Chapter 11

See alsoSir Joshua Fitch, by the Rev. A.L. Lilley (1906),

FITCH, RALPH(fl. 1583-1606), London merchant, one of the earliest English travellers and traders in Mesopotamia, the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean, India proper and Indo-China. In January 1583 he embarked in the “Tiger” for Tripoli and Aleppo in Syria (see Shakespeare,Macbeth, Act I. sc. 3), together with J. Newberie, J. Eldred and two other merchants or employees of the Levant Company. From Aleppo he reached the Euphrates, descended the river from Bir to Fallujah, crossed southern Mesopotamia to Bagdad, and dropped down the Tigris to Basra (May to July 1583). Here Eldred stayed behind to trade, while Fitch and the rest sailed down the Persian Gulf to Ormuz, where they were arrested as spies (at Venetian instigation, as they believed) and sent prisoners to the Portuguese viceroy at Goa (September to October). Through the sureties procured by two Jesuits (one being Thomas Stevens, formerly of New College, Oxford, the first Englishman known to have reached India by the Cape route in 1579) Fitch and his friends regained their liberty, and escaping from Goa (April 1584) travelled through the heart of India to the court of the Great Mogul Akbar, then probably at Agra. In September 1585 Newberie left on his return journey overland via Lahore (he disappeared, being presumably murdered, in the Punjab), while Fitch descended the Jumna and the Ganges, visiting Benares, Patna, Kuch Behar, Hugli, Chittagong, &c. (1585-1586), and pushed on by sea to Pegu and Burma. Here he visited the Rangoon region, ascended the Irawadi some distance, acquired a remarkable acquaintance with inland Pegu, and even penetrated to the Siamese Shan states (1586-1587). Early in 1588 he visited Malacca; in the autumn of this year he began his homeward travels, first to Bengal; then round the Indian coast, touching at Cochin and Goa, to Ormuz; next up the Persian Gulf to Basra and up the Tigris to Mosul (Nineveh); finally via Urfa, Bir on the Euphrates, Aleppo and Tripoli, to the Mediterranean. He reappeared in London on the 29th of April 1591. His experience was greatly valued by the founders of the East India Company, who specially consulted him on Indian affairs (e.g.2nd of October 1600; 29th of January 1601; 31st of December 1606).

See Hakluyt,Principal Navigations(1599), vol. ii. part i. pp. 245-271, esp. 250-268; Linschoten,Voyages(Itineraris), part i. ch. xcii. (vol. ii. pp. 158-169, &c., Hakluyt Soc. edition); Stevens and Birdwood,Court Records of the East India Company 1599-1603(1886), esp. pp. 26, 123;State Papers, East Indies, &c.,1513-1616(1862), No. 36; Pinkerton,Voyages and Travels(1808-1814), ix. 406-425.

FITCHBURG,a city and one of the county-seats of Worcester county, Massachusetts, U.S.A., situated, at an altitude varying from about 433 ft. to about 550 ft., about 23 m. N. of Worcester and about 45 m. W.N.W. of Boston. Pop. (1880) 12,429; (1890) 22,037; (1900) 31,531, of whom 10,917 were foreign-born, including 4063 French Canadians, 836 English Canadians, 2306 Irish and 963 Finns; (1910 census) 37,826. Fitchburg is traversed by the N. branch of the Nashua river, and is served by the Boston & Maine, and the New York, New Haven & Hartford railways, and by three interurban electric lines. The city area (27.7 sq.m.) is well watered, and is very uneven, with hill spurs running in all directions, affording picturesque scenery. The court house and the post office (in a park presented by the citizens) are the principal public buildings. Fitchburg is the seat of a state normal school (1895), with model and training schools; has a free public library (1859; in the Wallace library and art building), the Burbank hospital, the Fitchburg home for old ladies, and an extensive system of parks, in one of which is a fine fountain, designed by Herbert Adams. Fitchburg has large mercantile and financial interests, but manufacturing is the principal industry. The principal manufactures are paper and wood pulp, cotton and woollen goods, yarn and silk, machinery, saws, horn goods, and bicycles and firearms (the Iver Johnson Arms and Cycle Works being located here). In 1905 the city’s total factory product was valued at $15,390,507, of which $3,019,118 was the value of the paper and wood pulp product, $2,910,572 was the value of the cotton goods, and $1,202,421 was the value of the foundry and machine shop products. The municipality owns and operates its (gravity) water works system. Fitchburg was included in Lunenburg until 1764, when it was incorporated as a township and wasnamed in honour of John Fitch, a citizen who did much to secure incorporation; it was chartered as a city in 1872.

See W.A. Emerson,Fitchburg, Massachusetts, Past and Present(Fitchburg, 1887).

FITTIG, RUDOLF(1835- ), German chemist, was born at Hamburg on the 6th of December 1835. He studied chemistry at Göttingen, graduating as Ph.D. with a dissertation on acetone in 1858. He subsequently held several appointments at Göttingen, being privat docent (1860), and extraordinary professor (1870). In 1870 he obtained the chair at Tübingen, and in 1876 that at Strassburg, where the laboratories were erected from his designs. Fittig’s researches are entirely in organic chemistry, and cover an exceptionally wide field. The aldehydes and ketones provided material for his earlier work. He observed that aldehydes and ketones may suffer reduction in neutral, alkaline, and sometimes acid solution to secondary and tertiary glycols, substances which he named pinacones; and also that certain pinacones when distilled with dilute sulphuric acid gave compounds, which he named pinacolines. The unsaturated acids, also received much attention, and he discovered the internal anhydrides of oxyacids, termed lactones. In 1863 he introduced the reaction known by his name. In 1855 Adolph Wurtz had shown that when sodium acted upon alkyl iodides, the alkyl residues combined to form more complex hydrocarbons; Fittig developed this method by showing that a mixture of an aromatic and alkyl haloid, under similar treatment, yielded homologues of benzene. His investigations on Perkin’s reaction led him to an explanation of its mechanism which appeared to be more in accordance with the facts. The question, however, is one of much difficulty, and the exact course of the reaction appears to await solution. These researches incidentally solved the constitution of coumarin, the odoriferous principle of woodruff. Fittig and Erdmann’s observation that phenyl isocrotonic acid readily yielded α-naphthol by loss of water was of much importance, since it afforded valuable evidence as to the constitution of naphthalene. They also investigated certain hydrocarbons occurring in the high boiling point fraction of the coal tar distillate and solved the constitution of phenanthrene. We also owe much of our knowledge of the alkaloid piperine to Fittig, who in collaboration with Ira Remsen established its constitution in 1871. Fittig has published two widely used text-books; he edited several editions of Wohler’sGrundriss der organischen Chemie(11th ed., 1887) and wrote anUnorganische Chemie(1st ed., 1872; 3rd, 1882). His researches have been recognized by many scientific societies and institutions, the Royal Society awarding him the Davy medal in 1906.

