Ireland under the Stuarts and during the Interregnum, Vol. I (of 3), 1603-1642

Paulet’s violent behaviour

O’Dogherty remonstrated in a temperate letter and subscribed himself ‘your loving friend,’ but Paulet retorted that he was a traitor and that he left him to a provost-marshal and a halter. Three weeks later O’Dogherty went to Dublin, and protested his loyalty; but he was on good terms with O’Cahan, whose actions were also suspicious, and Chichester hardly knew what to think. Sir Cahir was at last suffered to depart after entering into a recognisance, himself in 1,000l. with Lord Gormanston and Sir Thomas Fitzwilliam in 500 marks each, to appear at all times upon twenty days’ notice in writing, and not to leave Ireland without licence before Easter 1609. About the close of the year 1607, Sir Cahir was foreman of the Grand Jury who found a true bill for treason against Tyrone, Tyrconnel, and their chief adherents.[46 - Docwra’s Narration; Cal. of State Papers, Ireland, for 1607; Recognisance in Chancery and Indictment of Tyrone, &c., calendared under June 1608; O’Dogherty to the Prince of Wales, February 14, 1608.]

Paulet insults O’Dogherty,

In February 1608 O’Dogherty wrote to the Prince of Wales protesting his fidelity, and asking to be made one of the gentlemen of his privy chamber. On April 18, the very day on which he plunged into rebellion, an order was sent by the English Government to restore the island of Inch, and all other lands withheld from Sir Cahir, excepting only the fort of Culmore, which stood at the mouth of the Foyle, and thirty acres of land with it.

who becomes an open rebel, and seizes a fort

The Four Masters say, and this has often been repeated, that Paulet struck O’Dogherty, and that the insult drove him into rebellion. Paulet was certainly abusive, but a blow is not anywhere mentioned in the State correspondence, though no Englishman then in Ireland had anything to say in favour of the unfortunate governor, nor by Docwra, who could scarcely be ignorant of so remarkable a fact. O’Sullivan Bere, who published his history at Lisbon in 1621, says Paulet threatened to have O’Dogherty hanged, but he had evidently not heard of any blow. The Four Masters wrote in Donegal, between 1632 and 1636, but it is not certain that any of them were in Ireland in 1608; at all events there was time for the growth of a traditional addition to the facts. Whatever may have been the immediate cause of his outbreak, O’Dogherty behaved with so much treachery as to throw doubt upon all his recent professions. He invited Captain Hart, the governor of Culmore fort, to visit him at Buncrana. He complained that Lady O’Dogherty, who was of the Pale and had English tastes, suffered from the want of society, and therefore Mrs. Hart was pressed to accompany her husband. After dinner O’Dogherty took Hart into an upper room under pretence of privacy, spoke of Paulet’s harsh conduct, and told his guest that he must die or surrender Culmore. Being disarmed, and told to choose, Hart refused to betray his trust. Lady O’Dogherty then entered the room in tears, upbraided her husband and his accomplices, and called heaven to witness that she was no party to the plot. O’Dogherty threatened to throw both her and his prisoner over the walls, and told Mrs. Hart that she must devise some means of seizing Culmore or die with her husband, her children, and the whole garrison. He swore upon a book that not one person should suffer if the fort were yielded quietly. At last she was frightened into going with O’Dogherty to Culmore and calling out some of the guard, saying that her husband lay hard by with a broken arm. Once outside the gate they were seized by the Irish, who rushed in and took the fort, surprising the rest of the garrison in their beds. Hart and his family were ferried over the Foyle and told to go to Coleraine, the soldiers escaping to Lifford during the confusion of that night.[47 - Hart’s narrative enclosed in Chichester’s despatch of May 4, disproving Cox’s statement that the garrison were murdered. O’Sullivan, Tom. iv. Lib. 1, cap. 5: ‘Georgius Paletus Luci (Derry) præfectus Anglus eques auratus O’Dochartum conviciis onerat, minans se facturum, ut ille laqueo suspendatur.’ Cox, writing in 1690, mentions a report that Paulet had given O’Dogherty a box on the ear.]

