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dron, who had fuffered fo much there, requested to have the fatisfaction of hanging them; and they accordingly did fo, and buried them in the barrack yard.

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The inhabitants of the town, to testify their concern for the fate of their fellow-traitors, clofed their doors and windows, and obferved a dead filence during the execu

tion.

Coffey, a captain, was taken up, and threatened to be whipped, but after a folemn invocation to the Almighty, declared his innocence. He still remained obdurate, after receiving seventy-five lafhes. Next morning, when he was on the point of receiving feventy-five more, he sent for general Dunn, and confeffed that he had been fworn, but denied that he had ever acted with the rebels, on which the general difmiffed him; and yet within a fortnight after, he was engaged in a committee of United Irishmen, and deeply concerned in a confpiracy to attack the king's troops at Philipftown and Tullamore, and had fworn his fon, a yeoman, to join in it. Having been convicted of thefe crimes, he was hanged, and buried in the stable of the barrack.

On the trial of Andrew Ryan, a fhopkeeper, it appeared in evidence, and which he acknowledged himself, that he had been a member of the fociety fince the year 1792, and that the object of it was to fubvert the exifting government. He must have meant the defenders, as the United Irishmen had not attempted to organize the King's county at that time.

By a court martial, held by orders of general Dunn, two men were convicted of swearing a perfon to be in readiness to attack Tullamore, and murder the proteftants. There was much difaffection among the popish yeomen in the King's county, Of eighteen papifts in the Dunkerrin cavalry, feventeen were fworn as United Irifhmen, and five of them were convicted of being concerned in robbing houfes of arms. Some or moft of the papifts in the Shinrone, Rofcrea, Caftleotway and Nenagh corps, were fworn to be true to the united caufe, though they had taken the oaths of allegiance.

An oath was framed by general Dunn, with a paragraph, importing, that they would furrender any arms in their poffeffion, and difcover fuch perfons as had any in their cuftody. But this produced no effect whatever, and no difcoveries were made, or arms yielded up, until fome of the notorious rebels, on being flogged, gave full informa

tion;

tion; and on this, great quantities of pikes were furrendered by thofe very perfons who had taken the above oath. A fhort time before the rebellion broke out, numbers of popish farmers ftrenuously urged to be admitted into the yeoman corps, for no other purpofe, as appeared afterwards, than to acquire arms and military difcipline; and some of them bought very good horfes, to induce the officers to prefer them to proteftants, who were not fo well mounted. It was obferved that the mafs of the people were very fober and difcreet for a confiderable time before the rebellion broke out, which arofe from their having taking an oath not to drink more than a naggin of whiskey in the course of the day.

*

A magiftrate, who lives in a country much fubject to tumult and difturbance, on the confines of the King's county and Tipperary, affured me, that no information had been fworn before him, for fome time previous to it.

It is obfervable that not a fingle inftance occurred of difloyalty in any of the protestant ycomen; at least I could not hear of fuch, after the most minute enquiry.

A fhort time before the general explofion, a printed letter, from the executive directory in Dublin, was dispersed in the King's county, recommending to the rebels to rife on a particular night, and to repair to Slievebloom mountain, where they would receive further orders.

Every thing that could incite or ftimulate the multitude to action, was mentioned in it; and to inflame them against the proteftants of the church of Ireland, whofe unfhaken loyalty was well known, it was faid the orangemen would rife and murder the Roman catholicks.

In the King's county the rebels never assembled but once, on the twentieth of Auguft, when they were to have been joined by their brethren of the Queen's county, and to have formed a camp at the Devil's-bit; but the latter having difappointed them, the former were foon difperfed by the Dunkerrin and Shinrone yeomen.

The mafs of the people in the King's and Queen's county are papifts; the gentlemen of landed property in general, and many of the farmers and fhopkeepers, are proteftants; there are but few prefbyterians in them. Though the state of the former was in general very alarming, the number of protestants in Rofcrea and its vicinity were fo great, and they were fo loyal and courageous, as to overawe the difaffected, and to reprefs their hopes of fucceeding in

James F. Rollerton, efquire

the

the infurrection there; and yet a numerous corps of United Irishmen was organized in and about that town.

The circumstances attending the rebellion in the Queen's county were exactly fimilar to thofe in the King's county, except that it was not fo well organized. Religious fanaticism was almost the only engine made use of by the directory to inflame the multitude in it; and the extirpation of proteftants, under the name of orangemen, was held out to them as an irrefiftible lure.

To disarm suspicion, and lull the magiftrates, oaths of allegiance were taken, and, as a matter of course, were afterwards violated; and there was much difaffection among the popish yeomen.

The infurrection was prevented in it by the following incident :

A meffenger was fent from the directory in Dublin, with a letter to a man of the name of Deegan, a leader of the United Irishmen, to fix the time for rifing; in a mistake, he went to a loyal perfon of the fame name, who entertained and plied him with drink; and in the mean time fent for a guard of foldiers, who conveyed him a prifoner to Stradbally, and he was afterwards hanged at Maryborough. Many murders and atrocities were committed in this county, and most of the proteftant houfes were plundered of arms, except fuch whofe inmates were able to des fend them.

