Ireland under the Tudors, with a Succinct Account of the Earlier History. Vol. 3 (of 3)

by Richard Bagwell

FOOTNOTES:

[379] Carew to the Privy Council, Aug. 6, 1601; Cecil to Carew, Sept. 5—both in Carew. ‘For Desmond (James Fitzthomas),’ says Cecil, ‘I find him more discreet than I have heard of him, and for Florence the same which I ever expected, which is a malicious, vain fool.’—Pacata Hibernia, lib. ii. cap. 6.

[380] Journal in Carew, No. 198; Pacata Hibernia, cap. 10; Carew to the Privy Council, Sept. 14.

[381] Pacata Hibernia, caps. 9, 10, and 11. The Spanish ships are described as fifty, forty-five, and thirty-five. The latter number probably came to Kinsale with Don Juan. Storms and accidents account for the rest. Small vessels had been purposely chosen, with a view to the Irish harbours.

[382] Pacata Hibernia, caps. 10 and 11; Warrants in Carew, Sept. 28.

[383] Pacata Hibernia, cap. 13; Fynes Moryson, part ii. book ii. chap. ii.; Journal in Carew (No. 199) Oct. 29 to Nov. 1.

[384] Journal in Carew, Nos. 199 and 200; Four Masters, 1601; Docwra’s Narration, p. 257. Castle Park fell on Nov. 20.

[385] Four Masters, 1601; Pacata Hibernia, cap. 14; Journal in Carew, No. 200; Carew to Mountjoy, Nov. 22. Carew returned to the camp on Nov. 26.

[386] Journal in Carew (No. 200) Nov. 29 to Dec. 9 Pacata Hibernia caps. 17, 18, and 19; Cecil to Carew, Feb. 9, 1602.

[387] Journal in Carew (Nos. 200 and 201) Dec. 7-20; Letters of Don Juan d’Aguila, Dec. 10/28, in Pacata Hibernia; Fenton to the Queen, Dec. 4, printed in the Ulster Journal of Archæology, vi. p. 64.

[388] Pacata Hibernia, caps. 15 and 18; Four Masters, 1601.

[389] Journal in Carew (No. 201) Dec. 21-3; Pacata Hibernia, cap. 21; Moryson. The Four Masters and O’Sullivan both say the English were on their guard, and the former note the report of treachery, but without giving MacMahon’s name.

[390] Mountjoy’s report is in Carew (No. 201). His private secretary, Fynes Moryson, the historian, was present. Carew’s account is in Pacata Hibernia. The Four Masters and O’Sullivan Bere are to be preferred for the movements of the Irish, and the latter may have learned some particulars from his uncle. See also Sir H. Power (who commanded the flying column) to Cecil, Dec. 27.

[391] Four Masters, 1602; Lord Deputy and Council to the Privy Council, Jan. 14; Carew to same, Jan.; Sir F. Stafford to Cecil (from Newry) Jan. 14; Clanricarde to Cecil (from Cork) Jan. 15. ‘The rebels are utterly forsaken of all aid from the Spaniards, and not able to make any head. O’Donnell is made away for Spain, as we think. I do not think we have lost fewer than 3,000 men; by fights and hurts not above 300, all the rest by sickness.’ Captain A. Enfield, R.N., to Fulke Greville, Jan. 6, in 12th Report of Historical MSS. Commission—Coke MSS.

[392] A short relation of the siege of Kinsale in Carew (No. 202) signed by Mountjoy, Carew, and others. O’Sullivan and others say the English outnumbered Tyrone’s forces. It is true that the Irish made no general or united effort, but only a small section of Mountjoy’s army was actually engaged. Moryson, who was present, says the former were 6,000 foot and 500 horse, the latter barely 1,200 and 400.

[393] Translations of the letters from the Duke of Lerma and others are in Pacata Hibernia, ii. chap. xxvi., the terms of capitulation (Jan. 2, 1602) in chap. xxiii. See Carew to the Privy Council, Jan.

[394] Letters to the King of Spain and the Governor of Galicia in Pacata Hibernia, ii. chap. xxviii.

[395] Pacata Hibernia, ii. chap. xxix. and iii. chap. xiii. Don Pedro de Heredia to Lord Carew, April 1, 1618, and the answer, Oct. 21, both in Carew. Don Juan’s peaceful proposals are mentioned by Moryson.

[396] The Queen to Mountjoy, Jan. 12, in Moryson; the Earl of Cork’s True Remembrances.

[397] The Queen to Mountjoy, Feb. 8 1601; Cecil to Mountjoy, received July 8, both in Moryson.

[CHAPTER LII.]

THE END OF THE REIGN, 1602-1603.

The Spaniards still feared.

Starvation by means of garrisons was Mountjoy’s prescription for the Irish malady, and this treatment he pursued to the end. But he continued to dread Spanish intervention, for, in common with most Englishmen of his time, he overestimated what was really a decaying and impoverished power. Cecil knew better, and throughout the spring and early summer of 1602 he continued to write in a rather contemptuous tone of Spanish intentions. In August he was able to say positively that there would be no invasion in force, though he could not promise that Philip would not send a few forlorn companies to keep up some sort of reputation in Europe, to put the Queen to cost, and ‘to fill the world with continual rumour of his undertaking humour.’ To Carew he wrote in the same strain, and with still greater freedom. It was impossible to keep Spanish ships from Irish harbours, ‘whereof there be more than the Queen hath ships,’ but the coast of Spain might be so harassed as to give them enough to do at home. Sir Richard Leveson was better employed taking carracks in the Tagus than he could be in Ireland, and between Hollanders and Englishmen the Catholic King was not likely to have many men to spare. But the Queen would not grudge the necessary outlay to make Cork, Kinsale, and some minor posts defensible. Thus encouraged, Mountjoy was free to attack Ulster, and he proceeded slowly, but surely, to draw the net round Tyrone.[398]

Docwra and Chichester in Ulster.

