Interregnum (Ireland)
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Ireland during the Interregnum (1649–1660) covers the period from the
execution of Charles I The execution of Charles I by beheading occurred on Tuesday, 30 January 1649 outside the Banqueting House on Whitehall. The execution was the culmination of political and military conflicts between the royalists and the parliamentarians in E ...
until the restoration of the monarchy under Charles II in 1660.


History

Life for both Irish and English Catholics in Ireland became increasingly difficult under Cromwell's rule, and Cromwell remains a despised figure in Ireland to this day. Cromwell's sweeping campaign in Ireland began in August 1649. He left in May 1650, but the campaign continued until 1653. Its effects devastated Ireland's Catholic population, roughly one-third of whom were killed or exiled by the war. Famine and plague were the biggest killers, resulting in large part from the scorched earth tactics used by Parliamentary forces. Some Irish prisoners of war were sold as
indentured labour Indentured servitude is a form of labor in which a person is contracted to work without salary for a specific number of years. The contract, called an "indenture", may be entered "voluntarily" for purported eventual compensation or debt repayment, ...
ers in the
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. The Catholic landowning class was dispossessed ''en masse''. Thousands of New Model Army soldiers and the Parliament's creditors were settled on confiscated Irish lands. Those Catholic landowners deemed innocent of rebellion against the Parliament but who had not shown "constant good affection" still had their land confiscated and were forced to relocate to
Connacht Connacht ( ; ga, Connachta or ), is one of the provinces of Ireland, in the west of Ireland. Until the ninth century it consisted of several independent major Gaelic kingdoms ( Uí Fiachrach, Uí Briúin, Uí Maine, Conmhaícne, and Del ...
, where the soil was poorer. The practice of Catholicism was banned and many of the soldier/settlers set up
dissenting Dissent is an opinion, philosophy or sentiment of non-agreement or opposition to a prevailing idea or policy enforced under the authority of a government, political party or other entity or individual. A dissenting person may be referred to as ...
religious communities, such as
Quakers Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abil ...
or Baptists, under the protection of the Parliamentary forces. The Scottish
Presbyterian Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...
community was also disadvantaged by the Interregnum regime, as most of them had taken the Solemn League and Covenant and had fought with the Scots against the Parliament in the
Third English Civil War Third or 3rd may refer to: Numbers * 3rd, the ordinal form of the cardinal number 3 * , a fraction of one third * 1⁄60 of a ''second'', or 1⁄3600 of a ''minute'' Places * 3rd Street (disambiguation) * Third Avenue (disambiguation) * H ...
(1649–50). Charles Fleetwood, the parliamentary commander in Ireland from 1652 to 1655, was viewed as being hostile to Catholics, Presbyterians, and the pre-war English Protestant settlers at the expense of the radical new settlers.
Henry Cromwell Henry Cromwell (20 January 1628 – 23 March 1674) was the fourth son of Oliver Cromwell and Elizabeth Bourchier, and an important figure in the Parliamentarian regime in Ireland. Biography Early life Henry Cromwell – the fourth son of Oli ...
, who replaced Fleetwood in 1655, was seen as a more conservative influence, conciliating the "Old Protestant" landed class and allowing the harshest legislation against Catholics (such as a ban on their living in towns) to lapse. Towards the end of the Interregnum, Parliamentarian generals Charles Coote and Richard Boyle (who were also pre-war English settlers) seized the strongholds in Ireland in preparation for the restoration of the monarchy.


Citations and sources


Citations


Sources

* * *{{Cite book, last=McCourt , first=Malachy , date=2004 , title=Malachy McCourt's History of Ireland , publisher=MJF Books , location=New York , isbn=978-1-6067-1037-1 , url=https://archive.org/details/malachymccourtsh0000mcco/ , url-access=registration 17th century in Ireland Interregnum (1649–1660) Political history of Ireland