kind of peaceable traffic by sea, whereby would ensue such a ruin to England as I am afeared to think on." 1 The civil policy of the Queen was at first merely an expansion of that adopted by Henry VIII. In 1570, by the 12 Eliz. c. 4, chieftains might surrender their lands, receiving them back to be held by patents under the Crown, to descend in hereditary succession according to the laws of England. A number of compositions were also arranged for, by which they were released from the obligation of an uncertain cess, and in return were to pay a quit rent to the Queen.3 Other terms of the compositions introduced a new element into English statesmanship. Henry VIII had dealt solely with the relation of the Crown to the heads of clans, ignoring their claims over their vassals, together with the rights of the minor tribesmen. The chiefs were now invited to abandon their Irish titles and the right to exact their old customary dues from their tenants.4 In lieu of these, they were to be confirmed in the fixed possessions of their lands, and to receive money rents. All were to hold direct from the Queen, all were to become subject to English law, and there was to be one people under the Crown. Though a fixed revenue was the immediate object of the Government, the whole policy had a deeper significance. The power of the chieftains over their vassals, who paid them tributes in kind and military service, had made them independent princes with large retinues at their command, through whom they menaced their neighbours and the peace of the country.5 It was intended now to place a permanent check upon their influence.6 By delivering 1 Cal. Car. MSS., I. 302. * See W. F. Butler, "The Policy of Surrender and Regrant," Journ. Roy. Soc. Antiquaries Irel. (1913), XLIII. See pp. 161-2. 66 3 Notably the Composition of Connacht" (1585), for which see the indentures printed in O'Flaherty's “Description of West or H-Iar Connacht " (1684) (ed. Hardiman), Ir. Arch. Soc. (1846). 4 The chief tax imposed by a chief upon his tenants was "bonaght," the quartering of soldiers. For an economic justification of this practice, in view of the undeveloped state of the country, see Bonn, op. cit. I. 197. See also pp. 60, 326 n. 1, 327–30. 5 "The continuance of these and other Irish exactions is the very root and foundation of the rebellions which have been from time to time in that country, both for that it giveth a mean to the lord to maintain so many idle persons in arms to attempt any villainy at his command, and also for that it draweth the obedience of the subject from his prince unto the captain, and maketh the common sort to stand in awe or know no other superiors than their Irish captains which thus exact upon them."-Dymmok, "A Treatise of Ireland" (1600), Ir. Arch. Soc. Tracts (1842), p. 9. "The plot of this composition (Connacht) was devised by Sir Richard (Bingham) of purpose to take away the greatness of the Irish lords . . . that the inferior subject might be freed from their Irish customs, cuttings and unreasonable exactions, and by knowing what was their own, to be drawn to depend ever after upon the State, and not on those Irish lords or gentlemen: which also might not only much avail her Majesty in time of any stirs or revolts, by drawing the common people from following the great chief lords, but also bring a more certainer yearly rent, or revenue into her Majesty's coffers than formerly was accustomed.”—Docwra, "Relation of Service done in Ireland," Miscellany Celtic Soc. (1849), pp. 190–1. the 66 66 poor flies" from the "webs and oppression of the great spiders" moreover, it was hoped that all would become loyal subjects. The mean freeholder freeholder" (the name given to the minor tribesman in the indentures) was for his part content with the terms of the compositions. He "began to grow rich and challenge to himself a more particular property in his own goods, and enjoy the fruit of his labour more freely than at any other time he could ever do or attain unto." 2 "They paid with very good. will," explained the Lord Deputy, Sir John Perrot, to Walsingham, "because they are come to a certainty every man knowing what is his, and depending now upon the law, and not upon one another." 3 The chiefs, however, soon began to repent of their bargain, and came to regard their rent as a "tribute" 4 when they found once more that English sanctions weakened their power over the tribesmen.5 They were primarily military rulers, and as such disliked the admittance of the sheriffs into their countries, and the administration of English law. The hostility of the chiefs, combined with the fact that the Government was not in a position to enforce its arrangements, led to the breakdown of the whole policy, and the Gaelic customs and ideas of government were soon replaced.7 The Government, as before, had gained an advantage. They had now a legal right to confiscate the estates of rebels who had entered voluntarily into these agreements, and this was the policy subsequently pursued.8 The division of Ireland into counties was commenced by King John, but up to Henry VIII's time English law was generally inoperative beyond the shires of the Pale.9 The Act, 11 Eliz. c. 9, provided that all counties not yet shire ground should be converted into such, and the serious establishment of county administration was begun under Sir Henry Sydney. 10 In 1 Cal. S.P.I. (1574-85), p. xxxvii. 