Alongside his older brother, Connor Maguire, Maguire is a prime mover in the conspiracy which leads to the outbreak of rebellion in Ireland on October 23, 1641. He is tasked with securing County Fermanagh for the rebels, but is only partially successful, with several key fortresses in the county, including Enniskillen Castle, remaining under Protestant settler control. His attempt to murder Sir William Cole immediately prior to the rising fails, but the landowner Arthur Champion is killed in one of the first actions of the rebellion. In November 1641, he joins Felim O’Neill of Kinard at Newry to issue a proclamation in which the rebels claim they are acting in defence of King Charles and Catholicism. In December 1641, the Fermanagh army under Maguire slaughters many of the garrison and refugees in Tully Castle, apparently in retaliation for the killing of the garrison of a Maguire castle which had been taken by assault some days previously. He also destroys Castle Archdale and its neighbouring settler village, and kills eight Protestant settlers at Monea Castle. In early 1642, he is expelled from the Irish Parliament and in the summer of the same year he is made a colonel in Owen Roe O’Neill‘s army in Ulster.
Maguire is appointed Governor of Fermanagh by the authorities of the newly established Confederate Ireland. He commands the rebel reserve in the Battle of Benburb in June 1646. He leads raids into Protestant-held areas in east Ulster, before joining O’Neill in his campaigns in Leinster in the autumn of 1646. Later that year, he raids lands in Connacht controlled by the Royalist commander, Ulick Burke, 1st Marquess of Clanricarde. In August 1647, O’Neill and Maguire move the army to Leinster, where Maguire quarrels so vigorously with O’Neill over the payment of troops that the general orders his arrest and court-martials him. After the court-martial, Maguire and his supporters, about five or six regiments, draw up their forces and threaten to desert. The mutiny soon dissipates and Maguire remains allied to O’Neill.
In 1648, Maguire joins O’Neill in opposing the truce between the Confederates and Royalists. He plays a prominent role in the skirmishes and evasive manoeuvrings that occur between the two sides in central Ireland. In the winter of 1648, Maguire withdraws north and on November 13 he is killed while leading an attack on a fortress near Jamestown, County Leitrim.
Following the trial and execution of the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, in May 1641, Ireland is in a state of turmoil. There is growing tension between Catholics and Protestants (particularly those of a Puritan tendency) with the former generally sympathetic to King Charles while the latter supports the English Parliament and the ScottishCovenanters in the dispute that shortly leads to the outbreak of the English Civil War. This forms part of the wider War of the Three Kingdoms.
On October 23, a major uprising breaks out in Ulster organised by leading members of the Gaelic aristocracy. The rebels attack Protestant plantation settlements as well as native Irish Protestants and take garrison towns held by the Irish Army. Irish government authorities in Dublin struggle to contain the insurgency with the limited number of troops they have at their disposal. A last-minute warning saves Dublin Castle from a surprise attack, although O’Neill is clearly unaware of the failure of the Dublin plot when he issues his proclamation.
After seizing several key strategic points in Ulster over the previous twenty-four hours, O’Neill makes his proclamation in Dungannon, a town that has symbolic importance as the traditional capital of the O’Neill dynasty.
In support of his actions, O’Neill claims to have a document from King Charles commissioning him. The Commission is supposedly signed under the Great Seal of Scotland. By declaring their loyalty to the Crown and defence of the Catholic religion, O’Neill and his followers adopt a political stance which is taken up by the subsequent Irish Confederation which governs rebel-controlled territory in the name of the King from 1642 until 1649. The Proclamation encourages many Catholics to believe they can lawfully join the rising with the King’s blessing, while Protestants are left demoralised.
O’Neill’s second and more trenchant proclamation is made “from our camp at Newry” on November 4, 1641 alongside Rory Maguire. He also publishes the actual royal commission that gives authority for his earlier proclamation. It is subtly different, in that it empowers him to arrest and seize property from all of Charles’s English Protestant subjects living in Ireland, but exempts his Irish and Scottish subjects.
Until the late nineteenth century historians generally accept that the commission is genuine, or at the very least Charles had secretly encouraged the Irish Catholics to launch a rising. Since then, for a variety of reasons, it has been considered to be a forgery produced by O’Neill and his associates without the knowledge of the King. They may well have acquired a copy of the Great Seal of Scotland when they captured the garrison town of Charlemont on October 23.
The historian David Stevenson notes that it would be unlikely that the commission would have been addressed to O’Neill. Had it been genuine it would almost certainly have been issued to more senior Irish Royalists such as the James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond, or the leading Catholic noble of Ulster, Randal MacDonnell, 1st Marquess of Antrim. It is also unlikely to have been issued at Edinburgh as O’Neill claimed. However, King Charles was in Edinburgh on October 1, dealing with Scottish political matters.
