Desmond Rebellions
Encyclopedia
The Desmond Rebellions occurred in 1569-1573 and 1579-1583 in the Irish province of Munster
.
They were rebellions by the Earl of Desmond
– head of the FitzGerald dynasty in Munster – and his followers, the Geraldines and their allies against the threat of the extension of Elizabethan
English government over the province. The rebellions were motivated primarily by the desire to maintain the independence of feudal lords from their monarch, but also had an element of religious antagonism between Catholic Geraldines and the Protestant
English state. The result was the destruction of the Desmond dynasty and the subsequent plantation
or colonisation
of Munster with English
settlers. 'Desmond' is the Anglicisation
given to the Irish
Deasmumhain, which translates to 'South Munster'.
(the provinces of Munster
and southern Leinster
) was dominated, as it had been for over two centuries, by the Old English
Butlers
of Ormonde and the FitzGeralds of Desmond, who maintained feudal principalities. Both houses raised their own armed forces and imposed their own law, a mixture of Irish and English customs independent of the English government of Ireland. Beginning in the 1530s, successive English administrations in Ireland tried to expand English control over the entire island (See Tudor conquest of Ireland). By the 1560s, their attention had turned to the south of Ireland and Henry Sidney
, as Lord Deputy of Ireland
, was charged with establishing the authority of the English government over the independent lordships there. His solution was the formation of "lord presidencies"—provincial military governors who would replace the local lords as military powers and keepers of the peace.
The local dynasties saw the presidencies as intrusions into their sphere of influence, and into their traditional violent competition with each other. This had seen the Butlers and FitzGeralds fight a pitched battle against each other at Affane
in County Waterford
in 1565. This was a blatant defiance of the Elizabethan state's law. Elizabeth I
summoned the heads of both houses to London
to explain their actions. However, the treatment of the dynasties was not even handed. Thomas Butler, 3rd Earl of Ormonde
— who was the Queen's cousin — was pardoned, while both Gerald FitzGerald, 14th Earl of Desmond (in 1567) and his brother, John of Desmond, widely regarded as the real military leader of the FitzGeralds, (in 1568) were arrested and detained in the Tower of London
on Ormonde’s urging.
This decapitated the natural leadership of the Munster Geraldines and left the Desmond Earldom in the hands of a soldier, James Fitzmaurice FitzGerald, the "captain general" of the Desmond military. Fitzmaurice had little stake in a new de-militarised order in Munster, which envisaged the abolition of the Irish lords’ private armies. A factor that drew wider support for Fitzmaurice was the prospect of land confiscations, which had been mooted by Sidney and Peter Carew
, an English claimant to lands granted to an ancestor just after the Norman conquest of Ireland that were lost soon afterwards.
This ensured Fitzmaurice the support of important clans, notably MacCarthy Mor, O'Sullivan Beare and O'Keefe and two prominent Butlers –brothers of the Earl. Fitzmaurice himself had lost the land he had held at Kerricurrihy in County Cork
, which had been leased instead to English colonists. He was also a devout Catholic, influenced by the counter-reformation
, which made him see the Protestant Elizabethan governors as his enemies. To discourage Sidney from going ahead with the Lord Presidency for Munster and to re-establish Desmond primacy over the Butlers, he planned a rebellion against the English presence in the south and against the Earl of Ormonde. Fitzmaurice however had wider aims than simply the recovery of FitzGerald supremacy within the context of the English Kingdom of Ireland
. Before the rebellion, he secretly sent Maurice MacGibbon, Catholic Archbishop of Cashel
, to seek military aid from Philip II of Spain
.
city in June 1569 before attacking Cork itself and those native lords who refused to join the rebellion. Fitzmaurice’s force of up to 4,500 men went on to besiege Kilkenny
, seat of the Earls of Ormonde in July. In response, Sidney mobilised 600 English troops, who marched south from Dublin and another 400 troops landed by sea in Cork. Thomas Butler, Earl of Ormonde returned from London
, where he had been at court, brought the rebel Butlers out of the rebellion and mobilised Gaelic Irish clans antagonistic to the Geraldines. Together, Ormonde, Sidney and Humphrey Gilbert
, appointed as governor of Munster, began devastating the lands of Fitzmaurice's allies. Fitzmaurice's forces broke up, as individual lords had to retire to defend their own territories. Gilbert in particular was notorious for the terror tactics he employed, killing civilians at random and setting up a corridor of severed heads at the entrance to his camps.
