UC-NRLF *B b3fi DEI berkeleyN LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA^/ EECOED OF THE | 1 4 22 62 38 42 W c>\ «;.-> 71 79 Mi «)(> 96 102 100 111 125 6 constituted from that of the present day, in almost every particular, for, although they fought well, but little could be said in favour of their drill or discipline. The North Cork Regiment, as will be shown in this volume, as a matter of record, did their duty well and bravely, even when the odds were immensly dispro- portioned against them ; and the officers — although, of course, devoid of any military education — by their coolness and presence of mind when face to face with desperate responsibility, proved themselves worthy of having their names handed down to future generations as examples for gallantry and courage, as what act of heroism in modern warfare can exceed that of the gallant Captain Snowe at the Bridge of Enniscorthy, as stated by Froude.* The North Cork " had suffered severely, one detachment destroyed at Prosperous, another at Oulart, and still at Enniscorthy they fought splendidly/ ' and had retreated only before numbers enormously superior, and an enemy whose policy was to treat them as traitors to their country, and to refuse all quarter to such of them as came within their savage power ; but of this more hereafter. The North Cork Regiment (No. 34) was raised by Government levy, in the North Riding of the County of Cork, in the months of April, May, and June, 1793, and numbered 26 officers, 24 sergeants, 16 drummers, 12 fifers, and 446 rank and file, under the command * Froude's " English in Ireland," Vol. III. of Viscount Kingsborough, with John De Courcey, twenty-sixth Baron Kingsale, as Lieutenant- Colonel. The following is a list of the officers appointed at the time, for which see Army List, January, 1794 : — . Colonel Commandant — Yiscount Kingsborough. Lt.- Colonel — Lord Kingsale. Major — John JNewenham. Captains. John Wallis. Richard Foote. David Franks. Edward Heard. James Lombard. Capt.- Lieut. — Honble. Wm. De Courcey. Lieutenants. Charles Yinters. John O'Hea. Stephen O'Hea. William Johnston. John Norcott. Michael Stewart. David Williams. James Glover. Ensigns. Michael Rourke Thomas Paye. Isaac Silletto. Thomas H. Justice. Charles Barry. John Roe. Chaplain — Rev. T. Barry. Adjutant — Honble. Wm. De Courcey. Quartermaster — Charles Yinters. Surgeon — Daniel Williams. Armit, Burrough & Co., Agents. Uniform red, Facings yellow. 8 The regiment after its embodiment was moved to Limerick and broken up into detachments to various parts of that county, in which it remained until the beginning of the year 1796, when it was moved into Kilkenny, and after a period of some nine months there, it was sent to the County Kildare head quarters, at INaas, with detachments throughout the county. About this time the compulsory increase of military power, under the provisions of the " Militia Bill," increased the general feeling of discontent, and the uneasiness was not abated by the rumour that the French Government had undertaken to land an army of 20,000 men to assist the Irish Revolutionists. This rumour was well founded, for on the 21st of December, the French Fleet, under "Morard de Galles," with thirty-four sail, entered Bantry Bay. But the disasters which befel it are graphically described in the Journal of the unfortunate Theobald Wolfe Tone, and recorded by an eminent historian.* It runs thus : — ' ' The morning is now come — the gale continues, and the fog so thick we cannot see a ship's length ahead ; so here we lie in the utmost uncertainty and anxiety. In all probability we are left without Admiral or General. Certainly we have been persecuted by a strange fatality from the very night of our departure from Brest, to this hour. We have been now six davs in Bantry Bay — within 500 yards of the shore, without * Maxwell. being able to effect a landing. We have been dispersed four times in four days ; and at this moment, of forty- three sail, of which the expedition consisted, we can muster of all sizes, but fourteen. There only wants our falling in with the English to complete our destruction. " On the 27th the weather continued stormy — several ships were obliged to cut and run — the fleet was reduced to seven sail of the line, and one frigate ; the troops to 4,200 men, and the artillery to two four-pounders. As a last effort this miserable remnant of the expedi- tion determined to seek the Shannon, which had been named as the place of rendezvous. During the whole gale which blew during the night of the 28th a sixth separation occurred, and three seventy-fours and a frigate parted company. On the 29th the Commodore signalled the captains to steer for France, and the last ship of our expedition intended to overthrow the British Monarchy quitted the shores of Ireland without having landed a single soldier, communicated with the disaffected, or thrown a musket on the shore. On the 1st January the Indomitable, with her three consorts, made Ushant and anchored the same evening in Brest Harbour. The run back to France, contrary to general expectation, had been fortunately uninterrupted from the night they left the Raz passage until they entered the Goulet on their return. Although the sea swarmed with British cruisers, the French Fleet had never seen a man of war." The failure of the French attempt was of course very 10 depressing to the Irish Unionists, and the reports of Irish agents tended little to encourage a fresh attempt, the gasconade of some presenting a ridiculous contrast to the gloomy anticipations of the remainder. The spirit of the Revolutionists, however, was as untameable as ever, and the capture of Lord Edward Fitzgerald about this time in Thomas Street, Dublin, was an additional incentive to stir up their fury. This occurred on the night of the 18th of May, 1797, and now open rebellion was threatened, and troops were being poured into Dublin to protect the Capital. The North Cork was about one of the first regiments ordered to Dublin, and was quartered in George's Street Barracks, now the establishment of Messrs. Pim, Brothers & Co. CHAPTER II. January, 1797. The year 1797, it has been stated,* was one rather of preparation than of incident, and the exertions of the leaders of the conspiracy at that period were unceasing, and the efforts of the Government equally so, and with such effect that nearly all the principals were arrested, for immediately after the capture of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the brothers John and Henry Sheares were taken, tried and executed, from papers found in their possession and the savage ferocity of intention indi- cated therein, especially the proclamation (to give no quarter) in the handwriting of John Sheares, about to be issued to the rebel leaders throughout the kingdom, showed that a terrible insurrection was about to burst forth. The plots to sei2e upon the metropolis, the Castle, Trinity College, &c, were all fortunately discovered by the indefatigable Major Sirr, in time to prevent any calamity of the kind. 1798, April. — Meanwhile the crisis rapidly hurried on, and every day it was expected the explosion would take * Maxwell. 12 place, and so on until the 23rd of May, a day that must ever carry with it deplorable recollections, for before another sun should rise the city was to undergo all the horrors that attend upon Civil War. Evening came, but no positive information had as yet reached the Castle, when late in the day Lieutenant La Touche, of the County Dublin Yeomanry Cavalry, sent word to apprise the Lord Lieutenant that the insurrection had actually broken out, and the rebels were collecting in great numbers at Rathfarnham, and in the roads and fields in the vicinity of Dublin. Immediately the garrison drums beat to arms ; the " North Cork Militia " — 432 strong — formed in Stephen's Green ; and all the approaches to the city were strongly guarded and occupied by the Royalist troops. The capture of Dublin was the grand and primary object at which the con- spirators aimed, and a simultaneous movement on the capital by the Kildare rebels was to have seconded the efforts of the disaffected within the city. The stoppage of the mail coaches was to be the signal for a general rising. On the evening of the 23rd the Belfast mail was burned at Santry ; the Limerick stopped on the Curragh of Kildare, and both guard and coachman murdered ; the Athlone coach was destroyed at Lucan ; and the Cork mail at JNaas ; and a number of petty affairs followed the instant outbreak of the rebellion, all tinged in a lesser or greater degree with the atrocity attendant upon Civil War. The North Cork only mustered 432 men for the 13 defence of the city, and, as the garrison was almost drained of regular troops, the safety of Dublin was intrusted to the Militia and Yeomanry, which circum- stance was not overlooked by the rebel leaders. In barracks soldiers cannot be easily surprised, a few moments being sufficient to place a regiment in order of battle, but to collect stragglers dispersed and distant from the alarm posts they have been instructed to assemble at, is a work of time, and equally difficult and precarious, as in an attempt to reach the post assigned, individuals and isolated parties are readily intercepted and overpowered. From the paucity of the number of troops in the country at the period, it was the custom of the wise- heads in command of His Majesty's forces to break up regiments into small parties for detachment duty. One fatal example of the evil attendant on such practice occurred to a company of the North Cork. "It is diffi- cult to decide, however, whether the stupidity of Swayne or the treachery of Esmonde M is most to be condemned. A man may trifle with himself individually, but for him who turns right or left from the plain path which duty points to, and compromises the safety of those committed to his charge, there can be no extenuation. For Swayne's folly there can be no apology ; his pickets should have been doubled. A cart — a ladder drawn across the street, would have marked suffi- ciently where those who came to surrender arms might approach with full security; a step beyond it, if the 14 challenge failed, the advanced sentry shot the intruder dead, and the garrison was at once alarmed. " So much for Swayne ;" his weakness was inexcusable. He died its victim — ignobly certainly, but still by the weapon of the foemen. Esmonde met the doom he merited* — a halter. The following account from Mr. Froude's " English in Ireland," page 359, vol. iii., is believed to be perfectly authentic. Maxwell. ■ inn iiiiii inn i iiiiii mi I ■■■■■■■ mill ■■■■■■r*."li pribgeti Recount OF THE IEISH KEBELLION 1798. FROM "MAXWELL'S HISTORY," &c, &c. CHAPTER III. Irish Rebellion, 1798. "1798, 24th Mat/. — Captain Swayne was at Prosperous in the County Kildare, with a detachment consisting of sixty men of the North Cork Militia and twenty- three of Wynn's Ancient Britons Dragoons. Among the officers of the Clane Yeomanry — a party of which corps was stationed at the village from whence it took its name, about two miles from Prosperous — was a gentle- man named Esmonde, who affected loyalty for the better service of his country and her cause. He had seduced the majority of his corps ; he was in accurate correspondence with the insurgent leaders in the neigh- bourhood. It was arranged that, on the preconcerted signal — the non- arrival of the mail from Dublin on the night of the 23rd — Naas, Clane, aud Prosperous were to be attacked at the same moment. Esmonde and the disaffected yeomen were to assist, and the officers and the loyal part of the soldiers were to be destroyed. Surprise was an essential part of the scheme. At the latter place many of the soldiers were billetted in private houses. If off their guard, they might be 17 found divided, and then could be easily dealt with. Swayne had been directed to collect the arms of the people at Prosperous. On Sunday, the 20th of Ma} r , he took his company of the North Cork to the Roman Catholic Chapel. Father Higgins, the priest, addressed his congregation on the duty of submission to the authorities ; and Esmonde, who had ridden over from Clane in the morning to support his brother officer, spoke to them as a Catholic in the same tone. A number of peasants, in apparent obedience, surrendered their pikes. In the priest's presence they expressed regret for having been betrayed into the conspiracy, and pro- mised to have no more to do with it. " To avoid recognition by his comrades, Esmonde undertook to lead the attack at Prosperous, leaving his own captain deserted, to be destroyed by others. On the afternoon of the 23rd, when the hour was drawing: near, he paid Swayne a visit, and dined with him at a hotel in the town. Father Higgins was present, and he and Esmonde told Captain Swayne that the people were really penitent. Yery many of them wished to give up their arms, but they dare not bring them in the day for fear of being recognised by their con- federates ; they would have brought them at night, and have laid them down in the street, but they were afraid of the sentinels. Swayne, credulous and good-natured, suspected nothing. He ordered the sentinels, if they saw men moving in the street after dark, to take no notice of them. The mails left Dublin that night as 18 usual. They were all stopped on the roads by the country people, according to instructions, and the call to arms went out. At two in the morning, when sleep was deepest, before the streaks of dawn had begun to show, Esmonde, with his Clane yeomen, a multitude of ruffians, armed chiefly with pikes, came into Prosperous. The sentinels gave no alarm, and were killed; and then, at once, before a note of warning had been raised, the rebel band flung themselves, with a wild yell, upon the barracks ; the door went down. Swayne's room was on the ground floor ; they plunged in and stabbed him as he was springing from his bed. The soldiers, startled out of their sleep, snatched their muskets and rushed out. The mob swung back into the street, barricaded the doors to keep them secure, and then flung fire into the cellars, which were filled with straw and faggots. Beset on all sides, the miserable men were driven from the lower rooms up the stairs ; as the flames pursued them, they sprung out of the windows, the mob below catching them as they fell on their pikes, and, as each victim writhed upon the point, received him with a fierce 'Hurrah!' The North Cork were Irishmen and Catholics, but received no mercy. All who were in the barracks were killed or desperately wounded. " The Ancient Britons — the remainder of poor S wayne's force — were quartered in a private house ; they, too, were hated equally, for they had made themselves notorious in the disarming of Ulster. Eight of the 19 twenty-three leaped out of a back window and escaped across the country in the darkness, the rest were killed, their horses, arms, and uniforms taken by the rebels. " Retribution was, however, close at hand. At Clane there were no barracks; the troops were billetted about the place in twos and threes, and were thus more dangerously exposed than at Prosperous. The attack, however had been delaj^edtill dawn. Captain Griffiths, who was in command of a party of the Armagh Militia and a corps of local yeomanry, felt for some reason uneasy and sleepless. Looking from his window he saw files of armed 'men coming in alon^ the roads. He gave the alarm in time to enable the Armagh to dress and snatch their muskets. The street was full as they came out, but the men fought their way towards one another, formed into line, and charged. Having failed in their surprise, the rebels showed their usual inability to encounter disciplined men. Though fifty to one, they turned and ran out of the town. Outside they were joined by parties coming up from Prosperous. Cheered by the news their friends brought, they formed again, and returned to the attack. They were received with a steady fire, which they were unable to face. Falling fast they wavered and broke. Esmonde had carried with him all the yeomanry but seventeen — these few charged and completed the route, and the wretches, masquerading as Ancient Britons were every one cut down. It was now six o'clock, p.m. Details had come in of the frightful disaster at 20 Prosperous. Pursuit with so small a force was impos- sible. Griffiths recalled his men, and reviewed his losses, and, unable to account for the shortness of numbers in the yeomanry, ordered them to parade. Those who had been concerned in the night's work had come back expecting to find as complete a sweep of their comrades as they had made themselves of Swayne and the " North Cork." Finding the day gone against them, they either dispersed or stole into their quarters unperceived. Esmonde especially contrived to reach his room to wash, dress, and powder himself, as a dog would do after a midnight orgie among sheep, and pre- sented himself in his place in the ranks as if he had never been absent from quarters. "There was no time for inquiry. A messenger galloped up at the moment with the news that Lord Gosport was at Naas, and required instant help. The men swallowed a hasty breakfast. Griffiths was in the saddle