Philip Chesney Yorke

“ The severe Wilson, while rebuking her gaieties, allows that she was “a good woman,” and that her character would stand the most prying investigation. She was intelligent and tactful, a faithful wife, a devoted mother and a staunch friend. Besides several children who died in infancy she had Henry, prince of Wales, who died in 1612, Charles, afterwards King Charles I., and Elizabeth, electress palatine and queen of Bohemia. ”

“ On the 24th of July 1663 he alone signed a protest against the bill “for the encouragement of trade,” on the plea that owing to the free export of coin and bullion allowed by the act, and to the importation of foreign commodities being greater than the export of home goods, “it must necessarily follow . . . that our silver will also be carried away into foreign parts and all trade fail for want of money.” ”

“ Her voyage to Scotland was interrupted by a violent storm—for the raising of which several Danish and Scottish witches were burned or executed—which drove her on the coast of Norway, whither the impatient James came to meet her, the marriage taking place at Opslo (now Christiania) on the 23rd of November. ”

“ Lord Anglesey married Elizabeth, daughter and co-heiress of Sir James Altham of Oxey, Hertfordshire, by whom, besides other children, he had James, who succeeded him, Altham, created Baron Altham, and Richard, afterwards 3rd Baron Altham. His descendant Richard, the 6th earl (d. 1761) , left a son Arthur, whose legitimacy was doubted, and the peerage became extinct. He was summoned to the Irish House of Peers as Viscount Valentia, but was denied his writ to the parliament of Great Britain by a majority of one vote. ”

“ On the wedding morning, however, the 6th of January 1540, he declared that no earthly thing would have induced him to marry her but the fear of driving the duke of Cleves into the arms of the emperor. Shortly afterwards Henry had reason to regret the policy which had identified him so closely with the German Protestantism, and denied reconciliation with the emperor. Cromwell’s fall was the result, and the chief obstacle to the repudiation of his wife being thus removed, Henry declared the marriage had not been and could not be consummated ”

“ But Arlington’s support of the court policy was entirely subordinate to personal interests; and after the appointment of Clifford in November 1672 to the treasurership, his jealousy and mortification, together with his alarm at the violent opposition aroused in parliament, caused him to veer over to the other side. He advised Charles in March 1673 to submit the legality of the declaration of indulgence to the House of Lords, and supported the Test Act of the same year, which compelled Clifford to resign. ”

“ He visited Cork and afterwards in July 1646 joined his troops in Scotland, with the hope of expelling Argyll from Kintyre; but he was obliged to retire by order of the king, and returning to Ireland threw himself into the intrigues between the various factions. In 1647 he was appointed with two others by the confederacy to negotiate a treaty with the prince of Wales in France, and though he anticipated his companions by starting a week before them, he failed to secure the coveted lord-lieutenancy, which was confirmed to Ormonde. ”

“ On the 26th of January 1644 Antrim was created a marquess. He returned to Kilkenny in February, took the oath of association, and was made a member of the council and lieutenant-general of the forces of the Catholic confederacy. The confederacy, however, giving him no support in his projects, he threw up his commission, and with Ormonde’s help despatched about 1600 men in June to Montrose’s assistance in Scotland, subsequently returning to Oxford and being sent by the king in 1645 with letters for the queen at St Germains. ”

“ And after the defeat of the royal cause he travelled in France and Italy, joined the exiled royal family in 1650, and in 1654 became official secretary to James on Charles’s recommendation, who had already been attracted by his “pleasant and agreeable humour.” [2] In March 1657 he was knighted, and the same year was sent as Charles’s agent to Madrid, where he remained, endeavouring to obtain assistance for the royal cause, till after the Restoration. On his return to England in 1661 he was made keeper of the privy purse, and became the prime favourite. ”

“ In 1681 Anglesey wrote A Letter from a Person of Honour in the Country, as a rejoinder to the earl of Castlehaven, who had published memoirs on the Irish rebellion defending the action of the Irish and the Roman Catholics. ”

“ Having made the grand tour he returned to Ireland; and being employed by the parliament in a mission to the duke of Ormonde, now reduced to the last extremities, he succeeded in concluding a treaty with him on the 19th of June 1647, thus securing the country from complete subjection to the rebels. In April 1647 he was returned for Radnorshire to the House of Commons. ”

“ He joined in his schemes Lord Slane and Sir Phelim O’Neill, later leaders of the rebellion, but on the outbreak of the rebellion in the autumn he dissociated himself from his allies and retired to his castle at Dunluce. ”

“ He was appointed a commissioner of the treasury in March 1679, was included in Sir William Temple’s new modelled council the same year, and was a member of the inner cabinet which was almost immediately formed. In 1681 he was made lord lieutenant of Suffolk. He died on the 28th of July 1685, and was buried at Euston, where he had bought a large estate and had carried out extensive building operations. ”