Sir John Perrot

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Perrot, Sir John (c.1527–1592). Perrot began his Irish career with a ruthless suppression of the first Desmond rebellion as provincial president of Munster (1571–3). He returned as lord deputy (1584–8), with orders to hold a parliament to confiscate the Desmond lands and to agree a composition with the Palesmen. His team's failure to get Poynings's Law suspended meant most intended legislation had to be abandoned.

Perrot wanted to introduce English law and land tenure into Ulster. Shiring, composition, and surrender and regrant were accomplished in theory but not in practice. Even his partition of Cavan was maintained only by keeping the tánaiste imprisoned in Dublin Castle. When war broke out with Spain in 1585, Perrot was forced to compromise with Sorley MacDonnell, whom he had earlier tried to evict.

Perrot's activism brought many enemies. He disagreed with Archbishop Loftus over plans for Dublin university, with Black Tom Butler (10th earl of Ormond) over the extension of the composition to Kilkenny, with Bingham over jurisdiction in Connacht, and with Nicholas Bagenal over Ulster policies.

In 1592 Perrot was convicted of treason on evidence trumped up by his successor Fitzwilliam, but Queen Elizabeth refused to execute him and he was rehabilitated in the 1620s.

Hiram Morgan

Perrot, Sir John (c.1527–92). Lord deputy of Ireland. Perrot was one of many who came to grief in the bogs of Tudor Irish politics. A Pembrokeshire man, he established his reputation as a jouster and was knighted at Edward VI's coronation. As a protestant he was in some difficulty during Mary's reign but Elizabeth chose him to help carry the canopy of state at her coronation. From 1570 to 1573 he was governor of Munster, spending most of his time dealing with James Fitzgerald. After some years mainly employed as vice-admiral of the Welsh seas, he was sent back to Ireland in 1584 as lord deputy. His first action was to subdue the Macdonnells in Ulster. But he found the Dublin Parliament difficult to deal with, quarrelled violently with colleagues, and was recalled in 1588. In 1591 he was sent to the Tower on a charge of treason, accused of speaking against Elizabeth and plotting with Philip of Spain. He died while under sentence of death.

J. A. Cannon