FITTON, MARY(c.1578-1647), identified by some writers with the “dark lady” of Shakespeare’s sonnets, was the daughter of Sir Edward Fitton of Gawsworth, Cheshire, and was baptized on the 24th of June 1578. Her elder sister, Anne, married John Newdigate in 1587, in her fourteenth year. About 1595 Mary Fitton became maid of honour to Queen Elizabeth. Her father recommended her to the care of Sir William Knollys, comptroller of the queen’s household, who promised to defend the “innocent lamb” from the “wolfish cruelty and fox-like subtlety of the tame beasts of this place.” Sir William was fifty and already married, but he soon became suitor to Mary Fitton, in hope of the speedy death of the actual Lady Knollys, and appears to have received considerable encouragement. There is no hint in her authenticated biography that she was acquainted with Shakespeare. William Kemp, who was a clown in Shakespeare’s company, dedicated hisNine Daies Wonderto Mistress Anne (perhaps an error for Mary) Fitton, “Maid of Honour to Elizabeth”; and there is a sonnet addressed to her in an anonymous volume,A Woman’s Woorth defended against all the Men in the World(1599). In 1600 Mary Fitton led a dance in court festivities at which William Herbert, later earl of Pembroke, is known to have been present; and shortly afterwards she became his mistress. In February 1601 Pembroke was sent to the Fleet in connexion with this affair, but Mary Fitton, whose child died soon after its birth, appears to have simply been dismissed from court. Mary Fitton seems to have gone to her sister, Lady Newdigate, at Arbury. A second scandal has been fixed on Mary Fitton by George Ormerod, author ofHistory of Cheshire, in a MS. quoted by Mr. T. Tyler (Academy, 27th Sept. 1884). Ormerod asserted, on the strength of the MSS. of Sir Peter Leycester, that she had two illegitimate daughters by Sir Richard Leveson, the friend and correspondent of her sister Anne. He also gives the name of her first husband as Captain Logher, and her second as Captain Polwhele, by whom she had a son and daughter. Polwhele died in 1609 or 1610, about three years after his marriage. But Ormerod was mistaken in the order of Mary Fitton’s husbands, for her second husband, Logher, died in 1636. Her own will, which was proved in 1647, gives her name as “Mary Lougher.” In Gawsworth church there is a painted monument of the Fittons, in which Anne and Mary are represented kneeling behind their mother. It is stated that from what remains of the colouring Mary was a dark woman, which is of course essential to her identification with the lady of the sonnets, but in the portraits at Arbury described by Lady Newdigate-Newdegate in herGossip from a Muniment Room(1897) she has brown hair and grey eyes.

The identity of the Arbury portrait with Mary Fitton was challenged by Mr Tyler and by Dr Furnivall. For an answer to their remarks see an appendix by C.G.O. Bridgeman in the 2nd edition of Lady Newdigate-Newdegate’s book.The suggestion that Mary Fitton should be regarded as the false mistress of Shakespeare’s sonnets rests on a very thin chain of reasoning, and by no means follows on the acceptance of the theory that William Herbert was the addressee of the sonnets, though it of course fails with the rejection of that supposition. Mr William Archer (Fortnightly Review, December 1897) found some support for Mary Fitton’s identification with the “dark lady” in the fact that Sir William Knollys was also her suitor, thus numbering three “Wills” among her admirers. This supplies a definite interpretation, whether right or wrong, to the initial lines of Sonnet 135:—“Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy ‘Will,’And ‘Will’ to boot, and ‘Will’ in overplus.”Arguments in favour of her adoption into the Shakespeare circle will be found in Mr Thomas Tyler’sShakespeare’s Sonnets(1890, pp. 73-92), and in the same writer’sHerbert-Fitton Theory of Shakespeare’s Sonnets(1898).

The suggestion that Mary Fitton should be regarded as the false mistress of Shakespeare’s sonnets rests on a very thin chain of reasoning, and by no means follows on the acceptance of the theory that William Herbert was the addressee of the sonnets, though it of course fails with the rejection of that supposition. Mr William Archer (Fortnightly Review, December 1897) found some support for Mary Fitton’s identification with the “dark lady” in the fact that Sir William Knollys was also her suitor, thus numbering three “Wills” among her admirers. This supplies a definite interpretation, whether right or wrong, to the initial lines of Sonnet 135:—

“Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy ‘Will,’And ‘Will’ to boot, and ‘Will’ in overplus.”

“Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy ‘Will,’

And ‘Will’ to boot, and ‘Will’ in overplus.”

Arguments in favour of her adoption into the Shakespeare circle will be found in Mr Thomas Tyler’sShakespeare’s Sonnets(1890, pp. 73-92), and in the same writer’sHerbert-Fitton Theory of Shakespeare’s Sonnets(1898).

