THE PURCELL FAMILY’S CONNECTION WITH THE BUTLER FAMILY OF ORMOND
The first part of the attached Purcell history (in .pdf format) explains in some detail the extent to which the Purcells of Co. Tipperary and Co. Kilkenny, in their first five centuries in Ireland, owed their position to the Butlers of Ormond.
In the Middle Ages, the Purcells held Loughmoe and the manor of Corketeny from their feudal overlords, the Butlers of Ormond. Sir Hugh Purcell, first Baron of Loughmoe (d. 1240) acquired Loughmoe and many other knights’ fees upon his marriage circa 1220 to Beatrix Butler, daughter of the 1st Chief Butler of Ireland (the head of the Butler family). In 1305, Sir Hugh’s grandson, also called Sir Hugh Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe (‘Dominus Hugo de Purcell’), held Corketeny from his cousin Edmund Butler, 6th Chief Butler of Ireland (and father of the 1st Earl of Ormond), in return for military service.
In a March 1338 inquisition held weeks after the death of James Butler, 1st Earl of Ormond, it was confirmed that John Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe had held several knights’ fees in Corketeny from the 1st Earl in return for ‘5 [pounds] of royal service when scutage runs, a sparrowhawk yearly, and doing suit at court.’ In 1362, the manors of Loughmoe, Corketeny and Ikerrin held by yet another Hugh Purcell were forfeited to the Crown, and King Edward III thereupon transferred them to his first cousin once removed, James Butler, 2nd Earl of Ormond, who then granted a life interest in two of the manors to Geoffrey Roth Purcell and Geoffrey, son of John Mór Purcell.
The oldest portion of Loughmoe Castle was built between 1444 and 1494, probably by James Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe and his wife, a Butler. James fought in the 1460s in support of the Butler lordship against troops of the Earl of Desmond. In a deed signed at Loughmoe in March 1518, Thomas Purcell, who used the title of ‘Baron of Loughmoe and Corketeny,’ confirmed that he held his lands from Piers Butler, 8th Earl of Ormond ‘as his ancestors had and held them from old times, to have and to hold to the Earl and his heirs.’
Loughmoe Castle passed out of the hands of the Purcell family following the deaths in 1722 and 1737, respectively, of the last Baron of Loughmoe, Colonel Nicholas Purcell, and his widow. The last Baron’s father, James Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe married a Butler (Elisabeth Butler, sister of James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde and 12th Earl of Ormond), as did his grandfather, Theobald Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe (Ellen Butler, daughter of the 12th Baron Dunboyne).
In 1967 an organization was begun in Kilkenny called The Butler Society, with the aim of preserving Butler records, manuscripts and history and of bringing together Butlers and those interested in the history of the Butlers. The Butler Society publishes a scholarly journal of high quality containing articles which should be of interest to families, such as the Purcells, who were closely allied with the Butlers. We encourage Purcells to visit The Butler Society’s website (https://butlersociety.org) and to consider membership. The success of The Butler Society directly inspired the formation in 2021 of The Purcell Society, which has goals similar to those of The Butler Society: that is, to commemorate Purcell history, preserve Purcell documents and bring Purcells and Purcell descendants together.
The late Hubert Butler (1900-1991), the extraordinarily gifted intellectual, writer and essayist, was the co-founder and chairman of The Butler Society. In a letter dated 4 May 1983, Hubert Butler, referring to the Butlers and the Purcells, wrote, ‘It is astonishing to me that no scholarly studies -or very few- have been made of these old Irish families.’ As to the Purcells, we hope the attached history will start to address that deficiency. Hubert Butler also expressed in this letter the hope that one day there might be a Purcell Society and societies of other families closely associated with the Butlers.
James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde and 12th Earl of Ormond, K.G. (1610-1688), viceroy of Ireland and head of the Butler family, shown in his Garter robes. At the Restoration of King Charles II in 1660, he became the guardian of his young nephew, Nicholas Purcell, last Baron of Loughmoe (d. 1722). Nicholas Purcell’s mother, Elisabeth Butler (widow of James Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe), was a sister of the Duke. There are unfortunately no surviving portraits of Colonel Nicholas Purcell.