O’Dogherty surprises Derry

Treatment of the garrison

O’Dogherty marched through the night and reached Derry at two o’clock in the morning of Tuesday, April 19, with scarcely a hundred men, not all of whom were armed. They divided at the bog-side, Sir Cahir attacking the lower forts where the storehouses were, and Phelim Reagh undertaking the governor’s house on the high ground. Paulet escaped into Ensign Corbet’s house, and there a short stand was made. Corbet fought with and wounded Phelim, but was struck down from behind. His wife killed the man who had dealt the fatal blow, and was herself slain. Paulet fell by the hand of Owen O’Dogherty. Lieutenant Gordon jumped from his bed, seized a rapier and dagger and ran out naked, killing two of the assailants and calling upon the soldiers to fight for their lives. He also was overpowered and killed. Lieutenant Baker gathered a few men together and attempted to retake the lower fort, but was ill supported, and retired into Sheriff Babington’s house. That house and the bishop’s were held till noon, but O’Dogherty’s force was constantly increasing, a piece of cannon was brought up from Culmore, and Baker, who had no provisions or ammunition, thought it best to make terms. A written undertaking was given that every man should depart with his sword and clothes, and the women with their clothes. Lady Paulet and Mrs. Susan Montgomery, the bishop’s wife, remained prisoners with O’Dogherty. According to O’Sullivan all Protestants were slaughtered, and all Catholics safely dismissed, but the total number killed did not exceed ten on either side. Lieutenant Baker, to use the language of Sir Josiah Bodley, was in ‘great grace and reputation,’ for he alone survived of those who had distinguished themselves on the fatal morning. He settled in Ulster, and his namesake, perhaps his descendant, was governor in that later siege which has made the name of Derry for ever famous.[48 - Bodley’s letter of May 3; Chichester’s of May 4, enclosing Hart’s and Baker’s own narratives; Newes from Ireland, concerning the late treacherous action, &c., London, 1608; O’Sullivan Bere ut sup.; Four Masters, 1608.]

The Bishop’s library burned

Collapse of the insurrection

Derry re-occupied

The rebels abandon Culmore

Pursuit of O’Dogherty

Surrender of Burt Castle

Before leaving Derry Phelim Reagh, who thought the place untenable by a small force, deliberately burned Bishop Montgomery’s library in sight of his men. O’Sullivan says there were ‘2,000 heretical books,’ and that the bishop vainly offered a hundred pounds ransom for his collection. Having set fire to the buildings and to two corn ships which lay near, Phelim removed to Culmore, taking some guns with him in two boats and throwing the rest into the sea. Doe Castle on Sheep Haven was also surprised, and Captain Henry Vaughan taken prisoner. Captain John Vaughan abandoned Dunalong and fled with his men to Lifford, and a few Scotch settlers at Strabane did the same. There O’Dogherty’s successes ended. Sir Richard Hansard, who never ceased to take the precautions which Paulet neglected, easily maintained himself at Lifford, and help was not long in coming. At the beginning of May Chichester sent all his available forces to Ulster. The officers in charge were Sir Richard Wingfield, Marshal of the army since 1600, and Sir Oliver Lambert, then more hated and feared than any English soldier. Sir Thomas Ridgeway, an energetic man who had succeeded Carey as vice-treasurer, accompanied them without Chichester’s knowledge. After inspecting the garrisons about Lough Neagh and the Blackwater, and warning them to be on their guard, Wingfield and his colleagues reached Derry on May 20. They found earthworks, walls and chimneys not much damaged, but everything that would burn had been reduced to ashes, except the wooden roof of the cathedral. Ridgeway was in doubt whether they had found this roof too high to set fire to, or whether they spared it out of respect to St. Columba, ‘the patron of that place, and whose name they use as their word of privity and distinction in all their wicked and treacherous attempts.’ According to the terms of the recognisance in which he was bound, Chichester’s letter summoning O’Dogherty to appear before him was publicly read by Ridgeway at ‘the half-burned house of Master Babington’ in Derry, and at Sir Cahir’s own castle of Ellagh not far off. Cabins were run up for the inhabitants of Derry, who had already returned to their homes, and enough cows and sheep to secure them against starvation were driven in from O’Dogherty’s country. Phelim Reagh declared that he would die in defence of Culmore, but thought it more prudent to set the place on fire and to escape by water. The fort was quickly refitted and garrisoned. Parties were sent to scour the country as far as Dunaff and Malin Head, and Inishowen was completely cleared, 2,000 cows, 2,000 or 3,000 sheep and 300 or 400 horses were driven in, and Buncrana was burned ‘as well from anger as for example’s sake.’ Armed resistance there was practically none. O’Dogherty had withdrawn into the territory of the MacSwineys west of Lough Swilly, and thither did Ridgeway and his colleagues pursue him. Even among the woods of Glenveagh he was unable to make any sort of defence, and it was said that he fled thirty-five miles in one march at the approach of the troops. Various plots having been laid for his betrayal, the army returned by Raphoe to Sir Cahir’s principal castle of Burt on Lough Swilly. The garrison were divided in opinion, some thinking that they held the place for the King of Spain and others for O’Dogherty. They had but one life each, they said, which they owed to God; if they surrendered they would either be treated like dogs by the English or hanged by Sir Cahir, and so they might as well do their duty. One Dowding, or Dowling, a native of Drogheda, and presumably more civilised than the Inishowen men, at last proposed a capitulation, involving a jointure for Lady O’Dogherty and some provision of land for the rest. The answer of the English officers, who thought it ‘intolerable strange for a King’s army to make jointures for ladies with the cannon,’ was to place two pieces of artillery in position. The Irish, whose chief leader was a monk, said they would put Mrs. Montgomery in the breach, but no breach was made, and they all surrendered at discretion after the second shot. Mrs. Montgomery and Captain Brookes’ son were, in Ridgeway’s quaint language, ‘returned to their owners.’ Sir Neill Garv O’Donnell and his two brothers, Lady O’Dogherty, her only daughter and her husband’s sister, with their female attendants, were taken on board his Majesty’s ship Tramontana, and Ridgeway went with them to Dublin, partly to avoid weakening Wingfield’s force, and partly because he thought the enforced idleness of a voyage would make the ladies talk freely. Lady O’Dogherty fulfilled his expectation by indulging in ferocious invectives ‘against Neill Garv for drawing her husband into rebellion.’[49 - Ridgeway’s Journal, June 30, and his letter to Salisbury of July 3. O’Sullivan, Compendium, Lib. i. cap. 5.]