Docwra was supposed to have between three and four thousand men in Derry and Donegal, Chichester nearly 1,000 at Carrickfergus; and about 800 more were in Lecale and in the garrisons at Mount Norris, Armagh, Blackwater, and Newry. Mountjoy had over 3,000 under his own command, and at the beginning of June he advanced to Dundalk. Docwra had established a post at Omagh, and had no difficulty in joining the Lord Deputy at Dungannon, while Chichester ferried his contingent over Lough Neagh. Tyrone, who had laid Dungannon in ashes, was forced out of his country into the almost inaccessible wilds of Glenconkein, and his deserted strongholds were taken. In one three guns were recovered, probably those taken at Blackwater. A new fort was built and manned at Mountjoy on Lough Neagh. Provisions falling short in July, Docwra was sent back to collect and victual a force at Omagh, with which Chichester, who now had hopes of ‘soon beheading that wood-kerne Tyrone,’ could co-operate from his fortified post at Castle Toome on Lough Neagh. Mountjoy retired towards Monaghan, taking all the small strengths in that direction, though not entirely without loss from sharp-shooters, and wrote home to urge the positive necessity of keeping the garrisons on foot. Tyrone was now driven from place to place like a hunted hare; but if the efforts to run him down were allowed to relax, he would gain strength quickly, and all the work would have to be done over again.[399]

The Queen disinclined to spare Tyrone.

Tyrone was now begging earnestly for mercy, but the fate of Essex warned Mountjoy against meddling with so dangerous a person. The rebel would not come in upon his bare word, nor would he give that word; for to detain him afterwards would be dishonourable, while he might be blamed for letting him go. He could only urge that while Tyrone was lowest was the best time to bring him to terms. After much hesitation the Queen was induced to promise him his life, but through Mountjoy only, and without divulging anything to the Council. Cecil saw no reason why she should not publish it to all the world. If peace could only be dreamed of, he said, ‘for saving of Christian blood and of miseries of her natural people from hence hourly sent to the shambles!... but her Majesty is the kingdom, and myself her humble vassal.’ Negotiations went on through the latter half of 1602, and in the meantime Mountjoy prosecuted the war. He gave out publicly that the Queen had resolved never to pardon Tyrone, but let him know that he himself might possibly become a suitor for him. That depended on how he behaved; ‘and yet,’ he wrote, ‘I have told him that I will cut his throat in the meantime if I can.’[400]

Carew reduces Munster.

Carew had nominally nearly 5,000 men to complete the reduction of Munster, but the real number was much less. Nearly half of the available force was sent, under Thomond’s command, to ravage the country west of Kinsale and on both sides of Bantry Bay. Carew himself left Cork six weeks later, and made his first halt on Tyrone’s late camping-ground near Carrigaline. Nights were spent at Timoleague, Rosscarbery, and Castle Haven, and Baltimore was reached on the fifth day. In crossing the mountains between Skibbereen and Bantry Bay slight resistance was made by some of the O’Driscolls and O’Sullivans, but Dunnemark was reached in safety on the eighth day from Cork. This place is called Carew Castle by the President, who is careful to note that it belonged to his ancestors, and that the Irish name was derived from their title of marquis. It is two miles to the north of Bantry, and was found a convenient place to collect the cattle and ponies of the neighbouring country. An O’Daly, whose ancestors had been hereditary bards of the old Carews, was here caught tampering with Owen O’Sullivan, and was sent for trial to Cork. The Spaniards in Dunboy were warned that they could expect no quarter if they remained there. If they left before the siege began they would be sent safely to Spain, and Carew suggested that they might deserve greater favour by spiking the guns or disabling the carriages before they came away. No notice was taken of this message, and the army lay at Dunnemark until all was ready for the attack on Dunboy.[401]

Kerry.

Early in February Carew sent Sir Charles Wilmot to Kerry with a force sufficient to overcome what remained of the rebellion there. Lixnaw Castle was taken, and Lord Fitzmaurice driven away into the mountains of Desmond. Carrigafoyle was found deserted and partly dismantled. The Dingle peninsula was thoroughly ransacked, the castles all taken, and the Knight of Kerry driven into Desmond. The cattle in Iveragh were also collected, and their owners forced into the woods of Glengariffe. Wilmot’s road to Bantry Bay lay by Mucross and Mangerton—‘a most hideous and uncouth mountain’—and great preparations were made to attack him by the way. Carew moved up as far as Carriganass, and in the end the Irish showed no fight, though trees had been felled and breastworks erected at every point of vantage. The junction of the two forces was effected, and on the same day ships came from Cork. The army had provisions left for only two days, and would have been forced to retreat but for this seasonable aid.[402]

Dunboy Castle.

