The war ended on 30 March 1603. Hugh O'Neill submitted to Lord Deputy Mountjoy at Mellifont Abbey only to discover that Queen Elizabeth had died six days earlier. Five days after his submission came news that James VI of Scotland was to be proclaimed King James I of England and Ireland. According to Fynes Moryson, the publication of this proclamation was met with ‘joyfull acclamations… through the chiefe streets of Dublyn’. Reaction in other urban centres was considerably less enthusiastic and certainly less obedient.

One might have expected a collective sigh of relief from the Palesmen and their colleagues in other parts of the country. The constant threat of violence had eased, the need to support large numbers of unruly soldiers had diminished and, although the debased coin was still circulating, there must have been hope that regular trading would soon resume. What is more, like the defeated Confederates, many loyalist Old English Catholics erroneously assumed that the new King James had Catholic sympathies and that it would be safe to publicly practise Catholicism again. But no one was actually this optimistic. Even before the war had concluded Mountjoy anticipated serious problems. He opined: ‘The Nobility, Townes, and English-Irish, are for the most part as weary of the warre as any, but unwilling to have it ended, generally, for feare that uppon a peace, will ensue a severe reformation of Religion.’ He also fretted that ‘generally over all the Kingdome, [is] the feare of a persecution for Religion, the debasing of the Coyne… and a dearth and famine, which is already begunne, and must of necessity grow shortly to extremity; the least of which alone, have been many times sufficient motives to drive the best and most quiet estates into sudden confusion’. Mountjoy was correct: many Old English townsmen were frustrated by their hardships; they were anxious about their futures; and, having long done their bit for the crown, were now prepared to stand upon their rights.

The interregnum between the death of Elizabeth and the confirmation of James I brought with it a great deal of uncertainty because Elizabethan officials were left without a mandate until the new king confirmed or replaced them. Taking advantage of this power vacuum, between 11 April and 10 May 1603, fourteen towns in Leinster and Munster went into ‘revolt’.