O’Dogherty in Tyrone, and Armagh, but is killed by Irish soldiers

Unable to cope with Wingfield in Donegal, O’Dogherty made a descent upon Tyrone in the middle of June. Chichester had ordered all garrisons to keep close, and this policy was strictly adhered to. O’Dogherty was afraid to do much damage lest he should alienate the affections of Tyrone’s late subjects, and he only took enough cattle to feed his following of about 800 men. He penetrated into Armagh, but soon wandered back into Donegal, making no attempt to relieve Burt, and pretending that its loss did not signify. After Ridgeway’s departure Wingfield prepared to attack Doe Castle, and while he waited at Kilmacrenan for his artillery, the enemy, about 700 strong, unexpectedly came in sight. Neill Garv had warned O’Dogherty not to fight, but he neglected this advice and was killed by Irish soldiers who wanted his land. His head was sent to Dublin and stuck upon a spike over the new gate. Within a few days Doe Castle succumbed to a heavy cannonade, and Lough Eske was surrendered by O’Gallagher, who was foster-father to Tyrconnel’s son. Chichester received the news of O’Dogherty’s death at Dundalk, and at once issued a proclamation warning the people of Ulster that those who received or protected any of the late rebel’s followers would be regarded as traitors themselves. All who delivered up any of the delinquents dead or alive were promised free pardons and the goods of the person so given up. Phelim Reagh MacDavitt alone was excluded from all hope of pardon.[50 - Chichester to the Privy Council, July 6, and the proclamation dated next day; Four Masters, 1608, with O’Donovan’s notes; Sir Donnell O’Cahan to his brother Manus (from the Tower), June 1, 1610. Manus gave the letter to Chichester.]

Ruthless suppression of the rebellion, which is condemned by an Irish jury

Phelim Reagh MacDavitt

Chichester had announced that the war should be made ‘thick and short,’ and his proclamation was well suited for the purpose. About fifty of the O’Hanlons were in arms near Mount Norris, but they were quickly dispersed with great loss on his arrival at that fort, and the prisoners hanged by martial law. O’Cahan’s brother Shane Carragh was soon afterwards brought in by the MacShane O’Neills to the post at Mountjoy. At Armagh the grand jury, almost entirely Irish, found a bill against all who were in rebellion. Being a man of importance Shane Carragh was tried by jury at Dungannon and hanged, and it was noted that the solemnity of the trial made a great impression upon the natives, who were accustomed to see summary sentences carried out at the nearest tree. The jurors were Irishmen, who attended as readily as when Tyrone was present, and the monk who had commanded at Burt voluntarily purchased life and liberty by renouncing the Pope and conforming publicly. Chichester then marched through Glenconkein, ‘where the wild inhabitants,’ according to Davies, ‘wondered as much to see the King’s Deputy as the ghosts in Virgil wondered to see Aeneas alive in hell.’ At Coleraine he heard of the capture of Sir Cahir’s illegitimate brother, whom the people wished to make O’Dogherty, of Owen O’Dogherty who killed Paulet, and of Phelim Reagh MacDavitt, who was regarded as the contriver of the whole rising. Phelim, who was hunted into a wood and found there after long search, made a stout resistance and was wounded, but great care was taken to keep him alive for his trial. He was taken to Lifford, where he made statements very damaging to Neill Garv, and was then hanged with twenty others. Chichester returned to Dublin at the beginning of September, leaving only the very dregs of a rebellion behind him.[51 - Davies to Salisbury, August 5, 1608; Chichester to the Privy Council, September 12.]

