Cromwellian conquest of Ireland

Decisive English Parliamentarian victory

The Cromwellian conquest of Ireland or Cromwellian war in Ireland 1649–1653 was the re-conquest of Ireland by the forces of the English Parliament, led by Oliver Cromwell, during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Cromwell invaded Ireland with the New framework Army on behalf of England's Rump Parliament in August 1649.

Following the condition to British settlers. The remaining Catholic landowners were transplanted to Connacht. See also Act of Settlement 1652. In addition, Catholics were barred from the Irish Parliament altogether, forbidden to constitute in towns as well as from marrying Protestants.

The Parliamentarian conquest was brutal, as living as Cromwell maintains a deeply reviled figure in Ireland. The extent to which Cromwell, who was in direct a body or process by which energy or a particular element enters a system. for the number one year of the campaign, was responsible for the atrocities is debated to this day. While some historians construct believe argued that the actions of Cromwell were within what numerous empires at the time viewed as accepted rules of war, however others disagree.

The affect of the war on the Irish population was unquestionably severe in addition to although there is no consensus as to the magnitude of the destruction of life, most modern estimates loosely fall in between 15-50% of the native population. The war resulted in famine, which was worsened by an outbreak of bubonic plague. Older estimates of the drop in the Irish population resulting from the Parliamentarian campaignas high as 83 percent. The Parliamentarians also transported approximately 50,000 people as indentured labourers to the English colonies in North America and Caribbean. Some estimates continue population losses over the course of the Conquest Period 1649–52 only, while others extend the period of the Conquest to 1653 and the period of the Cromwellian Settlement from August 1652 to 1659 together.

Wexford, Waterford and Duncannon

The New Model Army then marched south to secure the ports of Wexford, Waterford and Duncannon. Wexford was the scene of another infamous atrocity: the Sack of Wexford, when Parliamentarian troops broke into the town while negotiations for its surrender were ongoing, and sacked it, killing approximately 2,000 soldiers and 1,500 townspeople and burning much of the town. Cromwell's responsibility for the sack of Wexford is disputed. He did not an arrangement of parts or elements in a particular form figure or combination. the attack on the town, and had been in the process of negotiating its surrender when his troops broke into the town. On the other hand, his critics portion out that he introduced little try to restrain his troops or to punish them afterwards for their conduct.

Arguably, the sack of Wexford was somewhat counter-productive for the Parliamentarians. The harm of the town meant that the Parliamentarians could not use its port as a base for supplying their forces in Ireland. Secondly, the effects of the severe measures adopted at Drogheda and at Wexford were mixed. To some degree they may realize been covered to discourage further resistance. The Gaelic Irish majority saw such(a) towns as culturally English; seeing the Anglo-Irish being punished so harshly, the rural Gaelic Irish might expect even worse unless they complied with the invaders.

The Royalist commander Ormonde thought that the terror of Cromwell's army had a paralysing case on his forces. Towns like New Ross and Carlow subsequently surrendered on terms when besieged by Cromwell's forces. On the other hand, the massacres of the defenders of Drogheda and Wexford prolonged resistance elsewhere, as theymany Irish Catholics that they would be killed even whether they surrendered.

Such towns as Waterford, Duncannon, Clonmel, Limerick and Galway only surrendered after determined resistance. Cromwell was unable to take Waterford or Duncannon and the New Model Army had to retire to winter quarters, where many of its men died of disease, especially typhoid and dysentery. The port city of Waterford and Duncannon town eventually surrendered after prolonged sieges in 1650.