Strafford was recalled to expiate his career on the scaffold; the army was disbanded; and the helm of the state remained in the hands of a land-jobber and of a superannuated soldier. Disbanded troops are the ready weapons Rebellion of 1641. of conspiracy, and the opportunity was not lost. The Roman Catholic insurgents of 1641 just failed to seize Dublin, but quickly became masters of nearly the whole country. That there was no definite design of massacring the Protestants is likely, but it was intended to drive them out of the country. Great numbers were killed, often in cold blood and with circumstances of great barbarity. The English under Sir Charles Coote and others retaliated. In 1642 a Scottish army under General Robert Monro landed in Ulster, and formed a rallying point for the colonists. Londonderry, Enniskillen, Coleraine, Carrickfergus and some other places defied Sir Phelim O’Neill’s tumultuary host. Trained in foreign wars, Owen Roe O’Neill gradually formed a powerful army among the Ulster Irish, and showed many of the qualities of a skilful general. But like other O’Neills, he did little out of Ulster, and his great victory over Monro at Benburb on the Blackwater (June 5, 1646) had no lasting results. The English of the Pale were forced into rebellion, but could never get on with the native Irish, who hated them only less than the new colonists. Ormonde throughout maintained the position of a loyal subject, and, as the king’s representative, played a great but hopeless part. The Celts cared nothing for the king except as a weapon against the Protestants; the old Anglo-Irish Catholics cared much, but the nearer Charles approached them the more completely he alienated the Protestants. In 1645 Rinuccini reached Ireland as papal legate. He could never co-operate with the Roman Catholic confederacy at Kilkenny, which was under old English influence, and by throwing in his lot with the Celts only widened the gulf between the two sections. The state of parties at this period in Ireland has been graphically described by Carlyle. “There are,” he says, “Catholics of the Pale, demanding freedom of religion, under my lord this and my lord that. There are Old-Irish Catholics, under pope’s nuncios, under Abba O’Teague of the excommunications, and Owen Roe O’Neill, demanding not religious freedom only, but what we now call ‘repeal of the union,’ and unable to agree with Catholics of the English Pale. Then there are Ormonde Royalists, of the Episcopalian and mixed creeds, strong for king without covenant; Ulster and other Presbyterians strong for king and covenant; lastly, Michael Jones and the Commonwealth of England, who want neither king nor covenant.”
In all their negotiations with Ormonde and Glamorgan, Henrietta Maria and the earl of Bristol, the pope and Rinuccini stood out for an arrangement which would have destroyed the royal supremacy and established Romanism in Ireland, leaving to the Anglicans bare toleration, and to the Presbyterians not even that. Charles behaved with his usual weakness. Ormonde was forced to surrender Dublin to the Parliamentarians (July 1647), and the inextricable knot awaited Cromwell’s sword.
Cromwell’s campaign (1640-1650) showed how easily a good general with an efficient army might conquer Ireland. Resistance in the field was soon at an end; the starving-out policy of Carew and Mountjoy was employed Cromwell. against the guerrillas, and the soldiers were furnished with scythes to cut down the green corn. Bibles were also regularly served out to them. Oliver’s severe conduct at Drogheda and elsewhere is not morally defensible, but such methods were common in the wars of the period, and much may be urged in his favour. Strict discipline was maintained, soldiers being hanged for stealing chickens; faith was always kept; and short, sharp action was more merciful in the long run than a milder but less effective policy. Cromwell’s civil policy, to use Macaulay’s words, was “able, straightforward, and cruel.” He thinned the disaffected population by allowing foreign enlistment, and 40,000 are said to have been thus got rid of. Already Irish Catholics of good family had learned to offer their swords to foreign princes. In Spain, France and the Empire they often rose to the distinction which they were denied at home. About 9000 persons were sent to the West Indies, practically into slavery. Thus, and by the long war, the population was reduced to some 850,000, of whom 150,000 were English and Scots. Then came the transplantation beyond the Shannon. The Irish Catholic gentry were removed bodily with their servants and such tenants as consented to follow them, and with what remained of their cattle. They suffered dreadful hardships. To exclude foreign influences, a belt of 1 m. was reserved to soldiers on the coast from Sligo to the Shannon, but the idea was not fully carried out. The derelict property in the other provinces was divided between adventurers who had advanced money and soldiers who had fought in Ireland. Many of the latter sold their claims to officers or speculators, who were thus enabled to form estates. The majority of Irish labourers stayed to work under the settlers, and the country gradually became peaceful and prosperous. Some fighting Catholics haunted woods and hills under the name of tories, afterwards given in derision to a great party, and were hunted down with as little compunction as the wolves to which they were compared. Measures of great severity were taken against Roman Catholic priests; but it is said that Cromwell had great numbers in his pay, and that they kept him well informed. All classes of Protestants were tolerated, and Jeremy Taylor preached unmolested. Commercial equality being given to Ireland, the woollen trade at once revived, and a shipping interest sprang up. A legislative union was also effected, and Irish members attended at Westminster.
