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 The citizens of Dublin were the only considerable body of Catholics who had never done anything against the Parliament. Up to 1647 they had been under the authority of the King's Lord Lieutenant, Ormond, but had never been in collision with the parliamentary forces. Ormond in his negotiations in 1646 and 1647 for the surrender of Dublin and his other garrisons to the parliament endeavoured to secure guarantees that the Catholics who had been under his protection should be secured from molestation. But he does not seem to have been able to get any definite pledge from the parliament. When Jones took possession of Dublin in 1647, it would appear that he expelled many of these Catholics who for six years had been fighting against their own countrymen and co-religionists. Those not so expelled were forced to take leases of their own houses from the republican soldiers. It was now provided that holders of such leases were to keep them.

In the rest of Ireland, according to Sir William Petty, twenty-six Catholic landowners, owning between them 40,000 acres (i.e. 80,000 English acres) proved Constant Good Affection. Almost the only considerable person among them was the Knight of Kerry, whose lands, largely bog and mountain, must have accounted for a very large proportion of the 40,000 acres.