Sidney forced Fitzmaurice into the mountains of Kerry
, from where he launched hit and run attacks on the English and their allies. By 1570, most of Fitzmaurice's allies had submitted to Sidney. The most important, Donal MacCarthy Mor surrendered in November 1569. Nevertheless, the guerrilla campaign dragged on for three more years. In February 1571, John Perrot
was made Lord President of Munster
, pursuing Fitzmaurice with 700 troops for over a year without success. Fitzmaurice had some victories, capturing an English ship near Kinsale
and burning the town of Kilmallock
in 1571, for example, but by early 1573, his force was reduced to less than 100 men. Fitzmaurice finally submitted on February 23, 1573, having negotiated a pardon for his life. However in 1574, he again became landless and in 1575 he sailed to France to seek help from the Catholic powers to start another rebellion.
Gerald FitzGerald, Earl of Desmond, and his brother John were released from prison to stabilise the situation and to reconstruct their shattered territory. Under a new settlement imposed after the rebellion, known as "composition", the Desmond’s military forces were limited by law to just 20 horsmen and their tenants made to pay rent to them rather supply military service or to quarter their soldiers. Perhaps the biggest winner of the first Desmond Rebellion was the Earl of Ormonde, who established himself as loyal to the English Crown and as the most powerful lord in the south of Ireland.
Although all of the local chiefs had submitted by the end of the rebellion, the methods used to suppress it provoked lingering resentment, especially among the Irish mercenaries; gall oglaigh or "gallowglass
" as the English termed them, who had rallied to Fitzmaurice. William Drury, the new Lord President of Munster from 1576, executed around 700 of them in the years after the rebellion. Furthermore the aftermath of the rebellion, Gaelic
customs such as Brehon Laws
, Irish dress, bardic poetry and the maintaining of private armies were again outlawed – things that were highly provocative to traditional Irish society. Fitzmaurice, by contrast, had deliberately emphasised the Gaelic character of the rebellion, wearing the Irish dress, speaking only Irish and referring to himself as the captain (taoiseach) of the Geraldines. Finally, Irish landowners continued to be threatened by the arrival of English colonists. All of these factors meant that, when Fitzmaurice returned from continental Europe to start a new rebellion, there were plenty of discontented people in Munster waiting to join him.
In late 1569 a similar Catholic rebellion, the "Northern Rebellion," broke out in England
, but was quickly crushed. This and the Desmond Rebellion caused the Pope to issue "Regnans in Excelsis
", excommunciating Elizabeth, in early 1570. Thereafter, Elizabeth's previous acceptance of Roman Catholic worship in private turned into a more active suppression of organised Catholic services.
launched an invasion of Munster in 1579. During his exile in Europe, he had reinvented himself as a soldier of the counter-reformation
, arguing that since the Pope
's excommunication of Elizabeth I in 1570 Irish Catholics no longer owed loyalty to a heretic monarch. The Pope granted Fitzmaurice an "indulgence
" and supplied him with troops and money. Fitzmaurice landed at Smerwick, near Dingle
(modern County Kerry
) on July 18, 1579 with a small force of Spanish
and Italian
troops. He was joined in rebellion on August 1 by John of Desmond, a brother of the Earl, who had a large following among his kinsmen and the disaffected swordsmen of Munster. Other Gaelic clans and Old English families also joined in the rebellion. After Fitzmaurice was killed in a skirmish with the Clanwilliam Burkes on August 18, John FitzGerald assumed leadership of the rebellion.
Gerald, the Earl of Desmond, initially resisted the call of the rebels and tried to remain neutral but gave in once the authorities had proclaimed him a traitor. The Earl joined the rebellion by sacking the towns of Youghal
(on November 13) and Kinsale
, and devastated the country of the English and their allies. However, by the summer of 1580, English troops under William Pelham
and locally raised Irish forces under the Earl of Ormonde succeeded in bringing the rebellion under control, re-taking the south coast, destroying the lands of the Desmonds and their allies in the process, and killing their tenants. By capturing Carrigafoyle
at Easter
1580, the principal Desmond castle at the mouth of Shannon
river, they cut off the Geraldine forces from the rest of the country and prevented a landing of foreign troops into the main Munster ports. It looked as if the rebellion was fizzling out.
However, in July 1580, the rebellion spread to Leinster
, under the leadership of Gaelic Irish chieftain Fiach MacHugh O'Byrne and the Pale
lord Viscount Baltinglass
, both motivated by Catholicism and hostility to the English administration. A large English force under the Lord Deputy of Ireland
Earl Grey de Wilton
were sent to subdue them, only to be ambushed and massacred at the battle of Glenmalure
on August 25, losing over 800 dead. However, the Leinster rebels were unable to capitalise on their victory or to effectively coordinate their strategy with the Munster insurgents.
On September 10, 1580, 600 Papal troops landed at Smerwick in Kerry to support the rebellion, but were besieged in a fort at Dún an Óir. They surrendered after two days of bombardment and were then massacred. By relentless scorched-earth tactics, the English broke the momentum of the rebellion by mid 1581. By May 1581, most of the minor rebels and FitzGerald allies in Munster and Leinster had accepted Elizabeth I's offer of a general pardon. John of Desmond, in many ways the main leader of the rebellion, was killed north of Cork
in early 1582.
