Robert Preston, 1st Viscount Gormanston

[1] Robert succeeded his father as 4th Baron Gormanston in 1450; his mother later remarried Giles Thorndon, formerly Lord Treasurer of Ireland.

With Lord Portlester, he was one of the original Companions of the Brotherhood of Saint George, a short-lived military guild designed for the defence of the Pale (the four counties which were under secure English rule).

Another useful marriage connection was through his sister Elizabeth, who married as his second wife Christopher Plunkett, 1st Baron of Dunsany.

[6] After the downfall of the House of York, Gormanston, like most of the Anglo-Irish nobility, supported the claims of the pretender to the Crown, Lambert Simnel against the new Tudor dynasty.

[7] The council does not seem to have produced any useful results: soon afterwards Gormanston, Kildare and other nobles were summoned to England to account for their governance of Ireland.