Richard Preston, 1st Earl of Desmond

Background and early life

Richard was the third son of Richard Preston of Whitehill in Midlothian, near Edinburgh. His family was gentry of the Edinburgh area and owned Craigmillar Castle in the late 16th and early 17th century. He was known as Richard Preston of Haltree.

Royal favourite

Richard Preston joined James VI in his marriage trip to Norway and Denmark in 1589. He is recorded a page at the court from 1591. King James had a series of personal relationships with male courtiers, called his favourites, suspected to have been the king's homosexual partners. Esmé Stewart, whom he made Earl and Duke of Lennox, seems to have been the first. After the Raid of Ruthven in 1582, the King was forced to exile Lord Lennox to France.

Richard Preston gained the king's special favour in the 1580s or 1590s after Lennox's departure. He taught military skills to Prince Henry. When King James acceded to the English throne in 1603, Preston accompanied him to England and was knighted at the King's coronation in London on 25 July 1603 in the old elaborate ceremony that included the bathing of the new knight. He then was made a groom of the privy chamber. In 1607, Preston was appointed constable of Dingwall Castle in Scotland. He bought the barony of Dingwall and on 8 June 1609 the King created him Lord Dingwall. In London the King met in 1608 Robert Carr who became his favourite and seems to have supplanted Lord Dingwall, as he was now, in that role.

Masques and tournament pageants

On 6 January 1607, Preston was a performer as a Knight of Apollo in Lord Hay's Masque at Whitehall Palace, part of the celebrations at the wedding of Sir James Hay and Honora Denny. The nine knights were released from enchanted trees by the goddess of night.

In 1609, Preston attended the Accession day tournament, and presented a pageant of an artificial elephant, designed by Inigo Jones, which made its way slowly around the tiltyard. When Prince Henry was made Prince of Wales, a Scottish lord, either Preston or Lord Hay, presented a pageant on 6 June 1610, where "verie costlie apparelled" courtiers arrived in an artificial cloud. The cloud showered the spectators with water.

A tournament of tilting was held on New Year's Day 1614, to celebrate the wedding of Robert Carr and Frances Howard. The bride's team wore "murrey" and white and the groom's team were in green and yellow. Preston rode in murrey in the team of Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox (the son of Esmé Stewart), with the professionals Sigismund Zinzan and Henry Zinzan.

Marriage and child

In 1614, King James arranged for Lord Dingwall to marry an heiress, Lady Elizabeth Butler, only daughter of the Thomas Butler and widow of Theobald Butler, 1st Viscount Butler of Tulleophelim,

The King imposed this marriage on Elizabeth's father. The Earl of Ormond did not want the royal favourite for a son-in-law but could not oppose the King's will. Black Tom died soon after the marriage on 22 November 1614.

Richard and Elizabeth had an only child:

• Elizabeth (1615–1684), married James Butler and became Duchess of Ormond.

Later life and death

On 19 July 1619 Lord Dingwall was created Earl of Desmond. The Earldom of Desmond had originally been held by the Hiberno-Norman FitzGerald dynasty who were stripped of the title after the failure of the Second Desmond Rebellion against Queen Elizabeth I of England. After Richard Preston's death, the title again became extinct but, under the terms of letter patent issued by James I in 1622, it was immediately re-created for George Feilding (son of the Earl of Denbigh) who was intended to marry Preston's daughter.

Alfred Webb tells us of this creation of the earldom of Desmond that:

Thomas Butler, 10th Earl of Ormond, in right of his mother, Joan FitzGerald, daughter of the 11th Earl of Desmond, claimed the Earldom after the death and attainder of all the heirs male. When his daughter was married to James I.'s Scotch favourite, Sir Richard Preston, the title was conferred on him. When the only child of the latter, a daughter, was about to be married to the son of the Earl of Denbigh, the title was passed to the intended bridegroom. The marriage never took place; yet the title was retained [by] the Earls of Denbigh.

On 26 May 1623, King James I made the young James Butler, the future Duke of Ormond, a ward of Lord Desmond, and placed James at Lambeth, London, under the care of George Abbot, archbishop of Canterbury to be brought up as a Protestant.

