Ireland (10 page)

On the day after Anne’s execution, Henry married Jane Seymour and they had a son, Edward. Shortly afterwards, Jane died. But despite now having an heir, Henry married three more times. He had six wives in all. You might think that he enjoyed weddings, but in fact he had become a cruel, heartless man like his father. He had two of his wives beheaded, as well as many of his best friends and advisers.

Henry, like most kings, needed a great deal of money to run his palaces and to rule the country. To raise money, he taxed the people, but still did not have enough. He was still angry with the Pope and came up with an idea of how he could have revenge on the Pope and raise the money he badly needed. He decided to close the Catholic churches, monasteries and convents in England and Ireland, and seize all their valuables and land. There were over 500 monasteries and convents in Ireland, although they were not immediately affected by Henry’s decision. But over the next 100 years most were closed down or destroyed. This was a terrible blow to the people because the monasteries and convents provided education, and were also hospitals and refuges for the poor. Without their charity and medical aid, the poor suffered greatly.

There were many in England who were unhappy with Henry’s actions and opposed him. Meanwhile, the Irish ignored him as his actions still did not affect them. But there were many who believed that the Catholic Church was corrupt, and they supported Henry. The people who protested against the corruption became known as Protestants, a word that originated in Germany. There, in 1517, a man named Martin Luther began to preach against the corruption in the church, which he claimed needed reforming. Luther’s campaign became known as the Reformation. In 1529, German princes who supported Luther published a ‘protest’ against their Catholic Emperor. From this ‘protest’ we get the word Protestant.

This Reformation, which was sweeping Europe, affected the church in England. Henry’s quarrel with the Pope, and his declaring himself head of the Church in England, helped the Reformation make the English Church Protestant. Catholics were now persecuted, and those who refused to recognise Henry as head of the Church were imprisoned or executed, and their property and lands seized.

Again, this had little effect in Ireland, except for those English settlers who lived in the Pale. Outside this area, conflicts continued between the Irish clans and those settlers who had taken their land. The king, who lived in England, could do little about this. He relied on his Viceroy, his representative in Ireland, to rule the country in his name. At this time, Gearóid Óg Fitzgerald, of the Norman family of Kildare, was the Viceroy. Gearóid Óg ruled the country to his own advantage and King Henry was so displeased with him that he had him imprisoned in the Tower of London.

Gearóid Óg had a son, who was known as Silken Thomas because he dressed in fine clothes and wore silk fringes on his jackets. When he heard a rumour, which proved to be false, that his father had been executed by Henry, he rebelled.

Henry was furious and sent an army to Ireland under the command of Sir William Skeffington. He brought artillery to Ireland for the first time and easily took the Fitzgerald castle at Maynooth. On capturing it, he had all the defenders executed. This action terrified the Irish and the Normans. It made them realise that they could not defeat such a powerful army. Fearing for their lives and their lands, many of them submitted to Henry and also recognised him as the head of the Church in Ireland.

Silken Thomas was eventually captured and taken to England with five of his uncles. All six were charged with treason and beheaded in 1537 in the Tower of London, where Gearóid Óg had already died a prisoner in 1534.

At this time, the English king still only regarded himself as Lord of Ireland. But in 1642, Henry declared himself to be the king of Ireland, thus cementing the link between the two countries. From then on, only English-born men could hold the post of Viceroy, or other important government positions. A permanent English army was also stationed in Ireland to deal with any further rebellions that might arise.

Henry declared that all Irish land belonged to the king. He then granted the land back to the owners so that they were under obligation to him, and gave them new titles. The chief of the O’Neills, who in the Gaelic tradition was known as ‘The O’Neill’, now became Earl of Tyrone in the English tradition. Henry rewarded those Englishmen who had supported him by granting them lands taken from the rebels. This began the policy that became known as plantation, and which later English monarchs ruthlessly pursued. It led to great hardship and turmoil for the Irish people. It signalled the beginning of the end of 2,000 years of the old Gaelic way of life, and was to be responsible for much bloodshed and slaughter in the coming centuries.

