Piers Butler (bef. 1547 - abt. 1604)

Born before 1547 in Ireland

Ancestors

Descendants

Died about 1604 after about age 57 in England

Biography

Piers was the youngest son of James Butler, 9th Earl of Ormonde and Lady Joan Fitzgerald.

Piers was involved in the infamous "Butler Revolt" of 1569, led by his elder brother Sir Edmund Butler in response to a land dispute with the English Crown. This was an unusual tactic for the family of the Earl of Ormond, who had been fiercely loyal to the Crown for generations. Queen Elizabeth pardoned the brothers in the 1570s, and apparently they switched allegiances back to supporting their brother Thomas (10th Earl of Ormond) and the Crown. See Sir Edmund's profile for more details.

Excerpts from his profile in the Dictionary of Irish Biography:^[1]

• Known as "rebel and landowner" (born 1546/7), he was the 7th son of James Butler and Joan Fitzgerald

• He married Katherine, daughter of John, Lord Power, of Curraghmore.

• He inherited an estate at Grantstown in west Tipperary, lands bordering those of the Butlers’ traditional enemies the Fitzgeralds of Desmond, and from the mid-1560s participated enthusiastically in the long-running feud between the families

• In 1566 he demonstrated his contempt for the Crown's efforts to introduce the common law into the Butler lordship by attacking Kilkenny county jail, freeing many convicted felons.

• In January 1567, he launched a series of raids into the Desmond lands in Munster. This embarrassed his brother Thomas Butler, 10th Earl of Ormond, who had previously assured Queen Elizabeth that his family's feuding with the Fitzgeralds would cease. These incidents and others prompted the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Sir Henry Sidney, to hold court sessions in spring 1567 in Kilkenny, where he forced Piers on his knees in court to submit to the Crown and to confess his guilt before receiving a pardon.

• By the start of 1569 Piers and his older brothers Sir Edmund Butler and Edward Butler were preparing to rebel against the Crown. Piers attacked a number of known government supporters and raided Clonmel, killing 8 townsmen.

• In June 1569 the 3 Butler brothers were proclaimed rebels by Sidney. The 3 were angry at their eldest brother, the Earl of Ormond, for acquiescing in the Crown's efforts to curb their power. They attacked his agents and ravaged his manors at Callan and Arklow, and Piers robbed Ormond's treasurer of £2,000.

• In September 1569, Piers, Edward, and Sir Edmund submitted to their elder brother at Kilkenny. In January 1570 they tried to restart their rebellion, but failed to attract any support. Piers and Edmund surrendered once again to Ormond on 28 February 1570. Piers was imprisoned for a time and attainted by the Irish parliament in the summer.

• Despite his brothers’ animosity towards him, the Earl of Ormond knew that if they were executed for treason, their lands would be given to English settlers even more hostile to his interests. Hence he used his influence to prevent the attainder from being carried out.

• After his release from prison, Piers served the Crown against the rebellion of ["Arch-Traitor"] James fitz Maurice FitzGerald, and was pardoned in October 1573. Such was his rehabilitation that he was granted Leix Abbey in Queen's County [County Laios/Leix] soon after. During the Desmond wars of 1579–83 he again served the Crown loyally, unsuccessfully defending the Abbey of Leix against Sir John Fitzgerald^[2] of Desmond in August 1580.

• After the final defeat of the Fitzgeralds in 1583, he was granted a sizeable estate in the barony of Clanwilliam, between the rivers Aherlow and Suir.

From Lodge's Peerage (1789), edited for context and clarity:^[3]

• Pierce Bugler of Grantstown in Tipperary, and of Leix Abbey, of which place he was named when pardoned March 1573 for his rebellion against the Queen. Upon him, his wife and his children, his brother Thomas, Earl of Ormond, 14 May 159S, settled Ballygurteen [Clanwilliam], and other lands in Tipperary, to be holden of the manor of Donowghill, by the 40th part of a Knight's fee, and 4 [pounds] rent.

