FOOTNOTES:
[222] Diary in Contemp. Hist., iii. 260; Ludlow, i. 289, 294. Ireton’s correspondence with Galway, December 7-12, 1651, is printed in Hardiman’s Hist. of Galway, 129; Corbet, Jones, and Weaver to Lenthall, and to Cromwell, December 2, in appx. to Firth’s Ludlow, i. 496.
[223] Ludlow, i. 265; Bishop of Down’s letters, May 13 and 29, 1651, in Nicholas Papers, i. 250, 255.
[224] Ludlow, i. 300-304; the Four Commissioners to the Council of State, January 8, 1651-2, ib. 499; orders by the same Commissioners, January 13 and February 13, in Contemp. Hist., iii. 277, 283.
[225] Clanricarde to Ludlow, February 14, 1651-2. In the text of Ludlow the date is wrongly given as March 14, but see the appx. i. 505, and Contemp. Hist., iii. 58, with Ludlow’s answer in both places, and another to Sir Richard Blake, who had ‘reiterated in effect the former application,’ ib. 509.
[226] Dean King’s report, April 1, 1652, in Contemp. Hist., iii. 300.
[227] Order of the Irish Council as to Dominick Bodkin, &c., May 20, 1656, printed in O’Flaherty’s Western Connaught, p. 244; W. Heald to T. Holder, December 12, 1651, in Contemp. Hist., iii. 353; Corbet, Jones, and Weaver to Cromwell, December 2, 1651, in appx. to Ludlow, i. 497.
[228] Corbet, Jones, and Ludlow to Lenthall, May 6, 1652, in appx. to Ludlow, i. 516. The articles of surrender are in Hardiman’s Hist. of Galway, appx. xxix. to xxxiii., along with the strictures of the Commissioners and the list of those who had accepted or rejected the latter furnished by Coote, November 26, 1652.
[229] Clanricarde to Philip O’Reilly and Lieut.-General O’Ferrall, April 4 and 12, 1652, in Aphorismical Discovery, iii. 76; Castlehaven’s Memoirs, 97, ed. 15, with Anglesey’s letter of August 1680, appended p. 39; Clarendon S.P., iii. 66.
[230] Charles II. to Clanricarde, February 10, 1651-2 (enclosing one of February 6 to Duke of Lorraine), and March 23, in Clanricarde’s Memoirs, part ii. 51; Castlehaven’s Memoirs, p. 97; Clarendon State Papers, iii. 66; Aphorismical Discovery, iii. 122; Ludlow, i. 317, 323, 527; Warr of Ireland, by a British officer, 138; Bishop of Ferns’ letter, April 21, 1651, in Spicilegium Ossoriense, ii. 92; Bishop of Clonfert’s letter, August 31, 1652, ib. i. 386.
[231] Aphorismical Discovery, ii. 138-144; ib. iii. 54, 285-293; Clarendon’s Ireland, p. 194. See also Gardiner’s Commonwealth, ii, 46, 59.
[232] The tenour of the articles entered into can be seen from the subsidiary agreement printed in Contemp. Hist. iii. 293, the declaration of Walter Bagenal and others against him, and the despatch of Corbet, Jones, and Ludlow in appx. to Ludlow’s Memoirs, i. 515. For Mrs. Fitzpatrick, ib. 340. In his preface to Contemp. Hist., iii. xviii., Sir J. Gilbert says the witness against her was suborned, but he gives no authority, and in the collection of massacres appended to Clarendon’s volume on Ireland, several murders by Florence Fitzpatrick are mentioned, Elizabeth Baskerville testifying ‘that Mrs. Fitzpatrick blamed the murderers because they brought not Mrs. Nicholson’s fat or grease, wherewith she might have made candles.’—Lodge’s Peerage, ed. Archdall, ii. 345.
[233] Most of the articles are printed in Contemp. Hist. iii. 293-335.
