CHAPTER IV.

FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF HOSTILITIES TO THE LANDING OF KING JAMES IN IRELAND.

Tyrconnell, seeing that a civil war could no longer be averted in Ireland, bitterly regretted the loss of those troops that he had sent to England. A few well-equipped regiments: those of Mountcashel, Clancarty, Lord Antrim, Lord Bellew, and his own, about three thousand,—were all that remained in the country. Men by thousands daily presented themselves for enrollment, but they were destitute of every thing that constitutes the soldier, "excepting courage and good will," and he had neither money nor arms to equip them. The Williamite organization grew more powerful and extended, day by day. Along with the province of Ulster, it soon embraced the counties of Longford, Meath, and Dublin; its leaders, in the mean time, feigning to treat with Tyrconnell, while privately soliciting arms and succors from the Prince of Orange. Tyrconnell at last determined to make a final appeal to the country, and for this purpose issued colonels' commissions to the heads of the old Catholic houses and the loyal Palesmen of Leinster. The effect was electric. With a common impulse they rushed to his standard, and threw the wrecks of their former fortunes in the balance. In a short time, the regiments of McMahon, O'Reilley, MacDonnell, Maguinness, Maguire, O'Donnell, Nugent, Loutrell, Fitzgerald, Felix O'Neil, Gordon O'Neil, Cormac O'Neil, Bryan O'Neil, Sir Neale O'Neil, Clare, Galway, O'Moore, O'Dempsey, and others were in the field, to the number of 20,000, nearly all recruited from their respective households.

But the people having been long deprived of the right to bear arms, were necessarily unprovided with them, and the state to which the country had been reduced by the misgovernment and oppression of the last forty years, rendered them unable to provide any other than the rudest weapons, hastily improvised. They had, therefore, to be armed and provisioned at the individual expense of their leaders, and it was found impossible to equip and sustain the multitudes that presented themselves for service. The murmurs of the people were loud and deep, but there was no remedy. The organizations of the Council, all well armed, and supplied with the necessaries of war, were wide-spread throughout the country, and were levying, in the name of the Prince of Orange, on the Catholic people of Ulster, and even the eastern and southern provinces had to yield to their exactions. Notwithstanding all this, thousands had to be dismissed to their unprotected homes, with promises that a little time would remove those difficulties. It was represented, as it was indeed believed by all, that an immense armament was fitting out in France, to accompany the king, who was daily expected to arrive; that his presence would rectify every thing, and afford them the means and opportunity of giving active proof of their patriotism; and with these promises, though chafing at delay, they retired to watch the current of events, and bide the arrival of their king. The new regiments were reduced to a limited standard of about 250 each, so that 12,000 men, including those already enrolled, were rendered fit for service, and with this force Tyrconnell opened the campaign of 1689.

Carrickfergus and Charlemont in the north, and all the forts on the Shannon, from Lough Allen to the estuary, were still in the possession of the Irish, and each had to be reinforced and put in a better state of defence: the town of Kilkenny, and the cities of Cork and Waterford, had each to receive its quota of troops; Dundalk, an important seaport, had to be secured against the excursions of the insurgents of Monaghan and Armagh; and the metropolis could not dispense with the few veteran regiments that had been stationed there since the inauguration of the deputy. After the distribution of his forces among these posts, Tyrconnell found at his disposal a small army of 6,000 men available for the field, and, dividing it into three corps, he gave the command of one to Lieutenant-General Justin McCarthy, to operate in Munster, where Inchiquin had raised the standard of revolt; one to Lieutenant-General Richard Hamilton, for the reduction of the rebel garrisons from Dundalk to Derry; and another, a co-operative force of about 1,000 men, was placed under Lord Galmoy, to give countenance to the outlying posts around Cavan and Enniskillen.—The limits prescribed these pages preclude a detailed account of these expeditions, although each presents some of the most striking and agreeable events of that period. McCarthy, at the head of 2,000 regulars and a few hundred followers, reduced, in a few days, the rebels of Castle-Martyr and Bandon, and turning his attention to Inchiquin, who was plundering and laying waste the country, from the Shannon to the Blackwater, he drove him back on his stronghold in Clare, and marched uncontrolled from the Fergus to the Barrow. The Williamites of Munster, surprised by these events and the rapidity of their execution, laid down their arms, returned to their homes, and all apprehension of future trouble in that quarter was at an end:—for this important service McCarthy henceforth received the title of "Pacificator of Munster."