FITTON, WILLIAM HENRY(1780-1861), British geologist was born in Dublin in January 1780. Educated at Trinity College, in that city, he gained the senior scholarship in 1798, and graduated in the following year. At this time he began to take interest in geology and to form a collection of fossils. Having adopted the medical profession he proceeded in 1808 to Edinburgh, where he attended the lectures of Robert Jameson, and thenceforth his interest in natural history and especially in geology steadily increased. He removed to London in 1809, where he further studied medicine and chemistry. In 1811 he brought before the Geological Society of London a description of the geological structure of the vicinity of Dublin, with an account of some rare minerals found in Ireland. He took a medical practice at Northampton in 1812, and for some years the duties of his profession engrossed his time. He was admitted M.D. at Cambridge in 1816. In 1820, having married a lady of means, he settled in London, and devoted himself to the science of geology with such assiduity and thoroughness that he soon became a leading authority, and in the end, as Murchison said, “one of the British worthies who have raised modern geology to its present advanced position.” His “Observations on some of the Strata between the Chalk and the Oxford Oolite, in the South-east of England” (Trans. Geol. Soc.ser. 2, vol. iv.) embodied a series of researches extending from 1824 to 1836, and form the classic memoir familiarly known as Fitton’s “Strata below the Chalk.” In this great work he established the true succession and relations of the Upper and Lower Greensand, and of the Wealden and Purbeck formations, and elaborated their detailed structure. He had been elected F.R.S. in 1815, and he was president of the Geological Society of London 1827-1829. His house then became a meeting place for scientific workers, and during his presidency he held a conversazione open on Sunday evenings to all fellows of the Geological Society. From 1817 to 1841 he contributed to theEdinburgh Reviewmany admirable essays on the progress of geological science; he also wrote “Notes on theProgress of Geology in England” for thePhilosophical Magazine(1832-1833). His only independent publication wasA Geological Sketch of the Vicinity of Hastings(1833). He was awarded the Wollaston medal by the Geological Society in 1852. He died in London on the 13th of May 1861.

Obituary by R.I. Murchison inQuart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. xviii., 1862, p. xxx.

FITZBALL, EDWARD(1792-1873), English dramatist, whose real patronymic was Ball, was born at Burwell, Cambridgeshire, in 1792. His father was a well-to-do farmer, and Fitzball, after receiving his schooling at Newmarket, was apprenticed to a Norwich printer in 1809. He produced some dramatic pieces at the local theatre, and eventually the marked success of hisInnkeeper of Abbeville, or The Ostler and the Robber(1820), together with the friendly acceptance of one of his pieces at the Surrey theatre by Thomas Dibdin, induced him to settle in London. During the next twenty-five years he produced a great number of plays, most of which were highly successful. He had a special talent for nautical drama. HisFloating Beacon(Surrey theatre, 19th of April 1824) ran for 140 nights, and hisPilot(Adelphi, 1825) for 200 nights. His greatest triumph in melodrama was perhapsJonathan Bradford, or the Murder at the Roadside Inn(Surrey theatre, 12th of June 1833). He was at one time stock dramatist and reader of plays at Covent Garden, and afterwards at Drury Lane. He had a considerable reputation as a song-writer and as a librettist in opera. The last years of his life were spent in retirement at Chatham, where he died on the 27th of October 1873.

His autobiography,Thirty-Five Years of a Dramatic Author’s Life(2 vol., 1859), is a naïve record of his career. Numbers of his plays are printed inCumberland’s Minor British Theatre, Dick’s Standard PlaysandLacy’s Acting Edition of Plays.

FITZGERALD,the name of an historic Irish house, which descends from Walter, son of Other, who at the time of the Domesday Survey (1086) was castellan of Windsor and a tenant-in-chief in five counties. From his eldest son William, known as “de Windsor,” descended the Windsors of Stanwell, of whom Andrew Windsor was created Lord Windsor of Stanwell (a Domesday possession of the house) by Henry VIII., which barony is now vested in the earl of Plymouth, his descendant in the female line. Of Walter’s younger sons, Robert was given by Henry I. the barony of Little Easton, Essex; Maurice obtained the stewardship (dapiferatus) of the great Suffolk abbey of Bury St Edmunds; Reinald the stewardship to Henry I.’s queen, Adeliza; and Gerald (also adapifer) became the ancestor of the FitzGeralds. As constable and captain of the castle that Arnulf de Montgomery raised at Pembroke, Gerald strengthened his position in Wales by marrying Nesta, sister of Griffith, prince of South Wales, who bore to him famous children, “by whom the southern coast of Wales was saved for the English and the bulwarks of Ireland stormed.” Of these sons William, the eldest, was succeeded by his son Odo, who was known as “de Carew,” from the fortress of that name at the neck of the Pembroke peninsula, the eldest son Gerald having been slain by the Welsh. The descendants of Odo held Carew and the manor of Moulsford, Berks, and some of them acquired lands in Ireland. But the wild claims of Sir Peter Carew, under Queen Elizabeth, to vast Irish estates, including half of “the kingdom of Cork,” were based on a fictitious pedigree. Odo de Carew’s brothers, Reimund “Fitz William” (known as “Le Gros”) and Griffin “Fitz William,” took an active part in the conquest of Ireland.

Returning to Gerald and Nesta, their son David “Fitz Gerald” became bishop of St David’s (1147-1176), and their daughter Angharat mother of Gerald de Barri (Giraldus Cambrensis,q.v.), the well-known historian and the eulogist of his mother’s family. A third son, Maurice, obtained from his brother the stewardship (dapiferatus) of St David’s, c. 1174, and having landed in Ireland in 1169, on the invitation of King Dermod, founded the fortunes of his house there, receiving lands at Wexford, where he died and was buried in 1176. His eventual territory, however, was the great barony of the Naas in Ophaley (now in Kildare), which Strongbow granted him with Wicklow Castle; but his sons were forced to give up the latter. His eldest son William succeeded him as baron of the Naas and steward of St David’s, but William’s granddaughter carried the Naas to the Butlers and so to the Loundreses. Gerald, a younger son of Maurice, who obtained lands in Ophaley, was father of Maurice “Fitz Gerald,” who held the great office of justiciar of Ireland from 1232 to 1245. In 1234 he fought and defeated his overlord, the earl marshal, Richard, earl of Pembroke, and he also fought for his king against the Irish, the Welsh, and in Gascony, dying in 1257. He held Maynooth Castle, the seat of his descendants.

