The Elizabethan conquest of Ireland The 1590s crisis [Paperback]

This book is about the impact of the Nine Years' War on central and local government and society in the English and Welsh shires in the 1590s. It contains fascinating new insights into the centrality of Ireland to England's problems in the crucial last decade of Elizabeth I's reign.

However, this is in no sense a conventional military history, but rather a history of the social impact of the war and the strains it put upon the Elizabethan government. Based on painstaking primary research, it also covers the recruitment of levies for Ireland, their shipping, their service in Ireland and the limited extent of aftercare given to the sick and the wounded. The book therefore helps towards an understanding of why the Elizabethan conquest took so long to complete and why it proved to be more severe than at first intended.

List of tables

Preface

Acknowledgements

Abbreviations

Part one: Men and arms for the Nine Years' War

1. Background to the Nine Years' War

2. The machinery for the Irish war

3. The demands of the war on the shires of England and Wales

4. Military levies raised form Kent, 1594-1602

5. Levies to Ireland from the maritime shires of Lancashire and Cheshire, 1594-1602

Part II: Embarkation and transportation of troops to the Irish war

6. Chester, the chief military port for the Irish service in the 1590s

7. Bristol, Barnstaple and other western ports in the service of the Irish war

Appendix: Ships in the service of the Irish war

Part III: Elizabethan military service in Ireland

8. The maintenance of the army

9. The Elizabethan soldier at war

10. Casualties and welfare measures for the sick and wounded of the Nine Years' war

Conclusion

Select bibliography

Index

John McGurk is Associate Professor at the University of Ulster