Cromwell's deportation of Girls to Jamaica.
See JAMAICA: A. D. 1655.
IRELAND: A. D. 1660-1665.
The restored Stuarts and their Act of Settlement.
"On the fall of Richard Cromwell, a council of officers was
established in Dublin; these summoned a convention of deputies
from the protestant proprietors; and the convention tendered
to Charles the obedience of his ancient kingdom of Ireland.
… To secure the royal protection, they made the king an
offer of a considerable sum of money, assured him, though
falsely, that the Irish Catholics meditated a general
insurrection, and prayed him to summon a protestant parliament
in Ireland, which might confirm the existing proprietors in
the undisturbed possession of their estates. The present was
graciously accepted, and the penal laws against the Irish
Catholics were ordered to be strictly enforced; but Charles
was unwilling to call a parliament, because it would
necessarily consist of men whose principles, both civil and
religious, he had been taught to distrust. The first measure
recommended to him by his English advisers, with respect to
Ireland, was the re-establishment of episcopacy. For this no
legislative enactment was requisite. His return had given to
the ancient laws their pristine authority. … In a short time
the episcopal hierarchy was quietly restored to the enjoyment
of its former rights, and the exercise of its former
jurisdiction. To this, a work of easy accomplishment,
succeeded a much more difficult attempt,—the settlement of
landed property in Ireland. The military, whom it was
dangerous to disoblige, and the adventurers, whose pretensions
had been sanctioned by Charles I., demanded the royal
confirmation of the titles by which they held their estates;
and the demand was opposed by a multitude of petitioners
claiming restitution or compensation [protestant royalists,
loyal Catholics, &c.]. … Humanity, gratitude, and justice,
called on the king to listen to many of these claims. … From
an estimate delivered to the king, it appeared that there
still remained at his disposal forfeited lands of the yearly
rental of from eighty to one hundred thousand pounds; a fund
sufficiently ample, it was contended, to 'reprize' or
compensate all the Irish really deserving of the royal favour.
Under this impression, Charles published his celebrated
declaration for the settlement of Ireland. It provided that no
person deriving his title from the adventurers under the
parliament, or the soldiers under the commonwealth, should be
disturbed in the possession of his lands, without receiving an
equivalent from the fund for reprisals; that all innocents,
whether protestants or Catholics, that is, persons who had
never adhered either to the parliament or the confederates,
should be restored to their rightful estates." After much
contention between deputations from both sides sent to the
king, an act was passed through the Irish parliament
substantially according to the royal declaration. "But to
execute this act was found to be a task of considerable
difficulty. By improvident grants of lands to the church, the
dukes of York, Ormond, and Albemarle, the earls of Orrery,
Montrath, Kingston, Massarene, and several others, the fund
for reprisals had been almost exhausted." New controversies
and agitations arose, which finally induced the soldiers,
adventurers, and grantees of the crown to surrender one third
of their acquisitions, for the augmenting of the fund for
reprisals. "The king, by this measure, was placed in a
situation [August, 1665], not indeed to do justice, but to
silence the most importunate or most deserving among the
petitioners. … But when compensation had thus been made to a
few of the sufferers, what, it may be asked, became of the
officers who had followed the royal fortune abroad, or of the
3,000 Catholics who had entered their claims of innocence? To
all these, the promises which had been made by the act of
settlement were broken; the unfortunate claimants were
deprived of their rights, and debarred from all hope of future
relief. A measure of such sweeping and appalling oppression is
perhaps without a parallel in the history of civilized
nations. Its injustice could not be denied; and the only
apology offered in its behalf was the stern necessity of
quieting the fears and jealousies of the Cromwellian settlers,
and of establishing on a permanent basis the protestant
ascendancy in Ireland. … The following is the general
result. The protestants were previously [i. e., before the
Cromwellian Settlement] in possession of about one moiety of
all the profitable lands in the island; of the second moiety,
which had been forfeited under the commonwealth, something
less than two-thirds was by the act confirmed to the
protestants; and of the remainder a portion almost equal in
quantity, but not in quality, to one-third, was appropriated
to the Catholics."
J. Lingard,
History of England,
volume 11, chapter 4.
ALSO IN:
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
book 1, chapter 3 (volume 1).
T. Carte,
Life of James Duke of Ormond,
book 6 (volume 4).
IRELAND: A. D. 1685-1688.
The reign of James II.
Domination of Tyrconnel and the Catholics.
"At the accession of James II., in 1685, he found the native
Irish, all of whom were Roman Catholics, opposed to the
English rule, as to that of a conquering minority. … Of the
settlers, the Scotch Presbyterians shared the feelings of
their brethren in their native country, and hated
Episcopalians with the true religious fury. In the Irish
Parliament the Presbyterians and Episcopalians were nearly
balanced, whilst the Protestant Nonconformists, in numbers
almost equalling the other two parties, had but few seats in
the Parliament. The Episcopalians alone were hearty supporters
of the house of Stuart; the Presbyterians and Nonconformists
were Whigs. James was in a most favourable position for
tranquilising Ireland, for, as a Roman Catholic, he was much
more acceptable to the native Irish than his predecessors had
been.
{1771}
Had he followed his true interests, he would have endeavoured,
firstly, to unite together, as firmly as possible, the English
settlers in Ireland, and secondly, by wise acts of mediation,
to bridge over the differences between the English and Irish.
Thus he might have welded them into one people. James,
however, followed a directly opposite policy, and the results
of this misgovernment of Ireland are visible at the present
day. The Duke of Ormond was at the time of the death of
Charles II. both lord lieutenant and commander of the forces.
… Soon after his accession James recalled him, and the
office of lord lieutenant was bestowed on his own
brother-in-law, Lord Clarendon, whilst the post of general of
the troops was given to Richard Talbot, Earl of Tyrconnel.
