about the export of Irish wool.317 At the end of March, Ormond was still intent on building bridges with Danby, in case of further inquiries into his management of Ireland:
In such a conjuncture I am not ignorant how useful and obliging your interposition may be to prevent early and disadvantageous impressions, that they take no place till a fair disinquisition of the matter shall be allowed, that then it may appear whether private interest or discontent, or the king’s service is the true ground of information.318
Ormond’s political philosophy was summed up in April 1678 by his comment to Southwell that he ‘does not ridiculously affect to swim against a strong tide; neither does he give himself to be carried away with it. If fixed principles fail him now; better that, than departure from them.’319
The summer of 1678 saw some preparations for a Parliament in Ireland, especially a bill of confirmation for the Irish land settlement. Ormond regarded this as essential, although he expected it to be attacked by those interests adversely affected by it.320 However, Ormond was ‘so far from thinking myself concerned in the defence of every part of it that I really profess that I do not understand it, but did and do rely so far upon the honesty and ability of the king’s learned counsel and judges – all Protestants, and I think all concerned in some new interest – that I do not believe they would draw a bill for the destruction of it.’321 In December, Ormond was critical of Orrery, who had repeatedly complained that the bill for confirmation of estates favoured the Irish. Orrery had not endeavoured directly and openly to amend the bill, but had sent his objections to members of the Commons in England, with the intention of increasing the apprehensions of the English and to create distrust of Ormond.322
During the second half of 1678 enquiries were made, via Ormond’s sons, Arran and Ossory, about his willingness to part with the lord stewardship. Ossory suspected the intended beneficiary was probably the king’s illegitimate son (and Danby’s son-in-law) Charles Fitzcharles, earl of Plymouth.323 Then in January 1679 the king broached the same subject, forcing Ormond to point out that his removal would be taken as a mark of the king’s displeasure which he could ‘very ill support and very hardly dissemble.’324
Ormond was much exercised by the problem of security during the Popish Plot, but was keen not to overreact and thus create the disturbance he was trying to avoid. He spent much time reassuring the English in Ireland that they were not in danger.325 By early November 1678 Southwell thought that the situation in England merited Ormond’s presence, ‘not only to play his own game, but that of the king who very probably will ere long be in some puzzle and distraction who to trust’. On 30 Nov. Southwell reported that both he and the earl of Longford [I] (as Aungier had become), had shown in the Commons Ormond’s ‘late proclamation for purging out revolters from the army of Ireland, and for removing of fairs and markets from towns believed to be in dangerous condition’, which, he wrote, ‘give great satisfaction.’ He also suggested drawing up an account of what had been done in Ireland under Ormond’s administration in order to contrast the state of the kingdom, especially in matters ecclesiastical, with what it was during the administrations of Robartes and Berkeley.326 On one of the major issues of the session, that of removing Catholic peers from the Lords, Ormond later (1683) wrote that had he been in England he would have opposed the measure on grounds of conscience, because opinion ought not to be the cause of taking away a man’s birthright and because it is not for the House of Lords to show the way of turning one another out by a majority of votes.327
With a new Parliament due to be elected in England, Ormond no longer saw the time as propitious for calling a new Parliament in Ireland.328 Instead of worrying about Irish legislation, Ormond now had some electioneering to consider. He supported the candidacy of the solicitor general, Heneage Finch, later Baron Guernsey and earl of Aylesford, for Oxford University.329 On 1 Mar. Ormond gave his optimistic assessment of the election and forthcoming Parliament: ‘the elections are not so bad as we feared, nor so good as some hoped. I think monarchy will not be struck at the root, but I fear it will be very close lopped. I am in hope the duke has found his error and will return to our Church. He has admitted the conversation of some of our bishops, as it is said upon that point, and I believe so, for I know not what other business he could have with them.’330
Not surprisingly, given the furore over Catholic influence at court, Ormond was concerned about being labelled pro-Catholic. He was particularly worried about the inference drawn from his taking Catholics into his closet, which he claimed was the common policy of all chief governors and essential ‘if they hope to [obtain] good intelligence or to keep that people from uniting themselves generally against our government and religion’.331
The new English Parliament assembled on 6 March 1679, and by the end of the month Ormond certainly felt he had much to complain about, particularly the manner in which all his measures for the security of the crown and the Protestant interest had been misconstrued.332 Early in the session Strafford, ‘set on by my Lord Halifax’ [George Savile*, Viscount (later marquess of) Halifax], spoke of his fears for the safety of Ireland to the committee examining into the Plot, leading Shaftesbury to speak gravely of his own misgivings of the management of affairs there. Strafford had previously, towards the end of the Cavalier Parliament, accused Ormond of minding nothing but ‘playing at cards, dancing and revelling,’ and spoken of the insolence of the Catholic clergy, causing Ormond to worry that ‘an ill impression might be left with the Lords of me in a particular very subject to misconstruction, especially of one in my condition and station’.333 On 25 Mar. Shaftesbury made a widely-reported speech in the Lords, generally interpreted as in part an attack on the present government in Ireland and its perceived favour to Catholics. Ossory reported that there were suspicions of Ormond because many thought that he owed his place to York, and that he had been seen in conversation with Henry Arundell, Baron Arundell of Wardour, one of the accused Catholic peers, although Ossory felt that Ormond’s past service ought to shield him from attack on that score.334 At the end of the month Ormond responded that Shaftesbury did not like the management of Ireland, and probably never would while he remained in the government. ‘He was of the same opinion once before, but for a quite opposite reason. Then I was not Frenchman enough, nor satisfied with the commission set on foot by Colonel Talbot’s negotiation in favour of the Irish Papists and to the ruin of the English Protestant interest in Ireland’. Shaftesbury had been one of the commission, ‘and of all the council I only opposed till the Parliament thought fit to address against it.’ The reference was to Shaftesbury’s support for the proclamation to let Catholics into corporations issued under Berkeley’s lieutenancy in 1672.335
Discussion of Irish affairs in the Lords continued into April, though Shaftesbury denied to Ossory that any of it was aimed at Ormond personally, and rather more towards Col. John Fitzpatrick, Ormond’s brother-in-law. They resulted in an address to the king, agreed on 15 Apr., to instruct the lord lieutenant to take firmer measures against Catholics.336 Towards the end of April 1679 Ossory detected rumours that Ranelagh ‘is getting up articles to present to the ... Commons against you’. Ormond correctly predicted a rehash of the complaints made by Meath and Peter Talbot nearly ten years before.337 Nor was he unduly worried by the rumours , for as he wrote to Coventry, he could not remember a session, from which he was absent, ‘which did not bring hot alarms from his friends of preparations to accuse him.’ However, he did consider coming over to England and leaving Ossory in his place as lord deputy.338
About March-April 1679, Danby noted Ormond’s absence when estimating his voting strength among the Lords. At the beginning of May Ormond seemed willing to dispose of his steward’s place to Charles Powlett, 6th marquess of Winchester (later duke of Bolton), for £10,000, but only if the king approved, and only for ready money, preferably to be deposited in Holland. On 21 May Ormond made an interesting point about his office, which made the sale of it more attractive: if the succession were changed by Parliament, it would require oaths from office-holders to make it effectual. He was, he wrote, ‘somewhat tender in the point of oaths. The matter must be true in my opinion, just in what they bind to, and compatible with other lawful oaths formerly taken by me, or else I shall refuse them, cost me what it will.’ Winchester, however, declined the deal in July.339
In mid-May 1679 Henry Coventry concurred with Ormond’s decision to remain in Ireland: to come over to England now ‘would but precipitate those designs of your enemies by giving them the alarm.’ Whereas before, he suggested, Ormond’s danger lay at court and his strength in the Commons, now the prevailing interest in the lower House lay with men of different principles.340 Following the advice of his friends, on 25 May Ormond wrote to congratulate Shaftesbury on his assumption of the lord presidency, although he left it to his friends to decide whether to deliver the missive.341 He did not receive a reply.342 York, even in exile, remained a supporter, noting in May 1679 that Scotland and Ireland would remain loyal if the king would continue Lauderdale and Ormond in office.343