3 See p. 164. 5 Cal. S.P.I. (1588–92), p. 267. a Cal. S.P.I. (1586–8), p. 199. Annals of Loch Cé, II. 467. The Burkes rose in Connacht saying that they would have a MacWilliam, or else they would go into Spain for one; and that they would have no sheriff, nor answer at any assize or sessions. Cal. Car. MSS., II. 431. The Irish declared, moreover, that the terms of the composition were violated by the exactions of sheriffs and soldiers, and this charge is fairly well substantiated by the evidence of English officials.-Cal. S.P.I. (1586-8), pp. 68, 98; (1588–92), pp. 173, 506. 7 The lords of Connacht continued to levy payments in kind even in the seventeenth century. See Bonn, op. cit. I. 261–2. The Irish point of view is clearly expressed by O'Sullivan Beare. "All were required," he says, "to produce the patents under which they held their properties, so that means might be found of despoiling them of their goods. This might easily be done as most of the Irish had no patents and did not require them since they were owners of their countries before the time of the English rule."-Historia Catholica Ibernia Compendium (1621), II. iv. c. 29. 9 Davies, Discovery, 236-7. 10 Henry VIII had divided Meath into two counties, and King's and Queen's Counties were established under Philip and Mary. See pp. 48, 232-4. 1565 he erected Annaly into a county under the name of Longford, and in 1579 Connacht was divided into four shires, in each of which the principal towns were fortified and sheriffs installed. Ulster was the last of the Irish districts to be reduced to shire ground, and here as elsewhere the English authority was for a long time only nominal. It was not till James I's reign that county administration became really effective throughout Ireland.1 The government of the remote parts of the country, where the Deputy's rule was powerless, had always been an acute problem. It was decided, finally, in 1569-70, to appoint Presidents for Munster and Connacht, who should be answerable to the Lord Deputy, and who should be assisted by a Council, a Chief Justice, a Treasurer and other officials. The powers of these provincial governors, which were both executive and administrative, seem to have been rather ill-defined,2 and the value of the office varied with the character of the holder. Some Lord Presidents, such as Sir John Perrot in Munster, managed to repress disorder and enforce the English laws,3 others, as for instance Sir Richard Bingham in Connacht, ruled with quite unnatural severity and goaded the people into rebellion.4 The main cause of the risings which led to the Elizabethan conquest, setting aside the clash of feudal and tribal ideas on the land question already referred to, was the dynastic ambitions of the chieftains, who shook off their allegiance whenever they saw an opportunity of increasing their powers over their own territories, or procuring some advantage for themselves. Religious feeling, accentuated by the activities of the CounterReformation, played an important part with the great mass of the people; 5 it is somewhat difficult to determine how far the religious enthusiasm of the chieftains was genuine, and how far the claims of Irish Catholics, as set forth by them, were put forward to gain foreign support. 1 See Preface to Cal. S.P.I. (1606-8); C. L. Falkiner, "The Counties of Ireland," Illustrns. Irish History, ch. 5; Lane-Poole's Hist. Atlas, Plate xxxi. The duties of such an officer are laid down by the Earl of Sussex in a statement as to the way, in his opinion, in which Ulster should be reduced (1562), Cal. Car. MSS., I. 330-4. The Instructions to Sir George Carew as President of Munster (1599) are given in Stafford's Pacata Hibernia (ed. O'Grady), I. ch. 1. See Prefaces to Cal. S.P.I. (1606-8) (1608-10). For a full list of Presidents, see Lascelles, Liber Munerum Publicorum Hiberniæ, I. ii. 184, 189. Both Presidencies were abolished in 1672. See pp. 164-6. 3 The Ordinances proclaimed at Limerick by Sir John a fair sample of presidential legislation. See pp. 166–7. Perrot in 1571 are probably 4 The departure of Sir John Perrot from Munster was lamented by the poor, the feeble, and the unwarlike of the country." ."-Four Masters, V. 1665. For a general account of Bingham's cruelties in Connacht, see Docwra's "Relation," Misc. Celtic Soc. (1849). 5 James Fitzgerald, "the Queen's Earl of Desmond," for example, who was brought up in England, returned to Ireland with the sanction of the Government in 1600, and was received with enthusiasm as the head of his house, by the common people of Munster, until they discovered that he was a Protestant. The two greatest risings of the period were those of the Earl of Desmond in Munster and that of the O'Neills in Ulster. The Desmonds resented the support given by the Government to their hereditary enemies the Earls of Ormonde, and they doubtless feared the suggested establishment of presidential government in Munster as an encroachment upon their Palatine powers. The first rising was led by James Fitzmaurice, cousin of the fifteenth Earl of Desmond. He sent an agent in the spring of 1569 both to the Court of Spain and to the Vatican, offering to adopt any Catholic prince of the royal house of Spain or Burgundy whom Philip might appoint. He collected a force and harried the country, and in the spring of 1570 plundered Kilmallock, then held by an