On 26 May 1623, King James I, made Thurles a ward of Richard Preston, Earl of Desmond, and placed him at Lambeth, London, under the care of George Abbot, archbishop of Canterbury to be brought up as a Protestant. The Ormond estates being under sequestration, the young Lord had but £40 a year for his own and his servants' clothing and expenses. He seems to have been neglected by the Archbishop — "he was not instructed even in humanity, nor so much as taught to understand Latin".