Buckingham and Ireland 1616-1628

Victor Treadwell

This study of the interdependence and interaction of English and Irish politics in the context of the Elizabethan reconquest of Ireland, the union of the crowns of England, Scotland and Ireland in 1603, and thereafter the extension of English civility throughout Ireland with the aid of British colonization. Though much has been written on the political and social history of Ireland at the time of the settlement of the Ulster plantation, and much on the politics of the 1630s, there has been little on the vital period in between.

This is the first full study of the influence of the Court on politics and administration in early Stuart Ireland. The author has demonstrated that Buckingham exercised a dominant influence over the development of English policy in Ireland in the late 1610s and early 1620s, and that influence was invariably for the worse. The discoveries concerning the extent of Buckingham's covert activities are stunning, and the arguments concerning the manner in which the pretence of reform was frequently used as a cover for continued corruption are equally so. This work will give rise to a general revision of the character of the governments of St John and Falkland, and of the circumstances leading to the appointment of Wentworth.

By examining in detail the Irish ramifications and interests of George Villiers, duke of Buckingham, and the Villiers connection, this book throws new light on the decision-making process linking London and Dublin, and on the Court's disposal of an extensive Irish patronage in honours, offices, administrative patents and lands, particularly with regard to the continuous plantation advocated by the favourite's Irish clients. Moreover, the growth of Buckingham's stake in Ireland had a significant impact on the English parliamentary politics of the 1620s, and secured both the failure of Irish administrative reform initiated in 1621 and the disgrace in 1624 of its protagonist, the lord treasurer, Lionel Cranfield, earl of Middlesex. Finally, it is suggested, in some respects, the political configurations of the Buckingham era ominously anticipated the general crisis of the Three Kingdoms.

In 1993 Victor Treadwell retired from Ruskin College, Oxford, where he was Senior Tutor in History and Acting Vice-Principal. He is currently editing the 1622 Irish Commission Papers for the Irish Manuscripts Commission.