[234] Ludlow, i. 320, and his letter of June 24 to Lenthall, ib. 526. There is a good memoir on the siege of Ross by J. P. Prendergast in Kilkenny Arch. Journal, iii. 24-35, and a criticism of the same by Archdeacon Rowan in the Kerry Magazine, 1855, p. 101. Chudleigh’s monument at Kinsale says he ‘causavit terris velificasse ratem,’ which is rather ambiguous, for no boat could actually sail on land. Perhaps it is doubtful Latin for ‘inland.’ Smith, in his History of Kerry, 1756, p. 315, says the boats were ‘brought up by the river Lane by strength of men’s hands,’ and he afterwards mentions one Hopkins, sexton of Swords near Dublin a few years before, who lived to be 115, and who was one of the men employed in drawing the boats to the lake.
[235] Ludlow, Waller, Corbet, Jones, Coote and fourteen other superior officers to Lenthall, May 5, 1652, in appx. to Ludlow, i. 512; Declaration of May 12 in Contemp. Hist. iii. 315; Scobell’s Acts and Ordinances, 1650, cap. 27.
[236] The Leinster Articles, May 12, 1652, are in Aphorismical Discovery, iii. 94, 315; Ludlow, Corbet, and Jones to Lenthall, May 13, in appx. to Ludlow, i. 520.
[237] Ludlow, i. 322, with Mr. Firth’s note; Jones and Corbet to Lenthall July 22, 1652, in Contemp. Hist. iii. 339. The articles, June 22, are printed ib. 324.
[238] Aphorismical Discovery, with the articles of surrender, dated August 14, 1652, iii. 128-133, and the note ib. 392; Clarke’s Life of James II. i. 268; Memoirs of the Family of Grace, 1823, 27-34.
[239] Ludlow, i. 328, 342; Aphorismical Discovery, iii. 125; Thureau-Dangin, Hist. de la Monarchie de Juillet, vi. 343; Kinglake’s Crimean War, ii. 8. The French Government argued that conquest must precede philanthropy.
[240] Ludlow, i. 330. Fleetwood landed at Waterford on or just before September 11.
[CHAPTER XXXVI]
END OF THE WAR, AND ITS PRICE
The last stand at Innisbofin.
The islands surrendered, Feb. 1652-3.
Rory O’More.
The historian Cox says that he could find nothing that looked like war during the year 1653, though the rebellion was not officially declared at an end until September 26. The early part of the year cannot, however, be considered as peaceful. There was still some resistance in Ulster, and the Irish also possessed a fortified post in the island of Innisbofin. To that remote stronghold Murtagh O’Brien had repaired after Muskerry’s surrender, and with the help of some arms and ammunition from the Duke of Lorraine he continued to give trouble on the mainland. The fort of Arkin on the great island of Arran had been surprised through ‘the supine carelessness and negligence of Captain Dyas’ shortly before Fleetwood’s arrival, and the Irish garrison under Colonel Oliver Synnot did not surrender until the middle of January. Among those who took refuge in Innisbofin were Roger O’More, the original contriver of the rebellion, Bishop Lynch of Clonfert, Brian MacPhelim O’Byrne, and Colonel Dudley Costello. The governor was Colonel George Cusack, whose family had property in the Pale, and he soon came to terms with Reynolds. The islands of Bofin, Turk, and Clare were surrendered and facilities were given for transporting 1000 men into the Spanish service. The officers retained their arms, ‘prelates and clergymen’ being allowed to go with the rest. Some of the articles were more indulgent than usual, but Colonel Jones thought them ‘suitable to the difficulty of gaining that place by force.’ Only a few days before, near the neighbouring castle of Renvyle, on the mainland, 270 men who were on their way to attack Bofin fell into an ambuscade of 800 Irish, and only got through with the loss of four officers and forty-six men. According to the Aphorismical Discovery, O’More, who could expect no mercy if captured, was basely deserted by Cusack and the Bishop of Clonfert. Donogh O’Flaherty, who was also left behind, was shot by the soldiers; but O’More, after enduring great hardships, got away to Ulster and lived for some time as a fisherman.[241]
The last stand in Ulster.
Surrender of Cloughoughter, April 27.
Murder.