ready to start, when a note was slipped into his hand telling him that Esmonde had led the rebels at Prosperous. He thrust it into his pocket, and said nothing till he reached Naas, when the treacherous officer was placed in arrest, sent to Dublin, tried by Court Martial, and was promptly hanged. At Naas it was found that the attack had failed as at Clane, but not until after a sharper struggle. Gosport, more fortunate than Swayne or Griffiths, had received notice to be prepared on the evening preceding. The alarm was sounded at half past two in the morning. The 21 rebel columns were entering on four sides. They forced their way into the gaol, where they were received with grape from some field pieces, and with a heavy musketry fire. They bore three volleys before they gave way. Thirty of them were found dead in the streets, and as many more in the fields and lanes outside the town. The troops in turn had suffered severely. The rebels had fought with dangerous courage, and their evidently enormous numbers created just and serious misgivings, for, in fact, they were everywhere, and all day long the smoke of burning homesteads was seen rising from every point of the horizon." CHAPTER IV. The Rebel Army. On the 27th of May, by mid-day, the rebel army, numbering 5,000, encamped on the Hill of Oulart, under the command of Father John Murphy, of Boola- vogue. He was the son of a peasant at Ferns in the same county (Wexford) ; he had been educated for the priesthood at Seville ; had settled in his own country, a few miles from his birthplace, and had there remained waiting for the Salvation of Israel, and had grown into a big, coarse, powerful man of forty, when his country called upon him for his services. It is to be hoped that his action was unpremeditated, for he had recently taken an oath of allegiance, and made solemn protests of loyalty to the King and Constitution. The news that the people were out had been brought early in the day into Wexford. All the morning messengers were coming in bringing accounts of the murdering and burning, and praying for help to those who were left exposed. The garrison in the town was scanty, but Lieutenant- Colonel Foote was despatched after breakfast with a hundred and ten men of his regiment (the North Cork), and thirty or forty mounted 23 yeomanry of Lehunt's, a force considered amply suffi- cient to subdue any resistance which they were likely to meet with, and supposing that he had to deal only with a contemptible mob, Lt. Colonel Foote had flung himself on a body of men fifty times his number, mad with the excitement of a religious war, and armed with a weapon which, in determined hands, was gradually discovered to be a formidable one. Father John, seeing that he was to be attacked, had divided his force with extemporized generalship. Finding the rebels stand better than they expected, the troops recoiled to re-form. When they found that they were surrounded, and their retreat cut off, most of the yeomen deserted their comrades, and the North Cork were cut down almost to a man. There were no wounded in those battles ; every one who fell was despatched. The colonel only — with a sergeant and three privates — made their way back to Wexford. Major Lombard, Captain DeCourcy, and four other officers had been killed, namely, Lieutenants Williams, Ware, and Barry, and Ensign Keogh. The effect of Foot's defeat was frightful. The widows and children of the North Cork men, who had fallen at Oulart, rushed about the streets of Wexford, wringing their hands and shrieking, in the most wretched state. Fierce, gJoomy knots of men gathered about the quays whilst the Protestant ladies and clergy took refuge in the ships in the harbour, offering high prices for a passage to Wales. The panic spread through the 24 country. The Protestant families crowded on all sides into the nearest towns ; while Father John, reposing for the night on his field of glory, sent out his scouts, calling on all the peasants to shoulder their pikes and join him onthefollowingmorning. On the Slaney, twelve miles above Wexford, stands the town of Enniscorthv. The river is crossed here by a bridge — the town itself stands on the west side. This station — as commanding the passage between the two divisions of the country — was important enough to have retained a tolerable garrison composed of eighty men of the " North Cork," so many of whose comrades had lately fallen at Oulart and Prosperous, a hundred and sixty yeomen belonging to Enniscorthy itself, and sixty more from Ferns and the adjoining baronies. Captain Snowe, of the North Cork, was in command. Captain Drury, a local officer of yeomanry, who commanded under him — had seen service in the American war. Father John's perform- ances had sent every Protestant in the neighbourhood, who had escaped his pikemen, into Enniscorthy for shelter. Several hundred — the greater part of them women, children, and old men — had crowded into the town on Sunday, where, if their property was destroyed, they believed their lives would be safe. But Father John, after his victory over Foote, aspired to be the liberator of his country. He required possession of Enniscorthy Bridge, that he might open his way to New Boss and Kilkenny. Oulart was but five miles distant, and Snowe was not long in learning that he 25 must prepare to be attacked in the morniug. He hud the yeomen's families to protect as well as the fugitives from the country. Under these hard circumstances he made the best dispositions in his power. He arrested the most dangerous of the inhabitants, and locked them up in the gaol and market- house. The North Cork were posted on the bridge, on the direct road from Oulart ; the yeomen were placed at the back, where the road entered from the west. In this position they lay under arms through the Whit- Sunday night. Father John was early astir on the morning of Whit- Sunday. His call had been well answered ; the news of his first triumph had rung a peal through every parish. Among those who had come in to him before day-break were a few score of duck- shooters, from the marshes — experienced shots, armed with their fowling- pieces. He had secured the muskets and pouches of the dead soldiers, and he found himself with eight hundred men, possessed of firearms of one kind or another, besides 5,000 pikemen. It was a hot, bril- liant morning. Father John was a born general ; he threw out skirmishers on either side of him, who availed themselves of the natural cover and pressed on from bank to bank. According to the ancient Irish custom, he drove along the road in front of him a herd of wild cattle, goaded into madness, who rushed into the yeomen's lines ; the duck-shooters fired steadily. Captain Drury said that in all his American experience he had never seen guns better handled. The 26 soldiers were raw hands, caught up but a few weeks before, and scarcely better disciplined than the rebels. Outnumbered twenty to one, with the cattle plunging upon them, and losing men fast, the yeomen sent to Captain Snowe for assistance, but he had by this time his own hands full at the river, and was in need of much help himself. The troops gave way, but very slowly fighting, inch by inch, desperately. Still numbers toltl. As the rebels advanced they set fire to the houses on each side of the street, and the battle went on under an arch of flame ; the inhabitants seeing the soldiers retir- ing, fired upon them from the windows, and the streets were filled with the dead and dying, five rebels falling for each yeoman. Themselves under shelter, they sent their volleys with destructive effect into the exposed mass of men who were struggling within ten paces of their guns, and Father John seeing he could make no further progress, and was throwing away lives unneces- sarily, fell back to the fields outside, and prepared to try again at nightfall. Meanwhile Captain Snowe, with his company of the North Cork, had held his ground gallantly, though with less difficulty than the yeomen, as his men had been better protected by situation. Foiled at the bridge, where they fell in scores, the rebels had twice attempted to force a passage above and below it, but were driven back at both points, and by two o'clock the town was cleared, and Enniscorthy was still in possession of the loyalists. 27 But in what condition was it left ? Half the town was burning ; five hundred rebels lay about the streets dead and dying ; the prisons were filled with desperate men, whom there was no force to guard ; the Catholic inhabitants were furious ; of the scanty garrison a third had been killed, besides the wounded ; and an unknown number of Protestant gentlemen and tradesmen who had given their services had fallen also. Outside was the fast increasing insurgent army, savage for revenge ; within were several hundred unfortunate beings — families of tradesmen and farmers, households of gentry and clergy — all now on a common level of misery. The garrison might maintain themselves in the gaol, but those forlorn people, when the rebels broke in again, must inevitably be sacrificed. To prevent a scene which would have rivalled the worst infamies of 1641, Snowe decided on evacuating the town, and escorting his charge to Wexford. It was a frightful alternative. The distance was but twelve miles, and the weather was dry and warm ; but there were no carriages, no horses, save the few belonging to the mounted yeomanry, and these, though cheerfully surrendered, were altogether inadequate. There were wounded men to be transported, and delicate ladies, and little children, too young to walk f too old for their mothers to carry them, and the infirm and aged, and the sick and impotent, yet to leave them behind was to leave them to certain death. Late in the afternoon the miserable march began. The insurgents 28 rushed in as the troops filed out. Women unable to reach the bridge waded the river to escape with their babies on their backs. The march was rapid. Two miles below, on the Wexford road, they passed a wood, known as the wood of St. John, or Ringwood, and many poor creatures, struggling painfully on, were tempted to fling themselves down among the brush- wood, hoping to lie concealed there till morning. The rest of stronger limb, or stouter spirit, pushed on, and, soon after nightfall, found a brief respite from their sufferings within Wexford gates. Father John's object now was Wexford City, and on the night of the 26th May he encamped within four miles of it, at a place called Three Rocks. On Whit Tuesday 200 men of the Donegal Militia, under com- mand of Colonel Maxwell, arrived to strengthen the garrison, which was quite inadequate to cope with the overwhelming force at Three Rocks. Half of the small garrison had been killed at Oulart, and in less than forty hours after that disaster Enniscorthy had been captured. The North Cork had suffered severely ; one detachment of the regiment had been destroyed at Prosperous, another at Oulart. At Enniscorthy they fought splendidly, and had retreated only before numbers enormously superior. All the Irish Mililii had to do with an enemy whose policy was to treat them as traitors to their country, and to refuse all quarter to such of them as came within their savage power. 29 The fate of the city depended upon General Fawcett, who commanded at Duncannon. He started from thence with two regiments ; the 13th Regiment of the line and the Meath Militia — two companies of the Meath were sent on in advance with some artillerymen and a couple of guns, but the General loitered on the way, and the detachment of the Meath, in fact the entire party, were surprised by an ambuscade and killed to a man, and the guns captured. A few of the artillerymen were kept alive to serve them. One single officer alone survived to carry the tale to Maxwell. Notwithstanding this disaster Wex- ford might have been saved had Fawcett possessed conduct or courage ; but the evil spirit of Abercrombie had unnerved too many of the English generals. Fawcett, who had reached Taghmon in the morning* at once turned back and retreated on Duncannon* Maxwell pushed out from the town hoping to meet him on the road. He arrived at Three Rocks only to find Father John too strongly posted for his small force to dislodge. The mounted yeomanry were unsteady and fled. His infantry were driven back with loss ; and he was obliged to retreat precipitately. Wexford, too, like Enniscorthy, had now become untenable. The bulk of the inhabitants were at heart with the rebels, and were kept quiet only by fear. If Father John advanced they would certainly rise and assist him. 30 Fawcett had deserted the garrison, and Maxwell him- self had been beaten in a skirmish, which proved that Father John was too strong for him. The enemy wi s without, and traitors were within. At midnight on the 30th May, Maxwell marched out of Wexford, thirty-six hours after he had entered it, and retreated by the sea road, which was still open to Duncannon. His soldiers were charged with having been guilty of some outrages on the way — burning houses and flogging men. It may have been so ; dis_ cipline is rarely sustained in the wreck of a beaten army ; and the road lay through the Barony of Forth* which had supplied Father John with the duck-shooters^ from whose long guns the North Cork had suffered so severely at Enniscorthy. Maxwell himself says that he reached Duncannon without interruption, which seems unaccountable as the spirit of the rebels was savage in consequence of the beating they had received at Ennis- corthy. Father John meanwhile had his eyes on larger objects. Wexford was now secured, but a local rising could not hope for permanent success. If the insurrec- tion was to triumph, it must spread ; it must envelope Ireland. Nothing had really been done till Dublin especially had been wrested from the invader. The people were everywhere prepared to rise, and the rebel army had only to show itself to be swollen by the local levies, the object being the deliverance of 31 Dublin ; the number of armed men who could be relied upon was practically unlimited. The rebel army was ordered to move up the Slaney from Enniscorthy, take Newtownbarry, sweep the loyalists out of the north of the county, and then, advancing through Carlow into Kildare, threaten Dublin on the west. CHAPTER Y. Battle of New Ross, 5th June, 1798. The town of New Ross stands on the slope of the river Barrow, which rises on the Wexford bank of the river. It was then surrounded by a wall which had once resisted Cromwell, there were four gates, two at the bottom of the town, by the water side, through which the high road passed from Dublin to Waterford, and two above. When it was known that New Ross was in danger, General Johnstone had been sent to take charge of it with some English artillery, a squadron of dragoons, a Scotch Fencible regiment, the Antrim, the North Cork, the Meath, and the County Dublin regiments, the latter under the command of Colonel Luke Gardiner, Yiscount Mountjoy. The rebels on their side had commenced by making a camp, six miles off, at Carrickbyrne Hill, from which they plundered the adjoining baronies. Having taken many Protestants, they availed themselves for their safe keeping of Scullabogue, a place belonging to a Captain King, at the hill foot. They turned the barn 33 into a prison and quartered the guard in the dwelling- house. After being thus occupied for a week they pushed forward and arrived at Corbet Hill, overhang- ing the valley of the Barrow. The troops were under arms all the night of June 5th. They were paraded at two in the morning, and as day began to break, the peculiar Irish cry was heard rising in gathering waves of sound, in the direction of the camp ; nearer and clearer it came through the morning air. The rebels came on slowly and in enormous numbers — not less than thirty thousand ; they marched in order, by parishes and by baronies, the Dublin regiment under Mountjoy. The North Cork, the Antrim, and the dragoons, were drawn up outside " Three Bullet Gate " on open ground. The rebel masses bore down the hill towards them. When about a musket shot off they halted. Priests were seen moving up and down the lines in their vest- ments and carrying crucifixes. Mass was said at the head of every column, the men kneeling with marked devotion. For the moment General Johnstone thought that they were hesitating, but he was swiftly undeceived. It was now a little after three o'clock, daylight being scarcely yet fully established, when the battle began. They rose from their knees, the lines opened, and between them came herds of wild cattle rushing on amidst shouts and yells which burst from the enormous multitude, the rebels pricking them forward with their pikes. A fourth part of the rebel army had fire arms, 34 but their main strength was in the pikemen, who formed in column behind the cattle, and charged with the fierceness of resolution for which the English and Scotch officers present were quite unprepared. They rushed upon the Dublin regiment, which was in some confusion, and drove it back through the gate ; Mount- joy fell and was carried off into the insurgent lines. The dragoons charged, but without effect, and recoiled with loss. A gun was taken, and the rebel