The Irish rebellions in Queen Elizabeth's reign, have been generally ascribed to the influence of Roman Catholic zeal; and this opinion has been maintained both by Catholic and Protestant writers.
This circumstance might appear fatal to our argument, but this concurrence of opinion may be readily accounted for, even supposing the fact to have been otherwise.
For, those authors who have been most positive in ascribing these rebellions to religious principle, wrote in later times, when religious animosity had acquired its greatest rancour; and attributed the feelings of their own breasts to the times that had past; while the Protestant writers endeavoured to fix a stigma on the Roman Catholic religion, by setting it forth as the cause of these rebellions, the Roman Catholic writers, with a zeal equally eager, but less judicious, boast of these rebellions as an index of the fervency of the Catholic faith.
The wretched bigot, O'Sullivan, records a murder committed by Sir John of Desmond, on a Protestant, to whom he was much indebted, as ‘preclarum facinus.’5 The Protestant bigot, Sir Richard Cox, relates as a very meritorious action, that Lord Mountjoy reduced the Irish papists to the necessity of eating one another.
We must turn from these writers, who can never be trusted in their studied representations, but only when they involuntarily betray the truth, to the cotemporary writers, who saw the scenes which they describe. These, on the contrary, make little or no mention of any existing animosity on the score of religion, and so far from considering it as a cause of rebellion, they do not give the Catholics credit for it, even when they professed it was so, but expressly declare it was never more than a pretext.
Though the hasty words of such a man as the Earl of Essex cannot be pledged as historical fact, yet we may quote them with great reliance, as expressive of his feelings and the feelings of the times, when he replied to Hugh O'Neil, ‘Thou talk of a free exercise of religion! thou carest as much for religion as my horse.’
The Earl of Desmond's rebellion has also been ascribed to his zeal for the Catholic religion. Let us hear what he says himself, and collect the degree
It was made a condition by the Lord Deputy, that the Earl should promote the reformed religion in his territory. Desmond replies, ‘That as to the furtherance of religion in Munster, having no knowledge in learning, and being ignorant what was to be done in this behalf, he would aid and maintain whatever should be appointed by commissioners nominated for this purpose!’
As far as this rebellion is concerned, the testimony of Sir Richard Cox is decisive who, if he could have referred it to any thing like popery, would certainly have done so. He expressly allows that this rebellion arose from ‘the distaste of the old Irish potentates, and old English settlers, who had been dispossessed of their sovereign rights, and that religion was only made a pretence for rebellion.’
Moryson gives the same account of the origin of the insurrection under O'Neil. ‘About this time, the northern chieftains conspired to defend the Romish religion; (for now, first among them, religion was made the cloak of rebellion,) to admit no English sheriffs, and to defend their liberties and rights against the English.’
Those who have acquired from writers of later date an exaggerated idea of the fanaticism of the
Another fact, scarcely less decisive in proving that rebellions arose, not from Catholic zeal, but from Protestant intolerance, is, that during the reign of Elizabeth, (when in Ireland intolerance was yet young) the Roman Catholics of the Pale, who considered themselves as of English descent, invariably fought against the Roman Catholics without the Pale, whom they considered as mere Irish. Roman Catholic and Protestant had not yet become the badges of a party. It was the English and the Irish-English, without distinction of Protestant and Catholic, waging war against what were termed, the mere Irish, and the degenerate English. It was on one side, a powerful government, possessed with the spirit of rapine, invading
Religion, in fact, was nothing to the purpose. The English never mentioned it; the Irish only appealed to it as a known means of acquiring money and supplies from the Pope and the King of Spain. To lay stress upon religion, where passions and interests so much nearer to the human heart were at work, reminds me of a bon vivant who swallowed all manner of good things till he was fifty, and then attributed an attack of the gout, to eating too plentifully of water cresses.
There is no reason to believe that a single respectable Roman Catholic of the Pale, engaged in any rebellion, from attachment to his religion, during Queen Elizabeth's reign; on the contrary, they fought against the Irish, notwithstanding their common faith, with as much zeal as they had done for the four preceding centuries. O'Sullivan, a bigoted papist, reproaches them for doing so. Speaking of the reign of James I. he says, ‘And now the eyes even of the English-Irish (i. e. the Catholics of the Pale) were opened, and they cursed their former folly for helping the heretic.’
The English government were so sensible of the loyalty of the Irish-English Catholics, that they entrusted them, as usual, with the most confidential services. The Earl of Kildare was the principal instrument in waging war against the chieftains of Leix and Offaly. William O'Bourge, another Catholic, was created Lord Castle Connel for his eminent services; McGilly-Patrick, a priest, was the state spy.
The English government never betrayed any apprehensions on account of popery, but attributed the rebellions entirely to national feelings. In almost every letter of instructions to a Lord Deputy or a general, strong fears and jealousy are shewn of the Irishry, but never of the papists. The Queen herself perpetually remonstrated on the impolicy of employing Irishmen in the army, and after the defeat of Marshal Bagnell, gave directions that it should be cleared of them; but never mentions Catholics as objects of suspicion.
When Sir Henry Hannington was defeated by the O'Briens, Pierce Walsh was suspected of treachery executed, because he was an Irishman, as it is said, not because he was a Catholic.
