Charles Blount, 8th Baron Mountjoy
Lady Penelope Devereux | |
---|---|
Children | Penelope Rich Mountjoy Blount, 1st Earl of Newport Elizabeth Blount John Blount |
Parent(s) | James Blount, 6th Baron Mountjoy Catherine Legh |
Charles Blount, 1st Earl of Devonshire,
He succeeded to the family title as 8th
Early life
The second son of
Charles Blount was returned to the
Between 1586 and 1598, Charles spent most of his time on the
Ireland
The downfall of Lord Essex did no damage to Lord Mountjoy's career. After the failure of his rebellion, Essex shocked many by denouncing his sister Penelope, who was Mountjoy's mistress, as a traitor, which inevitably raised the question of his own possible involvement; but the Crown, anxious to retain Mountjoy's services, and also to show as much leniency as possible to the defeated rebels, simply ignored the accusation.
On 24 February 1600, Mountjoy landed in Ireland as
In early 1600, Mountjoy had dispatched Sir Henry Docwra with an army of 4,200 troops to land at Culmore to erect a fortress commanding the shores of Lough Foyle in the north-west of Ulster. To prevent Hugh O'Neill from sending a strong force to repulse Dowcra's forces, Mountjoy advanced in force from Dublin to Newry causing O'Neill to fear a southern advance into Tyrone.[4]
Mountjoy aimed to avoid the mistakes of previous Lords-Deputy. After the Battle of Moyry Pass, he had it cleared and a garrison established there. It had long been a problem for English forces advancing into Ulster from the south. He also established posts with garrisons at Mountnorris and Armagh.[4]
On 13 July 1601, Mountjoy with his army along with Turlough MacHenry O'Neill of the Fews who had recently switched to the English side in the war, had a stand-off with Hugh O'Neill's forces at the River Blackwater. After a few shots in vain from either side, O'Neill's forces withdrew and Mountjoy sent his forces to occupy the ruined Blackwater fort destroyed by O'Neill in 1595. Later O'Neill's forces attacked Mountjoy's camp before withdrawing. In response, the Lord-Deputy sent his forces across the river where they found strong artificially fortified fords, which would have held out against the English.[5]
By 15 July 1601, the Lord-Deputy had secured the surrender of O'Neill's ally Magennis. That month, Mountjoy had a new fort near the old Blackwater fort erected.[6]
Mountjoy reported to the council in England that O'Neill was determined to prevent his forces from advancing into Tyrone and towards Dungannon. As such he initiated a policy of burning large quantities of corn to induce a famine to drive the rebels out of their strongholds.[6]
Mountjoy set about trying to entice Hugh's forces to come out and attack by fetching some materials for the new fort from the Tyrone side of the river as well as burning more corn. Further skirmishes between Mountjoy and O'Neill's forces ensued during the summer of 1601.[6]
Spanish forces had landed in Munster in August 1601, forcing Mountjoy to send his forces southwards leaving O'Neill remaining in his unbroken heartland of Tyrone.
O'Neill during this time had also moved south to assist some of his allies, however, after some serious defeats at the hands of the forces of the Earl of Clanricarde of Connacht, he was in no place to offer any effective resistance once Mountjoy marched once more to Tyrone in the summer of 1602.[7]
Mountjoy advanced to the location he found the previous summer at the River Blackwater, which commanded safe and secure passage into Tyrone, previously inaccessible, and set about erecting a new fort. O'Neill having observed this burnt his capital at Dungannon and fled to his last refuge in Glenconkeyne.[7]
Advancing northwards through Tyrone, Mountjoy erected a fort in the townland of Magheralamfield, afterwards known as Mountjoy Castle.[8][7] He also Christened the new fort at the Blackwater Charlemont Fort after himself.[7]
Once in Tyrone, Mountjoy carried out a campaign of devastation throughout it resulting in the mass hunting of rebels, spoiling of corn, the burning of houses and the killing of churls so as to force the submission of O'Neill and his remaining allies.[7] Most symbolically Mountjoy had the inauguration site of the O'Neill's at Tullyhogue Fort destroyed.
