Oliver Cromwell vs Ireland: An Endless Cycle Of Violence | English Civil Wars | Timeline

A nation divided. It was a time of great bitterness and hatred in England - a war that set father against son and brother against brother. The breakdown in relations between Parliament and King. This series tells the story of the war that shaped the course of a nation’s history and laid the foundations of Britain as it is today. Drawing fascinating portraits of the men who were central to the entire tragic story.

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[gerardodwyer]

The irony of ironies is that Cromwell's health deteriorated significantly when campaigning in Ireland where he was diagnosed with acute tertian fever, a condition that worsened and quickened his death in 1658.

[anthonycosgrave]

So contuing the English Civil War in Ireland reduced the population of Ireland by half I mean half. Does that not sound like a genocide. The fact is that the population of Ireland was 50% of what it was after the English brought THEIR civil war to Ireland then called it an Irish problem. They then seeded the country with THEIR new colonists and called any unrest an Irish problem. Cromwell is a hated figure in Ireland and it will remain so despite the efforts by some to rewrite history.

[Jim_]

The Conquest of Ireland arguably wasn’t fully completed until the Act of Union in 1800 when the Kingdom of Ireland (after centuries of constitutional and regime changes) was forcibly merged into the British state (though our civil service and courts remained separate, and we retained our legislative representatives). Those representatives forced to sit in London instead of Dublin, but went back to Ireland in 1919 and declared independence in a reconstituted Irish Parliament (copying the Hungarian walkout of the Austrian parliament in the 1860s).

European history is very complicated.

[connorbehm]

For a video called "Cromwell vs Ireland" there is remarkably little about Cromwell in Ireland.

[seandoherty]

This is the sanitised version of Cromwell in Ireland. He was famous for his scorched earth policies. No need to kill the women and children when you can starve them by destroying the food supply. When I was studying history in the seventies the figure estimated to have died as a direct consequence of his time in Ireland was between 200, 000 and 250, 000, mostly due to starvation. So it was much more of a religious based ethnic cleansing of the unwanted Catholic (or Papist as one of your historian's calls them here) population than is acknowledged in the video.

[EM-frbr]

I cannot believe that English Historians still defend Cromwell in Ireland. Sickening...

[andrewg.carvill]

From Cromwell's letter of 19th October 1649 to the Governor of Ross, who was trying to negotiate surrender terms with Cromwell: "For that which you mention concerning liberty of conscience, I meddle not with any man's conscience. But if by liberty of conscience you mean a liberty to exercise the Mass, I judge it best to use plain dealing, and to let you know, where the Parliament of England have power, that will not be allowed of." The contradiction between the first and second sentences of these words written by Cromwell sums up very well the contradiction at the heart of the whole Puritan movement, and also the contradiction of centuries of attempts to 'extend English liberties' to Ireland.

[guyincognito]

Trying to watch this at 5am when I'm meant to be asleep when Alan Partridge's voice double appears. Zero chance I'm dozing off with him teaching me about Cromwell - I'll never get back to sleep until I hear "Ahaaaa!"

[fategamingandhighlights]

It's like during the French Revolution, with Napoleon rising through the ranks against the monarchy and then ending up being the king or emporer anyways, even though it's what they fought against, like Acton said, "Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely."

[jojokeavy]

Cromwell....
The most Hated man in Irish History .

[stommx]

Jaysus wept. The most brutal thing about this documentary is the continuous bad pronunciation of town of Drogheda.

[StopFear]

Cromwell's actions in regard to the Irish is inexcusable.

[markhanney]

Great video! Fascibating time in history that deserves to be better known. There's a lot of areas to explore in Montrose's campaign against Argyll like the Battle of Auldearn (1645)

[whitetroutchannel]

general monk visited my town with a gunboat and when he could siege our castle he burned the place down then cromwell himself turned up and demanded the doors be opened, the lady of the castle refused and held out for 6 weeks then worked out a pardon for her husband and the castle spared, killyleagh castle

[intuitknit]

Cromwell was a beast and historians shouldn't try to make excuses for him.

[equusquaggaquagga]

“I have not the particular shining bauble or feather in my cap for crowds to gaze at or kneel to, but I have power and resolution for foes to tremble at.”
― Oliver Cromwell

[margaretthorpe]

I'm speechless. The tone with which this man's so called heroics are described versus the reality of the bloody murderous trail of destruction he left in all COUNTRIES (Ireland was not a rebellious state but a country stolen) should leave his actions marred and a matter of shame. I must be naive. I honestly believed that reports in this day and age would reflect the reality far mire than this. Yes, the stories are told, but it's how they are told that matters. Facts, yes, but reflecting the human experience.

Also, as a reporter it behoves you to be able to correctly pronounce the names of the two towns you're speaking about on a recorded documentary.

[botesandhoze]

Gotta love that crusty old English guy, Prof. Black, putting those war crimes into “context” for us lol

[garybobst]

There's a reason nobody names their sons Oliver in Erin.

[mango]

The damage he did in terms of land-confiscations led to the landlordism that was so disasterous in the Famine 2 centuries later. The Act of Union of 1801 led to many of these landlords moving to Britain and becoming absentee landlords, less in touch with the condition of their estates. And because Cromwell's Act of Settlement seized almost all the land owned by Catholics, it turned vast majority of us into tenants. And it increased sectarianism because of the religious divide between the landlord and the tenant. In Ulster it was not always the same because Protestants there came from all classes. Cromwell used land owned by Catholics in Ireland to pay the New Model Army, because he couldnt afford to pay them at the time. When the English Restoration happened, about one third of the lost Catholic land was returned, but the Parliament then shut down the court that was returning it (many in Parliament and their sponsors had done well out of the Cromwellian settlement, or James I/Charles I's plantations). This was also an issue in the Williamite War, where James II's Irish Parliament tried to reverse the land settlement going back to 1641. The Penal laws of Cromwell and also 1691-1829 made it harder to pay the rent because a Catholic was not allowed to go to school, become a teacher, lawyer, (repealed around 1782) or hold public office (repealed 1829) so the people were tied to agricultural production to do so.