The Lord Deputy speaking of Sir Conn McTeige, of Muscry, says, that ‘for his loyalty and civil disposition, he was the rarest man that ever was born of the Irishry.’ Every where we find that
To these facts we have to add the testimony of another cotemporary, and certainly a man of penetration, Sir George Carew. In his letter to Sir Robert Cecil, he takes pains to prove, that ambition, not religion, was the cause of the rebellions—that the chieftains of English race fought to maintain the independent Sovereignty they had been permitted to acquire; that the Irish fought to maintain or recover their monarchy and provincial kingdoms, which they inherited from their ancestors.
Thus far the Roman Catholic religion must stand acquitted of being necessarily a disturber of the public peace, under a Protestant government; and thus far we have refuted those superficial and uncandid writers who have attributed the great rebellions during Elizabeth's reign, to the factious spirit of popery. But to leave no doubt upon the subject, it may be desirable to produce the real causes of these rebellions, and to prove that they are sufficient to account for these calamities, without any reference to religion.
These, it will appear, were nearly the same as what produced similar effects in the preceding reigns.
1st, The general aversion which every nation has to be governed by a foreign country.
2ndly, The particular hatred conceived by the Irish against the English, on account of injurious usage.
3rdly, The confiscations of property which had taken place, to the ruin of entire septs.
4thly, The intention manifested by the English government, of quelling the usurped power and princely independence of the chieftains of English descent.
5thly, The hostility of the English government to the Irish princes, and the intention openly avowed, of destroying all their sovereign rights.
The first cause assigned is so generally felt, that it requires no particular comment, though its influence must at all times, and is unfortunately even to this day, very considerable.
Of the second cause, a multitude of instances might be brought, but very few leading points will be sufficient. Sir John Davis relates, that it was held no crime to kill a mere Irishman, and mentions two or three instances of the murderer being acquitted, on its being proved, that the sufferer had not been naturalized. The property also of the Irish, was placed without the pale of law, and the moral of the most part of the military history of the English, is getting a great prey of cows. The treatment of the Irish hostages, being generally the sons
There is a fine reply of an old chieftain, who when brought to Dublin, was brutally shewn his son's head fixed on a pole: ‘My son,’ said he, turning from the horrid spectacle, ‘my son has many heads.’
Wherever the Irish were mentioned in the acts of parliament, it was to mark them out not merely as enemies, (though that was their appellation,) but as something wholly out of the contemplation of the common rules of law and morality.
Baron Finglas, in his Breviate of Ireland, gives several plans for the improvement of that country; one of them is, that no merchant do send any manner of wares among Irishmen, to be sold, on pain of forfeiture of the same.
Yet there appears nothing in the character of the Irish, to justify this excess of hostility and cruelty. Until the reign of Charles I. when religious persecution had soured their disposition, they seem to have maintained a very marked superiority over the English, in point of humanity and generosity; and this appears more striking, when we consider, that the principal historians are Englishmen who would naturally favor their own countrymen, and disparage the Irish; yet while they record the most atrocious actions committed by the English, such as the assassinations of Lord Mountjoy, and Sir G. Carew, they mention no instances of retaliation, or of similar brutality on the part of the Irish.
The Irish in fact possessed the virtues, as well as the vices which flow from elective monarchy.
While in their contest for their petty thrones, every species of violence and bloodshed was made use of, and seemed justified by established usage; in their private characters, they possessed that generosity, humanity, and affability, which was necessary to conciliate the affections of their sept.
A very amiable trait appears early in the Irish character, which has been very little noticed. Oh the first invasion of the English, we are told by Leland, that a synod of the church was held, to consider what national sin it was which had brought Upon their heads this terrible visitation. It was unanimously resolved, that it arose from the traffic which at that time was carried on in English slaves, and with a generous compunction which has since been very ill requited, this slave trade was abolished. A people who could reason thus, were certainly no barbarians; and when we consider the extreme humanity of their laws, which in no instance allowed the shedding of blood; we may conceive with what abhorrence they must have beheld that licentious system of English cruelty, which has been so minutely detailed by the principal instrument of its exercise, the author of die Paccata Hibernica.
The third cause is of all, the most important.
It has already been explained, that if the English government had extended the protection of its laws to the different septs, it would have found no difficulty in overturning the power of the Irish chieftains without shedding a drop of blood. This power was founded upon customs and laws so destructive to the property and security of the wretched vassals, that they would gladly have transferred their ill requited allegiance to the fostering controul of English law; certainly when once they had submitted to it, and
But when the government, by a most cruel and absurd implication, confounded the sept with the chieftain, and because he resisted, confiscated their property; they took from them more than they could ever make a recompense for, and gave them a common interest with their tyrant, whom it otherwise would have been more natural for them to desert, when the enjoyment of a more lenient government, was within their reach.
But in fact, the object of the English government at that time, was plunder, and confiscation; they despised the natives too much to consider them as objects of care or civil improvement; they were only solicitous to improve every pretext for making forfeitures.
We have seen that the territories of Leix and Offaly, were confiscated under Edward VI. and the septs, as well as their leaders, banished or destroyed. This circumstance had given rise to frequent rebellions under Mary; and as well as we can collect, the septs, viz. the O'Moors, and O'Connors, had succeeded in a certain degree in recovering part of their possessions by force of arms.