In the same month of February fighting continued in West Cork and Kerry among the O’Sullivans and O’Driscolls, some of whom took up arms after their inclusion in the Muskerry articles; and there were still a few desperate men for the garrisons of Cork and Limerick to hunt. But the last stronghold was the island in Lough Oughter, where Bedell had died in the first year of the war. In February, Colonel Barrow came to the lake, burned some of the defenders’ boats ‘with a fiery float,’ and their corn with incendiary missiles, but had the ill luck to be captured himself and held to ransom. This was probably the work of some loose band which remained in arms after the capitulation of the garrison at the end of April. The articles concluded were between Sir Theophilus Jones and Philip O’Reilly on behalf of himself and the other Ulster chiefs still remaining under arms. The terms were much the same as had been granted in other recent cases, and included liberty to make terms with the Spanish recruiting agents. Priests and others in Roman orders were given a month to leave the country, on condition that they did not exercise their function during the interval. Those guilty of murder, whether lay or cleric, were as usual excluded, and a murderer was specially defined as one ‘who had actually a hand in a particular murder or did command the same, or was present when a particular murder was committed by persons under his command by his order.’ It was no murder to have killed a man in fight in the open field at any time since the beginning of the war.[242]
Tories to be starved out.
Exhaustion of the country.
The plague.
Famine.
Mountjoy had long since proved that the way to subdue Ireland was to destroy the means of subsistence. As one of the Commissioners of Parliament, Colonel Jones was of opinion that no lasting peace could be made ‘but by removing all heads of septs and priests and men of knowledge in arms, or otherwise in repute, out of this land, and breaking all kinds of interest among them, and by laying waste all fast countries in Ireland, and suffer no mankind to live there but within garrisons,’ adding that declarations were about to issue for laying waste all Kerry and Wicklow, and portions—in some instances the greater part—of seventeen other counties. This was written shortly before the surrender of Cloughoughter, and after that the guerrilla warfare degenerated into mere brigandage. We are not to suppose that the whole ruthless programme was carried out; but no doubt the facts were bad enough. Ludlow was Jones’s colleague, and he speaks of the ‘poor wasted country of Ireland,’ adding that the Irish had always exhausted the land by bad cultivation, and of late worse than ever, ‘being in daily apprehensions of being removed.’ Not long afterwards Petty found the people living on potatoes, and the cultivation of that dangerous root must have been stimulated by the confusion of the past twelve years. It was then and for many years later the practice to dig out the tubers just as they were wanted. Such a crop could not well be carried away or destroyed, and if the sowers escaped the sword they would find something to eat for nine months out of the twelve; while corn could be easily cut or burned, and cattle still more easily driven off. The famine caused by war and by the destruction of food in districts not under protection was accompanied by the plague, which was rife in Galway and many other places. ‘It fearfully broke out in Cashel,’ says Jones, ‘the people being taken suddenly with madness, whereof they die instantly; twenty died in that manner in three days in that little town.’ Dublin did not escape. ‘About the years 1652 and 1653,’ says Colonel Lawrence, who had every opportunity of judging, ‘the plague and famine had swept away whole countries that a man might travel twenty or thirty miles and not see a living creature, either man, beast, or bird, they being either all dead or had quit those desolate places.’ He had himself seen starving wretches pick carrion out of a ditch, and had heard of cases in which human flesh was eaten. Wolves increased enormously, and rewards were given for their heads.[243]
Treatment of priests.
Galway.
Cloughoughter.
A Dominican’s experience.