Over the summer of 1679 Ormond’s friends reminded him of the need to respond to the address of the Lords of 17 Apr. relating to Irish security and warned him that Shaftesbury and others continued to question his governance in Ireland, particularly his failure to nurture the Protestant interest. For Ormond the most difficult issue related to the ‘guardianship of the children of papists, wherein we are bound in £10,000 to see young Aylmer [?Sir Gerald Aylmer of Balrath] educated a Protestant, which has been neglected and the boy is in France, but I will do the best I can to have him suddenly brought over’.344 Now that Essex was a member of the treasury commission, and involved in Irish revenue matters, there was a significant cooling of his relationship with Ormond, though his participation in the attacks on the Irish administration in March and April had already brought some bitterness.345 In late September 1679, Ossory, expecting a meeting of the new Parliament, was anticipating an impeachment against Ormond, but the Parliament elected in August and September did not meet until October 1680.346 There was, however, no let-up in the pressure against Ormond. In April 1680 he was said to be being attacked by Essex and Shaftesbury ‘with an ingenuity equal to that of Sir William Waller, Oates, and Bedloe.’ Bedloe was now in Ireland and Ossory warned against him, although Ormond does not seem to have needed any warnings when it came to dealing with informers.347 When the Irish informers left for England at the end of April 1680, Ormond was confident that much skill would be needed to make anything material out of their narratives and as much indulgence to make them creditable witnesses.348 He was correct to be suspicious of them, for when they reached London, it was reported on 11 May that ‘Shaftesbury hath got great light from these men, for ‘articles’ against my lord lieutenant.’349
Ossory’s death at the end of July 1680 had a profound effect on Ormond, who was ‘extremely afflicted’ by it.350 Many people at court questioned his resolve to continue in office, but there was no consensus about a successor. Lyttelton had heard that ‘the king says he will be firm to him’ but others thought that Ormond could be pushed out by Parliament and that an impeachment was intended on the grounds of his failure to deal with the Plot in Ireland. Ormond’s response was to note that ‘if they had gone further and charged me with conspiring with the Great Turk or Mogul I doubt not but witnesses might be found to prove it, but I can never suspect either the justice or prudence of four or five hundred English gentlemen so much as to be greatly alarmed at it.’351
Ormond was excused attendance on 30 Oct. 1680 and was absent when the bill for Exclusion was defeated on 15 November. On 11 Nov. the informer William Hetherington appeared before the Commons; he did not explicitly link Ormond to the Plot, but rather informed them about the miscarriages of his government. To Arran, the obvious inference was that Hetherington’s testimony was preparing the ground for an address to secure Ormond’s removal. Arran felt the threat was increased by the failure of Exclusion, but others correctly perceived that there were more immediate targets, such as Halifax.352
On 20 Dec. Ormond received a series of articles alleged against his government, mostly relating to his favourable treatment of Catholics, to which he responded by pointing out that his aim in working with Catholic clergy, such as Peter Walsh, had been to ‘work a division amongst the Romish clergy. I believe I had compassed it to the great security of the government and protestants, and against the opposition of the Pope and his creatures and nuncios, if I had not been removed from the government’ in 1669. He noted that such opinions would have cost Walsh his life were he to come under the Pope’s jurisdiction.353 At the beginning of January 1681 Ormond took notice of and vigorously refuted another accusation that he had ‘been seen to receive the sacrament in the Romish way’, at his sister Lady Clancarty’s, which ‘if it get into a narrative, thousands will swallow it as truth’.354 It was with this in mind that Ormond thought that Arran should attend the Parliament in Oxford, for otherwise whatever Shaftesbury said upon the ‘falsest information touching affairs of Ireland, will pass for current truth; and hasty resolves may be made upon it.’355
In February 1681 Ormond ridiculed Anglesey’s remarks on the Memoirs concerning the Wars of Ireland written by James Tuchet*, 3rd earl of Castlehaven [I] (and 13th Baron Audley). He nevertheless set out to refute it, collecting documents and evidence to bolster his case against Anglesey’s interpretation of history.356 On 31 Mar. he noted that what he intended to publish ‘in answer to my Lord Anglesey is here finished; but cannot come forth to be made use of’ unless the session proved to be a long one.357 Ormond noticed with relief the calmness with which the dissolution of the Oxford Parliament had been greeted in the City, and also the hope this gave that the affairs of Ireland, chiefly revenue matters, and especially the settlement of the accounts of Ranelagh and his partners, would be given adequate consideration in London.358 The dissolution led to some immediate release in the tension that surrounded Irish affairs. On 22 Apr. 1681 the king reassured Ormond that the rumours of his recall from Ireland were ‘the pure invention of your enemies and mine.’359 In July Ormond took time out from grappling with the complexities of a new proposal for farming the Irish revenue to remark that the proceedings against Shaftesbury (who had been arrested on 2 July) would have a good effect in Ireland whatever their result in England, but ‘there must be a steady and bold uniformity in all things and towards all persons, in matters of that nature’. But he was aware that Shaftesbury still had his supporters. In October, he was suspicious that the examination and committal of an Irish priest in Dublin ‘was contrived, and timed, for my Lord of Shaftesbury’s service; and that copies of the information were sent over in haste, to come forth in print before his Lordship’s trial.’360 He predicted that Shaftesbury’s acquittal in November ‘will raise the spirits of his faction here, but it shall in no degree lessen my watchfulness over them, or gain them better countenance.’361
In February 1682, Ormond alerted Arran to his plans to spend part of the summer in England. His departure was delayed by the death of his sister, Lady Clancarty, and he did not arrive in London until 10 May, being attended by 27 six-horse coaches, and about 300 horse, having been ‘very splendidly entertained all the way on the road hither from Chester.’362 He was clearly in good standing at court, no doubt as a reflection of the ‘profound quiet’ to be found in Ireland, which Southwell, and probably others, attributed to Ormond’s long experience and deep understanding of Ireland and the Irish.363
Whilst in London Ormond took the opportunity to complain to the Privy Council concerning his continuing dispute with Anglesey over Castlehaven’s memoirs.364 He took some satisfaction from Anglesey’s removal from office in August.365 Another reason for Ormond’s visit to England was the marriage of his grandson, James Butler, then styled Lord Ossory, the future 2nd duke of Ormond, a matter which had been exercising minds as different as Arlington (who favoured a distant cousin, Mrs Bennet), other family members, assorted nobles, and even the king.366 Ormond succinctly summed up his dilemma in providing a bride for his grandson: ‘where there is birth and an unblemished family, there is but little money to be had, £10,000 is the most that can be expected in such cases. Where money is to be had ... neither birth nor alliance is to be expected.367 A match was concluded in July 1682 with the daughter of Laurence Hyde, Viscount Hyde (later earl of Rochester). Its political significance was pointed out by John Hay*, styled Lord Yester (later 2nd marquess of Tweeddale [S]), shortly after the marriage: ‘these interests, by the late match, are joined, and very great, but they will meet with their enemies as well as other people. … My Lord Halifax had his eye upon the government of Ireland, which now, ’tis concluded my Lord Ormond will have as long as he lives, and it may be his heirs after him.’368
Ormond, a talisman of Anglican and royalist orthodoxy, found himself being used to bolster government support. On 22 July 1682, in the midst of the contest for the City launched by Shaftesbury’s supporters, Ormond dined with the lord mayor in order ‘to keep him fixed’.369 On 9 Aug. Ormond attended another political dinner, the ‘Tory feast’ at the Merchant Taylors’ Hall in the City, the apprentices choosing Ormond one of the stewards for the following year.370 On 28 Nov., Ormond dined with York at the Artillery Company at Merchant Taylors’ Hall where he was also chosen a steward.371
Already by the first week in August 1682, Ormond was waiting only for the conclusion of discussions over the new farm of the Irish customs’ duties before going over to Ireland.372 However, he was pressed to remain in England during the winter, and in August the king commanded Ormond’s attendance.373 To an Ormond loyalist such as Longford, the Whigs were ‘vexed to the soul at his grace’s stay in England, because his presence gives reputation to the king’s affairs’.374 The stay also condemned Ormond to a rather peripatetic – and costly – existence. In August, his steward, James Clark, remarked, ‘we have no house yet, nor there is none under £500 for six months. God send us over once again, for this will prove expensive.’375
Although Ormond was willing to believe the king, York and Hyde when they suggested that his reputation, especially with the ‘old loyal party,’ was of use in the present conjuncture, his political antennae had also picked up that ‘there is not so perfect a friendship, and so entire a confidence, betwixt those that govern, as is needed’, and too much jockeying for position between ministers.376 He undertook many social and political tasks during his stay, including acting as godfather to York’s daughter, Charlotte Maria, on 15 Aug. 1682, and as a member of the court of delegates in June which dealt with the long-running case of Bridget Hyde and John Emerton, a matter of some delicacy considering that it involved Danby’s son, Peregrine Osborne, Viscount Dunblane [S], the future 2nd duke of Leeds.377 Ormond voted in favour of Dunblane on 19 Oct. 1682, when the vote was tied, and again on 20 Apr. 1683 when the dispute was concluded.378
