Protestant Exiles from France/Book Second - Chapter 3 - Section VII
Sec. 7.— The Earl of Galway and Irish Presbyterians.
On May 25th, the Marquis of Winchester, eldest son of the Duke of Bolton, was gazetted as a Lord-Justice of Ireland, in conjunction with the Earl of Galway. A third name was added, but it was only a name, as Viscount Villiers never came to Ireland, being constantly employed as an envoy in Holland. A regular cavalcade attended the two Lords-Justices on their departure from London, en route for Chester. Luttrell says: “The Marquis of Winchester, the Earl of Galway, and Lord Chancellor Methuen, were attended out of town by the Earl of Bridgewater, Lord Lucas, &c, with eight coaches and six horses.”
After their arrival in Dublin, it was decided that the Parliament should meet in July. Such an event having become a rarity, the opening proceedings are recorded in stately language in the Journal of the House of Lords:—
“Tuesday, 27 July 1697. — Charles, Lord Marquis of Winchester, and Henry, Earl of Galway, Lords-Justices and General Governors of Ireland, entered the House with the usual ceremonies of grandeur. The Lords-Justices, making their congé to the cloth of state, seated themselves in the chairs under the canopy, all the Lords Spiritual and Temporal standing in their places uncovered. The Lord Chancellor, as Speaker, kneeling, confers with the Lords-Justices, and then ordered the gentleman usher of the black rod to acquaint the Commons that it is the Lords-Justices’ pleasure they should attend them in the House immediately. The Commons enter the House. The Lords-Justices made an excellent speech.”
The union of civil and military administration, which was usually Lord Galway’s lot, now characterised his Irish career. But before recording what he did, I shall occupy the remainder of the section with apologising for what he did not do. Dr Reid expresses just regret that the toleration of the Presbyterians was not embodied in a law at this time, and for a moment he leaves the reader to infer that Lord Galwayway was to blame, in words which on revisal might have been struck out, because inconsistent with all his other testimonies to the uniform integrity, impartiality, and independence of the Lords-Justices in Church matters.
As a viceroy, the Earl of Galway had to govern through the Parliament, before whom this measure had already been. And what had been the result? Notwithstanding King William’s known desires, and the late Lord-Lieutenant, Lord Capel’s, expressed wishes, the Irish House of Lords, under the influence and with the votes of the twenty-one bishops, had thrown out a bill for the legal toleration of Protestant Dissenters. Thereafter, Lord Galway being known as a friend of toleration, and it being expected that he and the Chancellor would summon a Parliament early in 1697, the bishops had opened a fierce pamphleteering campaign, stirring up the people, and dealing out cruel insinuations against Presbyterians. Such leaders being in the Upper House, it could only have increased the irritation to suggest to the Commons to renew the lately defeated proposal.
While the legal position of the Presbyterians was unsatisfactory, Lord Galway found them in the practical enjoyment of liberty. There was no sacramental test, as in England, to exclude them from government employments. And the English toleration seems to have been offered to them, upon the condition that the Anglican Test should by the same law be extended to Ireland. Such a change would have been worse than the existing- circumstances. It is true that the want of a law enacting toleration placed Presbyterians in a sort of moral pillory; it exposed to penalties for the worship of God the multitude of brave Presbyterian soldiers, but for whom Ireland, that pearl of the sea, would have had no place in William’s crown. But a toleration law along with a sacramental test would have banished them from the public service, and would have given them nothing but what they did actually possess. For how could the government sanction any prosecution on account of religious worship, which their Regium Donum avowedly paid for?
The Galway Case of 1698 illustrates most of what I have said. In consequence of some Presbyterian families having arrived in that town, and having discovered individual Presbyterians in the garrison, the Limerick Presbyterian minister, having received an invitation, preached in Galway. The mayor put him in prison according to law. He was liberated and sent back to Limerick on the Christian intercession of the Archbishop of Tuam. The Lords-Justices received at the same time, first, a memorial from the Dublin Presbyterian ministers in favour of their brother, the Rev. William Biggar; and secondly, a memorial from the mayor and corporation of Galway, praying that, as there had not been any meeting of dissenters there for the last twenty years, the Presbyterians should be prohibited from creating a division among the Protestants, to weaken that interest in the midst of so many Romanists. Dr Reid shall tell the rest: “The Lords-Justices sent for Mr Biggar, and found that he had confined himself strictly to the preaching of the Gospel, and that he had not given any unnecessary offence to the Episcopalians. They sent him back to Limerick, and directed that, for the present, no Presbyterian should preach in Galway. They immediately laid the whole case before the English government, to be submitted to the king, and prayed that his Majesty’s pleasure might be conveyed to them for their future guidance. What directions were returned to them cannot now be ascertained. But it is probable that the prohibition against preaching in Galway was removed by order of the king; for, not more than two years after this period, there was not only a Presbyterian congregation regularly organized there, but a minister duly ordained to that charge.” Dr Reid testifies to the uniform integrity, impartiality, and independence of these Lords-Justices, which encouraged Presbyterians to bring their complaints before them. He ascribes any incompleteness in the way of redress to the transference of the government to the Earl of Rochester, through the pressure of the opposition party, which compelled the king to dismiss his favourite ministers.