The reign of Elizabeth began ominously for Ireland. Her first instructions to Lord Sussex were, for ‘the distribution of Leix, Offaly, together with Iry, Glanmacaliry, and Slemergie.’ By the memorial of Sir J. Perrott, we find that all these lands were made estates in tail to Englishmen.
We have seen that the English government had influenced the chieftain Con. O'Neil, to surrender his territory, and take back a grant of it, with remainder to his bastard son Matthew, and his issue, instead of his legitimate son, Shane O'Neil. This policy exactly resembled what the English government has practised in later times in India; they raised a person to the throne, in violation of the customary mode of succession, who depended for his station on their power, who was strictly a dependant, and might be set aside whenever a favorable opportunity occurred. Upon the death of the father, Shane O'Neil was elected chieftain according to ancient usage. The English made war against him as an usurper; he is slain by treachery; and his territory, which in the eye of the English government itself, could not, by its own act, be considered as belonging to him, but to the issue of the bastard Matthew, was confiscated for his supposed rebellion; and the issue of Matthew, who had been guilty of no rebellion, were left destitute! So that in order to divert Shane, the territory was reputed Matthew's; and in order to get rid of Matthew's claim, the territory was confiscated as Shane's.
But in fact it belonged to neither. It was the great province of Ulster, which the chieftain possessed as a king, not as a landlord, and drew his revenue from various imports on the gross produce of the territory, and not from the territory itself.
The lands in fact belonged to the sept, and were held by them in joint tenantcy. To talk of confiscating the lands of Shane O'Neil, was the same as if the emperor of Austria was to confiscate the lands of the elector of Bavaria, to dispossess every old proprietor, and let every acre of ground to undertakers. To confiscate the most flourishing quarter of Ireland was even then much more easy to decree, than effect; and though this monstrous exploit was perpetrated in the end, yet for the present, it was more within the measure of the cupidity of the English government, than its power.
Yet the confiscation was decreed, and Elizabeth, with all the rapaciousness of a land pirate, took a share in the adventure.
The account is curious.
On the 9th of July, 1573, the Queen granted the Earl of Essex the half of the signories of Clanneboy and Ferny, &c. &c. The Earl was to go thither with 200 horse, and 400 foot, and maintain
The royal and lordly robbers took their measures with the duplicity of conscious villainy. The Lord Deputy, Sir William Fitzwilliams, was instructed to give out that Essex came to repel the Scots, and not to hurt the Irish. In consequence he was joined by Bryan Mac Phelemy; who soon deserted him, probably on discovering his real views. The expedition failed, as likewise did another fitted out by Sir Thomas Smith, who sent his natural son to make a plantation in the Ardes. As if these measures were not sufficient to force the miserable natives to take up arms, fresh instructions were sent to let Leix and Offaly to English undertakers.
Can we be surprised to read in the next page that ‘The Lord Deputy found Ulster in a flame?’ or
The rebellions of the Cavenaghs, of the Knight of the Glynns, and of the Seneschal of Imokilly, arose from the same cause. Barry of Barryscourt was despoiled of his territory merely on a complaint being preferred against him by Raleigh. Sir Peter Carew set up an antiquated claim to half the kingdom of Cork, which was supported by the Lord Deputy and Council, although they were sufficiently aware of its probable effects, as, ‘Peter was advised not to alarum the Irish by beginning with them first.’6 But the claims of the Queen, who seems to have had an eager spirit for rummaging into the ragged title deeds of the Irish, were more formidable. If priority of possession could make a good title, the Irish had the best in the world, as their genealogical tree was full of fruit before the other nations of Europe had thought of planting one.
But this title the English maintained was destroyed by the confiscations which took place after the successes of the English arms. The Irish might have replied by the same rule, when they re-conquered the lands that had been confiscated (which they had done,) the right derived by the English from
After the defeat of the Earl of Desmond, and the confiscation of that quarter of Ireland called Munster, the Queen advanced a step farther in the destruction of every security of property.
There were some men of property who had sense enough neither to care about the Earl of Desmond or the Queen—who had not taken arms, and whose property could not be decently confiscated. The Queen thought they might be inconvenient in her plan of making a colony in Munster; and therefore required them to prove their titles; which if they could not do to the satisfaction of her commissioners, they were turned out; and which, if they could do, why they were turned out too; only they were to be insulted by a compensation, allotted by these same commissioners, Mr. Smith, and Mr. Meagle, ‘meet men, and apt in the profession of the law.’
Are we to be surprised, that a fresh rebellion7 broke out? or is this too to be ascribed simply to the effect of Popish zeal?
The fourth cause we have assigned for the rebellions in Elizabeth's reign, is the intention shewn by Elizabeth to reduce the old chieftains of English blood who had become independent, and exercised princely prerogative, to the rank of mere subjects.
This was a difficulty which the English government had created for itself. It gave away the lands of the Irish with such liberality to its own subjects and dependants, that it made them too great for subjects.