When the rumor of William's conspiracy first became known to the Earl of Tyrconnell in the preceding year, he sent General Hamilton, as already indicated, with about four thousand men, for the service of James in England. After the invasion of William this force was either slain, dispersed, or forced into his service, and their general, contrary to the usages of war, and to the terms accorded to the other adherents of the king, was detained a prisoner. Being an Irish gentleman by birth, of great family influence, and one of the best cavalry officers of his time, William saw in him one who, if weaned from his allegiance to the king, would be a powerful agent of success to his designs on Ireland, and accordingly, 'tis said, made overtures to that effect. History, however, is not clear as to the nature of these proposals, nor of the manner in which they were met by Hamilton. This much at least is known, that he was released from captivity, was sent with proposals of an accommodation to Tyrconnell, but on arriving in Ireland he urged the most determined opposition to William, and was appointed to lead the expedition against the rebellion in Ulster.

Leaving Drogheda on the 8th of March, with a force of about two thousand men, he marched through Dundalk and Newry, and on the 13th took up a position between Loughbrickland and the river Bann, and sent out Colonel Butler to take a reconnoissance of the enemy, said to be in force between him and the Laggan. The service was one of extreme peril, and required the utmost courage and address:—he was in the midst of a mountainous country, surrounded by a wary foe, and the slightest misconduct on his part, was sure to result in the capture or destruction of the main body.

The task was, however, performed to the satisfaction of the general: the enemy were found strongly intrenched at Dromore-Iveagh, on the north side of the Laggan, to the number of 8,000 men, under the command of Hugh Montgomery, Lord Mount Alexander. It was soon decided to attack them; so breaking camp with the dawn, on the morning of the 14th, Hamilton crossed the Bann and advanced boldly on their position. The cavalry regiment of Montgomery advanced to meet him, but after the first charge of Hamilton's dragoons they fell back in confusion on the main body, and his infantry having also crossed the river, a general attack was ordered. The enemy, however, did not wait the assault, for Montgomery himself running away, his men followed the example, and a complete rout succeeded. The Irish remained masters of the encampment. Montgomery continued his flight to Hillsborough, into which he threw a few companies, and ordering the bulk of his forces to Coleraine, embarked at Donaghadee, and sailed for England. This was the first time the forces of "The Council" met the Irish in the field. They had been organizing and levying on the country for months; they were well armed; had an intrenched position of their own selection, behind a deep and rapid river, and the result was the loss of their camp equipage, four hundred slain, and that disgraceful flight known in the history of the period as "The Break of Dromore."

After stopping here for a day to rest his men and secure the advantages of his victory, Hamilton pushed on to Hillsborough, the headquarters of the Council, while Sir Arthur Rawdon advanced rapidly from Lisburn to its relief, at the head of 4,000 men. Rawdon, however, only arrived in the vicinity to find the place in the possession of Hamilton, and to see its paroled garrison making their way home across the country. On learning that Rawdon was in the neighborhood, the Irish troops advanced to meet him, but he, ordering his men to make the best of their way towards Coleraine, abandoned them to their fate, and, like Mount Alexander, embarked for England.

The capture of Hillsborough was of great service to the Irish cause. It had been the headquarters of the "Council" since its formation, and was the repository of its papers, plans, and secret correspondence with William; but, above all, it contained immense stores of provisions, wrung from the inhabitants of the surrounding country since the preceding winter. The evacuation of Dungannon, on the west side of Lough Neagh, a fine central position of the Williamites, and one of their chief depots for provisions and military stores, followed closely on that of Hillsborough; and Hamilton, pursuing the retreating insurgents through Belfast, Antrim, and Ballymena, drove them in on Coleraine, and halted to recruit his little army in the town of Ballymoney, within a few miles of their only remaining stronghold in Antrim. While here, he was assailed by a strong force sent out to cover the movements of a foraging party, but he attacked them so vigorously that he drove them within the gates of the town, inflicting a severe loss, and capturing all the booty collected in their excursion.

