This letter of the Protector's (or rather copy of the original) was enclosed by Dr. Barksdale in a petition to Protector Richard, at the beginning of 1659, in which he complains that his salary, which used to be 2007., is now reduced to 100l.; "too slender a maintenance for one that has spent twenty-four years in the study of physic in the universities, and has the charge of most of the sick and maimed soldiers belonging to your armies." 127 (BEFORE SPEECH VII) Speech to the Army Officers, Feb. 27, 1656-7 In the MS. volume, Add. MS. 6125, so often mentioned above, is a copy of part of a letter dated March 7, 1656-7, narrating what had taken place "yesterday sennight" (i.e., February 27) between the Protector and a hundred officers of the army, touching kingship. Their address prayed him that he "would not hearken to the title (king) because it was not pleasing to his army and was matter of scandal to the people of God [and] of great rejoicing to the enemy; that it was hazardous to his own person and of great danger to the three nations, such an assumption making way for Charles Stuart to come in again. His Highness returned answer presently to this effect:—" "That the first man that told him of it was he, the mouth of the officers then present (meaning Col. Mills); that for his part, he had never been at any cabal about the same (hinting by that the frequent cabals that were against kingship by certain officers). He said the time was when they boggled not at the word (king) for the Instrument by which the Government now stands was presented to his Highness with the title (king) in it, as some then present could witness (pointing at a principal officer, then in his eye), and he refused to accept of the title. But how it comes to pass that they now startle at that title, they best know. That for his part, he loved not (sic) the title, a feather in a hat, as little as they did. That they had made him their drudge upon all occasions; to dissolve the Long Parliament, who had contracted evil enough by long sitting; to call a Parliament or convention of their naming, who met; and what did they? Fly at liberty and property, insomuch as if one man had twelve cows, they held another that wanted cows ought to take a share with his neighbour. Who could have said any thing was their own, if they had gone on? After their dissolution how was I pressed by you (said he) for the rooting out of the ministry; nay, rather than fail, to starve them out. A Parliament was afterwards called. They sat five months; it is true we hardly heard of them in all that time. They took the Instrument into debate and they must needs be dissolved, and yet stood not the Instrument in need of mending. Was not the case hard with me, to be put upon to swear to that which was so hard to be kept? Some time after that you thought it was necessary to have Major-Generals, and the first rise to that motion then was the late general insurrections and was justifiable; and you Major-Generals did your parts well. You might have gone on. bid you go to the House with a bill and there receive a foil? Who After you had exercised this power awhile, impatient were you till a Parliament was called. I gave my vote against it, but you [were] confident by your own strength and interest, to get men chosen to your heart's desire. How you have failed therein, and how much the country hath been disobliged, is well known. That it is time to come to a settlement and lay aside arbitrary proceedings, so unacceptable to the nation. And by the proceedings of this Parliament, you see they stand in need of a check or balancing power (meaning the House of Lords or a House so constituted) for the Case of James Naylor might happen to be your own case. By their judicial power, they fall upon life and member, and doth the Instrument in being enable me to control it?” The writer of the letter goes on to say that three of the MajorGenerals " are come about for a second House and a successor," and that the matter of the name being postponed to the last of all, the House has since gone on with much unity. 128 AMONGST those who petitioned the Protector to be exempted from transplantation to Connaught was a grandson of the poet, Edmund Spenser. In 1580 Spenser went to Ireland as secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, and remained there until within a month of his death in Jan., 1598-9. He hated the Irish, regarding them as a nation of savages, and when the lands of the Desmond were declared to be forfeit in 1586, Spenser obtained a grant of 3,000 acres, including the castle of Kilcolman. In the autumn of 1598, after Tyrone's defeat of the * Add. MS. 6125, p. 285. There is a short notice of this speech in Clarke Papers, iii. 92. The "foil" was the opposition to the Bill for continuing the Decimation Tax, thrown out on Jan. 29. English on the Blackwater, the Irish in Munster broke out into rebellion, Kilcolman Castle was burnt, Spenser with his wife and children had to fly to Cork, and Ben Jonson says that one of his little ones perished in the flames. He died during an official visit to England shortly afterwards and his eldest son Sylvanus succeeded to the property in Desmond's country. The son married a Roman Catholic Irish lady, who trained her children in her own faith, and thus it came about that this grandson of a Protestant Englishman was in danger of transplantation as an Irish Papist. In spite of Cromwell's pleading on his behalf, William Spenser was transplanted, for in the list of "Transplanted Irish," his name occurs as having been adjudged 1011 acres in Connaught on July 26, 1657 (Hist. MSS. Commissioners' Report on the Ormonde MSS., series I., vol. ii., p. 175). Grosart says that “the letter was effectual. He had the estate of Kilcolman restored to him, but as far as can be made out not until after the Restoration." Cromwell's letter