Ulster (a whole province) was given to John de Courcy; the county of Meath to Hugh Lacy. The kingdom of Cork was granted to Cogan and Fitzstephens, the kingdom of Limerick to William de Braosa; Sir Thomas de Clare obtained a grant of Thomond, Ottho de Grandison of Tipperary, Robert De la Poer of Waterford, and William Fitzadlem of a large portion of Connaught. But a more material grant was the licence allowed to these robbers and their descendants, to raise troops, and take by force as much more territory as they were able. In consequence of these drains upon the sources of pillage, the crown had no more to bestow; every inch
This event had taken place even as early as Edward III's reign so completely, that in order to satisfy the voracity of a horde of disappointed adventurers, who had been drawn to Ireland on the speculation of new confiscations and grants, Edward was obliged to resume the grants made in his and his father's reigns. This invidious measure gave rise to the distinction of English by birth and English by blood, which afterwards produced so much animosity. The succession of English born in England, who passed over into Ireland to obtain civil employments or grants of land, were generally connected with some court influence, and obtained every thing worth having. While the old English by blood, born in Ireland, gradually lost their connection with the government, and degenerated, as it was phrased, into mere Irish.
Independent of the great property they had acquired, there was another foundation for the power of the English and Irish chieftains. Till the reign of Elizabeth, the English government was too weak at home to spare any great force for the protection of its colony in Ireland.8 The defence of the pale rested entirely with Irish-English chieftains who were constantly inured to war, and from their knowledge
The English government was also extremely necessitous, and hence the means and burthen of raising and maintaining a military force, were left entirely to these chieftains. It is not surprising that they soon began to esteem themselves independent of a power which would at any time have ceased to exist but for their protection.
They adopted the customs and prerogatives of the Irish princes whom they had dispossessed.
They not only levied armies, waged war, and made peace like other potentates, as the whim seized them, but they drew their revenues according to the Irish mode of taxation, partly from tribute paid by dependant chieftains, partly by imposts, called Bonnaught, Cutting, Coyne and Livery, Karnety, &c.
To mark still stronger their total secession from the controul of English jurisprudence, they adopted the Brehon law, they submitted their property, and that of their dependants to the custom of Gavelkind, as it has been improperly termed, more properly speaking, hodge podge; and their rank of chieftain descended according to the law of tanistry. All this the English government put up with very good humouredly, whenever it stood in need of these chieftains for defence against the native Irish; but whenever it occasionally gained a little strength, it was sure
It is of no consequence to our present enquiry whether the English government, or its degenerate subjects were in the wrong; we shall only observe, that the English-Irish chieftains had obtained a right by prescription to their independence, as far as lapse of time, and long possession could establish it: and as this is the firmest foundation of all right, there must have been great apparent hardship in requiring these chieftains to descend at once from the rank of princes, to that of mere subjects, at least it must have appeared so to them; which is sufficient for our purpose, as we wish only to prove that this sense of injury, and not religion, was the cause of their rebellions.
A short account of the rise and fall of the house of Desmond, will be sufficient to shew the real causes of the rebellion of its last earl under the reign of Elizabeth.
At the time of Edward II. the English power in Ireland only maintained a passive existence from the voluntary services of Maurice Fitz-thomas of Desmond. He was sufficiently brave, but extremely poor; and receiving no supplies from England, he was obliged to adopt the Irish custom of Coyne and
From this time the Earls of Desmond assumed all the prerogatives of independent princes, refusing to attend parliament, levying taxes, making wars, and as they could find no precedent for their conduct in English law, they very naturally adopted the old Irish usages which were quite consonant to their views.
Their example was followed by nearly all the English families of considerable property, by the Burkes, Birminghams, Dexons, Geraldines, Butlers, Condrons, &c. who, in the stile of Irish royalty, assumed a fictitious sirname in place of the title of prince. Such as McWilliam Eighter; McYoris, McCostelo, McMorris, McGibbon, McPheris, &c.
This was the state of things when Elizabeth ascended the throne, when every cause, which had so long repressed the natural energy of the English government of that solid and spirited force which arises from wise and equal laws, was removed; while the Irish had not advanced a step from the weak and impoverished state which had been engendered by tyrannical habits and absurd laws. Elizabeth felt the difference, and knew her power, and proceeded to reduce these long established dynasties to the rank of subjects. These unfortunate chieftains were too ignorant to comprehend what the power of England was, they only recollected how weak it had been. They had been in the habit of treating the threats of the English government with scorn, they had been successful in throwing off its controul and repelling its aggressions by force.
Take the particular instance in this reign of Garet, he last earl of Desmond. The lord deputy summoned him to resign all the princely prerogatives which had been transmitted to him through a long line of ancestors. He consults his relations and feudatories, who unanimously advise him to resist so unreasonable a demand, and promise to maintain their advice by force of arms, against the deputy or any other that will covet the said earl's inheritance. Not one word of religion. The Earl of Desmond had always been considered as the leader of the English-Irish chieftains; he was the most powerful and wealthy, and stood most forward on the canvass. As long as his privileges were untouched, theirs remained secure, when he was attacked, their welfare was in jeopardy till the contest was ended.
On this head there was no doubt of the intentions of Elizabeth; and consequently as soon as a small force of Spaniards landed at Smerwick, the Earl of Desmond and all his feudatories, turned their arms against the lord deputy.
But the Irish had at length to learn the difference between the force of a government, founded on wise laws, and the power of their dynasties which rested on principles, repugnant to justice, and common
All the Earl of Desmond's property was confiscated, and as it was convenient for the English government to construe the sovereignty he held over a large territory into property also, the estates of his clan, and his feudatories, were also confiscated. That is, nearly the whole province of Munster.
Hence we may trace the cause of the succeeding rebellion, without having recourse to that which has been made a saddle for all horses—religion.
