Connacht
and Clare were chosen for this transplantation because they were
surrounded by water except for a ten mile stretch of land which
would be protected by a series of forts. Members of the English
military would settle in a one mile perimeter, called The Mile
Line, around Connacht and Clare "to confine the transplanted
and to cut them off from relief by sea."
The
resident landowners of Connacht and Clare also came within the
category of transplanter. Their land holdings were reduced and
they were often transplanted from one parish to another where
the native landowners would regard them as enemies.
There
were three categories of transplanter; proprietors, tenants and
landless. The proprietors would have lands assigned to them corresponding
in quality to those they had left.
The
tenants would be assigned land as tenants of the state in proportion
to the number and kind of livestock they brought with them. A
horse would fetch four acres of land, while a cow would bring
three.
The
landless were allowed to settle on state-owned land on the provision
that they were not within ten miles of the Shannon.
The
last adventurer was settled on 1 May 1659 marking the end of the
Cromwellian Plantations. The Roman Catholics owned about three-fifths
of Ireland before the Irish Rebellion of 1641. By the 1680's,
they had lost all but one-fifth of it.
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