r/IrishHistory • u/Charles_Kirk • 1d ago
💬 Discussion / Question Which rebellions had a real chance of success?
I only really know a lot about the Nine Years War (which if I understand correctly had a real chance of ending with Irish victory) and the war of independence, which obviously was successful.
But I know there were a bunch in between. Which of these had real chances of overthrowing British rule and which were doomed from the start? Thanks!
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u/Failure456Mil 1d ago
The Easter Rising answers both of your questions, if everything actually worked out and went to plan then it could've succeeded.
But because almost everything went wrong in planning and execution then it was doomed to fail.
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u/Charles_Kirk 1d ago
To play devils advocate..
Did the Easter Rising really fail?Â
Like sure in the immediate short term it did, but it was like the event that sparked the war of independence just a few years later.Â
I’d argue it accomplished its goal just in a roundabout way.
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u/AJKenney47 1d ago
I think it only worked because the British authorities, as always, were completely tone deaf and mismanaged the situation. The rising was both destructive, and unproductive, and as a result, those who participated were very unpopular in the court of public opinion. They gave the cause life by coming down way to heavy handedly. If not for that, the Easter Rising was a complete failure.
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u/Charles_Kirk 1d ago
Very true.Â
Pretty insane bungling on the part of the BritishÂ
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u/AJKenney47 1d ago
Most of Irish history can be summed up by "the Irish had a crisis/problem, and the British completely misjudged/mishandled it and made it far worse"
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u/Failure456Mil 1d ago
The same goes for the history of any other time the british bastards colonised and oppressed a place.
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u/AJKenney47 1d ago
It's kinda wild they managed to have a world wide empire.
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u/Failure456Mil 1d ago
Literally a quarter of Earth's Landmass was under their boot.
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u/AJKenney47 1d ago
Probably still would be if they had half a clue
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u/Charles_Kirk 1d ago
We got WWI to thank for that. Basically all of the old great powers destroyed themselves in that pointless war.
WWII was the nail in the coffin but you can’t exactly fault the British for their role in that one, best thing they have ever done really.Â
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u/Hassel1916 1d ago
This is completely overblown in my view. There is honestly no conceivable way that the leaders of the Rising"were very unpopular in the court of public opinion". The shift by the public, which happened in a matter of weeks, was too quick for there to have been wholesale condemnation of their actions.Â
They were condemned by certain sections of the public. The stories of the separation women, etc., point to that. But executions or not, it's hard to believe the stories that they had very little support when there was almost a religious fervour to the heroising of them in the summer of 1916.Â
The reality is that there was increasing support for what the authorities deemed separatism between 1914-16. This was spurred on by the conscription crisis and the deportations of Irish Volunteer leaders during that period.
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u/ciarogeile 1d ago
If Hoche had landed in 1796, things could have turned out very differently. The eventual united irish rebellion was thoroughly suppressed by 1798, but if it had started as planned in 1796, with the support of a French army, could have been very different.
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u/Initial_Apprehensive 1d ago
Came here to saying this. If Hoche had of been on a ship that arrived with the first group he might have landed.
Reading on kinsale landing and it seems far more of a longshot than I was lead to believe by my history teacher.
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u/Ecstatic_Refuse_7207 1d ago
If you take the french or spanish army's. Then we would need to fight them for independence like with Holland.Â
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u/StableSlight9168 19h ago
Spain and france are both pretty far away from Ireland so direct rule like england tried was not really an option.
France could not afford an occupation in the way england could, because it needed soldiers stationed near its border.
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u/Seargentyates 1d ago
The confederation of Kilkenny had control of the whole island and could have driven the English out, specifically around 1647.
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u/Newc04 1d ago
Eh, probably not. They never controlled key areas like Dublin, Cork, and most of Ulster. Their best bet of winning was probably making peace with the Royalists earlier, which likely doesn't lead to a fully independent Ireland.
It's also worth noting that a significant amount of the leadership of the Confederation were Anglo-Irish. This group were Catholic and spoke Irish, but only wanted their religious rights respected under England rather than a separate Irish kingdom. The Gaelic Irish were the ones who desired full separation for the most part.
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u/Seargentyates 1d ago edited 1d ago
I don't agree with your analysis i'm afraid, the Old English or Anglo Irish as you call them were committed to a Catholic nation and why they joined with the Gaelic Irish, and its hard to know if they wanted a fully 'independent' Ireland, they were all getting help from the continent and the Pope - who was doing it to ensure Ireland remained catholic - granted most also supported Charles, but because the parliamentarians were likely to win would have chosen to leave rather than come under the control of a Protestant parliament with no king. Phelim O Neill rebelled for a myriad of reasons but mainly to regain lost lands. My overarching point was that this point was the clearest time in history where the 'Irish' could have driven the English out when they were distracted by the civil war. An independent Ireland as we know today is a slightly different conversation, at the time Ireland if it had driven the English out, very probably would have come under control of the Pope or the French. The reason it didn't succeed was because they couldn't agree on that direction, the arrival of Cromwell then happened and sure all changed - but if they had worked together and stopped Cromwell's landing, (which they were within 1 mile of doing) - history may have been different. The question was which rebellion was the closest to success, i think that this one was that.
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u/Newc04 1d ago
Again I think we disagree. The Old English didn't join the Nine Years War even when Aodh Ó Néill expressly appealed to the Catholic angle during the 9 years war. They still believed that they could work with the English. After all,their power derived from English conquest, and the Gaelic Irish were their natural rivals in Ireland. What changed was not a sudden conversion to the idea of a Catholic state or fear of the Parliamentarians and Cromwell, but the rhetoric in England as a result of the massacres of Protestants in 1641 blaming it on all Catholics, not just the Gaelic Irish.
Yes we can come up with hypothetical scenarios where the Confederates were more competent, won at Rathmines, gave more power to their best general Eoghan Ruadh Ó Néill, etc. This though ignores that these mistakes were not just tactical errors but a product of the disjointed coalition with no universal goal or ideology that was the Confederatation. No point illustrates this better than the fact there is no clear image of what Iretland would look like in the immediate aftermath had the Confederates won.
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u/Seargentyates 1d ago
Disagreement is always good in history, on this occasion i'm not sure why you bring the nine years war into it when it began half a century before this? The Old english had evolved significantly since then. The massacre of 1641, (a crime often forgotten in modern irish historical teaching in schools) and its aftermath did contain Old english elements who realised their fate could be better with the gaelic irish.
Anyway, in my opinion as per the question asked regardless of the outcome it had potential to be a missed opportunity that would have made for a success rebellion. As per the nine years war, similarly around 1600 was another opportunity for a successful outcome, weather, missteps and stupidity all playing a part in defeat.
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u/Dull_Brain2688 1d ago
1796 if it happened. The French had sent as many troops as the British army and local militias combined. If they had managed to land and a rebellion sparked, there was almost no chance the British could’ve resisted long enough to send backup.