James Spottiswood
James Spottiswood (7 September 1567 – March, 1645) was a Scottish courtier and Protestant bishop of Clogher.
Life
Born at
In 1588 Spottiswood entered the service of
Early in James's reign in England, Spottiswood was sent with letters to Archbishop
In 1620 Spottiswood went to London for a court case. While he was there, George Montgomery died, leaving two Irish sees vacant. Through the Marquess of Buckingham, Spottiswood was appointed bishop of one of them, Clogher, based south-west Ulster, much of it in County Fermanagh.[3] He landed at Dublin in April 1621, but his patent was not dated until 22 October, and he was involved in a dispute with James Ussher.[2]
In his diocese, Spottiswood was involved in a further dispute from 1625, over the schoolmaster at the royal school founded at Enniskillen. He was opposed by James Balfour, 1st Baron Balfour of Glenawley, and the matter came to blows, before the issue was settled in 1627. A complex legal case arose when one of Spottiswood's clergy stabbed fatally Lord Balfour's son-in-law Sir John Wemyss, the High Sheriff of Fermanagh in 1626.[3] Spottiswood refused to sign Ussher's declaration against Catholicism in 1626.[4] He retained royal favour, turning down the archbishopric of Cashel in 1629.[2]
When the Irish Rebellion of 1641, Spottiswood left for England. He died at Westminster in March 1645, and was buried in St Benedict's Chapel there on the 31st.[2]
Works
Spottiswood published his doctoral thesis, Concio J. Spottiswodii … quam habuit ad Clerum Andreanopoli … pro gradu Doctoratus, Edinburgh, 1616. He is believed to have been the author of an anonymous manuscript in the Auchinleck library, A Briefe Memoriall of the Life and Death of James Spottiswoode, bishop of Clogher. It contains information about his early years, but consists mainly of a long account of his private and public troubles as bishop; the last few pages are in another hand, and do not extend to the date of his death. The manuscript was edited and published by
Family
Spottiswood, who was married before taking orders, left a son, Sir Henry Spottiswood, and a daughter Mary, who married Abraham Crichton; Abraham Creighton, 1st Baron Erne was their grandson.[2][5]
Notes
- ^ Clogher clergy and parishes : being an account of the clergy of the Church of Ireland in the Diocese of Clogher, from the earliest period, with historical notices of the several parishes, churches, etc" Leslie, J.B. p 10: Enniskille; R. H. Ritchie; 1929
- ^ a b c d e f g h Lee, Sidney, ed. (1898). . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 53. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
- ^ doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/26165. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ R. Buick Knox (1967). James Ussher Archbishop of Armagh. University of Wales Press. p. 36.
- ^ Edmund Lodge (1859). The Genealogy of the Existing British Peerage and Baronetage: Containing the Family Histories of the Nobility. With the Arms of the Peers. Hurst and Blackett. p. 207. Retrieved 20 September 2013.
Further reading
- Raymond Gillespie, The Trials of Bishop Spottiswood 1620-40, Clogher Record Vol. 12, No. 3 (1987), pp. 320–333. Published by: Clogher Historical Society. Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27699247
- Attribution
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lee, Sidney, ed. (1898). "Spottiswood, James". Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 53. London: Smith, Elder & Co.