Much confusion follows in the family history, owing to the justiciar leaving a grandson Maurice (son of his eldest son Gerald) and a younger son Maurice, of whom the latter was justiciar for a year in 1272, while the former, as heir male and head of the race, inherited the Ophaley lands, which he is said to have bequeathed at his death (1287) to John “Fitz Thomas,” whose fighting life was crowned by a grant of the castle and town of Kildare, and of the earldom of Kildare to him and the heirs male of his body (May 14th, 1316), Dying shortly after, he was succeeded by his son Thomas, son-in-law of Richard (de Burgh) the “red earl” of Ulster, who received the hereditary shrievalty of Kildare in 1317, and was twice (1320, 1327) justiciar of Ireland for a year. His younger son Maurice “Fitz Thomas,” 4th earl (1331-1390), was frequently appointed justiciar, and was great-grandfather of Thomas, the 7th earl (1427-1477), who between 1455 and 1475 was repeatedly in charge of the government of Ireland as “deputy,” and who founded the “brotherhood of St George” for the defence of the English Pale. He was also made lord chancellor of Ireland in 1463. His son Gerald, the 8th earl (1477-1513), called “More” (the Great), was deputy governor of Ireland from 1481 for most of the rest of his life, though imprisoned in the Tower two years (1494-1496) on suspicion as a Yorkist. He was mortally wounded while fighting the Irish as “deputy.” Gerald, the 9th earl (1513-1534), followed in his father’s steps as deputy, fighting the Irish, till the enmity of the earl of Ormonde, the hereditary rival of his house, brought about his deposition in 1520. In spite of temporary restorations he finally died a prisoner in the Tower.

In his anger at his rival’s successes the 9th earl had been led, it was suspected, into treason, and while he was a prisoner in England his son Lord Thomas Fitzgerald, “Silken Thomas,” broke out into open revolt (1534), and declared war on the government; his followers slew the archbishop of Dublin and laid siege to Dublin Castle. Meanwhile he made overtures to the native Irish, to the pope and to the emperor; but the Butlers took up arms against him, an English army laid siege to his castle of Maynooth, and, though its fall was followed by a long struggle in the field, the earl, deserted by O’Conor, had eventually to surrender himself to the king’s deputy. He was sent to the Tower, where he was subsequently joined by his five uncles, arrested as his accomplices. They were all six executed as traitors in February 1537, and acts of attainder completed the ruin of the family.

But the earl’s half-brother, Gerald (whose sister Elizabeth was the earl of Surrey’s “fair Geraldine”), a mere boy, had been carried off, and, after many adventures at home and abroad, returned to England after Henry VIII.’s death, and to propitiate the Irish was restored to his estates by Edward VI. (1552). Having served Mary in Wyat’s rebellion, he was created by her earl of Kildare and Lord Offaley, on the 13th of May 1554, but the old earldom (though the contrary is alleged) remained under attainder. Although he conformed to the Protestant religion under Elizabeth and served against the Munster rebels and their Spanish allies, he was imprisoned in the Tower on suspicion of treason in 1583. But the acts attainting his family had been repealed in 1569, and the old earldom was thus regained. In 1585 he was succeeded by his son Henry (“of the Battleaxes”), who was mortally wounded when fighting the Tyrone rebels in 1597. On the death of his brother in 1599 the earldom passed to their cousin Gerald, whose claim to the estates was opposed by Lettice, Lady Digby, the heir-general. She obtained the ancestral castle of Geashill with its territory and was recognizedin 1620 as Lady Offaley for life. George, the 16th earl (1620-1660), had his castle of Maynooth pillaged by the Roman Catholics in 1642, and after its subsequent occupation by them in 1646 it was finally abandoned by the family.

The history of the earls after the Restoration was uneventful, save for the re-acquisition in 1739 of Carton, which thenceforth became the seat of the family, until James the 20th earl (1722-1773), who obtained a viscounty of Great Britain in 1747, built Leinster House in Dublin, and formed a powerful party in the Irish parliament. In 1756 he was made lord deputy; in 1760 he raised the royal Irish regiment of artillery; and in 1766 he received the dukedom of Leinster, which remained the only Irish dukedom till that of Abercorn was created in 1868. His wealth and connexions secured him a commanding position. Of his younger children one son was created Lord Lecale; another was the well-known rebel, Lord Edward Fitzgerald; another was the ancestor of Lord De Ros; and a daughter was created Baroness Rayleigh. William Robert, the 2nd duke (1749-1804), was a cordial supporter of the Union, and received nearly £30,000 for the loss of his borough influence. In 1883 the family was still holding over 70,000 acres in Co. Kildare; but, after a tenure of nearly 750 years, arrangements were made to sell them to the tenants under the recent Land Purchase Acts. In 1893 Maurice Fitzgerald (b. 1887) succeeded his father Gerald, the 5th duke (1851-1893), as 6th duke of Leinster.