Dermot Moyle MacCarthy, Florence’s brother, had been in Ulster the year before, and Carew had then declared his intention to plague him on his return. He thought him both wiser and braver than Florence himself, and certainly more popular with the scattered swordsmen—half soldiers, half caterans—who still maintained the rebellion. Reduced to want by Carew and Wilmot, this chief took some cows belonging to MacCarthy Reagh, and while fighting for their possession was killed by his own first cousin. To prevent his head from being exposed at Cork, as the President had threatened, the dead man was conveyed to Timoleague Abbey and there buried by a friar with great solemnity. After this it was judged impossible to take a military train round by Glengariffe, and it was decided to cross Bantry Bay. Tyrrell seems to have understood that the game was up, and would have been ready to join Thomond; but the Jesuit Archer prevented him, and he failed to come to the parley which he had himself asked for. The weather was very bad all this time, which the superstitious attributed to Archer’s conjury, but Carew said he hoped soon to conjure his head into a halter. And yet he was not altogether incredulous himself. ‘The country of Bere,’ he wrote, ‘is full of witches. Between them and Archer I do partly believe the devil hath been raised to serve their turn.’ Nevertheless Thomond established himself in Bere Island by June 1, and here he had an interview with Richard MacGeohegan, who held Dunboy for O’Sullivan. The Earl argued that the castle must fall, and urged the constable to gain credit by yielding it in time, while the latter tried to make out that the besiegers ran upon certain defeat, and could never even land in face of such strong fortifications. Neither persuaded the other, and Carew went on with his preparations.[403]

Carew at Berehaven

In spite of the witches, the army was transported into Bere Island without much difficulty. The sandy bay near Dunboy was found strongly fortified, and Carew resolved to make a false attack. The little island of Dinish was seized and two guns mounted on it, the fire of which occupied the defenders of the works on shore. The main body was then quietly ferried across Berehaven to a point westward of Dinish and close to Castletown. High ground hid the landing-place from the castle, and when the stratagem was at last discovered the Irish had to go round a deep creek. They found Carew’s men ready for them, and were worsted in the skirmish which followed. Tyrrell was wounded. Archer narrowly escaped, leaving his missal behind him, as well as a servant, who was immediately executed. On the morrow a camp was pitched half a mile to the north-east. Next day the work of entrenching began, materials for gabions having to be brought from a wood nearly two miles away. The artillery was landed in full view of the castle and without damage from its fire, but Carew did not begin to batter until the eleventh day after landing. In the meantime the Irish had taken courage from the arrival of a Spanish vessel at Kilmakilloge in Kenmare Bay. She brought 12,000l., much ammunition, and letters urging the Irish chiefs to remain firm. But perhaps the most important part of the cargo was Owen MacEgan, Bishop-designate of Ross and Vicar Apostolic or Nuncio, for he is called by both titles, who had absolute ecclesiastical authority over all Munster. He was able to impress the defenders of Dunboy with the idea that a great Spanish force would immediately come to their relief, and they imagined that they could hold out for two or three months.[404]

An island stronghold.

The Irish had built a small fort in the island of Dursey, which they intended for their last refuge. It was defended by forty men and three pieces of Spanish artillery. Captain Bostock and Owen O’Sullivan were sent by Carew, with 160 men, to reduce this remote stronghold. The water being tolerably smooth, the Queen’s pinnace was brought up near enough to attack from the sea side, and the bulk of the men were landed in boats. The soldiers showed so much dash in assaulting the fort that the garrison came out and surrendered as soon as the outwork was forced. They were taken to Carew’s camp, and all executed. Owen O’Sullivan recovered his wife, who had been O’Sullivan Bere’s prisoner since February. In this out-of-the way place Bostock found no less than 500 milch cows, besides wheat and oil, and the existence of such islands goes far to explain the long resistance of West Munster. Nothing could be done against them without ships, and ships were very seldom available.[405]

Capture of Dunboy.

Two desperate men.

Carew was a good artilleryman, as artillery was in his days, and he promised that Dunboy should fall within seven days after he had opened fire. Others expected a longer siege, but he was much better than his word. The fire of four guns, concentrated upon the castle, made it untenable within twenty-four hours. Tyrrell’s attempt upon the camp had been fruitless, and it was plain that there was no chance of relief. After four hours’ fire a turret fell in, burying many under its ruins. In another four hours the west front of the castle collapsed, and dice were cast to decide who should lead the stormers. The post of honour and danger fell to Captain Doddington’s company, and his lieutenant, Francis Kirton, was the first man to enter the breach. Kirton was wounded in three places, but he made good his ground, and Carew’s colours were soon planted on a commanding point of the works. The besiegers still fought, but their guns were carried with a rush, and the whole place was now commanded. Forty men tried to escape by sea, but armed boats guarded that side, and they were killed. Among them was Melaghlin O’More, the man who pulled Ormonde off his horse when he was captured two years before. Seventy-seven men were left, and would have surrendered at sunset upon promise of life only; but this was denied, and the Jesuit Dominick O’Colan came out by himself. Next morning, twenty-six more gave themselves up, including two Spaniards and one Italian, who were all that remained of the foreign gunners. MacGeohegan was mortally wounded, and Thomas Taylor, an Englishman’s son, but married to Tyrrell’s niece, was chosen commander in his room. Taylor shut himself up in the vault with nine barrels of powder, and with a lighted match in his hand swore to blow all up unless he and his companions were promised their lives. His men prevented this, and forty-eight surrendered at discretion with him. When the English officers entered, they found MacGeohegan still living. With a lighted candle in his hand, he staggered towards an open powder-barrel, but Captain Power held him back, and the soldiers killed him. Of the 140 picked men who composed the garrison, not one escaped. The powder was then spent in blowing up the walls, and the castle, from which so much had been expected, was laid level with the ground.[406]

Fate of the survivors.

A Jesuit.