H
enry VIII died in 1547 leaving three children: Mary, Elizabeth and Edward, who was the youngest of the three. Though only nine years old, as Henry’s only son, he succeeded to the throne. He was a quiet, gentle boy, who loved books, but he was also sickly and died aged fifteen in 1553. Before he died, English noblemen who wanted power for themselves forced him to make a will naming a young girl, Lady Jane Grey, as queen. She was also the queen of Ireland, but it is almost certain that the Irish didn’t even know this, nor cared all that much.

Lady Jane was the great-granddaughter of Henry VII, but she was not the heir to the throne. She was Edward’s cousin and had loved him dearly. At just sixteen years of age, Lady Jane was like any young girl and wanted to be having fun with her friends, and did not wish to be queen. But she was forced to agree. She reigned for just nine days before she was deposed by other noblemen who supported Henry’s daughter, Mary, who was the rightful heir. Though she was the Queen of England and Ireland, poor Lady Jane Gray was arrested and imprisoned in the Tower.

Mary was a Catholic, but she was a wicked woman and immediately set about punishing Protestants. During her reign many Protestant in England were burned at the stake. When some noblemen plotted against her, she blamed the innocent Lady Jane Grey. Lady Jane, along with her husband, father and her brother were beheaded. She was then just seventeen years old and it was an evil thing for the queen to do. With all the bloodshed she was responsible for, Queen Mary earned herself the appropriate nickname ‘Bloody Mary’.

She was also a stubborn woman who wanted her own way. Much against the wishes of the English people she married Philip II of Spain. Spain was a Catholic country and England’s sworn enemy. At this time the Spanish were persecuting anyone they suspected of not being a true Catholic. These people were known as heretics and thousands of them were burned at the stake.

Because Mary was Catholic, the Irish people thought that she would be kind to them. But she was not. When fighting arose between the Irish clans in the counties of Offaly and Laois and the English living in the Pale, Mary’s army drove out the Irish and took their land. She then gave it to English settlers, continuing the policy of plantation begun by her father and which would continue long after her death. She renamed Laois ‘Queen’s County’ in honour of herself, and renamed Offaly ‘King’s County’ in honour of her husband, Philip.

The dispossessed Irish families tried to win back their lands, but they were betrayed and many of them were murdered. The remaining members either fled into the woods and bogs and continued to fight, or fled westward to Kerry. In the coming years, tens of thousands of Irish people who were driven from their lands would also flee to the west of Ireland.

‘Bloody Mary’ died in 1558 and her half-sister, Elizabeth, became queen of England and Ireland. Elizabeth was the daughter of Anne Boleyn, and was a staunch Protestant. She had been imprisoned by ‘Bloody Mary’, who feared that Elizabeth might try to seize her crown.

When Elizabeth came to the throne she was determined to suppress any Irish rebellion that might break out and intended to continue the policy of plantation. The Irish who rebelled would have their lands taken and given to loyal Protestant English and Scottish settlers. The Viceroys, who had been Englishmen since the time of ‘Silken Thomas’, enforced English laws in Ireland with extreme brutality. This brutality even extended to the Norman families. They were also Catholics, and were seen as enemies of the queen, who was now head of the Protestant Church in England and Ireland.

Most of the Irish clans were frightened of rebelling, aware that if they did so their lands would be seized. But one man, Shane O’Neill, did rebel. His father was the Earl of Tyrone and following his death Shane became head of the clan. But he refused to accept the title of Earl, and still called himself ‘The O’Neill’ in the old tradition. He proclaimed that Ulster belonged to his family and that he would make it his. Because of his boasts, he was known as ‘Shane the Proud’.

In 1562 he rebelled and attacked the MacDonnells of Antrim, who were old enemies, and defeated them at Glenshesk. The English tried to poison him and when that failed, they persuaded the O’Donnells of Donegal to attack him. The two armies met near Letterkenny and in the ensuing battle Shane was defeated. Foolishly, he fled to the MacDonnells seeking their help. Though they pretended to welcome him, they were still bitter at their defeat at Glenshesk and murdered Shane. They pickled his head to preserve it and sent it to Dublin Castle where it was stuck on a spike at the entrance, a dire warning to anyone else who might be considering rebellion.