Ormond’s high standing was further emphasized in the autumn of 1682 when it became known that he was to receive an English dukedom, an honour that had long been intended, and that could now be attributed to Hyde’s influence.379 For Ormond, ‘Hyde is the best and honestest minister amongst us’. With a new title, the question of a permanent London residence became more acute. In late November 1682 Ormond posed a series of financial questions to his brother-in-law Mathew concerning the purchase of the house he was renting in St James’s Square; ‘one of the best in London and fit for my quality, and if I should remove into Ireland it is probable I may set it again at no loss.’380 Arran approved of the purchase, considering ‘how ill it would look now you are an English duke to have no house there’, and it was completed in December.381 However, the house inevitably involved extra expense: in May 1683 Ormond had temporarily to move to Hampstead while his house was ‘better fitted’, than Lord St Albans left it.382
A further potential drain on his finances was the projected marriage of his granddaughter, Lady Betty Stanhope, which raised the probability that her father, Chesterfield, ‘may expect the payment of the money I owe him, which must be got for him if he do.’383 No marriage took place, and although Ormond was evincing concern about the lack of progress in finding a husband for her in December 1684, in July 1685 Chesterfield was claiming that Ormond or his duchess had turned down several advantageous matches.384
In January 1683, Ormond surveyed the political landscape, criticizing the fact that ‘those the king owns to be his children, their mothers, and their dependents are so many; so over-dignified (being so numerous); and so insatiable’, so that ‘the enemies of the government are gratified and assisted, by those that subsist’ by the government. He also noted that ‘at home… we are now under the three denominations of Tories, Whigs and Trimmers, the first and the last have the patronage of the court’. The language of the last was ‘moderation, unity and peace, in joining with the Whigs in the care of religion and property and with the Tories for monarchy and army and legal prerogative… If we have good luck, we shall be all Tories, if we have bad, we shall not be all Whigs’.385
Anticipating that he would not be allowed to return to Ireland until the question of the charter of the City had been settled, and that a possible sitting of Parliament would certainly detain him in England.,386 by the beginning of February Ormond was feeling the financial strain of his stay in London, perceiving ‘the weight of a divided, numerous family and the necessity that lies upon we alone to support the charge of a chief governor of Ireland and the hospitality incident to a lord steward for which latter I have no sense of allowance.’387 Ormond remained involved in Court politics, Strafford reporting that when Halifax and Rochester (as Hyde had since become) clashed over the latter’s financial management, Ormond ‘sided much as might be expected’ with his grandson’s father-in-law.388 There was also some unfinished business to be attended to concerning allegations made against him apropos the Plot in Ireland, for which Ormond was awarded £10,000 in a case of scandalum magnatum against William Hetherington, who had suborned witnesses to give evidence against several major figures involved.389
By staying in England, Ormond was on hand to witness the fallout from the Rye House Plot. On 3 July he wrote of his employment in taking examinations relating to the Plot, which led him to the conclusion four days later that there seemed to have been two plots, ‘yet those crimes are so near akin and the time of consulting for them both almost the same, and some of the persons in it at both, that nothing but the monstrousness of the ingratitude of such a parricide’ in such as Monmouth, William, styled Lord Russell‡ and Ford Grey, 3rd Baron Grey of Warke (later earl of Tankerville) ‘can leave a doubt but that it was all one entire plot, though consisting of two parts.’ He expressed similar views in December, noting that it was ‘hard to believe’ Russell, Salisbury, Essex and Grey of Warke ‘could have any part in the assassination .... but if they had no inkling of that impious treason, they were very negligent or ill befriended in their own party.’390 The result was to confirm Ormond’s distrust of men of unsound principles. He wrote in July ‘if one who takes the oaths, frequents the Church and receives the sacrament just as far and no further than will serve his secular ends, if this man... shall have his chief conversations with fanatics, shall evidently countenance and protect them or shall talk discontentedly and factiously, he ought not to be continued in office or trust.’ Ormond remained in England over the summer and into the autumn and winter, though he was far from idle, apologizing in November for a tardy reply to a letter, citing ‘feasting in the City and attendance on councils and committees’ as his excuses.391 His absence from his charge offered a new line of attack to his enemies, whom he discerned in December had hit upon a more subtle line of attack by questioning Arran’s competence and then saying that Ormond could not be spared from England, nor was he able to govern Ireland at so great a distance, ‘whence the natural consequence will be that another must be sent’.392In May 1684 Sir Robert Reading pithily delineated Ormond’s dilemma: ‘if he stays here his own fortune suffers, if he goes the whole kingdom will’ adding that ‘upon the whole there is no appearance of his stirring this year.’393
On 15 June 1684 Ormond finally learnt that he was to return to Ireland, and to that end he recalled his grandson from France so that they could take the journey together. At this stage Ormond did not detect his position to be vulnerable, referring on the 26th to his return as ‘by somewhat more than the king’s approbation’.394 The death of his duchess on 21 July may have detained him somewhat but he was in Dublin on 19 August.395 Just as he returned, however, the king was deciding to change the government of Ireland. On 6 Sept. 1684, Ormond’s daughter, Lady Mary Cavendish, informed Arran that Rochester had a promise to succeed Ormond in the Irish lieutenancy, although the king did not confirm this until 19 October.396 When Rochester wrote to Ormond on 23 Oct., he claimed to have tried to hinder the change. Ormond wrote on 3 Nov. thathe hoped to remain in Ireland through the winter and then to hand over to Rochester, especially if Rochester kept the change secret until he began preparations to travel to Ireland.397 On 6 Nov. Arran, having just arrived in London, wrote that the king had informed him of the change in the government of Ireland, and ‘that great reformation is intended both as to civil and military affairs and therefore my Lord Rochester who fears no odium is chosen for that purpose.’398 Ormond’s response was to express disappointment that his suggestions ‘for the king’s service there, and for the lasting security of the Crown’, were to be ignored.399 On 12 Nov. Arran told his father of his resentment at the situation and noted that the king had held out ‘a great while’ against the importunities of York, Rochester and Robert Spencer, 2nd earl of Sunderland. On 20 Nov., however, Ormond wrote that as the king had resolved upon his removal before selecting a successor, this absolved Rochester of all charges of plotting against him.400 This would seem to refute the contention of Thomas Wyndham‡, written to Weymouth on 22 Nov., that ‘the lieutenancy of Ireland hath excited such a feud between my lord of Rochester and the family of Ormond [as was] never to be reconciled,’ at least in so far as it included the duke himself.401 According to Colonel Fitzpatrick, the king was heard to say that Ormond had ‘grown old and peevish; nothing will content him’, to which Ormond replied that he felt no discontent, public or private, until it pleased God to take away his wife, and that ‘grief and peevishness are not the same things, though the one may produce the other’. Other criticisms referred to ‘my age, my sloth, my aversion to Roman Catholics, my negligence in the choice of such as I have recommended to be placed in the king’s service’, in particular John Ellis, the secretary to the Irish revenue commissioners.402
On 3 Dec. 1684 Ormond wrote to Rochester worrying about plans to make an ‘almost total change in all the changeable part’ of the Irish government.403 On 4 Dec. Arran thought it looked ‘odd’, that York ‘should have interest enough to put Lord Rochester into the government, and not have it hinder you from being turned out, if he had pleased. But, by the most prudent conjecture I can make, your countrymen are the cause of your removal and they govern much now.’404 This alluded to Richard Talbot and his influence with the increasingly assertive York; it was (Arran implied) their determination to intrude Catholics into civil and military office, and to overturn the land settlement, both of which had been opposed by Ormond, that had led to his replacement.405 For good measure Arran added that nobody is ‘so great with my Lord Rochester now as my Lord Ranelagh is, I knew the time when matters were otherwise between them’.406 Ormond remained perplexed by the need to change men and measures in Ireland. On 8 Dec. 1684 he wrote to Rochester that despite having
been so long suffered to mistake what was, or what was not, for the king’s service, or what he thought was, or was not so … I confess I am at this time more confounded in my notions then ever I was, not from the report we have of almost a total change in all the changeable parts of the government of this kingdom, but from what the king himself was pleased to intimate to me to the same purpose; for which alteration … there neither is, nor can be any necessity, or good reason at this time … and therefore … I hope that intention will, at least, again be considered before it be put in execution.’407
Reign of James II 1685-8
Rochester was not appointed as lord lieutenant before Charles II’s death put an end to the prospect of his transfer to Ireland. Ormond proclaimed the succession of James II, though with, as he told Southwell, ‘dismal sadness’ in his heart.408 Shortly afterwards Rochester was promoted to the treasury and a commission issued for two lord justices in Ireland instead.409 Ormond quickly received leave to return to England (18 Feb.), and arrived in London on 31 Mar., being attended into town by ‘above 40 coaches’.410 He kissed the king’s hand on the same day, and the following day was sworn to the Privy Council.411 More importantly, he was continued in office as lord steward.
