The country of Ireland has suffered throughout a terrible history of conflict, violence and brutality. These conflicts, however

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History GCSE Assignment – Modern World Study

Northern Ireland

        The country of Ireland has suffered throughout a terrible history of conflict, violence and brutality. These conflicts, however, were not between Ireland and other countries; they were civil wars, and the people of Ireland were fighting amongst themselves.

        These civil disputes were caused by many different reasons, but the main three were politics, religious beliefs and cultural choices. Many significant events occurred because of the disagreements about these matters, and these events kept the conflict alive and made the citizens of Ireland more passionate about their beliefs. Every event which arose caused its own troubles and created even more consequences.

        In July 1689, the first significant event in the Northern Ireland civil conflict took place. This conflict was the Battle of the Boyne. At this time, James II was the King of England. James was very headstrong, he tended to ignore his parliament, and make his decisions alone, but most importantly, James was Catholic. Many of the leading protestant nobles in England rebelled against James’ ruling, and eventually deposed him. They felt that by doing this, they were protecting themselves and their liberty. As James daughter was a protestant, she and her husband, William of Orange of the Netherlands, were asked to rule England instead.

        Meanwhile, James had fled to France, where Louis XIV was in reign. As well as being a very close friend of James II, he was a bitter enemy of William of Orange. Because of this, Louis supplies James with troops, ships and weapons to help him overthrow William and regain his throne.

        However, on his journey, James didn’t invade England straightaway, but landed in Ireland in March 1689. James felt that he would be able to gain support from the Irish citizens, as most of them were fellow Catholics, and further increase his strength. He set up a Parliament in Dublin to confiscate Protestant lands, and this initially worked well for James. He gained a lot of support, and only a small part of Ireland called North-West Ulster held effective resistance from James and his supporters, as they were Protestants, and were desperately awaiting help from William.

        James realised that the key to winning back his country was the city of Londonderry. As James approached the city, it almost fell without a fight. James thought he had gained victory almost effortlessly, and the commander of the city guard thought the situation was hopeless, until, at the very last moment, thirteen apprentice boys shut the gates of the city as James’ supporters approached. James and Williams troops then commenced battle at the River Boyne, which is a few miles west of Drogheda. Due to the name of the river, this battle became known as “The Battle of the Boyne”. The battle was fought on 1 July 1690 at a fordable river bend four miles west of Drogheda. The main body of William’s infantry was concentrated on fording the river at the village of Oldbridge. First, however, a detachment of cavalry and infantry made a flanking attack upstream, which forced James to divert troops to prevent his retreat being cut off. William's army was stronger by at least 10,000 men, but after these troops were drawn off he had three-to-one superiority in the main arena. By mid-afternoon James’ army was in retreat, outpaced by James himself, who rode to Dublin to warn the city of William's approach. He was in France before the month was out. On 6 July William entered Dublin, where he gave thanks for victory in Christ Church Cathedral. After a long, gruelling battle, James was defeated, and he quickly fled back to France.

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        This battle resulted in many consequences. The rivalry and hatred between the unsuccessful Catholics and the victorious Protestants grew, and this ultimately led to all the following disputes and disagreements. The “Penal Laws”, which the Protestant parliament passed in 1691, were also a huge consequence. In Ireland, the "Penal Laws" is the name given to the code of laws passed by the Protestant Parliament of Ireland which regulated the status of Roman Catholics through most of the eighteenth century. The declared purpose of the Irish Penal Laws was to take away any power that the Catholics had, both political and ...

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