Thus, in less than a fortnight after his departure from Drogheda, all the eastern counties of Ulster—Armagh, Down, Antrim, and the greater part of Tyrone—were reduced to obedience; but, as he was now about to approach the walled town of Derry, he halted for a few days in his career, to await artillery and reinforcements from the capital.

In whatever light this campaign is considered—whether from a Williamite or a Jacobite point of view—it confers immortal honor on Hamilton and his little band, for it can scarcely be dignified by the name of an army. In a season of unusual severity, in the face of a vigilant foe, four times his number, and established in the strongest positions that could be selected, he, by vigilance and audacity, baffled all attempts at surprise, and with an insignificant loss, and without a single repulse, cleared the greater part of the province from the grasp of an enemy that a few days before had uttered defiance before the gates of Dundalk, and bore away their booty undisturbed within sight of the capital.

The co-operative force, under Galmoy, was scarce less successful. The scene of his operations embraced Monaghan, Cavan, and Fermanagh, where the leading rebels, Lord Blaney and Gustavus Hamilton, carried fire and sword wherever they went. The first to arouse the infatuated people, by the cry of religion, they were the persistent violators of all religious precepts. The total extirpation of the Catholics could alone appease them, and to this end they kept the minds of their followers inflamed by every species of misrepresentation and calumny. The people were driven from their homes, and wholesale murder and rapine, with crimes too revolting for detail, marked their course among the doomed fugitives. In the few months that had elapsed since the advent of the Prince of Orange in England, this section of country had become almost desolate. Few were to be seen but the destroyers let loose over it, or the stealthy Rapparees, that tracked their steps, to wreak a deadly revenge for the crimes that rendered them at once both homeless and merciless. But the contest was unequal; the unarmed people were forced to give way before the trained-bands of Hamilton and Blaney, when Galmoy entered on the scene, to add fresh fuel to the flame. He soon roused the flagging spirit of the Jacobites. Blaney and Hamilton, now joined by Wolseley, put forth all their strength to oppose him, but they were met by measures as arbitrary and effective as their own. "No quarter" became the cry on both sides; but the military skill of Galmoy proclaimed him the master-spirit, and after a few reverses, and a rigorous retaliation, they fell back wherever he advanced; all opposition in the open country soon ceased, and they were forced to take refuge within the walls of Enniskillen.

The poor countenance shown by the rebels in the field, now emboldened Galmoy to attempt the reduction of Enniskillen, which was their chief rendezvous in the south-western portion of the province; and for that purpose he approached the Castle of Crom, one of its principal defences, and having driven in its outposts, invested it about the middle of March. This fortress, which stands on a peninsula in the waters of the Lower Erne, being impregnable to his light-armed infantry, he now had recourse to stratagem. He got some tin cannon constructed, and giving out that artillery had reached him from Dublin, placed them in battery within musket range of the castle. On the 21st he summoned it to surrender, but the garrison, having been apprised of the ruse intended for them, provided themselves with the long guns used in duck-shooting on the lake, and answered his summons with a well-directed fire that killed about forty of his men, and compelled him to retire to a safer distance, leaving his mock cannon behind him. They were soon conveyed into the fort, and were exhibited as trophies at many a succeeding celebration of "the glorious and pious, etc.," furnishing the Enniskilleners with a theme of boastful merriment.9

