Sir Valentine Browne, Knight

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Sir Valentine Browne, of Crofts, Lincolnshire, (later of Ross Castle, Killarney) was an English politician. He was appointed Surveyor General of Ireland in 1559 by Queen Elizabeth I of England, later being appointed Auditor General.

Sir Valentine was an MP(1568) and a member of the Privy Council during Queen Elizabeth's reign. He is best known in Irish history as ancestor to the Earls of Kenmare.

Browne began his career from what we can discern, as a Vice-Admiral of the Coast, firstly for Northumberland in 1563, subsequently holding the said post in the shires of Durham and Westmoreland in 1568. Valentine Browne rose to prominence during Queen Elizabeth's wars in Scotland against Mary, Queen of Scots. Browne was knighted in 1570 “for his valours”, by the Lord Sussex after leading an assault on towns and villages all over Anandale. Having seized Ananda Castle, and Caer Lancrock, a Castle of the Maxwells’ and drove those who held for the Queen of Scots to such straights, that the Duke of Castle-Herald, Huntley, and Argyle sent unto him a writing under their hands and seals’, whereby they bound themselves both to abstain from war and to surrender to the English. In 1573 he led the assault that captured Edinburgh Castle.

In July of 1584, Her Majesty’s government, commissioned a survey of the lands of Munster, following the Desmond Rebellions. Sir Valentine Browne was appointed this task which was to facilitate the the plantation of Munster.

In a letter dated 10th October, 1584, from Sir Valentine Browne to Lord Burleigh, he stated that "the work was so difficult as to have extended over three years. This knight then wrote from Askeaton that he had "travailed hard in superintending the survey, passing through bogs and woods, scaling mountains, and crossing many bridgeless rivers and dangerous waters", waters in which he lost some of his horses, and was twice nearly lost himself; that his son had broken his arm, and that "the service was so severe that many of the men had fallen sick". He described the towns and villages as ruined, and that but one of thirty persons was left alive. Desmond's lands, thus void of inhabitants, were, however, "replenished with wood, rivers, and fishing’s". Sir Valentine's companion, Sir Henry Wallop, wrote at the same time of the great fertility of the soil, and rejoiced to think that England was about to re-people the province with a new and better race.

Browne’s survey resulted in the rebel lands being divided into 35 lots, he himself being granted 6,500 acres of land in County Kerry alone. Previous to this he had been granted lands in Hospital, County Limerick. He erected a castle nearby, which was subsequently called Kenmare Castle.

The sons of his second marriage became landed proprietors in Munster while the son of his first marriage became High Sheriff for Lincolnshire in 1593. However, unlike most of the English settlers since the Reformation, the Browne’s soon reverted to their old Catholic faith, and though they can hardly be said to have become Gaelicised they were at least sufficiently identified with the old Gaelic aristocracy to be coupled with the great Irish families in a 17th-century Irish poem eulogising the old order. On 28th June 1588 he purchased the family's vast estates, including the Lakes of Killarney, from the estate of Donald, Earl of Clancare.

He died in 1589 and is interned, most likely, in the vaults of St. Michan's Church in Dublin where his descendants lay in rest.