Among the gentlemen whom history has been pleased to gibbet for his share in these transactions was Mr. Thomas Judkin Fitzgerald, the High Sheriff of Tipperary. It was in Tipperary, the old home of the Whiteboys, that the intending insurgents had shown their colours with the most daring effrontery. When Abercrombie was seen to be hesitating, a town in Tipperary was occupied and plundered of arms in open day by a thousand rebel horse. In another town there a regiment of Yeomanry had been surrounded, and had been driven to apply for succour to save it from destruction. No slight courage was required to disarm Tipperary, nor was the disarming an easy matter when there was courage to undertake it. The High Sheriff was a Uniacke by birth. His father took the name of Fitzgerald. He is likely, therefore, to have been a relation of Mr. Uniacke, who had just been assassinated, with his wife and Colonel St. George. This gentleman did, by decisive measures, effectually break the insurgent organisation in Tipperary, so that when the rebellion came the most dangerous county in Ireland lay motionless. They were not gentle measures. He used the whip freely, and he made one mistake which was not forgotten. A man named Wright, at Clonmel, was suspected of connection with the United Irishmen. The suspicion in all likelihood was well-founded. On searching him a letter was found in his pocket, in French. Fitzgerald did not understand the language, but his mind, like that of everyone else, was full of the expected French invasion. The letter, though utterly innocent, was treated as an evidence of guilt, and Wright was severely flogged. He prosecuted the High Sheriff afterwards, and recovered 500l. as damages. CHAP. III. 1798. April. IX. 1798. April. BOOK Fitzgerald has been rewarded with a black name in Irish legend and with the scorn of foolish historians. He was rewarded, also, by the knowledge that by his general nerve and bravery he had probably saved at least ten thousand lives; and the English Government, though generally too proud to remember good service in Ireland, yet so far acknowledged Fitzgerald's merit that they paid his fine and created him a baronet. Had Abercrombie acted at once when first required by Camden to set the troops in motion, there would have been time to have made the disarmament complete, and Irish history would have been unstained by the bloody scenes which will have immediately to be described. Lake, however, had but a month. He succeeded in crippling the rebellion. He could not prevent it. His progress was attended, of course, by renewed outcries from the English Opposition and by yells from the incendiary press of Ireland. Grattan accused the Ministers of sounding the horrid trumpet of carnage and desolation, of encouraging the army to murder the Irish; of being in league with the Orange boys, and at war with the people. It might have been happier for Ireland and for England also if Camden had taken Portland's advice, and frankly adopted the Orange boys. He had himself confessed that of all subjects of the Crown they were the most to be relied upon. He stopped short of the measure which would have given him the absolute command of the insurrection. Within the limits which he had prescribed to himself he went on upon his way undiverted by clamour. By the 3rd of May he was able to report that large quantities of arms had been given up, and an evident impression made on the deluded wretches' who had infected the kingdom.1 A week later he could say that there was a cessation of murders. Before the proclamation of the 30th of March 'not a mail had arrived without accounts of savage cruelties or extensive pillage;' 'now he had the satisfaction to think that at least the lives of the loyal and well-disposed had been protected.' 'But there is still,' he added, 'much to be done. There are great combinations to break. General Dundas has made much impression in Kildare, where the treason was more organised than elsewhere.2 After the first measures of severity were adopted there was an appearance of contrition; but messages came from Dublin advising them to hold out ten days, when they should have help. Great numbers of arms, however, have been delivered up. In Queen's County and Tipperary there is great improvement. Wicklow is very extensively and very formidably organised. The mountains are depôts of arms and ammunition. The active and severe measures pursued in the country have driven many persons into Dublin. The fear of detection, the delay in the arrival of the French, together with the ill-disposition of those who have been obliged to fly the country, many imagine will induce the rebels to attempt an insurrection in the city. Orders have gone round to the people to be ready.' 1 Camden to Portland, May 3.' 2 Owing, as Lord Cornwallis afterwards admitted, 'to the fostering hand of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, and the countenance which it received from his weak brother of Leinster.'-' Cornwallis to General 3 Camden to Portland, May 11.' CHAP. III. 1798. May. BOOK 1798. May. SECTION VI. THE revolutionary chiefs understood the temper of their countrymen. They knew that whenever authority asserted itself the disposition of the Irish people was to submit. The arms, so carefully collected, were being swept away. Confidence was failing. If they waited longer, their boasts that they could bring into the field hundreds of thousands of men might turn to scandalous nothingness. Lord Edward Fitzgerald had never left Dublin. Neilson, Tone's friend, one of those who had registered the vow on McArt's Hill, was in Dublin also. The vacant places on the Committee had been filled with other daring and desperate men; among them were two young barristers, named John and Henry Sheares, sons of a merchant at Cork, who had been at Paris in the early days of the Revolution, and had been infected with the prevailing enthusiasm. They resolved to act, and to act at once, and Edward Fitzgerald designed a plan. The Government was watching their movements. Another informer had now tendered his services-a Captain Armstrong, an officer in a militia regiment quartered outside the capital at Lehaunstown. Captain Armstrong happened one day to enter a bookseller's shop in Grafton Street. The bookseller, whose name was Byrne, led by Armstrong's loose talk to suppose he was on the insurgent side, told him that something of consequence was immediately to be done, and offered to introduce him to two of the leaders. Armstrong consulted his Colonel, who ordered him to affect sympathy, accept the introduction, and learn what he could. On the 10th of May, the day preceding the date of Camden's last letter, Armstrong met John Sheares and his brother in the back room behind Byrne's shop, and the reason immediately appeared for their anxiety to secure his help. They told him that Dublin was about to rise. Dublin Castle, the camp at Lehaunstown, and the artillery barracks were to be simultaneously surprised. Many men in Armstrong's company were prepared to desert to the insurgents. He was entreated to use his influence with the Catholic non-commissioned officers to spread the spirit, and was told that if he could bring over the regiment he would be called the saviour of his country. With the help of Armstrong the Castle was exactly informed, and the conspirators were suddenly astonished by the announcement that Dublin, like the provinces, was to be disarmed, and by an offer of a thousand pounds reward for the discovery of Lord Edward Fitzgerald. Major Swan, who had arrested the Committee, with Major Sirr and Captain Ryan, instituted an instant search for pikes and muskets. Five cannon were taken in a brewer's yard in King Street, four others at a house in Townshend Street. Stores of arms of all kinds were found concealed about the Custom-house Quay. A blacksmith and his journeyman were caught forging pikes. The journeyman, threatened with the whip, told where pikes already made had been hidden, and many cartloads were thus seized. Still Dublin was too well pro ''Trial of Henry and John Sheares.'-State Trials, vol. 27. III. 1798. May. |