The fifth cause for the rebellions under Elizabeth was the plan adopted by the English government, of destroying the power and privileges of the Irish princes.
When we consider, that at the commencement of Elizabeth's reign, there were more than sixty independent chieftains in Ireland, of whom the greater part were in fact kings, and possessed of unlimited power over their subjects, when we know the attempts that had been made, and were at this period
The English government was in fact not so inimical to the Irish chieftains as it appeared; it was too conscious of the injustice and weakness of its pretentions to act up to them. In the very act which pronounces the prerogatives of the Irish princes an usurpation, and abolishes them as such, a power was vested in the Lord Deputy to re-grant the same by letters patent, with much greater privileges than the chieftain possessed by the rules of the Irish law.9
A chieftain possessed by the Brehon law, no property in the territory over which he ruled, except his patrimonial lands; he possessed the throne only as a life tenant; the succession did not necessarily descend to his son; on the contrary, his successor was generally elected by the sept during his life, and in some degree divided with him, the influence of government.
Whereas if he agreed to hold his petty empire by letters patent from the English government, immense advantage accrued to him. All the duties and exactions customary by the Brehon law, were continued to him; and in addition, the lands of the whole sept (by a most extravagant stretch of injustice) were made absolutely his private property, and what was still more gratifying, he was released from the interference of an elected successor, and his ancient prerogative and his new possessions were strictly entailed on his eldest son.
From this statement, one might be surprised that every chieftain did not immediately submit to hold his territory by English tenure. But there were several causes to produce hesitation. Pride strongly combated interest; and as the objects of interest are, after all, of no value except as they contribute to the gratification of pride, it is no wonder that in many instances the end was preferred to the means; and that the princely descendants of a line of kings preferred an honourable dominion, conferred by the free choice of their subjects, to a more lucrative
Yet the snare had to a certain degree succeeded; and though few of the Irish chieftains had consented to hold their territories by English tenure, yet their suspicions were lulled, and their animosities were disarmed, till the designs of the English government became too glaring to be mistaken.
This event took place on Sir William Fitzwilliam being appointed deputy, Ann. 1589. We are informed by Fynes Morrison, (a bitter enemy of the Irish,) that previous to Sir William's arrival, the kingdom was in the best state it had been a long time; any chieftain readily attended, when summoned by the lord deputy, none of them were discontented; the country was plentiful in corn, cattle, and all manner of victuals. This state of things was completely reversed by the outrages committed by the lord deputy against the Irish lords, McTuathel and O'Dogherty, and the Irish chieftain McMahown.
Sir William had received information, that part of the treasure on board the ships belonging to the Spanish armada, wrecked on the coast of Ireland, had fallen into the hands of the Irish in Munster.
He entered the country, but being disappointed of his booty, he seized on McTool, and O'Dogherty, who of all the Ulster lords, had been most faithful to the English, and put them into prison.
The first refusing to pay for his enlargement, continued prisoner till Sir William Russel's government, who in pity discharged him; but the old lord's heart was first broken, so that he shortly after died. The second was released, after two years imprisonment, not without paying for his liberty, as the Irish say.
‘And at this hard usage, all the great men of the Irish, (especially in the northern parts,) did much repine.’
But the murder of McMahon, prince of Monaghan, at length opened the eyes of the Irish chieftains to the designs of the English government, and shewed them that the sword afforded better security for their rights, than an English patent.
McMahon, chieftain of Monaghan, had surrendered his country to Elizabeth, and, as was the custom, received a re-grant of it to him and his heirs male, and in default of such issue, to his brother Hugh.
He died without issue, and Hugh took possession. The lord deputy Fitzwilliam, proceeded to Monaghan, under pretence of giving McMahon security in his possession. But as soon as he arrived there, he raised an accusation against McMahon, for having two years before recovered some rent due to him by force of arms. This by the law of the English pale was treason, but McMahon had never stipulated to be subject to the English law; on the contrary, the patents by which their territories were re-granted to the Irish princes, either formally acknowledged the validity of the Irish Brehon law, or tolerated it by a silence equally expressive.
The unhappy McMahon, for an offence committed before the law which declared it capital, was established in his country, was tried, condemned by a jury formed of private soldiers, and executed in two days, to the horror and consternation of his subjects and the rest of the Irish chieftains. His territory was distributed to Sir H. Bagnall and other English adventurers. Four only of the sept saved their property.
This event was well calculated to decide the Irish chieftains in taking up arms. ‘Certain it is,’ says Morrison, ‘that upon Mac Mahon's execution, heartburnings and loathings of the English government began to grow in the northern lords against the state, and they shunned, as much as they could, to admit any sheriffs, or any English to live among them.’
The minds of the Irish princes had already been sufficiently inflamed. English garrisons were forced on them under different pretences, which, removed from any responsibility, pillaged and laid waste the surrounding country. The English sheriffs were a yoke no less grievous: Established under pretence of introducing a more equitable administration of justice, as soon as they were firm in their seats, their extortions and exactions, with less appearance of right, became more intolerable than those of the native dynasts. In the instructions to Lord Grey and to Sir John Parot, the abuses committed by the English garrisons appear to have been notorious. The dread of an English sheriff had become so great in the Irish territories, though at first they were thankfully accepted, that his life was not secure. When Fitzwilliam proposed to Mac Guire, Prince of Fermanagh, to send a sheriff into his district, Mac Guire replied: ‘Your sheriff shall be welcome, but let me know his Erick, that if my people cut off his head, I may levy it on the country.’
