The Cessation of 1643 offered a number of immediate maritime benefits to the confederates and royalists in Ireland, allowing them to concentrate their military and naval war efforts against the parliamentarians in Ireland and elsewhere in the Three Kingdoms. The parliamentarian cause in Ireland thus in the short term suffered from the brokering of a truce. In particular the loss of access to ports put parliamentary naval forces on the back foot in the Irish Sea. In the following three years, much of the fighting that took place in the seas around Ireland or at outposts along the coast stemmed from the Cessation. The parliamentary navy could not prevent the transport of soldiers from Ireland to aid the king in England nor the surrender of Duncannon fort and Bunratty castle to the confederates in 1645 and 1646. In the longer term, however, many of the gains made by the royalists and confederates proved to be illusory as the parliamentary navy did enough to weather the storm.

September 1643–July 1644

The greatest gain to the confederate maritime cause from the Cessation came from the adherence of Duncannon fort and its governor Lord Esmond. Parliamentary men-of-war could no longer safely anchor below the fort and stop shipping from going to and from Waterford and New Ross. Port books from Waterford in this period suggest that a large volume of ships traded with the town from a range of foreign ports.