In a rather ironic tone, Ormond wrote to William Stewart, Viscount Mountjoy [I], in April 1685, that
it is no new thing to me to be calumniated sometimes for a papist, at least a favourer of popery, and at other times for a persecutor of Catholics and the greatest enemy they had. This has alternatively been my lot for above 40 years and yet I thank God I have stood firm to my principles without wavering so much as in my thoughts. It is now the Roman Catholics’ turn to asperse me. Yet I shall not wish to see them persecuted unless they will needs have it persecution not to be in power to persecute others. From that I will do my part to keep them. Let them call or think it what they will, but still with that loyalty and duty I have always shown to my king and master be he what religion and temper it shall please God to make him.412
Ormond was on hand to play a significant role in the coronation on 23 Apr., and as Southwell reported, to bring to fruition plans to marry the widowed Ossory to the eldest daughter of Henry Somerset, duke of Beaufort.413He was present at the opening of James II’s Parliament on 19 May 1685, when he was introduced as duke of Ormond by Charles Seymour*, 6th duke of Somerset, and Christopher Monck*, 2nd duke of Albemarle. He was named to eight committees, including that on the bill enabling his grandson, Ossory, to make a jointure to his future wife, which passed the Lords on 4 June. Perhaps significantly on that day, Ormond registered his proxy with Anglesey, even though he was present on most of the remaining days of the session. The choice of Anglesey was somewhat surprising considering their conflict in 1682, and also Anglesey’s institution on 16 Dec. 1682 of a chancery suit against Ormond, for debt. Moreover, in May 1685 Ormond was considering suing Anglesey in a debt of £800 concerning the education of Sir James Butler, the duke’s natural son, and plans were still afoot in October for Ormond to pursue the matter.414 On 27 June 1685 Ormond reported from the committee of the whole on the bill to encourage the building of ships in England. He attended on 28 days before the adjournment on 2 July (90 per cent of the total), missing only three days. Including the November meeting, his attendance rate was 93 per cent.
On 3 Aug. 1685, Ormond was at Badminton for Ossory’s marriage.415 Badminton was to be one of his favourite residences in his declining years. Following the death of Sir Leoline Jenkins‡ at the beginning of September 1685, Ormond forwarded a letter from Peter Mews, bishop of Winchester, to John Fell, bishop of Oxford, supporting Mews’ recommendation (if Fell approved it) for the vacant seat for the University.416 Ormond was also keen for Chesterfield to play his full part in political affairs, although Chesterfield thought this was primarily because Ormond ‘hath a mind to have his grandchild [Elizabeth Stanhope] in town, is so violent against my retirement that I am confident he would employ all his interest to keep me in an employment that he knows I do extremely desire to be handsomely rid of.’417
When the Parliament reconvened on 9 Nov. 1685, Ormond was on hand to introduce Henry Fitzroy, duke of Grafton, into the House. He attended on each of the 11 days of the session. On 18 Nov. Ormond was ordered to erect a court in Westminster Hall for the trial of Thomas Grey, 2nd earl of Stamford, due on 1 Dec., as he was officiating as lord great chamberlain in the absence of Robert Bertie, 3rd earl of Lindsey. The trial never took place.418 A similar order was issued to him for the trial of Henry Booth, 2nd Baron Delamer (later earl of Warrington).419 Although called to attend this trial, on 14 Jan. 1686 he was noted as absent, almost certainly because his son Arran was on his deathbed.420 On 16 Dec. 1685, Ormond was one of the throng who escorted Henry Hyde, 2nd earl of Clarendon, out of London on his journey to Ireland as the new lord lieutenant.421
Arran’s death almost certainly fuelled rumours at the end of January 1686 that John Sheffield, earl of Mulgrave, would replace Ormond as steward.422 Roger Morrice noted that Ormond had been ‘moved to resign up his place of lord high steward,’ but quickly corrected himself, adding that he ‘is desirous to resign up nothing being in years till he resigns up life altogether.’423 Chesterfield had also picked up Ormond’s momentary wavering, when he wrote on 5 Feb. that ‘in his affliction for his son’, Ormond was ‘going to live at Cornbury.’424 Gilbert Dolben‡ thought it would ‘grieve him’ to part with the white staff, ‘delighting as he does in a court life.’425
When Southwell visited Ormond in March 1686 he reported that Ormond ‘spends his time in exercise or in reading as the weather will allow, and I suppose has little thoughts of any other kind of life.’426 According to Morrice, in November 1686, at the council meeting when James II personally undertook the regulation of English justices of the peace, ‘Ormond and all the Church Tory Lords stood together all the while by the fire.’427 In mid-November 1686 it was reported that Ormond ‘though no favourite has ventured to lay down many reasons to induce the king to continue my Lord Clarendon in his place’ as lord lieutenant of Ireland.428 Clarendon was replaced by the earl of Tyrconnell [I] (as Richard Talbot had become) in January 1687.
That month, Morrice noted that at an election at Charterhouse, the lord chancellor, George Jeffreys, Baron Jeffreys, had attempted to use the king’s recommendation to secure a place for a Catholic, but was out-voted by Danby, supported by Ormond, Halifax and William Sancroft, archbishop of Canterbury: Morrice also reported a similar case under July 1687.429 In February 1687, Sir John Bramston‡ reported that Ormond had been closeted by James II concerning his attitude to the repeal of the Test and penal laws, although he was unable to discover the duke’s response.430 Morrice corroborated this report, suggesting that ‘all his life long he has done as he has been bid’, and that Rochester had influenced him in the matter.431 Carte believed that he did not answer the king in the affirmative, but was indulged because of his long service to the crown.432
Ormond attended the prorogation of Parliament on 15 Feb. 1687. From Cornbury on 12 Mar. Ormond expressed his disappointment that Clarendon would no longer be privy seal, but was pleased that his ‘old friend’ Arundell of Wardour was likely to be his successor.433 In May 1687, Morrice evinced the Presbyterian distrust of Ormond by remarking of the Irish land settlement that rich papists had paid large sums of money to be declared innocent, and that Ormond and Anglesey ‘did greatly enlarge their estates by contracts of that kind.’ Although John Hough*, later bishop of, in turn, Oxford, Coventry and Lichfield and Worcester, had served Ormond as a chaplain for seven years, until 1685, there is no evidence that Ormond played any role in his election as president of Magdalen College, Oxford in April 1687.434
On the crucial issue of the repeal of the Test Act, Ormond was assessed as an opponent of repeal on four lists dating from 1687 and January 1688. This was consistent with what Southwell reported following one of his visits, that although Ormond thought depriving Catholic peers of their seats in the Lords a ‘hardship and injustice’, yet he now felt that the danger of disposing of the Tests was ‘now so visible’ that no man could justify being absent from the Lords if they came into question.435 Morrice remained suspicious, recording at the beginning of November that he had ‘concurred to all intents and purposes, which no man ever made any doubt of that knew him, but it will not keep him in.’436
