Ireland under the Tudors (Vol. 1-3). Bagwell Richard

      CHAPTER XI.

       FROM THE YEAR 1536 TO THE YEAR 1540.

       Table of Contents

      Lord Leonard Grey Deputy, 1536.

Grey was immediately chosen Lord Justice by the Council, and his patent as Deputy was not long delayed. He began badly, his temper involving him in one of those personal difficulties which led to his ruin. He had never been on good terms with his predecessor, and was at no pains to make a decent or politic show of regret. Less than a month after her husband’s death Lady Skeffington wrote to Anne Boleyn, declaring that she was overwhelmed with debt through his liberality in advancing money for the public service. She had already complained to Cromwell of Grey’s harshness, and her son-in-law Anthony Colley went so far as to accuse him of shortening the late Deputy’s life. Aylmer and Alen, afterwards Grey’s most unrelenting enemies, were included in Lady Skeffington’s complaint. The Council now sustained Grey, but it was not in official documents that the politicians of Dublin were wont to assail a chief governor whose hand might after all be heavy against them. Verbal messages and innuendoes contained in private letters seldom failed to undermine a man whom it might be neither safe nor decent to accuse openly. Grey now contented himself with saying that the late Lord Deputy had died in debt, and that his property was held in pledge for his creditors. But Lady Skeffington replied, and no doubt truly, that the official salary had never been paid, and that she could do nothing without it. Cromwell at least believed her, for he gave orders that her goods should be delivered to her, and that she should be sped on her homeward journey. Grey complied in the most ungracious manner, and had all the luggage and furniture turned out of Maynooth Castle before carts could be provided to carry it away. It was stored in a church, and there further detained by the new Deputy for a debt to the Crown. Lady Skeffington was unable to leave for eight or nine months after her husband’s death, and obstacles were placed in her way to the last. There may have been faults on both sides, but had Grey been either a good-natured or a politic man he might have found means to smooth matters for a widowed lady whose chief desire was the very general one of wishing to get out of Ireland as quickly as possible.171

      Parliament of 1536.

Grey was commissioned to summon a Parliament, which accordingly met on Monday, May 1, the day before Anne Boleyn was sent to the Tower. In less than three weeks a number of important bills were passed, of which drafts carefully settled by Audeley himself had been sent from England. The succession was secured to the issue of Anne Boleyn, as Brabazon wrote only two days before that unfortunate lady’s execution. Before the letter reached London Jane Seymour had already been Queen a full fortnight, and Cromwell’s concern was, if possible, to stop the passing of an Act which would have to be repeated so soon. It was too late to do this, but the Parliament made no difficulty about enacting the same stringent rule of succession for the third as they had done for the second wife. They thus achieved the unique distinction of passing two contradictory Acts of Settlement within eighteen months. This remarkable performance does not adorn the printed statute book, because that compilation was made when Elizabeth was firmly seated on the throne.172

      The royal supremacy.

The bill declaring the King to be supreme head of the Church encountered some opposition from the proctors of the clergy, two of whom were summoned to Parliament from each diocese. The proctors had only consultative voices, but they now claimed not only to be full members of Parliament, but to form a separate order whose consent would be necessary