While the war still raged, Roman Catholic priests were for the most part either not mentioned in capitulations or specially excluded from the benefit of them. At Limerick some were excepted by name, and all were refused protection; but later the terms were not quite so rigorous. At Galway they were allowed six months to leave the country. At Roscommon the chaplain was allowed to go out with the garrison. When the Clare brigade surrendered to Waller, all persons in Roman orders were excepted, but he covenanted ‘industriously to solicit the Commissioners of Parliament that such of the clergy in orders, having no other act or crime laid to their charge than officiating their functions as priests, not being suffered to live in quarters or protection, shall have passes and liberty to go beyond the seas.’ Reynolds did much the same in Ulster. A large number of the clergy fled to Innisbofin, and when it was surrendered they were all given protection for life and goods, with leave to accompany the garrison abroad. At Cloughoughter, which was the last fortified place, they were given a month to go, provided they did not officiate in the meanwhile. Out of a great many extant letters from fugitive priests, that of a Dominican friar named O’Conor may be singled out. The brethren of his Order had, he says, continually roused Catholics by preaching to the soldiers and inciting the nobles to take up arms, living constantly among them in the woods and mountains, and opposing every proposal for surrender or capitulation. He himself had been prior of Kilkenny, where he strenuously supported Rinuccini, and was therefore thrice condemned to banishment by the Supreme Council, ‘having excited the anger of all heretics and bad Catholics.’ After the fall of Kilkenny he became prior of Burrishoole, in Mayo, where his convent was for three years the refuge of religious persons. Two attacks were beaten off, but at last the place was taken by storm. The soldiers were killed and some of the friars; others fled to the mountains. Accompanied by one boy, he took a skiff made out of a single log and went six leagues into the open ocean, almost miraculously making his way to Innisbofin. After a short time, seven Parliamentary ships with twenty-two boats hove in sight, and it became necessary to surrender the island. He was transported with the rest, on pain of death if he revisited Ireland, where an edict had been published exiling all ecclesiastics on the same terms, with severe penalties against all who helped them.[244]
An edict against Jesuits and seminarists.
The edict mentioned by Father O’Conor and by many other clerical writers of the same time was an order, signed by Fleetwood, Ludlow, Corbet, and Jones, setting forth the experience of many years, ‘that Jesuits, seminary priests, and persons in Popish orders in Ireland, estrange the people from due obedience to the English Commonwealth, and, under pretence of religion, excite them to rebellion, which gave rise to the barbarous murders of 1641 and the destructive war which followed.’ They were all to leave Ireland within twenty days, or incur the penalties of the English Act, 27 Elizabeth, which had never been the law of Ireland, and which made the priests traitors and their abettors felons.[245]
The swordsmen sent abroad.
Great numbers take foreign service.
Their ill-treatment in Spain.
Better received in France.
Clarendon’s reflection.
Chichester strove to get the swordsmen of Ulster into the Swedish service, where they might help the Protestant cause almost without knowing it. After the disbanding of Strafford’s army the English Parliament had very naturally, but very unwisely, prevented the men from going to Spain, thus aggravating, if not actually causing, the outbreak in 1641. Cromwell profited by experience, and saw that even in the service of the Catholic king the survivors of the Irish war would be much less dangerous than in their own country. At the beginning of 1653 the Commissioners reported that 13,000 had already gone, but that there were still left ‘many desperate rogues who know not how to live but by robbing and stealing out of bogs and fastnesses.’ By July the number had risen to 27,000. There were, says Petty, who was in Ireland at the time and whose estimate is rather under that of his friend Gookin, ‘transported of them into Spain, Flanders, France, 34,000 soldiers; and of boys, women, priests, &c., no less than 6000 more,’ of whom not half had returned in 1672. The Spanish Government broke all their promises and treated the Irish officers and soldiers very badly, so that whole regiments passed over from time to time into the service of France. In both services the dissensions which had been so fatal in Ireland continued between Celts and Anglo-Irish and between Ormondists and Nuncionists. Hyde, who knew Spain and had suffered many things there, excuses the desertions in Catalonia, which were stimulated by Inchiquin, and the ill-conduct of the Irish at Bordeaux, which caused the loss of that city, by the extreme ill-usage which they had received from the Spanish authorities. There were many needy Irish officers in London who were glad to contract with Cardenas for the transport of men. Philip found money enough to make this remunerative, but when the Irish were once landed in his country no further trouble was taken. ‘The soldiers, who were crowded more together into one ship than was fit for so long voyages, had contracted many diseases, and many were dead and thrown overboard. As soon as they came upon the coast the officers made haste to land, how far soever from the place at which they stood bound to deliver their men; by which in those places which could make resistance they were not suffered to land, and in others no provision was made for their reception on march; but very great numbers were starved or knocked in the head by the country people.’ All this, Clarendon adds, ‘manifested how loose the government was.’ Mazarin managed much better. The passage to France was shorter, and he took care that there should be no want of shipping and better accommodation on landing, so that at least 20,000 Irishmen came into the French service, though from old associations they would have preferred that of Spain. And the historian notes that Cromwell had been able to send abroad 40,000 men who would have been enough to drive him out of England; while the King’s Lieutenant, notwithstanding all the promises, obligations, and contracts which the Confederate Roman Catholics had made to and with him, could not draw together a body of 5000 men.[246]
Arrival of Fleetwood, Sept. 1653.
