| William Ireland |
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Ireland was the eldest son of William Ireland of Crofton Hall , Yorkshire , by Barbara, a daughter of Ralph Eure of Washingborough , Lincolnshire, by his first wife. Ireland was educated at the English College, St. Omer ; admitted to the Society of Jesus at Watten, 1655 ; professed, 1673 ; and was for several years confessor to the Poor Clares at Gravelines . In 1677 , Ireland was sent on the English Mission and appointed procurator of the province. On the night of September 28, 1678 , he was arrested by Titus Oates in person. Among the others who shared his fate as John Grove , a layman and the nominal occupier of that part of Wild House, London , occupied by the Jesuits and the Spanish Ambassador . After confinement in Newgate they were both sentenced to death on December 17. Together with Thomas Pickering , they were said to have planned, in the rooms of the Jesuit William Harcourt , to assasinate the king on August 19. Oates and Bedloe swore that Grove was to have £1500 for the job and Pickering 30,000 Masses. Ireland wrote a journal in Newgate, which accounted for every day of his absence from London between August 3 and September 14, but a woman swore that she saw him in Fetter Lane on August 20. All three men were found guilty, and after two reprieves Ireland and Grove were executed together at Tyburn , Grove saying: "We are innocent, we lose our lives wrongfully, we pray God to forgive them that are the causes of it." |
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