pikemen poured into the town after the retreating troops. According to their usual tactics they immediately fired the houses. Cannon had been placed in the long, straight street, which leads from the market place to the " Bullet Gate," and poured round shot and grape into their dense masses. Multitudes fell. An entire column was annihilated — not a man escaped out of it. Brave as they were, so terrible a reception startled them. They fell back for a while, and the troops had time to rally and reform. But soon the rebels came on again through smoke and flame, their courage and their overwhelming numbers compensating for want of discipline and inferiority in arms. Nor was the pike, in the hands of a strong, bold man, a weapon to be lightly regarded. With a shaft twelve or fifteen feet in length, a long taper point, with a hook some- times attached which would drag a horseman from his saddle, it was an overmatch under some conditions for the bayonet. Johnstone's advantage was in his heavy guns. The rebels had no artillerymen, and such 35 cannon as they captured they were unable to use. But the daring of the Irish on that day defied even artillery. A spectator from a window close to the spot from whence a gun was strewing the streets with piles of dead, saw a man rush straight upon it, and thrust his hat into the smoking muzzle, crying, " Come on boys ; her mouth is stopped ! " In another second he was blown to atoms. Careless in their desperate fanaticism, the Irish then showed in rebellion the contempt of danger which, as soldiers in the army of their sove- reign, they never failed to show. Four guns were taken. They forced the troops backwards and down- wards to the river — part into the market-place, where, as at Enniscorthy, the stone buildings became a fortress into which they could neither burn nor pene- rate ; part down over the bridge and into Kilkenny. At one time the rebels seemed to have won the day, and they would have won it, could their leaders have restrained them in victory. But they turned uncontrollably to plunder — incendiarism and whiskey, discipline resumed its superiority. Behind the river the broken troops had reformed. Johnstone led them back to the charge, and the rebels now scattered were driven back in turn at the bayonet's point. The guns were recovered and again began to work havoc in the disordered crowds. The carnage was now dreadful. No quarter had been given by the rebels at the begin- ning of the engagement — none was allowed them at the end of it. They were driven out through the gate at 36 which they had entered ; they attempted a stand within the lines where they first appeared in the morning- Johnstone stormed them and broke them. There Lord Mountjoy's body was found mangled and butchered in the most horrid manner, far from the place where he had fallen. Mountjoy was the Luke Gardiner of '82 who had wrung from the Protestant Parliament the first concessions to the Catholics. And this was his reward. The sight of their commander, thus brutally mutilated, drove the militia into fury ; they had generally behaved excellently in action, but when the fighting was over they could be no longer restrained. The carnage was now shocking. The troops were exasperated and could not be stopped. The scene became too hideous to be described. The battle had raged for eleven hours ; it began at four in the morning and lasted until three in the afternoon, when it was at last over. Musgrave, in his " History of the Bebellion" (vol. ii., c. 16), placed the numbers of the rebels who were killed in the fight and after it at 2,600. The North Cork in this action lost in killed and wounded nearly 200 officers and men. It will be remembered that the rebels when encamped at Carrickbyrne had seized many of the Protestants of the neighbourhood and had shut them up in Captain King's house at Scullabogue. One hundred and eighty-four of them, chiefly old men, women, and children, who had been taken because they were too helpless to escape, were confined in a barn thirty-four feet long and fifteen 37 wide. Amongst those were the wives and children of the hated " North Cork " men who had fallen into the insurgents' hands. When the first check occurred, June 5, '98, in the streets of New Ross, a party of the insurgents, who were cowards as well as savages, turned their backs and ran. Before nine in the morning they came panting to the door of Scullabogue declaring that the day was lost, and that they had brought orders for the prisoners to be put to death, as they might otherwise be dangerous — the miserable beings who had been pent up there through a summer's afternoon and must have been in a condition in which death would be a relief to most of them. In the barn thev were at that moment crushed so close together that their bodies supported each other, and they could neither sit nor lie down. The doors were barred on the outside, and the rebels with their pikes thrust blazing faggots into the thatch. The majority must have been instantly suffocated. Those who were near the walls sought chinks aud cracks for air, but were driven back by pike-points thrust into the openings. One little child crawled under the door and was escaping, when a rebel ran a pike into it as a peasant does a pitchfork into a cornsheaf and tossed it back into the flames. A woman who came four days later to look for the remains of her husband and son, found the ruins of the barn full of blackened bodies all in a standing posture, an un- intended confirmation of the received estimate of the number of those who perished there. D CHAPTER VI. Battle of Arklow, June 10th, 1798. The check at New Ross had, for the present, saved Waterford and Kilkenny. Colonel L'Estrange had blocked the road into Kildare, but Arklow was un- garrisoned ; and at all hazards it was necessary to open the passage to Arklow. General Needham reached the town on the 6th of June with the Cavan Militia. He gathered up as many men as he could find, and armed a few additional volunteers and yeomen, but with all his efforts the force in Arklow remained inferior to that which had so hardly defended New E-oss, while Father John's rebel division was far superior, and had he come on to Arklow at once, he could easily have overwhelmed Needham ; happily he had lingered on the road burning Protestant houses, and at midnight, between the 8th and 9th of June, three hundred men belonging to the Durham Fencibles arrived under Colonel Skerritt. The Durham was the most distinguished regiment in Ireland. When it was called on for service in Wexford, the rebels were so conscious of its value that they placed 7,000 men in ambush to destroy it, but Skerritt brought his men safely through, and with the addition of the 39 Durham, General Needham's force was raised to 1,600 men ; of these 120 were the survivors of Sir Watkin Wynn's Ancient Britons, the rest consisted of 800 Irish Militia, 300 Arklow Yeomanry, 100 Scotch Regulars and the Durham Regiment. Arklow stands at the mouth of the Avoca river, which runs down out of the Wicklow Hills, and then falls into the sea at Arklow. The river is crossed by a bridge over which passed the only available road for a large body of men from Wexford into Wicklow, and over this bridge lay Father John's way if he meant to reach Dublin. Needham's position was simple. Skerritt and the Durhams, with a party of the Antrim Militia, under Colonel O'Hara, and three six-pounder guns, held the town of Gorey. A barricade of carts had been placed in the street, and the men had been thrown out on either side of it. Sheltered among the hedges and cabins, two companies of the " North Cork," with another gun, covered the back of the town, and a squadron of dragoons was across the bridge out of shot range on the Wicklow side of the river to be used as occasion might serve. The fight began on the sea side ; the right column of the rebels came plunging along the sands ; the green banners waving ; the priests with pistols and crucifixes ; the Irish cry rising and falling in fitful cadences like the swell of an iEolian harp. They had no cattle with them, and, as at Ross, with their first rush they drove the soldiers back. They fired 40 a row of fisherman's cabins at the end of the street. A piquet of Ancient Britons had to gallop through the flames in retreating, and, unable to reach the bridge, had to swim their horses through the river. The road turns at a right angle as it reaches the town, and, as the rebels rounded the corner, they were received with a fire which staggered them and drove them back. They formed again and again, they fought their way desperately to the bridge foot — recoiled, and again advanced, but could never pass that point. On their last retreat the dragoons were let loose upon them, and cut them down as they scattered among the sand hills. The attack on the Gorev road was more successful, and the fighting more severe. Father Michael Murphy and his brother priests here distinguished themselves. Political lay conspirators in Ireland have been magnifi- cent on the platform, but have uniformly been found wanting in the field. The courage of their opinions was the Catholic peasantry, and their natural chiefs the clergy. The battery behind the barricade completely swept the road. Twice the priests led on their followers through musket shot, round shot and grape, to the very muzzles of the guns, the priests coming so close that they shot the gunners at their posts with their pistols. Twice they failed — the second time with such desperate loss that they wavered and sought shelter among the walls. Father Michael seized a standard with a blazoned cross upon it, and, " Liberty or Death." Con- spicuous on horseback, he rode out, and dragged from 41 his pocket a handful of balls, which he swore he had caught as they reached him. " Come on, boys," he cried, " the heretic bullets can never hurt you. You are fighting for your God and Mother Church." A third time they charged, with a contempt of death that was really admirable. They seemed determined to take the guns, when a round shot, against which even Father Michael's spells could not avail, caught him and his horse, and hurled them into ruin. Sullenly and slowly the rebels then drew back, leaving the ground covered with their dead. Even yet they might have tried once more, but it grew dark, and night, rather than defeat, ended an engagement more desperate than even the battle of New Boss had been. General Needham reported that he had held his ground. He could say no more, and he added that he expected to be attacked again with thrice the number of assailants* on the following morning. * Needham's letter to General Lake, June 10. Musgrave's " History of Irish Rebellion, '98." A letter from Lord Castlereagh to Mr. "Wickham of this date (June 12th, '98) states that the Cabinet had roused themselves at last. The mail on the evening of the 11th brought word that the 4 ' Guards" were on their way, and that other regiments were preparing to follow. The number of the insurgents is immense, so great as to make it prudent to assemble a very considerable force before an attempt is made to penetrate this difficult and enclosed country. The conduct of the Militia and Yeomanry has exceeded our most sanguine expectations. A very few of the Yeomanry have been corrupted, but in no instance have the Militia failed to show the most determined spirit. CHAPTER VII. Vinegar Hill, June 21st, '98. At three o'clock on the morning of June 2 1st, accord- ing to General Lake's dispositions, Vinegar Hill was stormed, and the columns closed in on the Irish camp. The divisions of Generals Dundas and Loftus came down the east bank of the Slaney, and spread over a front of almost over a mile, and as they approached the hill, formed round it, and General Johnstone came up simultaneously from Ballymakessy. The rebel army, 1,600 strong, was drawn up on the open ground on the brow. General Lake with Dundas attacked on the east side, Sir James Duff with part of General Loftus' division, on the north-west. On three sides they forced their way simultaneously up the slope. The rebels held their ground for an hour and a half with moderate firm- ness. Lake's horse was killed under him early in the action. Father Clinch of Enniscorthy, an enormous man on a tall white horse, specially distinguished him- self. But successive defeats had cooled the courage which had been so eminent at Arklow and New Ross. There was no longer the contempt of death which will make even the least disciplined enemy formidable. 43 Lord Koden singled out Father Clinch and killed him. The rebels were afraid of being surrounded ; and seeing the southern side of the hill still open, they fled down it, and escaped through Needham's Gap to Wexford from the scene of their brief and wild supremacy. The army rested for the day on the ground, burying the dead and examining, with ever- gathering indignation, the traces of the butcheries which had been perpetrated there. The rebels with their surviving generals, Father John, once invincible, now twice beaten, and savage in his despair ; John Hay, Edward Fitzgerald, and Father Kerne, streamed away down the east side of the Slaney. Some crossed the river at Carrick Ferry, three miles above Wexford ; some went on to the bridge and rushed mad and furious into the town, threatening vengeance on every Protestant still in their hands. It would have gone hard with the prisoners there ; but on the other side General Moore was coming on from Taghmon. Two hours at most would bring him to the gates. Bishop Caulfield and his priests were energetic enough now to prevent a renewal of the murders. If Moore came up when such work was goiDg forward, the town might pay for it as it paid before. They turned out into the streets, exhorting, praying, threatening, imploring the armed insurgents to leave the town while there was time, and to give no fresh provocation to the soldiers. The cause, they said, was plainly lost for the present. Lord Kingsborough, commanding the North Cork Militia, had promised that life and property should be respected 44 if no more blood was shed. For the sake of Ireland, for the sake of their holy religion, for the sake of all they held dear on earth or heaven, they besought the rebels to spare the city the risk of being stormed and sacked by the bloody Orangemen. Their prayers prevailed, and in prevailing left them with the less excuse for their apathy on the preceding day. Towards sunset part of the rebels filed back over the bridge out of the town. Dixon, their leader, and his wife, on horseback, threw themselves in their way, praying them to stay at least till they had dispatched the remaining prisoners. They were borne away in the crowd, the women screaming, " We shall conquer yet ; my * Saviour ' tells me we must conquer." These wretches went north to Gorey, where they committed a frightful massacre on the unfortunate Protestant inhabitants who, imagining themselves safe in the rear of the army, had returned to their homes. Thence breaking into smaller parties, they made for the Wicklow mountains. The rest— the remainder mainly of the army which had fought at Yinegar Hill — rallying under the inde- fatigable Father John, slipped away behind General Moore who had halted two miles from the town, and made their way over the Barrow into Kilkenny, carry- ing havoc and destruction along with them. Moore, in the twilight, entered Wexford after the insurgents had all left it. The scene was described as most affecting. The windows were crowded with women who had been expecting massacre, The prisoners in the gaol heard 45 in the noise of the approaching troops the summons as they supposed, to death upon the bridge. When the door was thrown open they saw the king's uniform and knew that they were saved. The insurgents, who escaped with Father John over the Barrow, after ravag- ing part of Kilkenny and finding the peasants contrary to their expectations, disinclined to join them, doubled back into Wexford and thence into the Wicklow Moun- tains, where, divided into roving gangs of murderous banditti, they protraeted through the summer the bloody and miserable struggle. 24:th June, 1798.