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Wars Of The Three KingdomsThe Wars of the Three Kingdoms were an intertwined series of conflicts that took place in Scotland, Ireland, and England between 1639 and 1651 at a time when these countries had come under the personal rule of the same monarch. The wars were the outcome of tensions between king and subjects as to whether religion was under the monarch or a direct relationship with God, and to what extent the king's rule was constrained by parliaments. They included the Bishops' Wars of 1639 and 1640, the Scottish Civil War of 1644-5; the Irish Rebellion of 1641, Confederate Ireland, 1642-9 and the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland in 1649; and the English Civil Wars of 1642-6, 1648-9 and 1650-51. These linked conflicts were named the Wars of the Three Kingdoms by recent historians aiming to have a unified overview rather than treating some of the conflicts as background to the English Civil War. Some have described them as the British Civil Wars, but this can be misleading as the kingdoms did not become a single political entity until the Act of Union 1800. Alternate meanings: Three Kingdoms (disambiguation) Background Since 1541 monarchs of England had also ruled the Kingdom of Ireland through a separate Irish Parliament, while Wales was made part of the Kingdom of England. With the Reformation the king made himself head of the Protestant Church of England and Roman Catholicism was outlawed in England and Wales, but remained the religion of most people in Ireland. In the separate Kingdom of Scotland the Protestant Reformation was a popular movement led by John Knox. The Scottish Parliament legislated for a National Presbyterian church, the Presbyterian Church of Scotland, and the Catholic Mary, Queen of Scots, was forced to abdicate in favour of her son James VI of Scotland. He grew up under a regency disputed between Catholic and Protestant factions, then took power and aspired to be an "universall King" favouring the English Episcopalian system of bishops appointed by the king. In 1584 he introduced bishops, but met vigourous opposition and was forced to concede that the General Assembly running the Kirk should also continue. Calvinists reacted against the formal liturgy of the Book of Common Order moving increasingly to extempore prayer, though this was opposed by an Episcopalian faction. James remained Protestant, taking care to maintain his hopes of succession to the English throne, and duly also became James I of England in 1603 and moved to London. His diplomatic and political skills were now fully engaged in dealing with the English Court and Parliament at the same time as running Scotland by writing to the Scottish Privy Council and controlling the Scottish Parliament through the Committee of Articles. He stopped the General Assembly from meeting, then increased the number of Scottish Bishops and in 1618 held a General Assembly and pushed through Five Articles of Episcopalian practices which were widely boycotted. In 1625 he was succeeded by his son Charles I who was less skilful or restrained and was crowned in St Giles Cathedral, Edinburgh, in 1633 with full Anglican rites. Opposition to his attempts to enforce Anglican practices reached a flashpoint when he introduced a Book of Common Prayer. Charles shared his father's belief in the Divine Right of Kings and his arrogant assertion of this led to a serious break between Charles and his English Parliament. While the Church of England remained dominant, a powerful Puritan minority who made up around one third of the members of Parliament had much in common with the Presbyterian Scots. - See also the English Civil War (Background).
Main events - 1637: Charles attempts to impose Anglican services on the Presbyterian Church of Scotland, Jenny Geddes starts riots
- 1638: Signing of the National Covenant.
- 1639: Conflict between Covenanter and Royalists in Scotland which began with the Covenanters seizing the City of Aberdeen in February
- 1639: The Bishops' War Charles brings his troops into Scotland but decided not to attack but negotiate instead. The Treaty of Berwick is signed — peace agreement between the Scottish army and Charles I in June
- 1640 The English Short Parliament is recalled in order for Charles to obtain money to finance his military struggle with Scotland
- 1640: The Second Bishops' War or 'Second War of the Covenant' broke out in August. An army of Covenanters crossed the Tweed and overran the English force at the Battle of Newburn marching on the city of Newcastle.
- 1640: The Treaty of Ripon left Newcastle in Scots hands who received a large tribute from Charles.
- 1640-1660 The English Long Parliament convenes in November as Charles needs to raise finances after being bankrupted by the cost of the Bishops' Wars
- 1641 Irish Rebellion (also know as the Irish Rising). Alliance of Ulster Catholics and the Old English to form the Catholic Confederation who won a battle against Crown forces at Julianstown Bridge near Drogheda in December
- 1642 A Protestant Scots army is sent by the Covenanters to Ulster to defend the Protestant plantations.
See Also External Links - The British and Irish Civil Wars article by Jane Ohlmeyer who argues that the English Civil War was just one of an interlocking set of conflicts that encompassed the British Isles in the mid-seventeenth century
Further Reading British Isles - John Kenyon and Jane Ohlmeyer (eds.), The British and Irish Civil Wars. A Military History of Scotland, Ireland and England 1638-1660 (Oxford University Press, 1998)
- The Civil War: The Wars of the Three Kingdoms 1638-1660 by Trevor Royle (2004)
- Martyn Bennett, The Civil Wars in Britain and Ireland (Blackwell)
- Martyn Bennett, The Civil Wars Experienced: Britain and Ireland 1638-1661 (Routledge)
- Charles Carlton, The Experience of the British Civil Wars 1638-1651 (Routledge)
- John R. Young (ed.), The Celtic Dimensions of the British Civil Wars (John Donald)
Scotland - Scottish Covenanters and Irish Confederates: Scottish-Irish Relations in the mid Seventeenth Century by David Stevenson (Belfast, 1981)
Ireland - Reformation and the Wars of the Three Kingdoms in Ireland: The Mission of Rinuccini, 1645-49 by Tadhg hAnnrachin (Oxford, 2001)
- Confederate Catholics at War, 1642-1649 by Pdraig Lenihan (Cork, 2001)
- Confederate Ireland, 1642-49: A Constitutional and Political Analysis by Michel Siochr (Dublin, 1999)
- Kingdoms in Crisis: Ireland in the 1640s by Michel Siochr, ed. (Dublin, 2000)
- The Outbreak of the Irish rebellion of 1641 by Michael Perceval-Maxwell (Dublin, 1994)
- Scottish Covenanters and Irish Confederates: Scottish-Irish Relations in the mid Seventeenth Century by David Stevenson (Belfast, 1981)
- Cromwell in Ireland by James Scott Wheeler (1999)
England - G.E. Aylmer, Rebellion or Revolution? England 1640-1660 (Oxford University Press)
- Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down (Temple Smith, Penguin)
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