Godfrey Greene

  Noted events in his life were:

• source. Mary-Ann Cook who writes:
Captain Godfrey Greeene was a `49 Officer, 1649 officers, Roll 1, March 22, 1666). On November 13, 1662, he leased Old Abbey, near Shanagolden, Co. Limerick, from the Earl of Orrerry. On April 3, 1663 he purchased Old Abbey. He obtained a patent on July 23, 1678 of the castle, town and lands of Ballynemony, Moorestown and other lands in Co. Tipperary. He was also granted Kilmanahan Castle in Co. Waterford.
He died in 1682 possessed of £1,500 in ready money, bonds and other securities for at least £2,000, plate, gold and diamond rings, household furniture to the value of £350, three hundred oxen, one hundred dairy cows and other cows, a great number of calves and yearlings, five thousand sheep, four thousand fleeces of wool and four hundred barrels of corn of various sorts. - Sir Wm. Betham`s Abstract of his Will, 1683.
Lord Cook states in his diary that on April 3, 1633 he purchased Old Abbey from Sir Charles Coote, the "inheritance of which is in lease to one John Greene". This is the father of Godfrey Greene. Will dated May 9, 1682, proved May 15, 1683.
On December 24, 1637 Richard Keating, in consideration of £300 borrowed from Robert Cox, demised Moorestown, Knocknangle, and Rathmore, Co. Tipperary, to Robert Cox for 99 years, in mortgage at the rent of a red rose at midsummer, redeemable on repayment of principal and interest, and the interest of said Cox became vested in Godfrey Greene, who, on September 27, 1677, exhibited his bill and discovery before the Court of Claims and obtained the certificate of said court for the lands. Chancery Pleadings: County Palatine of Tipperary - Godfrey Greene, plaintiff; Standish Hartstrong and others, defendants. Bill March 24, 1683.
In 1678 Frances Cox, a daughter of Sir Robert Cox, married Godfrey Greene, who was a retired officer in the army of Charles I. Greene lived at Kilmanahan. He did not enjoy his new acquisition for long because he died in 1678. His son John succeeded him and years afterwards, in 1735, exactly a hundred years after the Keatings lost Moorstown, his son Godfrey was killed in a duel. The duel had its origins in the loss of the land to the Cox family. Richard Keating of Nicholastown fought with young Greene and killed him. (Note: This information is incorrect. Godfrey died in 1682. Frances was his first wife, who died before 1678)
The Greenes lived in Moorstown till 1798. A descendant of John`s, yet another Godfrey Greene, died there in April 1798. He had been Member of Parliament for Dungarvan, as well as Accountant-General to the Court of Chancery. He never married. His brother, John survived him by six months and died in the castle. He was the last of the Greene family to live there. He had been an ardent promoter of the linen trade in Ireland but his son Robert, not only did not live at Moorstown, but lived in India where he died in Calcutta in May 1818.
The Greene family severed its connection with Moorstown in 1855. on the 7th of July of that year the Landed Estates Court sold the castle and land to pay debts incurred by the owners. It was ironical that it should end this way, when we consider how the Keatings lost their property in the first place. The buyer was Richard Grubb of Cahir.

Godfrey married Frances Cox. (Frances Cox was born circa 1640 and died before Feb 1681.)