Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 ‘Vain imagination’: the French dimension to Geraldine intrigue, 1523–1539
- 2 Gerald Fitzgerald's sojourn in France, 1540
- 3 Irish dimensions to the Anglo-French war, 1543–1546
- 4 The French diplomatic mission to Ulster and its aftermath, 1548–1551
- 5 French conspiracy at rival courts and Shane O'Neill's triangular intrigue, 1553–1567
- 6 French reaction to Catholic Counter-Reformation campaigns in Ireland, 1570–1584
- 7 France and the fall-out from the Nine Years' War in Ireland, 1603–1610
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Glossary
- Index
2 - Gerald Fitzgerald's sojourn in France, 1540
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 ‘Vain imagination’: the French dimension to Geraldine intrigue, 1523–1539
- 2 Gerald Fitzgerald's sojourn in France, 1540
- 3 Irish dimensions to the Anglo-French war, 1543–1546
- 4 The French diplomatic mission to Ulster and its aftermath, 1548–1551
- 5 French conspiracy at rival courts and Shane O'Neill's triangular intrigue, 1553–1567
- 6 French reaction to Catholic Counter-Reformation campaigns in Ireland, 1570–1584
- 7 France and the fall-out from the Nine Years' War in Ireland, 1603–1610
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Glossary
- Index
Summary
In spring 1540 fears for Gerald Fitzgerald's safety prompted Manus O'Donnell and his wife, Eleanor, to arrange the boy's escape to the continent. Thanks to Manus's characteristic duplicity in concealing his involvement in those arrangements, Eleanor has traditionally been credited with orchestrating her nephew's escape, supposedly on the grounds that she suspected her husband of intending to hand the boy over the English government following his abandonment of the league the previous winter. Manus deflected English suspicions of harbouring Gerald by giving a conditional undertaking to surrender Gerald and his close associate, James Delahide, to Henry VIII in return for a pardon for himself. Yet all the while Gerald and his escorts enjoyed the covert support of the Gaelic chief who undermined the Irish council's efforts to capture them. It was alleged that several people who ‘feigned themselves to seek diligently for him [Gerald] in the day time, … in the night time … were in his company and in O'Donnell's, his uncle, making good cheer and laughing merrily together’. Alain Governors, the Breton shipmaster responsible for conveying the boy to France, testified to O'Donnell's direct input in finalising the travel arrangements. While Governors was in Donegal Bay in late February or early March, Manus approached him, accompanied by several religious (including Leverous and Walsh), and requested that he convey Gerald to Brittany. In accordance with a formal agreement drafted and signed by both parties in the presence of a notary, Governors undertook to conduct Gerald and his escorts to his native port of Saint-Malo.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Franco-Irish Relations, 1500–1610Politics, Migration and Trade, pp. 44 - 58Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2003