newed his submission so humbly that the deputy suggested the advisability of conceding his requests and making him baron of Offaly. Henry yielded to St. Leger's suggestion, but nothing further apparently came of the proposal; though O'Conor and his brother Cahir had meanwhile, on 16 Aug. 1541, consented to submit their differences to arbitration. So long as St. Leger remained in Ireland O'Conor kept the peace, paying his rent regularly; but during his absence some slight disturbances occurred on the borders of the Pale, which the council sarcastically ascribed to ‘your lordshipes olde frende Occhonor.’ St. Leger attributed the insinuation to the malice of the chancellor, Sir John Alen, and in May 1545 mooted the propriety of rewarding O'Conor's loyalty by creating him a viscount. The proposal was sanctioned by the privy council, but it was not carried into effect, though, at St. Leger's recommendation, a grant of land was made to him in the vicinity of Dublin, together with the use of a house in St. Patrick's Close whenever he visited the city. But whether it was that he was discontented at the indifference of the government, or thought that the accession of Edward VI presented a favourable opportunity to recover his old authority, he, in the summer of 1547, joined with O'More in an attack on the Pale, nominally in behalf of the exiled house of Kildare. St. Leger at once invaded Offaly, which he burnt and plundered as far as the hill of Croghan, but ‘without receiving either battle or submission’ from O'Conor. No sooner, however, had he retired than O'More and O'Conor's son Rory emerged from their hiding-places, burnt the town and monastery of Athy, ravaged the borders of the Pale, and slew many persons, both English and Irish. St. Leger thereupon invaded Offaly a second time, and, remaining there for fifteen days, burnt and destroyed whatever had escaped in former raids. Deserted by their followers, O'Conor and O'More fled across the Shannon into Connaught. They returned about the beginning of 1548 with a considerable body of wild kerns, but so cowed were their urraghts and tribesmen that none dared even afford them food or protection. Nevertheless, O'Conor managed to keep up a determined guerilla warfare, and it was not till winter brought him face to face with starvation that he was induced to submit, his life being promised him in order to induce O'More to follow his example. He was sent to England and incarcerated in the Tower. He managed to escape early in 1552, but was recaptured on the borders of Scotland. He was afterwards released by Queen Mary, at the intercession of his daughter Margaret. He returned to Ireland in 1554 with the Earl of Kildare, but was shortly afterwards rearrested and imprisoned in Dublin Castle, where apparently he died about 1560.
By his wife Mary, daughter of Gerald Fitzgerald, ninth earl of Kildare, O'Conor had apparently nine sons and two daughters, several of whom played considerable parts in the history of the times, viz.: Cormac, who, after an adventurous career in Ireland, escaped to Scotland in 1550, and thence to France in 1551, where he remained till 1560, returning in that year to Scotland. He returned to Ireland in 1564, under the assumed name of Killeduff, and was for some time protected by the Earl of Desmond; but, being proclaimed a traitor, he again fled to Scotland. At the intercession of the Earl of Argyll he was pardoned in 1565. He returned to Ireland, and disappears from history in 1573. Donough, the second son, was delivered to Grey in 1538 as hostage for his father's loyalty; but, being released, he took part in the rebellion of 1547. In 1548 he was pressed for foreign service. He returned to Ireland, but being involved in an insurrection of the O'Conors in 1557, he was proclaimed a traitor and was killed in the following year, not without suspicion of treachery, by Owny MacHugh O'Dempsey. Calvach, the third son, after a long career as a rebel, was killed in action in October 1564.
Cathal or Charles O'Connor or O'Conor Faly, otherwise known as Don Carlos (1540–1596), a younger son, born about 1540, was taken when quite a child to Scotland. He accompanied D'Oysel to France in 1560, and appealed to Throckmorton to intercede for his pardon and restoration. By Throckmorton's advice he attached himself as a spy to the train of Mary Queen of Scots. In 1563 he obtained a grant of Castle Brackland and other lands in Offaly. He was implicated in the rebellion of James Fitzmaurice and the Earl of Desmond, and placed himself outside the pale of mercy by his barbarous murder of Captain Henry Mackworth in 1582. He avoided capture, and subsequently escaped in a pinnace to Scotland, and thence, disguised as a sailor, on a Scottish vessel to Spain. He joined the army of invasion under Parma in the Netherlands, and after the defeat of the Armada returned to Spain, where he was dubbed Don Carlos (a fact which has led to his being mistaken for the unfortunate prince of Spain of that name) and granted a pension of thirty crowns a month. He corresponded at intervals with Hugh O'Neill, earl of Tyrone, and endea-
