The History of Ireland: 17th Century. Bagwell Richard

Century, i. 45. The latter is undated, but must be earlier than Middlesex’s fall in May 1624.

[161] The evidence taken by Falkland is calendared at January 20, 1629. The evidence taken before the special commission is printed in Gilbert’s Confederation and War, i. 187. Particulars as to the lands may be found in Morrin’s Cal. of Patent Rolls, Car. I. pp. 356, 366, 399, 496. Accounts from various points of view are given in Gardiner’s History, viii. 20, in Miss Hickson’s Seventeenth Century, i. 38, and in Carte’s Ormonde, book i. Ussher admitted that the special commission had made more haste than good speed, see his letter of January 22, 1628–9, Works, xv. 421.

[162] Irish Council to the King, calendared at April 28, 1629; the King to the Lords Justices for the Earl of Carlisle, March 29, 1631; Lord Esmond to Dorchester, September 18; Lord Cork to Dorchester, January 1630 (No. 1591). Falkland’s Apology, December 8, 1628, is printed in Gilbert’s Confederation and War, i. 210.

[163] Falkland to Lord Conway, September 3, 1628, enclosing two letters from Captain James Tobin; Captain Tobin’s information given in England, September 29, 1629, and January 13, 1630.

[164] The King to the Lord Deputy and Council, with the first version of the Graces, September 22, 1626. The declaration of the bishops, November 26, 1626, and Ussher’s speech, April 30, 1627, are in Elrington’s ‘Life of Ussher,’ prefixed to his Works, i. 72–88. As to Downham’s sermon, April 22, 1627, see the paper calendared No. 693. Diary of the proceedings of the Great Assembly concerning the maintenance of 5,000 foot and 500 horse, October 14, 1626, to June 26, 1627, No. 713 in Calendar. The new charter of Waterford, May 26, 1626, is in Morrin’s Patent Rolls, Car. I., 169.

[165] Rushworth, i. 514, 622. Report of Commons committee, February 24, 1628–9, in Gardiner’s Constitutional Documents, No. 14. For the billeting of Irish soldiers in England see Court and Times, i. 316, 331. It was reported in London that the Irish Recusants were giving 120,000l. for a ‘kind of public toleration’ with power to erect monasteries, ib. 375.

[166] Captain Bardsey’s note of abuses, 1625, No. 1417 in Russell and Prendergast’s Calendar; proclamation against the monasteries etc., April 1, 1629, with Falkland’s letters of April 5 and May 2; Falkland to Ussher, April 14 and May 15, 1629, in Ussher’s Works, xv. 438, 442; Falkland to Dorchester, April 17 and September 29, 1629; King’s letter of recall, August 10. The Report of the Commissioners for Irish affairs concerning Poynings’ Act is calendared at September 9, 1628, and the story is told in Rushworth, ii. 16–22. It appears from Ware’s Diary, quoted by Gardiner, viii. 18, that the election for Dublin was actually held. The graces in their complete form are in Cox’s Hibernia Anglicana, ii. 45, and in Strafford’s Letters, i. 312.

[167] Star Chamber cases, ed. Gardiner, Camden Society, 1886.

[168] The petition is in Cabala, 221, other documents are in Lady Theresa Lewis’s Friends of Clarendon, i. Appx. B-E. The imprisonment was from January 17 to 27, 1629–30.

[169] Lord Cork’s Diary in Lismore Papers, 1st series, iii. 2. Wilmot to Dorchester, October 22, 1629. The instructions to the Lords Justices are calendared under July, No. 1443.

[170] Lord Cork’s Diary in Lismore Papers, 1st series, iii. 13. Wilmot to Dorchester, January 6, 1630; Cork to same, January, No. 1591, with enclosures; Privy Council to the Lords Justices, January 31, printed in Foxes and Firebrands, ii. 74, 2nd ed., Dublin, 1682; Gilbert’s History of Dublin, i. 242, 300; Cork to Dorchester, March 2, 1630.

[171] Wilmot to Dorchester, February 1, 1631; Lord Cork’s letters of December 8, 1630, and January 12, 1631; Ware’s Diary in Gardiner, viii. 28; Lord Cork’s Diary, November 26, 1632, in Lismore Papers, iii. 167.

[172] Todd’s St. Patrick, vii.; Hill’s Plantation in Ulster, 184; Henrietta Maria to Wentworth, and his answer, October 10, 1638, in Strafford Letters; Lord Cork’s Diary, September 8, 1632 in Lismore Papers, iii. 159; Cæsar Otway’s Sketches, 1827.

      CHAPTER XI

       GOVERNMENT OF WENTWORTH, 1632–1634

       Table of Contents

      Wentworth Lord Deputy, Jan. 1632. His antecedents.

      His rapid promotion.

      Dr. James Welwood, physician-in-ordinary to William III., wrote a short history of the hundred years preceding the Revolution and dedicated it to the King. He gave Strafford full credit as a great orator and greater statesman, and as a zealous opponent of illegal taxation during the first three Parliaments of Charles I., but goes on to say that ‘the Court bought him off, and preferred him to great honours and places, which lost him his former friends, and made the breach irreconcilable.’ That was the orthodox Whig view of the case, which prevailed when the Stuart monarchy had been finally converted into the parliamentary system of Walpole. The Puritans were satisfied to call Strafford an apostate, and the Whigs followed them. But he never really belonged to the popular party, and he sought office from the first, not only from ambition but from a love of efficient government. He became Custos Rotulorum of the West Riding in 1615, when he was only twenty-two, and a member of the Council of the North less than four years afterwards. A year later he was a successful candidate for the representation of Yorkshire, with a Secretary of State as his colleague, no other than Sir George Calvert, who became the Roman Catholic Lord Baltimore. In seeking the support of an influential neighbour at the election held on Christmas Day, 1620, Wentworth said: ‘In London I will carry you to Mr. Secretary, make you known to him, not only procure you many thanks from him, but that you shall hereafter find a readiness and cheerfulness to do you such good offices as shall be in his way hereafter. Lastly, I hope to have your company with me at dinner that day, where you shall be most welcome.’

      His breach with the Puritans.

      Wentworth and Pym.

Early in 1626, when he was only thirty-two, Wentworth applied to be made Lord President of the North in the event of a vacancy which was then expected. He stated that he had no wish to rise except by Buckingham’s means, and that he reposed under the shadow of his favour. He was at that time out of Parliament, the favourite having had him made sheriff of Yorkshire on purpose to exclude him. The death of Buckingham cleared the way for Wentworth, and in a little more than a year after his commission to the Marshalsea for refusing to pay the forced loan, he had found no difficulty in accepting a barony, a viscounty, and the coveted Presidency of the North. His action was really analogous to that of a modern politician who opposes the Government of the day, not with a view to overthrow it, but in order that he himself may be taken inside. Though this kind of thing is never admirable we find no great difficulty in tolerating it, but it was different in the time of Charles I.; men were too much in earnest and the principles at stake were too great. It is, therefore, possible to believe Welwood’s story about