Kilkenny Castle, principal seat of the Butlers of Ormond from 1391, when James Butler, 3rd Earl of Ormond acquired it, until 1967, when Arthur Butler, 6th Marquess of Ormonde and 24th Earl of Ormond, presented it to the people of Kilkenny.
This portrait by Sir Peter Lely shows Thomas Butler, Earl of Ossory, K.G., son and heir of the 1st Duke of Ormonde. Ossory was a first cousin of Nicholas Purcell, last Baron of Loughmoe. Ossory did not succeed to the dukedom because he died at age 46 in 1680, during the lifetime of his father. The 1st Duke had the distinction of sitting in the Irish House of Lords with all three of his surviving sons and sitting in the English House of Lords with two of his three sons. Ossory’s Dutch wife, Emilia van Nassau (granddaughter of Maurice, Prince of Orange), was a cousin of William, Prince of Orange, the future King William III of England, Scotland and Ireland, whom Ossory came to know well. In 1677 and 1678, Ossory commanded the British troops in Prince William of Orange’s allied army in the Netherlands. In 1678, when Ossory was in the Netherlands, his father, the 1st Duke, wrote to him, ‘I believe I shall shortly send you over one Toby Purcell, but as a very valuable present, for he is as honest a creature as lives, very brave and well experienced. I wish him near you on all occasions…I am confident he would make an excellent captain, major or adjutant; he has something of all the languages there in use, and he is a Protestant by conviction and not for interest.’ Lieutenant-Colonel Toby Purcell later fought as a Williamite officer at the battles of the Boyne and Aughrim in 1690 and 1691, serving as second in command of the 23rd Regiment of Foot (later the Royal Welch Fusiliers). On 13 July 1691, the day after the battle of Aughrim, King William III promoted Toby Purcell to Colonel of Infantry and placed him in command of the 23rd Foot. An image of his commission, signed by William III, is in the Photographs section of this website.
James Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormonde, K.G., the son of the above Earl of Ossory, had a long and turbulent life. He succeeded his grandfather as 2nd Duke of Ormonde and 13th Earl of Ormond in 1688, at age 23. Months after Ormonde succeeded to his titles, the Catholic King James II was toppled. Parliament called James II’s Protestant daughter Mary and son-in-law William of Orange to the throne as Mary II and William III, joint sovereigns. Ormonde, a Protestant like his father and grandfather but unlike most of the other Butlers, eventually supported William and Mary, to whom he was connected. William III was a cousin of Ormonde’s Dutch mother, Emilia van Nassau. Queen Mary II (as well as her younger sister, the future Queen Anne) were first cousins of Ormonde’s beloved late wife, Lady Anne Hyde. Although he was the head of the House of Butler, Ormonde’s Williamite sympathies placed him in a minority among the peers of his house. His Catholic kinsmen, the other Butler peers of Ireland, were all Jacobites: the Viscount Mountgarret, the Viscount Galmoy, the Viscount Ikerrin, the Baron Dunboyne, and the Baron Cahir. Ormonde, as colonel in command of the Queen’s Troop of Horse Guards, fought at the battle of the Boyne in 1690 against Jacobite regiments commanded by various cousins of his, including Colonel the Viscount Galmoy (Piers Butler, 3rd Viscount Galmoy), Colonel Thomas Butler of Garryricken (father of the future 15th Earl of Ormond) and Colonel Nicholas Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe. His cousin Captain the Lord Dunboyne (James Butler, who succeeded in 1690 as the 5th and 15th Baron Dunboyne) was an officer in Colonel Nicholas Purcell’s cavalry regiment. After the Jacobite defeat of 1691, Ormonde discreetly assisted his outlawed Jacobite kinsmen. Under Queen Anne, he was successively viceroy of Ireland and Captain-General of Her Majesty’s Land Forces in England, Scotland and Ireland. After the death of Queen Anne in 1714 and the accession to the throne of the House of Hanover, however, he was accused of Jacobite sympathies and fled in 1715 to France, where he revealed himself to be a Jacobite. He became a trusted advisor to James II’s exiled son, James Francis Edward Stuart, whom the Hanoverians called the Old Pretender and whom the Jacobites, the King of France and the Pope called King James III of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1745, James Francis Edward’s son Prince Charles Edward Stuart (‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’), traveling in disguise while en route to Paris to begin his expedition to Scotland, stayed secretly with Ormonde at the latter’s residence in Avignon. Abbé James Butler of Nantes, France, the Irish Catholic priest and Ormonde kinsman who was chaplain to Bonnie Prince Charlie on the 1745 sea voyage to Scotland, penned a letter to the Duke of Ormonde describing the July 1745 landing in Scotland. Ormonde died months later, in November 1745.
