ABSTRACT
‘Planters’ had to be English or ‘English born in Ireland’, to build stone houses, serve the Deputy with a given number of troops, pay quit-rent and employ only English servants. Ireland, it was agreed, had to be held for reasons of national security. Edmund Spenser, who knew Ireland well and wrote a book about it in 1596, compared Ireland to Britain in Dark Ages. The climate of government tended to favour Protestants, especially English Protestants. Fear of the Irish army was the basis of the parliamentary case against Strafford. The importance of the events in the long perspective of Irish history is that they led the English parliament to pass the ‘Adventurers’ Act’, which declared forfeit the property of all who had taken part in the rebellion. The Catholics had two different forces, one under General Owen Roe O’Neill, nephew of the last Earl of Tyrone, representing the Old Irish, and one under General Preston, representing the Old English Catholics.