The name "Enniskilleners," has now become nearly obsolete, and is only applied to a regiment of dragoons in the English army, kept up in perpetuation of the part they took in the ruin of their country; but at the time of the Revolution it was applied without distinction to the partisans of William, who, when driven before the Jacobites, took refuge within the town of Enniskillen, and held out until the relief of Derry, to which it was next in importance. It is a place of great natural strength, and has many historic memories dating farther back than the unhappy events that have given it such unenviable notoriety. It was originally the stronghold of the Maguires, who held it for centuries against each successive invasion, but had passed into the hands of Sir William Cole, after the civil war of 1641. It stands on a river connecting the upper and lower waters of Lough-Erne, which, lying from the north-west to the south-east of the County Fermanagh, and connecting with Lough-Oughter on the south, extends over a distance of more than forty miles. These lakes and their tributaries, studded with islands innumerable, render the country for several miles a labyrinth almost impassable to all but the natives. There is not, perhaps, in the world, for the same extent of country, a place so well adapted to insurgent warfare. In such a country the people of La Vendée would have exhausted all the resources of the French Directory; and the wonder is, not why Galmoy could not take it, but how he even approached it, in the face of such overwhelming odds.

Meanwhile the exiled king was keenly alive to all that was passing in his late dominions. Assured of the strenuous support of Louis, on the first demonstration of popular will in his favor in England, his agents there were active in their endeavors to effect a change of public sentiment; nor did their efforts seem barren of good results. The way of William, since his accession, was not strewn with flowers. Signs of reaction manifested themselves daily, and it required all the efforts of his Dutch and German mercenaries, to check the spirit of disaffection. The people had been taken by surprise. Their subjugation to the arms of Holland had been effected by a conspiracy between a few of the nobles and William, in which they had no part, and many of the moderate nobles had begun to regret an action by which they intended only a change of the royal policy, but which had terminated in a change of sovereigns. Nor was the result, in any light, very flattering to their vanity; nor a comparison between the sovereigns favorable to the new incumbent. It was, however, from the dignitaries of the Established Church that William experienced the greatest opposition. The Archbishop of Canterbury and six others, though active in their opposition to the reforms introduced by James, would never acknowledge any other king, and continued to pray publicly for his welfare and protection. Mary sent to the Archbishop to ask his blessing, but received for answer: "When she has obtained her father's blessing, I shall be very ready to give her mine." The Prince of Orange was outraged by such perverseness of spirit, and as an example of the religious liberty that he had established in England, deprived them of their bishoprics. Throughout the country a reaction had really set in. The Dutch guards and the English soldiers came frequently into collision, and the insolence of the former, being generally overlooked by William, he became an object of popular disfavor. To silence this disaffection he determined to send the malcontent regiments to Holland, and supply their place with Dutch soldiers. A Scotch regiment mutinied, and marched northward "with drums beating and colors flying," but were overwhelmed by three regiments of Dutch dragoons, under Ginkle, and sent off to the continent. This revolt caused the passage of the famous "Mutiny Bill," which deprives the British soldier of the right of citizenship, shuts him off from the benefit of civil law, and makes him an alien in his own country.

The Jacobite cause in Scotland was still hopeful, for there, Viscount Dundee kept the field, and refused all terms of compromise, while in Ireland three provinces remained steadfast in their allegiance, and the adherents of William in the other province, though still obstinate in the course they had adopted, were unable to keep the field. The Earl of Tyrconnell, faithful to his trust, animated the people by word and example, and "retained," says the Duke of Berwick, "all the kingdom in obedience;" so James, at last, rousing himself from his apathy, determined to assume the management of affairs in his Kingdom of Ireland. The state of the country demanded his presence; the people clamored for it; and the French king hastened it by his counsel, and gave promise of adequate military support. Accordingly, James set sail from France, under an escort of thirty-three war-ships, and arrived at Kinsale on the 12th of March, 1689. He was accompanied by his son, the Duke of Berwick, M. de Rosen, M. de Momont, M. de Pusignan, de Lery, Bo?sselau, Lestrade, Guidon, and about one hundred French officers of different grades, and twelve hundred of his guards, who had joined him in his exile.

