Page images
PDF
EPUB

sion of the hill, and both armies spent the night in preparations for battle, which began on the morning of the thirteenth, when the town was set on fire by the king's troops. The action was maintained with little or no execution, the rebel cannon being small, and the shells from the royal army bursting in the air. At length the Monaghan militia, with two field-pieces, posted at the great gate, were attacked with such determined courage by the rebel pikemen, that they were obliged to fall back on the Hillsborough cavalry, who also retired in great confusion. The troops afterwards found means to rally, while the Argyleshire fencibles were making their attack on another quarter. The rebels, confused and distracted, retreated up the hill, and making a resolute stand at its summit, at a kind of fortification defended that post for a considerable time, but were at length compelled to give way in all directions, with the loss of their cannon and about two hundred men in killed and wounded.

The loss of the king's army in this engagement may have amounted to about forty, of whom two were officers, captain Evatt killed and lieutenant Ellis wounded.

The main body of rebels retreated to the mountains of Sleeve Croob, where they soon after separated and returned to their several homes. Some of the leaders were soon after apprehended and executed, and thus terminated this short and partial but active and vigorous insurrection.

On the eleventh of June the rebels made an attack upon the town of Portaferry, but were repulsed by a small party of yeomanry, under the command of captain Matthews, assisted by the fire of a revenue cruiser, commanded by captain Hopkins, with the loss of forty men.

"On the subsiding of this local rebellion in the north-eastern quarter of Ireland, another local rebellion, much inferior in vigour, and very easily suppressed, commenced in the opposite south-western quarter, in the county of Cork. Accompanied with the same kind of violent acts as elsewhere in the south, and exhibiting nothing extraordinary or peculiar, it requires little notice. The principal action, and the only one which government has thought proper to communicate to the public, L1

took place near the vilage of Ballynascarty, where, on the nineteenth of June, two hundred and twenty men of the Westmeath regiment of militia, with two six-pounders, under the command of their lieutenant-colonel, sir Hugh O'Reilly, were attacked on their march from Cloghnakilty to Bandon by a body of between three and four hundred men, armed almost all with pikes. This was only a part of the rebel force, here placed in ambush in a very advantageous position. The attack was made from a height on the left of the column, so unexpectedly and rapidly, that the troops had scarcely time to form; but the assailants were quickly repulsed with some loss, and retreated to the height. Here, if the soldiers had pursued them, from which they were with great difficulty restrained, they would probably have been surrounded and slaughtered like the North-Cork detachment at Oulart. While the officers were endeavouring to form the men again, a body of rebels were making a motion to seize the cannon, and another body made its appearance on the high grounds in its rear; but, at the critical moment, a hundred men of the Caithness legion, under the command of major Innes, who on their march to Cloghnakilty had heard the report of guns, came to their assistance, and by a brisk fire put the assailants to flight on one side, after which those who were on the heights behind retired on receiving a few discharges of the artillery. The loss of the rebels in this action may perhaps have amounted to between fifty and a hundred men; that of the royal troops, by the commander's account, only to a sergeant and a private."

During all this time the metropolis remained perfectly tranquil, except in cases of alarm within and accounts of hostilities in the country. Soon after the rebellion broke out, a number of gentlemen, apprehended as rebel leaders, in the city, were tried and executed, among whom were Henry and John Sheares.

Lord Cornwallis, who had been appointed lord lieutanant, made his entrance into Dublin on the twentieth of June, which was soon after left by lord Camden, who retired to England.

On the tenth of July a proclamation was published in the Dublin Gazette, offering a general pardon and protection to the insurgents, in case of their surrendering and returning to their

allegiance. This proclamation produced an agreement between government and the chiefs of the United Irish, by which the latter and all others who should avail themselves of the offer, including Mr. Oliver Bond, then under sentence of death, were to give every information concerning their transactions, and to quit the kingdom, on condition of being pardoned. The agree ment was signed on the twenty-ninth of July by seventy-three persons, and six of the principal leaders, among whom were Dr. M•Nevin, Thomas Addis Emmett, Arthur O'Connor, and Samuel Neilson, who gave details on oath in their examinations before the secret committees of both houses of parliament.

Notwithstanding this agreement, fifteen of the principal prisoners were detained in custody. Mr. Oliver Bond died suddenly in prison.

1

CHAPTER XIV.

WHILE government was led to conclude that this bloody and desolating civil war was completely quelled, the rebellion again burst forth in a quarter where it had been least of all expected, and where not the smallest sign of disaffection had appeared. We allude to the province of Connaught. This quarter, however, was roused to insurrection by the landing in the bay of Killalla, on the twenty-second of August, of eleven hundred French troops, including seventy officers, with a con siderable quantity of Arms, clothing, and ammunition, under the command of general Humbert. These were disembarked from three frigates, and formed only the vanguard of that army which afterwards fell a prey to a British squadron.

The garrison of the town of Killalla, consisting of only fifty men, thirty of whom were yeomen, the remainder a detachment of the Prince of Wales fencibles, after a spirited attempt to oppose the entrance of the French vanguard, between seven and eight o'clock of the evening of the twenty-second, were obliged to retreat with precipitation, having two of their number killed; and lieutenant Sills of the fencibles, captain Kirkwood of the yeomen, and nineteen privates taken prisoners.

"All opposition being now at an end," says the narrator* of what passed at Killalla after the landing of the French troops, "the French general marched into the castle yard at the head of his officers, and demanded to see Mons. l'Eveque. Very fortunately for his family, and, indeed, as it afterwards appeared, for the town and neighbourhood, the bishop was tolerably fluent in the French language, having in his youth had the advantage of foreign travel. Humbert desired him to be under no apprehension, himself and all his people should be treated with the most respectful attention, and nothing should be taken by the French troops but what was absolutely necessary for their support: a promise which, as long as those troops continued at Killalla, was most religiously observed, excepting only a small sally of ill humour or roughness on the part of the commander towards the bishop, which shall be related presently.

"In the midst of all his hurry in giving the necessary orders for landing the remainder of his force, and appointing their quarters, general Humbert found time that very evening to enter into a very long conversation with the bishop on the subject of his invasion, and the sanguine hopes he entertained of its speedy and complete success. Such a powerful armament was to be sent out without delay from the French ports, to second his primary adventure, that not a doubt could in reason subsist, but Ireland would be a free and happy nation, under · the protection of France, within the space of a month. A directory was immediately to be set up in the province of Connaught, some of the members of which were already appointed; but there was still a place for a person of the ability and consequence of the bishop of Killalla, if he chose to embrace the fortunate opportunity at once of serving himself and liberating his country. The bishop at that time made no answer except by a bow to the personal compliment; but when the application was afterwards seriously repeated to him in their common bed-chamber, by the two principal officers, Humbert and Serrasin, he smiled, and said he had taken too many oaths of allegiance to his sovereign to have it in his power to change.

Supposed to be the bishop of Killalla.

« PreviousContinue »