Talbot … was a coarse, vulgar, truculent ruffian, greedy and
unprincipled; but in the eyes of James he had great virtues,
for he was devoted to the Romish Church and to his sovereign.
'Lying Dick Talbot,' as he was called, was raised by James to
the peerage as Earl of Tyrconnel. Lord Clarendon was, from the
time of his appointment, hampered by his associate," who,
finally, in 1687, supplanted him, gathering the reins of
government into his own hands, "not indeed as lord lieutenant,
but with the power which Ormond had formerly held, although
under a new title, that of lord deputy. The rule of Tyrconnel
entirely subverted the old order of things. Protestants were
disarmed and Protestant soldiers were disbanded. The militia
was composed wholly of Roman Catholics. The dispensing power
in the royal prerogative set aside the statutes of the
kingdom, and the bench and privy council were occupied by
Roman Catholics. Vacant bishoprics of the Established Church
remained unfilled, and their revenues were devoted to Romish
priests. Tithes were with impunity withheld from the clergy of
the Establishment. … The hatred of the Irish Roman Catholics
towards the Protestant settlers was excited to the utmost
under Tyrconnel's rule. The former now hoped to mete out to
the latter a full measure of retaliation. The breach was
widened owing to the fear and distrust openly showed by the
Protestants, and has never since been effectually repaired."
Before the occurrence of the Revolution which drove James from
his throne, in 1688, "Tyrconnel had disarmed all the
Protestants, except those in the North. He had a large force
of 20,000 men under arms, and of this force all the officers
were trustworthy and Papists. He had filled the corporations
of the towns with adherents of James. He had shown himself to
be, as ever, tyrannical and unscrupulous. It was universally
believed by the Protestants that a general massacre, a second
St. Bartholomew, was intended. Even a day, December 9, was,
they thought, fixed for the expected outbreak. The garrison of
Londonderry had been temporarily withdrawn. On December 8,
Lord Antrim arrived in command of 12,000 [1,200?] soldiers to
form the new garrison. Without any warning, the Protestant
apprentices ('the prentice boys of Derry') shut the gates of
the city in his face. The inhabitants, in spite of the
entreaties of the bishop and of the town council, refused to
allow them to be opened. Antrim was compelled to withdraw.
Thus one rallying-point was gained for the opponents of James.
Another was found in Enniskillen, sixty miles south of
Londonderry. Into these two towns poured all the Protestants
from the surrounding districts. With these two exceptions, the
boast of Tyrconnel that Ireland was true, was well founded."
E. Hale,
The Fall of the Stuarts,
chapters 10 and 13.
"He [James II.] deliberately resolved, not merely to give to
the aboriginal inhabitants of Ireland the entire dominion of
their own country, but also to use them as his instruments for
setting up arbitrary government in England. The event was such
as might have been foreseen. The colonists turned to bay with
the stubborn hardihood of their race. The mother country
justly regarded their cause as her own. Then came a desperate
struggle for a tremendous stake. … The contest was terrible
but short. The weaker went down. His fate was cruel; and yet
for the cruelty with which he was treated there was, not
indeed a defence, but an excuse: for though he suffered all
that tyranny could inflict, he suffered nothing that he would
not himself have inflicted. The effect of the insane attempt
to subjugate England by means of Ireland was that the Irish
became hewers of wood and drawers of water to the English. …
The momentary ascendency of Popery produced such a series of
barbarous laws against Popery as made the statute book of
Ireland a proverb of infamy throughout Christendom. Such were
the bitter fruits of the policy of James."
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapter 6 (volume 2).
ALSO IN:
J. R. O'Flanagan,
Lives of the Lord Chancellors of Ireland,
chapter 28 (volume 1).
IRELAND: A. D. 1688-1689.
Enniskillen and the Battle of Newton Butler.
Enniskillen, then a village, surrounding an ancient castle,
was, in 1688-89, one of the two rallying points of the
Protestant colonists in Ireland, who supported the Revolution
by which James II. was dethroned and William and Mary were
crowned. The chief stronghold of their cause was Londonderry;
but Enniskillen bore a scarcely less important part. "In
December, 1688, Tyrconnel's troops, being two companies of
Popish infantry, advanced upon Enniskillen. The inhabitants,
reinforced by 200 foot and 150 horse, contributed by the
neighbouring gentry, marched out to oppose them. Tyrconnel's
men fled to Cavan. The Enniskilleners, then, arming themselves
as well as they could, and converting all the country-houses
round Lough Erne into garrisons, appointed Gustavus Hamilton
their governor and resolved upon defence. … Early in May,
1689, the Enniskilleners routed Tyrconnel's troops, sent from
Connaught into Donegal. They next drove 1,500 men out of the
County Cavan—destroyed the Castle of Ballincarrig—and then
entered the County Meath, whence they carried off oxen and
sheep. Colonel Hugh Sutherland was sent with a regiment of
dragoons and two regiments of foot against the Enniskilleners,
who, however, defeated them, and took Belturbet, where they
found muskets, gunpowder, and provisions; but unfortunately
they were unable to relieve Derry, then beleaguered and sorely
distressed. The Enniskilleners held out against all attacks,
and refused all terms of surrender. They were now assailed
from various points; by Macarthy (then by James created
Viscount Mountcashel) from the east, by another body from the
west, and by the Duke of Berwick from the north.
