Pirate Queen of Ireland by Anne Chambers Page A

her party were escorted through the long corridors of the palace, past large rooms, panelled in rich mahogany with tapestry-covered walls, sweeping staircases and galleries with high ceilings, decorated with intricate plasterwork.
    It was a far cry from the simple surroundings of her stone castle at Carraigahowley.
    Granuaile realised the difficult task that lay before her. There was no turning back. When she left Greenwich it would be as a prisoner or as a free woman.
    She well knew that Bingham had blackened her name. Now, to save the life of her son, Granuaile would have to convince the queen to go against the advice of her own governor.
    The fashionable courtiers and their ladies stared in wonderment as the elderly woman, bareheaded, her long, greying hair bound up in a knot, her face lined and weather-beaten by the wind and the salt spray, dressed in a woollen cloak that stretched to the ground, was lead past them towards the queen’s private chamber.
    While they tittered at her out-of-fashion clothes, something about her, the way she marched through the room, the look she may have thrown at them, made them realise they were in the presence of someone special, someone who, as a poet wrote of her, was
    â€¦ well used to power, as one that hath
    Dominion over men of savage mood
    And dared the tempest in its midnight wrath
    And thru’ opposing billows cleft her fearless path.
    They looked at her in awe.
    This, after all, was the notorious woman pirate from the far west of Ireland they had heard about from Sir Philip Sidney – commander of rebels and pirates, the scourge of English merchant ships.
    What on earth was the queen thinking about to agree to see such a woman?
    As the doors of the presence chamber closed behind her, Granuaile came face to face with the woman against whom she had rebelled and in whose hands her life and her son’s life now lay; the very woman whose servants in Ireland had turned Granuaile’s world upside down. Granuaile saw a woman about the same age as herself, but there the resemblance ended.
    The queen was dressed in a richly embroidered gown, studded with diamonds and precious gems, which dazzled and shone in the sunlight.
    Behind the mask of the magnificent dress and fabulous gems, Granuaile saw that the queen’s face was like a mask, covered in white rice powder and rouge. Her nose was hooked and her teeth were black. Her head was covered in a red wig.
    Elizabeth peered short-sightedly at the ‘notorious rebel’, the ‘famous feminine sea-captain’, about whom her ministers in Ireland had written. She saw standing before a woman about her own age, dressed plainly, no paint or powder to hide her wrinkled face.
    But something about the way the Irishwoman stood, as if they were equals instead of queen and subject, made Elizabeth realise she was looking at someone special. This woman did not need fine dresses or gems to mark her out as being a leader.
    Despite her titles of High Admiral of her navy and Chief Commander of her armies, Elizabeth knew that, unlike this woman who stood before her, she had done little to deserve them.
    Unlike Granuaile, she had never led her troops into battle or sailed further downriver than Greenwich. Her titles were empty. Granuaile’s were the real thing.

    Granuaile with Queen Elizabeth I.
    It was said that the two women spoke to each other in Latin. The queen spoke many languages, but Granuaile could also speak English and knew some Spanish as well.
    The queen was curious to hear directly from Granuaile about her strange life on land and sea. Was it true she had led rebellions? Had she plundered English ships at sea? The queen peered at the document on the table beside her and pointed in disbelief to a particular sentence. Was it true that she had even attacked her own son?
    Taking a deep breath, Granuaile knew that she must be careful how she answered Elizabeth. She had to choose her words with care.
    Granuaile told