Cromwell in Ireland

pablomakaveli

jimbo78 wrote: »

Only before slaughtering 500,000 Irish people.

You got to respect Bertie Ahern for having the balls to walk out of Robin Cooks office after seeing a painting of Cromwell on the wall.

i agree. cromwell was a monster. what he did was even considered terrible even for that time as there was generally accepted rules of war at the time.

even british historians have agreed what he did in ireland was a blot on his reputation that will outlast his achievements.

Fratton Fred

jimbo78 wrote: »

Only before slaughtering 500,000 Irish people.

You got to respect Bertie Ahern for having the balls to walk out of Robin Cooks office after seeing a painting of Cromwell on the wall.

I heard it was 3 million.:rolleyes:

Jimbo

Fratton Fred wrote: »

I heard it was 3 million.:rolleyes:

I can't recall where I heard that from but:

An
estimated 500,000 Irish people died from war, plague and famine during Cromwell’s military
campaign, making it one of the greatest catastrophes ever to befall the country.

from http://www.rte.ie/tv/cromwellinireland/Cromwell-in-Ireland.pdf

Maybe he didn't slaughter 500,000, but he was directly repsonsible for their deaths.

Keep your :rolleyes: to yourself

McArmalite

Fratton Fred wrote: »

I heard it was 3 million.:rolleyes:

I heard the same about the Birmingham, Guildford, and Harrods etc bombings . Whether it's true or not I don't care. But surely Osam Bin Laden's people are planning to inflict as mcuh casualties as possible on probaly the worst terrorist nation in history. We'll see if certain people will smirk about the murder of innocent people then

Fratton Fred

McArmalite wrote: »

I heard the same about the Birmingham, Guildford, and Harrods etc bombings . Whether it's true or not I don't care. But hopefully Osam Bin Laden's people are planning to inflict as mcuh casualties as possible on probaly the worst terrorist nation in history. We'll see if certain people wil smirk about the murder of innocent people then

even by your exceptionally low standards, that is bad.

Jimbo

Fratton Fred wrote: »

even by your exceptionally low standards, that is bad.

Agreed. Hope he's not serious

zaister

The promo for the series is available on YouTube. I have to admit I'm curious to see it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKzU6ak5wsQ

Fratton Fred

jimbo78 wrote: »

I can't recall where I heard that from but:


from http://www.rte.ie/tv/cromwellinireland/Cromwell-in-Ireland.pdf

Maybe he didn't slaughter 500,000, but he was directly repsonsible for their deaths.

Keep your :rolleyes: to yourself

OK, it was overly sarcastic, but 500,000 were not slaughtered by Cromwell. A great many of the figures banded around from that era are little more than propaganda to give excuses for suspicion and hatred.

If you read the Wiki article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cromwellian_conquest_of_Ireland it states around 15 to 20% of the population were killed or exiled, Which was around 1.5million at the time.

If you then read this article http://www.saburchill.com/history/chapters/chap4008f.html it states that the irish population went from 1.5million in 1641 to 850k in 1652. a fall of 650k.

This is during the whole confederate wars and would have included the early massacres in Ulster as well as the massacres at Drogheda, Waterford etc.

Sure, an exceptionally high number of people were killed over that period, but to say Cromwell slaughtered half a million people is not true and sensationalist. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to defend Cromwell, but lets stick to reality eh?

jimbo78 wrote: »

Agreed. Hope he's not serious

Who knows, he comes out with crap like this from time to time and seems to get away with it.

LordSutch

I saw Part One of the 'two part' documentary about Cromwell on RTE One last night (09th/Sept) and the one thing that really struck me was the Nationalities of Cromwells Enemies in Ireland!

Cromwell's 'New Model Army' was fighting an assorted enemy made up from English Royalist's - Irish Catholics English Catholics - Irish Protestants - English Protestants - Scottish Planters of all sorts, & everything else in between . . . .

The documentary was very enlightening 'as it was calculated' with the door left firmly ajar as to whether Cromwell's forces deliberately comitted a massive atrocity against 'women & children' in Drogheda . . or not ?

No doubt the arguement will rage on in this Thread, and my own impression from this RTE historical programe was that Cromwell was hell bent on revenge for the slaughter of tens of thousands of Protestants (as reported ) several years earlier!

Whether or not the stories of Protestants being slaughtered in Ireland on an industrial scale was exaggerated or not - Cromwell believed the version of events 'Reported in England' & when he had despatched with the King's head in London, he turned his focus on Ireland & decided to sort out Ireland's Royalist's & Papist's once & for all - and by 'God's Command'.

