SKEFFINGTON, Sir John (1632-95), of Fisherwick, Staffs. and Antrim Castle, co. Antrim.

The Skeffingtons originated at Skeffington in Leicestershire, where they had owned land since the reign of Edward I. Although through the ensuing centuries their interests were mainly local, the family produced a number of crown officials, including a lord deputy of Ireland, Sir William Skeffington, who led the government’s campaign against the rebellious earl of Kildare in 1534.19Lodge, Peerage, 55-7. The Staffordshire Skeffingtons, a cadet branch of the Leicestershire family, had acquired a baronetcy in 1627, and by the 1640s this had passed to the 2nd baronet, Sir John Skeffington†, who supported the king in the English civil war and was forced to compound to save the family estates.20CB ii. 14-15; CCC 2207. John Skeffington, the future MP, was the nephew of the 2nd baronet. His father, Sir Richard Skeffington*, a Warwickshire landowner, had been elected as recruiter MP for Staffordshire in 1646, but died in 1647 when John Skeffington was only 15. In 1649 Skeffington went up to Magdalene College, Cambridge, and in 1651 he was admitted as fellow-commoner, and became a ‘fellow-pupil’ of the newly-arrived Samuel Pepys†.21CB ii. 14-15; Al. Cant.; Pepys’s Diary, 276-7. The death of his uncle and cousin in 1651 and 1652 unexpectedly brought the baronetcy into the hands of the 19-year-old John Skeffington.

With the family patrimony in Staffordshire added to his father’s lands in Warwickshire, Skeffington became an attractive match in both estate and title. When a marriage was proposed, it came from an unexpected quarter. Although the Skeffingtons had historic links with Ireland, and there were many trading and social connections between Staffordshire and Ulster, there is no evidence for previous contacts with the Antrim planter, Sir John Clotworthy. Yet, in July 1654 Skeffington married Clotworthy’s only daughter and heiress, in a ceremony at St Paul’s, Covent Garden.22CB ii. 14-15. The marriage settlement, agreed a few days before, shows that the match was advantageous for both parties: the bride’s portion would consist of £500 and all her father’s lands in cos. Antrim and Down; the groom promised a jointure payable from all his Staffordshire and Warwickshire lands; and the whole settlement was entrusted to prominent feoffees, including Arthur Hill* and Arthur Annesley*.23PRONI, D.207/16/1-2. The Clotworthy marriage changed Skeffington’s priorities almost overnight. Although he retained substantial estates in England, from 1654 his social and political world centred on Ireland, and his principal residence was in Ulster for the rest of his life. The influence of his father-in-law seems to have been especially strong in the later 1650s. In 1655 Skeffington joined Arthur Hill* and witness for an indenture between Lord Broghill (Roger Boyle*) and Clotworthy, assigning money to their nieces, the daughters of Viscount Ranelagh (Arthur Jones*).24NLI, D. 22017-22, unfol. By January 1657 he was serving as JP in co. Antrim, with Clotworthy, Arthur Hill, George Rawdon* and other Old Protestants.25CSP Ire. 1647-60, p. 623; Ire. under the Commonwealth, ii. 670-2. Skeffington’s election for the counties of Antrim, Down and Armagh in 1659 was almost certainly on the interest of his father-in-law, with the support of such Ulster friends as Hill, Annesley and Rawdon. There is no record of his activity in this Parliament.