A High Court established.
Trials at Kilkenny, Clonmel, and Cork.
On June 8 Fleetwood married Ireton’s widow, and on July 10 his father-in-law made him commander-in-chief in Ireland. In the following month he was appointed by Parliament a commissioner for the civil government along with the regicides Ludlow, Corbet, and Jones, and John Weaver, the member for Stamford. Fleetwood was in Ireland by the beginning of September, but there was not much left for a general to do except to superintend the reduction of the army. The dregs of the war had to be dealt with first, but the Commissioners were given great powers in the domain of law and justice, and their first care was for the punishment of those to whom murder could be brought home. Doctor Jones had already received orders to collect evidence. A High Court was erected in Dublin under Chief Justice Lowther, who issued commissions to find and examine witnesses in the country. Local courts were also established, the first of which, consisting of Justices Donnellan and Cook and Commissary-General Reynolds, sat on October 4 at Kilkenny in the room where the Supreme Council had been used to meet. Notwithstanding the difficulty of getting evidence eleven years after the first outbreak, sixteen persons were found guilty at Kilkenny, six at Clonmel, and thirty-two at Cork; and we are told that most of these were very considerable men, heads of septs or otherwise important. The High Court in Dublin did not sit until January.[247]
Uncertainty as to number executed.
Sir Phelim O’Neill.
It was considered murder to kill persons not in arms or who had been received to quarter, and this was the general principle on which prosecutions were based. The record is imperfect, but Cox estimated that not above two hundred died by the hands of the common executioner, though many murderers had perished by the sword or by disease. Hearsay evidence was probably admitted to an extent which would not be dreamed of in our days, but trials were carefully conducted, and there were a great many acquittals. Of the original insurgents surviving, by far the most important were Sir Phelim O’Neill, who had lurked in Tyrone since the surrender of Charlemont, where his wife remained. Early in 1653 he ventured, with a view of communicating with her, to take up his abode in an old house on an island in Roghan Lough, near Coalisland, accompanied by Tirlogh Groom O’Quin and a score of soldiers. His messenger was a follower named O’Hugh, who was under protection at Charlemont, and Lord Caulfield’s attention was thus roused. The little lake was surrounded and boats were launched upon it, and the island, which was very near the shore, was quite indefensible even against musketry. Sir Phelim surrendered, and was taken to Carrickfergus, where he was very civilly treated by Venables, who had found him a gallant enemy. He was sent off to Dublin and tried there upon the last day of February, his companions, with the exception of O’Quin, being released.[248]
Sir Phelim is found guilty.
The case of Lord Caulfield.
O’Neill was sentenced to death for high treason and for four murders proved against him, according to the judge’s notes. That he had levied war against the King is obvious, and the question is not worth discussing. He was not accused of murdering any one with his own hand, but as an accessory before the fact or by giving orders to the actual assassins. In the case of Lord Caulfield the fragments of evidence which we possess do not make the facts absolutely clear. The original capture was treacherous in the highest degree, and the murder was committed by Sir Phelim’s foster-brother. The young lord had been over five months O’Neill’s prisoner at or near Charlemont, and according to one witness he directed the escort to take him to Cloughoughter, in Cavan. Sir Phelim’s own house at Kinard was the first halting-place, and there the deed was done, fifteen or sixteen of Caulfield’s Scotch and English dependants being slaughtered at the same time. O’Neill was not present, but he had used very suspicious language shortly before, and the assassin was allowed to escape in his gaoler’s company, and was not caught. Of three warders, one who was an Irishman was not punished, while the other two, being English and Scotch, were duly hanged by Sir Phelim’s orders. The gaoler was restored to his post at Armagh. In all the cases much of the evidence is hearsay; but the murders charged, with many others, were committed within a few miles of Charlemont, and Sir Phelim, who commanded in chief, never punished anybody. Michael Harrison swore that in December 1641 he heard O’Neill say, ‘with great ostentation, that he would never leave off the work he had begun until mass should be sung or said in every church in Ireland, and that a Protestant should not live in Ireland, be he of what nation he would.’[249]
Execution of Sir Phelim O’Neill.
