Lot 2: Hieronimo Custodis , fl. 1598 - 1592 Portrait of Field Marshal Sir William Pelham, Lord Justice of Ireland (d. 1587) oil on panel, in an Italian Baroque style carved wood frame

insribed u.l.: ÆTATIS SVÆ, 50/ ANNO DÑI, 15.77/ FIELD MARSHALL/ SIR WILLIAM PELHAM, Kt,/ DIED 1587, and charged u.r. with the sitter's arms oil on panel, in an Italian Baroque style carved wood frame

90 by 72 cm., 35 1/2 by 28 1/4 in.

Anonymous sale, Philips London, 10th November 1954, lot 7;
D.H. Cevat, motcomb Street, London, by 1955;
Anonymous sale, Christie's London, 31st June 1968, lot 10;
East Barsham Manor, Norfolk;
their sale, Phillips, 21st September 1977, lot 142

THE PROPERTY OF A GENTLEMAN
The present portrait is after a painting of the sitter attributed to Cornelius Ketel (Earls of Yarborough). The son of William Pelham (d. 1538), of Laughton in Sussex, and his wife Mary, daughter of William Sandys, Lord Sandys, the sitter was probably thirty years old when he was appointed captain of the pioneers at the siege of Leith in 1560, where he was specially commended for his valour. He commanded the pioneers again at Le Havre in November 1562, under the Earl of Warwick, and in February 1563 assisted in the capture of Caen. Following his return to England Pelham's knowledge of siege craft resulted in his employment by Portinari and Concio in improving the fortifications at Berwick against potential Franco-Scottish attack. The Privy Council were so impressed with his competency and judgement that he was promoted lieutenant-general of the ordnance and spent the next few years strengthening the defences of the realm. In the summer of 1579 Pelham was sent to Ireland to organize the defences of the Pale against the rebellion of James fitz Maurice Fitzgerald, which threatened to spread from Munster. Knighted by Sir William Drury on 14υth September of that year, he was elected lord Justice of Ireland on the latter's death on 3 October, and it was in this capacity that he presided over the English well documented English military activity in the aftermath of fitz Maurice's rebellion and the subsequent suppression of the Earl of Desmond's uprising. Returning to England in October 1580, in January of the following year Pelham joined the Earl of Shrewsbury and Sir Henry Neville in the commission to escort Mary Queen of Scots from Sheffield Abbey to Leicestershire, and was promoted Lieutenant-General of the Ordnance. In July 1586 Pelham accompanied the Earl of Leicester to the Netherlands, where he was advanced to Marshal of the army, and took a bullet in the stomach defending his commander-in-chief whilst inspecting the defences before Doesburg. He survived his injuries and was present at the siege of Zutphen in September 1586 when Sir Philip Sydney was mortally wounded, it is said, imitating Pelham's previous act of chivalry.