{1772}
The Enniskilleners sent to Colonel Kirke [commanding the
English forces first sent to Ireland by William of Orange] who
had arrived in Lough Foyle, and received from him some arms
and ammunition; and Colonel Wolseley and Lieutenant-Colonel
Berry came from him to their assistance. Colonel Wolseley took
the command." Under Wolseley, the men of Enniskillen, 3,000
strong, encountered 5,000 of the enemy, under Mountcashel,
near the town of Newton Butler, on the 31st of July, three
days after Derry had been relieved. Their victory was
complete. "The whole Irish force was totally and hopelessly
routed. Their slaughter was dreadful—l,500 killed, and 500
drowned in Lough Erne, whither they were driven. Mountcashel
was wounded and taken prisoner. The Enniskilleners lost only
twenty killed and fifty wounded. They took 400 prisoners, some
cannons, fourteen barrels of gunpowder, and all the colours
and drums. … The victory became known at Strabane to the
Irish army retreating from Derry, which thereupon broke up in
confusion and fled to Omagh, and thence to Charlemont."
W. H. Torriano,
William the Third,
chapter 21.
ALSO IN:
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapter 12 (volume 3).
IRELAND: A. D. 1689-1691.
The War of the Revolution.
The Orange conquest.
Supported by a French fleet, supplied moderately with French
gold, and accompanied by a picked body of French officers, for
the organizing and disciplining of raw Irish troops, James II.
landed in Ireland, at Kinsale, on the 12th of March, 1689, to
take personal possession of the government still maintained
there in his name. From Kinsale he hastened to Dublin, "and
summoned a Parliament, which met on May 7, 1689, and sat until
July 18. This Parliament of James has been described as a
Parliament of Irish Celts, yet out of the 228 members of the
House of Commons about one-fourth only belonged to the native
race, and even including members of families Anglicized or of
doubtful origin, not one-third of the House of Commons
belonged to the so-called Celts. Of the thirty-two lay peers
who attended, not more than two or three bore old Irish names.
The four spiritual peers were Protestant bishops."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1, of Two Centuries of Irish History
chapter 1.
"The members of the House of Commons were almost all new men,
completely inexperienced in public business and animated by
the resentment of the bitterest wrongs. Many of them were sons
of some of the 3,000 proprietors who without trial and without
compensation had been deprived by the Act of Settlement of the
estates of their ancestors. To all of them the confiscations
of Ulster, the fraud of Strafford, the long train of
calamities that followed were recent and vivid events. … It
will hardly appear surprising to candid men that a Parliament
so constituted and called together amid the excitement of a
civil war, should have displayed much violence, much disregard
for vested interests. Its measures, indeed, were not all
criminal. By one Act which was far in advance of the age, it
established perfect religious liberty in Ireland. … By
another Act, repealing Poynings' law, and asserting its own
legislative independence, it anticipated the doctrine of
Molyneux, Swift, and Grattan. … A third measure abolished
the payments to Protestant clergy in the corporate towns,
while a fourth ordered that the Catholics throughout Ireland
should henceforth pay their tithes and other ecclesiastical
dues to their own priests and not to the Protestant clergy.
The Protestants were still to pay their tithes to their own
clergy. … Several other measures—most of them now only
known by their titles—were passed for developing the
resources of the country or remedying some great abuse. … If
these had been the only measures of the Irish Parliament it
would have left an eminently honourable reputation. But,
unfortunately, one of its main objects was to re-establish at
all costs the descendants of the old proprietors in their
land, and to annul by measures of sweeping violence the
grievous wrongs and spoliations their fathers and their
grandfathers had undergone. The first and most important
measure with this object was the repeal of the Acts of
Settlement and Explanation. … The preamble asserts that the
outbreak of 1641 had been solely due to the intolerable
oppression and to the disloyal conduct of the Lords Justices
and Puritan party, that the Catholics of Ireland before the
struggle had concluded had been fully reconciled to the
sovereign, that they had received from the sovereign a full
and formal pardon, and that the royal word had been in
consequence pledged to the restitution of their properties.
This pledge by the Act of Settlement had been to a great
extent broken, and the Irish legislators maintained that the
twenty-four years which had elapsed since that Act had not
annulled the rights of the old proprietors or their
descendants. They maintained that these claims were not only
valid but were prior to all others, and they accordingly
enacted that the heirs of all persons who had possessed landed
property in Ireland on October 22, 1641, and who had been
deprived of their inheritance by the Act of Settlement, should
enter at once into possession of their old properties. … The
long succession of confiscations of Irish land which had taken
place from the days of Mary to the Act of Settlement had been
mainly based upon real or pretended plots of the owners of the
soil, which enabled the Government, on the plea of high
treason, to appropriate the land which they desired. In 1689
the great bulk of the English proprietors of Irish soil were
in actual correspondence with William, and were therefore
legally guilty of high treason. The Irish legislators now
proceeded to follow the example of the British Governments,
and by a clause of extreme severity they pronounced the real
estates of all Irish proprietors who dwelt in any part of the
three kingdoms which did not acknowledge King James, or who
aided, abetted or corresponded with the rebels, to be
forfeited and vested in the Crown, and from this source they
proposed to compensate the purchasers under the Act of
Settlement. … The measure of repeal, however, was speedily
followed by another Act of much more sweeping and violent
injustice. The Act of Attainder, which was introduced in the
latter part of June, aimed at nothing less than a complete
overthrow of the existing land system in Ireland. A list
divided into several groups, but containing in all more than
2,000 names, was drawn up of landowners who were to be
attainted of high treason. …
{1773}
Few persons will question the tyranny of an Act which in this
manner made a very large proportion of the Irish landlords
liable to the penalties of high treason, unless they could
prove their innocence, even though the only crime that could
be alleged against them was that of living out of Ireland in a
time of civil war. … It is … a curious illustration of the
carelessness or partiality with which Irish history is
written, that no popular historian has noticed that five days
before this Act, which has been described as 'without a
parallel in the history of civilised countries,' was
introduced into the Irish Parliament, a Bill which appears, in
its essential characteristics, to have been precisely similar
was introduced into the Parliament of England; that it passed
the English House of Commons; that it passed, with slight
amendments, the English House of Lords; and that it was only
lost, in its last stage, by a prorogation. … These facts
will show how far the Irish Act of Attainder was from having
the unique character that has been ascribed to it. It is not
possible to say how that Act would have been executed, for the
days of Jacobite ascendency were now few and evil. The
Parliament was prorogued on the 20th of July, one of its last
Acts being to vest in the King the property of those who were
still absentees."