For the Geraldine Earl however there could be no second pardon, and he was pursued by crown forces until the end. From 1581 to 1583, the war dragged on, with his supporters evading capture in the mountains of Kerry
. The rebellion was finally ended on 2 November 1583 when the earl was hunted down and killed near Tralee in Kerry by the local clan O'Moriarty. The clan chief, Maurice, received 1000 pounds of silver from the English government for Desmond's head, which was sent to Queen Elizabeth. His body was triumphantly displayed on the walls of Cork.
hit Munster. In April 1582, the provost marshal of Munster, Sir Warham St Leger, estimated that 30,000 people had died of famine in the previous six months. Plague broke out in Cork city
, where the country people fled to avoid the fighting. People continued to die of famine and plague long after the war had ended, and it is estimated that by 1589 one third of the province's population had died. Grey was recalled by Elizabeth I
for his excessive brutality. Two famous accounts tell us of the devastation of Munster after the Desmond rebellion. The first is from the Gaelic Annals of the Four Masters
:
The second is from the View of the Present State of Ireland, written by English poet Edmund Spenser
, who fought in the campaign:
The wars of the 1570s and 1580s marked a watershed in Ireland. Although English control over the country was still far from total, the southern Geraldine axis of power had been annihilated, and Munster was "planted" with English colonists following the parliamentary arrangements of 1585. Following a survey begun in 1584 by Sir Valentine Browne, Knight
, Surveyor General
of Ireland, the thousands of English soldiers and administrators who had been imported to deal with the rebellion were allocated land in the Munster Plantation
of Desmond's confiscated estates. The Elizabethan conquest of Ireland was completed after the subsequent Nine Years War in Ulster
and the extension of plantation policy to other parts of the country.
Munster
Munster is one of the Provinces of Ireland situated in the south of Ireland. In Ancient Ireland, it was one of the fifths ruled by a "king of over-kings" . Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the ancient kingdoms were shired into a number of counties for administrative and judicial purposes...
.
They were rebellions by the Earl of Desmond
Earl of Desmond
The title of Earl of Desmond has been held historically by lords in Ireland, first as a title outside of the peerage system and later as part of the Peerage of Ireland....
– head of the FitzGerald dynasty in Munster – and his followers, the Geraldines and their allies against the threat of the extension of Elizabethan
Elizabethan era
The Elizabethan era was the epoch in English history of Queen Elizabeth I's reign . Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history...
English government over the province. The rebellions were motivated primarily by the desire to maintain the independence of feudal lords from their monarch, but also had an element of religious antagonism between Catholic Geraldines and the Protestant
Protestantism
Protestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...
English state. The result was the destruction of the Desmond dynasty and the subsequent plantation
Plantations of Ireland
Plantations in 16th and 17th century Ireland were the confiscation of land by the English crown and the colonisation of this land with settlers from England and the Scottish Lowlands....
or colonisation
Colonisation
Colonization occurs whenever any one or more species populate an area. The term, which is derived from the Latin colere, "to inhabit, cultivate, frequent, practice, tend, guard, respect", originally related to humans. However, 19th century biogeographers dominated the term to describe the...
of Munster with English
English people
The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...
settlers. 'Desmond' is the Anglicisation
Anglicisation
Anglicisation, or anglicization , is the process of converting verbal or written elements of any other language into a form that is more comprehensible to an English speaker, or, more generally, of altering something such that it becomes English in form or character.The term most often refers to...
given to the Irish
Irish language
Irish , also known as Irish Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family, originating in Ireland and historically spoken by the Irish people. Irish is now spoken as a first language by a minority of Irish people, as well as being a second language of a larger proportion of...
Deasmumhain, which translates to 'South Munster'.
Causes
The south of IrelandIreland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
(the provinces of Munster
Munster
Munster is one of the Provinces of Ireland situated in the south of Ireland. In Ancient Ireland, it was one of the fifths ruled by a "king of over-kings" . Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the ancient kingdoms were shired into a number of counties for administrative and judicial purposes...
and southern Leinster
Leinster
Leinster is one of the Provinces of Ireland situated in the east of Ireland. It comprises the ancient Kingdoms of Mide, Osraige and Leinster. Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the historic fifths of Leinster and Mide gradually merged, mainly due to the impact of the Pale, which straddled...
) was dominated, as it had been for over two centuries, by the Old English
Old English (Ireland)
The Old English were the descendants of the settlers who came to Ireland from Wales, Normandy, and England after the Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169–71. Many of the Old English became assimilated into Irish society over the centuries...
