The beginnings of failure
By Aengus O Snodaigh
Considering the effects of General Lake's terror, firstly in
Ulster, then in the rest of Ireland, the infiltration of
informers and arrests of a large section of the leadership it was
a wonder that the United Irish army was in position to stage any
sort of a rising in May/June 1798.
Proscribed for over two years and operating under martial law
since March the crown forces campaign against them had taken its
toll on the United Irishmen's membership. With the long-awaited
French expedition now delayed until August and most of the
soldiers and British Army regiments which could be relied upon to
support a rising having been dispersed abroad, a hastily-convened
Directory meeting on 17 May felt compelled to decide a date for a
rising before the movement would be no more. So it was that 23
May was selected as the commencement day for an Irish Revolution.
Following the arrest of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, Samuel Neilson,
John and Henry Sheares within days of this decision, any hope of
a co-ordinated rebellion evaporated, but in spite of this the
rising began. The northern section of the leadership were still
opposed to a rising before French aid arrived and with little or
no communications between localities the prospects for a
successful rising were receding fast.
On the night of 23 May before his arrest Neilson had directed
local commanders to assemble at points inside Dublin. This they
did but with no further direction coming throughout the night and
with the pre-informed Castle authorities massing soldiers at some
of the assembly points the thousands of United Irishmen gathered
returned to their homes. The grand strategy of Lord Edward
Fitzgerald, Arthur O'Connor and Samuel Neilson was no more.
Their strategy involved the taking of key locations in Dublin,
with surrounding areas stopping the mail coaches as a signal for
the rest of the country to rise, before moving en masse into
Dublin to reinforce the rebel strongholds. The county rebels were
to attack local garrisons and would be reinforced or relieved by
United Irish battalions after Dublin was secured. A similar plan
was used in 1916.
The failure of the Dublin United Irishmen to execute their
section of the plan did not deter outlying areas from trying to
effect their orders. What occurred in the next month was sporadic
risings in different areas with little or no communications
between the various United Irish camps. With little contemporary
United Irish records of casualties or deaths, many were buried in
unmarked or mass graves. We must rely on later works,
tradition/folklore and/or the English Administration's accounts,
all of which can be taken to be exaggerated for their own
purposes.
On hearing of the outbreak of war, A delighted Lord Camden,
England's Lord Lieutenant in Ireland, wrote to the Home Secretary
in England, ``Martial Law is established - the sword is drawn - I
have kept it within the scabbard as long as possible - it must
not be returned until this alarming conspiracy is put down''.
By the dawning of 24 May the United Irish commanders in counties
surrounding Dublin had effected their plan; they held a crescent
of positions within a 25 mile radius of the capital, effectively
sealing it off from the rest of the country. At least three mail
coaches were stopped; the Belfast mail at Santry; the Athlone
mail at Lucan; and the Cork mail at Naas, others were ambushed
unsuccessfully. The failure to stop these or even intercept them
at all was to have dire consequences, leaving some counties
rising with others still awaited a signal.
Some United Irish units began to advance on the city in the hope
of linking up with the city units which were to be in position by
now, before once again withdrawing.
The failure of Dublin allowed the crown forces to begin a mopping
up operation against the partially successful United Irish armies
in counties Westmeath, Carlow, Kildare, Meath, Laois and Offaly.
Much of this was done with great barbarity and against all
accepted rules of engagement which the English would uphold in
continental wars. What atrocities were committed on the rebel
side were replicated a hundred fold by crown forces prior to,
during and after the rising.
Despite the initial successes the United Irish armies were to
incur heavy losses over the next four days. At Naas an hour-long
battle left 130 United Irish soldiers and the rest fleeing to the
Wicklow Mountains; Kilcullen saw ``130 dead - no prisoners'';
Barrettstown 100 dead; Monasterevin 60 dead, including only five
of the crown forces. In Carlow the United Irish contingent
literally walked into cannon-fire. An eye-witness stated that
after this ``the army advance, firing volley after volley till
they came up to the cabins. They set every one of them on fire
and all that were in them, men, women and children, innocent and
guilty, all burned together in one common mass.''
At Tara Hill the several thousand United Irishmen gathered there
were routed by the Highland Fencibles leaving 350 dead; Rathangan
rebels were dislodged by cannon fire; 500 United Irishmen engaged
in surrender talks were gunned down on the Curragh of Kildare.
While these Leinster areas were doing battle and retreating after
bearing the brunt of the mass of crown forces, word was filtering
into other counties of what was occurring and preparations were
in hand in counties Down, Antrim and Wexford especially to
relieve their brethren. But co-ordination was lacking and the
original haphazard nature of the rising had allowed the crown
forces to regroup and reinforce weaker commands before taking
head-on the rebels in Ulster and then what remained of the
May/June United Irish Rising of 1798 in Wexford. Mopping up
operations continued into July, before the August French
expedition again threatened the crown's hold on Ireland. The
Battle of Ballinamuck as good as ended this revolutionary period
of Irish history, though sporadic United Irish actions continued
until 1803, when Robert Emmet's rising failed, Thomas Russell was
captured and the Wicklow United Irish leader Michael Dwyer was
transported to Australia.
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