The alleged royal commission.
Sham commissions were shown.
O’Neill was hanged, drawn, and quartered, one quarter being impaled at Lisburn, which he had burned; another at Dundalk, which he had taken; a third at Drogheda, which he had vainly besieged; and a fourth, with the head, at Dublin, which he had plotted to surprise. Tirlogh Groom O’Quin, who was captured with him and who had been his close associate in the early days of the rebellion, was executed later, and his head set upon the west gate of Carrickfergus. There has been much discussion as to the exact relation of Sir Phelim and the other original conspirators to Charles I., and the declaration of Dean Ker in 1681 was long accepted as evidence. Attempts have been made to set aside Ker’s statement, on the ground that he wanted to be a bishop, that he spoke twenty-eight years after the fact, and that it was impossible that things which happened in open court should have remained doubtful for so long. It is certain that he never became a bishop, and there is nothing to prove that he wished to be one. By his own showing he had often mentioned the matter to his friend or patron, Lord Lanesborough, who at last persuaded him to write it down. There is never anything extraordinary in London being ignorant of what happens in Dublin; and after the Restoration no one had any interest in recalling the proceedings of the Cromwellian High Court there. The late King’s position as a saint and martyr was then undisputed, and the Church of England was not on her defence. A more important difficulty is that the Dean says he heard Michael Harrison, who only saved his life by acting as secretary to Sir Phelim, confess in open court that he attached the Great Seal to a sham commission, and that O’Neill, when pressed by the judges, answered ‘that no man could blame him to promote that cause he had so far engaged in.’ In his sworn deposition Harrison says Sir Phelim had often spoken of a commission from the King, but he had never been able to get a sight of it, though it was generally believed to exist. It seems certain that a sham commission of some sort was shown not only in Ulster but in Munster; and there is no difficulty about believing that O’Neill should not have wished to die with a lie in his mouth, or that hopes of mercy should have been held out to him if he would implicate Charles. If the commission were forged, it matters little whether the seal was that of England or Scotland; either would do to exhibit at a distance. We know from the judge’s notes that O’Neill was believed to have altered a genuine document, and that a copy was produced in court. It is not impossible that Harrison may have been employed to affix a seal to some instrument which he had not been allowed to read. The memory of Charles I. has much to bear, but he could not have given a commission authorising a general insurrection. He had been angling for Roman Catholic help before the outbreak of the rebellion, and many may have been persuaded that they were doing his will by rising against the Lords Justices; but it is not at all likely that any of the leaders were of this opinion.[250]
Lord Muskerry acquitted.
His speech after trial.
Lord Muskerry was not one of the first conspirators, but he joined the movement soon after it had spread to Munster. After the surrender of Ross Castle he went to Spain, but he had been a determined opponent of Rinuccini, and he found the clergy so hostile that his life was not safe. At Lisbon his reception was little better, and he gave up his plan of raising troops for the Peninsula, returned to Cork, and threw himself upon the mercy of Parliament. This was in February 1653, and he remained a prisoner in Dublin until his trial in December. In the meantime Lady Ormonde had arrived there, and naturally interested herself in his behalf. If Carte was rightly informed, Lowther did what he could by privately informing her of the line which the prosecution would take, and so enabling the prisoner to be prepared for his defence at all points. He was not tried for treason, but as accessory to the murder of Mrs. Hussey and others in 1642; and this resulted in an acquittal. There was another charge for the murder of William Deane and others, also in 1642, and it was held that the prosecutors had proved the facts, but that the prisoner had no real share in what was done, and was in any case protected by the Ross articles. It was, moreover, shown that he often acted a humane and merciful part. A separate count, for the murder of Roger Skinner, also resulted in an acquittal. Muskerry was not finally discharged for some months, and this delay may have been caused by the discovery that a printed copy of the Ross articles produced on the trial differed from the original which had been retained by Ludlow. He was charged in May 1654 with the murder of a man and woman unknown, but there was a verdict of ‘Not Guilty.’ Muskerry’s speech after his acquittal on the Hussey and Deane charges has been preserved. He admitted that he had had a fair trial, and that if there had been any leaning it was in his favour. ‘I met,’ he said, ‘many crosses in Spain and Portugal. I could get no rest till I came hither, and the crosses I met here are much affliction to me; but when I consider that in this court I come clear out of that blackness of blood by being so sifted, it is more to me than my estate. I can live without my estate, but not without my credit.’ He raised men for the Venetian service, and went later to Poland, and regained most of his property after the Restoration.[251]
Primate O’Reilly found guilty.
