Ireland under the Stuarts and During the Interregnum, Vol. 2 (of 3), 1642-1660Bagwell, Richard
History
Ireland under the Stuarts and During the Interregnum, Vol. 2 (of 3), 1642-1660
Bagwell, Richard
Ireland -- History -- 17th century
according to Nicholas, was 'a great babbler of all his most secret
employments,' but it all led to nothing. Leyburn, however, persuaded
Clanricarde not to leave Ireland, which he had made up his mind to
do. In the end the best he could do for Digby was to procure him a
safe-conduct through the Confederate quarters, and he escaped to France
with some difficulty. At his earnest request Leyburn himself remained
in Ireland, and was sheltered by Clanricarde at Galway from August 1647
until the following March. In November he received a letter of recall
from the Queen dated three months back, and in February another from
Digby to the like effect. He sailed in the same ship with Glamorgan and
his wife, who had now become Lord and Lady Worcester, and reached Havre
in five days.[107]
[Sidenote: Leyburn's opinions.]
[Sidenote: Effect of the cessation.]
Leyburn, who was a very honest as well as intelligent man, favoured the
peace of 1646. The demand for a Catholic governor, he says, was one
which the King could not grant, and the objection to Ormonde's religion
was therefore invalid. He thought the divisions of Irish parties made
effective action hopeless, and that the hatred of the Leinster men to
O'Neill and the old Irish 'overbalanced their reason.' The cause of
the rebellion and of its savage character was that the 'Irish had not
enjoyed such a pleasant bondage under the English, but that they had
contracted ill will enough against their masters ... they ran hastily
and furiously to all kind of bloody executions, and as their rebellion
was without order so were their actions without measure, none that
was called English and was within reach escaping their fury ... they
either killed the English or forced them to forsake their habitations.'
The men of the Pale joined in because they had no arms, and were not
trusted by the Government. The massacres had been amply revenged
with much cruelty, the one committed 'by a rude, headless multitude,
the other by soldiers under order and command.' Insurgent slaves, he
says, seldom make good soldiers, and the Irish were always beaten
until Charles drew away to England the army which had been 'with his
consent employed against them by the Parliament,' which is perhaps the
strongest argument against the cessation of 1643.
[Sidenote: Ormonde's reasons for surrender.]
[Sidenote: Ormonde leaves Ireland.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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