On the restoration of the monarchy, Skeffington continued to gain from his father-in-law’s political influence, commanding the co. Antrim militia troop, and serving on local commissions.26HMC Ormonde, o.s. ii. 249; Irish Census, 1659, 626, 646. When in November 1660 Clotworthy was created Viscount Massereene [I], his patent allowed the title to pass to Skeffington and his heirs general.27CP. Once recognized as the heir to the viscountcy, Skeffington set about increasing his own influence in the region. In April 1661, for example, he was not only able to secure a seat as MP for co. Antrim in the Irish Parliament, but also, according to Viscount Conway, his ‘party’ helped to determine the result of elections elsewhere in Ulster.28CJI i. 588; Rawdon Pprs. ed. E. Berwick (1819), 200. In July 1661 Skeffington was one of the agents sent by the Irish Parliament to attend the king in England, and he was again resident in London in September 1664.29Pepys’s Diary, 276-7. In November 1664 he was in Staffordshire – although he promised to return to Dublin if there were ‘any likelihood of a motion’.30Bodl. Carte 33, f. 720. In this period he was on good terms with Ormond, who allowed him to import two horses for his stud, customs-free, in May 1665.31Bodl. Carte 145, f. 195; cf. Carte 33, f. 559; Carte 49, f. 312. On the death of Clotworthy in September 1665 Skeffington became Viscount Massereene and Baron of Lough Neagh [I]. Initially, the new viscount’s career continued to flourish. In April 1666 he became custos rotulorum for co. Londonderry; in November 1667 he was appointed to the Irish privy council; and in the same year the king helped him in his attempts to secure compensation for lands lost by Clotworthy at the Restoration.32CP; CSP Ire. 1666-9, pp. 482-6. In the last case, Massereene also received support from his old associate, Arthur Annesley (now earl of Anglesey and keeper of the privy seal).33CCSP v. 629.

From the end of the 1660s Massereene and Ormond increasingly came into conflict over religious matters and the security of Ulster. By 1670 it was an open secret that Massereene, like his father-in-law, was a supporter of Presbyterianism, and in the years that followed he employed the Presbyterian divine, John Howe, as his chaplain.34CSP Ire. 1669-70, p. 660; DIB. Matters came to a head after the Exclusion Crisis of 1679-81. In February 1681 Ormond (who was in the midst of a row with Massereene’s friend, the earl of Anglesey) reacted angrily to the viscount’s allegation that the Irish army contained many Roman Catholics, suspecting it to be ‘looked upon... as a calumny cast on the army and the government’, and criticised the viscount for himself protecting non-conformists.35HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 571-2, 573. Thereafter Ormond decided to enforce the oath and supremacy and church attendance for JPs and militia officers, but as a way of removing Presbyterians rather than Roman Catholics – in a deliberate attempt to reduce Massereene’s power in the north.36HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 584, 586, 592. From the spring of 1682 Ormond’s son, the earl of Arran, continued to harass Massereene, hoping ‘to turn out of all employments the peer himself’.37HMC Ormonde, n.s. vi. 358, 375. In 1683 Ormond aimed to get Massereene removed as privy councillor and as governor of Antrim, and the viscount was himself presented for non-attendance at church later in the same year.38HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 77, 90-1, 104-5, 140, 150. The duke was equally industrious in London, telling Arran that, if he had his way, Massereene must ‘entirely conform to the church in what she enjoins, and absolutely and totally abstain from assisting at conventicles’ or lose all his civil offices.39HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 157.

In the period before Ormond was replaced as lord lieutenant (in 1685), Massereene resisted his assaults, and clung on to his offices. But worse was to follow. The political and religious implications of the accession of James II were greeted with alarm in Ireland. Massereene thought that his fears about Catholics entering the army had now been realized, and the Ulster Presbyterians felt it was only a matter of time before they were attacked.40CCSP, v. 665. In December 1688 Massereene stayed in Antrim, refusing to co-operate with Tyrconnell, and hoping for a Williamite invasion.41CCSP, v. 685. He fled from Antrim on the arrival of the Jacobite army in March 1689, and in the same month he was among those indicted for treason, as ‘principal actors’ in a rebellion against the king.42DIB; HMC Ormonde, o.s. ii. 396. The victories of William III were naturally welcomed by Massereene, whose attainder was revoked, and in 1692 he was once again back on the Irish privy council.43HMC Ormonde, o.s. ii. 450-1. Massereene died in June 1695 and was buried at Antrim. He was succeeded by his son, Clotworthy Skeffington, whose descendants became earls of Massereene in 1756.44CP.