“The late Lord Chichester had lands to the value of £10,000 in one gift; and Lord Falkland £10,000 in money at once.” His Chaplain (afterwards Bishop) Bramhall, wrote to Archbishop Laud five years later:—“I think I should soon be able to show that the Crown has been defrauded of many appropriations, for here it hath been usual ... upon a Letter for £20 to pass £30 or £40 ... to pass that for nothing, in time of peace, which was found to have been worth little or nothing in time of war; and to take up appropriations as gentlemen do waifs in England.” These comments reveal only a surface acquaintance with the misdeeds practised against the Crown by its trusted servants. In the year after Strafford’s arrival he provided a remedy for some of the evils which corroded justice by causing Acts to be passed extending the “Statute of Uses” to Ireland, and clothing the Commissioners for Defective Titles with far-reaching powers. The first Act made secret conveyances impossible; and the second authorised the Commissioners to issue Patents which should stand good against the Crown, even if wrongfully obtained or corruptly enlarged, provided fines were paid. The Government was in debt; and, in order to raise cash, many grants, new and old, were assailed. Fines were then exacted as the price of indefeasible Patents. In 1635, when the Star Chamber at Westminster declared the Charter of the London Corporation forfeit, Strafford’s eye detected an unforeseen consequence. The Londoners, being compelled to surrender the Bann and the rest of their Irish estates, were left burdened with a rent of £100 a year to the Chichesters for Lough Neagh under the lease of 1622. Deprived of the river, Lough Neagh became useless to them; and they probably petitioned the Crown for relief. Strafford then caused the Chichester Patents to be scrutinised, and the misdeeds of his predecessor came to light. Yet he dealt not ungently with the dead peer’s heirs. Instead of re-seizing the whole of their ill-gotten possessions, he confined himself to demanding a surrender of Lough Neagh. At the outset the Chichesters resisted, but the stream of authority against the validity of their grants soon swelled to a torrent. Strafford knew that constant protests under two reigns had been lodged against them. Their base origin in 1603-4, Sir James Balfour’s inquiry of 1618, Allen’s repugnant findings at Derry and Carrickfergus in 1621, the ruling of the Exchequer Barons in 1623, the “discovery” of Sir William Power in 1628, and the order of Charles I. on Colonel Forbes’s petition in the same year, covered them with discredit. In 1630 the “opinion” of ex-Baron Oglethorpe openly alleged “fraud”; and Strafford, backed by these accumulated condemnations, took action.