W. E. H. Lecky,
History of England in the 18th Century,
chapter 6 (volume 2).
While James' Irish Parliament sat, "sufficient men had
presented themselves to form fifty regiments of infantry and a
proportionate number of cavalry. But … these levies were
undisciplined, and their officers, with few exceptions, were
without military training and experience. There were no
arsenals, and in the government stores only about 1,000
serviceable firearms were found; there was no artillery and no
supply of ammunition. … What coin was in circulation was
small in quantity and debased in quality. James's Government
issued a brass coinage, which had no currency outside the
kingdom, and even within it practically circulated only among
the partisans of James, and could not consequently help in
purchasing arms, ammunition, and military stores, which had to
be imported from without. Under such unfavourable
circumstances the war began. The first campaign comprised the
siege, or rather blockade, of Derry—for the Irish, having no
artillery, could not undertake a regular siege—which was
gallantly defended by the Scoto-English colonists; the check
of Mountcashel by the Enniskilleners, who had followed the
example of Derry; the landing of Schomberg with an army of
Dutch, French Protestants, and English, who went into winter
quarters near Dundalk, where he lost nearly half his troops
from sickness; and, lastly, the military parade of James, who
marched out from Dublin, and, failing to force Schomberg to
fight, went into winter quarters himself. The result of the
campaign was the successful defence of Derry, and the signal
exhibition of James's incapacity as a general. At the opening
of the second campaign, an exchange of troops was made between
James and Louis XIV., with the view of giving prestige to the
cause of the former. Six thousand French troops, under a
drawing-room general, the well-known Comte de Lauzun, arrived
in Ireland, and the same ships carried back an equal number of
Irish troops—the brigade of Mountcashel, the best-trained and
best-equipped body of troops in the Irish army. … The wasted
army of Schomberg was strengthened by the arrival of William
himself on June 14, 1690, with a considerable force. The
united armies, composed of the most heterogeneous materials,
one-half being foreigners of various nationalities, amounted
to between 36,000 and 48,000 men. … To meet William, James
set out from Dublin with an army of about 23,000 men. The
French troops and the Irish cavalry were good, but the
infantry was not well trained, and the artillery consisted
only of twelve field-pieces. The battle took place on July 1,
1690, at the passage of the River Boyne, a few miles above
Drogheda the rout of James's army being complete and its loss
about 1,500 men. William lost but 500; but the number included
Schomberg, one of the great soldiers of his age. James was
among the first in the flight, and he scarcely paused until he
had put himself on board of a French frigate and quitted
Ireland forever]. The Irish fell back on Dublin and thence
retired behind the line of the Shannon. About 20,000
half-armed infantry and about 3,500 horse concentrated at
Limerick. The English having failed in taking Athlone, the key
of the upper Shannon, William gathered together about 38,000
men in the neighbourhood of Limerick. Lauzun having declared
that Limerick could not be defended, and might be taken with
roasted apples, withdrew with the whole of the French troops
to Galway, to await the first opportunity of returning to
France. On August 9, 1690, William moved his whole army close
to the town and summoned the garrison to surrender; but having
failed, with a loss of 2,000 men, to carry the town by
assault, he raised the siege and went to England. The third
and last campaign began late in 1691. The Irish received many
promises of assistance from Louis XIV., but his ministers
fulfilled few or none of them. With scarcely any loss of men,
and with a small expenditure of stores and money, the Irish
war enabled Louis to keep William and a veteran army of 40,000
men out of his way. … The campaign opened in the beginning
of June with the advance of Ginkel [William's general] on
Athlone. The chief defence of the place was the River Shannon,
the works being weak, and mounting only a few field-pieces;
yet so obstinately was the place defended that, but for the
discovery of a ford, and some neglect on the part of D'Usson,
who commanded, it is probable that the siege would have been
raised. As it was, Ginkel became master of the heap of ruins.
… St. Ruth [the French officer commanding the Irish] moved
his camp to Aughrim [or Aghrim], and there was fought the
final battle of the war on Sunday, July 12, 1691. … St. Ruth
was killed at a critical moment, and his army defeated, with a
loss of about 4,000 men, the English loss being about half
that number. Part of the defeated Irish infantry retreated to
Galway; but the bulk of the troops, including the whole of the
cavalry, fell back on Limerick, which surrendered, after a
gallant resistance, in October, 1691."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1 of Two Centuries of Irish History,
chapter 1.
ALSO IN:
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapters 12, 16 and 17.
W. H. Torriano,
William the Third,
chapters 5 and 21-23.
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
chapter 3 (volume 1).
W. A. O'Conor,
History of the Irish People,
book 3, chapter 3 (volume 2).
Sir J. Dalrymple,
Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland,
part 2, books 2-5 (volume 2).
{1774}
IRELAND: A. D. 1691.
The Treaty of Limerick and its violation.
