gus, after which Carrickfergus surrendered (ib. p. 436; A Bloody Fight in Ireland and a great Victory obtained by Sir Charles Coote, Lord President of Connaught, and commander of those forces, and of Londonderry, against the British forces of Laggan, with some Regiments of Irish and Highlanders under Major-general Monro, 1649). In the beginning of 1650 he advanced towards Belfast (Whitelocke, p. 433). On 21 June he routed the Irish with great slaughter at Skirfold, and on 8 July took Athlone and Portumna. In November 1651 he joined Ireton and harassed the barony of Burren. He then blockaded Galway (ib. p. 497), which surrendered 12 May 1652. Having reduced Sligo and the northern strongholds, he marched against the royal forces in Kerry, after which the Marquis of Clanricarde surrendered. On 17 Dec. he was appointed a commissioner of the Commonwealth in Connaught. Next to Roger Boyle, Lord Broghill, afterwards earl of Orrery [q. v.], Coote was the ablest friend of the Commonwealth in Ireland, and enjoyed the implicit trust of the parliamentary party even after the death of Cromwell, becoming in Jan. 1659 a commissioner of government. He was M.P. for Sligo and Mayo cos. 1654, 1656, and 1659. On the deposition of Richard Cromwell he, however, at once recognised that the cause of Charles II was in the ascendant, and in order to secure the favour of the royalists went to Ireland to take measures for his restoration. Notwithstanding the mutual jealousy of Broghill and Coote, they saw the expediency of working harmoniously together in the cause they had decided to support. According to Clarendon, the hesitation of Broghill, who was watching for a convenient opportunity to serve the king, was removed by the decisive steps at once adopted by Coote, whom Clarendon describes as ‘a man of less guilt’ (than Broghill) ‘and more courage and impatience to serve the king’ (History of the Rebellion, Oxford ed. iii. 999). Coote sent Sir Arthur Forbes, a ‘Scottish gentleman of good affection to the king,’ to Brussels to the Marquis of Ormonde, ‘that he might assure his majesty of his affection and duty; and that if his majesty would vouchsafe himself to come into Ireland the whole kingdom would declare for him’ (ib. p. 1000). The king deemed it expedient to try his fortunes first in England; but meanwhile, before the arrival of Sir Arthur Forbes in March with letters expressing the king's satisfaction at the proposal, though he deemed it inexpedient to land in Ireland, Broghill and Coote had virtually secured Ireland for the king, Coote having made himself master of Athlone, Drogheda, Limerick, and Dublin. For these services Coote was rewarded on 30 July 1660 by the appointment to be president of Connaught, and by a grant of the lands and liberties of the barony of Westmeath, which was renewed to him 29 March 1661. On 6 Sept. he was created Earl of Mountrath. On 9 Feb. 1660 he was appointed colonel of a regiment of horse, and on 31 Dec. was named one of the lords justices of Ireland, to whom, 15 Oct. 1661, a grant was made of 1,000l. to be equally divided among them as it should become due upon forfeited bonds. By the Act of Settlement it was enacted that he should be paid his arrears due for service in Ireland before 5 June 1649, not to exceed 6,000l. On 30 July 1661 he was appointed receiver-general of the composition money in Connaught and Thomond, and named governor of Queen's County. He died 18 Dec. of the same year, and was buried in the cathedral of Christ Church, Dublin. By his first wife, Mary, second daughter of Sir Francis Ruish of Ruish Hall, he had a son, Charles, who became second earl; and by his second wife, Jane, daughter of Sir Robert Hannay, knight and baronet, he had two sons and three daughters. After his death she married Sir Robert Reading of Dublin, baronet.
[Whitelocke's Memorials; Ludlow's Memoirs; Clarendon's History of the Rebellion; Cox's Hibernia Anglicana; Borlase's Reduction of Ireland; Contemporary History of Affairs in Ireland, 1641–1652, ed. I. T. Gilbert, 1879–80; Cal. of State Papers, Dom. Ser.; Clarendon State Papers; Prendergast's Cromwellian Settlement in Ireland (1870); Biog. Brit. (Kippis), iv. 266–9; Lodge's Peerage of Ireland, ed. Archdall, ii. 71–7; Carte's Life of Ormonde; Froude's English in Ireland.]
COOTE, CHARLES, D.C.L. (1761–1835), historian and biographer, was son of John Coote, a bookseller of Paternoster Row, and the author of several dramatic pieces, who died in 1808. He was sent to St. Paul's School in 1773 (Gardiner, Register of St. Paul's School, pp. 154, 167, 397, 402), was matriculated as a member of Pembroke College, Oxford, in 1778, took the degree of B.A. in 1782, and on 30 Dec. 1784 was elected a scholar on the Benet or Ossulstone foundation in that society. He proceeded M.A. in 1785, B.C.L. by commutation on 10 July 1789, D.C.L. on 14 July following, and was admitted a member of the College of Advocates on 3 Nov. the same year (Cat. of Oxford Graduates, ed. 1851, p. 150). He devoted his attention to literature rather than to law, and was for some time editor of the ‘Critical Review.’ To adopt his own words, ‘even after his enrolment among the associated advocates he for some years did not