would not be very " effectual" then! In the end, Spenser seems to have secured both estates. See Grosart's Works of Edmund Spenser, i., Appendix, p. 561. The Lord Protector to the Commissioners for Affairs in Ireland Whitehall, 27th March, 1657. RIGHT TRUSTY AND WELL-BELOVED, A petition hath been exhibited unto us by William Spenser, setting forth that being but seven years old at the beginning of the rebellion in Ireland, he repaired with his mother to the city of Cork, and during the rebellion continued in the English quarters; that he never bore arms, or acted against the Commonwealth of England; that his grandfather, Edmund Spenser, and his father were both Protestants, from whom an estate in lands in the Barony of Fermoy, and county of Cork, descended to him, which during the rebellion yielded nothing towards his relief; that the estate hath been lately given to the soldiers' in satisfaction of their arrears, upon account of his professing the Popish religion, which since his coming to years of discretion he hath, as he professes, utterly renounced; that his grandfather was that Edmund Spenser, who by his writings touching the reduction of the Irish to civility brought on him the odium of that nation, and for those works and his other good services Queen Elizabeth conferred on him that estate which the said William Spenser now claims. We have also been informed that the gentleman is of a civil conversation, and that the extremity his wants have brought him unto have not prevailed over him to put him upon indiscreet or evil practices 1 To Capt. Peter Courthope and his troop. for a livelihood. And if upon enquiry you shall find his case to be such, we judge it just and reasonable, and do therefore desire and authorise you that he be forthwith restored to his estate, and that reprisal lands be given to the soldiers elsewhere. In the doing whereof our satisfaction will be the greater by the continuation of that estate to the issue of his grandfather, for whose eminent deserts and services to the Commonwealth that estate was first given to him. We rest, your loving friend, OLIVER P.* 129 To our Right Trusty and Right Well-beloved our Deputy of Ireland and Council there RIGHT TRUSTY and Well-BELOVED, Whitehall, 30th March, 1657. The Mayor, Sheriffs and Commonalty of the City of Corke have presented unto Us two petitions wherein they desire that the forfeited houses in Corke and the forfeited lands lying within the Liberties of that City may be set unto them for such term and under such rents and Conditions as by a Commission and Instructions from us and our Council here you are impowered to set the forfeited houses and lands in Ireland; and that the Cathedral Church of Finbarryes with the Liberties thereof, situate within the Suburbs of the said City, as also the several Islands within the Harbour to that City belonging, may be under their jurisdiction, And that St. Stephen's Hospital within the Suburbs of that City with the lands thereto belonging may be at their dispose and Government for the maintenance and education of the children of decayed Citizens and orphans. We have also received a petition from the Sovereign and Burgesses of Kinsale, desiring the Tenancy of the forfeited houses in that Town, and six thousand Acres of the next adjoining forfeited lands, that such houses and lands may by them be so disposed of, as may best suit with the accommodation of the Inhabitants therein concerned. We are very sensible of the Petitioners' eminent and faithful service to this Commonwealth in the *Letters from the Lord Protector etc., 1654-8, 8, p. 118. Public Record Office, Dublin. Printed in Prendergast's Cromwellian Settlement in Ireland, P. 44. rescue and recovery of the Towns of Corke and Kinsale from the power of the Enemy and the surrender of them and the Country thereabouts unto Us at such a time when our Army stood in need of that relief and refreshment, which could not be seasonably had elsewhere. We also very willingly remember, that in our concessions to them upon the rendition of those Towns, We gave them a promise, not only to do them right in all things to the uttermost of our power, but also to perform any such good office for them as might be a reward and memorial of their faithfulness and public affection showed by them in that action, wherein they could not have engaged without the manifest hazard of their lives. We are likewise inclinable to believe that our accommodating them with what they petition for, may not be inconsistent with but rather a promoting of the public good. We therefore refer their petitions to your especial care and Consideration, hereby impowering you to do therein as you upon examination and enquiry into the nature and merit of their desires shall judge meet and just, and that therein you will allow them all that dispatch and favour which their business can possibly require or admit of. Your loving friend, OLIVER P.* This letter is alluded to in an order of the Lord-Deputy and Council, printed in the Council Book of Kinsale, p. 55. 130 (WITH SPEECH XIII) (1) Paper of Objections, delivered April 21, 1657 WHEN the Protector made his speech on April 20, he mentioned a paper which he had brought with him (see p. 83 above). In his next day's speech, he alluded to it repeatedly, as also to another, and afterwards handed both in to the Committee. These two papers, in Thurloe's writing but with notes in Cromwell's own hand, and endorsed as presented to the Committee on April 21, are preserved amongst the Portland MSS. at Welbeck. The first consists of notes upon such articles of the Petition and Advice as the Protector wished to touch on in his speech. This is the paper which the editor of the Old Parliamentary History laments over as altogether lost." It runs as follows:-- Letters from the Lord Protector etc., 1654-8, p. 122. Public Record Office, Dublin. |