William Pitt and the Great War by John Holland Rose (book club reads txt) 📕

it was a religious war; priests marched at the head of the rebels, who

swept together and drove at their head the reluctant. For the sake of

humanity Pitt must send larger reinforcements. He added that Lake was

unequal to the emergency. Fortunately, on that day Pitt received the

consent of the Marquis Cornwallis to act as Lord Lieutenant and

Commander-in-Chief in Ireland. As Camden had more than once pointed out

the urgent need of that appointment, it is surprising to find him on

16th June upbraiding Pitt with the suddenness of the change. Surely it

was no time for punctiliousness. Already the Ulstermen were rising, and

30,000 rebels were afoot in Wexford. But, as it happened, the worst of

the trouble was over before Cornwallis could take the field. Landing on

20th June near Dublin, he heard news portending a speedy decision in

Wexford.

It is not easy to account for the savagery of the revolt in that county.

The gentry resided among their tenants on friendly terms; and the search

for arms had been carried out less harshly than elsewhere. Gordon, the

most impartial historian of the rebellion, admits that the floggings and

half-hangings had been few in number, yet he adds that the people were

determined to revolt, probably from fear that their turn would come.

Neither is the religious bigotry of the rebels intelligible. The

Protestants were numerous in Wexford town, Enniscorthy, and New Ross;

but there seems to have been little religious animosity, except where

tales were circulated as to intended massacres of Catholics by

Orangemen. The Celt is highly susceptible to personal influence; and,

just as that of the Fitzgeralds largely accounts for the rising in

Kildare, so does the personality of Father John Murphy explain the

riddle of Wexford. The son of a peasant of that county, he was trained

for the priesthood at Bordeaux, and ardently embraced the principles of

the French Revolution and the aims of United Ireland. His huge frame,

ready wit, and natural shrewdness brought him to the front in Wexford;

and he concerted the plan of establishing an Irish Republic on a

strictly Romanist basis, a programme incompatible with that of Wolfe

Tone and the United Irishmen.

Murphy, marching with his flock to the house of a neighbouring

Protestant clergyman, bade him and his terrified friends surrender.

Meeting with a refusal, they fired the outbuildings; and when the flames

gained the house, they granted the prayers of the occupants for mercy if

they came out. On coming out the adult males were forthwith butchered.

Meeting with large reinforcements from the hills, Father John's pikemen

beat off a hasty attack by 110 men of the North Cork Militia, only seven

of whom escaped to Wexford. Such were the doings on that Whitsunday in

Wexford (27th May). Next, the rebels swept down upon Enniscorthy; and

though beaten back from the very heart of the town by the steady valour

of the defenders, these last were yet fain to fall back on Wexford. But

for the plundering habits of the peasantry, not a man could have reached

that town. The priest and his followers now took post on Vinegar Hill, a

height east of the River Slaney, which overlooks Enniscorthy and the

central plain of the county. There on successive days he and his council

dealt out pike-law to some four or five hundred Protestants and

landlords. Meanwhile, as no help drew nigh, Maxwell, the commander at

Wexford, deeming that town untenable, beat a timely retreat westwards to

Duncannon Fort on Waterford Harbour (30th May).

Master of Wexford county, Murphy and his colleague, Father Michael,

proposed to raise Wicklow and Waterford. If these efforts succeeded, it

was probable that Dublin and Munster would rise. Ulster might then

revolt; and the advent of the French would clinch the triumph. In full

confidence, then, the masses of pikemen moved against the loyalists at

New Ross, an important position on the River Barrow. Parish by parish,

the priests at their head, they marched, some 30,000 strong. At dawn of

5th June, when near the town, they knelt during the celebration of

Mass. Then they goaded on herds of cattle to serve as an irresistible

vanguard, and rushed at the old walls. General Johnstone and the 1,400

defenders were at first overborne and had to retreat over the bridge;

but the plundering habits of the victors were their ruin. The soldiery

re-formed, regained their cannon, and planting them skilfully, dealt

such havoc among the disorderly mass, that finally it surged out into

the plain.[500] After their defeat the rebels deposed Harvey, a

Protestant, from his nominal command.

This success of the loyalists saved Waterford and Kilkenny from anything

more than local riots; and Moore, moving up from Fermoy and Clonmel,

soon threatened the rebel county from the west. The beaten peasants

glutted their revenge on Protestant prisoners near New Ross; and a

general massacre of prisoners at Wexford was averted only by the rapid

advance of Moore. Meanwhile, Father John, moving into County Wicklow

with a force some 30,000 strong, sought to break down the defence at

Arklow. But that important post on the River Avoca was stoutly held by

General Needham with some 1,500 men, mostly militia and yeomen. There,

too, the priests led on the peasants with a zeal that scorned death. One

of the peasant leaders rushed up to a gun, thrust his cap into it, and

shouted, "Come along, boys; her mouth is stopped." The next moment he

and his men were blown to pieces. Disciplined valour gained the day (9th

June), and John and his crusaders retired to Vinegar Hill. His

colleague, Father Michael Murphy, who had claimed to be able to catch

Protestant bullets, was killed by a cannon-shot; and this may have

decided the rebels to retreat.