Forgery or not, King Charles publicly proclaims all the Irish rebels as traitors on January 1, 1642.
That the Commission is genuine is widely accepted in England and Scotland by the King’s opponents and even some of his own supporters. It seems to tie in with earlier rumours of an army plot which had suggested that Charles might bring over the New Irish Army, made up largely of Ulster Catholics, to impose his will on England and Scotland. Anger at the King’s alleged links with the insurgents grow – particularly as horror stories of atrocities committed, such as the Portadown Massacre, begin to filter across the Irish Sea. Tensions arising from news of the Irish rebellion is a factor in the English push to Civil War in early 1642.
The Scottish authorities dispatch an Army which quickly retakes much of Ulster from the insurgents. Once the English Civil War breaks out in October 1642, Charles’ emissaries begin negotiations with the Irish rebels for their support, which seems to present further evidence to his opponents of his links with the Catholic Ulster leaders. Many of these later dealings are exposed when Charles private letters are captured during the Battle of Naseby (1645) and published as King’s Cabinet Opened.
When O’Neill is captured in 1653 following the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland, he is put on trial for his life. The authorities offer to spare him if he will repeat his earlier claims that Charles had ordered the Catholics to rise in 1641. O’Neill now refuses to implicate the King, who had been executed four years earlier, and is put to death himself. Nonetheless, the English Republicans continue to use O’Neill’s earlier claims of the King’s involvement to justify their decision to commit regicide.
Sir Rory O’Moore (Irish: Ruaidhrí Ó Mórdha), Irish politician and landowner also known Sir Roger O’Moore or O’More or Sir Roger Moore, dies in obscurity on February 16, 1655. He is most notable for being one of the four principal organizers of the Irish Rebellion of 1641.
O’Moore’s uncle, Rory O’More, Lord of Laois, had fought against the English during the Tudor conquest of Ireland. In 1556, Queen Mary I confiscates the O’Mores’ lands and creates “Queens County” (modern-day County Laois). Over 180 family members, who are peaceful and have taken no part in any rebellion, are murdered with virtually all of the leaders of Laois and Offaly by the English at a feast at Mullaghmast, County Kildare, in 1577. Rory Óg and his wife Maighréad O’Byrne, sister of Fiach MacHugh O’Byrne, are hunted down and killed soon afterwards. This leads to the political downfall of the O’Moore family as their estates are given to English settlers.
Given the causes of the rebellion and the Crown’s weakness during the Bishops’ Wars into 1641, O’Moore plans a bloodless coup to overthrow the English government in Ireland. With Connor Maguire, 2nd Baron of Enniskillen, he plans to seize Dublin Castle, which is held by a small garrison, on October 23, 1641. Allies in Ulster led by Sir Phelim O’Neill are to seize forts and towns there. The leaders are to assume the governing of their own country and with this provision offer allegiance to King Charles. They are betrayed, and the plan is discovered on October 22 and the rising fails in its first objective. O’Neill has some success, and O’Moore quickly succeeds in creating an alliance between the Ulster Gaelic clans and the Old English gentry in Leinster.
In November 1641, the Irish forces besiege Drogheda, and a royalist force comes north from Dublin to oppose them. O’Moore is one of the leaders of the rebel army that intercepts and defeats the relief force at the Battle of Julianstown on November 29.
The Irish historian Charles Gavan Duffy writes: “Then a private gentleman, with no resources beyond his intellect and his courage, this Rory, when Ireland was weakened by defeat and confiscation, and guarded with a jealous care constantly increasing in strictness and severity, conceived the vast design of rescuing the country from England, and even accomplished it; for, in three years, England did not retain a city in Ireland but Dublin and Drogheda, and for eight years the land was possessed and the supreme authority exercised by the Confederation created by O’Moore. History contains no stricter instance of the influence of an individual mind.”
Bishop Michael Comerford writes that after O’Moore’s defeat at the Battle of Kilrush in April 1642 he retires and dies in Kilkenny city in the winter of 1642–43, having co-founded the Irish Catholic Confederation there a few months earlier. However, this ignores his contacts with Inchiquin and Ormonde in 1647–48.
In 1652, O’Moore goes to Inishbofin off the coast of Galway, one of the last Catholic strongholds, but as the parliamentary forces approach, he makes arrangements to flee. Walter Lynch, Bishop of Clonfert, sails in the last ship to leave the island without waiting for O’Moore, who is forced to make his own way. He finally escapes into Ulster but dies in obscurity on February 16, 1655. He is buried at Steryne churchyard, in the parish of Magilligan, County Londonderry.
