Sir Geoffrey Fenton ( â 19 October 1608) was in his younger life a productive English writer of translations from French-language sources during the Elizabethan era. He went on to have a prominent career in service to the Crown in Ireland, as Privy Councillor and Principal Secretary of State in Ireland. He was thoroughly Protestant in outlook and somewhat remorseless in pursuing his causes.
Geoffrey (spelled "Jeffrey" by John Lodge) was born in 1539, the son of Henry Fenton of Sturton-le-Steeple, Nottinghamshire, England and Cicely Beaumont, daughter of Richard Beaumont of Coleorton Hall, Leicestershire, and was the brother of Edward Fenton the navigator.
Geoffrey is said to have visited Spain and Italy in his youth: at any rate, this might reflect his efforts to bring Italian and Spanish-language sources into English through intermediate French versions. Possibly he went to Paris in Sir Thomas Hoby's train in 1566, for he was living there in 1567 when he penned the dedicatory epistle of his first notable publication, Certaine Tragicall Discourses, a collection of moral tales in the Histoires tragiques genre. Until 1579 his literary endeavours appeared under the following titles:
Several of the title-pages of these works carry the motto "Mon heur viendra", meaning "My hour will come": although arms and a crest for Sir Geoffrey himself are described by Burke, this motto is not mentioned by him, and may have expressed personal aspiration, much as the dedications of his books aspire towards a certain class of patronage.
Through Lord Burghley he obtained, in 1580, the post of secretary to the new Lord Deputy of Ireland, Lord Grey de Wilton, and thus became a fellow worker with the poet, Edmund Spenser. Fenton thereafter abandoned literature for service to the Crown in Ireland. He proved himself a zealous Protestant, who worked against the "diabolicall secte" of Rome, and urged the assassination of the Crown's most dangerous subjects. With Edward Waterhouse he oversaw the torture of Archbishop Dermot O'Hurley in 1584 in an interrogation for high treason. He secured the Queen's confidence with his written reports, but was arrested at Dublin in 1587 by the authority of the Lord Deputy, Sir John Perrot, on account of his debts, and was paraded in chains through the city. He was soon released, and made himself an instrument in Perrot's downfall in the following years.
In 1589 Fenton was knighted, and in 1590âÂÂ1591 he acted as a Commissioner at London in the controversial impeachment of Perrot, which concluded when a death sentence was passed upon the former governor. By 1603 he was Principal Secretary of State, and Privy Councillor, in Ireland.
The policies Fenton promoted in relation to woodlands in the Plantations encouraged short-term commercial exploitation and clearance for agriculture, giving little weight to their conservation as a strategic resource.
Fenton is said to have disliked the Scots and in particular James VI of Scotland, so upon James's succession to the English crown as James I of England, Fenton's post was in danger, but Cecil exerted himself in his favour, and in 1604 it was confirmed to him for life, though he had to share it with Sir Richard Coke. Fenton died in 1608, and was buried in St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin.
Fenton married in June 1585, Alice, daughter of Dr Robert Weston (formerly Lord Chancellor of Ireland, 1567-1573) by his first wife Alice Jenyngs, and widow of Dr Hugh Brady, bishop of Meath 1563-1584. They had two children:
The Parsons family of Birr Castle, who hold the title Earl of Rosse, are collateral descendants of Fenton through his sister Catherine, who married James Parsons of Leicestershire.
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