O’Reilly pardoned.
Another remarkable case was that of Edmund O’Reilly, then or later vicar-general of Dublin and afterwards Primate, for the murder of John Joyce and others at Wicklow in December 1642. They appear to have been burned in Wicklow Castle in cold blood. Most of the evidence was hearsay, and does not perhaps amount to much more than that O’Reilly made rather light of what had been done. Luke Byrne, indeed, swore that in a conversation when Joyce was mentioned O’Reilly had advised him to kill all the English about him, and had afterwards excommunicated him for favouring them. The prisoner answered that this Byrne was his enemy, and that he had excommunicated him for living in adultery. Perhaps the strongest point against O’Reilly was made by Peter Wickham, who had been High Sheriff of Wicklow, and who stated that Edward Byrne was put off the jury because he, as foreman, was prepared to say that Joyce and the rest were murdered. Edward Byrne himself corroborated this. On the other hand, a witness bearing the English name of Pemberton swore that O’Reilly had done many acts of kindness and preserved many English lives, including those of five Protestant clergymen. These cases were all a good deal later than Joyce’s murder, and it is not improbable that, while favouring the rebellion at first, he became afterwards disgusted at the outrages that attended it. He was found guilty, but received a pardon. Peter Walsh, who was bitterly opposed to O’Reilly, speaks of him as rather a good-natured and merciful man, but adds that he escaped owing to ‘his former services to the Parliament, especially that of betraying the royal camp at Rathmines to Jones.’ He was certainly engaged in secret negotiations between Jones and Owen Roe O’Neill in 1648, and it may well be that there was no wish to deal hardly with him. Walsh says he was under protection within the Parliament’s lines, and in that unsafe position was rash enough to appear in Dublin as a witness for the prosecution in a criminal trial. He was recognised and named by a person in court, who called upon the judge to arrest him as priest and vicar-general and chief author of seizing and burning in cessation time the black castle of Wicklow, and consequently too of murdering all those within it. ‘Now whether this accusation was in itself true or false I know not.’[252]
Trial of Lord Mayo, who is shot.
Sir Theodore Bourke, third Viscount Mayo, submitted on July 14, 1652, and was one of the seven who signed on behalf of a large number. Those guilty of robbery or murder during the first year of the war were excluded from any benefit by the articles. Lord Mayo was tried at Galway as accessory to the Shrule massacre by a commission consisting of Sir Charles Coote and ten others. He was undoubtedly present at the murders, and he rode away without fighting for the victims, who were supposed to be under his protection; but there was evidence to show that he did make some effort to save them, and that he fled only to secure his own life. Four of the commissioners were for an acquittal, but he was condemned by a majority and shot.[253]
Cost of the war.
The city of London.
