James Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormonde

James was born on 29 April 1665 at Dublin Castle. He was the second but eldest surviving son of Thomas Butler by his wife Emilia van Nassau-Beverweerd.[1] His father was known as Lord Ossory. He was heir apparent of James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond but predeceased him and so never became duke. His father's family, the Butler dynasty, was Old English and descended from Theobald Walter, who had been appointed Chief Butler of Ireland by King Henry II in 1177.[2] James's mother was Dutch. She descended from a cadet branch of the House of Nassau. Both parents were Protestant. They married on 17 November 1659.[3]

They had eleven children.[4]

He was educated in France and afterwards at Christ Church, Oxford.[8] On the death of his father on 30 July 1680 he became Baron Butler in the English peerage and the 7th Earl of Ossory in the Irish Peerage.[9]

The Battle of the Boyne, at which Butler commanded the Queen's Troop.

Arms of James Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormonde

He obtained command of a cavalry regiment in Ireland in 1683,[10] and having received an appointment at court on the accession of James II, he served against the Duke of Monmouth at the Battle of Sedgemoor in July 1685.[11] Having succeeded his grandfather as 2nd Duke of Ormonde on 21 July 1688, he was appointed a Knight of the Order of the Garter on 28 September 1688.[12] In 1688 he also became Chancellor of the University of Dublin[13] and Chancellor of the University of Oxford.[14]

In January and February 1689 he voted against the motion to put William of Orange and Mary on the throne and against the motion to declare that James II had abdicated it.[15] Nevertheless, he subsequently joined the forces of William of Orange, by whom he was made colonel of the Queen's Troop of Horse Guards on 20 April 1689. He accompanied William in his Irish campaign, debarking with him in Carrickfergus on 14 June 1690[16] and commanded this troop at the Battle of the Boyne in July 1690.[17] In February 1691 he became Lord Lieutenant of Somerset.[18]

He served on the continent under William of Orange during the Nine Years' War and, having been promoted to major-general, he fought at the Battle of Steenkerque in August 1692 and the Battle of Landen in July 1693, where he was taken prisoner by the French and then exchanged for the Duke of Berwick, James II's illegitimate son.[19] He was promoted to lieutenant-general in 1694.[20]

After the accession of Queen Anne in March 1702, he became commander of the land forces co-operating with Sir George Rooke in Spain, where he fought in the Battle of Cádiz in August 1702[21] and the Battle of Vigo Bay in October 1702 during the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1714).[22] Having been made a Privy Councillor, Ormonde succeeded Lord Rochester as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1703.[23] In 1704 he leased and rebuilt a property that became known as Ormonde Lodge in Richmond outside London.[24]

Following the dismissal of the Duke of Marlborough, Ormonde was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Forces and colonel of the 1st Regiment of Foot Guards on 4 January 1712[25] and Captain-General on 26 February 1712.[26][27] In the Irish Parliament Ormonde and the majority of peers supported the Tory interest.[28]

James when he was still Lord Ossory

Ormonde's position as Captain-General made him a personage of much importance in the crisis brought about by the death of Queen Anne and, during the last years of Queen Anne, Ormonde almost certainly had Jacobite leanings and corresponded with the Jacobite Court including his cousin, Piers Butler, 3rd Viscount Galmoye, who kept barrels of gunpowder at Kilkenny Castle.[39] King George I on his accession to the throne in August 1714 instituted extensive changes and excluded the Tories from royal favour. Ormonde was stripped of his posts as Captain-General, as colonel of the 1st Regiment of Foot Guards and as Commander in Chief of the Forces with the first two posts going to the Duke of Marlborough[40] and the role of Commander-in-Chief going to the Earl of Stair. On 19 November 1714 Ormonde was instead made a member of the reconstituted Privy Council of Ireland.[41]

James Butler c. 1725–1730

Accused of supporting the Jacobite rising of 1715, during which the rebels had shouted "High church and Ormond",[42] he was impeached for high treason by Lord Stanhope on 21 June 1715.[43] He might have avoided the impending storm of Parliamentary prosecution, if he had remained in England and stood trial but instead he chose to flee to France in August 1715[44] and initially stayed in Paris with Lord Bolingbroke.[45] On 20 August 1715 he was attainted, his estate forfeited, and honours extinguished.[46] The Earl Marshal was instructed to remove the names and armorial bearings of Ormonde and Bolingbroke from the list of peers[47] and Ormonde's banner as Knight of the Garter was taken down in St George's Chapel.[48]

On 20 June 1716, the Parliament of Ireland passed an act extinguishing the regalities and liberties of the county palatine of Tipperary; for vesting his estate in the crown[49] and for giving a reward of £10,000 for his apprehension, should he attempt to land in Ireland.[50] But the same parliament passed an act on 24 June 1721, to enable his brother Charles Butler, 1st Earl of Arran, to purchase his estate, which he accordingly did.[51]

Ormonde subsequently moved to Spain[52] where he held discussions with Cardinal Alberoni.[53] He later took part in a Spanish and Jacobite plan to invade England and put James Francis Edward Stuart on the British throne in 1719, but his fleet was disbanded by a storm in the Bay of Biscay.[54][55] In 1732 he moved to Avignon,[56] where he was seen in 1733 by the writer, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.[57] Ormonde died at Avignon in exile on 16 November 1745, but his body was brought back to London and buried in Westminster Abbey on 22 May 1746.[58][59]

Mary Somerset, his second wife, painted by Michael Dahl

On 20 July 1682 he, then called Lord Ossory, married Lady Anne Hyde, daughter of Laurence Hyde, who was then Viscount Hyde of Kenilworth but became Earl of Rochester in November.[60] The couple had a daughter, Mary, who died young in 1688.[61]

Following the death of his first wife (which is known to have caused him intense grief) in 1685, Ossory planned to marry again, in order to secure a male heir. He gained permission from the House of Lords for the arranging of a jointure for another marriage in May 1685,[62] and in August of that year, he married Lady Mary Somerset,[63] daughter of the Duke of Beaufort and Mary Capel. [64] The couple had a son, Thomas (1686–1689), and two daughters, Elizabeth (1689–1750) and Mary (1690–1713).[65] Ormonde's second wife was a lady of the bedchamber to Queen Anne.[66] Their younger daughter, Mary, married John Ashburnham, 1st Earl of Ashburnham.[67]

• List of deserters from James II to William of Orange

• Clarendon, Edward, Earl of (1736). A vindication of the conduct of James, Duke of Ormonde during his long and faithful administration in Ireland.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• Faculty of Advocates (Scotland). Library (1867). Catalogue of the Printed Books in the Library of the Faculty of Advocates: A-Byzantium. 1867. Vol. 1. W. Blackwood and sons. p. 812.
• Murdoch, Tessa (ed.) (2022). Great Irish Households: Inventories from the Long Eighteenth Century. Cambridge: John Adamson, pp. 25–85 ISBN 978-1-898565-17-8 OCLC 1233305993.
• Wilson, Rachel (2015). Elite Women in Ascendancy Ireland, 1690–1745: Imitation and Innovation. Boydell and Brewer, Woodbridge. ISBN 978-1-7832-7039-2.

• Media related to James Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormonde at Wikimedia Commons
• "Archival material relating to James Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormonde". UK National Archives.

• This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Ormonde, James Butler, 2nd Duke of". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 20 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 297–298.