His wife, Elizabeth Butler died on 10 October 1628 in Wales. On 28 October 1628 Lord Desmond was drowned on a passage between Dublin and Holyhead.

10th Earl](james-fitzgerald-10th-earl-of-desmond) d. 1529|boxstyle_JmD10=border-width: 1px; border-radius: 0.5em; background: lightcyan;}} 9th Earl](james-butler-9th-earl-of-ormond) 1496–1546|boxstyle_JmsO9=border-width: 1px; border-radius: 0.5em; background: lavender; FitzGerald**](joan-fitzgerald-countess-of-ormond) d. 1565}} 10th Earl](thomas-butler-10th-earl-of-ormonde) c. 1531 – 1614 Black Tom|boxstyle_ThO10=border-width: 1px; border-radius: 0.5em; background: lavender; Sheffield** Kilcash**](john-butler-of-kilcash) d. 1570 MacCarthy**}} Viscount Tulleophelim](theobald-butler-1st-viscount-butler-of-tulleophelim) d. 1613 Preston 1st Earl Desmond d. 1628|boxstyle_Sbjct=border: 2px solid red; border-radius: 0.5em; background: lightcyan; Butler**](elizabeth-butler-countess-of-desmond) c. 1585 – 1628 11th Earl](walter-butler-11th-earl-of-ormond) 1559 – 1633 'Beads'|boxstyle_WtO11=border-width: 1px; border-radius: 0.5em; background: lavender; Butler** d. 1631}} Viscount Thurles](thomas-butler-viscount-thurles) d. 1619 d.v.p.* Pointz**](elizabeth-lady-thurles) 1587–1673}} 1st Duke](james-butler-1st-duke-of-ormond) 1610–1688|boxstyle_JsDO1=border-width: 1px; border-radius: 0.5em; background: lavender; Preston**](elizabeth-butler-duchess-of-ormond) 1615–1684 of Kilcash** 1615–1701 Tuchet**}} 6th Earl Ossory](thomas-butler-6th-earl-of-ossory) 1633–1680 d.v.p.* von Nassau**](emilia-butler-countess-of-ossory) 1635–1688 1st Earl Arran](richard-butler-1st-earl-of-arran) 1639–1684 Countess of Chesterfield](elizabeth-butler-stanhope-countess-of-chesterfield) 1640–1665 of Garryricken** d. 1700 Preston|boxstyle_SbjTx=border: 0 solid white; text-align: left; Ormond](duke-of-ormond)|boxstyle_Bk1Tx=border: 0 solid white; text-align: left; Desmond](duke-of-ormond)|boxstyle_Bk2Tx=border: 0 solid white; text-align: left;}}

References

Sources

• – 1613 to 1641
• – D to F (for Desmond)
• – N to R (for Ormond)
• – (for timeline)
• – Viscounts (for Butler, Viscount Mountgarrett)
• – Crawford to Falkland (for Dingwall)
• – Innermeath to Mar (for Lennox)
• – (for Richard Preston)

References

1. Miles Kerr-Peterson and Michael Pearce, "James VI's English Subsidy and Danish Dowry Accounts", ''Miscellany of the Scottish History Society'', XVI (Woodbridge, 2020), p. 51.
2. Sarah Fraser, ''The prince who would be king: the life and death of Henry Stuart'' (William Collins, 2017), pp. 31–32.
3. David Lindley, ''Court Masques'' (Oxford, 1995), p. 21–22, 28–29.
4. Martin Wiggins and Catherine Richardson, ''British Drama: 1609-1616'' (Oxford, 2012), pp. 78–79.
5. ''HMC Manuscripts in various collections'', 3 (London, 1904), p. 264.
6. Norman Egbert McClure, ''Letters of John Chamberlain'', 1 (Philadelphia, 1939), p. 498.
7. John Nichols, ''Progresses of James the First'', 2 (London, 1828), p. 729.
8. This family tree is partly derived from the condensed Butler family tree pictured in Dunboyne, pp. 16–17. Also see the mention of his daughter in the text.