Brinsley Butler, 2nd Earl of Lanesborough, PC (Ire) (4 March 1728 – 24 January 1779), styled The Honourable until 1756 and Lord Newtown-Butler from 1756 to 1768, was an Irish politician and peer.
As a Freemason, he was Deputy Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Ireland from 1753 to 1756, and was elected Grand Master in 1757, a post he held until the next year.[2]
His widow moved to Italy with her unmarried daughters, and there she gained an unenviable reputation for immorality and extravagance: in 1786 she fled from Naples to avoid being arrested for debt.[4] When her daughter Sophia married a Milanese nobleman, the Marquis Marescotti, Emma, Lady Hamilton asked unkindly if the mother had sold the daughter off to pay her debts.[5] She remarried John King, who had reputedly been her lover for some time, and died in 1828.[6]
Arms
Coat of arms of Brinsley Butler, 2nd Earl of Lanesborough
1st: A Wyvern with wings elevated and tail nowed Or the dexter paw supporting a Shield Argent thereon a Bend Gules charged with three Martlets Gold (Danvers); 2nd: A Demi Cockatrice couped Vert wings elevated Argent combed beaked wattled and ducally gorged Or (Butler)
Escutcheon
Quarterly: 1st and 4th, Gules a Chevron wavy between three Mullets of six points radiant Or pierced Azure (Danvers); 2nd and 3rd, Argent three Covered Cups in bend between two Bendlets engrailed Sable (Butler)
Supporters
On the dexter side a Cockatrice Vert with wings elevated Argent combed beaked wattled and ducally gorged Or, and on the sinister side a Wyvern Vert gorged with a Plain Collar and chained Or