In this, as in every such Irish siege, the actual capture was comparatively easy; the real difficulty was to reach these distant strongholds, and to maintain an army in the wilds. The garrison, champions of a lost cause and dupes of a feeble tyrant, deserved a better fate; but Carew showed no mercy. Of the survivors fifty-eight were at once ‘hanged in pairs by the Earl of Thomond.’ Twelve of Tyrrell’s best men were respited for a time, but were also hanged when that leader declared that he would remain true to his master the King of Spain. Taylor was taken to Cork, and hanged in chains near the north gate on the discovery that he had taken a principal part in George Bingham’s murder. O’Colan, whom the English called Collins, was closely examined at Cork, and Catholic accounts say that he was tortured. He gave no useful information, but freely told the strange story of his own life. Born at Youghal, and educated at a Jesuit school there, he went at the age of seventeen to France, made some money as a waiter in inns, and served the League for nine or ten years under the Duke of Mercœur. He rose to the rank of captain; and was recommended to the King of Spain by Don Juan D’Aguila, who was then in Brittany. Coming under the influence of the Jesuit Thomas White of Clonmel, who was rector of the Irish seminary at Salamanca, he was admitted, after a time, to the Society of Jesus, whose principles, we are told, he preferred to Dominican vigour or Franciscan rigour, but not to full priest’s orders; and Archer, who knew him only by reputation, asked that he might accompany him to Ireland. His military knowledge was perhaps thought useful at Dunboy. After keeping him a prisoner for about four months, Carew found that nothing would be gained by preserving his life, and he was hanged, drawn, and quartered at Youghal, meeting his fate with the greatest courage and in a manner most edifying to his co-religionists.[407]

O’Donnell in Spain.

Death and character of Hugh Roe O’Donnell.

The fall of Dunboy prevented the King of Spain from sending prompt help, but he did not give up the idea. Rumours of fresh invasions were rife during the summer, and sooner or later O’Donnell might have returned with another army. That chief had sailed from Castle Haven immediately after the battle of Kinsale, and fugitives from Munster continued to join him whenever opportunity offered. He landed at Corunna, and went straight to the King at Zamora. Falling upon his knees he obtained favourable replies to three requests: that an army should be sent to Ireland; that the King, when he gained Ireland, would set no O’Donnell over him or his successors; and that he would never deny any right that the O’Donnells had ever had. Philip sent him back to Galicia, then under the government of his zealous friend, the Marquis of Caraçena. Exiles are ever sanguine, and he professed to have no doubt of ultimate success; but Spanish vacillation sorely tried his impatient spirit. When the surrender of Kinsale became known in Spain, some vessels intended for Ireland were unloaded, and Don Juan’s report was unfavourable. The disgrace of that unsuccessful commander revived O’Donnell’s credit, and the ship which brought over Bishop MacEgan and his 12,000l. was despatched. O’Donnell began to despair of a great fleet, and begged to be allowed to go with a few small vessels. He asked his friends in Ireland to let him know the whole truth, but to keep bad news from Spanish ears. This, of course, could not be done, and the arrival of Archer and a crowd of fugitives after the disaster at Dunboy, must have outweighed all his arguments. He sought the King again at Simancas, and there he died after an illness of seventeen days. His body was carried, with great pomp, to the royal palace at Valladolid, and buried in the Franciscan monastery with every mark of respect. His solemn requiem was the death-song of the Irish tribal system. Much romance cleaves to his name, but his ideas scarcely rose above those of an ordinary chief. Local supremacy was his main object, and the panegyric of the annalists fails to raise him to the height of a national hero. He was, they say, ‘the vehement, vigorous, stern, and irresistible destroyer of his English and Irish opposers.’ He died at thirty, but there is nothing to show that he would have even attempted the task of building a stable edifice with the shifting sands of Irish life.[408]

Assassination plots.

The Irish accounts do not suggest foul play, but Carew believed that O’Donnell had been poisoned by one James Blake, of Galway, who had announced his intention of killing him. Blake was not hired by Carew, but he would hardly have made him his confidant if he had not expected reward, and he it was who brought the first news of O’Donnell’s death to Munster. John Anias, who had been implicated in a plot to murder Elizabeth, had offered to kill Florence MacCarthy, and afterwards gave out that he had been suborned by Cecil to poison that troublesome person. Cecil and Carew employed Anias as a spy, but denied that he had ever said anything about poison, and had him hanged out of the way as soon as he could be caught. Neither Blake nor Anias would have dared to speak of such things to a modern statesman, but the morality of that age was different. A similar suspicion attaches to the death of Hugh O’Donnell’s brother, Rory, afterwards Earl of Tyrconnell. An Italian came to Sir Henry Wotton, who was then ambassador at Venice, and offered to kill Tyrone or Tyrconnell, but without mentioning their names or even seeming to know them correctly. Wotton said the Earls were of no importance, having run away because they could do no harm at home. No doubt proclaimed rebels might be justly slain; ‘yet,’ he added, ‘it was somewhat questionable whether it might be done honourably, your Majesty having not hitherto proceeded to the open proscription of them to destruction abroad, neither was it a course so familiar and frequent with us as in other states.’ Three months later Tyrconnell and his page died rather mysteriously at Rome, others of his party also sickening. Roman fever was probably to blame, though Wotton seems to have half-suspected poisoning, but in the interest of the papacy, and not of the King of England.’[409]

Last struggles in Connaught.

When O’Donnell sailed for Spain he left his brother Rory in charge of the clan, who led them through all Munster and Connaught. The vast herds which Hugh had taken from his neighbours were found grazing peacefully in Sligo, and Ballymote was given up by O’Gallagher to the acting chief. Sir Niel Garv was co-operating with Docwra, and kept his rival out of Donegal; but Rory allied himself with O’Connor Sligo, and sought help from Brian O’Rourke against Sir Oliver Lambert, who was pressing him from the Connaught side. Tibbot-ne-Long and others of the lower Burkes solicited Lambert’s help, and he came up from Galway with a strong force, while O’Rourke fought for his own hand and refused to help O’Donnell. Lambert says he might easily have been stopped either at Ballina or Ballysadare, but he reached Sligo without serious fighting. The town had been burned by O’Connor, and the castle was in ruins. O’Donnell passed his cattle over the Curlews, and across the Shannon into Leitrim. Lambert, though camping in places ‘where no Christians have been since the war begun,’ could never catch him, but took 200 cows and a keg of Spanish powder. When the English were in Leitrim, and when Leitrim was invaded in turn, O’Donnell was safe in Roscommon; but Lambert established communications with his friends at Ballyshannon. The O’Malleys and O’Flaherties infested the coast, and Sir Oliver had to provide a galley with fifty mariners and fifteen oars on a side, for these pirates spared no one, and Bingham had found it necessary to take similar precautions. Lambert thought Sligo would be a dainty place for a gentleman if walled, and he placed a garrison there, which was able to maintain itself until the end of the war.[410]

Progress of Docwra in Ulster.

