The years 1333 and 1334 were disgraced by fearful crimes, in which the English and Irish equally participated.  In the former year the Earl of Ulster seized Walter de Burgo, and starved him to death in the Green Castle of Innishowen.  The sister of the man thus cruelly murdered was married to Sir Richard Mandeville, and she urged her husband to avenge her brother’s death.  Mandeville took the opportunity of accompanying the Earl with some others to hear Mass at Carrickfergus,[353] and killed him as he was fording a stream.  The young Earl’s death was avenged by his followers, who slew 300 men.  His wife, Maud, fled to England with her only child, a daughter, named Elizabeth,[354] who was a year old.  The Burkes of Connaught, who were the junior branch of the family, fearing that she would soon marry again, and transfer the property to other hands, immediately seized the Connaught estates, declared themselves independent of English law, and renounced the English language and customs.  They were too powerful to be resisted with impunity; and while the ancestor of the Clanrickardes assumed the Irish title of Mac William Oughter, or the Upper, Edmund Burke, the progenitor of the Viscounts of Mayo, took the appellation of Mac William Eighter, or the Lower.  This was not the last time when English settlers identified themselves, not merely from policy, but even from inclination, with the race whom they had once hated and oppressed.

In 1334 the English and Irish marched into Munster to attack MacNamara, and added the guilt of sacrilege to their other crimes, by burning a church, with 180 persons and two priests in it, none of whom were permitted to escape.  Another outrage was committed by the settlers, who appear to have been quite as jealous of each others property as the Irish clans; for we find that one Edmund Burke drowned another of the same name in Lough Mask, and, as usual a war ensued between the partisans of each family.  After a sanguinary struggle, Turlough O’Connor drove the murderer out of the province.  But this prince soon after ruined himself by his wickedness.  He married Burke’s widow, and put away his own lawful wife; from which it may be concluded that he had avenged the crime either from love of this woman, or from a desire to possess himself of her husband’s property.  His immoral conduct alienated the other chieftains, and after three years’ war he was deposed.

Edward had thrown out some hints of an intended visit to Ireland, probably to conceal his real purpose of marching to Scotland.  Desmond was released on bail in 1333, after eighteen months’ durance, and repaired with some troops to assist the King at Halidon Hill.  Soon after we find him fighting in Kerry, while the Earl of Kildare was similarly occupied in Leinster.  In 1339 twelve hundred Kerry men were slain in one battle.  The Anglo-Norman, FitzNicholas, was among the number of prisoners.  He died in prison soon after.  This gentleman, on one occasion, dashed into the assize court at Tralee, and killed Dermod, the heir of the MacCarthy More, as he sat with the judge on the bench.  As MacCarthy was Irish, the crime was suffered to pass without further notice.