A creature of the Lord Deputy, named Willis, was sent as sheriff, who according to Moryson and Lee, ‘harrassed the country with three hundred of the very rascal and scum of the kingdom, which did rob and spoil that people, ravish their wives and daughters, and make havoc of all.’
Moryson himself particularizes the tyranny of English sheriffs as a leading cause of the succeeding confederation of the Irish dynasts; and in their remonstrance
This being the fact, it was difficult for men so immediately interested, to be entirely unaware of their danger, and the period fast approached when it became necessary for them to forget their mutual feuds in their common peril, and make a last struggle for their independence, their power, and their property.
The period was favourable, as far as common injuries could give union and vigour to their exertions.
The sept of Mac Mahon, equally regretting their murdered chieftain, and abhorring the seneschal set over them, were ripe for action. Mac Guire roused to arms, by the indignity he had suffered from sheriff Willis, was only repressed by Hugh O'Neil, who had not yet thrown off the mask.
The O'Connors, and O'Moores had bravely contested the possession of their native territories, Leix and Ophalia, and were now in great force.
The chieftains of the De Burghes, originally English, but who had long enjoyed the independence and absolute prerogatives of Irish princes, had resisted the attempt of Sir Richard Bingham, to reduce them to the state of subjects; alarmed for their independence, and grievously harrassed (as we are told) by Wallop, by the late introduction of sheriffs, their defeat was only productive of forced submission.
O'Rorke, who had been driven from his petty principality by Sir Richard Bingham, had taken possession of Leitrim, and bid defiance to the lord deputy.
Shane McBrian O'Neil had taken arms to recover an island and a barony wrested from him by the Earl of Essex, who had imprisoned him till he surrendered them.
The inhabitants of Munster, driven from their possessions by the English undertakers, had collected in force, and only waited an opportunity to recover their properties; they soon after elected James Fitzthomas, commonly called the sugan earl of Desmond for their chieftain. He had the command of eight thousand men, as we learn from the Pacata Hibernia, he was elected agreeable to the law of
But the most formidable support of the Irish war, (for it is quite impossible to call it a rebellion, where there were more than sixty kings of acknowledged right, though possessed of trivial territory, fighting for the existence of their power) were the talents and courage of two principal chieftains O'Donnel, and O'Neil.10 O'Donnel was a hero. O'Neil was something still better. With equal courage and perseverance, he knew how to bend to circumstances, and to supply by address, the immense inferiority of force, which did not deter him from the daring attempt to release his country from a foreign yoke.
These men, whose characters have been basely traduced by historians, too bigoted to be generous; wanted only a more splendid sphere of action, to have ranked with the greatest characters that great events have produced. However, granting it otherwise, it does not affect the present argument, which tends to shew, not that the Irish chieftains were heroes, but simply that they were not bigots.
Hugh O'Neil was the son of the bastard Matthew, and in opposition to the Irish usage of tanistry (as we have already shewn) the dynasty and foe of Ulster was vested in him on his father's death, by
On his death, Hugh O'Neil was inaugurated by a better title than the queen had to bestow, the free election of the whole sept, who from time immemorial had appointed their chieftains. O'Neil was too well acquainted with the English court, and knew he could only maintain his rights by force. After he had endeavoured to supply his inadequacy in military strength by that policy which can alone give the weak the advantage against the strong; he took the field, and gained a decisive victory at Blackwater.
Hugh O'Donnel shared with him in the glory of the day; their ancestors had always been enemies, it was an O'Neil who in Henry VII's reign, wrote to Hugh Roe O'Donnel. ‘Cur hoom mi keesh no monna Curhir!’ i. e. ‘Send me my tribute, or if you don't!’—To which O'Donnel replied, ‘Neel keesh a gut urm, agus da beh,’ i. e. ‘I owe you no tribute, and if I did!’
We have seen in the reign of Henry VIII. the Lord Deputy declaring O'Donnel independent of O'Neil; but when the Lord Deputy proceeded to declare O'Donnel's dependants also independent, it seems to have opened his eyes, for we hear of no more disputes between the O'Donnels and the O'Neils.
The wrongs of Hugh O'Neil, a worldly and politic man, are not calculated to excite interest, but those of the open, generous and spirited O'Donnel will move any feelings but those of a bigot. The father of Hugh O'Donnel, the powerful Prince of Tyrconnel, refused to admit an English sheriff in his territory. The English government were too conscious of the villainy of the attempt, and their want of any plea of right, to enforce it by arms. They had recourse to means which would appear incredible, if the truth of the fact was not well authenticated. What must have been the general conduct of the English, when Sir John Perrott, who was accused of favouring the Irish, and who was beloved by the Irish, as comparatively a just and humane deputy, when he contrived and boasted of the following project:
A merchant of Dublin was instructed to feign himself a Spaniard, and to sail up by Donegal into the territory of Tyrconnel, to shew an extraordinary courtesy to the natives, to invite and feast them in his ship.—If the old chieftain or his son came on board, to intoxicate them, secure them under the
‘After the obtaining of him, his manner of usage was most dishonourable and discommendable, and neither allowable before God nor man. My reasons are these: He being young, and being taken by this stratagem, having never offended, was imprisoned with great severity, and many irons laid upon him, as if he had been a notable traitor and malefactor.’
