of Caherelly, diocese of Cashel, who married the eldest daughter of Edward Wight, rector of Meelick, co. Limerick, a member of an old Surrey family. He was born in co. Limerick on 19 Dec. 1789, and received most of his education at home. He was drawn in early life into the religious group formed by Selina Hastings, countess of Huntingdon [q. v.], whose biography he afterwards wrote. His first work was ‘Vital Christianity,’ exhibited in a series of letters on the most important subjects of religion, addressed to young persons; it appeared in 1810; a second edition was published in 1819. This work contains all his hymns, some of which are highly popular. In 1816 Seymour published a memoir of Charlotte Brooke [q. v.], prefixed to an edition of her ‘Reliques of Irish Poetry.’ His ‘Life and Times of Selina, Countess of Huntingdon,’ appeared in 1839. About 1850 he went to reside in Italy, and spent many years in Naples. In 1869 he retired to Bristol, and died there in October 1870. He took a deep interest in hymnology, and assisted Joseph Miller in preparing his ‘Singers and Songs of the Church.’
[Miller's Singers and Songs of the Church, 2nd edit.; Julian's Dict. of Hymnology; Allibone's Dict. of Engl. Lit.; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
SEYMOUR, Lady CATHERINE, Countess of Hertford (1538?–1568), probably born in 1538, was second of three daughters of Henry Grey, duke of Suffolk [q. v.], and his wife, Frances Brandon, her elder sister being Lady Jane Grey [see Dudley, Lady Jane], and her younger Lady Mary Keys [q. v.] She was thus great-granddaughter of Henry VII, and after the execution of her sister Jane stood, according to Henry VIII's will, next in succession to the crown after Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth. Catherine received the same elaborate education as her sister Jane, and shared in her graces and accomplishments. On Whit Sunday, 21 May 1553, she was married to Henry Herbert, afterwards second earl of Pembroke [q. v.], whose father was one of the Duke of Northumberland's chief supporters. The marriage does not seem to have been consummated, and, after the execution of Catherine's sister, Lady Jane Grey, and of her father the Duke of Suffolk, Pembroke found it convenient to dissolve the compromising alliance, and Catherine was divorced. On the accession of Elizabeth she was given a place at court, but her misfortunes were soon renewed by her marriage with Edward Seymour, earl of Hertford [q. v.]
The attachment between her and Seymour had begun during Mary's reign, while Catherine was living under the care of the Duchess of Somerset, and both Catherine and her mother, the Duchess of Suffolk, regarded Seymour with favour (Harl. MS. 6286). At first they hoped to obtain Elizabeth's assent to their marriage through the intervention of the Duchess of Suffolk, but the latter died in December 1559, and, despairing probably of the queen's consent, they were secretly married at the bridegroom's house in Cannon Row, Westminster, in November or December 1560. By an act of 1536, it was treason for a person of royal blood to marry without the sovereign's consent. The arrangements for Lady Catherine's marriage were made with the help of the bridegroom's sister, Lady Jane Seymour, and the ceremony was performed by a priest whose identity was never revealed or discovered. During the following summer the countess's condition laid her open to suspicion, and by August the Duchess of Somerset had heard of her marriage with Hertford. In the same month she was sent to the Tower and questioned on the subject, but refused to confess (Parker Corresp. p. 149). Hertford was summoned from Paris, and joined his wife in the Tower on 5 Sept. On the 24th she gave birth to her eldest son, Edward, lord Beauchamp [see under Seymour, Edward, Earl of Hertford]. The news roused Elizabeth to fury, and henceforth she pursued the unhappy countess with vindictive hostility. A commission was appointed, with Parker at its head, to ‘judge’ of her ‘infamous conversation’ and ‘pretended marriage.’ The earl and the countess were examined separately in the Tower; their evidence agreed on all essential points, but they were unable to produce the priest who performed the ceremony, or any documentary evidence to support their statements, and on 12 May 1562 the commission declared that there had been no marriage (see a minute account of its proceedings in Harl. MS. 6286). According to Dugdale, ‘the validity of this marriage being afterwards tried at common law, the minister who married them being present, and other circumstances agreeing, the jury found it a good marriage;’ but this statement lacks corroboration, though Catherine was generally styled Countess of Hertford (see Bedford, Hereditary Right, p. 197; Luders, Right of Succession to the Crown in the Reign of Elizabeth; Bailey, Succession to the English Crown, 1879, pp. 179–82; Hallam, Const. Hist. i. 127–9, 289–92). Meanwhile the orders to keep the pair separate in the Tower were not strictly carried out, and the birth of a second son, Thomas, on 11 Feb. 1562–3, was followed by further measures of severity against Hertford. In