Butlers
Butler dynasty
Butler dynasty refers to the several branches of the Butler family that has its origins in the Cambro-Norman family that participated in the Norman invasion of Ireland in the 12th century. Variant spellings include le Boteler and le Botiller. The surname has its origins in the hereditary office of...
of Ormonde and the FitzGeralds of Desmond, who maintained feudal principalities. Both houses raised their own armed forces and imposed their own law, a mixture of Irish and English customs independent of the English government of Ireland. Beginning in the 1530s, successive English administrations in Ireland tried to expand English control over the entire island (See Tudor conquest of Ireland). By the 1560s, their attention had turned to the south of Ireland and Henry Sidney
Henry Sidney
Sir Henry Sidney , Lord Deputy of Ireland was the eldest son of Sir William Sidney of Penshurst, a prominent politician and courtier during the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI, from both of whom he received extensive grants of land, including the manor of Penshurst in Kent, which became the...
, as Lord Deputy of Ireland
Lord Deputy of Ireland
The Lord Deputy was the King's representative and head of the Irish executive under English rule, during the Lordship of Ireland and later the Kingdom of Ireland...
, was charged with establishing the authority of the English government over the independent lordships there. His solution was the formation of "lord presidencies"—provincial military governors who would replace the local lords as military powers and keepers of the peace.
The local dynasties saw the presidencies as intrusions into their sphere of influence, and into their traditional violent competition with each other. This had seen the Butlers and FitzGeralds fight a pitched battle against each other at Affane
Battle of Affane
The Battle of Affane was fought in county Waterford, in south-eastern Ireland, in 1565, between the forces of the Fitzgerald Earl of Desmond and the Butler Earl of Ormond. The battle ended in the rout of the Desmond forces...
in County Waterford
County Waterford
*Abbeyside, Affane, Aglish, Annestown, An Rinn, Ardmore*Ballinacourty, Ballinameela, Ballinamult, Ballinroad, Ballybeg, Ballybricken, Ballyduff Lower, Ballyduff Upper, Ballydurn, Ballygunner, Ballylaneen, Ballymacarbry, Ballymacart, Ballynaneashagh, Ballysaggart, Ballytruckle, Bilberry, Bunmahon,...
in 1565. This was a blatant defiance of the Elizabethan state's law. Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...
summoned the heads of both houses to London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
to explain their actions. However, the treatment of the dynasties was not even handed. Thomas Butler, 3rd Earl of Ormonde
Thomas Butler, 3rd Earl of Ormonde
Thomas Butler, 10th Earl of Ormonde and 3rd Earl of Ossory, Viscount Thurles , was an Irish peer and the son of James Butler, 9th Earl of Ormond and Lady Joan Fitzgerald daughter and heiress-general of James FitzGerald, 10th Earl of Desmond...
— who was the Queen's cousin — was pardoned, while both Gerald FitzGerald, 14th Earl of Desmond (in 1567) and his brother, John of Desmond, widely regarded as the real military leader of the FitzGeralds, (in 1568) were arrested and detained in the Tower of London
Tower of London
Her Majesty's Royal Palace and Fortress, more commonly known as the Tower of London, is a historic castle on the north bank of the River Thames in central London, England. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the eastern edge of the City of London by the open space...
on Ormonde’s urging.
This decapitated the natural leadership of the Munster Geraldines and left the Desmond Earldom in the hands of a soldier, James Fitzmaurice FitzGerald, the "captain general" of the Desmond military. Fitzmaurice had little stake in a new de-militarised order in Munster, which envisaged the abolition of the Irish lords’ private armies. A factor that drew wider support for Fitzmaurice was the prospect of land confiscations, which had been mooted by Sidney and Peter Carew
Peter Carew
Sir Peter Carew was an English adventurer, who served during the reign of Queen Elizabeth of England and took part in the Tudor conquest of Ireland.He is to be distinguished from another Sir Peter Carew Sir Peter Carew (1514? – 27 November 1575) was an English adventurer, who served during the...
, an English claimant to lands granted to an ancestor just after the Norman conquest of Ireland that were lost soon afterwards.
This ensured Fitzmaurice the support of important clans, notably MacCarthy Mor, O'Sullivan Beare and O'Keefe and two prominent Butlers –brothers of the Earl. Fitzmaurice himself had lost the land he had held at Kerricurrihy in County Cork
County Cork
County Cork is a county in Ireland. It is located in the South-West Region and is also part of the province of Munster. It is named after the city of Cork . Cork County Council is the local authority for the county...
, which had been leased instead to English colonists. He was also a devout Catholic, influenced by the counter-reformation
Counter-Reformation
The Counter-Reformation was the period of Catholic revival beginning with the Council of Trent and ending at the close of the Thirty Years' War, 1648 as a response to the Protestant Reformation.The Counter-Reformation was a comprehensive effort, composed of four major elements:#Ecclesiastical or...