The absence both of Tyrone and of Hugh Roe O’Donnell in Munster left a comparatively clear field to Sir Henry Docwra; ‘the country void, and no powerful enemy to encounter withal, more than the rivers.’ Castle Derg and Newtown (Stewart), both lately garrisoned, had since been betrayed by Tirlogh Magnylson, a follower of Sir Arthur O’Neill, who had become a favourite with the English officers. Tirlogh first curried favour with Captain Atkinson at Newtown by helping him to seize some cattle. Having dined with this officer, he persuaded him to take a walk outside the castle. Three or four confederates suddenly appeared, who made the captain prisoner, while others got possession of the courtyard and of the hall-door. The soldiers ‘lying in the Irish thatched house’ were all killed. Captain Dutton lost Castle Derg by a similar stratagem. But in the absence of the great chiefs Docwra was clearly the strongest man: O’Cahan’s country was harried to punish his perfidy, and even women and children were killed. Donegal was victualled, and Ballyshannon, ‘that long desired place,’ taken and garrisoned. Tirlogh Magnylson’s turn soon came. Countrymen in Docwra’s pay pursued him from place to place, and his followers were killed one by one without knowing their pursuers; those who were taken, says Sir Henry, ‘I caused the soldiers to hew in pieces with their swords.’ The hunted man travelled about the woods at night, sometimes occupying three or four cabins successively, and lighting fires to attract attention where he did not intend to stay. A boy was set to watch, and at last the poor wretch was seen to take off his trousers and lie down. Four men, says Docwra, ‘with swords, targets, and morions, fell in upon him; he gat up his sword for all that, and gave such a gash in one of their targets as would seem incredible to be done with the arm of a man, but they dispacht him and brought me his head the next day, which was presently known to every boy in the army, and made a ludibrious spectacle to such as listed to behold it.’ Captain Dutton’s betrayers had better luck. They had killed no one, and were twice spared by Docwra, after swearing ‘with the most profound execrations upon themselves, if they continued not true.’ They broke out, nevertheless, and the ringleaders kept the woods till Tyrone’s submission, when they were pardoned by Mountjoy’s express command.[411]

Mountjoy breaks up the O’Neill throne.

Throughout the summer and autumn of 1602 Docwra and Chichester continued steadily to reduce small strongholds, to drive cattle, and to make a famine certain should Tyrone hold out till the spring. In August Mountjoy again went northwards and planted a garrison at Augher. At Tullaghogue, says Moryson, ‘where the O’Neills were of old custom created, he spent some five days, and there he spoiled the corn of all the country, and Tyrone’s own corn, and brake down the chair where the O’Neills were wont to be created, being of stone, planted in the open field.’ But he could not get within twelve miles of the rebel Earl himself, who had retreated into thick woods at the lower end of Lough Erne, and who endeavoured to keep his friends together by letters in which he urged them to make no separate terms for themselves; ‘if you do otherwise,’ he said, ‘stand to the hazard yourselves, for you shall not have my consent thereunto.’ One transient gleam of success rewarded Rory O’Donnell and O’Connor Sligo. In an attempt to force the passage of the Curlews from the Roscommon side a panic seized the English soldiers, who may have remembered the fate of Sir Conyers Clifford, and they fled in confusion to Boyle, but without any great loss.[412]

Last struggle in Munster.

It was in Munster that hopes of Spanish succour were strongest; but Carew was able to send troops and supplies to help Mountjoy, and at the same time to finish his own work. Sir Cormac MacDermot, the chief of Muskerry, whose intriguing nature was well known to Carew, was found to have received 800 ducats from Bishop Owen MacEgan, and to have placed Blarney Castle at the disposal of the Spaniards. Captain Roger Harvey was sent, on pretence of hunting the buck, to call at the castle and ask for wine and usquebaugh, ‘whereof Irish gentlemen are seldom disfurnished,’ and if possible to get possession of the place. But the warders were on their guard, and Harvey could not even get into the courtyard. Sir Cormac himself was at Cork, not having dared to refuse attendance at the assizes, and his wife and children were also secured. Finding himself in the lion’s mouth, he ordered his people to surrender Blarney, while he made preparations for his own escape. After dark on the evening of Michaelmas-day he got out of the window in his shirt, several gentlemen being outside to receive him. A passing Englishwoman raised the alarm, but the runaway was befriended by town and country and got safe away over the walls, only to find that he could do nothing. His castle of Kilcrea had already surrendered, and Macroom was taken, owing to an accidental fire which arose while the warders were singeing a pig. No Spaniards were visible, and Tyrrell, who had eaten up Bere and Bantry, proposed to quarter his men in Muskerry. At last, towards the end of October, Sir Cormac came to Carew, and sued for mercy on his knees. A protection was granted to him, for he was helpless without his castles, his eldest son was at Oxford well watched, and Tyrrell had destroyed his corn. Raleigh advised Elizabeth not to pardon him, his country being worth her while to keep, and its situation being such as to leave him always at her mercy. Orders were accordingly given that his pardon should be withheld, at least until he had provided an estate for his cousin Teig MacCormac, who had first revealed his intrigues with the Spaniards.[413]

Remarkable retreat of O’Sullivan Bere.