His imprisonment would have lasted for life, had he not found means to make his escape with the two sons of Shane O'Neil and O'Reily. Hugh O'Donnel and Arthur O'Neil were hotly pursued; they were obliged to conceal themselves in a fastness without food, and exposed to the cold of a severe winter. In this situation they remained four days, when they were discovered by their friends. Young O'Neil was expiring.
Hugh O'Donnel, deprived of the use of his limbs by the severity of the cold, was weeping bitterly over his friend, and endeavouring to preserve his life by sheltering him with his own body. Arthur O'Neil died. O'Donnel regained Tyrconnel, and swore eternal enmity to the English. His father
Upon the defeat of the English at Blackwater, every Irish chieftain took arms. Morrison gives a list of them and of their forces, which is alone sufficient to prove that the English government could not, with any propriety, consider them as subjects; directed by O'Neil and O'Donnel, they defeated the best appointed army which had ever been sent from England; and Essex, who commanded it, returned to England disgraced. This was the only time that the fortune of Ireland seemed to gain the ascendant. O'Neil, with an inferior force, had baffled the English by address; he had now the superiority, and his success appeared certain. Every chieftain, whether of Irish or English extraction, saw that they could only hope to maintain their prerogatives and independence by force of arms, and their natural courage was instigated by every spur of pride and self-interest. The assistance of Spain was hourly expected. The ablest of the English generals were cut off, and the Queen's army thought only of defending the Pale.
Lord Mountjoy was appointed Deputy in the room of Essex, and every thing was reversed. Lord Mountjoy, under an effeminate exterior, possessed all the qualities necessary for conquest; courage, promptitude, cunning, unshackled by probity; severity unalloyed by compassion. He made
O'Donnel, and with few exceptions the whole body of Irish chieftains, disdaining to live as subjects where they had ruled as kings, passed over into Spain, where they were received with all the respect due to their rank, and all the tenderness that could alleviate misfortune. O'Neil, confident in his resources, maintained a short and fruitless struggle, and then followed their example. This is one of the most singular, and yet least noticed, revolutions that ever took place in any country.
Sixty princes, independent, and exerting kingly prerogatives from time immemorial, after a contest of five centuries, were in the course of six years swept from the face of their country by the superior energy of an ambitious woman. They fought long and they fought bravely, and though vanquished they did not yield. This was clearly a contest of power, not of religion. We cannot refuse our sympathy to their wrongs, their courage, and their misfortunes; but it is the ideotism of fanaticism, to applaud them for their piety, or to censure them for their bigotry. Religion was never appealed to by them, but as a pretext calculated to gain them money and ammunition from Spain and the Pope, and to throw an additional stigma on the name of Englishmen.
Yet, since we find the Catholic religion assuming a considerable degree of consequence, as a principle of discontent in the succeeding reign; there can be no doubt that it had gained considerable hold of men's minds during the reign of Elizabeth. It is true, that at the beginning of the war, the being a papist was no cause of suspicion; all the towns were peopled with Catholics and remained loyal; the Queen's army consisted mostly of Catholics, and was generally commanded by Catholic officers; yet latterly apprehensions were entertained of the loyalty of the cities and towns at the same time this
These are the most material instances we collect of the progress of Catholic bigotry during Elizabeth's reign, which prove that it existed in no great degree, yet that it did exist and had encreased.
The reasons for this encrease appear to be these:
First. The Protestant religion having met with no persecution in Ireland, made no progress. The native Irish to a man remained Catholics, while the Protestants consisted entirely of English. Hence English and Protestant became synonimous terms, and by a natural association of ideas, the hatred entertained by the Irish to the English was continually transferring itself to the religion of the English; and, by the reverse cause, their attachment to
Secondly. In the war which they were waging, the chieftains derived the most important advantages from professing and inculcating in their followers the most devoted attachment to the see of Rome. O'Neil, though indifferent to religion himself, was too politic to forego so favourable a pretext, and declared himself the champion of the Roman Catholic religion: in consequence, supplies of money and men were obtained from the Pope and the King of Spain. Vicars and Jesuits were sent over to Ireland, who, by the customary arts of zealots, awakened religious fanaticism; and gave effect to a bull of excommunication issued against Elizabeth by the Pope. Mac Egan, the Pope's Vicar, never allowed any Irish papist that served the Queen to be pardoned when taken prisoner. The Irish chieftains, however, were never infected with this theological spirit; we hear of no murders or massacres of Protestants, as such, though they afterwards shed such horror over the rebellion of 1641. Yet men, the most indifferent to the meaning of their own professions, will insensibly be influenced by the constant repetition of them.
Though at first the Irish chieftains espoused the Pope's quarrel from policy, there is no doubt they became attached to it from principle, and the misfortunes they suffered while engaged in its cause,
The last reason seems to have been the distinctions drawn between Catholic and Protestant by the laws: these distinctions were comparatively trifling during the time of Elizabeth, and may be seen in the acts of the 2nd of her reign. But nothing is trifling that wounds the vanity or pride of men, motives which influence their conduct much more than grosser interests. They gave to O'Neil an opportunity of repeatedly demanding the free exercise of the Catholic religion, which claim (as is usual) was refused with a pertinacity equal to its insignificance.
This was sufficient.
The practical persecution, however, which was felt or feared by the Roman Catholics, was of greater extent.
