8

The Earl of Kildare and the Irish Contingent

In Ireland, as in England, there were different reactions to the emergence of the Dublin King in opposition to Henry VII. Nicholas St Lawrence, Lord Howth seems to have favoured the Tudor monarch. Generally, however, among the Anglo-Irish nobility, opposition to Henry VII appears to have been quite widespread. Hence there was a good deal of support for ‘Edward VI’. In fact the only major Irish family which supported Henry VII was the Butler family, earls of Ormonde. The Butlers had been declared traitors by Edward IV, so they had no great love for the royal house of York.

As Hayden has noted, however, the Irish supporters of the Dublin King ‘were not the real native Hiberni. In the long lists of those implicated in the plot we find but one certainly Celtic name.’ ‘It is to be noted that all the thirty-two names on the Dublin list of those pardoned are Anglo-Irish. On the Kinsale list there are thirty-nine names, of which one “Morys O’Kine” is certainly Celtic, while one “Denis Redyggan” is rather doubtful; the rest are Anglo-Irish. Nothing could more clearly show that Polydore Vergil and Bernard André are quite incorrect in stating that the native Irish supported Simnel.’1

The premier Anglo-Irish peer was Gerald the Great (Gearoid Mór Fitzgerald), eighth Earl of Kildare. An iarla mór (‘the great earl’) was said to be a man of exceptional charisma and impressive charm, although, rather like his friend and patron the Duke of Clarence, he has also been described as hot-tempered and unpredictable as a young man:

Nothing is known of his early life, although Walter Hussey, in the Book of Howth, recalled in the 1540s that he was ‘without great knowledge or learning, but rudely brought up according to the usage of his country’. He was, however, ‘a mightie man of stature, full of honour and courage’, ‘a warrior incomparable’, ‘hardlie able to rule himself when he were moved to anger’, but quickly appeased. … [although he was at home in the English language,] Kildare spoke and wrote in Gaelic, as occasion demanded, and his court included a Gaelic entourage, with a judge, physician, poets, and other captains, household servants, and receivers.2

By his second wife (a cousin of Henry VII) the Earl of Kildare later became an ancestor of the late Diana, Princess of Wales and thus also of her sons, the Duke of Cambridge and his younger brother.

In 1477, at the age of about 19, Gerald was appointed Lord Deputy to George, Duke of Clarence in succession to his late father, Thomas, seventh Earl of Kildare, who had been given that post by Clarence’s father, Richard, Duke of York, in 1455. Following the execution of the Duke of Clarence, in February 1477/78, Gerald Fitzgerald was dismissed as Lord Deputy by Edward IV in favour of Lord Grey of Ruthin. However, Lord Grey proved incapable of asserting his authority in Ireland, and in 1479, faced by a rebellion of the Irish nobility, Edward IV found himself forced to restore the Earl of Kildare to his former post. Kildare then remained in office until 1494. Subsequently he was once again reappointed Lord Deputy in 1496, after which he retained the post until his death in September 1513.

Gerald’s links with the house of York were strong. His mother, Jane Fitzgerald (a cousin of his father), was one of the daughters of James Fitzgerald, sixth Earl of Desmond, who had been one of the godfathers of George, Duke of Clarence at his baptism in Dublin in 1449. On his mother’s side his uncle was Thomas, the seventh Earl of Desmond, who was put to death in 1468, reportedly at the instigation of Elizabeth Woodville – just like the Duke of Clarence, ten years later.3 It would therefore have been in no way surprising if, in 1477, faced with the death of his wife and son – at the hands of the hated Elizabeth Woodville, as he apparently believed – the Duke of Clarence should have decided to entrust his surviving elder son and heir, Edward, Earl of Warwick, to the Earl of Kildare. As the nephew of another victim of Elizabeth Woodville, Gerald would have been very well able to understand Clarence’s point of view. Thus there appears to be some evidence for believing that the Earl of Kildare may have received a 2-year-old boy from England into his household as his ward in late March or early April 1477. There is also some indication that the arrival of this little boy may have been preceded by a personal visit of the Duke of Clarence, with the intention of establishing the child’s identity, and requesting Gerald’s assistance in taking care of him.