The other great Fitzgerald line was that of the earls of Desmond, who were undoubtedly of the same stock and claimed descent from Maurice, the founder of the family in Ireland, through a younger son Thomas. It would seem that Maurice, grandson of Thomas, was father of Thomas “Fitz Maurice”Nappagh(“of the ape”), justice of Ireland in 1295, who obtained a grant of the territory of “Decies and Desmond” in 1292, and died in 1298. His son Maurice Fitz Thomas or Fitzgerald, inheriting vast estates in Munster, and strengthening his position by marrying a daughter of Richard de Burgh, earl of Ulster, was created earl of Desmond (i.e.south Munster) on the 22nd of August 1329, and Kerry was made a palatine liberty for him. The greatest Irish noble of his day, he led the Anglo-Irish party against the English representatives of the king, and was attacked as the king’s enemy by the viceroy in 1345. He surrendered in England to the king and was imprisoned, but eventually regained favour, and was even made viceroy himself in 1355. He died, however, the following year. Two of his sons succeeded in turn, Gerald, the 3rd earl (1359-1398), being appointed justiciar (i.e.viceroy) in 1367, despite his adopting his father’s policy which the crown still wished to thwart. But he was superseded two years later, and defeated and captured by the native king of Thomond shortly after. Yet his sympathies were distinctly Irish. The remote position of Desmond in the south-west of Ireland tended to make the succession irregular on native lines, and a younger son succeeded as 6th or 7th earl about 1422. His son Thomas, the next earl (1462-1467), governed Ireland as deputy from 1463 to 1467, and upheld the endangered English rule by stubborn conflict with the Irish. Yet Tiptoft, who superseded him, procured his attainder with that of the earl of Kildare, on the charge of alliance with the Irish, and he was beheaded on the 14th of February 1468, his followers in Munster avenging his death by invading the Pale. His younger son Maurice, earl from 1487 to 1520, was one of Perkin Warbeck’s Irish supporters, and besieged Waterford on his behalf. His son James (1520-1529) was proclaimed a rebel and traitor for conspiring with the French king and with the emperor. At his death the succession reverted to his uncle Thomas (1529-1534), then an old man, at whose death there was a contest between his younger brother Sir John “of Desmond” and his grandson James, a court page of Henry VIII. Old Sir John secured possession till his death (1536), when his son James succeededde facto, andde jureon the rightful earl being murdered by the usurper’s younger brother in 1540. Intermarriage with Irish chieftains had by this time classed the earls among them, but although this James looked to their support before 1540, he thenceforth played so prudent a part that in spite of the efforts of the Butlers, the hereditary foes of his race, he escaped the fate of the Kildare branch and kept Munster quiet and in order for the English till his death in 1558. His four marriages produced a disputed succession and a break-up of the family. His eldest son Thomas “Roe” (the Red) was disinherited, and failed to obtain the earldom, which was confirmed by Elizabeth to his half-brother Gerald “the rebel earl” (1558-1582), but Gerald had other enemies in his uncle Maurice (the murderer of 1540) and his son especially, the famous James “Fitz Maurice” Fitz Gerald. Gerald’s turbulence and his strife with the Butlers led to his detention in England (1562-1564) and again in 1565-1566. In 1567 Sidney imprisoned him in Dublin Castle, whence, with his brother, Sir John “of Desmond,” he was sent to England and the Tower, and not allowed to return to Ireland till 1573. Meanwhile the above James, in spite of the protests of Thomas “Roe,” had usurped his position in his absence and induced the natives to choose him as “captain” or chieftain of Desmond. He formed a strong Irish Catholic party and broke into revolt in 1569. Suppressed by Sidney, he rebelled again, till crushed by Perrot in 1573. As Earl Gerald on his return would not join James in revolt, the latter withdrew to France. But Gerald himself, after some trimming, rose in rebellion (July 1574), though he soon submitted to the queen’s forces. On the continent James Fitz Maurice offered the crown of Ireland in succession to France and to Spain, and finally to the nephew of Pope Gregory XIII. With the papal nuncio and a few troops he landed at Dingle in Kerry (June 1579) and called on the earls of Kildare and Desmond to join him, but the latter assured the English government of his loyalty, and James was killed in a skirmish. Yet Desmond was viewed with suspicion and finally forced, by being proclaimed as a traitor (Nov. 1st, 1579), into a miserable rebellion. His castles were soon captured, and he was hunted as a fugitive, till surprised and beheaded on the 11th of November 1583, after long wanderings, his head being fixed on London Bridge. His ruin is attributable to his restless turbulence and lack of settled policy. The vast estates of the earls, estimated at 600,000 acres, were forfeited by act of parliament.

But the influence of his mighty house was still great among the Irish. The disinherited Thomas “Roe” left a son James “Fitz Thomas,” who, succeeding him in 1595 and finding that the territory of the earls would never be restored, assumed the earldom and joined O’Neill’s rebellion in 1598, at the head of 8000 of his men. Long sheltered from capture by the fidelity of the peasantry, he was eventually seized (1601) by his kinsman the White Knight, Edmund Fitz Gibbon, whose sister-in-law he had married, and sent to the Tower. The “sugan” (sham) earl lingered there obscurely as “James M’Thomas” till his death. In consequence of his rebellion and the devotion of the Irish to his race, James, son of Gerald “the rebel earl,” who had remained in the Tower since his father’s death (1583), was restored as earl of Desmond and sent over to Munster in 1600, but he, known as “the queen’s earl,” could, as a Protestant, do nothing, and he died unmarried in 1601. The “sugan” earl’s brother John, who had joined in his rebellion, escaped into Spain, and left a son Gerald, who appears to have assumed the title and was known as the Conde de Desmond. He was killed in the service of the emperor Ferdinand in 1632. The common origin of the earls of Desmond and of Kildare had never been forgotten, and intermarriage had cemented the bond. Just before his death the exile wrote as “DesmondaliasGerratt Fitz Gerald” to his “Most Noble Cosen” the earl of Kildare, that “wee must not be oblivious of the true amity and love that was inviolably observed betweene our antenates and elders.”