Portrait of Thomas Butler, 10th Earl of Ormond, K.G. (1541-1613). Thomas Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe (d.1599) was loyal to the 10th Earl, but their relationship was complicated and was at times marked by hostility on the part of the Earl. In the 1580s, a Butler army commanded by two brothers of the 10th Earl as well as by Thomas Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe and by Lord Dunboyne (a peer of the Butler family) fought the forces of the Earl of Desmond at Goart-na-Pisi. In a 1606 letter, Thomas Purcell’s son, Richard Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe lamented that the 10th Earl had persecuted his father and mother ‘from time to time by long imprisonment and such other extremities, and to take a principal part of their lands to his own hands.’ Ellen Purcell, daughter of Thomas Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe, married Piers Butler of Nodstown, Co. Tipperary (died 1627), only son of Walter Butler, younger brother of Thomas Butler, 10th Earl of Ormond.
St. Canice’s Cathedral, Kilkenny: Tomb of Piers Butler, 8th Earl of Ormond (1467-1539) and his wife Margaret FitzGerald. Following the death of Thomas Butler, 7th Earl of Ormond, his distant cousin Piers claimed the Ormond title as the nearest male heir. In England, Anne Boleyn’s father, Sir Thomas Boleyn (whose mother Lady Margaret Butler was a daughter of the 7th Earl) also claimed the title. Henry VIII awarded the title to Boleyn and in recompense created Piers as 1st Earl of Ossory. After the Boleyns fell from favour, however, Henry VIII recognized Piers as the rightful 8th Earl of Ormond. As stated above, in 1518 Thomas Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe signed a deed confirming that he held Loughmoe and Corketeny from Piers, 8th Earl of Ormond, in the same manner that his Purcell ancestors had done from old times.
A medieval carving of a Butler knight at Jerpoint Abbey in Thomastown, Co. Kilkenny. The knight’s shield bears the simple coat of arms of the Butlers (‘Or a chief indented azure’ in heraldic terms, meaning a gold shield with a blue indented stripe at the top).
A photograph of the main fireplace in the great hall of the south tower of Loughmoe Castle. The shield at the far left end of the mantelpiece once displayed the Purcell coat of arms. The Purcell arms were still visible there in 1892 but were later defaced. The faintly visible shield at the far right side of the mantelpiece, as shown in this photograph, displays the same simple Butler coat of arms (‘Or a chief indented azure’) as shown on the knight’s shield in the previous photograph. These were probably the arms of James Purcell, Baron of Loughmoe (alive in 1465) and his wife, a Butler. The south tower was built in the 1444-1494 period, and James Purcell and his wife were likely the lord and lady of the castle when the south tower was finished. Standing in the fireplace in this 1977 photograph was the German archaeologist Prince Frederick-Ernest of Saxe-Altenburg, Duke of Saxony (1905-1985), a friend of George Butler, 5th Marquess of Ormonde and 23rd Earl of Ormond (1890-1949).