Part Two > Next Tuesday (16th/Sept) 9:15pm RTE One.

mrjoneill

Nothing revisionist about it at all, it showed the brutality of the English not only on the Irish but on their very own when they were on the wrong side, in this case of the Royalist cause as it was these that resided within the walled towns and fortresses in Ireland. As for the 1641 Rebellion it was mostly British propaganda chiefly on the descendants of Mountbatten’s wife the then Master of the Rolls Sir John Temple then Master of the Rolls in the 17th century and its from this confiscations that they inherited their Sligo estate. Strange how the wheel went full circle there.

Judgement Day

McArmalite wrote: »

I heard the same about the Birmingham, Guildford, and Harrods etc bombings . Whether it's true or not I don't care. But surely Osam Bin Laden's people are planning to inflict as mcuh casualties as possible on probaly the worst terrorist nation in history. We'll see if certain people will smirk about the murder of innocent people then

Well despite your comments I hope that you are not there if/when Bin Laden's lunatics strike again! I think with your attitude a spell in Guantanamo Bay would be beneficial - at least it would keep you off Boards.ie. :p

McArmalite

Fratton Fred wrote: »

even by your exceptionally low standards, that is bad.

Fratton Fred wrote:

Who knows, he comes out with crap like this from time to time and seems to get away with it.

Your the one who makes a snide comment about the deaths of Irish people, and you think it should be regarded as a bit of 'fun'.

I reply with a snide comment on the deaths of british people and ofcourse you find it offensive.

Fighting fire with fire, if you want it to stop, drop the insulting comments and then you wouldn't have to worry about any snide replies from me

robp

I thought it was reasonably balanced; it did give arguments to support him.
The main condemning argument was simply he should have been in control of his troops so any excesses of troops in wexford for instance were more him losing control then a calculated massacure.

The re-enactments and period costumes were very impressive.
Nice to hear a bit of Irish and Latin thrown in too
.

getz

cromwell was a religious fanatic who made england a republic in 1649after the execution of charles1 he terrorized and killed not only the irish but also the english ---when you talk of massacres dont forget the british goverment troops also put people to the sword in the 19th cen .ie the peterloo massacre

Fratton Fred

McArmalite wrote: »

Your the one who makes a snide comment about the deaths of Irish people, and you think it should be regarded as a bit of 'fun'.

I reply with a snide comment on the deaths of british people and ofcourse you find it offensive.

Fighting fire with fire, if you want it to stop, drop the insulting comments and then you wouldn't have to worry about any snide replies from me

I was actually making a snide comment about the poster sensationalising the numbers of deaths, not about the deaths themselves.

Typical of you to over react tbh.

McArmalite

Camelot wrote: »

I saw Part One of the 'two part' documentary about Cromwell on RTE One last night (09th/Sept) and the one thing that really struck me was the Nationalities of Cromwells Enemies in Ireland!

Cromwell's 'New Model Army' was fighting an assorted enemy made up from English Royalist's - Irish Catholics English Catholics - Irish Protestants - English Protestants - Scottish Planters of all sorts, & everything else in between . . . .

The documentary was very enlightening 'as it was calculated' with the door left firmly ajar as to whether Cromwell's forces deliberately comitted a massive atrocity against 'women & children' in Drogheda . . or not ?

No doubt the arguement will rage on in this Thread, and my own impression from this RTE historical programe was that Cromwell was hell bent on revenge for the slaughter of tens of thousands of Protestants (as reported ) several years earlier!

Whether or not the stories of Protestants being slaughtered in Ireland on an industrial scale was exaggerated or not - Cromwell believed the version of events 'Reported in England' & when he had despatched with the King's head in London, he turned his focus on Ireland & decided to sort out Ireland's Royalist's & Papist's once & for all - and by 'God's Command'.

Part Two > Next Tuesday (16th/Sept) 9:15pm RTE One.

Yeah it's not bad, I was afraid it would be like last year's Killing at Coolacrease tripe. But then if Eoghan Harris makes an appearance on anything then it's undoubtedly going to be utter rubbish. Yeah I had known regarding the deaths of many, if not most, of those at Drogheda were English or " Old English " as they were referred to, infirming they were descendants of the Anglo Norman stock. Whether the same can be said of other towns I cann't say for sure, but it probably followed the same pattern in the population of Dublin, Wexford etc

Most of the population of the garrison ports/towns ( Drogheda, Dublin, Wexford, etc) on the east coast were made up of 'Old English' as the rules of the time forbade the native Irish to live within the garrison walls. E.g. they could come in to trade at markets, even work as a servant etc but had to leave at night for the obvious fear of the natives turning mutinous and opening the gates etc for the Irish rebels from the rest of the country over running them. For example, modern day Irishtown in Dublin was outside the city walls several centuries ago and was where the Irish stayed when they had to leave the city boundaries overnight, hence giving the name to the area.