Charles II. was bound in honour to do something for such Irish Catholics as were innocent of the massacres of 1641, and the claims were not scrutinized too severely. It was found impossible to displace the Cromwellians, but Charles II. (1660-1685). they were shorn of about one-third of their lands. When the Caroline settlement was complete it was found that the great rebellion had resulted in reducing the Catholic share of the fertile parts of Ireland from two-thirds to one-third. Ormonde, whose wife had been allowed by Cromwell’s clemency to make him some remittances from the wreck of his estate, was largely and deservedly rewarded. A revenue of £30,000 was settled on the king, in consideration of which Ireland was in 1663 excluded from the benefit of the Navigation Act, and her nascent shipping interest ruined. In 1666 the importation of Irish cattle and horses into England was forbidden, the value of the former at once falling five-fold, of the latter twenty-fold. Dead meat, butter and cheese were also excluded, yet peace brought a certain prosperity. The woollen manufacture grew and flourished, and Macaulay is probably warranted in saying that under Charles II. Ireland was a pleasanter place of residence than it has been before or since. But it was pleasant only for those who conformed to the state religion. Roman Catholicism was tolerated, or rather connived at; but its professors were subject to frequent alarms, and to great severities during the ascendancy of Titus Oates. Bramhall became primate, and his hand was heavy against the Ulster Presbyterians. Jeremy Taylor began a persecution which stopped the influx of Scots into Ireland. Deprived of the means of teaching, the Independents and other sectaries soon disappeared. In a military colony women were scarce, and the “Ironsides” had married natives. Roman Catholicism held its own. The Quakers became numerous during this reign, and their peaceful industry was most useful. They venerate as their founder William Edmundson (1627-1712), a Westmorland man who had borne arms for the Parliament, and who settled in Antrim in 1652.
The duke of Ormonde was lord-lieutenant at the death of Charles II. At seventy-five his brain was as clear as ever, and James saw that he was no fit tool for his purpose. “See, gentlemen,” said the old chief, lifting his glass James II. (1685-1689). at a military dinner-party, “they say at court I am old and doting. But my hand is steady, nor doth my heart fail.... To the king’s health.” Calculating on his loyal subservience, James appointed his brother-in-law, Lord Clarendon, to succeed Ormonde. Monmouth’s enterprise made no stir, but gave an excuse for disarming the Protestant militia. The tories at once emerged from their hiding-places, and Clarendon found Ireland in a ferment. It was now the turn of the Protestants to feel persecution. Richard Talbot, one of the few survivors of Drogheda, governed the king’s Irish policy, while the lord-lieutenant was kept in the dark. Finally Talbot, created earl of Tyrconnel, himself received the sword of state. Protestants were weeded out of the army, Protestant officers in particular being superseded by idle Catholics of gentle blood, where they could be found, and in any case by Catholics. Bigotry rather than religion was Tyrconnel’s ruling passion, and he filled up offices with Catholics independently of character. Sir Alexander Fitton, a man convicted of forgery, became chancellor, and but three Protestant judges were left on the bench. The outlawries growing out of the affairs of 1641 were reversed as quickly as possible. Protestant corporations were dissolved by “quo warrantos”; but James was still Englishman enough to refuse an Irish parliament, which might repeal Poyning’s Act and the Act of Settlement.
At the close of 1688 James was a fugitive in France. By this time Londonderry and Enniskillen had closed their gates, and the final struggle had begun. In March 1689 James reached Ireland with some French troops, and summoned a parliament which repealed the Act of Settlement. The estates of absentees were vested in the crown, and, as only two months law was given, this was nearly equivalent to confiscating the property of all Protestants. Between 2000 and 3000 Protestants were attainted by name, and moreover the act was not published. The appalling list may be read in the State of the Protestants by William King, archbishop of Dublin, one of many divines converted by the logic of events to believe in the lawfulness of resistance. Interesting details may be gleaned from Edmundson’s Diary. The dispossessed Protestants escaped by sea or flocked into Ulster, where a gallant stand was made. The glories of Londonderry and Enniskillen will live as long as the English language. The Irish cause produced one great achievement—the defence of Limerick, and one great leader—Patrick Sarsfield. The Roman Catholic Celts aided by France were entirely beaten, the Protestant colonists aided by England were entirely victorious William III. at the battle of the Boyne, on the 1st of July 1690; and at the battle of Aughrim on the 12th of July 1691. Even the siege of Limerick showed the irreconcilable divisions which had nullified the efforts of 1641. Hugh Baldearg O’Donnell, last of Irish chiefs, sold his services to William for £500 a year. But it was their king that condemned the Irish to hopeless failure. He called them cowards, whereas the cowardice was really his own, and he deserted them in their utmost need. They repaid him with the opprobrious nickname of “Sheemas-a-Cacagh,” or dirty James.
