The Scotch undertakers had previously been made acquainted with Ulster by the colonizations in Elizabeth’s reign in Down and Antrim. They felt more at home in a land where their friends had gone previously. The geographical position was favourable to them. So they and their followers settled permanently in sufficient numbers to give the movement a thoroughly Scotch aspect. Yet for all that, Mr. Prendergast says,[[38]] “Ulster continued to be the dangerous part of Ireland till after the war of the Revolution, when it was nearly colonized anew by the Scotch settlers and camp-followers of King William’s foreign forces. Eighty thousand small Scotch adventurers came in between 1690 and 1698 into different parts of Ireland, but chiefly into Ulster.”
Let me give a contemporary picture that is pleasant enough of a set of these Scotch settlers of James I’s reign. They were the holders of land in the barony of Mountjoy, Co. Tyrone; they had fallen into a goodly possession, and the industry we see them all conspicuous for is not to be looked upon as typical of all the adventurers, but only of those who were favoured by circumstances and surroundings. The men were, Andrew Stewart, Lord O’Chiltree; he was of old Scottish descent, and the fourth Lord O’Chiltree. He had fallen into difficulties, and was obliged to sell his barony to Sir James Stewart; the title went with the barony, so it was only a courtesy title by which he was called; but the king, to encourage him and his son, conferred on the young man the title of Earl of Castlestuart; Robert Stewart of Hilton, an Edinburgh man; Sir Robert Hepburn, a Scotch soldier; George Crayford or Crawford, Laird of Loughnorris, an Ayrshire man, belonging to an old family; Bernard and Robert Lindsay, who belonged to Leith; Robert Stewart of Rotton, an uncle of Lord O’Chiltree, and finally a brother of Robert Stewart of Hilton. These two Stewarts of Edinburgh, and the two Lindsays were all servants or caterers in some fashion to the king. In 1611, a year after they had taken out their patents, Carew makes the following report[[39]]: “Lord Ucheltrie, 3,000 acres; being stayed by contrary winds in Scotland, arrived in Ireland (at the time of our being in Armagh, upon our return home) accompanied with 33 followers, gents of sort [i.e., gentlemen of position], a minister, some tenants, freeholders and artificers, unto whom he hath passed estates; he hath built for his present use three houses of oak timber, one of 50 feet long and 22 feet wide, and two of 40 feet long, within an old fort, about which he is building a bawne. There are two ploughs going on his demesne, with some fifty cows and three score young heifers landed at Island Magy in Clandeboy which are coming to his proportion, with some twelve working mares. Sir Robert Hepburn, Knight, 1,500 acres; sowed oats and barley the last year upon his land, and reaped this harvest 40 hogsheads of corn; is resident; hath 140 cows young and old, and 8 mares; is building a stone house 40 feet long and 20 feet wide, already a storey high; intends to have it three stories high, and to cover it, and the next spring to add another storey to it; good store of timber felled and squared, and providing materials to finish the work. The Laird Loughnorris, 1,000 acres; being deceased himself, as we are informed, had his agent here, Robert O’Rorke; hath timber felled and is preparing materials for building against the spring. Bernard and Robert Lindsay, 1,000 acres apiece; have taken possession personally in the summer, 1610, returned into Scotland’s agent, Robert Cowties resident; a timber house is built on Robert Lindsey’s proportion; hath eight mares, and eight cows with their calves, and five oxen, with swine and other small cattle, and a competent portion of arms. Robert Stewart of Haulton, 1,000 acres: hath appeared in person, and brought some people; timber felled, and preparing materials for building. Robert Stewart of Robstone, 1,000 acres, hath appeared in person, with tenants and cattle; timber felled and squared, and providing materials for building. The Castle of Mountjoy, upon Lough Chichester [Lough Neagh] beside the old fort, wherein are many inhabitants both English and Irish, together with Sir Francis Roe’s foot company. Here is a fair castle of stone and brick, covered with slate and tile, begun in the late Queen’s time, and finished by his Majesty. It is compassed about by a good strong rampier of earth, well ditched and flanked with bulwarks. In this Castle Sir Francis Roe, the constable, and his family dwell.” This seems a happy sort of family; it represents the most industrious type of undertaker, who brings his family influence to bear in getting workers into the place. One would look upon them as intending to settle with their families for ever; but, alas for the good intentions of King James, when Pynnar’s survey was made in 1619 five of these proportions had passed to other hands, mostly by sale. Just as the young fellows who improve land now in Canada try to make something on it in a few years by sale, so a large number of the Ulster Plantation lands went the same way. Nearly all the king’s servants who obtained grants, sold them as soon as possible. Sir James Craig was clerk of the wardrobe and had probably begun life as a tailor. The brothers Achmootie were also servants of the king, and sold their lands.