In December 1687, Lord Yester reported that Ormond was ‘very unwell’ in Dorset.437 He continued to be ill during the winter, and in late March 1688 he had a severe fever.438 He died on 21 July 1688, at Kingston Lacy, ‘in a chair as he was going into his coach to take the air’.439 He had made a short will in April, appointing his grandson executor, and giving ‘a few legacies to some servants, and appointed to be buried with his wife and two sons, and as privately as possible.’440 He was thus conveyed to London and buried on 4 Aug. in Westminster Abbey, Thomas Sprat, bishop of Rochester and dean of Westminster conducting the service.441 His will referred to a power in the settlements made upon his grandson’s marriage to raise £20,000, which he directed to be used for the payment of his debts, as well as his personal estate which was also bequeathed to his grandson. This was a necessary provision given that a list dated 1 May 1689 of ‘the debts due from the late duke of Ormond upon mortgages and bonds’ totalled £86,572 10s. (£39,545 owed in England and £47,027 10s. in Ireland).442 Another estimate of 1690 gave a figure for his debts of over £150,000, set against a gross rental of £24,439 in 1688, which modern research suggests was closer to £18,000.443 As Ormond himself had said in September 1667, his ‘faculty is known to lie another way than that of thrift’.444
Reactions to Ormond’s death were mixed. One correspondent of John Ellis referred ‘the greatest man and best of subjects… who hath had the honour to outdo all the subjects in Europe, by his gallant actions and constant loyalty and integrity to his Prince for above fifty years together.’445 Morrice rather unsympathetically wrote of him as ‘a ready and obsequious tool he had been all his life ready to do whatsoever he was bid, and at last doing whatsoever he was bid would not serve his purpose, for he had done so much to help to bring in arbitrary power and Popery that they needed his service no longer, but thought they could do it themselves without him.’446 More sympathetic accounts referred to Ormond’s loyalty and stoicism. Another contemporary noted that ‘he loved splendour when it could be come at. Yet when crosses rushed upon him and [he] could not prevent it, he bore them with a talent to be admired.’ Others noted that ‘he wanted the small arts of familiarity and caressing which men of many designs could not be without.’447
Ormond has similarly divided historians; their assessments have ranged from regarding him as a ‘mettlesome hero’ to a ‘venal traitor.’448 Ormond himself possessed an acute awareness of his place in history: Arthur Onslow‡ recorded him saying that ‘however ill I may stand at court, I am resolved to lie well in the chronicle.’449 His power and influence came from the sheer size of his acreage, Pepys describing him as ‘the greatest subject of any prince in Christendom, and hath more acres of land than any’. Modern research has estimated his holdings at about 256,000 acres (with the duchess holding an additional 30,000 acres) c.1675.450
There is no doubt that Charles II valued Ormond as an ‘instinctive loyalist’, and that he was willing to put up with a certain amount of administrative inertia, of which Strafford had remarked in 1682: ‘I should have been ashamed not to have done more in four years than a certain person, I am not much obliged to, has done in fourteen’.451 Ormond’s identity was clear, at least to himself: in January 1668 he wrote, ‘I have been strangely mistaken these 40 years and upwards, if I am not by birth, education, religion, and affection, a perfect Englishman. If having a good estate in Ireland change the case, many English are, and more would, become Irish.’ 452 This may explain, too, his less than positive reaction to his client Dryden’s encomium in the preface of his Lives of Plutarch (1683), with at least one contemporary reckoning that he was ‘nettled’ by being made an Irishman.453 More to his taste was Dryden’s portrait of Ormond as Barzillai in Absalom and Achitophel (1681), where his loyalty to the king and his father was extolled with lavish praise.454
In religious matters Ormond was a pragmatist; as he wrote to Southwell in November 1678, ‘I am taught by nature and also by instruction that difference in opinion concerning matters of religion dissolves not the obligations of nature, and in conformity to this principle I own not only that I have done but I will do my relations of that or any other persuasion all the good I can.’455 Ormond’s Catholic Mathew relations were often useful to him, particularly in the management of his estates. Thus, in February 1675 Ormond told Southwell: ‘it is my great grief that my brother Mathew, and many other of my relations, are Papists. I would go far, and do much, to make them other, but in the mean time differences of opinion cannot remove our relation... and I think ought not to abate natural affections.’456 For all his sympathy towards them, many of his most trenchant critics were Catholics, epitomized by Bishop French, who characterized Ormond as ‘a high fig-tree bearing great leaves of vanity and no fruit, sucking up the fat and sap of the earth and starving all the plants around him.’457 Perhaps the last word should be left to Burnet, who described him as ‘a man every way fitted for a court: of a graceful appearance, a lively wit, and a cheerful temper: a man of great expense, decent even in his vices; for he always kept up the form of religion. … He was firm to the protestant religion, and so far firm to the laws, that he always gave good advices: but when bad ones were followed, he was not for complaining too much of them’.458
S.N.H.- 1 Carte, Ormond, i. 7; Dukes of Ormonde ed. Barnard and Fenelon, 61.
- 2 TNA, PROB 11/392.
- 3 CSP Dom. 1664-5, p. 243.
- 4 CSP Dom. 1671-2, p. 419.
- 5 Williamson Letters (Cam. Soc. n.s. viii), 149; CTB, vii. 1253.
- 6 Bodl. Carte 158, p. 216.
- 7 Ibid. 43, f. 320.
- 8 Merchants and Merchandize in Seventeenth-Century Bristol ed. P. McGrath (Bristol Rec. Soc. xix), 157.
- 9 CSP Dom. 1671, p. 224; Add. 36916, f. 224.
- 10 Bodl. Tanner, 43, f. 17.
- 11 Cal. Ancient Recs. of Dublin, iv. 243.
- 12 Preston Guild Rolls 1397-1682 ed. W.A. Abram (Lancs. and Cheshire Rec. Soc.) ix. 180.
- 13 R. Somerville, Duchy of Lancaster Office-Holders, 161-2; Bodl. Carte 40, f. 480.
- 14 Bodl. Carte 40, f. 480; Carte 220, f. 134; CTB, 1685-9, p. 990.
- 15 Bodl. Carte 143, ff. 23-24.
- 16 Bodl. Carte 41, f. 388; Dalton, Irish Army Lists, 1660-85, pp. 4, 149; HMC Ormonde i. 411.
- 17 Dalton, Irish Army Lists, 3, 147; Carte, Ormond, iv. 676, 679.
- 18 Al. Carth. 35, 50.
- 19 CTB, 1681-5, p. 943.
- 20 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 51; Carte 48, ff. 176-7.
- 21 HMC Ormonde, ii. 280.
- 22 Dukes of Ormonde, 63-64.
- 23 Hutton, Restoration, 108; CJ, ix. 30.
- 24 Hutton, 191.
- 25 Bodl. Carte 49, f. 31.
- 26 Clarendon, Life, i. 370; Seaward, Cavalier Parlt. 14.
- 27 Dukes of Ormonde, 5.
- 28 TNA, PRO 31/3/107, p. 92ff.
- 29 Pepys Diary, i. 228-9.
- 30 Dukes of Ormonde, 142.
- 31 Morgan Lib. rulers of Eng. box 9 no. 32.
- 32 Hutton, 135; Bodl. Carte 31, ff. 99, 430, 458.
- 33 M. Schoenfeld, Restored House of Lords, 194; Exact and Impartial Accompt of the … Trial … of nine and twenty Regicides (1660), 7.
- 34 Haley, Shaftesbury, 148.
- 35 TNA, PRO 31/3/108, pp. 1, 3-5; HMC 5th Rep. 157.
- 36 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 6; CCSP, v. 62, 97.
- 37 Kingdomes Intelligencer, 31 Dec. 1660.
- 38 CCSP, v. 78; Bodl. Clarendon 74, f. 109.
- 39 Bodl. Carte 48, ff. 9-10; HP Commons, 1660-90, iii. 657.
- 40 HMC 5th Rep. 159.
- 41 HMC 15th Rep. VII, 166-7.
- 42 CP, x. 151.
- 43 Bodl. Carte 48, ff. 21-22.
- 44 Bodl. Carte 31, passim.
- 45 Ibid. 49, f. 68.
- 46 Carte, Ormond, iv. 112.
- 47 Evelyn Diary, iii. 313.
- 48 CSP Dom. 1661-2, p. 324; Seaward, Cavalier Parlt., 175-6.
- 49 TNA, PRO 31/3/109, pp. 72 ff; Haley, Shaftesbury, 161.
- 50 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 30; Carte 66, ff. 369-371.
- 51 Bodl. Carte 40, f. 660.
- 52 CJ [I], i. 751-2; Bodl. Carte 31, f. 510.
- 53 Bodl. Carte 49, f. 117; Carte 40, f. 702.
- 54 CJ [I], ii. 7-8, 17-18; Irish Statutes, ii. 503.
- 55 CCSP, v. 296.
- 56 Bodl. Carte 44, f. 36.
- 57 L. Arnold, Restoration Land Settlement in Co. Dublin, 47.
- 58 Bodl. Carte 31, f. 526; Arnold, 86.