St. Colman’s Church on the island once bears a tablet with the inscription: “In memory of many valiant Irishmen who were exiled to this Holy Island and in particular Rory O’More a brave chieftain of Leix, who after fighting for Faith and Fatherland, disguised as a fisherman escaped from his island to a place of safety. He died shortly afterwards, a martyr to his Religion and his County, about 1653. He was esteemed and loved by his countrymen, who celebrated his many deeds of valour and kindness in their songs and reverenced his memory, so that it was a common expression among them; ‘God and Our Lady be our help and Rory O’More’.”
The Balyna estate is inherited from Calvagh O’More by Rory’s brother Lewis. Balyna is passed down to Lewis’s last surviving O’More descendant, Letitia, who is also descended from Rory O’More because her grandfather married a second cousin. Letitia marries a Richard Farrell in 1751. This Farrell family henceforth takes the surname More O’Ferrall.
Waterford is a Catholic city and like most other towns in southeast Ireland, the populace has supported the Confederate Catholic cause since the Irish Rebellion of 1641. Late in 1641, Protestant refugees, displaced by the insurgents, begin to arrive in the town, creating tension among the Catholic townspeople. The city’s mayor wants to protect the refugees, but the recorder and several of the aldermen on the city council want to strip them of their property and let in the rebels, who arrive outside the walls in early 1642. At first, the Mayor’s faction is successful in refusing to admit rebel forces, but by March 1642, the faction in the municipal government sympathetic to the rebellion prevails. The Protestants in Waterford are expelled, in most cases put on ships to England, sometimes after having their property looted by the city mob. In 1645, Confederate troops under Thomas Preston besiege and capture nearby Duncannon from its English garrison, thus removing the threat to shipping coming to and from Waterford.
Waterford’s political community is noted for its intransigent Catholic politics. In 1646, a synod of Catholic Bishops, based in Waterford, excommunicate any Catholic who supports a treaty between the Confederates and English Royalists, which does not allow for the free practice of the Catholic religion. The Confederates finally agree to a treaty with Charles I of England in 1648, in order to join forces with the Royalists against their common enemy, the English Parliament, which is both anti-Catholic and hostile to the King. The Parliamentarians land a major expeditionary force in Ireland at Dublin, under Cromwell in August 1649.
The English Parliamentarian New Model Army arrives to besiege Waterford in October 1649. One of the stated aims of Cromwell’s invasion of Ireland is to punish the Irish for the mistreatment of Protestants in 1641. Given Waterford’s history of partisan Catholic politics, this provokes great fear amongst the townspeople. This fear is accentuated by the fate of Drogheda and nearby Wexford which had recently been taken and sacked by Cromwell’s forces and their garrisons massacred.
Waterford is very important strategically in the war in Ireland. Its port allows for the importation of arms and supplies from continental Europe and its geographical position commands the entrance of the rivers Suir and Barrow.
Before besieging Waterford, Cromwell has to take the surrounding garrisons held by Royalist and Confederate troops in order to secure his lines of communication and supply. Duncannon, whose fort commands the sea passage into Waterford, is besieged by Parliamentarians under Ireton from October 15 to November 5. However, due to a stubborn defence, the garrison there under Edward Wogan holds out. This means that heavy siege artillery cannot be brought up to Waterford by sea.
New Ross surrenders to Cromwell on October 19 and Carrick-on-Suir is taken on November 19. A counterattack on Carrick by Irish troops from Ulster under a Major Geoghegan is repulsed on November 24, leaving 500 of the Ulstermen dead.
Having isolated Waterford from the east and north, Cromwell arrives before the city on November 24. However, Waterford still has access to reinforcements from the west and up to 3,000 Irish soldiers from the Confederate’s Ulster Army under Richard O’Farrell are fed into the city in the course of a week. O’Farrell, having been a successful officer in the Spanish Army, is highly trained and experienced in siege warfare from battles in Flanders. Cromwell has come up against a superior minded soldier and commander. The weather is extremely cold and wet, and the Parliamentarian troops suffer heavily from disease. Out of 6,500 English Parliamentarian soldiers who besiege Waterford in 1649, only 3,000 or so are still fit by the time the siege is called off. Added to this, Cromwell is able to make little headway in taking the city. The capture of a fort at Passage East enables him to bring up siege guns by sea, but the wet weather means that it is all but impossible to transport them close enough to Waterford’s walls to use them. Farrell proves tactically superior in defending Waterford and repels Cromwell’s attempts. Eventually Cromwell has to call off the siege on December 2 and go into winter quarters at Dungarvan. Among his casualties is his commander Michael Jones, who dies of disease.