— -The North Cork, numbering 100 men,* and a party of yeomanry of about the same strength under command of General Dunn, defended the town of Athy, and pursued the rebels during the night ; and although unable to come up with the flying enemy, they were driven into the grasp of Major Mathews, who had marched from Maryborough in the Queen's County, to co-operate with Sir Charles Asgill, his force comprising 400 of his own regiment, the Queen's Co. Militia, Royal Downshire, the Maryborough Infantry, under Captain Gore, and the Ballyfin Cavalry, under Captain Poole. The rebels were observed in great numbers on the heights above Doonane, but as it was now evening, the troops rested in the town of Timahoe for the night, but determined to bring the rebels into action the next morning. Sir Charles Asgill recalled the troops to Maryborough ; but acting on his * Maxwell's Historv, 46 own responsibility and with great judgment, Major Mathews held his ground, and urged Sir Charles to make a joint attack with him next morning, and while he assailed them from Doonane the Major would make his attack by Timahoe ; but Sir Charles thought his troops were too much fatigued to do so. The rebels, however, retreated to Goresbridge, in the County of Kilkenny, and Major Mathews marched at midnight to intercept them, and at daybreak they were discovered halted on Kilcomney Hill. The attack was begun by the Downshire Battalion guns opening fire, and the rebels fell back ; while endeavouring to reform they were attacked by Asgill's troops in the rear. They broke, fled, and were cut down almost without any resistance, the pursuit being continued for two hours with fatal effect. This was a crushing blow to the Southern insurrection. All was lost — baggage, arms, provisions, and ammunition — all had fallen into the hands of the loyal troops. Father John Murphy, the Rebel Commander-in- Chief, who fled from the field of battle, was taken at an alehouse in the town of Goresbridge by three yeo- men, one of them named McCabe, and after a savage resistance was finally overpowered and brought a prisoner to Tullow, the head-quarters of Sir James Duff. He was brought before that General who was seated, surrounded by his Aides-de-Camp, Colonels Foster and Eden, the Earl of Roden, and Captain McClintock. His conduct even in their presence was most brutal, 47 and tie was taken from the room in a state of demoniacal rage and fury ; and in a few hours afterwards he was hanged in the Market-place, his head fixed on the Market-house and his body burned. He was a man about 45 years old ; light complexioned, bald-pated, and about 5 feet 9 inches high, powerfully made, uniting strength and agility. He was exceedingly irascible, and when in a passion had the aspect of a tiger. His vestments, his pix, his oil-stock, and a small crucifix were found in his pocket.* Gordon, " the historian/' states that the body of Father Murphy was cut open, the heart taken out and roasted, and the fat melted and used by some of the Ancient Britons' yeomanry cavalry for greasing their boots. * Musgrave. CHAPTER VIII. Landing of the French. On the ever- memorable 22nd August, 1798, three large vessels, flying English colours, entered Killala Bay. They were at first mistaken for English ships of war, but shortly the inhabitants of the town were undeceived by the landing of three hundred French soldiers within a mile of it, who, under command of General Humbert, at once pushed on, and after driving out the garrison, which consisted of about fifty yeomen, who offered but a feeble resistance, occupied the town, and requisitioned everything they wanted — especially the horses. This force was but the advance guard, and the remainder, about twelve hundred, disembarked during the day. They were mostly of the Army of Italy, who had recently fought under Buonaparte in that country. They were eagerly joined by the Irish rebels, and 5,000 stand of arms were distributed amongst them, but as a general rule they preferred the pike to the French fusils. Humbert, the leader of the expedition, was a good officer, apparently master of his art ; a bold dashing fellow, of handsome exterior, and 49 in the full vigour of life. Many of the British generals had yet to learn a good deal of the art of war, and Humbert gave them a practical lesson on the 27th of August, 1798, at Castlebar, in the county of Mayo ; for whilst in false confidence that the invaders must advance by the high road from Ballina, he suddenly wheeled to the right, crossed the mountains, and appeared in close column crowning the ridge. He covered the advance of his Grenadiers by a body of the rebels in French uniforms to draw awav from his own troops the fire of the artillery, which had to a great measure checked the rapidity of his advance. He made himself well acquainted with the country between him and the British, and knew every point of cover for his brave soldiery — the hardy veterans of many a well- fought field of Italy and the Rhine. Humbert com- menced deploying rapidly from the centre, with open files, until he formed line most in rank entire — nearlv parallel with the front of the Royal position. The fatal mistake of this disgraceful day was made here ; for instead of holding their ground quietly, and allowing the enemy to close, the British opened a useless fire at a distance which rendered it perfectly ineffective. The French at once saw the want of judgment, and rushing forward en tirailleur, they seized some hedges in front of the Royal line, ex- tended rapidly, gradually outflanking it ; and now a disgraceful scene ensued. The line exhibited general unsteadiness, and notwithstanding the excellent artillery 50 practice, the supporting infantry gave way, leaving the guns exposed to a rush from the enemy ; and, as might be expected, the guns were captured, and the troops made of! pele mele towards the town, pursued by the French cavalr} T , by whom numbers of them were slaughtered. Although no attempt was made to follow them further than the town of Castlebar, a panic seemed to possess the troops, who retreated so quickly as to reach the town of Tuam — thirty miles from the scene of action — on the night of the same day. This occurrence, no doubt, gave rise to the ridiculous state- ment in Lever's " Charles O'Malley," " that the North Cork ran away fifteen miles further than the enemy followed them." But according to Maxwell, in his " History of the Irish Rebellion of 1798," an officer of the Carabineers, 6th Dragoon Guards, with sixty of his men, after some refreshment in Tuam, retired still further towards Athlone, and arrived there at one o'clock on Tuesday, the 29th, having covered a distance of 63 miles — the distance between Castlebar and Athlone — in 27 hours. Beside that of the Cara- bineers, of which no return has been made, the Royalist loss in this disgraceful affair, it has been stated, was 53 killed, 34 wounded, and 279 missing. Among the prisoners and missing were 2 majors, 3 captains, 6 lieutenants, 3 ensigns, 2 officers of the staff, 10 sergeants, and 2 drummers. Of the privates missing the greater part belonged to the Longford and Kilkenny Militia, who afterwards 51 deserted to the enemy. The Boyal troops were commanded by Generals Lord Lake, Taylor, and Hutcheson, and were greatly superior in number to the French, but Humbert's estimate of the British com- manding officers will give a key to the secret of their defeat. " I met," he said " many generals in Ireland, but the only ' general ' I met, after all, was Colonel Yereker."* Humbert evacuated Castlebar on the 3rd of Septem- ber, 1798, accompanied on the march by a mob of rebels, who deserted him every hour by twenties. His object now appeared to be the occupation of the town of Sligo, within five miles of which lies the town of Collooney, where Colonel Vereker and his regiment — the City of Limerick Militia — a corps of yeomanry and two curricle guns — a force not exceeding 300 men — gallantly engaged the French. The result was, how- ever, what might have been expected. Vereker's right flank was turned, and he was obliged to retreat across the river, after keeping up a sharp and spirited action for upwards of an hour. To the British Commander the action was most creditable, and, although he was obliged to retreat with- out his guns, he inflicted a severe and discouraging loss upon the enemy. Four days had passed since the French and their auxiliaries had abandoned Castlebar, and during that time they had been continually harrassed, and so closely * Maxwell's Hist. 52 were those gallant fellows pressed that a fusilade was almost incessant between their rere guard and the advance of the Royalists. General Lake was very strong in cavalry, which enabled him to hang closely on their rere, from which it was not possible to shake him off, and so vigorously were the valiant Frenchmen pushed that their leader was obliged to halt the head of his column and receive an attack from the advancing enemy. 8th September, 1798. — -While forming the leading division, the rere guard, under General Sazarin, were overtaken within half a mile of Ballinamuck, and that officer who commanded, en second, at once sur- rendered, and, by so doing, exercised a sound discretion, and prevented a useless expenditure of human blood. The sacrifice most painful to a soldier's feeling would never have been made by him until every hope was over, and, indeed, there was no alternative, as Lord Cornwallis's army — 30,000 strong — had almost sur- rounded them, and Lord Lake had advanced so rapidly in pursuit as to arrive at Ballinamuck in time to co- operate with Cornwallis in compelling the surrender of Humbert's gallant little army. " The following circumstances," says Musgrave, " attended the surrender of the French army at Ballina- muck — Hompesche's dragoons and Lord Eoden's fox- hunters, yeomanry, were the cavalry that hung upon Humbert's rear on the retreat from Castlebar, and were the troops to whom the French first showed signs of 53 willingness to surrender, and accordingly after sound of trumpet, which was answered by the French, Lord Roden and General Crawford then came up to the 1st and 2nd Brigade of the French army, who surrendered to about 300 cavalry, under his lordship and General Crawford. After this they advanced with about 20 dragoons and took possession of three French guns. Shortly afterwards Humbert rallied his Grenadiers, consisting of about 400 men, the only part of the army, except the Chasseurs, that had not surrendered, who surrounded Lord Roden and his 20 dragoons. They were given in charge to the hussars while they were their prisoners, which lasted about half an hour. The French officers loaded the United Irishmen, their allies, with execrations for having deceived and dis- appointed them by inviting them to undertake a fruitless expedition. They also declared that the people of Ireland were the most treacherous and cowardly they had ever met. From the commencement of Humbert's movement towards the North until his surrender, not an hour passed without the vengeance of the Royalists falling on the deluded wretches who still continued rather to embarrass than assist the French army while retreating. Every straggler that was overtaken was cut down by the Hompeschers and Foxhunters who formed the advance of the Royal Army, and when the urvaders laid down their arms at Ballin amuck, if blood could have atoned for treason, it was fearfully exacted, for the l 54 sword and the halter were used with unsparing hands. During the pursuit of Humbert, the rebels preserved not even the semblance of order, but straggled as they pleased, it was not unusual to find them sleeping in dozens in the fields, some from fatigue, some from drunkenness. "No questions were asked. The coup de sabre while on the march ; the arm of the next tree, when halted, ended all inquiry. At Ballinamuck voe victis was pronounced ;* no quarter was given, and, to use Musgrave's words, dreadful havoc was made among the unfortunate wretches who were excluded from mercy, and cut down by the hundred. The force of the rebels accompanying the French army is said to have consisted of 1,500 men at the time of this surrender, and the troops of General Humbert were found, when prisoners, to consist of 748 privates and 96 officers, a loss of 288 being sustained since their first landing at Killala. The only troops actually engaged at Ballinamuck were the Light Battalion and the Armagh Militia. A French standard fell into the hands of the light company of the Armagh, and is still kept with the regimental colours in Gosford Castle. * Musgrave's History. CHAPTER IX. Humbert's Surrender. 27 th October 1798. — After the surrender of the French army immediate steps were taken by the Irish adminis- tration for sending the French prisoners of war back to their own country, and just before^ and for the last time, that an invading force of French Republicans appeared on the western shores of Ireland, and the same frigates from which Humbert and his gallant followers had debarked on the evening of the 22nd of August, once more entered Killala Bay, on the 27th of October, 1798, with, as was reported, 2,000 men on board. When they sailed from Brest intelligence had not been received by the French Directory of Humbert's surrender, and this force had been dispatched to assist and to co-operate with him on the north-east coast of Ireland ; but their anchors had scarcely reached the bottom, when several British vessels appeared in the offing and obliged them to stand out to sea without holding any communication with the shore, and then managed to escape by superior sailing, and after that failure the French Executive seem to consider any future attempts 56 on Ireland as hopeless, and virtually the Irish Rebellion of 1798 was at an end. Some small affairs did occur in the north of the kingdom occasionally afterwards, but were immediately suppressed by the now over- whelming force at the disposal of the authorities in the country. This fact, together with the dread of falling into the hands of the King's troops or any others in authority, stamped out any idea of further armed resistance to law and order at the time ; and it must be said that terrible acts of hurried justice were daily witnessed even in the metropolis ; the lamp irons, or the scaffolding on the bridges, were turned into temporary gallows ; corporal punishment, and even torturous measures, used — sometimes from vague suspicion, at others from private enmity alone. A few of the instances may be stated as follows, and to the shame of the North Cork Regiment be it said that their introduction of the " pitch cap " torture was about one of the worst ; it was used in the county of Wexford on any person having his hair cut short, called a " croppy," as the soldiers designated the United Irishmen, and on being pointed out by some loyal neighbour was immediately seized, brought into a guard house where caps either of coarse linen or strong brown paper besmeared inside with pitch were always kept ready for use. The unfortunate victim had one of these, well heated, compressed upon his head, and when judged of a proper degree of coolness, so that it could not be easily pulled off, the sufferer was turned out 57 amid the horrid acclamations of the merciless tor- turers.* In the centre of the capital a heart-rending spectacle was presented of a human being rushing from the infernal depot of torture, besmeared with a burning preparation of turpentine and pitch, plunging in his distraction into the Liffey, and terminating at once his suffering and his life. The indiscriminating punishment inflicted on the Wexford leaders, without exception, has been heavily condemned. That men like Harvey, Keogh, Colclough, and Grogan were radically infected with republican principles cannot be questioned, but like hundreds of theoretic politicians of that day, it is more than probable that their treasonable intents would have been confined to the dinner table, and not displayed in the field, for men jested at the dinner table, after the ladies retired, then just as they do now, unconscious that the sword was suspended over them by a hair, and never dreamed that within a few brief months a boon com- panion, sitting at the same board, might, like Hamlet, apostrophize the only remnant of their mortality that was left : " That skull had a tongue in it, and could speak and sing once. How the knave jowls it to the ground as if it were Cain's jawbone that did the first murder." The North Cork Regiment had seen a good deal of » * See -"Lives of the United Irishmen," chapter ix. 58 actual hard fighting for the past twelve months ; had fought well in three general actions, viz. : — New Ross, Arklow, and Vinegar Hill. At Arklow Lord Kings- borough, afterwards Earl of Kingston, the commanding officer, was taken prisoner by the rebels, and kept as a hostage, but was afterwards liberated and sent to General Moore. During his absence, however, the regiment lacked nothing in the way of being well commanded, as Lord Kingsale most ably filled his place. The recruiting of the corps was, as may be supposed, a matter of some difficulty, but the losses were quickly made good and the full strength of the regiment well kept up, and since the outbreak of the rebellion six companies had been added, raised, as at the embodi- ment of 1793, by Government levy, and the number now stood at 1,100 men. Notwithstanding the havoc made in the ranks at the three battles last stated, besides the affairs at Prosperous, Oulart, Enniscorthy, &c, no regiment in the service of King George had given and received more hard knocks during '98 than the " North Cork;" but fighting, like everything else, must have its limit, and after the defeat of the French fleet, under Commodore Bompart, off Lough Swilly, by Sir J. B. Warren, Bart., on the 12th of October, public confidence became much restored, and although a large force was necessarily kept up in the country, the " North Cork " regiment was not again called upon to meet an enemy m the field, but had the usual routine of garrison duty to perform throughout 59 the kingdom, and early in the year 1799 the regiment moved into the County of Meath, head-quarters at Trim, under the command of Colonel R. N. Fitzgerald, who had been appointed to the chief command of the corps since the previous month of November, just after the resignation of Lord Kingsborough, with Lieut.