- 59 HMC Finch, i. 206.
- 60 HMC 15th Rep. VII, 163, 165.
- 61 Bodl. Carte 143, ff. 10-13.
- 62 Burnet, i. 237.
- 63 Bodl. Carte 47, ff. 9-10; Dukes of Ormonde, 116-17, 134.
- 64 Bodl. Carte 143, ff. 17-20, 23-24; Carte 47, ff. 12-16; Carte 221, ff. 15-16.
- 65 Bodl. Carte 32, f. 167; Carte 143, ff. 100-1.
- 66 VCH Herts. ii. 377; Bodl. Carte 33, f. 129; HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 100-2.
- 67 HALS, DE/GH/436-7, 439, 440-1; HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 445.
- 68 CCSP, v. 302-3.
- 69 Bodl. Carte 47, f. 89.
- 70 Ibid. 49, f. 173.
- 71 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 66-67.
- 72 Bodl. Carte 143, ff. 118-19; Carte 221, ff. 42-44, 46.
- 73 Bodl. Carte 37, ff. 375-6; Carte 32, f. 570.
- 74 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 122-4.
- 75 Bodl. Carte 32, ff. 597, 719.
- 76 Ibid. 221, ff. 77-78.
- 77 Ibid. 143, ff. 175-6.
- 78 Ibid. 47, f. 65.
- 79 Ibid. 49, f. 238.
- 80 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 62; J. Ohlmeyer, Civil War and Restoration in the Three Stuart Kingdoms, 269-71.
- 81 Bodl. Carte 143, ff. 246-8.
- 82 Ibid. ff. 249-50.
- 83 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 136-8; Bodl. Carte 47, f. 81.
- 84 Bodl. Carte 143, ff. 269-73.
- 85 Ibid. 51, ff. 95-96.
- 86 Ibid. 143, f. 293.
- 87 Ibid. 46, f. 189.
- 88 Ibid. 33, f. 389.
- 89 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 166.
- 90 HMC 15th Rep. VII, 173.
- 91 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 170-1; Bodl. Tanner, 47, ff. 149-50.
- 92 Carte, Ormond, iv. 203; TNA, PRO 31/3/113, p. 209.
- 93 Bodl. Tanner, 47, ff. 163-4.
- 94 Bodl. Carte 33, f. 627; Carte 49, ff. 354, 370; Carte 35, ff. 285-6.
- 95 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 51; Carte 145, f. 5; Carte 48, ff. 176-7.
- 96 Bodl. Carte 33, f. 510.
- 97 Carte, Ormond, iv. 204.
- 98 Arnold, Restoration Land Settlement, 87-91.
- 99 Carte, Ormond, iv. 211; Arnold, 94-95; Bodl. Carte 33, f. 629.
- 100 Bodl. Carte 145, ff. 162-3.
- 101 Ibid. 220, ff. 181-2.
- 102 PH, xxviii. 437.
- 103 Bodl. Carte 33, f. 731; Carte 145, f. 1.
- 104 CSP Dom. 1664-5, p. 101.
- 105 HMC Hastings, ii. 147.
- 106 Hatton Corresp. 42.
- 107 Bodl. Carte 49, ff. 300-1; Seaward, Cavalier Parlt., 137.
- 108 TNA, PRO 31/3/114, pp. 184 ff. 267, 302.
- 109 TNA, PRO 31/3/115, p. 37.
- 110 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 191.
- 111 Bodl. Carte 128, f. 386; Carte, Ormond, iv. 221; CSP Dom. 1664-5, p. 534; CSP Ire. 1663-65, p. 640.
- 112 Bodl. Carte 48, ff. 366, 370.
- 113 Ibid. 46, f. 209.
- 114 Bodl. Carte 34, ff. 44, 450-1, 454; Carte 49, f. 316.
- 115 Bodl. Carte 51, ff. 121-4.
- 116 Ibid. 46, ff. 279-280; CSP Ire. 1666-9, p. 83.
- 117 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 54.
- 118 Ibid. 35, f. 285-6.
- 119 Ibid. 51, ff. 2, 219-20.
- 120 Ibid. 35, ff. 32-35.
- 121 Ibid. 43, f. 541.
- 122 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 107-11.
- 123 Bodl. Carte 35, f. 126; Clarendon, Life (1857), ii. 332.
- 124 Bodl. Carte 35, f. 126; Carte 47, f. 136.
- 125 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 432.
- 126 Ibid. 51, ff. 18-19, 281.
- 127 Bodl. Carte 46, ff. 385-6; Carte 35, f. 101.
- 128 Bodl. Carte 217, f. 342; Carte 46, f. 402.
- 129 Seaward, Cavalier Parlt., 252-3.
- 130 Bodl. Carte 46, ff. 398, 438-9; Carte 47, f. 138; Carte 35, f. 30.
- 131 Bodl. Carte 51, f. 283.
- 132 Ibid. 45, f. 210.
- 133 Ibid. 48, f. 82.
- 134 Ibid. 47, f. 183.
- 135 Ibid. 221, ff. 109-10.
- 136 Ibid. 48, ff. 217, 463.
- 137 Ibid. 141, ff. 173-4; IHS, xviii. 295-6.
- 138 Bodl. Carte 227, f. 14.
- 139 Ibid. 220, ff. 286-7.
- 140 Bodl. Carte 216, f. 411; Carte 45, f. 232.
- 141 Bodl. Carte 220, ff. 296-8.
- 142 Arnold, Restoration Land Settlement, 120.
- 143 Bodl. Carte 51, ff. 378-9.
- 144 Bodl. Carte 147, f. 7.
- 145 Ibid. 220, f. 292.
- 146 Bodl. Carte 35, f. 764; Carte 243, f. 48.
- 147 Bodl. Carte 217, f. 419.
- 148 Bodl. Carte 68, ff. 635-6; Carte 36, f. 25; Pepys Diary, viii. 518-19.
- 149 Bodl. Carte 220, f. 306.
- 150 James II, i. 435.
- 151 Burnet, i. 488.
- 152 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 147; Carte 243, f. 18.
- 153 Bodl. Carte 51, f. 74.
- 154 Ibid. 49, f. 469.
- 155 Ibid. 147, pp. 28-29.
- 156 Bodl. Carte 51, f. 76; Carte 35, f. 847.
- 157 Bodl. Carte 220, f. 310.
- 158 Ibid. 46, ff. 577-8.
- 159 Bodl. Carte 51, ff. 380, 384; Carte 46, f. 579.
- 160 Bodl. Carte 220, f. 331.
- 161 Ibid. 49, f. 499.
- 162 Ibid. 36, f. 104.
- 163 Ibid. 70, ff. 415-18.
- 164 Ibid. 220, ff. 344-6, 348-9, 354-5.
- 165 Ibid. 48, f. 254.
- 166 TNA, PRO 31/3/118, pp. 75-76.
- 167 Bodl. Carte 46, f. 610; Carte 36, f. 214; Carte, Ormond, iv. 327.
- 168 Add. 36916, f. 66; Bodl. Carte 46, ff. 618-19, 627.
- 169 Bodl. Carte 51, f. 89.
- 170 Ibid. 220, f. 356.
- 171 TNA, PRO 31/3/118, pp. 119-20.
- 172 Bodl. Carte 49, f. 537.
- 173 Ibid. f. 548; CSP Dom. 1667-8, p. 374; Beckett, Old Cavalier, 97.
- 174 Bodl. Carte 46, ff. 625, 627.
- 175 Ibid. 51, f. 390.
- 176 Add. 36916, f. 100.
- 177 Pepys Diary, ix. 184-5.
- 178 Bodl. Carte 147, p. 75.
- 179 Ibid. 215, f. 489.
- 180 Chatsworth, Cork mss, misc. box, Burlington diary.
- 181 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 266.
- 182 Ibid. 37, ff. 322-31.
- 183 Ibid. 48, f. 268.
- 184 Verney ms mic. M636/22, Denton to Sir R. Verney, 13 July 1668.
- 185 Ibid. Denton to Verney, 25 July 1668.
- 186 IHS, xviii. 298.
- 187 Bodl. Carte 51, f. 427.
- 188 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 278.
- 189 Browning, Danby, i. 63-64; 36, f. 406.
- 190 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 280.
- 191 Ibid. 49, f. 586.
- 192 Verney ms mic. M636/22, Denton to Verney, 26 Aug. 1668; Browning, i. 64.