Rinuccini is born in Rome on September 15, 1592. He is educated by the Jesuits in Rome and studies law at the Universities of Bologna and Perugia. In due course, he is ordained a priest, having at the age of twenty-two obtained his doctor’s degree from the University of Pisa. He is named a camariere (chamberlain) by Pope Gregory XV and in 1625 becomes Archbishop of Fermo. In 1631 he carefully refuses an offer to be made Archbishop of Florence.
Rinuccini departs France from Saint-Martin-de-Ré near La Rochelle on October 18, 1645, on the frigate San Pietro and arrives in Kenmare, County Kerry, on October 21, 1645, with a retinue of twenty-six Italians, several Irish officers, and the Confederation’s secretary, Richard Bellings. He proceeds to Kilkenny, the Confederate capital, where Richard Butler, 3rd Viscount Mountgarret, the president of the Confederation, receives him at the castle. He speaks Latin to Montgarret, but all the official business of the Confederates is done in English. He asserts in his discourse that the object of his mission is to sustain the King, but above all to help the Catholic people of Ireland in securing the free and public exercise of their religion, and the restoration of the churches and church property to the Catholic Church.
Rinuccini had sent ahead arms and ammunition: 1,000 braces of pistols, 4,000 cartridge belts, 2,000 swords, 500 muskets and 20,000 pounds of gunpowder. He arrives twelve days later with a further two thousand muskets and cartridge-belts, four thousand swords, four hundred braces of pistols, two thousand pike-heads, and twenty thousand pounds of gunpowder, fully equipped soldiers and sailors and 150,658 livres tournois to finance the Irish Catholic war effort. These supplies give him a huge input into the Confederate’s internal politics because he doles out the money and arms for specific military projects, rather than handing them over to the Confederate government, or Supreme Council.
Rinuccini hopes that by doing so he can influence the Confederates’ strategic policy away from making a deal with Charles I and the Royalists in the English Civil War and towards the foundation of an independent Catholic-ruled Ireland. In particular, he wants to ensure that churches and lands taken in the rebellion would remain in Catholic hands. This is consistent with what happened in Catholic-controlled areas during the Thirty Years’ War in Germany. His mission can be seen as part of the Counter-Reformation in Europe. He also has unrealistic hopes of using Ireland as a base to re-establish Catholicism in England. However, apart from some military successes such as the Battle of Benburb on June 5, 1646, the main result of his efforts is to aggravate the infighting between factions within the Confederates.
The Confederates’ Supreme Council is dominated by wealthy landed magnates, predominantly of “Old English” origin, who are anxious to come to a deal with the Stuart monarchy that will guarantee them their land ownership, full civil rights for Catholics, and toleration of Catholicism. They form the moderate faction, which is opposed by those within the Confederation, who want better terms, including self-government for Ireland, a reversal of the land confiscations of the plantations of Ireland and establishment of Catholicism as the state religion. A particularly sore point in the negotiations with the English Royalists is the insistence of some Irish Catholics on keeping in Catholic hands the churches taken in the war. Rinuccini accepts the assurances of the Supreme Council that such concerns will be addressed in the peace treaty negotiated with James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond, negotiated in 1646, now known as the First Ormond Peace.
However, when the terms are published, they grant only the private practice of Catholicism. Alleging that he had been deliberately deceived, Rinuccini publicly backs the militant faction, which includes most of the Catholic clergy and some Irish military commanders such as Owen Roe O’Neill. On the other side there are the Franciscans Pierre Marchant, and later Raymond Caron. In 1646, when the Supreme Council tries to get the Ormond Peace ratified, Rinuccini excommunicates them and helps to get the Treaty voted down in the Confederate General Assembly. The Assembly has the members of the Supreme Council arrested for treason and elects a new Supreme Council.
However, the following year, the Confederates’ attempts to drive the remaining English (mainly Parliamentarian) armies from Ireland meets with disaster at the battles of Dungan’s Hill on August 8, 1647 and Knocknanuss on November 13, 1647. As a result, the chastened Confederates hastily conclude a new deal with the English Royalists to try to prevent a Parliamentarian conquest of Ireland in 1648. Although the terms of this second deal are better than those of the first one, Rinuccini again tries to overturn the treaty. However, on this occasion, the Catholic clergy are split on whether to accept the deal, as are the Confederate military commanders and the General Assembly. Ultimately, the treaty is accepted by the Confederacy, which then dissolves itself and joins a Royalist coalition. Rinuccini backs Owen Roe O’Neill, who used his Ulster army to fight against his former comrades who had accepted the deal. He tries in vain to repeat his success of 1646 by excommunicating those who support the peace. However, the Irish bishops are split on the issue and so his authority is diluted. Militarily, Owen Roe O’Neill is unable to reverse the political balance.