-Colonel W. H. M. Hodder, as second in com- mand, since the retirement of Lord Kingsale, commis- sion dated 15th January, 1799. The regiment was then qua rtered in various parts of the North of Ireland for some two years, and afterwards sent into the county of Kilkenny, where the good conduct and the general appearance of the corps elicited much approbation, as the following extract from Brigade orders amply shows : — [Copy.] Brigade Orders. "Kilkenny, 5th October, 1803. " Brigadier- General Sir Charles Green desires to ex- press his great satisfaction at the soldierlike and hand- some appearance of the North Cork Regiment under arms this day. The progress they have made in their field discipline was also strongly marked by the correct manner in which they performed their different evolu- tions, and upon the whole the Brigadier- General has so much reason to be pleased with the North Cork Regiment that he requests Lieut.-Colonel Hodder, the commanding officer, Major Atkin, and the rest of the officers, may accept of his best thanks for the zeal and 60 attention they have shown in the discharge of their different duties, and he further assures them that in the event of facing an enemy, he shall think himself fortunate in having so good a corps under his com- mand. " Signed by order, " J. B. Campbell, Brigade Major. " Edward Heard, Capt. and Adjutant, " North Cork Begt." 61 Battle of Assaye, and Lord Cathcart's Expedition to Hanover. November, 1803. — The North Cork Regiment was next quartered in the King's County, head-quarters at Banagher, with detachments at various towns in the county. Just at this time the British Government was actively engaged with the affairs of India ; the battle of Assaye had been fought — one of the first of the glorious victories of "Wellington — then Major- General Wellesley, where, on the 23rd September, 1803, he defeated Scindiah, the Marhatta Chief, having an army of 50,000 men, with a force of only 8,000. The military operations in India required every soldier that England could spare from the year 1803 to 1806, when the campaign in that country was happily brought to a close by the negotiations of Lord Lake. The Irish Militia contributed largely to the number of men required to fill the place of those who fell during that war, and the North Cork volunteered numerously. The British Government, about this time, having determined to effect a diversion on the Continent, an expedition was prepared and placed under the com- mand of Lord Cathcart ; but the disastrous consequences which resulted from the defeat of the combined armies of Austria and Prussia, at Austerlitz, by the French under the Great Emperor Napoleon, on the 2nd of December, 1805, rendered it advisable to abandon the attempt, and accordingly the expedition returned from Hanover, immediately after that great event. ■ ■mi AUGUST, 1808. THE PENINSULAR WAR. MAXWELL'S " LIFE OF WELLINGTON." ■-.J! CHAPTER X. The Peninsular War. The peace of Europe was at this period in a very unstable condition. Napoleon Buonaparte,* "the wonder of an age/' had raised a mighty empire on the ruins of a republic ; his power, his glory, were at their zenith ; the movements of his armies were but a march to victory ; half Europe was at his feet, and thrones and kings rose and fell at his dictation — with one solitary exception — all cowered before the magic of his name, and while her political horizon became every hour more heavily overcast, Great Britain main- tained, with inflexible resolution, the attitude she had from the first assumed; and though every banner beside her own veiled its glories before the victorious eagles of the Corsican, the leopards of England were seen waving proudly — " Far as the breeze could bear, or billows foam." The outbreak of the war between England and France by the battle of Rolica, August 17th, 1808, and * Maxwell's " Life of Wellington." 66 the almost certain long continuance of hostilities in Spain and the Peninsula, caused great anxiety to the British Government, and an immense strain was put upon the military resources of the country. The Irish Militia responded cheerfully to the call for volunteers to the regiments of the line, and during the six years which occupied the attention of the world by the " Peninsular War/' the North Cork Regiment contributed as many as 510 officers and men to swell the ranks of Welling- ton's victorious army ; and well may this " great General " have said " that some of his best soldiers were raw recruits from the Irish Militia."* The great events which occurred on the Continent, and the glorious achievements of the British arms in Spain, Portugal, and France, up to the capitulation of Paris, and the abdication of Napoleon at Fontainebleau, in March, 1814, are mere matters of history. And the decisive victory over the French at Waterloo in the following year by the combined armies of Great Britain and Prussia brought peace to Europe — " The grave of France — the field of Waterloo." After the battle of Waterloo, June 18th, 1815, the standing army of Britain was much reduced, and many regiments of militia were disembodied ; but the North Cork Regiment was suffered to remain in its integral state until the following year, when the corps was dis- embodied on the 1st of April, 1816. * Napier. 67 The following is a list of the officers of the regiment when disembodied 1st April, 1816 : — Rank and Names. Colonel — W. H. M. Hodder, died. Lieut.-Colonel — W. H. M. Hodder, remained in com- mand. Lieut.-Colonel — Sir John Fitzgerald, supernumerary ; resigned 24th July, 1815. Majors — Norman dniacke. „ John Roe, supernumerary; resigned 24th July, 1815. Captains — Edward Hoare. Cooper Penrose. Joseph Coghlan. William Dorman. Michael Roberts. Thomas Herrick. John Hyde. Thomas Cooke Maxwell Atkins. Lieuts — John Boy ce. Robert Starkey. Thos. Spires. James Hudson. James Cotter. Robert Atkins. Daniel Kirby. » » it )> „ Richard Hickson. „ John Wallis. 68 Lieuts — Wm. Collis. George Jessop. George Heard. Ensigns — Edward Heard „ Richard Lane. Frederick Campbell. Joseph. Atkins. » „ — Roberts. „ James Atkins. „ Henry Collins. „ David Hodson. Paymaster — Henry Atkins. Adjutant — Captain Edward Heard. Quarter-Master — Edward Ring. Surgeon — Chermside. Assist. -Surgeon — Lloyd. 1853. OUTBREAK OF WAR IN THE CRIMEA AND FALL OF SEBASTOPOL. CHAPTER XI. War in the Crimea. After an interval of " thirty-nine years " the peace of Europe was again disturbed. The Czar Nicholas of Russia moved, it is said, by prophecies, which assigned to the dominion of the Turks in Europe a period of 400 years from the taking of Constantinople in 1453, thought the time was come for seizing, after he had in vain proposed to divide with England, the inheritance of the " Sick Man," as he called the Sublime Porte. He marched his armies into the principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia, and his Black Sea fleet issuing suddenly from Sebastopol, destroyed the Turkish Navy at Sinope. In the following spring, England and France declared war in defence of Turkey, and sent expeditions to the Baltic and the Euxine to adduce u the last reason of kings."* The noble defence of the line of the Danube by the Turks under Omar Pasha " left the allied armies available for an attempt to destroy the fortress of Se- Smith. bastopol (or Sevastopol) —which means ' The City of the Emperor or Czar, Se^o-aros being the Greek equivalent for the Latin Augustus '* whence Russia dominated the Euxine and menaced Constantinople." The allied armies landed on the western coast of the Crimea — the ancient Taurica Chersonesus — and gained a complete victory at the Alma over the Russians under Prince Mentschikoff, on the 20th of September, 1854 ; and they might have followed the routed army into Sabastopol had they known the weakness of its defenders. Instead of this they marched round the city and prepared to attack it from the south. The respite was improved by the resolution of Prince Gort- schakoff and the genius of Todleben, and the grand attack of the allies by land and sea was repulsed, Oct. 17th. The siege that followed was signalized by the rash but splendid charge of our Light Cavalry Brigade under Lord Cardigan on the Russian guns at the Battle of Balaklava, October 25th, and by the stern, triumphant resistance of the British infantry to the attack of the Russians at Inkerman before daybreak on November 5th ; but the terrible sufferings of the English army during the winter brought much discredit on our military organization. On January 10th the Anglo-French alliance was joined by the King of Sardinia, whose troops, under General La Marmora, " bore the chief part of the victorv of the Tchernava ' (August 16th, 1855). A successful assault was made * Kinglake. on the defences by the allies on the 8th of September, and on the following: night Prince Gortschakoff withdrew in good order to the fort on the north side of the harbour, and the allied army entered Sebastopol. The Czar Nicholas at the age of 59 had succumbed to disappointment and to the cold of which he boasted as his ally, March 2nd, 1855 ; and his son, Alexander, was not able to continue the contest after the fall of Sebastopol ; and on the 16th January, 1856, Russia accepted the basis of a peace which was signed at Paris, March 30th, 1856. By the Act of June 30th, 1852, for the re-organization of the militia, the entire construction of the force was materially altered, and by the subsequent Act of August, 1854, the numbers and the uniforms of the regiments underwent a complete change. To the North Cork " was given the number 116, and their uniform changed to that of Rifles." January, 1855. — List of Officers. Colonel — Wm. H. M. Hodder, late 88th Foot. Lieut-Col. — Wm. St. Leger Alcock Stawell, late Capt. 23rd Foot. Major — Robert Atkins, late Capt. 60th Foot. Captains — Robert Aldworth, late Capt. 94th Foot. ,, Richard Lane Warren, late Lt. 35th Foot. John Robert Stawell, late Lt. 38th Foot. Fredric J. Rawlins, late Lt. 5th Foot. 74 Captains — Ed. Braddell, late Capt. 70th Foot. St. Leger Barry, late Capt. 65th Foot. Spencer Geo. Walsh, lateLt. Rl. Marines. Poole Gabbett, late Lt. 31st Foot. J. Martin, late Capt. Rifle Brigade. Edward Hoare. Lieuts. — Charles Lyster. ,, Dominick Sarsfield. „ Fred. J. Blackburne. ,, Robert Pern 7 . ,, John E. F. Alymer. „ Cornelius O'Callaghan. 5) „ Chas. F. Knolles. ,, John Foote. fV >> Thos. McCarthy. Ensigns. — Miles O'Reilly. ,, Herbert Coghlan. ,, Richard G. Creagh. „ James Geo. Anderson. William L. Howe. Richard W. Stokes. i > 1 1 Adjutant — Fred. M. Callaghan. Paymaster — Nil. Surgeon — James F. Uniacke, M.l). Assist.-Surg. — Francis L'Estrange. The embodiment of the militia to meet the emergency caused by the outbreak of the war in the Crimea was partial, not general, but the " North Cork w was one of the first regiments of the Irish militia selected for service, and, after a repose of 38 years, it was re- embodied, by voluntary enrolment, at Buttevant, in the county of Cork, on the 18th of December, 1854, under the chief command of Colonel Wm. Henry Moore Hodder, commission dated 1st March, 1831, formerly of the 88th Regiment (Connaught Bangers), with which gallant corps he served in the Peninsular War, and was present at the Battles of Talavera, Busaco, and Fuentes d'Onor, affairs of Foz d'Arouce and Sabugal, and the lines of Torres Vedras (medal and three clasps.)* This veteran was son of the officer who was second in command of the " North Cork " after the retirement of Lord Kinsale in 17JJ9. The regiment remained at Buttevant until the 2nd of June, 1855, during which short period the corps made great progress in its drill and discipline, under the untiring efforts of the indefatigable adjutant, Captain Frederick Marcus Callaghan, appointed 3rd November, 1854, formerly of the 60th Eoyal Rifles. From Buttevant the regiment moved to Limerick, from whence it got the route, on the 24th of July, for the Curragh Camp. On the 6th of December it was again moved, and arrived at the Camp, Aldershot, on the 9th December, 1855. Here it lay until the 9th April, 1856, when the corps was sent to Weymouth, with •Hart's "Army List" (October, 1856), 76 detachment at Portland, and on the 16th of June, 1856 to Fermoy, where it arrived on the 21st June, and was disembodied in that garrison on the 29th August, 1856. The number of volunteers given to the regular array during embodiment was 271. EXTRACTS FROM HISTORY OF THE WAR OF THE INDIAN MUTINY. HAVELOCKS COLUMN. 1857- MABSHMAN'S "LIFE OF HAVELOCK." CHAPTER XII. The Indian Mutiny. January, 1857. — The year 1857, destined to be one of unexampled atrocities, dawned tranquilly on the rulers of India, and the empire was supposed to be in a state of the most profound repose. Suddenly, from a cause apparently insignificant, the spark was applied to the mine on which we had been slumbering, and in a few months India was in a blaze. It had been determined to improve the efficiency of the native army by the introduction of the Enfield rifle, the cartridges of which required to be lubricated. They were made up for the rifles in the laboratory at Dumdum. On the 22nd of January Captain Wright informed Major Boutein, commanding the depot of musketry at that station, that a very unpleasant feeling existed among the Sepoys, who had been sent there for instruction regarding the grease used in preparing the cartridges. It appears that a mechanic attached to the magazine asked a Sepoy, of the 2nd Grenadiers, for water from his lotuh, or brass water pot ; the Sepoy refused it, on the ground that he did not know to what caste he belonged, when the mechanic immediately 80 retorted, " You yourself will soon have no caste left, for you will be required to bite cartridges smeared with the fat of pigs and cows." However indifferent a Hindoo may be on the subject of his religious belief, he is frantic on any question of " caste/ ' and the man who would not hesitate to lampoon his gods for a con- sideration would regard the attempt to touch his lips with a piece of beef as an inexpiable offence. It was then discovered for the first time that a report had been disseminated through the native army that it was the design of Government to destroy the caste of the Sepoys by constraining them to bite off the end of greased cartridges. General Hearsay, commanding the Presidency divi- sion, fully estimating the gravity of the crisis, lost not an hour in addressing the Deputy Adjutant- General of the Army on the subject, and, with a view of eradicating this impression from the minds of the Sepoys, proposed that the ingredients necessary for the preparation of the musket cartridge should be procured from the bazaar, and the Sepoys allowed to make it up them- selves. The Deputy Adjutant- General allowed three days to pass, and then forwarded it to the Military Secretary to the Government, who replied, on the 27th, that the Governor-General in Council sanctioned the proposal, and that it might be carried into effect, not only at Dumdum, but also at the stations of Umbala and Sealkote in the north-west. It was now, however, too late to remedy the mis- 81 chief. By means of that active correspondence which was maintained with each other by men of the same caste and family in the various regiments, the alarm had already spread throughout the army, and it was universally believed that the greased cartridges were intended to destroy their caste, with a view of com- pelling them to embrace Christianity. General Hearsay held a Court of Enquiry at Barrack- pore to ascertain the cause of this universal disaffection, and he informed the Government that although the men expressed themselves to be perfectly satisfied, the con- viction that grease was used in the composition of the cartridges was now so deeply rooted in their minds that it would be both idle and unwise to attempt to remove it. The spirit of mistrust and disaffection had, in fact, reached that point at which every effort to correct it by explanation would only tend to confirm it, with the additional evil of being regarded as an index of pusillanimity. On the 10th of February the Sepoys at Barrackpore held a meeting on the parade ground at night to concert a general rising, when they proposed to murder all the Europeans, plunder the station, and proceed where they liked. General Hearsay again addressed the supreme Government in Calcutta in urgent terms, and affirmed that they had been dwell- ing at Barrackpore on a mine ready for explosion. He pointed out the extreme danger arising from the presence of four or five disaffected native regiments so 82 close to the metropolis and quoted Sir Chas. Metcalf's memorable remark, " That we should wake some morn- ing and find India lost to the Crown of England." l§th February f 1857. — On the 19th of February the Mutiny burst forth at Berhampore. The 19th Regi- ment broke out into open revolt, seized their muskets, and rushed with loud yells on the parade ground. Colonel Mitchell, who commanded the regiment, had not a single European in the cantonment, but with the aid of two guns and 160 irregular horse who, from the circumstance of their enlistment and organization, were, in the early stages of the Mutiny, better affected towards the Government than the line, managed to smother the flame without bloodshed. Her Majesty's 84th Regiment was ordered up from Rangoon, and on its arrival at Calcutta, the 19th Regi- ment was directed to proceed from Berhampore to Barrackpore. All the regiments at Barrackpore were, however, tainted with disaffection ; but the 34th took the lead in the revolt, and on Sunday, 29th of March, a Sepoy named Mungul Punday, infuriated with intoxi- cating drugs, rushed to the parade ground and called on his comrades to come forward in defence of their religion. The European sergeant-major of the regi- ment advanced to seize him, while the quarter guard witnessed the scene without moving. The adjutant of the regiment then came to the rescue, but the Panday shot his horse, and then came a hand-to-hand conflict with both European officers. 