Passage of the Shannon.

A disinterested guide.

O’Sullivan Bere still maintained himself in Glengariffe, but his position had become hopeless. In December Tyrrell gave up the contest and marched eighty miles without a halt from near Castleisland into the King’s County, ‘leaving all his carriages and impediments, as they tired, scattered to hazard.’ Wilmot then attacked O’Sullivan’s position, and succeeded, after six hours’ sharp fighting, in driving off 2,000 cows, 4,000 sheep, and 1,000 hackneys. Sir John Shamrock’s son, William Burke, refused to stay a moment longer, cursing himself for lingering in Munster and losing his brave followers. O’Sullivan was thus forced to fly, and on the night of the 3rd of January he slipped away, with all his family and retinue. When Wilmot came to his late camping-ground he found only sick and wounded men, ‘whose pains and lives by the soldiers were both determined.’ The fugitives had a sharp skirmish with Lord Barry near Liscarroll, but reached the Shannon at Portland on the ninth day, fighting all the way and not venturing to turn aside after cattle, although often very hungry. Finding no boats, they killed twelve horses, and Dermot O’Driscoll, who was used to the canoes or curraghs of the west-coast fishermen, constructed one with osiers, twenty-six feet long, six feet wide, five feet deep, and capable of holding thirty men. Eleven horseskins were used to cover this ark, and the twelfth was devoted to a round vessel planned by Daniel O’Malley and intended to carry ten men. The O’Malleys were more given to the sea than even the O’Driscolls, but the round ferry-boat sank, while the long one answered its purpose. Ormonde’s sheriff of Tipperary failed to prevent O’Sullivan from crossing the great river, and he reached Aughrim on the eleventh day from Glengariffe. Sir Thomas Burke, Clanricarde’s brother, who had the help of some English soldiers, attacked him here with a superior force, but was worsted with loss after a hard fight, and O’Kelly’s country was passed on the same day. On the borders of Galway and Roscommon MacDavid Burke showed the will, but not the power, to stop the fugitives, who eluded pursuit by leaving great fires in the woods near Castlereagh. They suffered horribly from snow and rain, their shoes were worn out, and their last horses furnished a scanty meal. O’Connor Kerry’s feet were a mass of sores, and he reproached those members for their cowardice, which was likely to imperil his head and his whole body. He struggled on with the rest, and in a wood near Boyle, heaven, as the pious historian believed, provided them with a guide. A barefooted man, in a linen garment and with a white headdress, and carrying an iron-shod staff in his hand, came to meet them. His appearance was such as to strike terror, but he told O’Sullivan that he had heard of his glorious victory at Aughrim, and was ready to lead him safely into O’Rourke’s country. O’Sullivan, who was perhaps less credulous than his kinsman, secured the stranger’s fidelity with 200 ducats, which he magnanimously accepted, ‘not as a reward, but as a sign of a grateful mind.’ He lead them by stony ways to Knockvicar near Boyle, where they bought food and dried themselves at fires. The blood upon O’Connor’s blisters hardened with the heat, and he had to be carried by four men until they found a lean and blind old horse, on whose sharp backbone the sufferer was rather balanced than laid. The Curlews were safely passed, and at daybreak on the sixteenth day of their pilgrimage O’Rourke’s castle of Leitrim was in sight. Of over a thousand persons who started from Glengariffe, but eighteen soldiers, sixteen horseboys, and one woman reached the house of refuge. A few more afterwards straggled in, but the great bulk had died of wounds and exposure, or had strayed away from their leaders. ‘I wonder,’ says the historian, ‘how my father, Dermot O’Sullivan, who was nearly seventy, or how any woman, was able to sustain labours which proved too much for the most muscular young men.’ The distance traversed was about 175 miles as the crow flies.[414]

Rory O’Donnell submits.

Tyrone sues for mercy.

Like many chief governors before him, Mountjoy contemplated spending much time at Athlone, and the Queen approved of this. He went there in November 1602, and both Rory O’Donnell and O’Connor Sligo came to him there before Christmas. Rory called to mind the hereditary loyalty of his family since Henry VIII.’s days, adding that he himself had agreed with Sir Conyers Clifford to serve against his brother Hugh, and had been put in irons by him. O’Connor claimed to have brought in Rory, and to have suffered likewise for his fidelity to Clifford. His legs, he said, had never healed properly, being ‘almost rotted’ with the irons. Tyrone lurked in Glenconkein in very wretched case, whence he wrote in most humble terms, and, as he said, with a most penitent heart. Mountjoy had sent back his last letter because it contained no absolute submission. ‘I know the Queen’s merciful nature,’ he now said, ‘though I am not worthy to crave for mercy.... Without standing on any terms or conditions, I do hereby both simply and absolutely submit myself to her Majesty’s mercy.’ Sir Christopher St. Laurence conducted some negotiations on his own account, but the Lord Deputy earnestly repudiated any knowledge of these, and continued almost to the end to say that he might possibly intercede with the Queen, but would do nothing more. Elizabeth’s instinct told her that Tyrone was no longer formidable unless she set him up again, and this it is most probable she would have never done. A month after the letter last quoted, and barely two months before the Queen’s death, Mountjoy talked of hunting the arch-traitor into the sea. He and Carew were together at Galway soon after Christmas, and it was agreed that the latter should go to England. Both of them wished to get away, but the Queen would not hear of the Deputy quitting his post, nor would she let the President go without his superior’s leave; and Cecil cleverly contrived that the suggestion should seem to come from Mountjoy himself. Never, we are told, was ‘a virgin bride, after a lingering and desperate love, more longing for the celebration of her nuptial’ than was Carew to go to England; but he returned to Munster and made things quite safe there before he started. Now that Tyrrell and O’Sullivan were gone, he ventured to send to Athlone 500 men out of 700, which were all he had available after providing for the garrisons and making allowances for the sick and missing. He feared that O’Sullivan might return, but of this there was no real danger. The war was now confined to a corner of Ulster, and if Elizabeth had lived the fate of Tyrone might have been like that of Desmond. To run him down was, however, a matter of extreme difficulty, and he seems to have thought that he could get out of Ireland if the worst came to the worst.[415]

Tyrone driven into a corner.