Piers Butler (brother of Sir Edmond) was considered a traitor to Queen Elizabeth I in this Attainder from 1570, which mentions 15 Irish traitors altogether:^[4]

• "But the wicked, better acquainted with darkenss than lighte, have chosen to wallowe in their own filthe and puddle of tyranny, oppression, rape, rapine and spoile, for as it is manifest and well known to us, the vile and ingrate traytours
  • Mac Cartie, more latelie create earle of Clancartie;
  • Sir Edmond Butler, Knight; Edwarde Butler and Piers Butler his brethern;
  • Piers and James Butler, sonnes to [Richard] the vicounte Mountgarret;
  • James and John Butler, sonnes of Piers Butler of the Grallaghe;
  • Walter Butler, Tibbot Butler, Piers Butler, John Butler, sonnes to Edmond Butler of Pollestone;^[5]
  • James Fitz Geralde, sonne to Sir Morishe Fitz Desmond;
  • the seneschal of Imokillye [John Fitzedmund Fitzgerald];
  • the White Knight;
  • with divers outhers, wicked and disloyall traytours, against whose wicked and tyrannouse course of life the lamentable crie of manye widdowes, innocent orphans and pore oppressed people resounde before the Throne of God his Majestie for vengeaunce."

Children

Verbatim from "The Descendants of James, 9th Earl of Ormond":^[6]

• "Piers, the youngest son of Earl James, had Grantstown, near Tipperary. He had sons James, Edward, Richard, and Edmund [and possible others]. James, in turn, had a son, James Oge, and his posterity, next heirs to the earldom after the line of Kilcash, flourished until the middle of the 18th century, when they became extinct in the male line."

• James (eldest of 6 sons of Piers) had an only son, James Oge, who married a daughter of Walter, 11th Earl of Ormond. James Oge was owner of Kilmoyler and apparently of Ballycarron and Rathgallon in 1641, restored as an "Innocent Papist" by the Act of Settlement, to Piers, his son and heir. Another son, Theobald, was page to Charles II. Piers' son James was owner of Kilmoyler in 1722.

Piers was the grandfather of the "Mr. James Butler of Grantstown", who attended the funeral of his mother-in-law Eleanor, Countess of Ormond, held in Kilkenny Castle on 27 March 1632. Eleanor was wife of the still-living Walter Butler, 11th Earl of Ormond.^[7]

"Pierce Butler of Abbeyleix, the youngest brother of Walter of Nodstown, had 4 sons from whom descend the Butlers of Kilmoyler and Grantstown, Co. Tipperary."^[8]

From Lodge's Peerage (1789), edited for context and clarity:^[9]

• Pierce married Catharine, daughter of John, 3rd Lord Poer, by whom he had 6 sons -- James his heir, William, Thomas, Edward ^[10] Richard of Killenaule, Edmond, and several daughters, whereof Catharine was married to John Tobin of Killahay.

• James, the eldest son, was of Killmoyleagher (or Killveleigher/Killmoyler), married Anne, daughter of Meiler Magrath, Archbishop of Cashell, and left one son James Butler Oge, living in the reign of King James I, who married 1) Ellen, daughter of the Earl of Ormond; and 2) Mary, 3rd daughter of Thomas Lord Kerry; by the former James had 2 sons, Pierce and Theobald.

Butler Revolt

Verbatim from A Brief History of the Purcells of Ireland:^[11][12]

• James Butler, 9th Earl of Ormond and his wife Lady Joan FitzGerald, daughter of James FitzGerald, 11th Earl of Desmond, had had seven sons, of whom Thomas, 10th Earl of Ormond was the eldest. At the time of the Desmond Rebellion, Sir Edmund Butler, Edward Butler and Piers Butler, younger brothers of the 10th Earl of Ormond, were themselves in open rebellion. In 1568, Edward Butler and the son of Sir Edmund Butler were accused of having attacked the lands of Mac-i-Brien:
  • With 600 gunners and kerne [Irish light infantry], 100 galloglass [Scottish mercenaries], 60 horsemen and 300 slaves, knaves and boys, Edward had invaded Ara, carried off 300 coffers that lay within 2 churches, to the value of 500 pounds; and remaining during 2 days and 2 nights round these churches, his men ravished all the poor women, young and old, married and unmarried, who had fled into the said churches.

• In April 1569, the Lord Deputy of Ireland [Sir Henry Sidney] sent a Commission from Dublin to Tipperary to investigate the crimes of the brothers of the Earl of Ormond and take evidence. The Commissioners spent a night at Loughmoe Castle^[13] while in Tipperary, and Edward Butler, showing his defiance, arrived at Loughmoe with a great number of kerne, “which pilfered and spoiled the poor people of the town, so as all night we had but howling and crying…” The 10th Earl’s youngest brother, Piers Butler, whom the Commissioners intended to meet in Kilkenny with a view to arresting him and transporting him to Dublin, “retired to his bed at Loughmoe, sore sick or so feigning himself” in order to avoid the journey to Kilkenny.

