Sir Anthony Saint Leger

Sir Anthony Saint Leger (born c. 1496—died March 16, 1559, Ulcombe, Kent, Eng.) was an English lord deputy of Ireland from 1540 to 1548, 1550 to 1551, and 1553 to 1556. Considered by many historians to be the most able 16th-century English viceroy of Ireland, he maintained peace in that country by upholding the feudal privileges of the powerful native chieftains.

Saint Leger was educated on the European continent and at the University of Cambridge. He was sent to Ireland in 1537 to intimidate the Irish Parliament into passing measures that were in accord with King Henry VIII’s antipapal policies (e.g., the confiscation of monasteries). Returning to England in 1538, Saint Leger became a gentleman of the king’s privy chamber and in 1539 was knighted. Appointed lord deputy of Ireland in July 1540, Saint Leger continued the conciliatory policy of his predecessor, Lord Leonard Grey. (Grey, who had been recalled and executed, had basically followed the policy that Henry VIII had advised 20 years earlier.)

Saint Leger secured peace in Ireland for eight years. The Geraldine League broke up after the young Gerald Fitzgerald, 11th earl of Kildare, was smuggled (1540) to safety on the continent. Thenceforth, public submissions to Henry VIII and renunciations of the pope were made by various prominent chiefs. On Saint Leger’s advice they were given titles to lands that they had formerly held in defiance of English law. This has been called the policy of surrender and regrant.

Saint Leger was recalled early in King Edward VI’s reign, but, after his successor’s aggressive policies failed, he was briefly restored as lord deputy in 1550–51. The final period of his moderate rule in Ireland (1553–56) ended when Queen Mary I, a Roman Catholic, appointed a new viceroy to expedite her plans to reconcile the Irish church with the pope and to plant English colonies on Irish soil.