Irish Confederate Wars

The Irish Confederate Wars also sometimes called the Eleven Years War was fought in Ireland between 1641 and 1653. The Wars were the Irish theatre of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms - a series of civil wars in Kingdoms of Ireland, England and Scotland (all ruled by Charles I of England) that also included the English Civil War and Scottish Civil War. The conflict in Ireland essentially pitted the native Irish Roman Catholics against the Protestant British settlers and their supporters in England and Scotland.

The Confederates ruled Ireland as a de facto sovereign state until 1649, outwardly remainingly loyal to Charles I. It was the only such assembly to occur in Ireland until 1919 when the Irish Dáil first sat. From 1641to 1649, the Confederates fought with Scottish Covenanter and English Parliamentarian armies in Ireland. They were loosley allied with the English Royalists, but were divided over whether to send military help to them in the English Civil War. Ultimately, they never sent troops to England, but did send an expedition to help the Scottish Royalists, sparking the Scottish Civil War. The wars ended in the defeat of the Confederates. They and their Royalist allies were crushed during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland by the New Model Army under Oliver Cromwell in 1649-53. The wars caused massive loss of life in Ireland, comparable in the country's history only with the Great Famine of the 1840s and also saw the mass confiscation of land owned by Irish Catholics.

Military history

For the political context of this conflict, see Confederate Ireland. This article is concerned with the military history of Ireland from 1641-53.

The Plot - October 1641
See also Irish Rebellion of 1641

Dublin Castle, the centre of British rule in Ireland. It was supposed to be taken in the first hours of the rebellion, but the plot was discovered and the attack called off.The Irish Rebellion of 1641 was intended to be a swift and mainly bloodless seizure of power in Ireland by a small group of conspirators led by Phelim O’Neill. Small bands of the plotter’s kin and dependants were mobilised in Dublin, Wicklow and Ulster, to take strategic buildings like Dublin Castle. Since there were only a small number of English soldiers stationed in Ireland, this had a reasonable chance of succeeding. Had it done so, the remaining English garrisons could well have surrendered, leaving Irish Catholics in a position of strength to negotiate their demands for civil reform, religious toleration and Irish self-government. However, the plot was betrayed at the last minute and as a result, the rebellion degenerated into anarchic violence. Following the outbreak of hostilities, the festering hatred of the native Irish Catholic population for the British Protestant settlers exploded into violence.

The Rebellion - 1641-1642

From 1641 to early 1642, the fighting in Ireland was characterised by small bands, raised by local lords or among local people, attacking civilians of opposing ethnic and religious groups. At first, Irish Catholic bands, particularly from Ulster, took the opportunity given them by the collapse of law and order to settle scores with Protestant settlers who had occupied Irish land in the plantations of Ireland. Initially, the Irish Catholic gentry raised militia forces to try and contain the violence, but afterwards, when it was clear that the government in Dublin intended to punish all Catholics for the rebellion, participated in the attacks on Protestants and fought English troops sent to put down the rebellion. In areas where British settlers were concentrated, around Cork, Dublin, Carrickfergus and Derry, they raised their own militia in self-defence and managed to hold off the rebel forces. All sides displayed extreme cruelty in this phase of the war. Around 4000 Protestants were massacred and a further 12,000 may have died of privation after being driven from their homes. In one notorious incident, the Protestant inhabitants of Portadown were taken captive and then massacred on the bridge in the town. The settlers responded in kind, as did the Government in Dublin, with attacks on the Irish civilian population. Massacres of Catholic civilians occurred at Kilwarlin woods, Rathlin island and elsewhere. In addition, the English Parliament passed an Ordinance of No Quarter against the Irish rebels, meaning that prisoners were to be killed when taken. The rebels from Ulster defeated a government force at Julianstown, but failed to take nearby Drogheda and were scattered when they advanced on Dublin.

By early 1642, there were four main concentrations of rebel forces; in Ulster under Phelim O'Neill, in the Pale around Dublin led by Viscount Gormanstown, in the south east, led by the Butler family - in particular Lord Mountgarret and in the south west, led by Donagh MacCarthy, Viscount Muskerry.

The Confederate’s war - 1642-48
See also Confederate Ireland

Kilkenny Castle, where the Confederate General Assembly met.King Charles I sent a large army to Ireland in 1642 to put down the rebellion, as did the Scottish Covenanters. These armies quickly drove the Irish out Ulster and from around Dublin. In self-defence, Irish Catholics formed their own government, the Catholic Confederation, with its capital at Kilkenny and raised their own armies. The Confederates also held important port towns at Waterford and Wexford, through which they could receive aid from Catholic powers in Europe. Almost all Irish Catholics joined the Confederation, with the odd exception like the Earl of Clanricarde, who stayed neutral. They had available to them only the militias and lord’s private levies, commanded by aristocratic amateurs like Lord Mountgarret. These were defeated in a series of encounters with English troops at Liscarroll, Kilrush and New Ross.

However, they were saved from defeat by the outbreak of the English Civil War. Most of the English troops in Ireland were recalled to fight on the Royalist side in the civil war. The Irish Confederates mopped up the remaining garrisons within their territory, leaving only Ulster, Dublin and Cork in Scottish and English hands. Garret Barry, a returned Irish mercenary soldier, took Limerick in 1642, while the townspeople of Galway forced the surrender of the English garrison there in 1643. The remaining British forces were disunited bu the events in England. The garrison of Cork, commanded by Murrough O'Brien, Earl Inchiquinn, sided with the English Parliament, as did the Protestant settler army around Derry, whereas the troops on Ireland’s east coast, commanded by Earl of Ormonde, sided with the King. The Scottish Covenanter army, based around Carrickfergus, pursued the agenda of the Edinburgh based Scottish government, allied with the English Parliament up to 1647.

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