While Mountjoy was conferring with Carew at Galway, Docwra and Chichester were pressing Tyrone hard. He was confined to about 200 square miles of glens and woods in the south-eastern part of Londonderry and the easternmost corner of Tyrone, and his fighting men scarcely exceeded 50. His numerous cattle were on the inaccessible heights of Slieve Gallion, and he himself had several resting-places surrounded with felled trees and protected by streams which were only fordable in dry weather. Docwra came to Dungannon with 450 English foot and 50 horse, and with 200 O’Cahan and 100 O’Dogherty kerne. Chichester had a fortified post at Toom, where the Bann leaves Lough Neagh, and he gathered there all the forces that the Ulster garrison could spare. Letters between the two leaders for the most part miscarried, and it was found quite impossible to converge upon Tyrone. From the very entrance of the woods the O’Cahans ran away to their own country, and the O’Dogherties pronounced the travelling impossible. The men sickened fast; one guide went off to Tyrone and was followed by another, who first contrived that cattle coming to Docwra’s relief should be stolen. Chichester penetrated farther into the woods, and fought two skirmishes without doing much harm to his light-footed adversary. Docwra returned to Derry two or three days after Christmas, and Chichester also abandoned the enterprise. The country about Toom was eaten as bare as an English common, and things were rather worse at Derry, which was quite out of the course of trade, and equally deprived of local supplies. It was no better in the Pale, and the whole army, now reduced to a nominal 13,000, depended entirely upon victuals sent from England. Even Dublin feared famine, and everyone was so worn out that it was difficult to get any service done.[416]

Famine.

The confusion in the currency crippled trade and caused distress in the towns. But the winter war had worked a far greater mischief among the poor rebels in the country. Mountjoy had clearly foreseen a famine, had done his best to bring it about, and had completely succeeded. Multitudes lay dead in the ditches of towns and other waste places, ‘with their mouths all coloured green by eating nettles, docks, and all things they could rend up above ground.’ Sir Arthur Chichester saw children eating their mother’s corpse. Captain Trevor found that certain old women lit fires in the woods, and ate the children who came to warm themselves. Rebels received to mercy killed troop-horses by running needles into their throats, and then fought over the remains. Not only were horses eaten, but cats and dogs, hawks, kites, and other carrion birds. The very wolves were driven by starvation from the woods, and killed the enfeebled people. The dead lay unburied, or half-buried, for the survivors had not strength to dig deep, and dogs ate the mouldering remains. Some fled to France or Spain, but they were few compared to those who perished at home.[417]

Tyrone and James VI.

Elizabeth and James VI.

Had Tyrone escaped from Ireland he would have gone to Scotland, or perhaps only to the Scotch islands. In 1597 he had offered his services to James, complaining of hard treatment at the hands of Deputies, and apologising for not having paid his respects sooner. While accepting these overtures and declaring himself ready to befriend him in all his ‘honest and lawful affairs,’ the King, with characteristic caution, noted that the time had not come. ‘When,’ he wrote, ‘it shall please God to call our sister, the Queen of England, by death, we will see no less than your promptitude and readiness upon our advertisement to do us service.’ Tyrone took care to be on good terms with the sons of Sorley Boy MacDonnell, to one of which, Randal, created Earl of Antrim in the next reign, he afterwards gave his daughter. A channel of communication with Scotland was thus always open, and it was certainly used on both sides. Early in 1600 Tyrone thanked James for his goodwill, and assured him that Docwra’s expedition was intended to end in the writer’s extermination. This letter came into Cecil’s hands, and no doubt he was constantly well-informed. He had a Scotch spy, one Thomas Douglas, who also acted as a messenger between James, Tyrone, and the MacDonnells, and who carried a letter from the Duke of Lennox to Ireland early in 1601. This did not prevent James from offering to help Elizabeth with Highlanders against Tyrone in the same year. The Queen thanked him heartily, but remarked that ‘the rebels had done their worst already.’ It is plain that she saw through her good brother like glass. ‘Remember,’ she once wrote to him, ‘that who seeketh two strings to one bow, may shoot strong but never straight; if you suppose that princes’ causes be vailed so covertly that no intelligence may bewray them, deceive not yourself; we old foxes can find shifts to save ourselves by others’ malice, and come by knowledge of greatest secret, specially if it touch our freehold.’[418]

The question of toleration.

