| Lettice FitzGerald | |
|---|---|
| 1st Baroness Offaly | |
| Spouse(s) | Sir Robert Digby |
| Issue | |
| Mabel Digby Robert Digby, 1st Baron Digby Essex Digby, Bishop of Dromore George Digby Gerald Digby John Digby Simon Digby MP Philip Digby Lettice Digby Abigail Digby |
|
| Noble family | FitzGerald dynasty |
| Father | Gerald FitzGerald, Lord Offaly, Lord Garratt |
| Mother | Catherine Knollys |
| Born | c.1580 |
| Died | 1 December 1658 |
| Burial | Parish Church of Coleshill, Warwickshire, England |
Lettice FitzGerald, 1st Baroness Offaly (c.1580[1]- 1 December 1658) was an Irish noblewoman and a member of the powerful FitzGerald dynasty. Heiress-general to the Earls of Kildare on the death of her father,[2] the title instead went to the next FitzGerald male heir when her grandfather, the 11th Earl of Kildare died in 1585. In 1620 she was created suo jure Baroness Offaly by King James I of England.
She was the wife of Sir Robert Digby, a landed English aristocrat by whom she had ten children.
In early 1642, at the age of about sixty-two, her castle of Geashill was besieged by a force of insurgents from the O'Dempsey clan; she managed to hold out against them until October 1642.[3] Her defence has been described as having been the "most spirited episode in the history of the Irish Rebellion of 1641".[4]
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Lettice was born in about 1580, the only child and heir of Gerald FitzGerald, Lord Offaly and Lord Garratt by Catherine Knollys, who was a younger daughter of Catherine Carey and Sir Francis Knollys. Lettice's maternal great-grandmother was Mary Boleyn, elder sister of Anne Boleyn, the second queen consort of King Henry VIII of England, who had been the lover of Mary prior to his courtship of Anne and possibly the biological father of her daughter Catherine. Her paternal grandparents were Gerald FitzGerald, 11th Earl of Kildare and Mabel Browne. One of her aunts, and after whom she was likely named, was Lettice Knollys, the celebrated rival of Queen Elizabeth I, who was also a distant cousin.
Her father died in June 1580, around the time of her birth, so Lettice never knew him. He was nineteen years of age. Upon his death, Lettice became heiress-general to the Earls of Kildare; however, the earldom passed to her uncle, Henry. Her mother married secondly Sir Philip Butler, but it is not known whether she had additional children.
On 19 April 1598, when she was about eighteen years old, Lettice married Sir Robert Digby (1575- 24 May 1618), a landed aristocrat of Coleshill, Warwickshire, whose brother was John Digby, 1st Earl of Bristol. The couple resided in Ireland where Sir Robert held the office of MP for Athy, County Kildare in 1613.
The marriage produced ten children:[5]
As the daughter and only heir of the eldest son of the 11th Earl of Kildare, the barony of Offaly had been claimed for her when she was a child; in 1599, she assumed the title Baroness Offaly.[6] Lettice has been described as having been an accomplished negotiator,[7] and this skill paid off when finally, on 29 July 1620, after years of dispute, King James I granted her the suo jure title of 1st Baroness Offaly for life. This was made under the Great Seal of England, and the King also invested her with the lands of Killeagh, and the territory and demesne of Geashill in King's County, Ireland. Geashill had been her dowry which she had brought into the Digby family upon her marriage. Her husband had died in May 1618. On the same day of her investure as Baroness Offaly, her eldest son, Robert was made Baron Digby.
In 1641, the Great Irish rebellion broke out. Lettice, by then a widow in her early sixties, became caught up in it at the end of 1641,[8] when Lettice received an insolent letter by her cousin Henry O'Dempsey, Lord Clanmaliere containing fraudulent orders from King Charles I to surrender Geashill Castle to the O'Dempseys, and leave with her people in a safe convoy provided by them. The letter continued with the threat to burn the castle, town, as well as massacre all the Protestant inhabitants, should she fail to yield to their demands. Lettice, who resided at the castle with her sons and some of her grandchildren, refused to hand over the castle, and sent a scornful letter back to Henry O'Dempsey:
"I am, as I have ever been, a loyal subject of my king. I thank you for your offer of a convoy, which however, I hold as of little safety. Being free from offending His Majesty, or doing wrong to any of you, I will live and die innocently, and will do my best to defend my own, leaving the issue to God".[9]
In early 1642, the O'Dempseys made an assault on the castle, and more letters were exchanged, however, she and her people managed to hold out; she later refused to leave under the convoy of a relief party sent by Dublin, preferring to defend her fortress. When the rebels had captured one of her sons, and brought him under the castle walls in chains, they threatened to decapitate him if she did not immediately surrender Geashill. Lettice retaliated by bringing one of her own prisoners, a Catholic priest, onto the ramparts and threatened to kill him on the spot unless they released her son, unharmed.[10] The rebels complied with her demand, and her son was returned to her.
Well-armed with weapons and ammunition from Dublin, Lettice kept the insurgents at bay until October 1642 when Lettice was finally persuaded to leave Geashill in the company of Sir Richard Grenville. She departed Ireland to retire to her late husband's family estate in Coleshill, England where she died in December 1658. She was buried alongside Sir Robert in Coleshill Parish Church.
She was not succeeded by her eldest grandson, Kildare Digby (c.1627- 1661) as the patent of the barony of Offaly stipulated that upon her death the title was to pass to the head of the House of Kildare who in 1658 was George FitzGerald, 16th Earl of Kildare.
| Peerage of Ireland | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by New creation |
Baroness Offaly 1620–1658 |
Succeeded by George FitzGerald, 16th Earl of Kildare |