The people, who expected to see this imposing array of ships pour out its thousands of armed men on their shores, were greatly disappointed; but the arrival of the king banished every other consideration. His adversity awakened all the sympathies of their nature, and he had an abiding-place in every heart. From Kinsale he proceeded to Cork, which he entered amid the greatest rejoicings. After the usual formalities, of which religious ceremonies formed the most solemn and imposing part, he received from the deputy an account of his stewardship. It exceeded even what he had been led to expect, and as a mark of his approval, Tyrconnell was raised to the rank of Duke, and McCarthy, "The Pacificater of Munster," was created Lord Mountcashel, and honored with a seat in his cabinet. After a short delay here, the king proceeded to the metropolis. His route through the country was one continued ovation. Crowds of people lined the wayside, invoking blessings on his cause, while religious ceremonies, pledges, and addresses of loyalty, arrested his way at every step of his route. The city of Dublin, proverbial in all times for taste and elegance, and which had never witnessed the advent of a king since the days of Henry II., exhausted every effort that art or fancy could suggest, to grace the royal pageantry. The corporation, headed by the mayor, in all the pomp of office, went forth to meet him, and tender him the keys of the city. Farther on, and near the portals of the castle, the Primate, crowned with the triple tiara, and holding in his hand the emblem of redemption, awaited to receive his obeisance, and bestow the benediction. As he approached the august dignitary, a general halt of the procession took place, and even the multitude, that surged like a closing sea behind, hushed their acclamations, and bent in lowly reverence, until the king, rising from his genuflection before the cross, and, bareheaded, offered them his parting acknowledgments. Then, as the national flag, standing out above the castle-gate, revealed to him the terse and significant motto:

"Now or Never; Now and Forever,"

one wild and prolonged cheer, deep and fervid, burst from the hearts of the multitude. The die was cast, and their adherence to the discrowned monarch was sealed and irrevocable.

Immediately after his arrival in Dublin,10 James proceeded to the construction of his cabinet, the leading members of which were Tyrconnell, Mountcashel, General Nugent, and some of the French officers that formed his escort. He at once issued a proclamation, offering pardon and protection to all who would retire peaceably to their homes, and again announced his unalterable determination to maintain the civil and religious liberty of all religious denominations. The army, however, demanded his earliest attention, for, whatever was its enthusiasm, its real condition was far from encouraging. The gentlemen who bore the expense of the first levy were unable to continue the drain on their slender means, and the soldiers were suffering much privation. It was necessary also to organize a force sufficient to meet events that might now be daily expected, and accordingly the king at once appealed to the country. More than one hundred thousand men, almost simultaneously, offered their services; "but," says Hume, "not two in every hundred were provided with muskets fit for service; the rest were armed with clubs and sticks tipped with iron," and he found himself compelled to decline the service of all but about twenty thousand.11

These, together with those already in the service, constituted an army short of thirty thousand men; the whole artillery in the country was twelve field-pieces and four mortars; and with this force, in the weakest period it had known since the first invasion, Ireland resolved to measure strength with England, its army of mercenaries, and the most powerful of her own provinces now arrayed on the side of the usurper. The king had unbounded confidence in the timely assistance of France; but the people had realized the purport of this war; for them it was to be a struggle for national life or total extinction, and though many retired to their homes wherever it was practicable, thousands who had already been rendered homeless, seized on every rude weapon that presented, and, determined to wring a subsistence from the enemy, took up the bold and reckless life of the Rapparee. Tyrconnell was now appointed commander-in-chief of the army; M. de Rosen was raised to the rank of lieutenant-general, and appointed second in command; M. de Momont was raised to the same rank; de Pusignan and de Lery to that of major-general; Bo?sselau was appointed adjutant-general, Guidon master-general of cavalry, and a reinforcement of about three thousand troops, then the best in the country, was sent to Lieutenant-General, the Viscount of Dundee, who was making head against Mackey, the commander of the Williamite forces in Scotland.

The condition of affairs now brooked of no delay; the English Parliament was convened for an early day; William had expressed his intention of sending an expedition into Ireland, and only waited its assent: the suppression of the Ulster rebellion before such an event should take place, was a matter of vital importance to the Jacobite cause, and an active campaign was at once determined on. Accordingly, Major-General, the Duke of Berwick, was dispatched to the assistance of Hamilton, now lying before the fortified town of Coleraine, while de Pusignan, with a select body of horse and foot, and two pieces of artillery, was to march through Charlemont and Dungannon, and passing to the west of Lough Neagh, unite with Berwick and Hamilton, and proceed against Derry, the chief stronghold of the rebellion.