Despite this grim warning, a rebellion broke out in Munster. Some of the finest land in Ireland was in the province, and many Englishmen wished to possess it. One of the most important families in Munster was the Fitzgeralds. They were Normans and known as the Geraldines. They bitterly resented the English queen being head of the Irish Church, and were also angered by English interference in Munster, which was intended to make them rebel. At first they resisted rebellion, fearful of losing their land. But eventually they were forced to rebel.

The rebellion was just what the English had been waiting for. They invaded Munster and laid waste to the province. There was fearful slaughter, both of people and animals. It has been claimed that from Limerick to Kerry not a single cow could be heard lowing. Those people who survived the slaughter fled into the bogs and woods where most died of starvation and disease.

The Irish sought help from Spain, which was England’s enemy. A small Spanish force of about 800 landed at Smerwick, near Dingle in County Kerry. The English soldiers surrounded them in the fort of Dún an Óir and, outnumbered, the Spanish surrendered. They were shown no mercy and all of them were brutally slaughtered. When the rebellion was over, the best land in Munster was confiscated and given to English settlers, a policy which would be pursued with utter ruthlessness in the years to come. Among those who were given land were the seafarer Sir Walter Raleigh, and the poet Edmund Spenser, who wrote
The Faerie Queen.

The Irish still hoped that help might come from Spain, which was still a strong Catholic country. You remember that Philip II, king of Spain had married ‘Bloody Mary’. After her death, he wished to marry Elizabeth, but she refused him. Bitterly angry at this, and because England was one of Spain’s greatest enemies, he decided to invade the country. In 1588 a great Spanish force of about 130 warships, known as the Spanish Armada, set out from Spain bound for England. The English, who had always hated and feared the Spanish, and who now hated them even more because they were still Catholics, were ready and waiting. The Irish, however, wanted a Spanish victory, hoping that the Catholic King Philip II would look kindly on Ireland.

One of the greatest English seamen of that time was Sir Francis Drake. In 1587 he had attacked the Spanish fleet at Cadiz and burned around forty ships. He said afterwards that he had ‘singed the king of Spain’s beard’. Drake was playing bowls when the Spanish fleet was sighted off the English coast. The huge armada of around 130 ships would surely have terrified most men, but Drake was a brave man. He finished his game of bowls before he and his navy sailed out to meet the enemy.

A great battle raged for almost a week. Hugh cannons boomed and the air was thick with smoke and the noise of battle and the screams and shouts of the sailors. The English ships, though smaller, were an equal match for the enemy’s larger, gilded vessels. English ships, known as ‘hellburners’, sailed in among the Spanish vessels. These ‘hellburners’ were first filled with gunpowder and then set on fire. In those times ships were built of timber and the ‘hellburners’ set fire to many enemy vessels.

Before the outcome of the battle was decided, a great storm blew up. The English took shelter along their coastline. The Spanish, however, could not use the English coast for shelter, and were helplessly driven along by the storm. Many ships were wrecked on the rocks while others foundered. Some ships were driven all the way to Ireland and wrecked along the west coast. With the loss of the Armada, Ireland now seemed without hope.

The only part which had not been completely subdued was Ulster, and there was a man there who still believed that he could defeat the English. He was Hugh O’Neill, and he had succeeded Shane O’Neill as head of the O’Neills of Tyrone. Hugh was educated in England and had attended Elizabeth’s court. She was very fond of him, and had appointed him Earl of Tyrone in 1585. But despite this, O’Neill saw himself as a proud Irishman. His family had once been the most powerful family in Ireland. He felt that his land and title were his by right, and not a right to be granted him by an English queen.

In 1590, Hugh Roe MacMahon, Lord of Monaghan, raided the lands of an English settler, the Earl of Essex. An English army marched against Hugh Roe, who was captured and hanged. His lands were then confiscated and divided up between local families loyal to the English. The lands of both east and west Breifne were also confiscated and given to loyal families. After this, the English tried to seize the lands of the Maguires of Fermanagh, who rose in rebellion.