Although there is no consensus in the sources about the year, prominent County Limerick landowner Sir John Bourke (Burke, de Burgo) of Brittas was put to death around December 20 sometime during the first decade of the seventeenth century. Sir John's case is a well-documented one which is worth exploring in detail, but I will introduce him to the blog with a summary of his life and death by local historian Maurice Lenihan (1811-1895). Drawing on the account of Bishop David Rothe (1573–1650), one of a number of contemporary martyrologists who ensured that the memory of this courageous Limerick martyr remained alive, we learn of Sir John's deep faith which led him to try to leave for exile in Spain, only to be thwarted by his wife's father. I was struck by the part played by family relationships in his story. His wife Grace was from very different stock yet their daughter Eleanor, born after her father's death, shared both his faith and his commitment to the Dominican Order. She achieved the European exile denied him and entered the Order's Bom Sucesso foundation in Lisbon. The Sarsfield family also feature in the story of Sir John Bourke, indeed his is a great human interest story encompassing all of the complexities of family, politics and class during this turbulent time. I hope to explore other aspects of Sir John Bourke's case in future posts, but for now here is Bishop Rothe's account brought to us via Maurice Lenihan's 1866 work Limerick: its histories and antiquities:
In the year 1609, according to some authorities, according to others [1] in 1610, occurred the cruel execution of John Burke, Baron of Brittas, who was adjudged to a terrible death, and all his property confiscated for the use of the king, merely because a priest had been found celebrating mass in his house. His life and death were holy. Being offered, says Carve, the restitution of all his goods and a remission of the sentence passed on him, if he would only embrace the Protestant faith, he is said to have replied, "I prefer far to save my soul, to become possessor of the entire world”. His granddaughter, Honora was married to the illustrious defender of Limerick, Patrick Sarsfield, Earl of Lucan, and after his death at Landen in Flanders, to the Duke of Berwick. [2]
We extract from Rothe's Analecta, translated in the White MSS. a detailed account of this event, which is the best possible commentary on the pretended toleration of the hypocritical pedant, who now occupied the throne of England.
This illustrious champion of his faith was descended from such a noble family, and was possessed of so plentiful a fortune, as that Sir George Thornton, one of the chief governors of Munster, thought him to be a great match for his daughter, Grace Thornton, to whom the Lord Brittas was married, and had nine children by her. He formed a purpose of going to Spain, in order the more freely to enjoy the benefits of the Catholic religion, which at this time was greatly persecuted in Ireland; but his design being discovered to his father-in-law, Sir George, he so effectually managed with his fellow-governor, Sir Charles Wilmot, as entirely to prevent the Lord Brittas's departure. Being thus destuted in his journey he more fully and publicly performed all acts of the Catholic religion, by going openly to mass, assisting at sermons, having mass said in his own house, whither all the neighbours resorted to hear it; his domestic affairs he left entirely to his wife, and devoted himself entirely to religion, by harbouring and supporting ecclesiastics and religious persons, especially those of the order of St. Dominick. This, his conduct, being represented in a new light to Charles Mountjoy, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, in his passage to Limerick, he thereupon forfeited the Lord Brittas's estate, and it was with the greatest interest and difficulty it was afterwards restored to him. He no sooner got possession, but he prepared a large hall in his house of Brittas for performing divine service therein the following Sunday, which was the first Sunday of October, and whither all those of the sodality of the rosary came to perform their devotions. When the President was informed of this, he sent one Captain Miller with a detachment of horse to apprehend Lord Brittas, just as divine service was going to begin. The congregation was alarmed, and through fear dispersed up and down; the Lord Brittas, with his chaplain and three or four servants, retired into a strong tower adjoining his house, into which they denied Miller or his troop admittance. The President made handle of this to have him proclaimed as rebel, which laid the Lord Brittas under the necessity of seeking shelter in foreign countries ; to effect this he went to a distant seaport, in hopes of meeting with a ship to transport him, but he was disappointed, which made him seek for shelter in the inland country; but the edicts against him being published everywhere, he was discovered in Carrick, and apprehended by the magistrate of that town and confined in jail.
When his wife, who was with child, visited him in his confinement, his entire entertainment with her was inculcating on her the principles of the faith, the devotion to the Blessed Virgin, and that she may avoid all commerce with heretics; he, by her, wrote letters to father Edmond Hallaghan, the director of the Sodality, entreating him to have care of her instruction, and though she was big with child, by her husband's orders, she travelled from Carrick to Waterford, and from thence to Kilkenny, in quest of said director. The Lord Brittas, by the President's orders, was removed from Carrick to Limerick, where the President was to hold a court in a short time. On his trial the President assured him that he neither thirsted after his life, nor his estate, both which he should have, provided he conformed to the Protestant faith and religion: but the Lord Brittas absolutely refused to comply, or forsake the true religion he was educated in. The two Lord Justices, whose office it was to try him, having remorse of conscience, evaded it, whereupon the President, with despotic authority, ordered Dominick Sarswell, the King's attorney, to try him, which he did, contrary to the dictates of his conscience. He asked the Lord Brittas if he would conform, as it was the King's pleasure, but was answered by him that he knew no king or queen who renounced the law and faith of the King of kings; thereupon Sarswill declared him guilty of high treason, and pronounced sentence of death against him, that he should be hanged, beheaded, and quartered, which sentence the said Brittas received with a joyful and cheerful countenance. When he was brought to the place of execution outside of the city, he behaved with the greatest devotion and composure, as if going to feast. When he was hanged, Sir Thomas Brown, and many other gentlemen, interceded with the President, that he should not be quartered, and their request was granted; his friends conveyed his body into town, and he was buried in St. John's church, Limerick, the 20th of December, in the year 1607.
So far Rothe, who gives the date two years earlier than Carve.
His daughter, Eleanor Bourke, became a Dominican Nun, and died in 1646 in the Irish Dominican Nunnery of Lisbon, in the odour of sanctity.
Maurice Lenihan, Limerick: its histories and antiquities, (Dublin, 1866), p.133-134.
[1] Carve, a Tipperary man and notary apostolic, refers this event to 1610 in his "Annals of Ireland," page 315.
[2] See O'Daly's History of the Geraldines, and Hibernia Dominicana, p. 565, where his daughter, a sanctified Dominican nun, is said to have died in 1646.
Sir John Bourke of Brittas is number 116 on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918) whose names were submitted to Rome for consideration. No further progress has been made with his cause.
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