Irish History
And
The Fighting Irish
And
The Fighting Irish
The
County of Coleraine ( Derry ) was divided up among the London trade Guilds, the drapers, the
fishmongers, vintners, haberdashers, etc - who had financed the Plantation scheme. The Church termon lands were bestowed upon the Protestant bishops. And thus a new nation was planted upon the fair race of Ireland's proudest quarter. The new nation was meant to be a permanent nation there. The written conditions upon which the new people got their lands specifically bound them to repress and abhor the Irish natives - They were bound never to alien the lands to the Irish, to admit no Irish customs, not to inter-marry
with the Irish, not to permit any Irish other than menials to exist on or near their lands. And they were bound to build castles and bawns, and keep mant armed British retainers - thus constituting a permanent British garrison which would help to tame if not exterminate the Irish race. Sir John Davies, the Scotic king's very faithful servant, assures us that his master did tame the whole race. In his book " A Discoverie of True Causes why Ireland was never Subdued and Brought under Obediance to the Crowne of England until the Beginning of His Majestie's Happie Reign, " he says " The multitude having been brayed as it were in a mortar with sword, pestilence and famine, altogether became admirers of the Crowne of England. "
And when they were made true admirers of the Crown of England it was that their fertile possessions were given to the stranger, and they sent to co-habit with the snipe and the badger among rocks and heather. And the faithful servant, Sir Juhn, a pious Puritan rogue who strained his powers to rob and wrong the natives even far beyond the sweeping robbery powers which the ' law ' provided to his hand - this Saint, in the traditional British fashion, tells us: " This transplanting of the natives is made by his Majestie like a father, rather than a lord or monarch. . . So as his Majestie doth in this imitate the skilful husband - man who doth remove his fruit trees, not on purpose to extirpate and destroy, but the rather that they may bring forth better and sweeter fruit! " And when the starving one , from his perch among the rocks , glanced over the smiling valleys from which James had transplanted him for his own betterment, it is easy to conceive the depth of feeling with which he appreciated that kind father's solitute.
The character of the Planters who were given the lands of the hunted ones is recorded for us by the son of one of them, and also by a later one of their own descendants. Reid in his " History of the Irish Presbyterians " says : Among those whom divine Providence did send to Ireland . . .the most part were such as either poverty or scandalous lives had forced hither. "
And Stewart, the son of a Presbyterian minister who was one of the Platers, writes: " From Scotland came many, and from England not a few, yet all of them generally the scum of both nations, who from debt, or breaking, or fleeing justice, or seeking shelter, came hither hoping to be without fear of man's justice. "
Sore indeed was the lot of the poor Irish in the woods, and mountains, and moors. Thousands of them perished of starvation. Other many thousands sailed away under leaders to enlist in the Continental armies.
To far Sweeden alone went no less than six thousand swordsmen. But the lot of those who lived and remained was sorer far than of those who went either to exile or to death.
with the Irish, not to permit any Irish other than menials to exist on or near their lands. And they were bound to build castles and bawns, and keep mant armed British retainers - thus constituting a permanent British garrison which would help to tame if not exterminate the Irish race. Sir John Davies, the Scotic king's very faithful servant, assures us that his master did tame the whole race. In his book " A Discoverie of True Causes why Ireland was never Subdued and Brought under Obediance to the Crowne of England until the Beginning of His Majestie's Happie Reign, " he says " The multitude having been brayed as it were in a mortar with sword, pestilence and famine, altogether became admirers of the Crowne of England. "
And when they were made true admirers of the Crown of England it was that their fertile possessions were given to the stranger, and they sent to co-habit with the snipe and the badger among rocks and heather. And the faithful servant, Sir Juhn, a pious Puritan rogue who strained his powers to rob and wrong the natives even far beyond the sweeping robbery powers which the ' law ' provided to his hand - this Saint, in the traditional British fashion, tells us: " This transplanting of the natives is made by his Majestie like a father, rather than a lord or monarch. . . So as his Majestie doth in this imitate the skilful husband - man who doth remove his fruit trees, not on purpose to extirpate and destroy, but the rather that they may bring forth better and sweeter fruit! " And when the starving one , from his perch among the rocks , glanced over the smiling valleys from which James had transplanted him for his own betterment, it is easy to conceive the depth of feeling with which he appreciated that kind father's solitute.
The character of the Planters who were given the lands of the hunted ones is recorded for us by the son of one of them, and also by a later one of their own descendants. Reid in his " History of the Irish Presbyterians " says : Among those whom divine Providence did send to Ireland . . .the most part were such as either poverty or scandalous lives had forced hither. "
And Stewart, the son of a Presbyterian minister who was one of the Platers, writes: " From Scotland came many, and from England not a few, yet all of them generally the scum of both nations, who from debt, or breaking, or fleeing justice, or seeking shelter, came hither hoping to be without fear of man's justice. "
Sore indeed was the lot of the poor Irish in the woods, and mountains, and moors. Thousands of them perished of starvation. Other many thousands sailed away under leaders to enlist in the Continental armies.
To far Sweeden alone went no less than six thousand swordsmen. But the lot of those who lived and remained was sorer far than of those who went either to exile or to death.