The surrender of Limerick was under the terms of a treaty—or
of two treaties, one military, the other civil—formally
negotiated for the terminating of the war. This Treaty of
Limerick was signed, October 3, 1691, by Baron De Ginkel,
William's general, and by the lords justices of Ireland, on
behalf of the English, and by Sarsfield and other chieftains
on behalf of the Irish. "Its chief provisions were: 'The Roman
Catholics of this kingdom shall enjoy such privileges in the
exercise of their religion as are consistent with the laws of
Ireland; or as they did enjoy in the reign of King Charles
II.; and their Majesties, as soon as their affairs will permit
them to summon a Parliament in this kingdom, will endeavour to
procure the said Roman Catholics such further security in that
particular as may preserve them from any disturbance upon the
account of their said religion. All the inhabitants or
residents of Limerick, or any other garrison now in the
possession of the Irish, and all officers and soldiers now in
arms under any commission of King James, or those authorized
by him to grant the same in the several counties of Limerick,
Clare, Kerry, Cork, and Mayo, or any of them, and all the
commissioned officers in their Majesties' quarters that belong
to the Irish regiments now in being that are treated with and
who are not prisoners of war, or having taken protection, and
who shall return and submit to their Majesties' obedience, and
their and every of their heirs shall hold, possess, and enjoy
all and every their estates of freehold and inheritance; and
all the rights, titles, and interest, privileges and
immunities, which they, or every or any of them, held,
enjoyed, and were rightfully and lawfully entitled to in the
reign of King Charles II.' … A general pardon was to be
granted to all persons comprised within the treaty, and the
Lords Justices and the generals commanding King William's army
were to use their best endeavours to get the attainders of any
of them attainted repealed. … In the copy of the rough draft
engrossed for signature the following words, 'and all such as
are under their protection in the said counties,' which
immediately followed the enumeration of the several counties
in the second article, were omitted. This omission, whether
the result of design or accident, was, however, rectified by
King William when confirming the treaty in February, 1692. The
confirming instrument stated that the words had been casually
omitted; that the omission was not discovered till the
articles were signed, but was taken notice of before the town
was surrendered; and that the Lords Justices or General
Ginkel, or one of them, had promised that the clause should be
made good, since it was within the intention of the
capitulation, and had been inserted in the rough draft.
William then for himself did 'ratify and confirm the said
omitted words.' The colonists, or at all events the 'new
interests'—that is, those who shared or expected to share in
the confiscations—were indignant at the concessions made to
the native race."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1 of Two Centuries of Irish History,
chapter 1.
"The advantages secured to Catholics by the Treaty of Limerick
were moderate. But when the flower of the Irish army had
withdrawn to France, and the remnant could be hanged without
ceremony, they began to look inordinate. The parliament of
Cromwellian settlers and Government officials in Dublin having
excluded Catholic members, by requiring from them an oath of
abjuration, in direct infringement of one of the articles of
surrender, were free to proceed at their discretion. They
first passed a stringent statute depriving Catholics of arms,
and another ordering all 'Popish archbishops, bishops,
vicars-general, deans, Jesuits, monks, friars, and regulars of
whatever condition to depart from the kingdom on pain of
transportation,' and then proceeded to consider the treaty.
They … resolved by a decisive majority not to keep the
conditions affecting the Catholics. William … struggled for
a time to preserve his honour; but it is not convenient for a
new king to be in conflict with his friends, and after a time
he gave way. … In Ireland the Treaty of Limerick can never
be forgotten; it is one of the title deeds of the Irish race
to their inheritance in their native land. For more than a
century its sordid and shameless violation was as common a
reproach to England on the Continent as the partition of
Poland has been a reproach to Russia in our own day."
Sir C. G. Duffy,
Bird's-Eye View of Irish History, revised edition,
pages 155-156
(or book 1, chapter 4, of "Young Ireland").
"The Protestant rancour of parliament was more powerful than
the good will of the prince. The most vital articles of the
capitulation were ignored, especially in all cases where the
Catholic religion and the liberties granted to its professors
were concerned; and 4,000 Irish were denounced as traitors and
rebels,—by which declamation a fresh confiscation of
1,060,000 acres was immediately effected. … It has been
calculated that in 1692 the Irish Catholics, who quadrupled
the Protestants in number, owned only one-eleventh of the
soil, and that the most wretched and unproductive portion."
A. Perraud,
Ireland under English Rule,
introduction, section 8.
IRELAND: A. D. 1691-1782.
The peace of despair.
A century of national death.
Oppression of the Penal Laws.
"By the military treaty [of Limerick], those of Sarsfield's
soldiers who would were suffered to follow him to France; and
10,000 men, the whole of his force, chose exile rather than
life in a land where all hope of national freedom was lost.
When the wild cry of the women who stood watching their
departure was hushed, the silence of death settled down upon
Ireland. For a hundred years the country remained at peace,
but the peace was a peace of despair. The most terrible legal
tyranny under which a nation has ever groaned avenged the
rising under Tyrconnell. The conquered people, in Swift's
bitter words of contempt, became 'hewers of wood and drawers
of water' to their conquerors; but till the very eve of the
French Revolution Ireland ceased to be a source of terror and
anxiety to England."
J. H. Green,
Short History of England,
chapter 9, section 8.
"In Ireland there was peace. The domination of the colonists
was absolute. The native population was tranquil with the
ghastly tranquillity of exhaustion and of despair. There were
indeed outrages, robberies, fireraisings, assassinations. But
more than a century passed away without one general
insurrection. During that century, two rebellions were raised
in Great Britain by the adherents of the House of Stuart. But
neither when the elder Pretender was crowned at Scone, nor
when the younger held his court at Holyrood, was the standard
of that House set up in Connaught or Munster.
{1775}
In 1745, indeed, when the Highlanders were marching towards
London, the Roman Catholics of Ireland were so quiet that the
Lord Lieutenant could, without the smallest risk, send several
regiments across Saint George's Channel to reinforce the army
of the Duke of Cumberland. Nor was this submission the effect
of content, but of mere stupefaction and brokenness of heart.
