Name Thomas Bathe | ||
 | ||
Sir Thomas Bathe, 1st Baron Louth (died 1478) was an Irish peer, lawyer and judge of the fifteenth century. Even by the standards of that turbulent age, he had a troubled and violent career. He was deprived of his property and outlawed by Act of Parliament, but was later restored to favour: his claim to the title Baron Louth was eventually recognised by the English Crown, and he ended his career as Chief Baron of the Exchequer.
Contents
Early life
He belonged to the leading Anglo-Irish Bathe family, who were prominent landowners in County Meath, and whose principal seat was at Athcarne, near Duleek. From the 1450s on he claimed the title "Lord and Baron of Louth" and the right to be summoned to Parliament as a peer: his right both to the title and the summons was denied by the Irish Parliament in 1460, but implicitly confirmed in 1476.
As a young man he seems to have been quarrelsome and violent, and this reputation was to darken his later life. He was in London in 1439, probably to study law, when he was charged with "ill conversation and behaviour", and committed to Ludgate Prison, from which his brother obtained his release.
Dr. Stackpole
Far more serious charges (some of which however were certainly false) were levelled against Bathe in 1449, and these were the main basis for the indictment against him in the Parliament of 1460. He was accused of a serious assault on Dr. John Stackpole, a cleric attached to the Abbey of Navan. It seems that Stackpole had been installed as the parish priest of Kilberry, a living which Bathe claimed was his to dispose of. The dispute between the two men led Stackpole to ask the Bishop of Meath for Bathe's excommunication: in revenge Bathe kidnapped and imprisoned him. However the most serious charge, that Bathe had Stackpole's eyes and tongue removed, was clearly an invention, since the indictment revealed that Stackpole, allegedly "by a miracle", was in fact in full possession of his faculties of sight and speech. This incident did not harm Bathe's career in the short term: he was knighted and appointed Chief Escheator of Ireland.
Wars of the Roses
In the late 1450s the Wars of the Roses, the dynastic conflict between the rival branches of the Plantagenet dynasty, spread to Ireland, where Richard of York, the claimant to the Crown of England, found some of his strongest supporters. The ruling House of Lancaster was supported by James Butler, 5th Earl of Ormonde, with whom Bathe was closely allied. The English Parliament of 1459, popularly known as the Parliament of Devils, appointed Ormonde Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, with Bathe as his Deputy. However York was still very powerful in Ireland and Bathe's appointment never took effect.
York summoned the Irish Parliament at Drogheda in 1460: this Parliament ordered "Thomas Bathe" - referred to ominously as the "pretended Lord Louth" - to appear and answer numerous charges, of which the most serious was his attack on Dr Stackpole in 1449. Understandably Bathe did not choose to appear. He was outlawed and deprived of his estates, although it seems that he was able to have a portion of them regranted to his son John Bathe of Ardee. It was explicitly stated that Bathe "shall never have place in the Parliament of this land or hold any office under the King's grant".
Later years
Despite the triumph of the Yorkist cause in 1461, Bathe's disgrace was not permanent: York's son, the new King Edward IV in general followed a policy of reconciliation with his former enemies. Bathe's estates were restored to him in 1472 and even the title Lord Louth was acknowledged: in 1468 he used the title when witnessing a royal grant of murage to the town of Drogheda, and a statute of 1476 appoints Thomas Bathe "Lord and Baron of Louth" as one of the commissioners to fix the boundaries of County Louth. He was appointed Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer in 1473 and held office until 1478 when he apparently died. He had at least one son, John, but the title Baron Louth quickly lapsed, and was recreated for the Plunkett family in 1541.