The History of Ireland

Front matter

THE HISTORY ..I IRELAND. By JOHN O'DRISCOL. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON : PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, REES, ORME, BROWN, AND GREEN, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1827. London : Printed by A. & It. Spottlswoode, New-Street-Square. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE JAMES ABERCROMBIE, M. P. Sir, It is an ancient privilege of authors to dedicate their works — and I am inclined to think, that, like the privileges of other and greater public characters, it ought to be considered as a trust for the benefit of the Public, which might sometimes be usefully employed, and ought not to be entirely surrendered. The lighter productions of taste are, with great propriety, frequently dedicated a to private friendship ; but graver works, which from their nature might perhaps be considered national, ought to be inscribed with names of public worth.

It is my good fortune to unite the public object and the private purpose. I do no more than record the judgment which the voice of the public has pro nounced of Mr. Abercrombie, — as one of the purest of public characters, and one of the truest friends of Ireland — and bear witness that the judgment is true. Many circumstances concurred to in duce me to attempt a brief History of Ire land. Such a work was wanting. The public called for it. Not for a heavy detail of Irish grievances and disasters ; but for a clear and distinct outline, drawn without prejudice or favour, of the great events of Irish history. I was solicited by several, whose opinions I valued highly, to un dertake such a work. Many might be found whose talents were equal to the task ; but there were few, perhaps, whose studies and pursuits had fitted them for V such a labour, — that were placed like my self, as it were, in a central position between the two great parties which divide Ire land — connected with both, and the slave of neither.

I had obtained some reputation for impartiality. The chief object of my humble efforts in literature had always been to suppress faction, and to raise up in its stead one great national interest in Ireland ; to root out party spirit; to cultivate national attachments, especially in the gentry of that country ; to unite these with the po pular feelings ; and to bind the whole round the throne and island of Great Britain. I have reason to know and rejoice, that I have not been entirely unsuccessful in this my favourite object ; and I look confidently to the time, as now near at hand, when, the main obstacles which have hitherto impeded every effort for the improvement of Ireland being removed, all those who have honestly laboured in her service may expect to reap a full measure of success. a VI In the mean time, I have not been wholly without my reward.

Preface

. The intention of the Author in the following Volumes, was to lay before the Public a correct and faithful view of Irish History. He was anxious to avoid encumbering his subject with such matter as did not elucidate the leading events or mark the character of the time. He has done no more than sketch an outline of the earlier periods of the history ; — for this is all that can be faithfully accomplished. Far removed in the distance of time, the details of those ages have faded away from our view, but the outline still remains strong and well defined upon the horizon. He has been more full in those portions of the History which may be considered eras, and which have had a powerful influence upon the course of subsequent events ; and he has a

PREFACE.

. been abundantly copious as he approached those later periods, which ultimately fixed the political condition of Ireland. It did not appear to him to be the duty of the Historian to load his page with details of every barbarity, and recitals of every treachery and fraud. Such accuracy would overwhelm the subject with a mass of heavy and disgusting matter, little connected with the progress of events, and as disagreeable for its sameness as revolting in its nature. The history of fierce conflicts, the contrivances of fraud, the efforts of oppression, and the struggles of despair, are all marked by little variety ; and when they are dragged from beneath the oblivion that covers them, and brought together in the crowd in which they unfortunately exist, they are apt to disgust the reader with the subject with which they are connected, or to distract his attention, and shut him out from a clear view of the great land-marks of history.

Unless such a view be obtained, the story of human affairs is but an idle tale, without object, and incapable of instruction. But he has been careful nevertheless to preserve as much of this unhappy material as the truth and fulness of history required. He has

PREFACE.

. IX not sought to remove the dark masses of shade which belonged to the subject, but merely so to dispose them upon the canvass, that they may not obscure, but rather assist in throwing out a vivid and strong delineation of the grand fea tures of the piece. There is but one History of Ireland deserving the name — that of Mr. Leland. But it is a heavy work, overlaid with the rubbish of barba rous and unimportant details, and disfigured with a degree of prejudice and unfairness still more objectionable. Leland writes like a gentleman and a scholar ; but he had no clear views of his subject ; and he was unable, or unwilling to disengage himself from the prejudices of the period in which he lived. It is to be feared that the latter was very much the case ; for throughout his misrepresentations and glosses, we are here and there struck with glimpses of a conscience ill at ease.

He is not, however, often chargeable with misstating facts, but he discolours them with observations strangely at variance with the natural deductions from the matter to which they relate. That Leland yielded to the spirit of the times was in him no ordinary error. The first and X

PREFACE.

. the best historian of Ireland, he had before him a glorious task, if he had been equal to its ac complishment. He might have soothed and appeased the bitter hatreds, and baneful animosities of his country ; he might have done much to reconcile his countrymen to each other ; he might have taught them that they were the children of one land, and the worshippers of one Creator; he might have been the first to an nounce to them a " new commandment," as surprising to the Irish as to the Jews of old — " to love one another" — and have found reasons and motives in abundance in the history he unfolded. But the sole design of his History seems to have been to foster prejudice, and to flatter power ; a poor and pitiful, but common application of talent — and Leland's was considerable. Undoubtedly it requires no ordinary courage to deal honestly with such a subject.

The Author of this work has proved the peril of a dangerous sincerity upon former occasions ; and upon this he has been cautioned, by more than one warning voice, how he ventured to tread upon volcanic grounds — " sepositos cineri do loso."

PREFACE.

. XI He might, indeed, have refused to write ; but, having written, he could do no other than follow the course he pursued in worse times, and do " equal and indifferent justice " to all. It was the advice of his Bookseller, and his own wish, to treat the subject in as short a compass as could be, without doing it any in justice ; and this he thinks he has accomplished. In the Two Volumes which he now presents to the Public, he has brought down his History to the important epoch of the conclusion of the civil wars by the treaty of Limerick. Hereafter, if he should find leisure for the task, he may probably continue the narrative to a later period. CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME. CHAP. I. Page Introduction ---._ j CHAP. II. Ancient State of Ireland - - - . 4 CHAP. III. Ancient Church and Learning in Ireland - - 25 CHAP, IV.

From Henry II. to Elizabeth - . - 30 CHAP. V. Subject continued - - -43 CHAP. VI. Subject continued - - - - 53 CHAP. VII. Reign of Elizabeth - - - - CONTENTS. CHAP. VIII. Page Reign of Elizabeth continued - - - 80 CHAP. IX. Reign of Elizabeth continued - - - 93 CHAP. X. Reign of Elizabeth continued - - - 1 1 3 CHAP. XI. Reign of Elizabeth continued - - - 128 CHAP. XII. Reign of James I. - - - -149 CHAP. XIII. Reign of Charles I. - - - - 162 CHAP. XIV. War of the Confederates - - - 188 CHAP. XV. War of the Confederates continued - - 2 1 0 CHAR XVI. The Cromwellian War - - 230 CHAP. XVII. The Cromwellian War continued - . 246 CHAP. XVIII. The Cromwellian Settlement - CONTENTS. XV CHAP. XIX. Page Reign of Charles II. - - 262 CHAP. XX. Reign of Charles II. continued - - - 278 CHAP. XXI. Reign of Charles II. continued ... 294 CHAP. XXII. Reign of James II. - - ... 306 CHAP. XXIII. Tyrconnel's Administration - - - - 323 CHAP. XXIV. Flight of James from England -