* Rymer, tom. xvi. p. 366.
** Camden. Osborne, p. 371.
Essex left London in the month of March, attended with the acclamations of the populace; and, what did him more honor, accompanied by a numerous train of nobility and gentry, who, from affection to his person, had attached themselves to his fortunes, and sought fame and military experience under so renowned a commander. The first act of authority which he exercised after his arrival in Ireland, was an indiscretion, but of the generous kind, and in both these respects suitable to his character. He appointed his intimate friend the earl of Southampton, general of the horse; a nobleman who had incurred the queen’s displeasure by secretly marrying without her consent, and whom she had therefore enjoined Essex not to employ in any command under him. She no sooner heard of this instance of disobedience, than she reprimanded him, and ordered him to recall his commission to Southampton. But Essex, who had imagined that some reasons which he opposed to her first injunctions had satisfied her, had the imprudence to remonstrate against these second orders;[*] and it was not till she reiterated her commands that he could be prevailed on to displace his friend.
Essex, on his landing at Dublin, deliberated with the Irish council concerning the proper methods of carrying on the war against the rebels; and here he was guilty of a capital error, which was the ruin of his enterprise. He had always, while in England, blamed the conduct of former commanders, who artfully protracted the war, who harassed their troops in small enterprises, and who, by agreeing to truces and temporary pacifications with the rebels, had given them leisure to recruit their broken forces.[**] In conformity to these views, he had ever insisted upon leading his forces immediately into Ulster against Tyrone, the chief enemy; and his instructions had been drawn agreeably to these his declared resolutions. But the Irish counsellors persuaded him that the season was too early for the enterprise, and that as the morasses, in which the northern Irish usually sheltered themselves, would not as yet be passable to the English forces, it would be better to employ the present time in an expedition into Munster. Their secret reason for this advice was, that many of them possessed estates in that province, and were desirous to have the enemy dislodged from their neighborhood;[***] but the same selfish spirit which had induced them to give this counsel, made them soon after disown it, when they found the bad consequences with which it was attended.[****]
* Birch’s Memoirs, vol. ii p. 421, 451.
** Birch’s Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 431. Bacon, vol. iv. 512.
*** Birch’s Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 448.
**** Winwood, vol. i. p. 140.
Essex obliged all the rebels of Munster either to submit or to fly into the neighboring provinces: but as the Irish, from the greatness of the queen’s preparations, had concluded that she intended to reduce them to total subjection, or even utterly to exterminate them, they considered their defence as a common cause; and the English forces were no sooner withdrawn, than the inhabitants of Munster relapsed into rebellion, and renewed their confederacy with their other countrymen. The army, meanwhile, by the fatigue of long and tedious marches, and by the influence of the climate, was become sickly; and on its return to Dublin, about the middle of July, was surprisingly diminished in number. The courage of the soldiers was even much abated: for though they had prevailed in some lesser enterprises against Lord Cahir and others, yet had they sometimes met with more stout resistance than they expected from the Irish, whom they were wont to despise; and as they were raw troops and unexperienced, a considerable body of them had been put to flight at the Glins by an inferior number of the enemy. Essex was so enraged at this misbehavior, that he cashiered all the officers, and decimated the private men.[*] But this act of seventy, though necessary, had intimidated the soldiers, and increased their aversion to the service.
The queen was extremely disgusted, when she heard that so considerable a part of the season was consumed in these frivolous enterprises; and was still more surprised, that Essex persevered in the same practice which he had so much condemned in others, and which he knew to be so much contrary to her purpose and intention. That nobleman, in order to give his troops leisure to recruit from their sickness and fatigue, left the main army in quarters, and marched with a small body of fifteen hundred men into the county of Ophelie against the O’Connors and O’Mores, whom he forced to a submission: but, on his return to Dublin, he found the army so much diminished, that he wrote to the English council an account of its condition, and informed them, that if he did not immediately receive a reënforcement of two thousand men, it would be impossible for him this season to attempt any thing against Tyrone. That there might be no pretence for further inactivity, the queen immediately sent over the number demanded;[**] and Essex began at last to assemble his forces for the expedition into Ulster.
* Cox, p. 421.
** Birch’s Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 430. Cox, p. 421.
The army was so averse to this enterprise, and so terrified with the reputation of Tyrone, that many of them counterfeited sickness, many of them deserted;[*] and Essex found, that after leaving the necessary garrisons, he could scarcely lead four thousand men against the rebels. He marched, however, with this small army; but was soon sensible, that in so advanced a season, it would be impossible for him to effect any thing against an enemy who, though superior in number, was determined to avoid every decisive action. He hearkened, therefore, to a message sent him by Tyrone, who desired a conference; and a place near the two camps was appointed for that purpose. The generals met without any of their attendants; and a river ran between them, into which Tyrone entered to the depth of his saddle; but Essex stood on the opposite bank. After half an hour’s conference, where Tyrone behaved with great submission to the lord lieutenant, a cessation of arms was concluded to the first of May, renewable from six weeks to six weeks; but which might be broken off by either party upon a fortnight’s warning.[**] Essex also received from Tyrone proposals for a peace, in which that rebel had inserted many unreasonable and exorbitant conditions: and there appeared afterwards some reason to suspect that he had here commenced a very unjustifiable correspondence with the enemy.[***]
* Sydney’s Letters, vol. ii. p. 112, 113.
** Sydney’s Letters, vol. ii. p. 125.
*** Winwood, vol. i. p. 307. State Trials. Bacon, vol. iv.
p. 514, 585, 537.
So unexpected an issue of an enterprise, the greatest and most expensive that Elizabeth had ever undertaken, provoked her extremely against Essex; and this disgust was much augmented by other circumstances of that nobleman’s conduct. He wrote many letters to the queen and council, full of peevish and impatient expressions; complaining of his enemies, lamenting that their calumnies should be believed against him, and discovering symptoms of a mind equally haughty and discontented. She took care to inform him of her dissatisfaction: but commanded him to remain in Ireland till further orders.