, which made him see the Protestant Elizabethan governors as his enemies. To discourage Sidney from going ahead with the Lord Presidency for Munster and to re-establish Desmond primacy over the Butlers, he planned a rebellion against the English presence in the south and against the Earl of Ormonde. Fitzmaurice however had wider aims than simply the recovery of FitzGerald supremacy within the context of the English Kingdom of Ireland
Kingdom of Ireland
The Kingdom of Ireland refers to the country of Ireland in the period between the proclamation of Henry VIII as King of Ireland by the Crown of Ireland Act 1542 and the Act of Union in 1800. It replaced the Lordship of Ireland, which had been created in 1171...
. Before the rebellion, he secretly sent Maurice MacGibbon, Catholic Archbishop of Cashel
Archbishop of Cashel
The Archbishop of Cashel is an archiepiscopal title which takes its name after the town of Cashel, County Tipperary in Ireland. The title is still in use in the Roman Catholic Church, but in the Church of Ireland it was downgraded to a bishopric in 1838....
, to seek military aid from Philip II of Spain
Philip II of Spain
Philip II was King of Spain, Portugal, Naples, Sicily, and, while married to Mary I, King of England and Ireland. He was lord of the Seventeen Provinces from 1556 until 1581, holding various titles for the individual territories such as duke or count....
.
First Desmond Rebellion
Fitzmaurice launched his rebellion by attacking the English colony at Kerrycurihy south of CorkCork (city)
Cork is the second largest city in the Republic of Ireland and the island of Ireland's third most populous city. It is the principal city and administrative centre of County Cork and the largest city in the province of Munster. Cork has a population of 119,418, while the addition of the suburban...
city in June 1569 before attacking Cork itself and those native lords who refused to join the rebellion. Fitzmaurice’s force of up to 4,500 men went on to besiege Kilkenny
Kilkenny
Kilkenny is a city and is the county town of the eponymous County Kilkenny in Ireland. It is situated on both banks of the River Nore in the province of Leinster, in the south-east of Ireland...
, seat of the Earls of Ormonde in July. In response, Sidney mobilised 600 English troops, who marched south from Dublin and another 400 troops landed by sea in Cork. Thomas Butler, Earl of Ormonde returned from London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, where he had been at court, brought the rebel Butlers out of the rebellion and mobilised Gaelic Irish clans antagonistic to the Geraldines. Together, Ormonde, Sidney and Humphrey Gilbert
Humphrey Gilbert
Sir Humphrey Gilbert of Devon in England was a half-brother of Sir Walter Raleigh. Adventurer, explorer, member of parliament, and soldier, he served during the reign of Queen Elizabeth and was a pioneer of English colonization in North America and the Plantations of Ireland.-Early life:Gilbert...
, appointed as governor of Munster, began devastating the lands of Fitzmaurice's allies. Fitzmaurice's forces broke up, as individual lords had to retire to defend their own territories. Gilbert in particular was notorious for the terror tactics he employed, killing civilians at random and setting up a corridor of severed heads at the entrance to his camps.
Sidney forced Fitzmaurice into the mountains of Kerry
County Kerry
Kerry means the "people of Ciar" which was the name of the pre-Gaelic tribe who lived in part of the present county. The legendary founder of the tribe was Ciar, son of Fergus mac Róich. In Old Irish "Ciar" meant black or dark brown, and the word continues in use in modern Irish as an adjective...
, from where he launched hit and run attacks on the English and their allies. By 1570, most of Fitzmaurice's allies had submitted to Sidney. The most important, Donal MacCarthy Mor surrendered in November 1569. Nevertheless, the guerrilla campaign dragged on for three more years. In February 1571, John Perrot
John Perrot
Sir John Perrot served as Lord Deputy of Ireland under Queen Elizabeth I of England during the Tudor conquest of Ireland...
was made Lord President of Munster
Lord President of Munster
The post of Lord President of Munster was the most important office in the English government of the Irish province of Munster from its introduction in the Elizabethan era for a century, to 1672, a period including the Desmond Rebellions in Munster, the Nine Years' War, and the Irish Rebellion of...
, pursuing Fitzmaurice with 700 troops for over a year without success. Fitzmaurice had some victories, capturing an English ship near Kinsale
Kinsale
Kinsale is a town in County Cork, Ireland. Located some 25 km south of Cork City on the coast near the Old Head of Kinsale, it sits at the mouth of the River Bandon and has a population of 2,257 which increases substantially during the summer months when the tourist season is at its peak and...
and burning the town of Kilmallock
Kilmallock
Kilmallock or Kilmalloc is a town in south County Limerick, Ireland, near the border with County Cork. There is a Dominican Priory in the town and King's Castle . The remains of medieval walls which encircled the settlement are still visible. The Dublin–Cork railway line passes by the town,...
in 1571, for example, but by early 1573, his force was reduced to less than 100 men. Fitzmaurice finally submitted on February 23, 1573, having negotiated a pardon for his life. However in 1574, he again became landless and in 1575 he sailed to France to seek help from the Catholic powers to start another rebellion.