The iron had entered into the soul. The memory of past
defeats, the habit of daily enduring insult and oppression,
had cowed the spirits of the unhappy nation. There were indeed
Irish Roman Catholics of great ability, energy and ambition;
but they were to be found everywhere except in Ireland,—at
Versailles and at Saint lldefonso, in the armies of Frederic
and in the armies of Maria Theresa. One exile became a Marshal
of France. Another became Prime Minister of Spain. If he had
staid in his native land he would have been regarded as an
inferior by all the ignorant and worthless squireens who had
signed the Declaration against Transubstantiation. …
Scattered over all Europe were to be found brave Irish
generals, dexterous Irish diplomatists, Irish Counts, Irish
Barons, Irish Knights … who, if they had remained in the
house of bondage, could not have been ensigns of marching
regiments or freemen of petty corporations. These men, the
natural chiefs of their race, having been withdrawn, what
remained was utterly helpless and passive. A rising of the
Irishry against the Englishry was no more to be apprehended
than a rising of the women and children against the men."
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapter 17.
"An act of 1695 'deprived the Roman Catholics of the means of
educating their children, either at home or abroad, and of the
privilege of being guardians either of their own or of any
other person's children.' Another Act of the same year
deprived the Roman Catholics of the right of bearing arms, or
of keeping any horse which was worth more than £5. An Act of
1697 ordered the expulsion of every Roman Catholic priest from
Ireland. The Parliament, which had imposed these disabilities
on Irish Roman Catholics, proceeded to confirm the Articles of
Limerick, or 'so much of them as may consist with the safety
and welfare of your Majesty's subjects of this kingdom,' and
by a gross act of injustice omitted the whole of the first of
these articles, and the important paragraph in the second
article which had been accidentally omitted from the original
copy of the Treaty, and subsequently restored to it by letters
patent under the Great Seal. Reasonable men may differ on the
propriety or impropriety of the conditions on which the
surrender of Limerick was secured; but it is difficult to read
the story of their repudiation without a deep sense of shame.
Three other acts relating to the Roman Catholics were passed
during the reign of William. An Act of 1697 forbade the
intermarriage of Protestants and Papists. An Act of 1698
prevented Papists from being solicitors. Another Act of the
same year stopped their employment as gamekeepers. William
died; and the breach of faith which he had countenanced was
forgotten amidst the pressure of the legislation which
disgraced the reign of his successor. Two Acts passed in this
reign, for preventing the further growth of Popery, were
styled by Burke the 'ferocious Acts of Anne.' By the first of
these Acts a Papist having a Protestant son was debarred from
selling, mortgaging, or devising any portion of his estate:
however young the son might be, he was to be taken from his
father's hands and confided to the care of a Protestant
relation. The estate of a Papist who had no Protestant heir
was to be divided equally among his sons. The Papist was
declared incapable of purchasing real estate or of taking land
on lease for more than thirty-one years. A Papist was declared
incapable of inheriting real estate from a Protestant. He was
disqualified from holding any office, civil or military. With
twenty exceptions, a Papist was forbidden to reside in
Limerick or Galway. Advowsons the property of Papists were
vested in the Crown. Religious intolerance had now apparently
done its uttermost. … But the laws failed. Their severity
insured their failure. … The first of the ferocious Acts of
Anne was almost openly disregarded. … Its failure only
induced the intolerant advisers of Anne to supplement it with
harsher legislation. The Act of 1704 had deprived the Papist
of the guardianship of his apostate child. An Act of 1709
empowered the Court of Chancery to oblige the Papist to
discover his estate, and authorized the Court to make an order
for the maintenance of the apostate child out of the proceeds
of it. The Act of 1704 had made it illegal for a Papist to
take lands on lease; the Act of 1709 disabled him from
receiving a life annuity. An Act of 1704 had compelled the
registry of priests. The Act of 1709 forbade their officiating
in any parish except that in which they were registered.
These, however, were the least reprehensible features in the
Act of 1709. Its worst features were the encouragement which
it gave to the meaner vices of human nature. The wife of a
Papist, if she became a Protestant, was to receive a jointure
out of her husband's estate. A Popish priest abandoning his
religion was to receive an annuity of £30 a year. Rewards were
to be paid for 'discovering' Popish prelates, priests, and
schoolmasters. Two justices might compel any Papist to state
on oath where and when he had heard mass, who had officiated
at it, and who had been present at it. Encouragement was thus
given to informers; bribes were thus held out to apostates;
and Parliament trusted to the combined effects of bribery and
intimidation to stamp out the last remnant of Popery. The
penal code, however, was not yet complete. The armoury of
intolerance was not yet exhausted. An Act of George I.
disabled Papists from serving in the Irish militia, but
compelled them to find Protestant substitutes; to pay double
towards the support of the militia, and rendered their horses
liable to seizure for militia purposes. By Acts of George II.
the Papists were disfranchised; barristers or solicitors
marrying Papists were deemed Papists; all marriages between
Protestants and Papists were annulled; and Popish priests
celebrating any illegal marriages were condemned to be hanged.
By an Act of George III. Papists refusing to deliver up or
declare their arms were liable to be placed in the pillory or
to be whipped, as the Court should think proper. Such were the
laws which the intolerance of a minority imposed on the
majority of their fellow-subjects. Utterly unjust, they had
not even the bare merit of success. …
{1776}
'The great body of the people,' wrote Arthur Young [1780],
'stripped of their all, were more enraged than converted: they
adhered to the persuasion of their forefathers with the
steadiest and the most determined zeal; while the priests,
actuated by the spirit of a thousand inducements, made
proselytes among the common Protestants in defiance of every
danger. … Those laws have crushed all the industry and
wrested most of the property from the Catholics; but the
religion triumphs; it is thought to increase.'"
S. Walpole,
History of England from 1815,
chapter 8 (volume 2).
ALSO IN:
R. R. Madden,
Historical Notice of Penal Laws against Roman Catholics.
A. Perraud,
Ireland under English Rule: introduction.
