GEORGE CAREW, EARL OF TOTNESS, THE younger son of a dean of Exeter, raised himself by his merit to great honours. Though his titles were conferred by the kings James and Charles, his services were performed under Elizabeth, in whose reign he was master of the ordnance in Ireland, treasurer of the army there, president of Munster, and one of the lords justices. With less than four thousand men he reduced many castles and forts to the queen's obedience, took the earl of Desmond prisoner, and brought the Bourks, O'Briens, and other rebels, to submission. He baffled all attempts of the Spaniards on his province, and established it in perfect peace. He died in an honourable old age at the Savoy in 1629, and is buried under a goodly monument at Stratford upon Avon. He was a great patron of learning and lover of antiquities. He wrote, "Pacata Hibernia; or the History of the Wars in Ireland', especially within the Province of Mounster, 1599, 1600, 1601, and 1602;” which after his death was printed in folio at London in 1633, with seventeen maps, being published by his natural son Thomas Stafford3. It is certain that his lordship proposed to write the reign of Henry the fifth, and had made collections and extracts for that purpose. The author of the life of Michael Drayton says*, that Speed's reign of that prince was written by [This work, says bishop Nicolson, contains the transac tions of three years of much action in Munster, from the latter end of 1599 to the death of queen Elizabeth, in the conclusion, of 1602. The whole is divided into three books: whereof the first treats of the desperate condition of that province, above other parts of the kingdom, when the lord president entered upon his government, and the hopeful prospect whereinto publick affairs were brought by his wise management within the compass of twelve months. The next gives an account of the landing of the Spaniards, and the entire conquest of them at Kinsale, with the transporting of the invaders back to Spain In the third, a recruit of money and ammunition puts new spirits into the rebels; which occasions the siege, taking, and demolishing of the strong castle of Dunboy, which put an end to the troubles of Munster. Irish Historical Lib. p. 25. If any one, says Walter Harris, takes the pains of looking into the preface, and into p. 367, and other parts of Pacata Hibernia, he will be convinced that Carew was not the author of it; but it was probably compiled by his directions, to which he furnished the materials. Harris's edit. of Ware's Ireland, vol. iii. p. 329.] 3 Vide Ant. Wood and Dugdale's Baronage. 4 P. 15. our earl: others only say that his lordship's collections were inserted in it. Others of his collections, in four volumes folio, relating to Ireland, are in the Bodleian library at Oxford. Others were sold by his executors to sir Robert Shirley o. Sir James Ware says, that this earl translated into English, "A History of the Affairs of Ireland," written by Maurice Regan, servant and interpreter to Dermot, son of Murchard king of Leinster in 1171, and which had been turned into French verse by a friend of Regan". [The following family-piece of biography was placed on the back of a picture of lord Totness, in the possession of his descendant, the late Boothby Clopton, esq. 5 Gen. Dict. vol. ix. p. 324; Biogr. p. 1171. • Dugdale, vol.ii. p. 425. [Bishop Nicolson de ? Vide Hist. of Irish Writers, p. 20. scribed this History to be extant in the duke of Chandos's li brary, under the title of " Mauritii Regani, Servi et Interpretis Dermitii, Filii Murchardi, olim Regis Lageniæ, Historiæ de Hiberniâ Fragmentum Anglice redditum a D. Georgio Carew, Memoniæ Preside sub Elizabethâ. Annales Rerum Hibernicarum ab An. 1579, ad An. 1590. Hibernico charactere." Ubi sup. p. 31. Mr. Harris mentions another MS. copy among the bishop of Clogher's MSS. in the college library, Dublin.] |