The industrial distress, which had come to be the habitual state of things in Ireland, had been aggravated in 1770 and the following years by a series of embargoes placed by the English Privy Council on the export of Irish provisions to foreign countries. These crippled and eventually almost destroyed one of the only two surviving branches of trade which remained to the country. In 1775 the American colonies, then on the verge of war, excluded Irish linens from their markets.

In 1778 the permission to export some few articles of food from Ireland to England, given some time previously, was withdrawn. The prohibition of the foreign provision trade had been justified on the ground that the rebel colonial army was being fed by Irish beef and pork, but for the refusal to admit Irish food into Great Britain no such excuse could be offered. It was due to mere commercial selfishness and weak pandering to the clamorous complaints of the English farmer and graziers.

The ruin was now complete and widespread amongst all classes and in all parts of the country. The Limerick and Cork merchants found themselves with huge stocks of unsold and unsaleable provisions on their hands. The Dublin weavers paraded the streets in procession carrying a black fleece. Ten thousand workpeople were said (May 1778) to have lost their employment. The Finances were reduced to a deplorable condition. In 1777 the expenses had exceeded the revenue by £80,000. La Touche, the Dublin banker, professed to be unable to advance £20,000 to the authorities. For lack of money the few regular troops left in the country were obliged to be left stationary; their travelling expenses could not be paid.