I've been looking at the events of 1688 - and this is an interesting panic that gripped the UK.
Irish Fright
The
Irish Fright was a
mass panic that took place in England in December 1688, during the
Glorious Revolution. It accompanied the final days of King
James II's regime after his initially thwarted attempt to flee into exile in France. Troops of the
Jacobite Irish Army
were stationed in England to prop up James II's authority but were
widely detested by the predominately Protestant population of England.
Rumours began to circulate in mid-December that the Irish soldiers
were preparing to carry out a campaign of massacre and pillage against
the English population in revenge for James's overthrow. False reports
of the Irish burning English towns and massacring inhabitants spread the
panic rapidly from London to at least nineteen English counties, whose
inhabitants formed armed militias to guard against supposed Irish
marauders. The panic subsided after a few days. It was never determined
who was responsible for sparking it, though contemporaries suspected
that it may have been the work of
Orangist sympathisers seeking to further discredit James II