Severities in Tory Island

The rebels destroy each other

Shane MacManus, Oge O’Donnell, who aspired to be the O’Donnell, was the last to hold out with about 240 men in Tory and the adjacent smaller islands. Sir Henry Ffolliott, the governor of Ballyshannon, finished the business in a very ruthless manner. On his way he took the island stronghold at Glenveagh, which was held by an O’Gallagher, ‘one of Tyrconnell’s fosterers, who killed three or four of his best associates after he yielded up the island, for which we took him into protection.’ Of armed resistance there was not much, but Ffolliott’s task was made difficult by foul winds upon that rough coast, and he failed to capture Shane MacManus, who escaped with the bulk of his followers by boat into Connaught, preferring to trust to Clanricarde’s clemency, but leaving eleven men in the castle on Tory island, where Ffolliott found them. The constable called to Sir Mulmore MacSwiney, begging to be allowed to see the English commander and promising service. MacSwiney let him come out, and he was induced by Ffolliott to purchase his life by betraying the castle and taking the lives of seven out of the ten men in it. A MacSwiney who was one of the garrison was also admitted to a parley and made the like promise, but the constable got back first, ‘each of them,’ says Ffolliott, ‘being well assured and resolved to cut the other’s throat.’ He killed two of his followers and the rest scattered into the rocks, where he shot one. Ffolliott kept him to his promise of seven heads, which were to be taken without help from the soldiers. One of the others turned and stabbed his late leader to the heart and was then killed by one of his own companions. Three others were killed in the scuffle. Shane MacManus’s boat was found in the island of Arran, while his mother with a boy of ten and a girl of eleven remained prisoners. ‘And so,’ reported Ffolliott, ‘there were but five that escaped, three of them churls and the other two young boys… Shane MacManus is deprived of his mother and two children and his boat, which I think he regards more than them all.’[52 - Chichester to the Privy Council, September 12 and 17, the latter enclosing Ffolliott’s narrative.]

Fate of Neill Garv O’Donnell

Irish juries will not find verdicts for treason

Neill Garv is sent to the Tower, where he dies

Sir Neill Garv O’Donnell gave no effectual help against O’Dogherty, and he was really a fellow-conspirator. Lifford, Ballyshannon and Donegal were to be seized by him and his friends, while Sir Cahir took Derry and Culmore, and all plunder was to be divided equally between them. Sir Neill was to have Burt Castle and whatever rights O’Donnell had over Inishowen, as long as he could hold his own. He continued, however, to profess loyalty and to urge his claims over the whole of Tyrconnel. O’Dogherty’s country he regained by special grant, but he was an abettor, if not the principal contriver, of the Derry surprise, gave advice about the mode of attack, sent sixteen men of his own to help, and charged O’Dogherty to spare no one. All this was not certainly known until later, and Sir Neill obtained protection from Wingfield, whom he accompanied on his expedition into Donegal. He was soon again in communication with the rebels, was arrested at Glenveagh and sent a prisoner to Dublin, but it was not until June, 1609, that a Donegal jury could be sworn in the King’s Bench there. The jurors were Irishmen and not of very high position, for the English settlers and the principal natives had served on the grand jury which found the bill. Davies offered no evidence as to Sir Neill’s complicity in the Derry affair, though there could be no doubt of the fact, because it might be held that the treason was covered by Wingfield’s protection. There was good proof of the breach of that protection by aiding and abetting the King’s enemies, but the jury were shut up from Friday till Monday and almost starved to death. They refused to find a verdict of treason on the ground that Sir Neill had not been actually in arms against the King, and it was believed that they had bound themselves by mutual oath not to find the lord of their country guilty. They were discharged ‘in commiseration of their faintings and for reasons concerning his Majesty’s service.’ ‘The priests,’ said Davies, ‘excommunicate the jurors who condemn a traitor. The Irish will never condemn a principal traitor: therefore we have need of an English colony, that we may have honest trials. They dare not condemn an Irish lord of a country for fear of revenge, because we have not power enough in the country to defend honest jurors. We must stay there till the English and Scottish colonies be planted, and then make a jury of them.’ There being no hope of a verdict, the lawyers could only suggest that Sir Neill should be tried by a Middlesex jury as O’Rourke had been in 1591. In any case he should be sent to England, for Dublin Castle was no safe place for a prisoner who was always trying to escape, and who had already been found with a rope long enough to ‘carry him over the wall from the highest tower.’ Sir Neill went to London in due course, and died in the Tower in 1626.[53 - Davies on the juries, State Papers, Ireland, 1608, No. 801; his and Chichester’s accounts of the trial, June 27 and July 4, 1609; abstract of evidence calendared at October 1609, No. 514; Letter to Bishop Montgomery from Ineen Duive, Hugh O’Donnell’s mother and Tyrconnel’s aunt, printed from Carte MSS. in O’Donovan’s Four Masters, 2364.]