• By June 1569, Sir Edmund Butler was in league with James FitzMaurice FitzGerald, who was leading the Desmond uprising in place of his cousin, the imprisoned [Gerald, 15th] Earl of Desmond. Sir Edmund Butler was deeply hostile to Sidney, Queen Elizabeth’s Lord Deputy of Ireland. In July and August 1569, Piers Butler plundered Callan [southwest of Kilkenny] and then the town of Leighlin Bridge [border of counties Kilkenny and Carlow], killing nine men and burning four young children in the latter location.

• Learning of his brothers’ conduct, the Earl of Ormond hurried over from England and met his three brothers near Kilkenny on September 1. Sir Edmund and Piers accompanied the 10th Earl to Dublin, where the two rebel brothers were imprisoned. Sir Edmund then escaped from Dublin Castle, and Piers was released on bail. Parliament passed an Act of Attainder in 1570 against the three brothers as “vile and ingrate traitors.” Queen Elizabeth pardoned the three in 1573, but the attainder was not reversed.

• At the end of the first Desmond Rebellion, Sir Edmund and Edward switched to their eldest brother’s side and fought against the rebels. Twenty years later, in the late 1590s, Sir Edmund Butler’s son, another Piers Butler, joined in the rebellion of O’Neill and O’Donnell. When this Piers Butler was later captured, his uncle, the 10th Earl of Ormond, had him hanged as a traitor at Thurles, near Loughmoe, and had his head brought to Dublin.

Sources

• Lodge, John. The Peerage of Ireland, or, A Genealogical History of the Present Nobility of that Kingdom (James Moore, Dublin, 1789) Vol. 4, Page 30. Internet Archive
• Wikipedia-James Butler, 9th Earl of Ormond
• The Butler family of Lebanon, Connecticut : an account of the ancestry and descendants of Patrick Butler and Mercy Bartlett, 1934. Published by The Tuttle Company Rutland Vermont, page 12

1. ↑ Terry Clavin, Dictionary of Irish Biography profile for Piers Butler of Grantstown:
   • https://www.dib.ie/biography/butler-piers-a1278
2. ↑ Sir John Fitzgerald, younger brother of Gerald, 15th Earl of Desmond, is profiled in the Dictionary of Irish Biography:
   • https://www.dib.ie/biography/fitzgerald-sir-john-fitz-james-a3170
3. ↑ Lodge's Peerage (1789), Vol.4, pp.29-30:
   • https://archive.org/details/peerageofireland04lodg/page/28/mode/2up
4. ↑ Sir Henry Blackall, The Butlers of County Clare, Appendix 2: Attainder of James Butler of Grallagh:
   • http://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclare/genealogy/butlers/appendix2.htm)
5. ↑ The Butlers of Polestown were descended from Sir James Butler (1440-1487), father of Piers, 8th Earl of Ormond, via one of Piers' 2 illegitimate elder brothers (Edmund and Theobald).
6. ↑ William F. Butler, “The Descendants of James, Ninth Earl of Ormond.” Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, vol.19, no.1 (1929), p.34 and p.39.
   • www.jstor.org/stable/25513504
7. ↑ Sir Henry Blackall, The Butlers of County Clare, first published in the North Munster Antiquarian Journal, 1952:
   • http://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclare/genealogy/butlers/appendix6.htm#166
8. ↑ Patrick Theobald Tower Butler (Lord Dunboyne), "Butler Family History", Butler Society, Kilkenny, Ireland (1966), p.22:
   • https://archive.org/details/butlerfamilyhist00dunb/page/22/mode/2up?q=nodstown
9. ↑ Lodge's Peerage (1789), Vol.4, pp.29-30:
   • https://archive.org/details/peerageofireland04lodg/page/28/mode/2up
10. ↑ Edward, by Ellen Blanchville his wife (who re-married with James Walsh of Grenghlaghbegg in Tipperary) left an only daughter and heir, Elynor, about a year old at his decease, who became the wife of Richard Butler of Killenaule)
11. ↑ Col. Brien Purcell Horan, A Brief History of the Purcells of Ireland (2000), pp.30-31:
    • https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5e5ad6d49070ef2e922658b1/t/5ec594b2a115e674da8db322/1590006963189/Purcell+history+2019+%28003%29.pdf
12. ↑ These details of the rebellion of the 10th Earl of Ormond’s younger brothers are taken from W.F. Butler, M.A., M.R.I.A., “Plot and Counterplot in Elizabeth Ireland”, Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review, vol. 15, No. 60 (Dec. 1926), pp. 633-648
13. ↑ Sir Thomas Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe, was a close friend of the 10th Earl of Ormond and, although culturally Irish, was generally known for his loyalty to the Crown.