- 193 TNA, PRO 31/3/119 pp. 86-89, 91-93.
- 194 Bodl. Carte 49, f. 604.
- 195 Bodl. Carte 40, ff. 710, 768; Carte 48, f. 292; Carte 49, f. 614-15.
- 196 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 437.
- 197 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 290.
- 198 TNA, PRO 31/3/120 pp. 10, 11.
- 199 Browning, ii. 21-22.
- 200 Bodl. Carte 48, ff. 295-6.
- 201 TNA, PRO 31/3/120 pp. 24, 28, 57.
- 202 TNA, PRO 31/3/121, pp. 1-2, 9.
- 203 CTB, 1667-8, pp. 419, 423, 465-6, 478, 493.
- 204 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 308.
- 205 Ibid. ff. 311, 315.
- 206 TNA, PRO 31/3/121, p. 41.
- 207 Bodl. Carte 48, f. 331; Add. 36916, f. 126; Pepys, Diary, ix. 446n.
- 208 Bodl. Carte 141, f. 98.
- 209 TNA, PRO 31/3/121, pp. 47-48.
- 210 Bodl. Carte 51, ff. 433-4.
- 211 Bodl. Carte 50, ff. 24, 30; Carte 40, f. 719.
- 212 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 36; CTB, iii. 14-138 passim.
- 213 Bodl. Carte 50, ff. 18-19.
- 214 CSP Dom. 1668-9, pp. 279, 324.
- 215 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 42; CSP Dom. 1668-9, p. 399.
- 216 Carte, Ormond, iv. 361-2; Add. 36916, f. 141; Bodl. Carte 69, f. 160.
- 217 Bodl. Carte 37, f. 129; Mapperton, Sandwich mss Jnl. x. 34.
- 218 Bodl. Carte 37, f. 288; Add. 36916, f. 143.
- 219 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 58.
- 220 CSP Dom. 1668-9, p. 543.
- 221 Add. 36916, f. 153.
- 222 TNA, PRO 31/3/123, pp. 57-58.
- 223 Harris, Sandwich, ii. 317.
- 224 TNA, PRO 31/3/123, pp. 60-61, 63.
- 225 Harris, ii. 316.
- 226 Ibid. 311-17.
- 227 TNA, PRO 31/3/124, pp. 92-3.
- 228 Swatland, House of Lords, 60.
- 229 Add. 38015, ff. 117-8.
- 230 CTB, iii. 379, 385, 422, 429, 487.
- 231 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 110; HP Commons, 1690-1715, i. 340.
- 232 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 445.
- 233 Bodl. Carte 50, ff. 93-94.
- 234 Verney ms mic. M636/22, Denton to Verney, 22 Aug. 1670; HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 305-7; Bodl. Carte 51, f. 439.
- 235 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 113.
- 236 CSP Dom. 1670, p. 468.
- 237 Add. 36916, f. 200.
- 238 Marshall, Intelligence and Espionage in the Reign of Charles II, 190-4.
- 239 PA, HL/PO/CO/1/2, ff. 431, 451; Swatland, 190.
- 240 CSP Dom. 1671, p. 30.
- 241 Arnold, Restoration Land Settlement, 121-2.
- 242 TNA, PRO 31/3/126, p. 27.
- 243 CJ, ix. 276-7; Arnold, 127-8.
- 244 CSP Dom. 1671, p. 284.
- 245 Verney ms mic. M636/24, Denton to Verney, 14 Sept. 1671.
- 246 Ibid. M636/25, J. Cary to Verney, 10 Apr. 1672, Denton to same, 3 Oct. 1672; Bodl. Carte 70, f. 445.
- 247 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 323-4.
- 248 Bodl. Carte 219, ff. 115, 117, 119, 121; Carte 243, ff. 73, 77, 79, 81-82; Carte 38, f. 16.
- 249 Bodl. Carte 38, f. 24.
- 250 HMC Le Fleming, 100-1; Verney ms mic. M636/25, Denton to Verney, 25 Apr. 1673.
- 251 Williamson Letters, 48, 56.
- 252 Bodl. Carte 218, ff. 87-88.
- 253 Williamson Letters, 98-100; TNA, PRO 31/3/128, pp. 102-7.
- 254 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 110-12.
- 255 Bodl. Carte 70, ff. 427, 429-30; Carte 40, f. 770.
- 256 Burnet, ii. 37; Life of James II, i. 631; Haley, Shaftesbury, 337.
- 257 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 130-3.
- 258 TNA, PRO 31/3/129, ff. 59-61.
- 259 Ibid. ff. 70-73.
- 260 Haley, Shaftesbury, 342-3.
- 261 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 150-1.
- 262 TNA, PRO 31/3/130, ff. 21-22, 31-33.
- 263 Ibid. ff. 31-33; Verney ms mic. M636/27, Sir R. to E. Verney, 8 Jan. 1674.
- 264 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 159-61.
- 265 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 159-61.
- 266 TNA, PRO 31/3/130, ff. 34-36.
- 267 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 162-4.
- 268 TNA, PRO 31/3/130, ff. 41-43.
- 269 Ibid. ff. 88-91.
- 270 Ibid. ff. 92-93, 101-5.
- 271 Verney ms mic. M636/27, Sir R. to E. Verney, 5 Mar. 1674.
- 272 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 195-7, 199-200, 219-20.
- 273 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 115; CTB, iv. 242-3.
- 274 Bodl. Carte 219, ff. 131, 150; Carte 72, f. 177.
- 275 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 136; Carte 220, ff. 456-7.
- 276 Bodl. Carte 38, ff. 179, 182.
- 277 Ibid. 47, ff. 253-4.
- 278 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 214; Carte 38, f. 238.
- 279 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 240.
- 280 Essex Letters (1770), 51.
- 281 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 321.
- 282 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 1-3.
- 283 Bodl. Carte 38, f. 284; Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. n.s. xlvii), 318.
- 284 Bulstrode Pprs. 284.
- 285 TNA, PRO 31/3/132, ff. 27-29.
- 286 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 244; HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 366-7.
- 287 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 245.
- 288 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 33-35.
- 289 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iii. 371.
- 290 Longleat, Bath mss, Coventry pprs. 84, f. 27.
- 291 Bodl. Carte 51, f. 441.
- 292 TNA, PRO 31/3/132, ff. 98-100.
- 293 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 49-50.
- 294 Hatton Corresp. 128-9; Haley, 407.
- 295 CSP Dom. 1676-7, p. 480.
- 296 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 58-59.
- 297 HEHL, EL 8419.
- 298 Bodl. Carte 243, f. 254.
- 299 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 71-72.
- 300 CTB, v. 365.
- 301 Add. 27872, ff. 30-32.
- 302 PA, HL/PO/CO/1/3, pp. 145, 163, 165, 181, 184.
- 303 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 20.
- 304 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 108; Carte, Ormond, iv. 529.
- 305 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 21.
- 306 HMC 9th Rep. pt. 2, p. 86.
- 307 Add. 29571, f. 388.
- 308 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 103-4, 119-21, 123, 127.
- 309 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 247.
- 310 Essex Pprs. (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xxiv), 127, 140-1; Add. 75375, ff. 42-43.
- 311 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 27-8; CSP Dom. 1677-8, pp. 202, 315.
- 312 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 27.
- 313 CSP Dom. 1677-8, p. 201; HEHL, Hastings mss HM 30314 (60).
- 314 CTB, v. 462, 464, 467.
- 315 Browning, ii. 62.
- 316 Bodl. Carte 70, f. 462.
- 317 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 116-17, 126-8.
- 318 Eg. 3331, ff. 11-12.
- 319 Bodl. Carte 141, f. 61.
- 320 Ibid. 118, ff. 315, 317.
- 321 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 205.
- 322 Bodl. Carte 70, ff. 529-30.
- 323 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 149-50, 157-8, 162, 225.
- 324 HMC 14th Rep. IX, 401; Bodl. Carte 118, ff. 335-6.
- 325 Bodl. Carte 70, ff. 474-5, 513.
- 326 Ibid. 38, ff. 653, 662-3.
- 327 Ibid. 219, ff. 498-9.
- 328 Bodl. Carte 118, f. 178; Carte 146, f. 153.
- 329 Bodl. Carte 39, f. 5; HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 310-11, 325.
- 330 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 340.
- 331 Bodl. Eng. Hist. c 37, ff. 103-4.
- 332 Bodl. Carte 141, ff. 103-4.