E. Burke,
Letter to a Peer of Ireland on the Penal Laws
(Works, volume 4).
E. Burke,
Fragments of a Tract on the Popery Laws
(Works, volume 6).
A. J. Thébaud,
The Irish Race,
chapter 12.
IRELAND: A. D, 1710.
Colonization of Palatines in Munster.
See PALATINES.
IRELAND: A. D. 1722-1724.
Wood's halfpence.
The Drapier's Letters.
"A patent had been given [1722, by the Walpole administration]
to a certain William Wood for supplying Ireland with a copper
coinage. Many complaints had been made, and in September,
1723, addresses were voted by the Irish Houses of Parliament,
declaring that the patent had been obtained by clandestine and
false representations; that it was mischievous to the country;
and that Wood had been guilty of frauds in his coinage. They
were pacified by vague promises; but Walpole went on with the
scheme on the strength of a favourable report of a committee
of the Privy Council; and the excitement was already serious
when (in 1724) Swift published the Drapier's Letters, which
give him his chief title to eminence as a patriotic agitator.
Swift either shared or took advantage of the general belief
that the mysteries of the currency are unfathomable to the
human intelligence. … There is, however, no real mystery
about the halfpence. The small coins which do not form part of
the legal-tender may be considered primarily as counters. A
penny is a penny, so long as twelve are change for a shilling.
It is not in the least necessary for this purpose that the
copper contained in the twelve penny pieces should be worth or
nearly worth a shilling. … At the present day bronze worth
only twopence is coined into twelve penny pieces. … The
effect of Wood's patent was that a mass of copper worth about
£60,000 became worth £100,800 in the shape of halfpenny
pieces. There was, therefore, a balance of about £40,000, to
pay for the expenses of coinage. It would have been waste to
get rid of this by putting more copper in the coins; but if so
large a profit arose from the transaction, it would go to
somebody. At the present day it would be brought into the
national treasury. This was not the way in which business was
done in Ireland. Wood was to pay £1,000 a year for fourteen
years to the Crown. But £14,000 still leaves a large margin
for profit. 'What was to become of it. According to the
admiring biographer of Sir R. Walpole the patent had been
originally given by Lord Sunderland to the Duchess of Kendal,
a lady whom the King delighted to honour. … It was right and
proper that a profit should be made on the transaction, but
shameful that it should be divided between the King's mistress
and William Wood, and that the bargain should be struck
without consulting the Irish representatives, and maintained
in, spite of their protests. The Duchess of Kendal was to be
allowed to take a share of the wretched halfpence in the
pocket of every Irish beggar. A more disgraceful transaction
could hardly be imagined, or one more calculated to justify
Swift's view of the selfishness and corruption of the English
rulers. Swift saw his chance and went to work in
characteristic fashion, with unscrupulous audacity of
statement, guided by the keenest strategical instinct. … The
patent was surrendered, and Swift might congratulate himself
upon a complete victory. … The Irish succeeded in rejecting
a real benefit at the cost of paying Wood the profit which he
would have made, had he been allowed to confer it."
L. Stephen,
Swift (English Men of Letters),
chapter 7.
ALSO IN:
Dean Swift,
Works (Scott's edition),
volume 6.
Lord Mahon (Earl Stanhope),
History of England, 1713-1783,
chapter 13 (volume 2).
J. McCarthy,
History of the Four Georges,
chapter 15.
IRELAND: A. D. 1760-1798.
Whiteboys.
Oak Boys.
Steel Boys.
Peep of Day Boys.
Catholic Defenders.
"The peasantry continued to regard the land as their own; and
with the general faith that wrong cannot last forever, they
waited for the time when they would once more have possession
of it. 'The lineal descendants of the old families,' wrote
Arthur Young in 1774, 'are now to be found all over the
kingdom, working as cottiers on the lands which were once
their own.' … With the growth of what was called
civilization, absenteeism, the worst disorder of the country,
had increased. … The rise in prices, the demand for salt
beef and salt butter for exportation and for the fleets, were
revolutionizing the agriculture of Munster. The great
limestone pastures of Limerick and Tipperary, the fertile
meadow universally, was falling into the hands of capitalist
graziers, in whose favour the landlords, or the landlords'
agents, were evicting the smaller tenants. … To the
peasantry these men were a curse. Common lands, where their
own cows had been fed, were inclosed and taken from them. The
change from tillage to grazing destroyed their employment.
Their sole subsistence was from their potato gardens, the
rents of which were heavily raised, while, by a curious
mockery of justice, the grass lands were exempt from tithe,
and the burden of maintaining the rectors and vicars of the
Established Church was cast exclusively on the Catholic poor.
Among a people who are suffering under a common wrong there is
a sympathy of resentment which links them together without
visible or discoverable bond. In the spring of 1760 Tipperary
was suddenly overrun by bands of midnight marauders. Who they
were was a mystery. Rumours reached England of insurgent
regiments drilling in the moonlight; of French officers
observed passing and repassing the Channel; but no French
officer could be detected in Munster. The most rigid search
discovered no stands of arms, such as soldiers use or could
use. This only was certain, that white figures were seen in
vast numbers, like moving clouds, flitting silently at night
over field and moor, leaving behind them the tracks of where
they had passed in levelled fences and houghed and moaning
cattle; where the owners were specially hateful, in blazing
homesteads, and the inmates' bodies blackening in the ashes.
Arrests were generally useless. The country was sworn to
secrecy.
{1777}
Through the entire central plains of Ireland the people were
bound by the most solemn oaths never to reveal the name of a
confederate, or give evidence in a court of justice. … Thus
it was long uncertain how the movement originated, who were
its leaders, and whether there was one or many. Letters
signed by Captain Dwyer or Joanna Meskell were left at the
doors of obnoxious persons, ordering lands to be abandoned
under penalties. If the commands were uncomplied with, the
penalties were inexorably inflicted. … Torture usually being
preferred to murder, male offenders against the Whiteboys were
houghed like their cattle, or their tongues were torn out by
the roots."
