Nicholas French

[1] The Confederates established their capital there, and with the collapse of Royal authority as a result of the British Civil Wars, became the de facto government of Ireland between 1642 and 1649.

[1] In 1646, a crisis emerged when Papal Nuncio Giovanni Battista Rinuccini opposed a settlement between the Confederates and the King's representative, James Butler, Marquess of Ormond.

[1][3] French and Plunkett assumed control of the Supreme Council and tried to promote a better peace treaty with the Royalists at the same time as a more vigorous prosecution of the war.

[citation needed] French deemed it prudent to leave Ireland in 1651, and he lived the rest of his life in continental Europe.

Only a "favoured minority" of Irish Catholic Royalists were returned the land confiscated from them by the Parliamentarians under the Act of Settlement 1662 and the public practice of Catholicism remained illegal.

[citation needed] In 1676, French published his attack on James Butler, entitled "The Unkinde Desertor of Loyall Men and True Friends," and shortly afterward "The Bleeding Iphigenia."

[2] In collaboration with Plunkett and Bologna-based Irish professor Niall Ó Glacáin, French wrote eulogistic poems in Latin to Pope Innocent X, titled Regni Hiberniae ad Sanctissimi Innocenti Pont.