On 30 March 1603, six days after the death of Elizabeth and the accession of
As part of the Plantation of Ulster, the majority of the barony of Loughinsholin was detached from County Tyrone and made part of the newly created County Londonderry. The rest of Loughinsholin along with the northern parts of Dungannon barony were merged to create the short-lived barony of Mountjoy. It would later be amalgamated with the barony of Dungannon.
Later life
On his return to England, Lord Mountjoy served as one of
Mountjoy's long-term successor in Ireland was Sir Arthur Chichester. Ireland remained in a state of some tension, with a number of disgruntled Gaelic Irish allies of the Crown angered by Mountjoy's generous terms to the Earls of Tyrone and Tyrconnell which meant land that had been promised to them had now been restored to the earls.
In 1607, a year after Mountjoy's death, the
Marriage
Towards the end of his life, on 26 December 1605 at
After the execution of her brother in 1601, Lord Rich divorced her in the ecclesiastical courts.[1] The marriage was carried out in defiance of canon law and resulted in the disgrace of both parties, who were banished from King James I's court circles. The Earl and Countess of Devonshire continued to live together as husband and wife with their illegitimate children until his death a few months later in the following year.
Illegitimate progeny
His
- Penelope Rich (1592–?) – despite her surname, she was a daughter of Penelope by Blount
- Mountjoy Blount, 1st Earl of Newport (1597–1666)
- Sir Saint John Blount – baptized at St Clement Danes with the name 'Scipio Rich', 8 December 1597. Saint John Blount, being described as the brother of Mountjoy, Lord Mountjoy, was made a Knight of the Bath on 1 February 1625 at the coronation of King Charles I, along with his nephew Robert Rich, son of his half brother the 2nd Earl of Warwick. His daughter Penelope (died probably before 1651) was the wife of Dr. Stephen Goffe.
- Ruth Blount (1600–1694)
- Isabella (Elizabeth) Blount
- Charles Blount (1605–1627)
Legacy
Lord Devonshire left no legitimate children, and so his hereditary titles became extinct at his death[1] on 3 April 1606 at Savoy House, London.[2] His young contemporary, John Ford wrote one of his two earliest works, Fame's Memorial, as an elegy of 1169 lines on the recently deceased Charles Blount, 1st Earl of Devonshire. Ford has an acrostic – a series of lines whose first letters spell a word or name – in his prefatory dedication of the elegiac poem to Penelope Devereux, countess of Devonshire.
See also
Bibliography
- John J. Marshall. To Rule the North: Being a History of the Fort of Blackwater in Ulster, Sometime Called Portmore. Ulster Archaeological Society.
Notes
- ^ a b c d e f Chisholm 1911.
- ^ a b "BLOUNT, Charles (1563-1606), of Canford Magna, Dorset and Wanstead, Essex". History of Parliament Online. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
- ^ a b Remarks on Bodley's "Journey," and an Account of His Campaign in Ireland with Mountjoy's Armies, and His Connection with the "Plantation" of Ulster. Ulster Journal of Archaeology, First Series, Vol. 2 (1854), pp. 95-99. Ulster Archaeological Society. Pg. 99.
- ^ a b Marshall, pg. 57.
- ^ Marshall, pg. 58.
- ^ a b c Marshall, pg. 59.
- ^ a b c d e f Marshall, pg. 61.
- ^ "Mountjoy, County Tyrone". PlaceNames of Northern Ireland. Retrieved 6 April 2020.[permanent dead link]
- ^ Berleth, p. 293
- ^ As listed in text of 1605 Charter as "Charles, Earl of Devonshire": Croft, Pauline, The Spanish Company, London Record Society, Volume 9, London, 1973.
References
- public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Mountjoy, Barons and Viscounts s.v. Charles Blount". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 18 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 941. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
- Berleth, Richard: The Twilight Lords, 1978; reissued 1994, Barnes & Noble Books, ISBN 1-56619-598-5