Tyrone had made an unconditional submission, so far as it was possible to make it by letter; but the Queen was very unwilling to pardon him or to grant him anything more than bare life. At the same time there was a disposition to press the matter of religious uniformity, and to revive the Ecclesiastical Commission which had long lain dormant. Vice-Treasurer Carey was not content with the mischief done by the new coin, but must needs recommend a sharper way with recusants as a means of pacifying the country, and perhaps of filling official pockets. Mountjoy, whose great object was to end the war and get home, in effect told Carey that Satan was finding mischief for his idle hands in Dublin, while the army was half-starved, and the Lord Deputy himself likely to be reduced to salt ling. ‘If,’ he wrote from Trim, ‘you did but walk up and down in the cold with us, you would not be so warm in your religion.’ Mountjoy had his way on this point, and nothing was done to frighten the Irish unnecessarily, or to drive the towns into Spanish alliances. He reminded Cecil that Philip II. had lost the Netherlands by bringing in the Inquisition, and that the States, who at one time held nearly all the provinces, had lost many of them by pressing the matter of religion too hotly. All religions, he said, grew by persecution, but good doctrines and example would work in time. In the meanwhile he advised discreet handling as the only means of avoiding a new war, of which, he said, ‘many would be glad, but God deliver us from it.’[419]

Death of Queen Elizabeth.

At the beginning of March, Mountjoy received two letters from the Queen, written on February 6 and 17, and another from Cecil, written on the 18th. In the first of these despatches, which were all delivered together, Elizabeth told her Deputy to send for Tyrone on promise of life only, and to detain him; in the second she authorised him to offer life, liberty, and pardon; and in the third, speaking through Cecil, she rather enlarged his powers, while laying some stress on altering the title of Tyrone, on reducing the size of his country, and on forcing him to keep the roads into it always open. There was no difficulty about the last covenant, for the felling of a few trees would always nullify it; but Mountjoy pointed out that O’Neill, and not Tyrone, was the dangerous word, and that it was great gain to have an earl by any name instead of a chieftain by that one. As to curtailing the repentant rebel’s land, he thought that obedience would be more probable from one who would lose rather than gain by change. The great Queen was no more when the letter containing this reasoning was sent, so that we cannot tell whether she would have agreed to it or not. On the very day of her death, commission was given to Sir William Godolphin and Sir Garret Moore to treat with Tyrone, and he and his adherents were protected for three weeks. Elizabeth died on March 24, and Mountjoy knew this on the 27th; but his secretary, the historian Moryson, had the address to prevent the news from being publicly known before April 5, and in the meantime Tyrone had made his submission.[420]

Submission of Tyrone.

To save time under the extraordinary circumstances in which he was placed, Mountjoy sent Godolphin to tell Tyrone that the least hesitation would probably be fatal to him, and that his former delays had much incensed the Queen. Godolphin was not in the secret, but he felt that it was no time for ceremony, and in the belief that confidence would beget confidence he rode several miles beyond Dungannon to meet Tyrone, who readily accompanied him to the fort at Charlemont. Next day the commissioners brought their prize early to Mellifont, where Mountjoy lodged. There, says the secretary, who was present, ‘Tyrone being admitted to the Lord Deputy’s chamber, kneeled at the door humbly on his knees for a long space, making his penitent submission to Her Majesty, and after being required to come nearer to the Lord Deputy, performed the same ceremony in all humbleness, the space of one hour or thereabouts.’ He had ever preferred the substance to the shadow, and his formal humility stood him in good stead. The written submission was equally complete, and contained not one word about liberty of conscience or in favour of that Church as whose champion the Pope had sent him a crown. He renounced all dependence upon foreign principles, and especially upon Spain, abjured the name of O’Neill, abandoned all his claims over the lands of neighbouring chiefs, and agreed to accept such estates only as the Queen should grant him by patent. He promised to disclose all he knew about dealings with Spain, to bring his son back from thence if possible, and, in short, to do everything that might become a faithful subject of the English crown. Mountjoy in return promised a royal pardon, and a patent for nearly all the lands which he held before his rebellion. 300 acres were reserved for the fort of Mountjoy and 300 for Charlemont, and Ulster was to submit to a composition as Connaught had done. On April 4, Tyrone reached Dublin with the viceregal party, and on the 5th, Sir Henry Danvers arrived from England with official tidings of the great change. King James was at once proclaimed, and the people shouted for joy; but Tyrone, on whom all eyes were fixed, shed abundant tears, and he was fain to hint at grief for the loss of the mistress whom he had been fighting for the last ten years. ‘There needed,’ says the observant secretary, ‘no [OE]dipus to find out the true cause of his tears; for, no doubt the most humble submission he made to the Queen he had so highly and proudly offended, much eclipsed the vain glory his actions might have carried if he had held out till her death; besides that by his coming in, as it were, between two reigns, he lost a fair advantage, for (by England’s estate for the present unsettled) to have subsisted longer in rebellion (if he had any such end) or at least an ample occasion of fastening great merit on the new King, if at first and of free will he had submitted to his mercy.’[421]

The conquest of Ireland Queen Elizabeth’s work.

During the last four years and a half of the Queen’s reign, it was computed that the Irish war had cost her about 1,200,000l., and this was an enormous demand upon the slender revenue of those days. The drain upon the life-blood of England was also terrible. Droves of recruits were forced annually into the ranks, to perish among the bogs and woods, while the most distinguished officers did not escape. The three Norrises, Clifford, Burgh, Bagenal, and Bingham died in Ireland, while Essex and Spenser were indirectly victims of the war there. The price was high, but it secured the conquest of Ireland. Lawyers in the next reign might ascribe the glory to James; but the hard work was all done ready to his hand, and it would not have been done at all had it been left to him. It was by Elizabeth that the power of the chiefs was broken, and until that was done neither peaceable circuits nor commercial colonies were possible in Ireland. The method pursued was cruel, but the desired end was attained. It is easy to find fault; but none who love the greatness of England will withhold their admiration from the lonely woman who repelled all attacks upon her realm, who broke the power of Spain, and who, though surrounded by conspirators and assassins, believed that she had a mission to accomplish, and in that faith held her proud neck unbent to the last.