A similar testimony is borne in an answer, which in later times a Presbyterian was provoked to write, to a libellous tract called “A sample of True-Bleu Presbyterian Loyalty.” The answer was published with the title, “A sample of Jet-Black Prelatic Calumny.” I quote the introduction to its account of a case tried before Lord Galway and others (the case itself I need not narrate):—
“In the year 1698, a petition against the Presbyterians of Ulster, framed by the Bishop of Down and Connor, was sent to England to the Lords-Justices there (to whom the government was committed during King William’s absence) complaining of several practices of the Presbyterians, by which the Established Church seemed to be in danger. This petition, not being proper for the cognizance of the Justices of England, was remitted to the Chief-Governors of Ireland, the Marquis of Winchester and the Earl of Galway, the proper judges of that matter, though by the Irish clergy suspected to favour the Dissenters too much, and therefore not fit to be trusted with a trial of that nature.”
By combining this suspicion with a contrary verdict in another case, we may conclude that Lord Galway was impartial. In the French Church of Cork, which did not use the liturgy, a feud arose in 1698. The ministerial status of their pastor, Monsieur Fontaine, having been called in question, the bishop recommended that he should be episcopally ordained; and, the good pastor having objected with excessive heat, Bishop Wetenhall formally complained to the Lords-Justices. Lord Galway, says the pastor in his journal, “was disposed to sacrifice me to please the Bishop of Cork.” An unsatisfactory correspondence following, Fontaine resigned, with a reservation which he records thus: “I wrote to Lord Galway and told him that if any change should be made in the mode of worship I had adopted, by the appointment of an Fnglish clergyman, I should feel myself bound, in spite of my resignation, to officiate for that portion of the flock who preferred the French usage. I believe this threat was not without its effect in causing Lord Galway to recommend Mr Marcomb for my successor, which was most satisfactory to me.”[1] The whole system in such cases is easily explained. The bishops predominated in the Irish privy council, so that when Lord Galway referred a case to the council, the episcopal party got their own way. In cases where this result might prove oppressive, Lord Galway kept the business in his own hands, and stood firm to his royal master’s maxims of toleration.
Having been led out of the proper chronological order, I now return to the opening of Lord Galway’s Irish administration. Colonel Arthur Upton of Templepatrick, and for many years M.P. for County Antrim, had long been the acknowledged chief of the Presbyterians. Like all the Presbyterians of influence, he had stood out against Oliver Cromwell; but he early appeared for King William, and raised a regiment from among his tenantry. His eldest surviving son, Captain Arthur Upton, fought at the Battle of Aughrim, but fell among the slain. Thereafter his heir-apparent was Colonel Clotworthy Upton, a brave officer, who in his father’s old age worthily continued his public work. I conclude this section with an extract from a letter from the young Colonel to Mr Carstares, the well-known secretary of King William:—
“London, August 30, 1697. . . . As to our old affair, it stands just as it did, my Lord Galway not being willing, as I apprehend, to meddle with a thing of that nature on his first entrance on the government. His coldness in it, and delays, at last make me believe he never spoke to the king about it; or, if he did, that his Majesty was of opinion with his Lordship, but was unwilling to give a denial to so considerable a body of his faithful friends. Therefore we are put off with courtiers’ promises, and in the meantime we lie under the lash of severe laws. . . . Our government in Ireland pleases all sorts of people extremely; and I doubt not but my Lord Galway’s wisdom and prudence will continue it. — I remain, Reverend Sir, your faithful humble servant,
- ↑ “Memoirs of a Huguenot Family,” translated and compiled from the Autobiography of Fontaine. New York, 1853.