Irish rhetoric commonly styles Limerick “the city of the violated treaty.” The articles of capitulation (Oct. 3, 1691) may be read in Thomas Leland’s History of Ireland (1773) or in F. P. Plowden’s History of Ireland (1809); from the first their interpretation was disputed. Hopes of religious liberty were held out, but were not fulfilled. Lords Justices Porter and Coningsby promised to do their utmost to obtain a parliamentary ratification, but the Irish parliament would not be persuaded. There was a paragraph in the original draft which would have protected the property of the great majority of Roman Catholics, but this was left out in the articles actually signed. William thought the omission accidental, but this is hardly possible. At all events he ratified the treaty in the sense most favourable to the Catholics, while the Irish parliament adhered to the letter of the document. Perhaps no breach of faith was intended, but the sorrowful fact remains that the modern settlement of Ireland has the appearance of resting on a broken promise. More than 1,000,000 Irish acres were forfeited, and, though some part returned to Catholic owners, the Catholic interest in the land was further diminished. William III. was the most liberally minded man in his dominions; but the necessities of his position, such is the awful penalty of greatness, forced him into intolerance against his will, and he promised to discourage the Irish woollen trade. His manner of disposing of the Irish forfeitures was inexcusable. The lands were resumed by the English parliament, less perhaps from a sense of justice than from a desire to humiliate the deliverer of England, and were resold to the highest bidder. Nevertheless it became the fashion to reward nameless English services at the expense of Ireland. Pensions and sinecures which would not bear the light in England were charged on the Irish establishment, and even bishoprics were given away on the same principle. The tremendous uproar raised by Swift about Wood’s halfpence was heightened by the fact that Wood shared his profits with the duchess of Kendal, the mistress of George I.
From the first the victorious colonists determined to make another 1641 impossible, and the English government failed to moderate their severity. In 1708 Swift declared that the Papists were politically as inconsiderable as the women and children. In despair of effecting anything at home, the young and strong enlisted in foreign armies, and the almost incredible number of 450,000 are said to have emigrated for this purpose between 1691 and 1745. This and the hatred felt towards James II. prevented any rising in 1715 or 1745. The panic-stricken severity of minorities is proverbial, but it is not to be forgotten that the Irish Protestants had been turned out of house and home twice within fifty years. The restrictions on Irish commerce provoked Locke’s friend William Molyneux (1656-1698) to write his famous plea for legislative independence (1698). Much of the learning contained in it now seems obsolete, but the question is less an antiquarian one than he supposed. Later events have shown that a mother country must have supreme authority, or must relax the tie with self-governing colonies merely into a close alliance. In the case of Ireland the latter plan has always been impossible. In 1703 the Irish parliament begged for a legislative union, but as that would have involved at least partial free trade the English monopolists prevented it. By Poynings’s law (see above) England had control of all Irish legislation, and was therefore an accomplice in the penal Penal laws. laws. These provided that no Papist might teach a school or any child but his own, or send children abroad, the burden of proof lying on the accused, and the decision being left to magistrates without a jury. Mixed marriages were forbidden between persons of property, and the children might be forcibly brought up Protestants. A Catholic could not be a guardian, and all wards in chancery were brought up Protestants. The Protestant eldest son of a Catholic landed proprietor might make his father tenant for life and secure his own inheritance. Among Catholic children land went in compulsory gavelkind. Catholics could not take longer leases than thirty-one years at two-thirds of a rack rent; they were even required to conform within six months of an inheritance accruing, on pain of being ousted by the next Protestant heir. Priests from abroad were banished, and their return declared treason. All priests were required to register and to remain in their own parishes, and informers were to be rewarded at the expense of the Catholic inhabitants. No Catholic was allowed arms, two justices being empowered to search; and if he had a good horse any Protestant might claim it on tendering £5.
These laws were of course systematically evaded. The property of Roman Catholics was often preserved through Protestant trustees, and it is understood that faith was generally kept. Yet the attrition if slow was sure, and by the end of the century the proportion of land belonging to Roman Catholics was probably not more than one-tenth of the whole. We can see now that if the remaining Roman Catholic landlords had been encouraged they would have done much to reconcile the masses to the settlement. Individuals are seldom as bad as corporations, and the very men who made the laws against priests practically shielded them. The penal laws put a premium on hypocrisy, and many conformed only to preserve their property or to enable them to take office. Proselytizing schools, though supported by public grants, entirely failed.
The restraints placed by English commercial jealousy on Irish trade destroyed manufacturing industry in the south and west (see the section Economics above). Driven by the Caroline legislation against cattle into breeding Commercial restraints. sheep, Irish graziers produced the best wool in Europe. Forbidden to export it, or to work it up profitably at home, they took to smuggling, for which the indented coast gave great facilities. The enormous profits of the contraband trade with France enabled Ireland to purchase English goods to an extent greater than her whole lawful traffic. The moral effect was disastrous. The religious penal code it was thought meritorious to evade; the commercial penal code was ostentatiously defied; and both tended to make Ireland the least law-abiding country in Europe. The account of the smugglers is the most interesting and perhaps the most valuable part of J. A. Froude’s work in Ireland, and should be compared with the Irish and Scottish chapters of Lecky’s History.