Despairing of the Catholic cause in Ireland, Rinnuccini leaves the country on February 23, 1649, embarking at Galway on the ship that had brought him to Ireland, the frigate San Pietro. In the same year, Oliver Cromwell leads a Parliamentarian re-conquest of the country, after which Catholicism is thoroughly repressed. Roman Catholic worship is banned, Irish Catholic-owned land is widely confiscated east of the River Shannon, and captured Catholic clergy are executed.
Rinuccini returns to Rome, where he writes an extensive account of his time in Ireland, the Commentarius Rinuccinanus. His account blames personal vainglory and tribal divisions for the Catholic disunity in Ireland. In particular, he blames the Old English for the eventual Catholic defeat. The Gaelic Irish, he writes, despite being less civilised, are more sincere Catholics.
Rinuccini returns to his diocese in Fermo in June 1650 and dies there on December 13, 1653.
In September 1643, Ormond agrees to a truce, or ‘Cessation’, with the Confederation, freeing his troops for use in England against Parliament in the First English Civil War. Some Irish Protestants object, and switch sides, including Sir Charles Coote, who becomes Parliamentarian commander in Connacht. Charles surrenders in 1646, while a Covenanter/Royalist uprising is quickly suppressed in the 1648 Second English Civil War. On January 17, 1649, the Confederation allies with Ormond’s Royalists. Following the execution of Charles on January 30, they are joined by the Laggan Army and remaining Scots troops in Ulster.
There are various reasons for this. The Covenanter government, who provides support for Scottish settlers in Ulster, considers Oliver Cromwell and other leaders of the new Commonwealth of England dangerous political and religious radicals. As Scots, they object to the execution of their king by the English; as Presbyterians, they view monarchy as divinely ordained, making it also sacrilegious, and transfer their allegiance to his son, Charles II of England.
However, this is offset by a split within the Confederation, between Catholic landowners who want to preserve the position prevailing in 1641, and those like Ó Néill, whose estates had been confiscated in 1607. As a result, he agrees a truce with Coote, and refuses to join the Alliance, depriving them of their most effective fighting force in the north. Despite this, by late July, Ormond’s combined Royalist/Confederate army controls most of Ireland.
In Ulster, Derry is the only major town still held by forces loyal to the Commonwealth. The garrison is commanded by Coote, who is besieged by the Laggan Army under George Munro, Robert’s nephew. In July, Munro is forced to lift the siege by Ó Néill, an example of the impact of the truce between two unlikely allies.
Ormond’s defeat at Rathmines on August 2 allows Cromwell and an army of 12,000 to land in Dublin unopposed. After capturing Drogheda on September 11, his main force heads south towards Wexford. Colonel Robert Venables is sent north with three regiments, or around 2,500 men, to take control of Ulster. Munro’s garrisons surrender with minimal resistance, and by the end of September, Venables has occupied Dundalk, Carlingford, Newry, and Belfast. These are accompanied by the mass expulsion of Scots settlers, as punishment for their defection. When Coote captures Coleraine on September 15, he massacres the largely Scottish garrison.
At the end of October, Coote joins Venables at Belfast. They spend November reducing remaining Royalist garrisons in the north, and in early December, assemble 3,000 men to attack Carrickfergus. After lifting the siege of Derry, Munro has retreated to Enniskillen with the remainder of the Laggan Army. Since the loss of Carrickfergus would effectively cut communications with Scotland, he is determined to prevent this if at all possible.
He combines forces with Royalist leader Lord Clandeboye, creating an army of around 5,000. However, it comprises remnants from many different regiments, its men are poorly equipped, and demoralised, while most have not been paid for over two years. As they march north, their numbers dwindle due to desertion.
Learning of their advance, Coote and Venables move to intercept Munro, and the two advance guards make contact outside Lisnagarvey, near Lisburn, on December 6. Despite superior numbers, the Royalists cannot hold their ground against their far more experienced opponents. When the main body of the Parliamentarian force appears, the retreat rapidly turns into a rout, the majority fleeing without firing a shot. In the pursuit that follows, they lose 1,500 men, killed or captured, along with their baggage train and supplies. Clandeboye and the remnants of his army surrender shortly afterwards, although Monro escapes to Enniskillen.
Lisnagarvey ends resistance by Scottish forces to the Parliamentarian army. Carrickfergus surrenders on December 13, and as with other towns, its Scottish settlers are expelled. Early in 1650, Monro agrees to evacuate Enniskillen for £500, and returns to Scotland, leaving Ó Néill’s army as the only remaining obstacle to Parliamentarian control of the north. However, his death in November 1649 proves a major blow to its morale and fighting ability. In June 1650, it is destroyed by Coote and Venables at Scarrifholis.