[[40]] Their common greed for money was the distinguishing point of all these worthies. Some of them are specially worthy of note for their acquisitiveness. Touchet, Lord Audelay, and his clan, were amongst these. This nobleman came from Staffordshire, and had entirely failed as a planter in Munster. When the northern confiscations began, he made a modest request for 100,000 acres. I don’t know whether the word “land-grabber” was then in vogue, but at any rate his demand was rejected; but he and his interesting family got the barony of Omagh among them, which was set down as having 11,000 arable acres. Lord Audelay got 3,000 acres; Sir Marvin Audley, his son, 2,000; Sir Ferdinand Audley 2,000; Sir John Davies, his son-in-law, 2,000; Edward Blount, another son-in-law, 2,000. The old man was made Earl of Castlehaven, and Davies the lawyer became ancestor of the Earls of Huntingdon, by his daughter marrying a Mr. Hastings. Davies’ grants in all parts of Ulster were enormous; many of the properties were beyond his powers to manage, and he sold them. Here is a report of work done, the date is 1611. “Cavan Precinct of Loughtie. Sir John Davys, Kt., 2,000 acres, has made over his proportion to Mr. Richard Waldron, who passed the same to Mr. Regnold Home, who sold his estate to Sir Nicholas Lusher, Kt., nothing done.”[[41]]
Davies got grants of land, confiscated properties and so forth, literally in every county in Ireland. He also received a grant of 100 marks for his services about the parliament. The grant just quoted in Omagh alone must have worked out for the family at nearly the 100,000 acres asked for. On Lord Audley’s death it was found that his property contained not only the 3,000 acres granted, but also 3,000 of meadow, 3,000 of pasture, 2,000 of wood, 2,000 of briars and whins, and 200 of bog; thus extending his original 3,000 to 13,200, these additions having been thrown in as unprofitable or waste land. So greedy were these men that there was a special commission appointed to correct any blunders that had been made in the grants to the little family group. Davies, Touchet’s son-in-law, the Irish Attorney-General, and the evil genius of the whole Plantation, was described by Tyrone as being more fitted to be a stage-player than a lawyer. In the case of this Audley crew, the enquiries showed that they neglected the land shamefully, and did not even reside.
Hamilton, the first Earl of Abercorn, and his crowd, were an example of the hungry Scotch lairds. James Hamilton was the head of this family party; he was grandson of the second Earl of Arran. He, his brother Sir Claud, his brother Sir George, his kinsman another George, his brother-in-law Sir Thomas Boyd, got out of O’Neill’s property the greater part of the barony of Strabane. Sir George afterwards incurred Royal displeasure and lost his property by becoming a Roman Catholic, and his grandson was a general in the Jacobite army in Ireland.[[42]] Sir Arthur Chichester got Inishowen as his plunder for having been viceroy, and especially for his subserviency in the Parliamentary dispute. He also got large tracts of country where Belfast now is. These three, the Chichesters, the Hamiltons, and the Touchets must have taken an enormous amount of land amongst them.
Then there were the London Companies. The city was very slow in taking up the idea of a settlement in Ireland, and when they did consent to the plan insisted on getting their own way, without any regard to the Plantation rules. As one looks back on the history of the Irish Society, and a chequered history it has been, the best we can say of it is that this gigantic system of absenteeism has not been as bad as one might have prophesied.
The grants and leases to the natives were of very small value, mostly 60 acres, and were only given to a small number. In a great number of cases they were limited either by being only given for one or two lives, with remainders to Englishmen, or by the possibility of forfeiture under the regime of a new landlord. The Derry see lands were at first let out thus; to English or Scotch on lease for sixty years; to Irish for twenty-one years or three lives, with power of revocation by the succeeding Bishop.[[43]] Before eight years had elapsed we find that the tenants had been compelled to surrender their leases and take out new ones “on increased rents, by means whereof the revenues were well increased, to the honour of Almighty God.” Occasionally a native appears with 1,000 acres opposite his name, but it is pretty rare. For example, “Only forty natives in the whole extensive County of Donegal obtained small grants in the dreary regions of Doe and Fanet, now Kilmacrenan. Several of them were representatives of noble Irish families, and the remainder belonged to the class of native gentry. The prevailing surnames amongst them were those of O’Donnell, MacSwyne, O’Gallagher, and O’Boyle. A few very old people got pretty liberal grants, but with remainders to Sir Ralph Bingley and Sir Richard Hansard.”[[44]] Some of the conditions attached to grants in this reign are very striking:
Dowry to be forfeited on marrying an Irishman.
Not to take tenants nor employ anyone who could only speak Irish.
Not to destroy passes or bridges unless they led into the Irishmen’s land.
Not to take the names of O’Rourke, O’Mulloy, The Fox, McCoghlan, O’Doyne, The Great O’Ferrall, The Great O’Carroll.[[45]]