There can be no doubt that the house of Fitzmaurice was also of this stock, although their actual origin, in the 12th century, is doubtful. From a very early date they were feudal lords of Kerry, and their dignity was recognized as a peerage by Henry VII. in 1489. The isolated position of their territory (“Clanmaurice”) threw them even more among the Irish than the earls of Desmond, and they often adopted the native form of their name, “MacMorrish.” Under Elizabeth the lords of Kerry narrowly escaped sharing the ruin of the earls. The conductof Thomas in the rebellion of James “Fitz Maurice” was suspicious, and his sons joined in that of the earl of Desmond, while he himself was a rebel in 1582. Patrick, his successor (1590-1600), was captured in rebellion (1587), and when free, joined the revolt of 1598, as did his son and heir Thomas, who continued in the field till he obtained pardon and restoration in 1603, though suspect till his death in 1630. His grandson withdrew to France with James II., but the next peer became a supporter of the Whig cause, married the eventual heiress of Sir William Petty, and was created earl of Kerry in 1723. From him descend the family of Petty-Fitzmaurice, who obtained the marquessate of Lansdowne (q.v.) in 1818, and still hold among their titles the feudal barony of Kerry together with vast estates in that county.

From the three sons by a second wife of one of the earls of Desmond’s ancestors, descended the hereditary White Knights, Knights of Glin and Knights of Kerry, these feudal dignities having, it is said, been bestowed upon them by their father, as Lord of Decies and Desmond. Glin Castle, county Limerick, is still the seat of the (Fitzgerald) Knight of Glin. Valencia Island is now the seat of the Knights of Kerry, who received a baronetcy in 1880.

Authorities.—Calendars of Irish documents and state papers and Carew papers; Gilbert’sViceroys of Ireland; Lord Kildare’sEarls of Kildare; G.E. C[okayne]’sComplete Peerage; Haymond Graves,Unpublished Geraldine Documents;Annals of the Four Masters; Calendar of the duke of Leinster’s MSS. in 9thReport on Historical MSS., part ii.; Ware’sAnnals; J.H. Round’s “Origin of the Fitzgeralds” and “Origin of the Carews” in theAncestor; his “Earldom of Kildare and Barony of Offaley” inGenealogist, ix., and “Barons of the Naas” inGenealogist, xv.; and his “Decies and Desmond” inEng. Hist. Rev.xviii.

(J. H. R.)

FITZGERALD, EDWARD(1809-1883), English writer, the poet of Omar Khayyám, was born asEdward Purcell, at Bredfield House, in Suffolk, on the 31st of March 1809. His father, John Purcell, who had married a Miss FitzGerald, assumed in 1818 the name and arms of his wife’s family. From 1816 to 1821 the FitzGeralds lived at St Germain and at Paris, but in the latter year Edward was sent to school at Bury St Edmunds. In 1826 he proceeded to Trinity College, Cambridge, where, some two years later, he became acquainted with Thackeray and W.H. Thompson. With Tennyson, “a sort of Hyperion,” his intimacy began about 1835. In 1830 he went to live in Paris, but in 1831 was in a farm-house on the battlefield of Naseby. He adopted no profession, and lived a perfectly stationary and rustic life, presently moving into his native county of Suffolk, and never again leaving it for more than a week or two. Until 1835 the FitzGeralds lived at Wherstead; from that year until 1853 the poet resided at Boulge, near Woodbridge; until 1860 at Farlingay Hall; until 1873 in the town of Woodbridge; and then until his death at his own house hard by,calledLittle Grange.

During most of this time FitzGerald gave his thoughts almost without interruption to his flowers, to music and to literature. He allowed friends like Tennyson and Thackeray, however, to push on far before him, and long showed no disposition to emulate their activity. In 1851 he published his first book,Euphranor, a Platonic dialogue, born of memories of the old happy life at Cambridge. In 1852 appearedPolonius, a collection of “saws and modern instances,” some of them his own, the rest borrowed from the less familiar English classics. FitzGerald began the study of Spanish poetry in 1850, when he was with Professor E.B. Cowell at Elmsett and that of Persian in Oxford in 1853. In the latter year he issuedSix Dramas of Calderon, freely translated. He now turned to Oriental studies, and in 1856 he anonymously published a version of theSalámán and Absálof Jámi in Miltonic verse. In March 1857 the name with which he has been so closely identified first occurs in FitzGerald’s correspondence—“Hafiz andOmar Khayyámring like true metal.” On the 15th of January 1859 a little anonymous pamphlet was published asThe Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. In the world at large, and in the circle of FitzGerald’s particular friends, the poem seems at first to have attracted no attention. The publisher allowed it to gravitate to the fourpenny or even (as he afterwards boasted) to the penny box on the bookstalls. But in 1860 Rossetti discovered it, and Swinburne and Lord Houghton quickly followed. TheRubáiyátbecame slowly famous, but it was not until 1868 that FitzGerald was encouraged to print a second and greatly revised edition. Meanwhile he had produced in 1865 a version of theAgamemnon, and two more plays from Calderon. In 1880-1881 he issued privately translations of the two Oedipus tragedies; his last publication wasReadings in Crabbe, 1882. He left in manuscript a version of Attar’sMantic-Uttairunder the title ofThe Bird Parliament.

From 1861 onwards FitzGerald’s greatest interest had centred in the sea. In June 1863 he bought a yacht, “The Scandal,” and in 1867 he became part-owner of a herring-lugger, the “Meum and Tuum.” For some years, till 1871, he spent the months from June to October mainly in “knocking about somewhere outside of Lowestoft.” In this way, and among his books and flowers, FitzGerald gradually became an old man. On the 14th of June 1883 he passed away painlessly in his sleep. He was “an idle fellow, but one whose friendships were more like loves.” In 1885 a stimulus was given to the steady advance of his fame by the fact that Tennyson dedicated hisTiresiasto FitzGerald’s memory, in some touching reminiscent verses to “Old Fitz.” This was but the signal for that universal appreciation of Omar Khayyám in his English dress, which has been one of the curious literary phenomena of recent years. The melody of FitzGerald’s verse is so exquisite, the thoughts he rearranges and strings together are so profound, and the general atmosphere of poetry in which he steeps his version is so pure, that no surprise need be expressed at the universal favour which the poem has met with among critical readers. But its popularity has gone much deeper than this; it is now probably better known to the general public than any single poem of its class published since the year 1860, and its admirers have almost transcended common sense in the extravagance of their laudation. FitzGerald married, in middle life, Lucy, the daughter of Bernard Barton, the Quaker poet. Of FitzGerald as a man practically nothing was known until, in 1889, Mr W. Aldis Wright, his intimate friend and literary executor, published hisLetters and Literary Remainsin three volumes. This was followed in 1895 by theLetters to Fanny Kemble. These letters constitute a fresh bid for immortality, since they discovered that FitzGerald was a witty, picturesque and sympathetic letter-writer. One of the most unobtrusive authors who ever lived, FitzGerald has, nevertheless, by the force of his extraordinary individuality, gradually influenced the whole face of Englishbelles-lettres, in particular as it was manifested between 1890 and 1900.

