BOOK 1798. SECTION X. So passed the night of the 20th of June in Wexford. General Lake, meanwhile, had completed his last June 21. dispositions, and Vinegar Hill was to be stormed at daybreak. It was creditable to the skill and spirit of the Irish that preparations so elaborate had been found necessary. The rebels of '98 were at least in earnest. They did not, like their degenerate modern representatives, dissolve like a mist at the touch of the policeman's staff. The different divisions arrived duly at their allotted stations. Dundas and Loftus lay that evening at Solsborough, on the Slaney, two miles above Enniscorthy. Needham had reached Oulart Hill. Johnstone was on Ballymakessy Bridge. At dawn they severally advanced; and if the professed design had been carried out, Needham would have occupied the road to Wexford, and the net would have been closed on every side. From an unexplained cause the orders of the day in this one direction were not carried out, and one opening, called afterwards Needham's Gap, was left. It was whispered afterwards that the mistake was intentional, lest too terrible a vengeance might fall on the wretched beings who had been guilty of crimes so atrocious. If this was the reason, it was misplaced leniency. Nothing but some decisive and overwhelming evidence of the consequences of a rebellion carried out in the spirit which had been shown in Wexford would ever convince the Irish of the hopelessness of measuring I. 1798. strength with England, or prevent a repetition of CHAP. the same folly when opportunity seemed again to offer itself. Never had the villanous elements of June 21. the Irish population gathered themselves into form with more deliberation, or could have been taken at a time when the nature of their crimes would have made acknowledgment of sympathy with them impossible. Justice would, in the long run, have been found equivalent to mercy, and a stern example made them on Vinegar Hill might have spared Ireland the scenes of barbarity which for two years continued to disgrace her population, and might have extinguished possibly for centuries or for ever the infatuated dreams of an impossible independence which still work like poison in her veins. Subordinate officers, however, cannot be expected to discharge duties as painful as they are serious and stern when they are uncertain of support from authority. General Lake was well aware of the irresolution of the Cabinet, and, with the natural humanity of a brave man, he was perhaps glad to be spared the necessity of adding fresh horrors to a war already savage beyond modern experience. upon At sunrise on the 21st the columns closed in the Irish camp. Dundas's and Loftus's divisions. came down the east bank of the Slaney, spread over a front of almost a mile, and as they approached the hill formed round it at various points from the north to the south-east. Johnstone came up simultaneously from Ballymakessy. The rebels held Enniscorthy in force, and Johnstone's duty was to drive them out and take possession of the bridge before the general attack commenced. A second time within three weeks the little town of Enniscorthy became the BOOK X. 1798. June 21. scene of a desperate and bloody engagement. Only after two hours of severe fighting, Enniscorthy was taken, the bridge secured, and the rebel garrison forced back over it to their friends on the hill. It was now seven in the morning. The rebel army, sixteen thousand strong, was drawn up on the open ground on the brow. Their guns, thirteen in all, of various sorts and calibre, were at the windmill. General Lake, with Dundas, attacked on the east side; Sir James Duff, with part of Loftus's division, on the north-west, from the bank of the river; Loftus himself was between them. On these three sides they forced their way simultaneously up the slope. The rebels held their ground for an hour and a half with moderate firmness. Lake's horse was killed under him early in the action. Father Clinch, of Enniscorthy, an enormous man, on a tall white horse, specially distinguished himself. But successive defeats had cooled the courage which had been so eminent at Arklow and New Ross. There was no longer the contempt of death which will make even the least disciplined enemy formidable. Lord Roden singled out Father Clinch and killed him. The rebels were afraid of being surrounded; and seeing the southern side of the hill still open, they fled down it, and escaped through Needham's gap to Wexford, from the scene of their brief and wild supremacy. The army rested for the day on the ground, burying the dead and examining, with ever-gathering indignation, the traces of the butcheries which had been perpetrated there. The rebels, with their surviving generals, Father John, once invincible, now twice beaten, and savage in his despair, John Hay, Edward Fitzgerald, and Father Kerne, I. 1798. streamed away down the east side of the Slaney. CHAP. Some crossed the river at Carrick Ferry, three miles above Wexford; some went on to the bridge, and June 21. rushed mad and furious into the town, threatening vengeance on every Protestant still in their hands. It would have gone hard with the prisoners there; but on the other side General Moore was coming on from Taghmon. Two hours at most would bring him to the gates. Bishop Caulfield and his priests were energetic enough now to prevent a renewal of the murders. If Moore came up when such work was going forward, the town might pay for it as it paid before. They turned out into the streets, exhorting, praying, threatening, imploring the armed insurgents to leave the town while there was time, and to give no fresh provocation to the soldiers. The cause, they said, was plainly lost for the present. Lord Kingsborough had promised that life and property should be respected, if no more blood was shed. For the sake of Ireland, for the sake of their holy religion, for the sake of all they held dear in earth or heaven, they besought the rebels to spare the city the risk of being stormed and sacked by the bloody Orangemen. Their prayers prevailed, and in prevailing left them with the less excuse for their apathy on the preceding day. Towards sunset part of the rebels filed back over the bridge out of the town. Dixon and his wife, on horseback, threw themselves in their way, praying them to stay at least till they had despatched the remaining prisoners. They were borne away the crowd, the woman screaming, 'We shall conquer yet: my Saviour tells me we must conquer.' These wretches went north to Gorey, where they committed a frightful massacre on the unfortunate Protestant in BOOK 1798. June 21. inhabitants who, imagining themselves safe in the rear of the army, had returned to their homes. Thence, breaking into smaller parties, they made for the Wicklow mountains. The rest, the remainder mainly of the army which had fought at Vinegar Hill, rallying under the indefatigable Father John, slipped away behind General Moore, who had halted two miles from the town, and made their way over the Barrow into Kilkenny, carrying havoc and destruction along with them. Moore, in the twilight, entered Wexford after they had all left it. The scene was described 'as most affecting.' 'The windows were crowded with women who had been expecting massacre.' The prisoners in the gaol heard, in the noise of the approaching troops, the summons as they supposed to death upon the bridge. When the door was thrown open they saw the King's uniform, and knew that they were saved. At three o'clock the following morning (June 22nd) the trumpet sounded in Lake's camp on Vinegar Hill. Before the army began its march for Wexford, Edward Hay1 and Captain Macmanus, the bearers of the proposals of the townsmen to submit on conditions, were brought into Lake's presence. They had failed to find Needham, to whom they were commissioned. They had gone on to Enniscorthy, and were carried before the Commander-in-Chief. It was not then known that Moore was in the town. They delivered their message. Lake replied briefly that he would make no terms with rebels in arms against their Sovereign. He required instant and unconditional surrender. If 1 The historian of the Rebellion. |