The effects of O’Dogherty’s rising

Fate of O’Cahan

The abortive rebellion of O’Dogherty made the fate of the six Ulster counties harder than it might otherwise have been. It was, say the Four Masters, ‘from this rising and from the departure of the Earls that their principalities, their territories, their estates, their lands, their forts, their fruitful harbours, and their fishful bays were taken from the Irish of the province of Ulster, and were given in their presence to foreign tribes; and they were expelled and banished into other countries, where most of them died.’ Inishowen, which O’Dogherty held by patent independently of Tyrone, was separately forfeited, and the whole of it granted to Chichester himself. The failure of trial by Jury in Neill Garv’s case prevented Davies from running a fresh risk with O’Cahan, who lay long in Dublin Castle, and was sent to the Tower late in 1609 in charge of Francis Annesley, afterwards Lord Mountnorris. Neill Garv and his son Naughton went in the same vessel. ‘The boy,’ said Chichester, ‘has more wit than either of them,’ and he had been at Oxford and at Trinity College, Dublin. No charge was made against him, but he was as proud as his father. O’Cahan remained a prisoner, and no doubt there was plenty of evidence against him, but Chichester, while carrying out the policy of the Home Government, scarcely hides his opinion that he had been badly treated, and that he had the reputation of a truth-telling man. As to the facts, the Lord Deputy’s story tallies closely with that of Docwra. Writing as late as 1614, the latter says deliberately that ‘O’Cahan, from the breach of my promise with him, derives, as well he may, the cause of all his miseries,’ and he thought he would have done nothing rebellious if faith had been kept with him. He was never tried, and spent years in the Tower, where he probably died in 1628. A thousand acres of his old territory was granted, or perhaps only promised, to his wife Honora, with reversion to her son Donell, but the young man went to the Netherlands, returned in 1642 with Owen Roe O’Neill, and was killed at Clones. His elder brother Rory was hanged for his share in the conspiracy of 1615.[54 - Docwra’s Narration, 283. Francis O’Cahan’s petition calendared with the papers of 1649, p. 278, but evidently of a much earlier date. Hill’s Ulster Plantation, 61, 235.]

CHAPTER V

THE SETTLEMENT OF ULSTER

Ulster before the settlement

The tribal system known to the writers of what are called the Brehon laws survived much longer in Ulster than elsewhere. In the other three provinces the Anglo-Norman invaders may not have made a complete conquest, but they had military occupation and many of their leaders took the position of Irish chiefs when the weakening power of the Crown made it impossible to maintain themselves otherwise. Yet they never forgot their origin, and were ready enough to acquiesce when the Tudor sovereigns reasserted their authority. But there were no Butlers, Fitzgeralds, or Barries in Ulster, while the Burkes withdrew into Connaught and assumed Irish names. For a long time the native clans were left almost to their own devices. Con Bacagh O’Neill, when he accepted the earldom of Tyrone in 1543 and went to England to be invested, took a long step towards a new state of things. Through ignorance or inadvertence the remainder was given to Matthew Ferdoragh, who was perhaps not an O’Neill at all. Shane O’Neill, the eldest son of undoubted legitimacy, kept the leadership of his clan, while insisting in dealing with the government that he was Con’s lawful heir. Even Shane admitted that Queen Elizabeth was his sovereign. When the original limitation of the peerage took practical effect, and Hugh O’Neill became Earl of Tyrone, the feudal honour was most useful on one side while the tribal chiefry was still fully maintained on the other. In two cases, decided by the Irish judges in 1605 and 1608 respectively, gavelkind or inheritance by division among all males was abolished as to lands not forming part of the chief’s demesne, and Tanistry as to the land of the elective chief. This purely judge-made law was followed in the settlement of Ulster with far too little regard to the actual state of things there.[55 - Le Case de Gavelkind, 3 Jac., and Le Case de Tanistry, 5 Jac., in Davies’ reports, 1628.]