(Pictured: Map of key locations of the 1649 campaign in Ulster)
The Rebellion comes about because of the resentment felt by the Irish Catholics, both Gael and Old English, in regard to the loss of their lands to Protestant settlers from England and Scotland.
Irish Catholics are frightened by reports that the Covenanter army in Scotland is considering an invasion of Ireland in order to eradicate the Catholic religion. At the same time, there is also a threat of invasion by Oliver Cromwell’s Puritans who are at war against King Charles I. It is hoped that the King would redress the complaints of the Catholics and halt or even reverse the policy of plantation. It is not an act of rebellion against the Royal domain.
The uprising is led by Rory O’ Moore from Leix, with Sir Phelim Roe O’ Neill and his brother Turlough of Tyrone, the Maguires of Fermanagh, the Magennis, O’ Reilly and the MacMahons. They plan to begin the rebellion on October 23, 1641, with attacks on Dublin and various other British strongholds throughout the country. However, their plans are betrayed to the British by a native Irish convert to Protestantism, Owen O’ Connolly.
As a result of this betrayal, Dublin does not fall. However, the rebellion proceeds in the north with the towns of Dungannon, Newry, and Castleblayney, along with the fort at Charlemont falling to the rebels.
Most of the province of Ulster comes under the control of the rebel leaders. The rebel army, consisting of 30,000 men, has been instructed to take no life except in battle, to arrest the gentry and to spare the Scottish planters as they are considered kindred. For a week after the rebellion, these instructions are adhered to but many of the rebels have lost their lands to the Protestant planters, and they want revenge. They attack farms and settlements, killing and turning many people away, robbing and stripping them of all their goods.
Sir Phelim O’ Neill has been himself thought to have ordered the murder of Protestants in Tyrone and Armagh. It is believed that about 12,000 people are slaughtered although contemporary reports put the death toll as much higher. It is thought that up to 30% of the Ulster planters lost their lives while 10% is the figure for the whole of Ireland.
As the rebellion progresses in Ulster there are uprisings in Leinster by November and thereafter throughout the whole of Ireland. In Munster, where many English settlers are planted, the rebels do not shed much blood, but they do turn out these settlers, many of whom flee back to England.
In 1642 the Scottish Covenanters invade the North and they, in turn, take to killing Catholics in revenge for the deaths of Protestants. The Covenanter Clan Campbell of Argyll takes the opportunity to attack and slaughter the Catholic Rathlin Islanders who belong to ancient enemies, Clan Mac Donald. The Covenanters also slaughter the approximately 3,000 Catholics on Islandmagee. Catholic prisoners and traders in Newry are murdered.
This ruthless slaughtering of civilians, by both sides, is only brought under control when Owen Roe O’ Neill arrives back from exile in France to take control of the Confederate army and, with Major General Robert Monroe in charge of the Covenanter Army, continues the war under the code of conduct that they had both learned on the Continent. However, the effects of the rebellion last to the present day, especially in Ulster where sectarian divide remains strong during The Troubles.
(Pictured: Depiction of the massacre of Ulster Protestants during the 1641 rebellion, The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images)
Butlers’s attempts to conclude a peace are blocked by a Catholic faction that advocates complete independence for Ireland. The situation deteriorates further, and in July 1647, he departs from Ireland, leaving the Protestant cause in the hands of the parliamentarians, who had defeated King Charles I in the First English Civil War (1642–46).
Returning to Ireland in September 1648, Butler concludes a peace with the confederacy in January 1649. He then rallies Protestant royalists and Catholic confederates in support of Charles II, son and successor of Charles I. For several months most of Ireland is under his control. But the parliamentarian general Oliver Cromwell lands at Dublin in August 1649 and swiftly conquers the country for Parliament. Butler flees to France and becomes one of Charles II’s closest advisers at his court-in-exile in Paris.
When Charles II returns to England in the Restoration of 1660, Butler, who had urged constitutional rather than military rule, is made commissioner for the treasury and the navy. Appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1662, he makes vigorous attempts to encourage Irish commerce and industry. Nevertheless, his enemies at court persuade Charles to dismiss him in 1669. He is restored to royal favour in 1677 and is again appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Although he is created a duke in the English peerage in 1682, he is recalled from Ireland in 1684 as a result of new intrigues at Charles’s court and because of the determination of James, Duke of York, to strengthen his supporters in Ireland.
Butler dies on July 21, 1688, at the Kingston Lacy estate, Dorset. He is buried in Westminster Abbey on August 4, 1688. His eldest son, Thomas, 6th Earl of Ossory, predeceases him, but Ossory’s eldest son James succeeds as 2nd Duke of Ormonde (1665–1745).