Gerald FitzGerald, Earl of Desmond, and his brother John were released from prison to stabilise the situation and to reconstruct their shattered territory. Under a new settlement imposed after the rebellion, known as "composition", the Desmond’s military forces were limited by law to just 20 horsmen and their tenants made to pay rent to them rather supply military service or to quarter their soldiers. Perhaps the biggest winner of the first Desmond Rebellion was the Earl of Ormonde, who established himself as loyal to the English Crown and as the most powerful lord in the south of Ireland.
Although all of the local chiefs had submitted by the end of the rebellion, the methods used to suppress it provoked lingering resentment, especially among the Irish mercenaries; gall oglaigh or "gallowglass
Gallowglass
The gallowglass or galloglass – from , gallóglach – were an elite class of mercenary warrior who came from Norse-Gaelic clans in the Hebrides and Highlands of Scotland between the mid 13th century and late 16th century...
" as the English termed them, who had rallied to Fitzmaurice. William Drury, the new Lord President of Munster from 1576, executed around 700 of them in the years after the rebellion. Furthermore the aftermath of the rebellion, Gaelic
Gaels
The Gaels or Goidels are speakers of one of the Goidelic Celtic languages: Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx. Goidelic speech originated in Ireland and subsequently spread to western and northern Scotland and the Isle of Man....
customs such as Brehon Laws
Brehon Laws
Early Irish law refers to the statutes that governed everyday life and politics in Early Medieval Ireland. They were partially eclipsed by the Norman invasion of 1169, but underwent a resurgence in the 13th century, and survived into Early Modern Ireland in parallel with English law over the...
, Irish dress, bardic poetry and the maintaining of private armies were again outlawed – things that were highly provocative to traditional Irish society. Fitzmaurice, by contrast, had deliberately emphasised the Gaelic character of the rebellion, wearing the Irish dress, speaking only Irish and referring to himself as the captain (taoiseach) of the Geraldines. Finally, Irish landowners continued to be threatened by the arrival of English colonists. All of these factors meant that, when Fitzmaurice returned from continental Europe to start a new rebellion, there were plenty of discontented people in Munster waiting to join him.
In late 1569 a similar Catholic rebellion, the "Northern Rebellion," broke out in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, but was quickly crushed. This and the Desmond Rebellion caused the Pope to issue "Regnans in Excelsis
Regnans in Excelsis
Regnans in Excelsis was a papal bull issued on 25 February 1570 by Pope Pius V declaring "Elizabeth, the pretended Queen of England and the servant of crime" to be a heretic and releasing all her subjects from any allegiance to her and excommunicating any that obeyed her orders.The bull, written in...
", excommunciating Elizabeth, in early 1570. Thereafter, Elizabeth's previous acceptance of Roman Catholic worship in private turned into a more active suppression of organised Catholic services.
Second Desmond Rebellion
The second Desmond rebellion was sparked when James Fitzmaurice FitzGeraldJames FitzMaurice FitzGerald
James Fitzmaurice Fitzgerald was a member of the 16th century ruling Geraldine dynasty in the province of Munster in Ireland. He rebelled against the crown authority of Queen Elizabeth I of England in response to the onset of the Tudor conquest of Ireland and was deemed an archtraitor...
launched an invasion of Munster in 1579. During his exile in Europe, he had reinvented himself as a soldier of the counter-reformation
Counter-Reformation
The Counter-Reformation was the period of Catholic revival beginning with the Council of Trent and ending at the close of the Thirty Years' War, 1648 as a response to the Protestant Reformation.The Counter-Reformation was a comprehensive effort, composed of four major elements:#Ecclesiastical or...
, arguing that since the Pope
Pope Pius V
Pope Saint Pius V , born Antonio Ghislieri , was Pope from 1566 to 1572 and is a saint of the Catholic Church. He is chiefly notable for his role in the Council of Trent, the Counter-Reformation, and the standardization of the Roman liturgy within the Latin Church...
's excommunication of Elizabeth I in 1570 Irish Catholics no longer owed loyalty to a heretic monarch. The Pope granted Fitzmaurice an "indulgence
Indulgence
In Catholic theology, an indulgence is the full or partial remission of temporal punishment due for sins which have already been forgiven. The indulgence is granted by the Catholic Church after the sinner has confessed and received absolution...
" and supplied him with troops and money. Fitzmaurice landed at Smerwick, near Dingle
Dingle
Dingle is a town in County Kerry, Ireland. The only town on the Dingle Peninsula, it sits on the Atlantic coast, about 49 kilometres southwest of Tralee and 71 kilometres northwest of Killarney....
(modern County Kerry
County Kerry
Kerry means the "people of Ciar" which was the name of the pre-Gaelic tribe who lived in part of the present county. The legendary founder of the tribe was Ciar, son of Fergus mac Róich. In Old Irish "Ciar" meant black or dark brown, and the word continues in use in modern Irish as an adjective...