The tribal system

Backward state of the natives

Without going into the technicalities of Celtic tenure it may be assumed for historical purposes that the Ulster Irish consisted of the free tribesmen who had a share in the ownership of the soil and the mixed multitude of broken men who were not only tolerated but welcomed by the great chiefs, but who were not joint proprietors though they might till the land of others. A large part of the inferior class consisted of the nomad herdsmen called creaghts, who were an abomination to the English. There was always much more land than could be cultivated in a civilised way, and the cattle wandered about, their drivers living in huts and sheds till the grass was eaten down, and, then removing to a similar shelter in another place. One main object was to turn these nomads into stationary husbandmen, and it was not at all easy to do. Still more troublesome were the ‘swordsmen’ – that is, the men of free blood whose business had always been fighting and who would never work. They formed the retinue of Tyrone and the rest, and when the chiefs were gone they had nothing to do but to plunder or to live at the expense of their more industrious but less noble neighbours. ‘Many natives,’ says Chichester, ‘have answered that it is hard for them to alter their cause of living by herds of cattle and creaghting; and as to building castles or strong bawns it is for them impossible. None of them (the Neales and such principal names excepted) affect above a ballybetoe, and most of them will be content with two or three balliboes; and for the others, he knows whole counties will not content the meanest of them, albeit they have but now their mantle and a sword.’ Some of these men owned land with or without such title as the law acknowledged. The radical mistake of the English lawyers was in ignoring the primary fact that land belonged to the tribe and not to the individual. It is true that the idea of private property was extending among the Irish, and that the hereditary principle tended to become stronger, but the state of affairs was at best transitional, and the decision in the case of gavelkind went far in advance of the custom. Yet it might possibly have been accepted if Chichester’s original idea had been followed. He wished first to distribute among the Irish as much land as they could cultivate, and to plant colonists on the remainder. What really happened was that everything was done to attract the undertakers, and as the rule of plantation allowed no Irish tenants to have leases under them the natives who remained were reduced to an altogether inferior position. The servitors were allowed to give leases to the Irish, whom they might keep in order by their reputation and by the possession of strong houses. But the amount of land assigned for this purpose was inadequate, and the Irish tenants, who for the most part were not given to regular agriculture, soon found themselves poor and without much hope of bettering their condition. Very light ploughs attached to the tails of ponies were not instruments by which the wilderness could be made to blossom like the rose. This system of ploughing certainly shows a low condition of agriculture, and it was general wherever estates were allotted to native gentlemen. ‘Tirlagh O’Neale,’ says Pynnar, ‘hath 4,000 acres in Tyrone. Upon this he hath made a piece of a bawn which is five feet high and hath been so a long time. He hath made no estates to his tenants, and all of them do plough after the Irish manner.’ Mulmory Oge O’Reilly had 3,000 acres in Cavan, lived in an old castle with a bawn of sods, and ‘hath made no estates to any of his tenants, and they do all plough by the tail.’ Brian Maguire, who had 2,500 acres in Fermanagh, lived in a good stone house and gave leases to some of his tenants, but even they held to the Irish manner of ploughing. A good many of the undertakers made no attempt to build, and of course the lands were in the occupation of Irishmen who were liable to be disturbed at any moment, and therefore very unlikely to improve.[56 - A Ballyboe varied from sixty to 120 acres, and a Ballybetagh was about 1,000. An introduction to the very large and complicated question of Celtic tenures may be had through Maine’s Early History of Institutions and Joyce’s Social History of Ancient Ireland, 1903.]