(Pictured: “James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond,” oil on canvas by William Wissing, National Portrait Gallery)
Although slightly smaller than their opponents, Coote’s troops consist largely of veterans from the New Model Army and have three times the number of cavalry. After an hour of fighting, the Ulster army collapses and flees, losing most of its men, officers, weapons, and supplies. The battle secures the north of Ireland for the Commonwealth and clears the way to complete the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland.
In September 1643, Ormond agrees a truce, or ‘Cessation’, with the Confederation, freeing his troops for use in England against Parliament in the First English Civil War. Some Irish Protestants object, and switch sides, including Sir Charles Coote, who becomes Parliamentarian commander in Connacht. Charles surrenders in 1646, while a Covenanter/Royalist uprising is quickly suppressed in the 1648 Second English Civil War. On January 17, 1649, the Confederation allies with Ormond’s Royalists. Following the execution of Charles on January 30, they are joined by the Laggan Army and remaining Scots troops in Ulster.
There are various reasons for this. The Covenanter government, who provide support for Scottish settlers in Ulster, consider Oliver Cromwell and other leaders of the new Commonwealth of England dangerous political and religious radicals. As Scots, they object to the execution of their king by the English. As Presbyterians, they view monarchy as divinely ordained, making regicide also sacrilegious, and they transfer their allegiance to his son, Charles II of England.
However, this is offset by a split within the Confederation, between Catholic landowners who want to preserve the position prevailing in 1641, and those like Ó Néill, whose estates had been confiscated in 1607. As a result, he agrees a truce with Coote, and refuses to join the Alliance, depriving them of their most effective fighting force in the north. Despite this, by late July, Ormond’s combined Royalist/Confederate army control most of Ireland.
Ormond’s defeat at the Battle of Rathmines on August 2 allows Cromwell and an army of 12,000 to land in Dublin unopposed. After capturing Drogheda on September 11, his main force heads south towards Wexford. Colonel Robert Venables is sent north with three regiments, or around 2,500 men, to take control of Ulster. Munro’s garrisons surrender with minimal resistance, and by the end of September, Venables has occupied Dundalk, Carlingford, Newry, and Belfast. These are accompanied by the mass expulsion of Scots settlers, as punishment for their defection. When Coote captures Coleraine on September 15, he massacres the largely Scottish garrison.
Ó Néill’s death in November 1649 and Coote’s defeat of a combined Royalist/Covenanter force at Lisnagarvey in December leaves the Catholic Ulster army as the only remaining opposition to the Commonwealth in the north. At a meeting at Belturbet on March 18, 1650, Heber MacMahon, Catholic Bishop of Clogher, is appointed in his place. Although a leading figure in the Confederation, MacMahon has no military experience and opposes the alliance with Ormond’s Royalists. His election is essentially a compromise between supporters of Henry, Ó Néill’s son, and his cousin, Felim Ó Néill.
By May 20, MacMahon and his deputy Richard O’Farrell have assembled an army near Loughgall, with 5,000 infantry and 1,000 cavalry. They lack both arms and artillery but after Ormond promises to send these from Connacht, they march north, intending to divide Coote’s troops at Derry from those commanded by Venables at Carrickfergus in the east. To do this, MacMahon establishes a line of garrisons with its northern end at Ballycastle, then moves south, intending to cross the River Foyle just below Lifford and maintain contact with Ormond through Ballyshannon.
At this point, Coote has only 1,400 men and seems vulnerable. The Irish cross the river on June 2, beating off an attack by the Commonwealth cavalry and occupy Lifford, where they spend the next two weeks and Coote withdraws to Derry. However, the supplies promised by Ormond fail to arrive, leaving MacMahon short of provisions, while on June 18 Coote is joined by an additional 1,000 infantry under Colonel Roger Fenwick sent from Belfast. At the same time, detaching men for the new garrisons leave MacMahon with around 4,000 infantry and 400 cavalry.
MacMahon now relocates to the Doonglebe/Tullygay Hill overlooking the pass at Scariffhollis, a strong defensive position two miles west of Letterkenny on the River Swilly. When Myles MacSweeney takes his regiment off to recapture his ancestral home at Doe Castle, it leaves the two armies roughly equal in number. However, Coote’s men are well equipped veterans, and he has three times the number of cavalry. When he appears at Scariffhollis on June 21, MacMahon’s subordinates advise him not to risk battle. They argue Coote will soon be forced to retreat due to lack of provisions, allowing the Irish to withdraw into Connaught in good order.
For reasons that are still debated, MacMahon ignores this advice and on the morning of June 21, 1650, orders his troops down from their mountain camp to give battle. Coote later reports that although the ground is still “excessive bad,” it allows him to use his cavalry, although the initial fighting is conducted by the opposing infantry.