English garrison, and burnt the town. A vigorous campaign was undertaken by Sir John Perrot against him, and as no aid came from abroad, a truce was signed in February, 1573. Two years later, Fitzmaurice escaped to the Continent, where, by professing the fidelity of Ireland to the Holy See, he gained the sympathy of Gregory XIII. The Pope sanctioned an expedition under the command of Thomas Stukely, self-styled "Duke of Ireland," an ex-pirate, and one of the most extraordinary of the many adventurers who played a part in Irish politics during this period. Stukely's expedition left Civita Vecchia early in 1578, but it was diverted to Morocco, and never reached its original destination. Fitzmaurice, however, collected an army, and accompanied by the celebrated English Jesuit, Dr. Nicholas Sanders, landed in Kerry in July, 1579, issuing a Proclamation in which he declared that "this war is undertaken for the defence of the Catholic faith against the heretics." 3 Fitzmaurice was shortly afterwards killed in a skirmish by a sept of the Burkes, who were loyal to the Queen, and the Earl of Desmond (who had been imprisoned as the result of a quarrel with the Earl of Ormonde and released in 1573) then took the field. He sacked Youghal and advanced upon Cork. He was proclaimed a traitor in November, 1579. Meanwhile James Eustace, Viscount Baltinglas, whose father had been in opposition to the Crown on the question of the cess, an arbitrary tax imposed on the Pale, led the malcontents of that region, and inflicted a severe defeat upon the Deputy in the Wicklow mountains.4 Soon after, a mixed force of Italians and "This Country (Kerry) was a Palatinate to the Earl of Desmond, the liberties and royalties whereof (he being a man of small discretion), caused him to grow insolent above measure, forbidding the Lord President and Council of the province to have any dealings in his jurisdiction, which was the very original ground and cause of his rebellion and overthrow."-Dymmok, A Treatise of Ireland, p. 18. Davies, Discovery, pp. 207–10; Cal. Car. MSS., II. 342-3. 2 Cal. S.P. Dom. (1566–79), p. 543; Cal. S.P. Foreign (1569-71), pp. 394, 422-3; Cal. S.P. Rome (1558–71), pp. 379–85, 387–91; and see the Index of Cal. S.P. Spanish (1568-79). 3 See p. 169. • About this time the Jesuits, Parsons and Campion, landed in England, and there Spaniards landed in Kerry, and entrenched themselves at Smerwick. The English, under Sir William Pelham and the Earl of Ormonde, had harried the whole of Munster in a series of horrible campaigns; 1 they now, under the Deputy Lord Grey de Wilton and Admiral Winter, attacked the fort by land and sea, and when the garrison surrendered six hundred of them were put to death (10 Nov., 1580).2 The capture of Smerwick broke the rebellion; the rebels were reduced to famine and hunted in the mountains, and the Earl of Desmond, after many hairbreadth escapes, was taken by a party of hostile Irish in a wood and put to death (11 Nov., 1583).3 The desolation of Munster after the wars has been described by Edmund Spenser in a well-known passage.4 The way was now prepared for the confiscation of the Desmond estates and for the Plantation of Munster. The great rebellion of the O'Neills in Ulster, the strongest and most Irish part of Ireland, was by far the most serious with which the Government had to deal. The first trouble arose from the confusion between English and Irish ideas concerning the succession to the earldom which resulted from Henry VIII's bargain with Con O'Neill; but as time went on Ulster became the focus of the whole Irish national resistance, and Hugh O'Neill, who had national 5 as well as strong dynastic ambitions, gained the active support of Spain, and waged a war in the name of the Catholic Church which taxed the strength of Elizabeth to a very considerable extent, and threatened the existence of English power in Ireland for many years. The succession to the lands of the O'Neill, which comprised the whole of the modern counties of Armagh and Tyrone and part of Londonderry, had been secured by Henry VIII's arrangement to Matthew, Baron of Dungannon, who had been put forward by Con as the legitimate heir to the earldom; 6 but Shane, another son of Con, was preferred by his clan, and he received the title of O'Neill by the election of his people. Elizabeth, being at war with Scotland, and handicapped by lack of funds, at first took little action against him, and in 1562 he paid a visit to her Court 7 were rumours of a Papal invasion. Baltinglas probably expected outside aid. "The expectation of foreign forces makes them all stand upon their tip toes."-Sir N. Malby to the Earl of Leicester (17 Aug., 1580), Cal. Car. MSS., II. 298. See p. 169 n. 1. Lord Justice Pelham to the Queen (12 Aug., 1580), Cal. Car. MSS., II. 293. 2 The treatment meted out to prisoners of war in the sixteenth century was often harsh, see Cal. S.P.I. (1574-85), p. lxxviii. For an account of this siege, see Lord Grey's letter to the Queen (12 Nov., 1580), Cal. S.P.I., p. lxix, and Hooker in Holinshed (ed. 1808), VI. 437-9. 3 A full account of the Desmond rising is given by Camden in his "Annals," pr. and tr. in White Kennet's Complete History of England (1706). Thos. Churchyard in A Scourge for Rebels (1584) gives an eye-witness's account of the death of the Earl. 4 See p. 171. 6 Cal. Pat. Rolls (ed. Morrin), I. 85. 5 See pp. 182-3. |