The reports of the slaughter of Protestants in Ireland were a complete fabrication, try watching the ( excellent so far ) series about the English civil War on Discovery Knowledge called Blood on Our Hands running at the moment. The Puritan fanatics indulged in all sorts of what we would call black propaganda today, i.e. making wild and exadurated claims to bolster their own fanatic beliefs and demonise the opposition. It's a good point you make whether Cromwell believed these or not is conjecture, but since Cromwell was one of the leaders, it's undoubted he knew about these wild and exaggerated claims but perpetrated the military slaughters due to his own fanaticism. It's like wondering did Hiimmler believe in Hitler's racial policies or not.

McArmalite

Fratton Fred wrote: »

I was actually making a snide comment about the poster sensationalising the numbers of deaths, not about the deaths themselves.

Typical of you to over react tbh.

Well then you should have addressed it in a respectful way and not presented it in a snide fashion - to which will inevitably produce a similar reply.

Fratton Fred

McArmalite wrote: »

Well then you should have addressed it in a respectful way and not presented it in a snide fashion - to which will inevitably produce a similar reply.

OK.

Good of you to change your original post too. "Surely Al Qeada..." is a million miles from "Hopefully Al Qeada...."

McArmalite

getz wrote: »

cromwell was a religious fanatic who made england a republic in 1649after the execution of charles1 he terrorized and killed not only the irish but also the english ---when you talk of massacres dont forget the british goverment troops also put people to the sword in the 19th cen .ie the peterloo massacre

Fair enough points, but lets not use these ( and I'm not saying you are ) to lessening the feelings of injustice that the vast majority have of the period. I rememeber reading that something like 500,000 German civilians ( Socialists, trade unionists, etc ) were sent to concentration camps several years before other minorities were. ( Not much of an international cry was raised at the time as most of the gallant 'Allies' would like to have done the same with 'troublemakers' in their own countries. )

My main point been, like someone trying to use the 500,000 Germans to deflect attention and criticism of Germany's atrocities across Europe - lets not let anyone to try and deflect England's culablity in this genocide perpetrated on Ireland.

Shinji Ikari

zaister wrote: »

The promo for the series is available on YouTube. I have to admit I'm curious to see it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKzU6ak5wsQ

****e! I missed this. Is it available on the internet? When is the second part out? I'm never heard of Bertie leaving an office because it had a picture of Cromwell. Does anyone have a link for this?

zaister

you could try the company that made the series for RTE, they're called tile films. some good info at

www.tilefilms.ie/cromwell

Shinji Ikari

zaister wrote: »

you could try the company that made the series for RTE, they're called tile films. some good info at

www.tilefilms.ie/cromwell

Thanks. Unfortuately they did'nt mention anything about a future DVD release. So....if anyone has part one recorded please upload it to youtube!

Snickers Man

Shinji Ikari wrote: »

Thanks. Unfortuately they did'nt mention anything about a future DVD release. So....if anyone has part one recorded please upload it to youtube!

Seconded!!

Can't believe I missed it.

pablomakaveli

It would be interesting to see if the BBC or the history channel in britain would show the cromwell documentary.

the only programs about irish history that i have seen on the history channel are "irelands nazis" and "the secret history of the IRA" which was about the IRAs border campaign in the 1950s. both these programs portray irish people in a bad light.

i think showing programs like the cromwell documentary in britain would be important as it would help british people to have an understanding as to the animosity in ireland towards britain and as to the conflict in the north. as a lot of british people seem to know little about irish history.

LordSutch

pablomakaveli wrote: »

It would be interesting to see if the BBC or the history channel in britain would show the cromwell documentary.

Apparently this RTE Documentary was made with the intention of the History Channel taking it on board ...

pablomakaveli wrote: »

i think showing programs like the cromwell documentary in britain would be important as it would help british people to have an understanding as to the animosity in ireland towards britain and as to the conflict in the north. as a lot of british people seem to know little about irish history.

