William Lamport (or Lampart) (1611/1615 – 1659) was an Irish Catholic adventurer, known in Mexico as "Don Guillén de Lamport (or Lombardo) y Guzmán". He was tried by the Mexican Inquisition for sedition and executed in 1659. He claimed to be a bastard son of King Philip III of Spain and therefore the half-brother of King Philip IV. In 1642, he tried to foment rebellion against the Spanish crown, with the aid of black and indigenous peoples, as well as creole merchants, but was denounced by a man he had hoped to recruit for his plan and arrested, languishing in the Inquisition jail for 17 years. A statue of Lamport is immediately inside the Angel of Independence monument in Mexico City. Birth and education The main source for biographical information about Lamport is his own declaration before the Inquisition; it is difficult to tell how much of it is true. William Lamport was born in either 1611 (according to his brother) or 1615 (other sources) in Wexford, Ireland to a family of Catholic merchants. He received Catholic education from Jesuits in Dublin and London, and then at an Irish college in the great pilgrimage site of Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain. Since the Protestant monarchy in England increasingly restricted opportunities to Catholics, a number of colegios for Irishmen were set up in Spain. There were longstanding ties between Catholic Ireland and Spain, the staunch defender of Catholicism in Europe. Spain recognized Irish nobles on equal footing as Spaniards, and Irish could claim Spanish citizenship. In 1627, he claimed to have been arrested in London for sedition for distributing Catholic pamphlets. According to his testimony, he escaped, left Britain for Spain and became a pirate for the next two years. He also fought for the French at the Siege of La Rochelle against the Huguenots. In Spain, Lamport came to the attention of the Marquis of Mancera, perhaps via Mancera's sister whose late husband had been posted to London and apparently knew Lamport's tutor there. In 1633, he joined one of three Spanish-sponsored Irish regiments and took part in the combat against Swedish forces in the Spanish Netherlands. His participation in the Battle of Nordlingen in 1634 attracted the interest of the Count-Duke of Olivares, chief minister to Philip IV of Spain, who eventually helped him to enter the service of the King. By that time he had hispanized his