83 The Sepoys of the regiment, instead of supporting their officers, attacked them from behind, and they must have fallen victims to this murderous assault had not General Hearsay rescued them by his personal resolution and gallantry. On the arrival of the 19th at Barrackpore, the Queen's 84th, a wing of the 53rd, two batteries of artillery, and the Governor-General's body guard, were assembled on parade. General Hearsay, in obedience to the order of the Governor- General, then read the public order, which had been passed on the occasion. It stated that the native officers and men of the regiment had been guilty of open and defiant mutiny, and that the punishment decreed by the Supreme Government was that they should be discharged from the service, be deprived of their arms, receive their arrears of pay, and be required to quit the cantonment. It, moreover, directed that this sentence — so utterly inadequate to the offence — should be read at the head of every regi- ment in India. Five weeks were then allowed to pass without any decision on the conduct of the 34th Regiment. During this period of inaction the spirit of insubordination was rising to maturity throughout the Bengal Army. On the 9th of May all the disposable troops, Euro- pean and native, were assembled at Barrackpore, to witness the punishment of the mutinous 34th. Four hundred of the most culpable in that corps were called 84 on the parade ; their crime, which was described as the most heinous a soldier could be guilty of, was then circumstantially detailed, after which they were paid up their arrears and discharged from the public service and ordered to be conveyed to Chinsurah, to which place their families and baggage were to be sent after them. Thus, on the spot where 33 years before the mutinous 47th had expiated their crime under showers of grape and the sabres of the cavalry, the 19th and 34th, guilty of a more atrocious revolt, were requited by discharge from the service, accompanied by the receipt of all their arrears to the uttermost farthing. The conduct of the Government in 1824 nipped mutiny in the bud, while the conduct of the authorities in 1857 rendered a revolt throughout the army under the existing state of feeling inevitable. 8th Mai/, 1857. — On the 8th of May cartridges were served out to the 3rd Cavalry at Meerut ; they refused to accept them, though it was distinctly explained that they had not been smeared with grease. In fact, the army was now ripe for mutiny. On the 9th May, 85 of the recusants were tried by Court-Martial, and sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour from terms varying from 5 to 10 years. All the troops, European and native, were drawn up on parade, and the delinquents were stripped of their uniform and ironed. They were then marched off to jail, uttering imprecations on the Government. 85 There were at the time two native infantry regiments at that station, and one of cavalry, and two European corps, with two troops of European horse artillery and a field battery. The European troops could easily have exterminated the native force, but unhappily the station was under the command of a worn out and imbecile septuagenarian, General Hewitt, whose name has ob- tained a most unenviable notoriety in Indian history. G CHAPTER XIII. Massacre by teie Sepoys. On the llth May, as the bells were ringing for Church Service, incendiary fires became visible in various directions. The incensed troopers of the 3rd Cavalry rushed to the jail, where no European guard had been stationed, and knocked off the irons of their companions and likewise liberated all the prisoners. Simultaneously with the forcing of the jail, the two infantry regiments assembled tumultuously on their parade, seized their arms, and shot Colonel Finnis, and other of their officers who were endeavouring to appease them. The Sepoys and the convicts joined by the mob, now rushed into the houses of the Europeans, and in- discriminately massacred all they could seize, without regard to sex or age, aggravating murder by outrages still more revolting. After they had plundered or destroyed the property they set fire to the bungalows, and the cantonment was soon in a blaze. When the destruction was complete, and every European man, woman, and child had been mercilessly butchered, they prepared to leave Meerut and take the road to Delhi, 87 distant about 40 miles. It was at this stage of the catastrophe that the European troops were first brought into action, but it was now too late. The dragoons and the riflemen overtook and shot down a few of the hindermost of the mutineers. Handled with the most ordinary skill, the European troops at the station might have effectively prevented the march of the mutineers to Delhi, but they were under the command of General Hewitt, and they were to proceed to Delhi, without a blow. On their arrival they found no difficulty in persuad- ing the two regiments stationed there to unite with them, and enact the same scenes they had perpetrated at x\feerut. Every European found in the city was put to death under circumstances of unexampled barbarity. There was not a single company of British troops to <^uard the arsenal, the second in magnitude and importance in the Bengal Presidency, and after a brief defence by a feeble handful of Europeans who hastened to its protection, it fell into the hands of the insurgents, with its almost inexhaustible stores and munitions of war. The pensioned King of Delhi was drawn from his obscurity and proclaimed Emperor of India, and within t month after the outbreak at Meerut the British authority had become extinct throughout the north- west provinces. From Meerut to Allahabad, among a population of 0,000,000, and throughout a territory many hundred 88 miles in extent, there did not exist the vestige of a Government, which, on the 1st of January, was con- sidered unassailable, with the exception of the fort of Agra and the closely beleaguered entrenchment at Cawnpore. On the right bank of the Ganges, and about 120 miles from Allahabad, lay the military cantonment at Cawnpore, one of the most important stations in the Bengal Presidency, the connecting link between Allahabad, Agra, and Delhi. It had never hitherto been left without a European regiment, and was often protected by two. In June, 1857, however, there were only 200 European soldiers and 10 guns. It was under the command of Major-General Sir Hugh Wheeler, a soldier of great Indian experience, in whom Government reposed high and well-merited confidence. About the middle of May, perceiving a growing spirit of disaffection between the four native regiments under his command, he had taken the precaution of throwing up an entrenchment as a place of resort in case of extremity ; but so great was his confidence in the loyalty of the troops, in whose ranks his life had been passed and his honours gained, that he regarded this entrenchment rather for its moral effect than a refuge for safety in danger, the possibility of which his faith in the native soldier prevented him from entertaining. The work was, therefore, never rendered actually defensible, nor was it provided with water and supplies. His position, in a military point of view, was moreover 89 embarrassed by the women and children of the 32nd foot, quartered at Lucknow, the ladies of the station, and other female fugitives of the surrounding districts. On the night of the 6th of June, the native regi- ments broke into open mutiny, burnt down the lines, and plundered the treasury of £170,000. Glutted with this boot}', they proposed to march to Delhi, but they were persuaded by Nana Sahib to take service under his standard and complete the extermination of the English. ^jM^t^S ^^Z^mES*: CHAPTER XIY. Nana Sahib's Treachery. Nana Sahib, whose name will ever be conspicuous in the annals of crime as the personification of perfidy and cruelty, was the adopted son of Bagee Row, the Peishwa or head of the ancient Mahratta Confederacy. In the year 1818, while at peace with the British Government, the Peishwa had endeavoured by an act of the basest treachery to destroy Mr. Mountstuart Elphinstone, the Resident at his Court, but the assault was gallantly repelled, and he was obliged to fly from his capital at Poonah, and was hunted through the country for several months by Sir John Malcolm. His power was finally crushed at the battle of Kirkee ; but just at the period when he was brought to bay and must have surrendered at discretion, he was admitted to terms, and by an act of reckless prodigality endowed with an annuity of £90,000 ; this provision he lived to enjoy 32 years, and after having received from the British Government a sum of two millions and a half sterling, died at Bithoor, about sixteen miles above Cawnpore, which had been assigned as the place of his residence. Of these accumulations he bequeathed a 91 large portion to his adopted sod Nana Sahib, 'who had the assurance to demand the continuance of the pension. It was, as a matter of course, refused, and from that time he conceived the most bitter hostility to the English. When the spirit of disaffection first appeared among the native troops at Cawupore, the Nana manifested the most friendly disposition towards Sir Hugh Wheeler, and at his request afforded every assistance for the safety of the Treasur} r , which remained for several days under the protection of 600 of his men and two guns. But no sooner had the Sepoys at Cawnpore broken into open mutiny and obtained the ascendancy, than he threw off the mask and took the lead of the hostile movement. The indiscriminate destruction of the European and native Christians under every form of barbarity who had not taken refuge in the intrenchments to which Sir Hugh Wheeler had retired, now became the pastime of this fiend in human shape. A hundred and twenty- six fugitive English ladies and gentlemen and children had happily escaped from the insurgents at Futtyghur, and were proceeding down the river to Allahabad, when the boats were descried by the Nana's followers at Bithoor and brought to, and the whole party was ruthlessly murdered. The revolted Sepoys swelled by the recruits enlisted by Nana Sahib, and aided by the large resources of the Cawnpore magazine, which Sir Hugh Wheeler had 92 attempted to blow up but failed, now closed round the intrenchment. The sufferings of the ill- sheltered in- mates from the combined effect of exposure, privation and ceaseless watching night and day under arms, and of the concentrated fire incessantly poured upon them from a powerful artillery, present perhaps the most dismal page in the history of British India. On the day on which General Havelock received in Calcutta his appointment to the command of the column for the relief of Cawnpore the garrison was driven, after a defence, the record of which is imperishable, to entertain thoughts of a capitulation — -not for their own sakes, but for that of the helpless women and children. Four days afterwards this band of Englishmen, bright in their valour, and of Englishwomen, still brighter in their fortitude, by an act of the most atrocious perfidy, had ceased to exist. Of the 870 persons who had survived the cannonade for more than three weeks, 330 were women and children. When reduced to the last extremity, Nana Sahib sent a messenger to Sir Hugh Wheeler, offering the garrison a safe conduct to Allahabad, with per- mission to take their baggage, arms, and ammunition with them, on condition that they would capitulate. Sir Hugh most reluctantly accepted the overture, but only because it held out a hope of saving the heroic women and the tender children from a lingering death. The Nana took an oath by the water of the Ganges — h e most sacred that a Hindoo and a Brahmin can 93 utter — to be faithful to his engagement. Boats were provided by him, and the women and children were conveyed to them in vehicles, in some cases with every expression of sympathy and solicitude for their welfare. Every heart now beat high with the certainty of their deliverance ; but no sooner had the whole party been seated in the boats than three signal guns were fired, and a destructive fire was opened on the helpless fugitives from cannon planted on the shore and hitherto concealed along the bank, as well as from the pieces of Sana's soldiers. The shrieks of the women and the cries of the children were drowned by the rattle of musketry and the roar of the guns, and the yells of the hounds now let loose on them. The massacre was a preconcerted perfidy. It has since become evident by the discovery of the document, that an order had been sent to the Commandant of the mutinous 17th Native Infantry and some irregulary cavalry, then on the Oude bank, to fire on any of the fugitives who might attempt to land. The whole party was treacherously butchered, with the exception of 210 women and children, who were taken back to the town, and reserved for future destruction. This atrocity was perpetrated on the 27th of June. On the 7th July General Sir Henry Havelock marched out of Allahabad with a relieving column of about 1,000 bayonets from four European regiments — the 64th, the 78th High- landers, the 84th Foot, and the Madras Fusiliers, 130 Sikhs, some volunteer cavalry, and six guns. This 94 small force encountered the enemy at Futtepore on the 12th of July ; their number was estimated at 3,500, with 12 guns, and in four hours that gallant officer defeated them, captured 11 guns, and scattered the enemy's whole force to the winds, without the loss of a single British soldier. On the 16th of July Havelock's force was in front of Cawnpore. It was reported in camp that the 210 women and children who had survived the massacre on the 27th of June were still alive, and the animating hope of rescuiug them banished every sense of fatigue from our brave fellows who had marched so many miles under a broiling sun and with but scanty sup- plies. The Nana had come out in person with a body of 5,000 men and eight guns, to play his last stake for power. The position he had chosen was a most formidable one : his left covered by the Ganges, a mile distant, and by the high ground sloping towards it, was defended by four 24 pounders. The road to the canton- ment of Cawnpore divided his left from the centre, which was posted in a low hamlet ; here a 24 pounder, howitzer and a horse 6 pounder were planted and en- trenched. The great trunk road ran between his centre and his right, which was behind a village encompassed with mangoe groves, surrounded by a mud wall, and defended by two 9 pounders. The railroad embankment lay to the right of it. The two roads met about 800 yards in front of the enemy's position, which extended 95 over a mile and a quarter in the form of a crescent, the centre more retired than the flanks. The Nana calculated that our force would necessarily come up the grand trunk road to this point of conver- gence, and all his artillery was laid and pointed to sweep it, the range having been carefully measured and marked off. His infantry was massed in support of the guns to defend the strong position, and the mutinous 2nd Cavalry was placed in rere of the enemy's left. It was evident that any attempt to carry this position by a coup de main would entail a most serious loss of life, for the artillery of the enemy equalled our own in number, and outweighted in calibre, and they enjoyed the im- mense advantage of an entrenched cover. The General, therefore, determined to turn their position. The Volunteer Cavalry was directed to bring in some of the neighbouring villagers, who were minutely and separa- tely questioned as to the nature of the ground on both the enemy's flanks, and the bye roads leading to their camp. From a careful collation of these reports, it appeared that the ground lying between the enemy's left and the river was more elevated, while that on their right was low and swampy, and moreover, commanded by the railway embankment, the General therefore resolved to select their left flank for his attack. CHAPTER XV. Gallant Attack, and Route of the Enemy. Having determined on his course of operation, com- manding officers of detachments were summoned. The General, standing in the midst of them, rapidly traced a rough diagram of the projected movements in the dust with the point of his scabbard, and in a few brief