The Works of Edward FitzGeraldappeared in 1887. See also a chronological list of FitzGerald’s works (Caxton Club, Chicago, 1899); notes for a bibliography by Col. W.F. Prideaux, inNotes and Queries(9th series, vol. vi.), published separately in 1901;Letters and Literary Remains(ed. W. Aldis Wright, 1902-1903); and theLife of Edward FitzGerald, by Thomas Wright (1904), which contains a bibliography (vol. ii. pp. 241-243) and a list of sources (vol. i. pp. xvi.-xvii.). The volume on FitzGerald in the “English Men of Letters” series is by A.C. Benson. The FitzGerald centenary was celebrated in March 1909. See theCentenary Celebrations Souvenir(Ipswich, 1909) andThe Timesfor March 25, 1909.

(E. G.)

FITZGERALD, LORD EDWARD(1763-1798), Irish conspirator, fifth son of James, 1st duke of Leinster, by his wife Emilia Mary, daughter of Charles Lennox, 2nd duke of Richmond, was born at Carton House, near Dublin, on the 15th of October 1763. In 1773 the duke of Leinster died, and his widow soon afterwards married William Ogilvie, who superintended Lord Edward’s early education. Joining the army in 1779, Lord Edward served with credit in America on the staff of Lord Rawdon (afterwards marquess of Hastings), and at the battle of Eutaw Springs (8th of September 1781) he was severely wounded, his life being saved by a negro named Tony, whom Lord Edward retained in his service till the end of his life. In 1783 Fitzgerald returned to Ireland, where his brother, the duke of Leinster, had procured his election to the Irish parliament as member for Athy. In parliament he acted with the smallOpposition group led by Grattan (q.v.), but took no prominent part in debate. After spending a short time at Woolwich to complete his military education, he made a tour through Spain in 1787; and then, dejected by unrequited love for his cousin Georgina Lennox (afterwards Lady Bathurst), he sailed for New Brunswick to join the 54th regiment with the rank of major. The love-sick mood and romantic temperament of the young Irishman found congenial soil in the wild surroundings of unexplored Canadian forests, and the enthusiasm thus engendered for the “natural” life of savagery may have been already fortified by study of Rousseau’s writings, for which at a later period Lord Edward expressed his admiration. In February 1789, guided by compass, he traversed the country, practically unknown to white men, from Frederickstown to Quebec, falling in with Indians by the way, with whom he fraternized; and in a subsequent expedition he was formally adopted at Detroit by the Bear tribe of Hurons as one of their chiefs, and made his way down the Mississippi to New Orleans, whence he returned to England.

Finding that his brother had procured his election for the county of Kildare, and desiring to maintain political independence, Lord Edward refused the command of an expedition against Cadiz offered him by Pitt, and devoted himself for the next few years to the pleasures of society and his parliamentary duties. He was on terms of intimacy with his relative C.J. Fox, with R.B. Sheridan and other leading Whigs. According to Thomas Moore, Lord Edward Fitzgerald was the only one of the numerous suitors of Sheridan’s first wife whose attentions were received with favour; and it is certain that, whatever may have been its limits, a warm mutual affection subsisted between the two. His Whig connexions combined with his transatlantic experiences to predispose Lord Edward to sympathize with the doctrines of the French Revolution, which he embraced with ardour when he visited Paris in October 1792. He lodged with Thomas Paine, and listened to the debates in the Convention. At a convivial gathering on the 18th of November he supported a toast to “the speedy abolition of all hereditary titles and feudal distinctions,” and gave proof of his zeal by expressly repudiating his own title—a performance for which he was dismissed from the army. While in Paris Fitzgerald became enamoured of a young girl whom he chanced to see at the theatre, and who is said to have had a striking likeness to Mrs Sheridan. Procuring an introduction he discovered her to be aprotégéeof Madame de Sillery, comtesse de Genlis. The parentage of the girl, whose name was Pamela (?1776-1831), is uncertain; but although there is some evidence to support the story of Madame de Genlis that Pamela was born in Newfoundland of parents called Seymour or Sims, the common belief that she was the daughter of Madame de Genlis herself by Philippe (Égalité), duke of Orleans, was probably well founded. On the 27th of December 1792 Fitzgerald and Pamela were married at Tournay, one of the witnesses being Louis Philippe, afterwards king of the French; and in January 1793 the couple reached Dublin.

