This is the weblog for my english-project.

So if you want to learn something about the Irish history from the 16th century till today,

then your right here.

This time was full of hate, conflicts and wars and I hope I can give you just a short overview of all the happenings.

Nearly 400 years later, under the regency of Henry the VIII, Ireland was directly under the  British Crown.

Also in this time, there was a break with the Roman church in England. For this reason the colonization-politic in Ireland was against the catholics as well. The first steps were to confiscate irish church goods and to settle down English and Scottish people, with the protestant belief, in Ireland. But although the biggest part were still catholic.

The name of this settlement was “Plantation”(Bepflanzung) and since the 60th of the 16th century more and more people come to Ireland and they were accompanied by the military, because in Ireland there begun to sprout an Irish resistance against the colonization. This situation ended in two different rebellions called ” the Desmond Rebellions”. Both were drown brutish from the English military.

But this were not the last Rebellish activities: until the 17th century many Irish and also English people died in such conflicts. In the year 1600 Queen Elisabeth I appointed Lord Mountjoy to the new Lord Deputy of Ireland and with him the life of catholic Irish people got harder than ever before.  He sent destruction and poverty over the hole country. Under his control the English military fought hard against the Irish resistance and finally he won and many rich Irish people escaped from Ireland. This Escape is also called „Flight of the Earls“.

Another popular fight was the Battle of Boyne, where Irish Catholics fought for their sovereignity, tolerance of Catholicism and Catholic land ownership. But  they lost against British, French and Dutch protestant troops, with the result of British Protestant rule of Ireland.

The Battle of Boyle was in 1690. Only five years later the “Penal Laws” were passed. They had fatal consequences for all Irish catholics. For example the exclusion from voting or legal professions.

In the end of the 18th century it came to the Irish Rebellion which was influenced of the French Revolution. The aim was to end the influence of British rules in Ireland.

A great step to the freedom of Irish catholic people was the creation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. With the Kingdom catholics got rights like the permission to vote. 45 years later  there was a famine which killed nearly a quarter of the population. It was called “Potato famine”, because the bad main foodstuff-crop and this foodstuff were the potatoes. This hard circumstances also affect Irish people to leave their home and to emigrate to the USA. The Irish population were bisected in that time. From 8 million people to 4,4 million in only a few years.

At the beginning of the 20^th century(in  1916) some Irish Republicans fought for the independence of Ireland and were executed.  But they didn’t die for nothing.  This case deployed a “wave of sympathy” for the Irish Republicans and maybe this treatment was one of the main reasons for the Anglo-Irish War, which broke out 4 years later. It was a war between Ireland and Britian where Ireland could achieve the independence from Britian.  After this conflict it came to the Founding of a free Irish state. The only area which was still under the control of Britian was Ulster.

Directly after the Irish victory in the Irish-Britian conflict a Civil War followed where  the opponents of the Free State  fought against the supporters. But they lost.

Then, in 1948 Ireland become a full independent  Republic  with 26 counties in the south of Ireland. Ulster was still under control of the UK.

Since 1968 the IRA (Irish Republican Army) tried to split up Northern Ireland from Britian. Further these catholics  want to reform the political situation especially in the North of their country.

The worst incident of the conflict between the catholics and the british(/irish) protestants was in 1972. It is called “Bloody Sunday”. 13 unarmed Irish people were shot  by British soldier in Derry. After this the Irish nationalists fought more intensive than ever before to create a free, independent Irish Republic