The Irish army is drawn up in a large mass formation with 200–300 musketeers in front, which may have been due to their shortage of ammunition. The battle begins when Colonel Fenwick leads a detachment of 150 men against the advance guard. After an exchange of fire, during which Fenwick is mortally wounded, it turns into a hand-to-hand struggle. As Coote feeds in reinforcements, the Irish musketeers fall back on their main force, which has no room to manoeuvre and is now subjected to devastating volleys at close range. After an hour of bitter conflict, the Irish are out of ammunition and at this point the Parliamentarian cavalry charges their flank. Thrown into disarray, the Irish break and run.
In most battles, flight is the point at which the defeated suffer the heaviest casualties, exacerbated by the lack of Irish cavalry and the brutal nature of the war. Most of the infantry dies on the battlefield or in the pursuit that follows, including Henry Ó Néill and many officers, some of whom are killed after surrendering. Estimates of the Irish dead range from 2,000 – 3,000, while Coote loses around 100 killed or wounded.
MacMahon escapes with 200 horse but is captured a week later and executed. Phelim Ó Néill and O’Farrell make it to Charlemont, which is besieged by Coote and surrenders on August 14. With the exception of a few scattered garrisons, this ends fighting in the north. Limerick is taken by Hardress Waller in October 1651, and the war ends when Galway surrenders to Coote in May 1652.
(Pictured: A view of the mouth of River Swilly at Lough Swilly, Letterkenny, County Donegal)
At the outbreak of the First English Civil War, Ireton joins the Parliamentary army, commanding a cavalry force in the indecisive Battle of Edgehill in October 1642, and at the Battle of Gainsborough in July 1643. In 1643 he meets and befriends Oliver Cromwell, then a colonel in the army of eastern England. Cromwell appoints him deputy governor of the Isle of Ely in 1644, and he fights at the Parliamentary victories in the Battle of Marston Moor (July 1644), and the Battle of Naseby (June 1645). In the summer of 1646, he marries Cromwell’s eldest daughter, Bridget. The marriage brings Ireton’s career into parallel with Cromwell’s.
Although Ireton’s military record is distinguished, he earns his fame in politics. Elected to Parliament in 1645, he looks on while a conflict develops between the Independents in the army and the Presbyterians who control the House of Commons. In 1647 he presents his “Heads of the Proposals,” a constitutional scheme calling for division of political power among army, Parliament, and king and advocating religious tolerance for Anglicans and Puritans. These proposals for a constitutional monarchy are rejected by the king. At the same time, they are attacked by the Levellers, a group that calls for manhood suffrage and an unfettered liberty of conscience in matters of religion.
Ireton then turns against the king. When the Independents in the army triumph over Parliament during the second phase of the Civil War, his “Remonstrance of the Army” provides the ideological foundation for the assault on the monarchy. He helps to bring Charles I to trial and is one of the signatories of the king’s death warrant. From 1649 to 1651 he prosecutes the government’s case against Roman Catholic rebels in Ireland, becoming Lord Deputy of Ireland and acting commander in chief in 1650.
In early June 1650, Ireton mounts a counter-guerrilla expedition into the Wicklow Mountains to secure his lines of supply for the Siege of Waterford in southeast Ireland. Thomas Preston surrenders Waterford after a three-month siege. Ireton then advances to Limerick by October but has to call off the siege due to cold and bad weather. He returns to Limerick in June 1651 and besieges the city for five months until it surrenders in October 1651. At the same time, parliamentarian forces conduct the Siege of Galway, and he rides to inspect the command of Charles Coote, who is blockading that city. The physical strain of his command takes hold, and he falls ill.
After the capture of Limerick, Ireton has dignitaries of Limerick hanged for their defence of the city, including Alderman Thomas Stritch, Bishop Terence O’Brien, and an English Royalist officer, Colonel Fennell. He also wants the Irish commander, Hugh Dubh O’Neill hanged, but Edmund Ludlow cancels the order after Ireton’s death.
Ireton falls ill of the plague that is raging through the town and dies on November 26, 1651. His loss reportedly “struck a great sadness into Cromwell” and he is considered a great loss to the administration. At his funeral in Westminster Abbey, John Watson and others wear new tabards that replace the royal arms with the new arms of the commonwealth.
On January 30, 1661, following the Restoration of the English monarchy of 1660, Charles II has Ireton’s corpse exhumed from Westminster and mutilated in a posthumous execution, along with those of Cromwell and John Bradshaw, in retribution for signing his father’s death warrant. The date is symbolic, being the 12th anniversary of the execution of Charles I.
(Pictured: Painting of Henry Ireton, circa 1650, National Portrait Gallery: NPG 3301)
seamus dubhghaill 