words explained his intentions. After this he satisfied himself with questions, that his plan was clearly comprehended by the officers. With a commander so bold, and yet so perspicuous in his orders, the troops marched as to assured victory. A column of sub- divisions was now formed in front, one wing of the Madras Fusiliers heading it, the other covering the left flank in skirmishing order ; then came m succession with the guns at intervals, the 78th High- landers, the 64th, the 84th and the Sikhs. The Volunteer Cavalry advanced in front of the infant^ with orders, when the column reached the point of divergence, to continue its march deliberately along the road to attract the attention of the enemy and lead to the belief that our troops were moving onward in the 97 teeth of their guns. For three miles the column moved steadily on the road, and then wheeled to the right, while the Volunteer Cavalry drew the fire of the enemy's guns on themselves. The infantry marched for a thousand yards under the shelter of the groves and unseen by the enemy; but a gap in the trees at length betrayed the movement, and the enemy opened fire with every gun that could bear on the flank of the 78th and 64th, inflicting some loss. Not a shot was fired in return ; the column advanced silently and compactly as on parade, and the stillness was only broken by the bursting shells of the enemy, and the imprecations of the bullock drivers, as they urged their cattle to the utmost speed. The rear of our column having cleared the groves, the companies wheeled at a bound into line. The force at once advanced in direct echellon of battalions from the right, the 78th, the leading battalion, being supported by four guns on each flank, and by the whole of the Madras Fusiliers in skirmishing order. Our artillery at once opened fire, pushing forward as rapidly as the broken nature of the ground would permit. By this master-stroke the fire of the enemy's centre and right was neutralized as they could not use their guns without endangering their left. Three guns of the enemy were stoutly posted behind a lofty hamlet well entrenched. The honour of capturing them was given to the 78th Highlanders. They were led by 98 Colonel Hamilton, and followed him with surpassing steadiness and gallantry under a heavy fire — need it be added that the enemy fled and the guns captured. One effort more remained to be made, as arduous as any of the struggles of the day. The enemy appeared to be in full retreat to Cawnpore, followed by our exhausted troops, when a reserve 24-pounder planted on the road, and aided by two smaller guns, reopened fire on our advancing line, as the Nana had deter- mined here to make his final stand for the possession of Cawnpore, from which fresh troops had poured forth to his assistance. The greatest animation pervaded the enemy's ranks — the din of their drums, the shouts of their cavalry, and the booming of their guns were sufficient to affect the minds of the troops, lying down as they were, to afford time for our own guns, which were a mile in the rere, to come up. This temporary pause in our advance emboldened the enemy. General Havelock's horse had been shot, but he speedily mounted a hack, and, coming into that rain of fire, in a clear and firm tone issued the order to rise for a last advance. The 64th was the leading regiment of the echellon, and as it advanced the gun swept its ranks, and from thirty to forty fell before the corps reached the muzzle. The enemy lost all heart, and after a hurried fire of musketry gave way in total route. Four of our guns came up and completed their discomfiture by a heavy cannonade. 99 Such was the battle of Cawnpore, in which 1,000 British troops and 300 Sikhs, fighting under a deadly sun, with the aid of only 18 horse, against a superior artillery and numerous cavalry, drove from a position skilfully selected and strongly entrenched, a body of 5,000 native troops, trained and disciplined by our own officers. The troops bivouacked on the night of the 16th of July, on the bare ground, without food or tents ; no fire was lighted, and a dead silence prevaded the line. The baggage had been left at Maharajpore, and as it would have been imprudent to move it during the night in the presence of the enemy's superior cavalry, it did not come up till morning. Early on the morning of the 17th of July 1857, General Havelock's force entered Cawnpore, but un- happily too late to prevent the dreadful massacre of the helpless women and innocent children, and as some of the troops advanced to the Sevada plain, east of Cawnpore — Wheeler's encampment — and the building where those unfortunates had been confined were entered, and the troops were struck with horror at the sight which met their eyes. The pavement was swimming in blood, and frag- ments of ladies' and children's dresses were floating upon it. The apartments were found empty and silent, but there also the blood lay deep on the floor, covered with bonnets, collars, combs, and children's frocks and frills; the walls were dotted with the 100 marks of bullets, and on the wooden pillars were deep sword cuts, from which hung tresses of hair, but neither the sword cuts or the dents of the bullets were sufficiently high above the floor to indicate that the weapons had been aimed at men defending their lives ; they appeared, rather, to have been levelled at crouching women and children begging for mercy. The soldiers proceeded in their search, when, in crossing the court- yard, they perceived human limbs bristling from a well, and found it choked up with the bodies of the victims, which appeared to have been thrown in promiscuously, the dead with the wounded, till it was full to the brim. It is related that the Highlanders, on coming to a body which had been barbarously exposed, and which was supposed to be that of Sir Hugh Wheeler's daughter, cut off the tresses, and reserving a portion to be sent to their own families, sat down and counted the remainder, and swore that for every hair one of the rebels should die. It was ascertained on further inquiry that the Nana, actuated by feelings of revenge for the defeat of his army, resolved to wreak his vengeance on the helpless women and children in his power. The Cawnpore rebels were equally anxious to remove out of the way all who could identify the perpetrators of previous atrocities, and it was determined to put the defenceless prisoners to death. The men of the Nana's guard were sent down, and 101 they massacred in cold blood, 212 unresisting worn, n and children. In the annals of human guilt there is no blacker page than that in which her perfidious murders of Cawnpore are inscribed. A century will scarcely suffice to restore that Confidence in the native character which the atrocities committed during the mutiny at various stations, more especially at Cawnpore, have so com- pletely obliterated. On the 20th of July General Neill arrived at Cawn- pore from Allahabad with a reinforcement, whom Havelock left with a force of about 500 men, and an entrenched camp, as a provision for the defence of the town. This precaution was considered as a necessity, as at a distance of about 70 miles, the Nawaub of Futtypore, after having murdered all the Europeans men, women and children within his reach, had raised the standard of revolt, and assembled under it two regiments of native infantry, some of the revolted Oude troops, and a rabble of armed followers. i» CHAPTER XVI. Capture of Onao. Before the mutiny Futtyghur was the great military workshop of the north-west provinces, with large establishments for the supply of gun carriages, cloth- ing, &c.j and from these stores the Nawaub was enabled to furnish himself with munitions of war of every description. Nana Sahib, moreover, was across the Ganges at Futtehpore Chourasse, where he was endea- vouring to reassemble his scattered troops. Though he was not likely again to try conclusions with Havelock in the field, he might take advantage of his absence and try to regain possession of Cawnpore, And the whole district teemed with a hostile and martial population. The wise and gallant Havelock having taken all necessary precautions against the town again falling into the hands of the insurgents, was impatient to hasten to the relief of Lucknow. The enterprise on which the General now entered was one of no common difficulty, and but for the great object before him, that of rescuing the beleaguered garrison from destruction, must have appeared rash even to presumption. 103 On the 28th of July the whole of Havelock's force, amounting to about 1,500 men and 10 guns, assembled at Mungulwar, and on the 29th advanced to Onao, a •distance of about three miles, where the enemy, having ftaken up a strong position, disputed the way, and our attack became unavoidable. The place was vigorously •defended, but the village was set fire to by our troops. Pinally the guns were captured, and the enemy de- feated, with a loss computed at 300 men. After pursuing the enemy for some distance the troops halted for three hours and partook of a meal. The bugle then sounded again, the men fell into their places, and marched for a distance of six miles to Busseerutgunge, a walled-in town, intersected by the high road to Lucknow. The main gate at the entrance •of the town was defended by an earth- work, a trench, and four guns. It was a formidable position, and it became manifest to the General that an attempt to assail it in front, unsupported by a flank movement, would entail serious loss of life, lie, therefore, directed the G4th Regiment to march round the town on the left, and interpose itself between the farther gate and the causeway. The 78th Highlanders and the Madras Fusiliers endeavoured to storm the gateway, but the •enemy's guns sending repeated and heavy discharges into their ranks they were ordered to lie down, while our cannon plied the defence, with energy. The enemy's fire now appeared to slacken, and the two corps, having received orders to rise, sprang to their feet, und 104 with a shout which, struck terror to the rebels, cleared the trench, and rushed in at the gate. The enemy bewildered at the impetuosity of the charge, and the flank movement of the 64th became utterly disheartened, abandoned their guns, and fled in confusion through the town and over the causeway, hotly pursued b} r the victors. With the exception of three hours given to rest and refreshment, the troops had now been incessantly marching and fighting from sunrise to sunset. The night was now closing in, and the General did not deem it prudent to allow them to proceed in pursuit of the enemy beyond the causeway, and the weary soldiers were bivouacked for the night close to the town. The opposition that the General had encountered in these, his first operations in Oude, was likely to increase as he penetrated into the province. He had learned that the insurgents had been strengthened by the revolt of three native regiments at Dinapore, and the hostile force in his rere thus assumed a more formidable appearance. It was, moreover, reported that a third of his gun ammunition had been expended in the attack at Onao and Busseerutgunge, and the army had as yet progressed only one-third of its way to Lucknow. Eighty men had been killed and wounded in the two actions of the previous day, and as many disabled by fatigue, exposure, and the ravages of cholera. These invalids required the whole of the sick carriage of the force. There was not an unoccupied doolie in the 10c - Having thus obtained the assurance of prompt rein- forcements, he offered his cordial thanks to Sir Colin for the succour which was promised, and hoped that it wu only the advanced guard of a stronger force, which was most urgently needed, lie wanted a company of artil- lery to work his heavy guns, and cavalry to improve his success. 110 Sir James ^Outram arrived at Cawnpore with rein- forcements on the 15th of September. The force now about to make the third attempt to relieve Lucknow consisted of Havelock's veterans — fearfully reduced in number — a detachment of 200 or 300 men who had come up with Colonel Stisted, and the reinforcements brought by Sir James Outram, constituting in all a force of 2,500 men. With this gallant little army, under command of General Havelock, the relief of Lucknow was effected. On the evening of the 25th of September, 1857, the troops were drawn up at the hour of 8 o'clock in front of the Alumbagh, and formed for the advance. A small table was placed in the open field on which a map of the City of Lucknow was spread, and, as the two Generals and their Staff bent over it tracing the route, a nine pound shot from the enemy's battery, coming straight to the table, fortunately struck the ground at a distance of about four yards, and rising, bounded over their heads, leaving them uninjured. Between 8 and 9 o'clock the welcome order to "Advance" was given. Sir James Outram took the command of the 1st and leading brigade, with all the artillery, heavy and light. The 2nd under Havelock followed in support. The Highlanders and Sikhs, with Outram and Have- lock at their head, pushed on to the Residency through an incessant storm of shot. The loopholed houses on either side poured forth a stream of fire as they ad- 11-1 vanced ; every roof sent down a shower of missiles on them ; deep trenches had been cut across the road to detain them under the fire of the adjacent buildings ; at every angle they encountered a fearful volley. At length they forced their way to the gates of the Resi- dency, and entered in the dark and in triumph. Then came three cheers for the leaders and the joy of the half-famished garrison. The scene within the Residency has been eloquently described by a Staff officer thus : — " Once fairly seen all our doubts and fears regarding them were ended, and then the garrison's pent up feelings of anxiety and sus- pense burst forth in a succession of deafening cheer* from every pit, trench, and battery, from behind the- sand bags piled on shattered houses, from every post still held by a few gallant spirits rose cheer on cheer, even from the hospital many of the wounded crawled forth to join in that glad shout of welcome to those who had so bravely come to their assistance. It was a moment never to be forgotten. The delight of the ever gallant Highlanders, who had fought 12 battles to enjoy that moment of ecstacy, and in the last four days had lost a third of their number, seemed to know no bounds ; and as the General and Sir James Outram had entered Dr. Frazer's house, the ladies in the garrison and their children crowded with intense excitement into the porch to see their deliverers. The Highlanders rushed for- ward — the rough bearded warriors — and shook tlu> ladies by the hand with loud and repeated gratulatiom 112 They took the children up in their arms, fondly caressing them, passing them from one to another in turn. Then when the first burst of enthusiasm was over, thev mournfully turned to speak among themselves of the heavy losses they had sustained, and to inquire the names of numerous comrades who had fallen in the wav," General Havelock has been blamed by some for bringing with him four heavy guns, which were con- sidered as embarrassing to his small force, but he always held a strong opinion on the question of heavy artillery, based on the manifest difficulties which the want of it had entailed on "Napoleon at Acre," on "Wellington ■at Burgos," and on " Lake at Bhurtpore." It is impossible to over-estimate the value of the hervices rendered by the gallant Sir Henry Havelock and the army of heroes which he commanded at that most critical period of the mutinies — the months of •July and August. In braving the inclemency of the season they achieved what it was till then believed no Englishman, or other European, could do ; and in putting to flight, with small numbers, the masses of troops opposed to them, supported by so powerful an artillery, teaching all British soldiers to despise the foe, and thereafter, whatever the disparity of numbers, they always ad- vanced to assured victory. Long, therefore, will the recollection of the name of Havelock and of the 78th Highlanders, the 1st Madras Fusiliers, and the 64th 11 and 84th regiments be cherished by all who lor mod part of the garrison of Lucknow. After the capture of the Residency by Havelock and Outram, with their brave followers, Sir Colin Campbell pushed forward at the head of 5,000 men, and now the final relief was accomplished with an army of 6,000 British bayonets and a powerful artillery, commanded by such leaders as Campbell, Outram, Havelock, Inglis, and others. Lucknow was ours (and there was now no power able to cope with such a force), so that the whole of the insurgent province and the capital of Oude lay at the mercy of the victorous British Army. CHAPTER XVIII. Officers of the Regiment, 1857. After the suppression of the Mutiny in India, of course the standing army at home and abroad was gradually reduced and the Militia of the United King- dom disembodied. Colonel. William Henry Moore Hodder, late Lieut. 88th Foot. Lt.