Following the death of Richard III at Bosworth, and the accession of the unknown stranger as King Henry VII, Gerald was easily able to retain his post in Ireland, where, as yet, the new Tudor dynasty exerted very little control. However, the presence in his household of an English ward, whom he believed to be the true son of the Duke of Clarence would have given him a wonderful opportunity to oppose the new dynasty in a much more vigorous manner, by attempting to displace Henry VII from his newly acquired throne – upon which the new king’s seat was still somewhat insecure. As we shall see, Gerald was obviously in contact both with Clarence’s sister, Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy, in Mechelen, and also with Clarence’s nephew, John, Earl of Lincoln, in England. As a result, the young ward, whose presence in the Kildare household I have posited, was apparently shipped to the Low Countries to pay a visit to Margaret. There Lincoln and Lovell joined the two of them, and the plot to proclaim and crown the Dublin King was set in motion.

During the Dublin King’s brief reign in Ireland, the Earl of Kildare effectively functioned as his Irish regent, or Lord Chancellor (see below). ‘For the invasion of England … Kildare recruited 4000 Gaelic kerne commanded by his brother to reinforce the 2000 German mercenaries supplied by Margaret of Burgundy.’4 However, in June 1487, when the boy-king and his supporters (including Kildare’s younger brother, Thomas) crossed the sea to England, Kildare himself remained safely in Ireland.

There, the earl continued to rule in the name of the Dublin King. Indeed, the one surviving document in the Irish archives issued in the boy-king’s name, and bearing the only surviving impression of his royal seal, is a letter issued by Kildare after the boy had left the country. Incidentally, the fact that Kildare used the great royal seal of ‘Edward VI’ on this letter proves that the seal was not taken to England with the Dublin King and his troops, and then lost at the Battle of Stoke. It remained in Ireland in the hands of the Earl of Kildare. In fact, Kildare retained, and used, the great seal even after ‘Edward VI’ had been defeated. What finally became of the seal matrix, and whether it still exists somewhere in Ireland, is unknown.

Thanks to his commanding position in his homeland, after the Dublin King’s defeat at the Battle of Stoke the Earl of Kildare found himself pardoned by Henry VII, and retained in his post. Curiously, however, he subsequently proved wary of the second Yorkist claimant, generally known as Perkin Warbeck, and did not support the claims of that pretender. For Gerald, it therefore seems possible that the key factor behind his support of the Dublin King may have been the fact that the first pretender had been brought up in the earl’s own household, as his ward, since the age of 2. As a result, he personally seems to have felt no doubts regarding this boy’s authenticity as a royal prince. On the other hand, while many apparently believed that Perkin Warbeck was the younger son of Edward IV, Gerald Fitzgerald had no personal knowledge on that point. What is more, the younger son of Elizabeth Woodville – even if genuine – may have exerted little appeal to his loyalty.

The younger brother of the Earl of Kildare, who commanded the Irish contingent which accompanied the Dublin King to England, was Sir Thomas Fitzgerald of Laccagh. Born in about 1458, Sir Thomas’ base was at Laccagh in County Kildare. He had been appointed Lord Chancellor of Ireland in 1483. Yet, despite his service to Richard III, and the fact that, like much of the Irish nobility, Sir Thomas was known to favour the Yorkist cause, Henry VII (whose control over Ireland was questionable) had little option but to confirm him in this post after the Battle of Bosworth. His subsequent support for the Dublin King led ultimately to Sir Thomas’ death at the Battle of Stoke. Nevertheless, his family subsequently managed to retain its tenure of his estate at Laccagh. Amongst the later descendants of Sir Thomas Fitzgerald was the first Duke of Wellington.

Notes

Abbreviations

  1.  Hayden, ‘Lambert Simnel’, pp. 626, 637.

  2.  ‘Gerald Fitzgerald, eighth Earl of Kildare’, ODNB.

  3.  For a detailed analysis of the execution of the Earl of Desmond, see J. Ashdown-Hill and A. Carson, ‘The Execution of the Earl of Desmond’, Ricardian, 15 (2005), pp. 70–93.

  4.  ‘Gerald Fitzgerald, eighth Earl of Kildare’, ODNB.