Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 2 Vol 4.djvu/264

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246 DESMOND Having, it is said, been benighted when out hunting, he unfortunately "was obliged to take up his lodgings at the Abbey of Feale," where he saw Katherine, the da. of one of his tenants, William MacCormicke, com- monly called the Monk of Feale, and afterwards married her. Owing to this imprudent match, his friends and tenants abandoned him, and his uncle James thrice expelled him from his estates, and finally obliged him to surrender the Earldom in I4i8.(*) He then "pined away and died" at Rouen or at Paris, and was bur. at Paris, 10 Aug. 1420, in the Church of the Franciscans, or in that of the Dominicans.() VI, 1420. 6. James (fitz Gerald), Earl OF Desmond, uncle of the last Earl, being a yr. s. of Gerald, the 3rd Earl. On 8 Dec. 1388 his father obtained royal lie. to send him to Conor O'Brien of Tho- mond hibernicum to be brought up {nutrienduni).{^) As James, s. of Gerald late Earl of Desmond, he was appointed a justice and guardian of the peace in cos. Waterford, Cork, and Limerick, and in the cross of Kerry, 10 Dec. i42o.('^) By indentures, dated Saturday before the Purification 9 Hen. V [31 Jan. 1 42 1/2], James, Earl of Ormond, appointed him Keeper, Governor, and Supervisor of all the baronies and lordships of Inchiquin and Imokilly, and of the town of Youghal, and Seneschal in all the said baronies and lordships, to hold for life, and to receive therefrom a moiety of all the rents and other profits of the same.C^) Having brought from Munster to Carbury expelled his nephew, despite the opposition of the Viceroy, on account of his marriage, marriage with the native Irish being penal under the Statute of Kilkenny. It seems more likely that this foster-son of O'Brien affected to succeed his brother by tanistry. (^) The Annals of Ulster, vol. iii, p. 60, and the Annals of the Four Masters, vol. iv, p. 804, say that James banished him in 1411, but assign no reason. Lodge states that the Earl made a formal surrender of the Earldom to his uncle James at Callan in 141 8, and that James got the Earldom confirmed to himself and his heirs by Act of Pari, [there is nothing on the subject in the printed Statute Rolls'], Also that James gave to Morice, the Earl's son, "an Earl's son's portion of land," vtT,., the manors of Moyallow, Broghill, and Kilcolman. The existence of this Morice and his descendants (the FitzGeralds of Broghill and others, according to most genealogists) is awkward, as it renders, according to any known doctrine, all the subsequent Earls of Desmond usurpers. More thoughtful writers accordingly bastardize the issue of Earl Thomas. In a statement of claim to Decies (Carew MSS., vol. 610, f. 87), dated 161 2, it is stated "Then cometh James ... to be Earl of Desmond, by unjust disin- heriting of his nephew Thomas . . . which was banished into Normundy, and there died without issue." {^) The King of England being present at his funeral. Henry V may have been at Paris on 10 Aug. 1420, and the legend is so far plausible. {^) Patent Rolls [I.], 12 Ric. II, no. 88; 8 Hen. V, no. 18. C^) He is styled Earl of Desmond in the charter, a copy of which is in Carew MSS., vol. 613, ff. 24V-25V. In an agreement which he made, Tuesday after the Annunciation 9 Hen. V [i Apr. 142 1 ] — not 9 Hen. IV as in the printed Calendar — with Patrick fitz Morice fitz John, Captain of his nation, he is styled Earl of Desmond and Lord of the liberty of Kerry. [Patent Roll [I.], 32-33 Hen. VIII, m. 4 d: Copy in Cotton MSS., Titus, Bii, f. 331).