Conference on Ulster Plantation

The conference is hosted by the People of the Ulster Plantation Database project, a. research project jointly managed by Queen’s University Belfast and Maynooth University. Access to the project’s database is free at https://ulster-settlers.maynoothuniversity.ie/.

The conference will bring together experts on the Ulster plantation who will present the most up to date research on the colonial project. The programme also includes a presentation of the database and how it can be used to trace men and women who came to Ulster in the first half of the seventeenth century.

Funding for the database project was provided by the Hunter Foundation, which was established by the Royal Irish Academy in memory of the late Robert John (Bob) Hunter (1938-2007). Bob Hunter was a renowned historian of the Ulster plantation. His research focussed on the people who came to live in the north of Ireland in the first half of the seventeenth century. In the opening presentation of the conference, Dr William Roulston of the Ulster Historical Foundation will discuss Bob Hunter’s research on the plantation.

Admission to the conference is free. Attendees should register here.

Image above, Enniskillen Castle, County Fermanagh.

Programme

11.00 am - 12.30 pm:

Dr William Roulston (Ulster Historical Foundation): ‘R J Hunter and Plantation Studies’

Professor Tom O’Connor (Maynooth University): ‘Introduction to the Database and its Possibilities’

Dr Robin Usher (Queen’s University Belfast): ‘Sources and Life Stories Traceable Through the Database’

Chair: Professor Mary O’Dowd (Queen’s University Belfast)

12.30 pm - 1.15 pm: Lunch Provided

1.15 pm - 2.45 pm:

Andrew Kane (Ulster Historical Foundation): ‘Mapping the Ulster Plantation Estates’

Dr Annaleigh Margey (Dundalk Institute of Technology): ‘Maps and the Plantation’

Dr David Heffernan (Independent Researcher): ‘Beyond the Crown Surveys: Estate Records for the Ulster Plantation, c. 1609 – 1641’

Chair: Dr William Roulston (Ulster Historical Foundation)

2.45 pm - 4.00 pm:

Ian Montgomery (Ulster Historical Foundation): ‘Adapt to Survive, the Earls of Antrim in the Plantation Era’

Dr Brendan Scott (Irish Family History Foundation): ‘Ulster’s Plantation Towns: An Appraisal’

Chair: Professor Peter Gray (Queen’s University Belfast)

With thanks to the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland and the Hunter Foundation, Royal Irish Academy for their support for the conference