- 333 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 318, 353, 366.
- 334 Ibid. v. 1.
- 335 Ibid. v. 13-15, 60-61.
- 336 HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 21, 22.
- 337 Ibid. v. 70-71, 83.
- 338 Ibid. 118, f. 196.
- 339 HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 78-79, 109, 152.
- 340 Ibid. 105-6.
- 341 Bodl. Carte 118, ff. 198-9; Carte 70, f. 487.
- 342 Bodl. Carte 70, f. 495.
- 343 HMC Dartmouth, i, 34.
- 344 HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 526-7; n.s. v. 183-4, 190-1.
- 345 Bodl. Carte 146, ff. 209-11; HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 21, 22.
- 346 HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 212-3.
- 347 Bodl. Carte 243, f. 460; Carte 146, f. 265.
- 348 HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 312-13.
- 349 Bodl. Carte 243, ff. 473-4.
- 350 Ibid. 232, ff. 66-67; Add. 28053, f. 188.
- 351 Hatton Corresp. 236-7; CSP Dom. 1680-1, p. 49; HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 439-40, 471.
- 352 HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 486.
- 353 CSP Dom. 1680-1, p. 98; Bodl. Carte 141, ff. 119-21; Carte 50, f.256; IHS, xxxiv. 18-20.
- 354 Bodl. Carte 141, ff. 122-3.
- 355 Ibid. 219, ff. 190-1.
- 356 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 224; Carte 70, ff. 550-1; Carte 39, f. 408; J. Perceval Maxwell, ‘The Anglesey-Ormond-Castlehaven Dispute’, in Taking Sides (2003), 213-30; HJ xlix, 681-3.
- 357 Bodl. Carte 39, f. 408; Carte 219, f. 330.
- 358 Bodl. Carte 219, ff. 226-7.
- 359 Ibid. 118, f. 341.
- 360 Ibid. 219, ff. 260, 304.
- 361 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vi. 248.
- 362 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 321; Bodl. Carte 50, f. 262; Carte 216, f. 41; HMC Ormonde, n.s. vi. 361; HMC Hastings, ii. 392; Luttrell, Brief Relation, i. 182.
- 363 Bodl. Carte 232, ff. 105, 107-8.; HMC Egmont, ii. 111-12.
- 364 Bodl. Carte 50, f. 275; Carte 70, f. 554; Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. ii. 322.
- 365 Bodl. Carte 70, ff. 556-7.
- 366 Add. 28875, f. 214; Bodl. Carte 219, f. 323; Carte 216, f. 31; Carte 50, f. 292; HMC Ormonde, n.s. iv. 215; vi. 334-5, 378-9, 405.
- 367 Bodl. Carte 70, f. 552.
- 368 NLS, ms 7009, f. 117.
- 369 Bodl. Carte 216, f. 113.
- 370 Verney ms mic. M636/37, J. Stewkeley to Verney, 10 Aug. 1682; HMC 7th Rep. 356.
- 371 HMC 12th Rep. IX, 88.
- 372 Bodl. Carte 216, f. 131.
- 373 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 359; Carte 216, f. 147.
- 374 Bodl. Carte 216, f. 149.
- 375 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vi. 427.
- 376 Bodl. Carte 70, f. 558.
- 377 Luttrell, Brief Relation, i. 213; Bodl. Tanner, 35, ff. 31-32.
- 378 Eg. 3384, ff. 90, 95.
- 379 Bodl. Carte 216, f. 226; Carte 219, ff. 396-7.
- 380 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vi. 485.
- 381 Ibid. 502; Survey of London, xix. 119.
- 382 Bodl. Carte 219, ff. 458-9.
- 383 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vi. 486.
- 384 Bodl. Carte 220, f. 104; Letters of Chesterfield, 280-3.
- 385 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 416-7.
- 386 Bodl. Carte 68, ff. 314, 322-3.
- 387 Bodl. Carte 232, ff. 9-10.
- 388 Add. 75361, Strafford to Halifax, 24 Feb. 1682[-3].
- 389 HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 581-2; vi. 23, 221; CSP Dom. 1680-1, pp. 554; Bodl. Rawl. Letters 48 no. 9; EHR, xl. 259-60; Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. ii. 366-7; Luttrell, Brief Relation, i. 256-7; NLW, Clenenau, 819.
- 390 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 60, 64-65, 169.
- 391 Ibid. 72-73, 158.
- 392 Bodl. Carte 219, ff. 556-7.
- 393 Bodl. Carte 216, f. 498.
- 394 Bodl. Carte 220, ff. 66-67, 70-71.
- 395 Bodl. ms Eng. lett. c. 53, f. 69; Carte 220, f. 78; NAS GD 406/1/3265; HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 267.
- 396 Bodl. Carte 216, f. 343; Clarendon Corresp. i. 96-97.
- 397 Bodl. Carte 141, ff. 149-52.
- 398 Ibid. 217, f. 51.
- 399 Ibid. 220, ff. 87-88.
- 400 Bodl. Carte 217, ff. 61-3; Carte 220, ff. 89-90.
- 401 Longleat, Bath mss, Thynne pprs. 12, f. 43.
- 402 Bodl. Carte 220, ff. 90, 98-99.
- 403 Ibid. 141, ff. 159-60.
- 404 Ibid. 217, ff. 79-80.
- 405 G. Tapsell, Personal Rule of Charles II, 175-6.
- 406 Bodl. Carte 217, ff. 79-80.
- 407 Add. 27448, f. 295.
- 408 Bodl. Carte 141, f. 169.
- 409 Ibid. 232, f. 275.
- 410 HMC Ormonde, vii. 324; Petty-Southwell Corresp. 137; Verney ms mic. M636/39, Stewkeley to Sir R. Verney, 1 Apr. 1685.
- 411 HMC Egmont, ii. 151.
- 412 Bodl. Carte 220, f. 112.
- 413 Bodl. Carte 217, f. 131; HMC Egmont, ii. 151.
- 414 Bodl. Carte 118, ff. 350-56, 443-63, 466.
- 415 Ibid. 50, f. 361.
- 416 Ibid. 220, f. 125.
- 417 Add. 75361, Chesterfield to [Halifax], 6 Nov. 1685.
- 418 CTB, viii. 434.
- 419 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 392.
- 420 Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. iii. 80.
- 421 HMC 10th Rep. VI, 96-97.
- 422 Add. 70013, f. 317.
- 423 Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. iii. 99, 102.
- 424 Chesterfield Letters, 292.
- 425 Add. 72481, ff. 114-15.
- 426 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 410; Petty-Southwell Corresp. 185.
- 427 Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. iii. 295.
- 428 Verney ms mic. M636/41, C. Gardiner to Sir R. Verney, 17 Nov. 1686.
- 429 Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. iii. 346, iv. 108.
- 430 Bramston Autobiog. 268-9.
- 431 Morrice, Entring Bk. iii. 360, 376.
- 432 Carte, Ormond, iv. 684-5.
- 433 HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 488.
- 434 Magdalen College and the Crown, 43.
- 435 HMC 7th Rep. 757.
- 436 Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. iv. 150.
- 437 NLS, ms 7010, f. 203.
- 438 HMC 7th Rep. 757.
- 439 Beinecke Lib. OSB mss 1, box 2, folder 86, Wynne to Poley, 27 July 1688.
- 440 Ellis Corresp. ii. 90-92.
- 441 Carte, Ormond, iv. 691.
- 442 Add. 28939, f. 67.
- 443 Dukes of Ormonde, 22, 26n.
- 444 Bodl. Carte 219, f. 71.
- 445 Ellis Corresp. ii. 65-66.
- 446 Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. iv. 299.
- 447 Dublin Pub. Lib. Gilbert ms 207, pp. 2, 37.
- 448 Dukes of Ormonde, 1.
- 449 HMC 14th Rep. IX, 462.
- 450 Pepys Diary, ix. 347; Restoration Ire. ed. C. Dennehy, 47-48.
- 451 Barnard, Stuart Courts, 259; Add. 75361, Strafford to Halifax, 12 June 1682.
- 452 Bodl. Carte 70, ff. 415-18.
- 453 Cam. Misc. viii. 3; HJ, xlix. 677-706.
- 454 HJ, xlix. 680-2.
- 455 Dukes of Ormonde, 7-8.
- 456 Bodl. Carte 70, ff. 452-3.
- 457 Dukes of Ormonde, 181.
- 458 Burnet, i. 172-3.