In the pardon granted to the province of Munster by Sir G. Carew, he himself tells us (in the Paccata Hibernia) that Priests and Romish religious persons were excepted. The Priests were always murdered in cold blood, whenever a town or garrison was taken. Sir C. Wilmot, when he took the Lord of Lixnaw's castles only spared the Priest's life, to get possession of the Lord of Lixnaw's child. Edmund Spencer speaking of the state of religion in Ireland, of which he had been an eye witness,
This maxim, however, was so little congenial to English jurisprudence, that on the contrary, Valentine Brown calmly recommended the extirpation of the Irish papists, as the best means of advancing the Reformation. These reasons appear sufficient to account for the degree of Roman Catholic bigotry which appeared at the conclusion of Elizabeth's reign. But, as I imagine, that at this time was also formed that sanguinary character which henceforth marks the Irish, and the Popish religion in Ireland. I shall plead no excuse for digressing to point out its cause. This was the extreme ferocity with which this war of Elizabeth was carried on, against the Irish and the Irish chieftains.
Superiority and impunity are the only conditions necessary to develope the natural barbarity of the human heart, when its object is power. What we despise we appear to have a right to oppress. Hence, the nations which are themselves the most free, prove the greatest tyrants to their dependants. Hence the contempt which the white men in the West Indies feel for the black, may be considered
While the Irish were able to maintain a pretty equal struggle with the English colony, that is, till the reign of Elizabeth, the common usages and laws of war (unless they were very unsuccessful) were preserved towards them. But when the power and pride of the English became so highly exalted under Elizabeth, the Irish were considered as a sort of rebel savages, clearly excluded from the contemplation of the laws of God and man, the violation of whose rights formed no precedent that could affect civilized nations; and it did not follow that a man who should spoil and murder them might not be possessed of an upright and gentle heart; as the owner of a privateer may be a very honest merchant, or a butcher a very tender husband.
Not to weary the attention with a repetition of cruelties, which would become monotonous in spite of their singular atrocity, we will confine our remarks to the policy and conduct of the Lord Deputy Mountjoy. He adopted the plan for reducing Ireland, pointed out, though not practiced, by the Earl of Essex: this was by the sword and by famine. That there might be no cessation to military execution, the armies were kept on foot during the winter; sallies were made from forts and garrisons, to prevent the sowing of corn; every exertion was made to capture or destroy the cattle, and in summer, the soldiers were employed to cut down the
Because the Queen's troops could not kill fast enough, no Irishman was pardoned, unless he undertook to murder his nearest friend or relation. Lord Mountjoy's secretary relates that, ‘Lord Mountjoy never received any to mercy but such as had so drawn blood on their fellow rebels.’ Thus Mc. Mahon and Mac Artmoyle offered to submit, but neither could be received without the other's head.
‘I have,’ it seems, says Lord Mountjoy, ‘made some of them put themselves in blood already; I hear that Lord Mountgarrett's sons have killed some of Cloncares and some of Tyrrill's followers: since I contested with their father, about somewhat I heard suspicious of them.’11
A singular account may be seen in the Paccata Hibernia, related by Sir G. Carew himself, of the attempt he made to assassinate the Sugan Earl, and his brother, by means of their friend Nugent. The plot failed, but it had the effect of sowing mistrust among the chieftains; and as they never retaliated
And now came the triumph of power.
‘The multitude, (as Sir J. Davis informs us) being brayed, as it were in a mortar, with the sword, pestilence, and famine, altogether became admirers of the crown of England.’
‘No spectacle, says Morrison, was more frequent in the ditches of towns, and especially in wasted countries, than to see multitudes of these poor people dead, with their mouths all coloured green, by eating nettles, docks, and all things they could rend above ground.’
The very commanders, with some degree of inconsistency, had to hang a parcel of old women, convicted of being cannibals, after they had reduced them to the necessity of becoming so. At length Sir Arthur Chichester was eye witness to three children feeding upon the dead body of their mother; and some compunction seems to have arisen in the breasts of the English when they found nature outraged by the effect of their measures.
The Queen exclaimed, that she feared the same reproach might be made to her which was formerly made by Batto to Tiberius: ‘It is you, you that are to blame for these things, who have committed your flocks, not to shepherds, but to wolves.’
Even Lord Mountjoy, the author of this system of coercion, saw its folly and repented of it. In his letters to the English lords of council, he advises sincere and perfect forgiveness to be granted to the Irish, complete toleration of religion, and great tenderness and liberality, in treating with the old Irish chieftains.
So that after all the waste of life and money, Lord Mountjoy had not advanced a step, but now equally felt the necessity of those wise and conciliatory measures which, if adopted at first, would have made the war unnecessary.
The Lord Verulam, in a letter to Secretary Cecil, inculcates the same policy; and, with his usual good sense, objects to the too much letting of blood, (the panacea, so readily adopted by statesmen of cold hearts, and muddy understandings) and insists on the necessity of religious toleration.
It is quite terrible (and it is still more shocking that the observation should have become trite and common-place) how odious human nature appears in the recorded transactions of governments. There seem to have no humanity, not even good nature, and their errors seem to spring just as much from a spirit of oppression and revenge, as from folly. Elizabeth was certainly a highly gifted princess, yet if she had never been known but by her administration in Ireland, she might fairly have been