- Colonel. William St. Leger Alcock Stawell, late Capt. 23rd Foot. Major. Robert Aldworth, late Captain 94th Foot. Captains, Frederick J. Rawlins, late Lieut, oth Foot. Edward Braddell, late Capt. 70th Foot. Edward Hoare. Dominick R. Sarstield. Robert Aldworth. Crewe C. Townsend. Robt. D. Perry. Chas. Fredk. Knolles. Eyre Massy Shaw Lieutenants. Cornelius O'Callaghan. William Lambert Howe. Richard Meade. Francis B. Kell. Herbert Coghlan. Ohas. Dudley Gabbett. Hy. A. St. Clair Keogh. Charles Elliott. Ensigns. John Quarry. Richd. Reynell Aylmer. George Halberd. Henry Chas. Mansergh. Edmund Leahy. Philip Sydney Dudley. Douglas Mercer. Thos. Richard Gabbett. Richard Conner. John Francis Belli*. Augustus Stanley Clarke. James F. W. Cronin. Adjutant. Frederick M. Callaghan, late Lieut. GOth Royal Rifles. Quartermaster — Foster Hewison, late Rifle Brigade. Surr/eon — James F. Uniacke, M.D. Assistant Surgeon — Francis Ffolliott, M.D. Paymaster — Richard G. Creagh. 116 The North. Cork Rifle Regiment was selected for embodiment during the war of the Indian Mutiny, and assembled at Mallow in the County of Cork on the 15th September, 1857, under the command of Colonel Hodder, and on the 24th of same month marched to Fermoy, where it remained until the 17th November following, when it was ordered to England, and sailed from Queenstown to Portsmouth for the Camp at Shorn - cliffe, where it arrived on the 2nd of December, 1857 The regiment remained there attached to the Brigade of Major-General Lord West until the 14th of June, 1858, when " the route " arrived for Sheerness, where it was engaged on dockyard and garrison duty with the Royal Artillery until the middle of the following October. An unfortunate fracas occurred here be- tween the seamen, the marines, the townspeople, and some men of the regiment. The row originated in one of the low public-houses in the worst part of Bluetown, a not over-salubrious portion of the place ; the few men of the corps first attacked were presently joined by a number of others, when the affair threat- ened to assume serious proportions. The officer in command of the place, Major-General Sir Richard England, R.A., then gave orders to send out strong pickets of the Royal Artillery and the Rifles to quell the disturbance and arrest the ringleaders, which, after a good deal of difficulty, was accomplished. A Court of Enquiry, however, was convened, and an officer from the War Office Staff was sent b} T the Duke of Cambridge 117 from the Horse Guards to inquire into the matter. This resulted in the exoneration of the Rifles, as the following letter specifies : — " Horse Guards, 29th October, 1858. "Sir, — The General Commanding-in-Chief having had under his consideration the proceedings of the "Court of Enquiry, held to investigate the circumstances attending the disturbance between certain men of the North Cork Rifles under your command, and the sea- men, marines, and inhabitants of Sheerness, by which His Royal Highness was compelled, in order to restore -and maintain the tranquillity of the town, to remove the regiment to Aldershot. u I have it in command to acquaint you, that His* Royal Highness collects, from evidence, that the militia cannot be considered as the original aggressors in these riots, which have acquired so unpleasant a notoriety. " The General Commanding-in-Chief directs me to make this communication to you, as the result of the Court of Enquiry in question has fully confirmed the report made by the Staff-Officer, who was sent down personally to communicate with the Admiral and the Commandant of the garrison, both of whom spoke in the highest terms of the conduct of the North Cork Rifles, and to whom the Superintendent of Police stated, that ever since the arrival of the regiment in June last, up to this unfortunate quarrel, not a man of the corps had been in custody of the Civil power for any offence whatever. 118 " His Royal Highness commands me add, that he has every confidence in the North Cork Rifles con- tinuing to maintain the high character they have hitherto held during the whole of their embodied service. " I have the honour to be, Sir, " Your obedient Servant, "Gd. Wethbrall, A.G " Colonel W. H. M. Hodder, " Commanding North Cork Rifles," North Camp, Aldershot." u At an early hour on the morning of 15th of June, 1858, the regiment paraded and the roll called. Not a man was absent, and the corps embarked in silence and in perfect order from the Government Gun Wharf in two war steamers for Strood Station, North Kent Rail- way, from whence it was conveyed to the North Camp, Aldershot, and was attached to the Brigade of Major- General Lord William Paulette, where it took its part in the usual routine of camp duty, divisional and brigade field days, &c, marching out, and encampment at Woolmer Forest, where a model camp was pitched, and the troops remained under canvas for three days. The regiment whilst at Aldershot won golden opinions — even from the voice of Royalt}', as it marched past — and on more than one occasion Her Majesty the Queen 110 * was pleased to state her approval of the manner in which the North Cork ' behaved under arms ' at her reviews." The following letter is a matter of record : — "North Camp, Aldershot, " October loth, 1859. 44 My Dear Colonel, 11 As I suppose you have resumed the command of the North Cork Rifles, I think it is due to you and the regiment to express my entire approbation of their conduct during the time they have been under my command. No regiment in my brigade have had fewer Courts Martial, no regiment has behaved better, and no regiment has given me less trouble, and it was with regret I parted with them. " They quitted this command in the most creditable manner, not leaving a man behind. " I beg to wish you all every prosperity. " And believe me, " Very truly yours, " W. Paulette, Major-General, " Commanding 1st Brigade. 4i Colonel W. H. M. Hodder, " North Cork Rifles, '* Ayr Barracks, N.B. 120 The distance from the North Camp, Aldershot, to Woolmer Forest is over 15 miles, which was accom- plished by the troops in about five hours, under a broiling sun, a dusty road, and in heavy marching order, yet not a man of the North Cork fell out, although the leading battalion, and immediately following the Field Artillery and the Cavalry ; then came the 11th Regiment, the 19th, the 36th, the 1st King's Own Stafford, and some others, whilst in front were the E Company Royal Engineers, a battery of Artillery r the 2nd Life Guards (two squadrons), the 10th Hussars, the 5th Dragoon Guards, and a troop of the Military Train. The Camp at Aldershot in those days was a very enjoyable quarter, and although a little expensive, and with numberless field days and plenty of work, yet from its proximity to London, and other advantages,. the place was much enjoyed by the officers of the regiment. But by far the most delightful of the quarters occupied by the North Cork during this embodiment was the Camp at Shorncliffe, standing as it does at an elevation of about 100 feet above the sea, with the beautiful little town of Sandgate at foot, and with Folkestone and Dover — always gay — close by, and with the North Foreland, Calais, &c, in the dis- tance. The point of Dungeness where there is, or was, a fort, the town of Hythe, the School of Musketry, and the well-known shingle sea beach, for ball practice are in the vicinity. The situation is delightful, and is 121 - esteemed one of the most healthful quarters in Great Britain. The North Cork Rifles left the Camp, Aldershot, for service in Scotland, on the 7th October, 1859, having been within a few days of one year doing duty there. The entire regiment left the North Camp Station at an early hour in the morning, about four o'clock, and early as it was, it was played to the railway by the bands of the 36th Regiment and the 1st King's Own Stafford. It was accompanied by many of the officers and men of other regiments in the brigade, especially by Colonel Smith and officers of 10 th Royal Hussars, who kindly wished " God speed and all prosperity " to the jolly "old North Cork." The regiment was detained at sea a couple of days longer than it should have been by a dense fog, but it arrived safely, however, at Leith Pier, near Edinburgh, on the morning of the 14th October, 1859, was divided into detachments, one (head-quarter), with band, &c, to Ayr, remainder to the town of Hamilton, near Glas- gow. Both detachments reached their destination the same afternoon. * " Ayr, wham ne'er a toon surpasses, For honest men and bonnie lasses." Ayr is celebrated as the birthplace of Robert Burns, Avhose house, and the crib or nook in which he was born * Burns. 122 is still in existence. There is also close by a monu- ment erected to his memory, surrounded by ornamental grounds, with a small museum containing relics "of the poet" and his " Highland Mary." In the immediate locality are to be seen Auld Alloway Kirk, the four walls of which are now only remaining, surrounded by a churchyard and the auld Brig of Doon, where * " Meg brought off her master hale, But left behind her ain grey tail," At these quarters the North Cork Rifles experienced a sad loss by the death of their gallant old chief, Colonel Hodder. Whilst dismounting from the horse he had been riding at the head of the regiment that morning, he fell backwards on his head in the barrack-yard, never recovered consciousness, and died on the 20th of November, 1859. The corpse was followed to the rail- way station at Ayr by the whole regiment, from whence it was conveyed to Ireland for interment at Carrigaline, County Cork. The town of Hamilton is rather prettily situated, with good barrack accommodation, and close by the seat of the Duke of Hamilton, with a large circular- shaped building of cut stone, known as the Mausoleum, in front of the dwelling-house, where the bones of all the members of that ancient family, for generations, have been laid. In the immediate vicinity is Both well Brig, cele- * Burns' "Tarn O'Shanter." 123 brated as the scene of a battle between the Covenanters, under John Balfour of Burley, and Royal Troops, under the gallant Graharae of Claver- house, Viscount Dundee, described in Sir Walter Scott's "Old Mortality." From the bridge can be seen the old Castle of Tullytudlem, where dwelt Lady Margaret Bellenden, a by no means unimportant character, described in the novel by the same Immortal author. Upon the death of Colonel Moore Hodder the command of the North Cork Rifles devolved upon Lt.- Colonel W. Alcock Stawell, an officer who had served with the 24th and 47th Regiments, and lastly with the 23rd Fusiliers, in various parts of the world, including Gibraltar, North America and the West Indies, from the year 1826 to 1848, when he retired from the regular army and became Lieut. -Colonel and second in command of the North Cork Rifles in November, 1854. The regiment during its stay in Scotland received the utmost kindness and hospitality, and by its good •conduct and smart appearance earned the best wishes and universal approbation of the Scottish people. The •officers in return entertained the elite of the country in the same hospitable manner, and the fine band of the regiment — under Mr. Miller, the Bandmaster — was much admired. The "route" for Ireland arrived on the 16th of February, and the Regiment sailed for Queenstown, 124 and was disembodied at Mallow, co. Cork, on the 28th February, 1860. The number of volunteers from the North Cork Rifles during the "War of the Indian Mutiny was 317, many of whom fought and bled in the Royal Artillery and the 64th and 84th Regiments with Havelock's victorious column. CHAPTER XIX. Vicissitudes of the Regiment. The North Cork Rifles assembled at Mallow for their first annual training and exercise, after the disembodi- ment of the corps on the 21st May, 1862. On the 25th of May, 1863, Mallow ; On the 25th of May, 1864, Mallow ; and On the 22nd of May, 1865, Mallow. The Government for the following six years did not embody the Irish Militia for the usual 27 days' train- ing. On the 22nd of May, 1871, however, the North Cork assembled at Mallow. During the training, this year, his Excellency the Lord Lieutenant, Earl Spencer, visited the town, and honoured the officers with his presence at their mess dinner. In the year 1872 the regiment was not embodied on account of an epidemic of fever in the South of Ireland, and the North Cork Rifles did not again meet for training until the 21st July, 1873, when they assembled at Fermoy, from whence they proceeded to the Curragh Camp, for the Autumn manoeuvres, on the 8th August following. Here a most unpleasant quarrel took place between the regiment and the men of the Queen's Co. Rifles, who 126 were injudiciously quartered in the next line3 to the North Cork. A fight ensued, sticks and stones were freely used on both sides ; the Queen's County were driven into their quarters and huts for shelter, which were furiously assailed by North Cork. Both parties rushed to obtain their arras, when a strong force of the 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment, under Colonel Freer, in- terposed, and after some time the riot was quelled. Both regiments were disarmed, however, and by order of the •General Officer commanding, separated and placed under canvas at the opposite ends of the Camp — the Queen's Co. Regiment was located at a well-known spot called " Donnelly's Hollow," near the Kilcullen road, and the North Cork at a part bearing the name of " French Furze,' : ' near the town of Kildare. An investigation was held in the Quarter- Master General's offices, where the officers belonging to both regiments were assembled, and the Lieutenant-General, Sir Thomas Steele, in- formed them that he regretted the unfortunate occur- rence which, for sake of the maintenance of good order, had obliged him to separate the regiments as he had done. The whole affair, however, might have been avoided had the two regiments not been placed to- gether and a little judgment employed, so as to prevent the rivalry, which in reality was the origin of the row between the two battalions. The North Cork returned to Fermoy on the 22nd of August, 1873, and was disembodied a few da} T s after- wards in the new barracks there. The regiment was 127 commanded by Lieut. -Colon el Robert Aldworth, who- succeeded Colonel Alcock Stawell in command after that officer's retirement in 1873. He served with the 94th Regiment from December, 1830, to May, 1844,. in the Mediterranean, India, and Ceylon. The regiment was not called out for training in the year 1874. It was embodied again for training at Fermoy on the 23rd August, 1875. On the 8th of May, 1876, the North Cork Rifles assembled at Fermoy, and proceeded to Horsham, for mobilization with the 2nd Army Corps, in the troopship "Himalaya," on the 12th of July, rid Queenstown to Portsmouth. His Royal Highness the Field Marshal Commanding in Chief inspected the regiment at Horsham on the 18th July, 1876, after which it proceeded by rail to Guilford on the evening of the 19th July, 1876, and marched via the " Hog's Back " to Aldershot. The regiment marched past before His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales and H.R.IL the Duke of Cambridge, in the Long Valley, on the 22nd July, and on the 25th proceeded to Farnboro' Station, took rail to Portsmouth, and re-embarked in Her Majesty's troopships " Himalaya " and " Assistance/' for convey- ance to Mallow, via Queenstown, and w r as disembodied on the 29th of July, 1876. The regiment assembled for training at Mallow on the 2nd July, 1877, and was dismissed on the 28th July, 1877. For the three following years the regiment went through the annual period for training and exercise at 128 the barracks, Buttevant — namely, on the 2nd July, 1878 ; on the 21st July, 1879, and on the 3rd May, 1880. Under the Array Bill of 1881 the name North Cork Rifles was abolished, and the regiment became the 9th Battalion of the King's Royal Rifle Corps. The present gallant Chief of the Battalion, Colonel R. W. Aldworth, entered the army as 2nd Lieutenant in the 60th Royal Rifles (2nd Battalion), and accom- panied them to North America, where he served from 1845 to 1847, and again there with the 7th Royal Fusiliers, from 1848 to 1850. He served in the Eastern Campaign of 1854, including the Battles of Alma and Inkerman, Siege of Sebastopol, and Sortie of 26th of October (medal and clasps). After the Crimean War he went to India, in June, 1857, in command of the 1st Battalion 7th (Royal Fusiliers), and landed at Kurrachee in November the same year. He remained in India during the entire of the Mutiny, until 1861, when he returned to England. On the 20th of May. 1863, he obtained the rank of Colonel, shortly afterwards retired from the regular army, subsequently accepted the rank of Major in the Tipperary Militia, and finally became Lieut.- Colonel North Cork Rifles on the 29th of October, 1873. RETURN CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT TO"jg» 202 Main Library _-j LOAN PERIOD 1 HOME USE ALL BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAYS Renewals and Recharges mqy be made 4 days prior to the due date. Books may be Renewed by calling 642-3405 DUE AS STAMPED BELOW SF^t ON iLL ifir A n WQfi AUG 1 9 wao U. C. BERKELEY FORM NO. DD6 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY BERKELEY, CA 94720