Discontent in Ireland was now rapidly becoming dangerous, and was finding a focus in the Society of the United Irishmen, and in the Catholic Committee, an organization formed a few years previously, chiefly under the direction of Lord Kenmare, to watch the interests of the Catholics. French revolutionary doctrines had become ominously popular, and no one sympathized with them more warmly than Lord Edward Fitzgerald, who, fresh from the gallery of the Convention in Paris, returned to his seat in the Irish parliament and threw himself actively into the work of opposition. Within a week of his arrival he denounced in the House of Commons a government proclamation, which Grattan had approved, in language so violent that he was ordered into custody and required to apologize at the bar of the House. As early as 1794 the government had information that placed Lord Edward under suspicion; but it was not till 1796 that he joined the United Irishmen, whose aim after the recall of Lord Fitzwilliam in 1795 was avowedly the establishment of an independent Irish republic. In May 1796 Theobald Wolfe Tone was in Paris endeavouring to obtain French assistance for an insurrection in Ireland. In the same month Fitzgerald and his friend Arthur O’Connor proceeded to Hamburg, where they opened negotiations with the Directory through Reinhard, French minister to the Hanseatic towns. The duke of York, meeting Pamela at Devonshire House on her way through London with her husband, had told her that “all was known” about his plans, and advised her to persuade him not to go abroad. The proceedings of the conspirators at Hamburg were made known to the government in London by an informer, Samuel Turner. Pamela was entrusted with all her husband’s secrets and took an active part in furthering his designs; and she appears to have fully deserved the confidence placed in her, though there is reason to suppose that at times she counselled prudence. The result of the Hamburg negotiations was Hoche’s abortive expedition to Bantry Bay in December 1796. In September 1797 the government learnt from the informer MacNally that Lord Edward was among those directing the conspiracy of the United Irishmen, which was now quickly maturing. He was specially concerned with the military organization, in which he held the post of colonel of the Kildare regiment and head of the military committee. He had papers showing that 280,000 men were ready to rise. They possessed some arms, but the supply was insufficient, and the leaders were hoping for a French invasion to make good the deficiency and to give support to a popular uprising. But French help proving dilatory and uncertain, the rebel leaders in Ireland were divided in opinion as to the expediency of taking the field without waiting for foreign aid. Lord Edward was among the advocates of the bolder course. His opinions and his proposals for action were alike violent. He was on intimate terms with apologists for assassination; there is some evidence that he favoured a project for the massacre of the Irish peers while in procession to the House of Lords for the trial of Lord Kingston in May 1798. It was probably abhorrence of such measures that converted Thomas Reynolds from a conspirator to an informer; at all events, by him and several others the authorities were kept posted in what was going on, though lack of evidence producible in court delayed the arrest of the ringleaders. But on the 12th of March 1798 Reynolds’ information led to the seizure of a number of conspirators at the house of Oliver Bond. Lord Edward Fitzgerald, warned by Reynolds, was not among them. The government were anxious to save him from the consequences of his own folly, and Lord Clare said to a member of his family, “for God’s sake get this young man out of the country; the ports shall be thrown open, and no hindrance whatever offered.” Fitzgerald with chivalrous recklessness refused to desert others who could not escape, and whom he had himself led into danger. On the 30th of March a proclamation establishing martial law and authorizing the military to act without orders from the civil magistrate, which was acted upon with revolting cruelty in several parts of the country, precipitated the crisis.

The government had now no choice but to secure if possible the person of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, whose social position more than his abilities made him the most important factor in the conspiracy. On the 11th of May a reward of £1000 was offered for his apprehension. The 23rd of May was the date fixed for the general rising. Since the arrest at Bond’s, Fitzgerald had been in hiding, latterly at the house of one Murphy, a feather dealer, in Thomas Street, Dublin. He twice visited his wife in disguise; was himself visited by his stepfather, Ogilvie, and generally observed less caution than his situation required. The conspiracy was honeycombed with treachery, and it was long a matter of dispute to whose information the government were indebted for Fitzgerald’s arrest; but it is no longer open to doubt that the secret of his hiding place was disclosed by a Catholic barrister named Magan, to whom the stipulated reward was ultimately paid through Francis Higgins, another informer. On the 19th of May Major Swan and a Mr. Ryan proceeded to Murphy’s house with Major H.C. Sirr and a few soldiers. Lord Edward was discovered in bed. A desperate scuffle took place, Ryan being mortally wounded by Fitzgerald with a dagger, while Lord Edward himself was only secured after Sirr haddisabled him with a pistol bullet in the shoulder. He was conveyed to Newgate gaol, where by the kindness of Lord Clare he was visited by two of his relatives, and where he died of his wound on the 4th of June 1798. An Act of Attainder (repealed in 1819) was passed, confiscating his property; and his wife—against whom the government probably possessed sufficient evidence to secure a conviction for treason—was compelled to leave the country before her husband had actually expired.

Pamela, who was scarcely less celebrated than Lord Edward himself, and whose remarkable beauty made a lasting impression on Robert Southey, repaired to Hamburg, where in 1800 she married J. Pitcairn, the American consul. Since her marriage with Lord Edward she had been greatly beloved and esteemed by the whole Fitzgerald family; and although after her second marriage her intimacy with them ceased, there is no sufficient evidence for the tales that represented her subsequent conduct as open to grave censure. She remained to the last passionately devoted to the memory of her first husband; and she died in Paris in November 1831. A portrait of Pamela is in the Louvre. She had three children by Lord Edward Fitzgerald: Edward Fox (1794-1863); Pamela, afterwards wife of General Sir Guy Campbell; and Lucy Louisa, who married Captain Lyon, R.N.

Lord Edward Fitzgerald was of small stature and handsome features. His character and career have been made the subject of eulogies much beyond their merits. He had, indeed, a winning personality, and a warm, affectionate and generous nature, which made him greatly beloved by his family and friends; he was humorous, light-hearted, sympathetic, adventurous. But he was entirely without the weightier qualities requisite for such a part as he undertook to play in public affairs. Hotheaded and impulsive, he lacked judgment. He was as conspicuously deficient in the statesmanship as he was in the oratorical genius of such men as Flood, Plunket or Grattan. One of his associates in conspiracy described him as “weak and not fit to command a sergeant’s guard, but very zealous.” Reinhard, who considered Arthur O’Connor “a far abler man,” accurately read the character of Lord Edward Fitzgerald as that of a young man “incapable of falsehood or perfidy, frank, energetic, and likely to be a useful and devoted instrument; but with no experience or extraordinary talent, and entirely unfit to be chief of a great party or leader in a difficult enterprise.”

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