After the Plantation of Ulster 1610, the Cromwellian Settlement in the 1650's,  and the Williamite Wars (1688-1691) Ireland was a devestated and defeated land. Following the Treaty of Limerick (1691) more than 30,000 people were exiled to France. In the following fifty years it is estimated that upwards of 450,000 Irishmen - the "Wild Geese"- died in the service of the French armed forces.

By the end of the 17th century Ireland was under the control of a new Protestant landowning elite who forcibly took control and ownership of almost all the land in Ireland and extended that control by excluding the Catholic and Dissenter population from the political and social structures of the country. Penal Laws introduced at this time were designed to isolate and marginalize native Irish people and others that remained outside the established Church of Ireland/England. The new Protestant landowning elite were intent on ensuring that…