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Under its arch possibly stood London's first chronicler, Fitzstephen, the monk, when he saw the famous horse fairs that took place in Smithfield every Friday, which he described so graphically. Thither flocked earls, barons, knights, and citizens to look on or buy.
This service Fitzstephen represented to the king, and begged that he might be equally honored. "My liege," he said, "my father steered the ship with the golden boy upon the prow in which your father sailed to conquer England, I beseech you to grant me the same honor, that of carrying you in the White Ship to England."
Fitzstephen grasped the helm, his soul proud with the thought that, as his father had borne the Conqueror to England's strand, he was bearing the pride of younger England, the heir to the throne.
Thomas, third son of Maurice Fitzgerald, claimed partly through his uncle Fitzstephen, and partly through his marriage with the daughter of another early adventurer, Sir William Morrie, whose vast estates on which his descendants were afterwards known as Earls of Desmond, the White Knight, the Knight of Glyn, and the Knight of Kerry.
Wexford opened its gates, its townsmen submitting to Dermot, who thereupon presented the town to his allies, FitzStephen, true to his Norman instincts, proceeding forthwith to build a castle upon the rock of Carneg, at the narrowest point of the river Slaney, the first of that large crop of castles which subsequently sprang up upon Irish soil.
One of the King's marshals touched Fitzstephen on the shoulder, telling him it was forbidden to speak to the Archbishop; upon which he glanced at his master, and pointed to the cross, to express what he was forbidden to say. The King sat in his own chamber, and the bishops and barons were sent in turn with messages from him to the Archbishop.
Strongbow was thus shut in with foes behind and before, and the like disaster had befallen Robert FitzStephen, who was at this time closely besieged in his own new castle at Wexford. Dermot their chief native ally had recently died. There seemed for a while a reasonable chance that the invaders would be driven back and pushed bodily into the sea. Discipline and science however again prevailed.
Thomas, third son of Maurice Fitzgerald, claimed partly through his uncle Fitzstephen, and partly through his marriage with the daughter of another early adventurer, Sir William Morrie, whose vast estates on which his descendants were afterwards known as Earls of Desmond, the White Knight, the Knight of Glyn, and the Knight of Kerry.
The cantreds immediately adjoining the town on the north and east were conferred on Fitzstephen according to the treaty made at Bristol, and he at once commenced the erection of a fortress on the rock of Carrig, at the narrowest pass on the river Slaney.
FITZSTEPHEN, WILLIAM (d. 1190). Was a servant of Thomas
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