The confpiracy in the county of Clare,

THE firft fymptoms of the confpiracy appeared in the county of Clare, in the fummer of the year 1797, when it was difcovered that at Ennis and in its vicinity, numbers of people had formed clubs and combinations, and had taken illegal oaths; but no certain proof was obtained of it till the month of October, when a countryman having attempted to fwear a gentleman's fervant in that town, his mafter perfuaded him to give information against the countryman; on which he was committed to goal. When he was arrefted, he threw away from him, for fear of difcovery, the conftitution and the test oath of the United Irishmen, printed on fine paper and with an excellent type. On his committal, he faid, that he would make a full difcovery of what he knew, but that he feared it would put his life in danger; having been affured of the contrary, he confefled that many perfons had come from Dublin for the purpose of forming allociations, which were cemented by oaths; and

that

that they wore green ribands, having embroidered on them in gold the harp without the crown, and the words, Erin go bragh, meaning "Ireland for ever." Among others he charged one Thady Griffy, a ferge weaver, with being very active in diffeminating the principles and doctrines of the United Irishmen. He was a canting hypocrite, who was engaged, and deeply verfed in the mysteries of the Carmelites, and affected an extraordinary fanctity and aufterity of manners, which he affumed as a cloak to conceal the most flagitious and turbulent principles. He was tried at the fpring affizes of 1798 at Ennis; but by the seduction of fome witneffes, the intimidation of others, and the puzzling of those who meant to declare the truth, by the gentlemen of the bar, he was acquitted, and immediately chaired by his rebellious friends, who in immenfe numbers celebrated their triumph over juftice by vociferous acclamations, and with all the wantonnefs of favage joy.

A number of ftrangers, who were all of the Carmelite order, went into the county of Clare in the year 1796, and fettled in the barony of Tullagh, on the borders of the county of Galway. The most part of them were weavers, and as they were very induftrious, and feemed to have a great purity of morals, conftantly recommending fobriety and good order to the multitude, the gentlemen of the country rejoiced at their arrival. Thus they continued to be protected, till the winter of the year 1798, when they began to hold fecret nightly meetings, to plunder the houfes of protestants, particularly the yeomen, of arms, and to cut down great quantities of young afh trees to make pike handles, and to employ the blacksmiths in making pikes. On the twelfth and thirteenth of January, 1799, they and the profelytes whom they initiated into the Carmelite order, to the number of feveral thoufands, affembled in the day at Milltown and Inniftimmon, and moved forward apparently with an intention of meeting the king's troops; but on their approach under general Meyrick, they fled to the mountains of Slievecullane, which are inacceffible; they pretended to furrender their arms, but it was well known that they kept the best, and the greater part of them. Soon after their rifing they houghed great quantities of cattle, for which compenfation was made to the fufferers by large fums of money levied by the grand jury on the county; they went with unparalleled affurance next day, to the places where they had committed these acts of favage cruelty, to carry

off

*

off the flesh of the poor animals that they had butchered the preceding night; and lamenting with diffimulation the perpetration of them, faid, as they are killed, we may as well as any other perfons carry home the meat. They killed fome of them which were not quite dead. Mr. Lyfaght was the only person & confideration concerned with them, and he engaged in the bufinefs merely from private resentment to individuals; he was tried, convicted and transported.

The parish priest of Kilfenora, of the name of Carrick, was committed on the following charge: That during the infurrection, a great number of thefe rebellious hypocrites were procceding in a body to plunder the houfe of Mr. Smith of Smithtown of arms, and that they were entertained by Carrick, who exhorted them to unite, and be zealous in the cause, as the French would foon land and give them ample affiftance. The profecutor who charged Carrick was kept in the guard-houfe of Ennis, where fome vagabonds pretending to make a riot, the guard rushed into the street to quell it, on which the informer made his efcape, according to a preconcerted scheme.

The magiftrates discovered at that time an itinerant Carmelite who feemed to be a high priest of that order; he had a long beard, and a cowl like the Capuchin friars, and a cloak which he hooked over his chin, and prevented, when he chofe, his beard from being feen; he had a long brown. fhirt which reached to the ground, and on the breast of it, there was the image of a coffin in white; he had one bag full of fcapulars which he fold to the befotted multitude, and another full of fhreds to make them; he had many little religious books, containing the most abominable fuperftitious doctrines, and which the priests conftantly circulate among their flock. He faid, that he went from one holy well to another, where he preached to a numerous auditory, who never failed to attend him. He had recently come from a holy well near Burren, where a great concourse of people affembled, under religious pretences, but in reality to promote rebellion. It appeared by fome papers found on him, that he was a Northern man, and had fled from near Belfast in confequence of having committed some crime. He was difcovered by a gentleman who over-heard him preaching to a number of people in a weaver's house, where he was inveighing against proteftants, and the government of Ireland. The magiftrates urged the parifh "

* They killed great numbers of them in the night.

priest

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