People in Britain also have very 'mixed' views on Cromwell, remember it was he who chopped off the Kings Head !!! You might also note from Post#40 that Cromwell's foes in Ireland were not necessarily Irish ......

Snickers Man

Camelot wrote: »

You might also note from Post#40 that Cromwell's foes in Ireland were not necessarily Irish ......

This should not be a surprise if you look at things dispassionately with the benefit of 350 years of hindsight.

To say that the troubles between Ireland and Britain over the centuries have been a consistent struggle between the same two sides is a gross oversimplification. The Norman invaders of the 12th century became the Irish "rebels" of the 16th century. The Fitzgerald's of Kildare and Munster in particular were the descendants of Norman lords who had snatched lands from native Irish.

The presbyterian United Irishmen who rebelled against the Establishment in Ulster in 1798 became the Carsonites of a century later and the Paisleyites of recent memory.

The Catholics who defended to the death the cause of the Stuart kings against the Puritan republicans of the 17th century became the most ardent republicants a century later.

To quote President De Gaulle: "Geography is the constant factor in the making of history" The implication being that all else is changeable.

Ireland's fertile lands were a natural target for brigandly medieval knights from Britain. But from the 16th century on, with a growing international rivalry on the European stage Ireland became an important strategic concern to Britain. As the country on its western flank, it had to be secure against invasion from whichever European superpower Britain was fighting against at the time.

That was the strategic factor which gives the context for why Spaniards in the 16th and 17th centuries, Frenchmen in the 17th and 18th centuries, and Germans in the 20th century all attempted to curry favour with Irish rebels.

The financial picture changed too. In feudal times, land was everything. In post industrial revolutionary times the economy in Ireland changed. While much of the country languished as a backward agrarian economy, Ulster developed as a modern industrial economy. Textiles, ship building, heavy engineering. Paid for by British investment, powered by British coal and steel and serving the markets of the empire, there was no sound economic reason to split Ulster away from the bosom of the empire in the early 20th century.

The differences in the population were frequently brought to division but the dividing lines changed regularly. Where once native settler clashed with Norman invader, they had by the 16th century largely come to be allies as Catholics against the Protestant invaders of Tudor times.

Catholics were more natural allies of the Stuart kings against the non-conformist Puritans who sought, among other things, to curtail the power of monarchs by making them subservient to an elected parliament.

And the Scots, who had been the allies and had provided the bulk of the fighting forces of Irish chieftains since time immemorial had become by the early 17th century the hated Presbyterian planters of Ulster.

It may seem ironic now that an English republican who essentially came to Ireland to safeguard his commonwealth against the allies of a deposed monarch should come to be such a reviled character among today's Irish republicans but that's history for you.

That was then and this is now.

Shinji Ikari

pablomakaveli wrote: »

It would be interesting to see if the BBC or the history channel in britain would show the cromwell documentary.

the only programs about irish history that i have seen on the history channel are "irelands nazis" and "the secret history of the IRA" which was about the IRAs border campaign in the 1950s. both these programs portray irish people in a bad light.

i think showing programs like the cromwell documentary in britain would be important as it would help british people to have an understanding as to the animosity in ireland towards britain and as to the conflict in the north. as a lot of british people seem to know little about irish history.

There was another one, shown on what was then Discovery Civilisation.
It was about Padraig Pearse. It basically ranted on about Pearse has become the forgotten man of Irish History and how revisionists attempted to argue that he was gay and even into pedastry. It was pretty good. He is a forgotten character from history to an extent. So many new books come out about Collins and Dev' but when was the last book on Pearse written?

Fratton Fred

Snickers Man wrote: »

It may seem ironic now that an English republican who essentially came to Ireland to safeguard his commonwealth against the allies of a deposed monarch should come to be such a reviled character among today's Irish republicans but that's history for you.

That was then and this is now.

A big "What If" I think that also needs to be considered, is what would have happened if Cromwell not come to Ireland?

The fight would have come to England, with victorious Irish confederate chieftains being given English land as payment for their efforts.

Presuming for one minute that the tactics used by Cromwell were the standard of the day, then Cromwell's biggest crime, it could be argued, was winning.

zaister

Snickers Man wrote: »

Seconded!!

Can't believe I missed it.

Snickers man and Shinji... i got in touch with the company that made the documentary for rte... they said they'll have DVDs available for sale in the near future. You can email them at info@tilefilms.ie

LordSutch

Cromwell in Ireland > Part Two > Tonight (Tuesday) 16th-Sept 10:15pm RTE One.