) on July 18, 1579 with a small force of Spanish
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
and Italian
Italian people
The Italian people are an ethnic group that share a common Italian culture, ancestry and speak the Italian language as a mother tongue. Within Italy, Italians are defined by citizenship, regardless of ancestry or country of residence , and are distinguished from people...
troops. He was joined in rebellion on August 1 by John of Desmond, a brother of the Earl, who had a large following among his kinsmen and the disaffected swordsmen of Munster. Other Gaelic clans and Old English families also joined in the rebellion. After Fitzmaurice was killed in a skirmish with the Clanwilliam Burkes on August 18, John FitzGerald assumed leadership of the rebellion.
Gerald, the Earl of Desmond, initially resisted the call of the rebels and tried to remain neutral but gave in once the authorities had proclaimed him a traitor. The Earl joined the rebellion by sacking the towns of Youghal
Youghal
Youghal is a town in County Cork, Ireland. Sitting on the estuary of the River Blackwater, in the past it was militarily and economically important. Being built on the edge of a steep riverbank, the town has a distinctive long and narrow layout...
(on November 13) and Kinsale
Kinsale
Kinsale is a town in County Cork, Ireland. Located some 25 km south of Cork City on the coast near the Old Head of Kinsale, it sits at the mouth of the River Bandon and has a population of 2,257 which increases substantially during the summer months when the tourist season is at its peak and...
, and devastated the country of the English and their allies. However, by the summer of 1580, English troops under William Pelham
William Pelham (lord justice)
Sir William Pelham was an English soldier and lord justice of Ireland.-Life:He was third son of Sir William Pelham of Laughton, Sussex, by his second wife, Mary, daughter of William Sandys, 1st Baron Sandys of the Vyne near Basingstoke in Hampshire...
and locally raised Irish forces under the Earl of Ormonde succeeded in bringing the rebellion under control, re-taking the south coast, destroying the lands of the Desmonds and their allies in the process, and killing their tenants. By capturing Carrigafoyle
Siege of Carrigafoyle Castle
The Siege of Carrigafoyle Castle took place at Easter in 1580 near modern-day Ballylongford, County Kerry, Ireland on the southern shores of the River Shannon. The engagement was part of the English crown's campaign against the forces of Gerald Fitzgerald, 15th Earl of Desmond during the Second...
at Easter
Easter
Easter is the central feast in the Christian liturgical year. According to the Canonical gospels, Jesus rose from the dead on the third day after his crucifixion. His resurrection is celebrated on Easter Day or Easter Sunday...
1580, the principal Desmond castle at the mouth of Shannon
River Shannon
The River Shannon is the longest river in Ireland at . It divides the west of Ireland from the east and south . County Clare, being west of the Shannon but part of the province of Munster, is the major exception...
river, they cut off the Geraldine forces from the rest of the country and prevented a landing of foreign troops into the main Munster ports. It looked as if the rebellion was fizzling out.
However, in July 1580, the rebellion spread to Leinster
Leinster
Leinster is one of the Provinces of Ireland situated in the east of Ireland. It comprises the ancient Kingdoms of Mide, Osraige and Leinster. Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the historic fifths of Leinster and Mide gradually merged, mainly due to the impact of the Pale, which straddled...
, under the leadership of Gaelic Irish chieftain Fiach MacHugh O'Byrne and the Pale
The Pale
The Pale or the English Pale , was the part of Ireland that was directly under the control of the English government in the late Middle Ages. It had reduced by the late 15th century to an area along the east coast stretching from Dalkey, south of Dublin, to the garrison town of Dundalk...
lord Viscount Baltinglass
James Eustace, 3rd Viscount Baltinglass
James Eustace of Harristown, 3rd Viscount BaltinglassJames FitzEustace, the eldest son of Roland FitzEustace, the 2nd Viscount of Baltinglass and Joan, daughter of James Butler, 8th Baron Dunboyne. He was born in 1530 and died in Spain in 1585...
, both motivated by Catholicism and hostility to the English administration. A large English force under the Lord Deputy of Ireland
Lord Deputy of Ireland
The Lord Deputy was the King's representative and head of the Irish executive under English rule, during the Lordship of Ireland and later the Kingdom of Ireland...
Earl Grey de Wilton
Arthur Grey, 14th Baron Grey de Wilton
Arthur Grey, 14th Baron Grey de Wilton was a baron in the Peerage of England, remembered mainly for his memoir of his father, and for participating in the last defence of Calais.-Life:...
were sent to subdue them, only to be ambushed and massacred at the battle of Glenmalure
Battle of Glenmalure
The Battle of Glenmalure took place in Ireland in 1580 during the Desmond Rebellions. An Irish Catholic force made up of the Gaelic clans from the Wicklow Mountains led by Fiach MacHugh O'Byrne and James Eustace, Viscount Baltinglas of the Pale, defeated an English army under Arthur Grey, 14th...
on August 25, losing over 800 dead. However, the Leinster rebels were unable to capitalise on their victory or to effectively coordinate their strategy with the Munster insurgents.
