The Irish rebellions (1594-1649)
A large part of the native Irish aristocracy was from the outset hostile to the Plantations, for reasons that were not only cultural and religious but also political : the deployment of an English administration did after all threaten its own authority over the Gaelic populations. Hugh O'Neill[1], Earl of Tyrone and chief of a powerful Ulster clan was leading an insurrection as early as 1594. Faced with English and Scottish inroads into his province, where he was determined to be a foremost player, he took the lead of a confederation of Ulster chieftains who had resolved to campaign against the English authority's garrisons and representatives as represented by Henry Bagenal[2]. Considered by Elisabeth's subjects as “rebels”, they wrote to Philip II[3] of Spain asking for his support. They introduced themselves as champions of the Catholic Church fighting to obtain religious and political freedom for the Irish people. To their way of thinking, political and religious demands could not be divorced from each other. This feature of what was to become the “Irish Question” is crucial to understand the conflict.
The rebellion against advancing English colonisation lasted nine years. O'Neill won victories until 1599, notably in 1598 at Yellow Ford, South West of Lough Neagh. From 1600 onwards the English governor (Lord Deputy), Charles Blount[4], Baron Mountjoy, was sent considerable reinforcements in order to quell the rebellion. So that, on 3 January 1602 he was able to defeat the Irish near Kinsale, even though the Spanish had landed 3500 soldiers in 1601. O'Neill ended up negotiating with the English and, in 1603, signed with them the Treaty of Mellifont which did not appear too disadvantageous to the Irish : the rebels kept hold of most of their land under condition to submit to English law and O'Neill held on to his title and estates but he must forego his suzerainty over his clan's vassals. This Nine Year War showed up both Irish determination and divisions and provided the English with the opportunity to extend their control of the island. It did not put paid to colonisation, the troubles affecting the mainland notwithstanding.
The period that witnessed, post the “Thorough” policies of 1640-1641, the civil war (1642-1649), the Commonwealth[5] (1649-1653), and Cromwell's Protectorate (1653-1659), revolutionary in its essence, reignites the Irish protest movement. In 1640, Puritan and Presbyterian members of the London Parliament found themselves at loggerhead with Charles I[6]. With a view to purify the Anglican church they deem corrupt, and to assert the rights of Parliament before the Crown, they restrict the king's power : they order the arrest of the Archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud[7], and have Thomas Wentworth[8], a once much trusted counsellor of the king, executed on 12 May 1641. Faced with this political set of circumstances, the Irish Catholics seize the initiative for two reasons : they want to recover the properties Protestants have taken from them ; they fear that the de facto tolerance they have enjoyed over some years be brought into question, given the growing hostility of the English Puritan members of Parliament against the Catholics. That is the reason why they back Charles Ist, a sovereign who had indeed incurred the ire of Old English Catholics by pursuing the Plantation policy at the beginning of his reign and by dispatching Thomas Wentworth to Ireland in 1632 to quash any opposition to the Crown in Ireland. But a sovereign who had also made enemies of the English Presbyterians as Wentworth implemented William Laud's anti-Puritan policies.
So the Irish hoped that by supporting Charles I against his enemies, they would obtain from him as a reward some economic, religious and political concessions. On 22 October 1641, Ulstermen under the leadership of Phelim O'Neill[9] rose to overthrow the English government in Ireland. The following day the province was in the thrall of insurgence. Insurrectionists claiming to act in the name of the king – when no contact has been established – and to defend the crown against the presumptions of the “Puritan faction”, began to massacre the Protestants and pillage their houses. At the end of 1641, the Old English joined the rebels, hoping that they would in this way preserve their estates and their socio-political influence. In February 1642, the rebels controlled nearly the whole island. Still out of their reach remained the area around Dublin, Dublin itself, Londonderry, Cork, Belfast and Carrickfergus : as many harbours where the English could disembark men and equipment. It is difficult to assess the extent of the massacres for the memory of the violence perpetrated in the 17th century prevented for a long time any serious study of the subject. Nowadays, English and Irish historians put forward a figure of 4,000 victims but the loss of lives may have reached 12,000 if settlers dead of hunger or hardships suffered after their expulsions are taken into account. It was not the first time that the Irish lead violent attacks against Anglican and Presbyterian settlers coming from Britain but the violence had never reached such a climax.
On 8 November 1641, upon hearing about these events, the English parliament voted the credits needed for the repression. Many English folks are then convinced that Protestantism is under threat from Papism[10] in Great Britain. Anti-Catholic riots take place in London on 29 November, and on the 11, 27, 28, 29 and 30 December. Yet, the English did not intervene immediately in Ireland as the civil war opposing the Royalists to the parliamentarians pinned them down in England from the summer of 1642. This war granted the Irish insurgent a seven year breathing space they put to good use by giving themselves as early as 1642 some institutions. They set up in Kilkenny a parliament whose members were elected by the big landowners and the Catholic clergy. This assembly appointed a government called Supreme Council and which was dominated by the Old English.
The new leadership, which called itself the Confederate Catholics of Ireland meant to restore the rights of the Catholic Church and defend Irish freedoms as well as the Crown's prerogatives. Minded of the fact that Charles may have need of them in his war against the English Parliament, they were ready to place a high price on their potential help. On 15 September 1643, they concluded a cease-fire with the king's agents : at the cost of a considerable sum, they obtained the return of 2,500 soldiers to England. Next they negotiated a peace treaty with the representative of royal power in Ireland, James Butler[11], by then Marquis of Ormond, and arrived at an agreement on 28 March 1646 : the confederates must send 10,000 men to England to support the king militarily ; in counterpart, they obtain the admission of Catholics to all levels of civil and military office in Ireland. Charles' weakness thus enabled Irish Catholics to obtain measures to their advantage. But this reversal of situation was short lived, because of divisions within confederate ranks on the one hand and, on the other because of the English Parliament's determination to wipe out this “papist” hotbed.
For his part, the Nuncio Giambattista Rinuccini, sent by Innocent X[12] wanted to continue the fight in order for Catholic Ireland to achieve total victory over the Protestants. Accordingly he advised the Irish clergy to stall any peace process and incited the Kilkenny parliament to reject the 28 March 1646 agreement which he considered an unacceptable compromise. Meanwhile, the Catholic military chiefs remained divided as to the line to take regarding the towns still in the hands of the Protestants. Their procrastination made them miss in November 1946 their last opportunity to take Dublin. The Marquis of Ormond still kept on negotiating with them. On 17 January 1649, he arrived at a new treaty based on the free exercise of the Catholic faith, but the situation remained unclear. After the execution of Charles I on 30 January 1649, Ireland seemed divided into three forces : the Scottish Presbyterians in Ulster ; Owen Roe O'Neill's men in the North of Ireland who cut deals with the English Parliament ; the Royalists lead by the Marquis of Ormond who fought in the interests of Charles II[13], son of Charles I.