The British Guards had now arrived, to the inexpressible relief of

Camden and his advisers. Beset by reports of a general rising in Ulster

and by the furious protests of loyalists against the inaction of Pitt,

the Lord Lieutenant had held on his way, acting with energy but curbing

the policy of vengeance, so that, as he informed Pitt, he was now the

most unpopular man in Ireland. Nevertheless, before he left her shores,

he had the satisfaction to see his measures crowned with success. The

converging moves of Lake, Needham, Dundas, and Johnstone upon Vinegar

Hill cooped up the rebels on that height; and on 21st June the royal

troops stormed the slopes with little loss. The dupes of Father John no

longer believed in his miraculous powers. The survivors broke away

southwards, but then doubled back into the mountains of Wicklow. The war

now became a hunt, varied by savage reprisals. Father John was hanged on

26th June. By his barbarities he had ended the dream of United Ireland.

Few of the malcontents of Antrim and Down obeyed the call to arms of the

United Irishmen early in June; and the risings in those counties soon

flickered out. Religious bigotry enabled Dublin Castle once more to

triumph.

Pitt was vehemently blamed by Irish loyalists for his apathy at the

crisis. The accusation, quite natural among men whose families were in

hourly danger, was unjust. As we have seen, even before the arrival of

Camden's request, he took steps to send off 5,000 men. As the Duke of

York and Dundas cut down that number to 3,000, and endeavoured to

prevent any more being sent, they were responsible for the despatch of

an inadequate force. If the French detachments intended for Ireland had

arrived early in June, they must have carried all before them. But it

was not until 22nd August that General Humbert, with 1,100 men, landed

at Killala. Even so his little force was believed to be the vanguard of

a large army, a fact which explains the revival of rebellion at the end

of the summer.

Not until 1st September did Pitt hear this alarming news. At once he

ordered all possible reinforcements to proceed to Ireland. There was

need of them. The Irish militiamen under Lake and Hutchinson who opposed

the French at Castlebar rushed away in wild panic from one-fourth of

their numbers (27th August). Such were "the Castlebar Races." Probably

the Irishmen were disaffected; for many of them joined the enemy.

Cornwallis proceeded to the front, and with 11,000 men made head against

the rebels and the French. The latter were now but 800 strong, and after

a most creditable stand finally surrendered with the honours of war (8th

September). Cornwallis issued a tactful bulletin,[501] commending his

troops for their meritorious exertions and trusting to their honour not

to commit acts of cruelty against their deluded fellow subjects. In

point of fact 11,000 men with difficulty brought 800 to surrender and

then gave themselves up to retaliation on the rebels. Fortunately the

French Directory sent only small parties of raiders. A month later,

Wolfe Tone, with a squadron, appeared off Lough Swilly; but the French

ships being overpowered by Sir John Warren, Tone was captured, taken to

Dublin, and cut his throat in order to escape the ignominy of a public

hanging. Another small French squadron entered Killala Bay late in

October, but had to make for the open. Thus flickered out a flame which

threatened to shrivel up British rule in Ireland.

What causes contributed to this result? Certainly not the activity and

resourcefulness of Pitt and his colleagues; for their conduct at the

crisis was weak and tardy. The Duke of York and Dundas must primarily be

blamed for the despatch of inadequate reinforcements; but Pitt ought to

have overruled their decision. Perhaps the Cabinet believed England to

be the objective of Bonaparte and the fleet at Brest; but, thanks to the

rapid growth of the Volunteer Movement, England was well prepared to

meet an invading force and to quell the efforts of the malcontent

Societies. In Ireland the outlook was far more gloomy. After the

resignation of Abercromby, Camden and the officials of Dublin Castle

were in a state of panic. Pitt did well finally to send over Cornwallis;

but that step came too late to influence the struggle in Leinster. In

truth the saving facts of the situation were the treachery of informers

at Dublin and the diversion of the efforts of Bonaparte towards the

East. The former event enabled Camden to crush the rising in Dublin; the

latter left thousands of brave Irishmen a prey to the false hopes which

the French leaders had designedly fostered, Barras having led Wolfe Tone

to believe that France would fight on for the freedom of Ireland. The

influence of Bonaparte told more and more against an expedition to her

shores; but the Irish patriots were left in the dark, for their rising

would serve to distract the energies of England, while Bonaparte won

glory in the East. To save appearances, the French Government sent three

small expeditions in August to October; but they merely prolonged the

agony of a dying cause, and led that deeply wronged people to ask what

might not have happened if the promises showered on Wolfe Tone had been

made good.

It is recorded of William of Orange, shortly before his intended landing

in England, that, on hearing of the march of Louis XIV's formidable army

into the Palatinate, he serenely smiled at his rival's miscalculation.

Louis sated his troops with plunder and lost a crown for James II.

Similarly we may imagine the mental exultation of Pitt on hearing that

Bonaparte had gone the way of Alexander the Great and Mark Antony.

Camden and he knew full well that Ireland was the danger spot of the

British Empire, and that the half of the Toulon force could overthrow

the Protestant ascendancy. Some sense of the magnitude of the blunder

haunted Napoleon at St. Helena; for he confessed to Las Casas: "If,

instead of the expedition to Egypt, I had undertaken that against

Ireland, what could England have done now?" In a career, illumined by

flashes of genius, but wrecked by strange errors, the miscalculation of

the spring of 1798 was not the least fatal. For of all parts of the

British Empire Ireland was that in which the Sea Power was most helpless

when once a French _corps d'armée_ had landed.