On September 10, 1580, 600 Papal troops landed at Smerwick in Kerry to support the rebellion, but were besieged in a fort at Dún an Óir. They surrendered after two days of bombardment and were then massacred. By relentless scorched-earth tactics, the English broke the momentum of the rebellion by mid 1581. By May 1581, most of the minor rebels and FitzGerald allies in Munster and Leinster had accepted Elizabeth I's offer of a general pardon. John of Desmond, in many ways the main leader of the rebellion, was killed north of Cork
Cork (city)
Cork is the second largest city in the Republic of Ireland and the island of Ireland's third most populous city. It is the principal city and administrative centre of County Cork and the largest city in the province of Munster. Cork has a population of 119,418, while the addition of the suburban...
in early 1582.
For the Geraldine Earl however there could be no second pardon, and he was pursued by crown forces until the end. From 1581 to 1583, the war dragged on, with his supporters evading capture in the mountains of Kerry
County Kerry
Kerry means the "people of Ciar" which was the name of the pre-Gaelic tribe who lived in part of the present county. The legendary founder of the tribe was Ciar, son of Fergus mac Róich. In Old Irish "Ciar" meant black or dark brown, and the word continues in use in modern Irish as an adjective...
. The rebellion was finally ended on 2 November 1583 when the earl was hunted down and killed near Tralee in Kerry by the local clan O'Moriarty. The clan chief, Maurice, received 1000 pounds of silver from the English government for Desmond's head, which was sent to Queen Elizabeth. His body was triumphantly displayed on the walls of Cork.
Aftermath
After three years of scorched earth warfare, famineFamine
A famine is a widespread scarcity of food, caused by several factors including crop failure, overpopulation, or government policies. This phenomenon is usually accompanied or followed by regional malnutrition, starvation, epidemic, and increased mortality. Every continent in the world has...
hit Munster. In April 1582, the provost marshal of Munster, Sir Warham St Leger, estimated that 30,000 people had died of famine in the previous six months. Plague broke out in Cork city
Cork (city)
Cork is the second largest city in the Republic of Ireland and the island of Ireland's third most populous city. It is the principal city and administrative centre of County Cork and the largest city in the province of Munster. Cork has a population of 119,418, while the addition of the suburban...
, where the country people fled to avoid the fighting. People continued to die of famine and plague long after the war had ended, and it is estimated that by 1589 one third of the province's population had died. Grey was recalled by Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...
for his excessive brutality. Two famous accounts tell us of the devastation of Munster after the Desmond rebellion. The first is from the Gaelic Annals of the Four Masters
Annals of the Four Masters
The Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland or the Annals of the Four Masters are a chronicle of medieval Irish history...
:
The second is from the View of the Present State of Ireland, written by English poet Edmund Spenser
Edmund Spenser
Edmund Spenser was an English poet best known for The Faerie Queene, an epic poem and fantastical allegory celebrating the Tudor dynasty and Elizabeth I. He is recognised as one of the premier craftsmen of Modern English verse in its infancy, and one of the greatest poets in the English...
, who fought in the campaign:
The wars of the 1570s and 1580s marked a watershed in Ireland. Although English control over the country was still far from total, the southern Geraldine axis of power had been annihilated, and Munster was "planted" with English colonists following the parliamentary arrangements of 1585. Following a survey begun in 1584 by Sir Valentine Browne, Knight
Sir Valentine Browne, Knight
Sir Valentine Browne, of Crofts, Lincolnshire, was an English politician.-Life:Valentine Browne was the son of Sir Valentine Browne of Croft, Lincolnshire and may have been educated at Trinity College, Cambridge...
, Surveyor General
Surveyor General
The Surveyor General is an official responsible for government surveying in a specific country or territory. Originally this would often have been a military appointment, but is now more likely to be a civilian post....
of Ireland, the thousands of English soldiers and administrators who had been imported to deal with the rebellion were allocated land in the Munster Plantation
Plantations of Ireland
Plantations in 16th and 17th century Ireland were the confiscation of land by the English crown and the colonisation of this land with settlers from England and the Scottish Lowlands....
of Desmond's confiscated estates. The Elizabethan conquest of Ireland was completed after the subsequent Nine Years War in Ulster
Ulster
Ulster is one of the four provinces of Ireland, located in the north of the island. In ancient Ireland, it was one of the fifths ruled by a "king of over-kings" . Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the ancient kingdoms were shired into a number of counties for administrative and judicial...
and the extension of plantation policy to other parts of the country.
See also
- List of Irish rebellions
- Tudor conquest of Ireland
- Early Modern Ireland 1536-1691