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
book 5, chapter 1 (volume 2).
The Whiteboys took their name from the practice of wearing a
white shirt drawn over their other clothing, when they were
out upon their nocturnal expeditions. "The Oak Boy movement
took place about 1761-2. … The injustice which led to the
formation of the 'Oak Boys,' one of the best known of the
colonial societies, was duty work on roads. Every householder
was bound to give six days' labour in making and repairing the
public roads; and if he had a horse, six days' labour of his
horse. It was complained that this duty work was only levied
on the poor, and that they were compelled to work on private
job roads, and even upon what were the avenues and farm roads
of the gentry. The name Oak Boys, or Hearts of Oak Boys, was
derived from the members in their raids wearing an oak branch
in their hats. The organization spread rapidly over the
greater part of Ulster. Although the grievances were common to
Protestant and Catholic workmen, and there was nothing
religious in the objects or constitution of the Oak Boys, the
society was an exclusively Protestant body, owing to the total
absence at the period of any association between the
Protestants and Catholics. … The Steel Boys, or Hearts of
Steel Boys, followed the Oak Boys [about 1771]. They also were
exclusively Protestant; the origin of this organization was
the extravagance and profligacy of a bad landlord, the
representative of the great land thief, Chichester, of the
Plantation of King James I. … The Oak Boys and Steel Boys
did not last long."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1 of Two Centuries of Irish History,
chapter 5, with foot-note.
The landlord here referred to, as having provoked the
organization of the Steel Boys, was the Marquis of Donegal.
"Many of his Antrim leases having fallen in simultaneously, he
demanded £100,000 in fines for the renewal of them. The
tenants, all Protestants, offered the interest of the money in
addition to the rent.' It could not be. Speculative Belfast
capitalists paid the fine and took the lands over the heads of
the tenants, to sublet. … The most substantial of the
expelled tenantry gathered their effects together and sailed
to join their countrymen in the New World. … Between those
who were too poor to emigrate, and the Catholics who were in
possession of their homes, there grew a protracted feud, which
took form at last in the conspiracy of the Peep of Day Boys;
in the fierce and savage expulsion of the intruders, who were
bidden to go to hell or Connaught; and in the
counter-organization of the Catholic Defenders, which spread
over the whole island, and made the army of insurrection in
1798."
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
book 5, chapter 2, section 6 (volume 2).
IRELAND: A. D. 1778-1794.
Concession of Legislative independence by the
so-called Constitution of 1782.
"England's difficulty was Ireland's opportunity. Over in the
American colonies Mr. Washington and his rebels were pressing
hard upon the troops of King George. More than one garrison
had been compelled to surrender, more than one general had
given up his bright sword to a revolutionary leader. On the
hither side of the Atlantic the American flag was scarcely
less dreaded than at Yorktown and Saratoga. … Ireland,
drained of troops, lay open to invasion. The terrible Paul
Jones was drifting about the seas; descents upon Ireland were
dreaded; if such descents had been made the island was
practically defenceless. An alarmed Mayor of Belfast,
appealing to the Government for military aid, was informed
that no more serious and more formidable assistance could be
rendered to the chief city of the North than might be given by
half a troop of dismounted cavalry and half a troop of
invalids. If the French-American enemy would consent to be
scared by such a muster, well and good; if not Belfast, and
for the matter of that, all Ireland, must look to itself.
Thereupon Ireland, very promptly and decisively, did look to
itself. A Militia Act was passed empowering the formation of
volunteer corps—consisting, of course, solely of
Protestants—for the defence of the island. A fever of
military enthusiasm swept over the country; north and south
and east and west men caught up arms, nominally to resist the
French, really, though they knew it not, to effect one of the
greatest constitutional revolutions in history. Before a
startled Government could realise what was occurring 60,000
men were under arms. For the first time since the surrender of
Limerick there was an armed force in Ireland able and willing
to support a national cause. Suddenly, almost in the twinkling
of an eye, Ireland found herself for the first time for
generations in the possession of a well-armed,
well-disciplined, and well-generalled military force. The
armament that was organised to insure the safety of England
was destined to achieve the liberties of Ireland. … All talk
of organisation to resist foreign invasion was silenced; in
its place the voice of the nation was heard loudly calling for
the redress of its domestic grievances. Their leader was
Charlemont; Grattan and Flood were their principal colonels."
J. H. McCarthy,
Ireland Since the Union,
chapter 3.
"When the Parliament met, Grattan moved as an amendment to the
Address, 'that it was by free export and import only that the
Nation was to be saved from impending ruin'; and a corps of
Volunteers, commanded by the Duke of Leinster, lined Dame
Street as the Speaker and the Commons walked in procession to
the Castle. Another demonstration of Volunteers in College
Green excited Dublin a little later on, and (15th November,
1779) a riotous mob clamoured for Free Trade at the very doors
of the House. … These events resulted in immediate success.
Lord North proposed in the British Parliament three articles
of relief to Irish trade—
(1) to allow free export of wool, woollens, and wool-flocks;
(2) to allow a free export of glass;
(3) to allow, under certain conditions, a free trade to all
the British colonies.
{1778}
When the news reached Ireland excessive joy prevailed. … But
this was only a beginning. Poynings' Law, and the 6th of
George I., required to be swept away too, so that Ireland
might enjoy not only Free Trade, but also Self-government.
Grattan moved his two famous resolutions:—
1. That the King, with the consent of the Lords and Commons of
Ireland, is alone competent to enact laws to bind Ireland.
2. That Great Britain and Ireland are inseparably united under
one Sovereign.