First schemes of settlement

The injustice of confiscating several counties for the default of certain chiefs is obvious to us, even if we admit that their forfeiture was just. But no Englishman at the time, not even Bacon, seems to have had any misgivings. The packet in which the flight of the Earls was announced contained a letter from Sir Geoffrey Fenton to Salisbury with the first rough sketch of the Ulster settlement. The old secretary pointed out that the opportunity had at last come for pulling down the proud houses of O’Neill and O’Donnell, for vesting all in the Crown, and for improving the revenue, ‘besides that many well-deserving servitors may be recompensed in the distribution, a matter to be taken to heart, for that it reaches somewhat to his Majesty’s conscience and honour to see these poor servitors relieved, whom time and the wars have spent even unto their later years, and now, by this commodity, may be stayed and comforted without charge to his Majesty.’ A few days later Chichester wrote more in detail. His idea was to divide the land among the inhabitants as far as they were able to cultivate it. After that there would be plenty left for colonists, and to reward those who had served the King in Ireland. This was the course he advised; otherwise he saw nothing for it but to transplant all the people of Tyrone, Donegal, and Fermanagh with their cattle into waste districts, ‘leaving only such people behind as will dwell under the protection of the garrisons and forts,’ which were to be strengthened and multiplied. Sir Oliver St. John advised some garrisons and corporations, but relied rather upon making the Irish tenants of the Crown at high rents. The Irish, he said, were more used to esteem a landlord whom they knew than a king of whom they seldom heard. Make the King their landlord and they will turn to him, neglecting ‘their wonted tyrants whom naturally they love not.’ Salisbury had already turned his attention to the subject, and the Privy Council in England lost no time in expressing their general approval of Chichester’s plan.[57 - Fenton to Salisbury, September 9, 1607; Chichester to same, September 17; St. John to same, October 9; Salisbury to Chichester and Privy Council to same, September 27.]

Bacon on colonisation

Bacon’s attention was much drawn to Ireland at this critical time, and Chichester’s secretary, Henry Perse, kept him well informed. Davies wrote to him at length about the flight of the Earls, and he saw that the opportunity had come for making a fresh start. ‘I see manifestly,’ he told Davies, ‘the beginning of better or worse.’ It may therefore be assumed that he had some hand in the proceedings that followed. Both he and Chichester were naturally thinking of the scheme of American colonisation which had just so nearly failed, and were anxious that the mistakes made should not be repeated. ‘I had rather labour with my hands,’ said the Lord Deputy, ‘in the plantation of Ulster than dance or play in that of Virginia.’ The American enterprise, said the Lord Chancellor, ‘differs as much from this, as Amadis de Gaul differs from Cæsar’s Commentaries.’ Bacon warned the Government against sending over needy broken-down gentlemen as settlers. Men of capital were to be preferred, such as were fit to ‘purchase dry reversions after lives or years, or to put out money upon long returns.’ They might not go themselves, but they would send younger sons and cousins to advance them, while retaining the property ‘for the sweetness of the expectation of a great bargain in the end.’ He thought enough was not done to encourage the growth of towns and fortified posts, and yet the example of the Munster failure was ready to hand as to ‘the danger of any attempts of kernes and swordsmen.’ The wisdom of this advice was seen in 1641, when Londonderry alone stood out in all the planted counties. Bacon discouraged facilities for making under-tenancies, for the excluded natives would offer tempting rents and fines, the interest of the grantee waning when he parted with actual possession. Here also the advice was good. The undertakers took Irish tenants, in spite of the rules, because they could get no others, and these tenants turned against them when the day of trial came.[58 - Chichester to Salisbury, October 2, 1605; to the King, October 31, 1610. Bacon to Davies, October 23, 1607, in Spedding’s Life, iv. 5, and his ‘Considerations touching the plantation of Ireland, presented to the King’ on January 1, 1608-9, ib. pp. 123-125.]

Scots in Ulster. Bishop Montgomery

The Scottish element in the north of Ireland has played an important part in history. One of James’s first acts was to nominate Denis Campbell, who had long been Dean of Limerick, to the sees of Derry, Raphoe, and Clogher. Campbell died before consecration, and George Montgomery was appointed instead. Montgomery was of the family of Braidstane in Ayrshire, an offshoot of the House of Eglinton, who found his way to the English Court and made himself useful both to Cecil and to the King of Scots. His elder brother Hugh remained in Scotland and retailed the news to his own sovereign. George received the living of Chedzoy in Somerset, and the deanery of Norwich, and through life he showed a remarkable aptitude for holding several preferments together. Queen Elizabeth died, and the laird of Braidstane took part in the great Scotch invasion. Having lodged himself at Westminster, says the family historian, ‘he met at Court with the said George (his only then living brother), who had with long expectations waited for those happy days. They enjoyed one the other’s most loving companies, and meditating of bettering and advancing their peculiar stations. Foreseeing that Ireland must be the stage to act upon, it being unsettled, and many forfeited lands thereon altogether wasted, they concluded to push for fortunes in that kingdom.’ The laird accordingly devoted himself to acquiring an estate and a peerage in Down at the expense of the O’Neills, and the parson to enriching the Church and himself in other parts of Ulster.[59 - Hill’s Montgomery MSS., p. 19.]

