Above : Painting Of Hugh O’Neill

When the news of the intended confiscations came to the ears of the Irish whose lands lay within the counties to be planted, it was to them ” as a sentence of death.” The fiat, however, had gone forth against them; no justice, much less mercy, was accorded them. In vain they employed lawyers to plead their cause before the Royal Commission ; the decisions were almost always against them. It mattered little that, in order to justify many of the confiscations, the most absurd pleas had to be resorted to.

The claim of the Crown to the lands, based on the rebellion of Shane and s later of Hugh O’Neill and of Rory O’Donnell, could not extend to the possessions of the sub-chiefs, nor to those of freeholders who had not joined in the insurrections. All these pleas were, however, brushed aside by Davys, the Attorney-General. By the March of 1609 the scheme was ready. Soon the settlers came to take possession of their new estates. Some of them were, as subsequently appeared, very undesirable persons ; insolvent debtors, defaulters or ex-convicts.

The Rev. Ambrose Stewart, a contemporary, gives a most unflattering account of them; saying that those who came from England and Scotland were ” generally the scum of both countries,” whose ” carriage made them to be abhorred at home.” Not all the colonists, fortunately, were of this kind. Many, of the Scotch especially, were sober and industrious farmers, who, finding themselves amongst a people of kindred race, customs and tongue—for a large number were Gaelic speakers—speedily settled down, and introduced a valuable element into the life of the northern Province.

Of the expelled Irish, many left the country and took military service on the Continent. Others fled to the woods and became rapparees and outlaws, ” tories,” as the English authorities called them. These, when opportunity offered, raided the possessions of the English and Scotch planters, whom they saw established on the lands which had once been their own or their kinsmen’s heritage.

From this and other causes, many of the colonists found the new land, from which they had hoped so much, no very desirable place of residence. Within a short time, large numbers returned to their native country. In 1619, it was found that, within seven years, some estates had changed hands three or four times. As had happened in Munster, the Irish found their way back as tenants, offering high rents and accepting hard conditions. In 1624, the London Companies had 4,000 Irish tenants on their estates; according to the terms of their charter, they should not have had a single one.