War is a costly business. First there is the blood-tax, withdrawing thousands of young men from remunerative work. Then there is the expenditure on war materials, and the destruction of property, which may take long to replace. In modern times soldiers are paid punctually, but some part of the waste has to be met by loans, and so the expense of war goes on when its causes are half forgotten. In the case of the Irish rebellion, it was seen at once that the work could not be paid for out of revenue. Except for a moment under Strafford, Ireland had never been self-supporting, and Parliament, upon whom the King at once cast the responsibility, as yet commanded no regular income and could not pledge the national credit. The city of London was willing enough to give money, but security for repayment was required, and 2500 acres of Irish land were hypothecated for this purpose. It was assumed, judging by the great area affected, and by the experience of former rebellions, that a very much larger amount would be forfeited. Those who subscribed would have something to sell as soon as their money had done its work. In addition to this it proved, just as in Elizabeth’s time, that there was never ready cash enough to pay the soldiers in full, and their arrears also were made a charge upon the Irish forfeitures. There were also many miscellaneous creditors who expected to be paid out of the same fund.[254]
Charles I. a party to the plan of settlement.
Money subscribed for Ireland,
but spent in England.
It is unnecessary to set out in detail the negotiations which led to the passing of the Act for the speedy reduction of the rebels in Ireland, but it received the royal assent and was therefore a legal statute forming the basis of what is known as the Cromwellian settlement. Charles II. was bound by it, for the original contract could not be denied. Six hundred and twenty-five thousand acres were pledged in each province, and the money advanced was to be repaid with land distributed by lot at the rate of 1000 acres in Ulster for every 200l., in Connaught for every 300l., in Munster for every 450l., and in Leinster for every 600l. Profitable land only was counted, bogs, loughs, and barren mountains with the woods growing on them, being thrown in without measurement. A quit-rent was reserved to the Crown of one penny per acre in Ulster, three halfpence in Connaught, twopence farthing in Munster, and threepence in Leinster. Patents and pardons before attainder since the fatal October 23, 1641, were declared void, and so were assignments made after March 1 in that year. A special cause of forfeiture was entering after the said March 1 into ‘any compact, bond, covenant, oath, promise, or agreement to introduce or bring into the said realm of Ireland the authority of the see of Rome in any case whatsoever or to maintain or defend the same.’ The money subscribed was all to be paid in London, and it was specially provided that no part of it was to be devoted to any purpose except the reduction of the Irish rebels until Parliament should declare that the thing was done. But it very soon became evident that there would be war nearer home and long before the time limited for closing the collection. One hundred thousand pounds was borrowed by the House of Commons for their own purposes ‘upon the public faith.’ Charles protested, as he had every right to do, but he set up his standard at Nottingham only nine days later, having already proclaimed Essex a traitor. The Irish difficulty could not be effectively dealt with until it was decided who was to be master in England.[255]
Further financial enactments.
The doubling ordinance.
Superstitious uses.
The settlement suspended by war.
Three Acts to explain or extend the original one were passed soon afterwards. By the first special arrangements were made for admitting Scotch adventurers and Dutch Protestants on or before May 10, 1642; by the second, subscribers who paid all their money before July 20, 1642, were to have Irish acres based upon a perch of twenty-one feet, new contributors and those who were not so prompt, being still confined to English measure, with a perch of sixteen and a half feet, by the third corporations and companies were admitted to contribute as well as individuals. A permanent committee sat in London to watch the interests of the adventurers. Ordinances affecting them were made from time to time, of which one of the most important was that of July 14, 1643, doubling the amount of land to be given in Irish acres for an additional one-fourth to the original subscription, and encouraging merchants and manufacturers to advance money on the security of the towns and neighbourhoods of Limerick, Waterford, Galway, and Wexford. All chantry lands ‘given, unto superstitious uses for maintenance of popish priests and idolatrous masses’ were thrown in, and also all lands ‘given for maintenance of lazars and lazarous people and concealed in possession and occupation of such who are now or shall be rebels, and have been by their ancestors enjoyed by many descents.’ Some months before this, at the beginning of October 1642, the House of Commons sent a committee to Ireland consisting of Robert Goodwin and Robert Reynolds, adventurers and members of Parliament, and of Captain William Tucker, who was associated with them by the City of London. They disagreed among themselves, and effected nothing for the adventurers, but their pretensions gave the King an opportunity of interfering. Dublin was secured in Ormonde’s hands, and so it remained until Charles was overthrown in England. But civil government was in abeyance long after that, and it was not until August 1652, when the Irish war seemed to be nearly over, that Parliament was able to declare how Irish land should be dealt with.[256]