Sir William Parsons, 1st Baronet of Bellamont

Sir William Parsons, 1st Baronet of Bellamont, PC (Ire) (c. 1570 – 1650), was known as a "land-hunter" expropriating land from owners whose titles were deemed defective.

[9][10] About 1615[b] William Parsons married his cousin Elizabeth, eldest daughter of John Lany, an Alderman of Dublin,[12] and niece of his maternal uncle Sir Geoffrey Fenton.

[13] This marriage made him a cousin of Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork, the dominant Anglo-Irish magnate of his time, to whom he was close.

William and Elizabeth had five sons: —and seven daughters: Parsons personally presented surveys of escheated estates to King James I.

[32] During the years 1633–40, when Strafford was all-powerful in Ireland, Parsons prudently offered him no open opposition, but he came increasingly to dislike and distrust "that strange man ... a mischief to so many".

Parsons was notorious as a "land-hunter", who acquired lands previously held by Irish clans by dubious legal means.

He has been particularly censured by historians for the seizure of the former O'Byrne lands in County Wicklow, although it has also been argued that his behaviour was no worse than that of his partner in the transaction, Lord Lieutenant Wentworth, who proceeded to swindle Parsons out of his share.

According to Bagwell (1909) and Clavin (2009), Parson was one of the two MPs for County Armagh during the Parliament of 1634–1635, the first of Charles I,[33][10] but the list of Irish MPs compiled in 1878 states that Sir Faithful Fortescue, knight, and Sir George Radcliffe, knight, sat for County Armagh in that parliament.

[37] In December 1640 Parsons was appointed Lord Justice jointly with Robert Dillon, the future 2nd Earl of Roscommon.

When the Irish Rebellion of 1641 broke out, Sir William had to cope with it virtually single-handedly, since his colleague Borlase was incompetent.