A lady colonist

The idea that high Irish preferment involved corresponding duties seems to have been very imperfectly understood at this time. Mrs. Montgomery, writing from Chedzoy, informed her relations that the King had bestowed on her husband three Irish bishoprics, ‘the names of them I cannot remember, they are so strange, except one which is Derye.’ Fifteen months later, on the eve of their departure from London, she reported that the King had dismissed the Bishop with many gracious words. ‘I hope we shall not long stay in Ireland, but once he must needs go.’ They were met and escorted into Derry ‘by a gallant company of captains and aldermen,’ and found it a much nicer place than they expected. Their house was English built, small but very pretty and capable of enlargement if Sister Peggy and her husband would come over. There were several ladies and gentlemen ‘as bravely apparelled as in England. The most that we do mislike is that the Irish do often trouble our house, and many times they doth lend to us a louse, which makes me many times remember my daughter Jane, which told me that if I went into Ireland I should be full of lice.’ Excellent flax was to be bought at sixpence a pound, and thread at one shilling, the land was good, and the tenants were continually bringing in beeves and muttons. This lady, who thought only of a short visit, was destined to have some very disagreeable adventures and to remain in Ireland till her death, when her husband wrote of ‘the best gift I ever received, the greatest loss I ever had in this world.’[60 - Letters of Mrs. Susan Montgomery (née Stayning) in Part III. of Trevelyan Papers (Camden Society), May 20, 1605; August 21, 1606; October 8, 1606 (from Derry). Bishop Montgomery’s letter of February 16, 1614, ib.]

Episcopal property

A jury of Celtic experts

Montgomery was at once admitted by the King’s special order to the Irish Council, and events soon showed that he enjoyed a good share of royal favour. Chichester was directed to inquire by commission as to the state of ecclesiastical property in his three dioceses. The King’s letter set forth that Church lands had long been usurped by temporal lords, and until the legal tangle could be cleared no grants of Termon or abbey lands were to be made in Monaghan and Fermanagh. Davies, who at first accepted the Bishop’s claim without question, took enormous pains to understand the real nature of these Termon lands, and he seems to have come near the truth. Montgomery claimed that they were rightly the absolute property of the Church, while Tyrone and the other Irish chiefs maintained that only rents were payable, the tribal ownership with fixity of tenure belonging to the Erenachs, who had for ages been in actual possession. Thus old Miler Magrath, who had jobbed Church property so shamelessly, held Termon-Magrath, which included St. Patrick Purgatory, in succession to his father. Davies felt that his law was at fault, and after long controversies hit upon the plan of swearing in a jury of clerks or scholars to find the facts, ‘who gave them more light than ever they had before touching the original and estate of Erenachs and Termon lands.’ Of these fifteen jurors thirteen spoke Latin fluently. Their verdict was hostile to Montgomery, who contended that the Termons were episcopal demesne lands; but James, on his principle of ‘no bishop, no king,’ having asserted his claim to the forfeited property, made it all over to the Church. This was after the flight of Tyrone, but Montgomery’s proceedings may have been one cause of it. He claimed that his patent gave him everything that he or his predecessors had enjoyed, but others were for construing it strictly, and there were many suits against him upon colour of terming divers parcels of his inheritance to be monasteries, friaries, and of abbey land, and the Bishops of Clogher and Derry, where their predecessors had only chief rent, would now have the land itself. And he besought the King to stop such mean courses and make them rest content with what their predecessors had enjoyed for many years.[61 - The King to Chichester, May 2, 1606; Bishop Montgomery to Salisbury, July 1, 1607; Chichester to Salisbury, January 26, 1607; Tyrone’s petition calendared at 1606 No. 89 with the references there; Davies to Salisbury, August 28, 1609; Todd’s St. Patrick, p. 160. The speculations of Ussher and Ware on this subject are obsolete.]

Church and Crown