James Fitz Maurice Fitz Gerald - Continental Intrigue

Continental Intrigue

On the return to Ireland of the Earl of Desmond in 1573, FitzMaurice found his leadership too amenable to the crown and quit for the continent, offering his reasons variously as a desire to gain pardon from the queen through the French court, and the unkindness of the earl. In March 1575 he and his family, along with the Geraldine Seneschal of Imokilly, James Fitzedmund Fitzgerald, and the White Knight, Edmund Fitzgibbon, sailed on the La Arganys for St Malo, Brittany where they were received by the governor. He had several interviews with Catherine de' Medici in Paris, even offering to help make Henry III of France king of Ireland, and was granted a pension of 5000 crowns in 1576. Early in the following year he left for the Spanish court, where he offered the crown to the brother of King Philip II, Don John; the king was not enthusiastic, and FitzMaurice left his boys, Maurice and Gerald, with Cardinal Granvelle, and travelled to Italy to meet Pope Gregory XIII.