Father Murphy[[582]] was killed in an attack on Carlow, and his death threw the balance strongly in favour of the Government troops, who eventually proved victorious. After the battle of Ross, the Wexford men chose the Rev. Philip Roche as their leader, in place of Mr. Bagenal Harvey, who had resigned the command. The insurgents were now guilty of following the example of their persecutors, if not with equal cruelty, at least with a barbarity which their leaders in vain reprobated. The prisoners whom they had taken were confined in the jail, and every effort was made to save them from the infuriated people. But one savage, named Dixon, would not be content without their blood; and while the army and their leaders were encamped on Vinegar Hill, he and some other villains as wicked as himself found their way into the jail, and marched the prisoners to the bridge, held a mock trial, and then piked thirty-five of their victims, and flung them into the water. At this moment a priest, who had heard of the bloody deed, hastened to the spot; and after in vain commanding them to desist, succeeded at last in making them kneel down, when he dictated a prayer that God might show them the same mercy which they would show to the surviving prisoners. This had its effect; and the men who waited in terror to receive the doom they had so often and so mercilessly inflicted on others, were marched back to prison.
The camp on Vinegar Hill was now beset on all sides by the royal troops. An attack was planned by General Lake, with 20,000 men and a large train of artillery. General Needham did not arrive in time to occupy the position appointed for him; and after an hour and a-half of hard fighting, the Irish gave way, principally from want of gunpowder. The soldiers now indulged in the most wanton deeds of cruelty. The hospital at Enniscorthy was set on fire, and the wounded men shot in their beds. At Wexford, General Moore prevented his troops from committing such outrages; but when the rest of the army arrived, they acted as they had done at Enniscorthy. Courts-martial were held, in which the officers were not even sworn, and victims were consigned to execution with reckless atrocity. The bridge of Wexford, where a Catholic priest had saved so many Protestant lives, was now chosen for the scene of slaughter; and all this in spite of a promise of amnesty. Father Roche and Mr. Keogh were the first victims of the higher classes; Messrs. Grogan, Harvey, and Colclough were hanged the following day. A mixed commission was now formed of the magistrates, who were principally Orangemen, and the military, whose virulence was equally great. The Rev. Mr. Gordon, the Protestant clergyman whose account I have principally followed, as above all suspicion, declares that "whoever could be proved to have saved an Orangeman or royalist from assassination, his house from burning, or his property from plunder, was considered as having influence amongst the revolters, and consequently as a rebel commander." The reward for their charity now was instant execution. The Rev. John Redmond, the Catholic priest of Newtownbarry, had saved Lord Mountmorris and other gentlemen from the fury of the exasperated people, and had preserved his house and property from plunder. He was now sent for by this nobleman; and, conscious of his innocence, and the benefits he had rendered him, he at once obeyed the summons. On his arrival, he was seized, brought before the court, and executed on the pretence of having been a commander in the rebel army. He had, indeed, commanded, but the only commands he ever uttered were commands of mercy. Well might Mr. Gordon sorrowfully declare, that he had "heard of hundreds of United Irishmen, during the insurrection, who have, at the risk of their lives, saved Orangemen; but I have not heard of a single Orangeman who encountered any danger to save the life of a United Irishman." With equal sorrow he remarks the difference in the treatment of females by each party. The Irish were never once accused of having offered the slightest insult to a woman; the military, besides shooting them indiscriminately with the men, treated them in a way which cannot be described, and under circumstances which added a more than savage inhumanity to their crime.
The next act of the fatal drama was the execution of the State prisoners. The rising in Ulster had been rendered ineffective, happily for the people, by the withdrawal of some of the leaders at the last moment. The command in Antrim was taken by Henry McCracken, who was at last captured by the royalists, and executed at Belfast, on the 17th of June. At Saintfield, in Down, they were commanded by Henry Monroe, who had been a Volunteer, and had some knowledge of military tactics. In an engagement at Ballinahinch, he showed considerable ability in the disposal of his forces, but they were eventually defeated, and he also paid the forfeit of his life. A remnant of the Wexford insurrection was all that remained to be crushed. On the 21st of June, Lord Cornwallis was sent to Ireland, with the command both of the military forces and the civil power. On the 17th of July an amnesty was proclaimed; and the majority of the State prisoners were permitted eventually to leave the country, having purchased their pardon by an account of the plans of the United Irishmen, which were so entirely broken up that their honour was in no way compromised by the disclosure.
Several men, however, were executed, in whose fate the country had, for many reasons, more than ordinary interest. To have pardoned them would have been more humane and better policy. These were the two Sheares, M'Cann, and Mr. William Byrne. Their history will be found in the Lives of the United Irishmen, by Dr. Madden, a work of many volumes, whose contents could not possibly be compressed into the brief space which the limits of this work demands.
Some painfully interesting details of this fearful period may be found in the Annals of Ballitore, a work already referred to in this volume. The writer being a member of the Society of Friends, must be beyond all suspicion of partiality for rebels or Papists; yet, happily, like many members of that Society, was distinguished for humanity and toleration for the opinions of others. Her account of '98, being the annals of a family and a village, is, perhaps, almost better calculated to give an exact idea of the state of the times than a work comprising a more extended range of observation; and yet what was suffered in Ballitore was comparatively trifling when compared with the sufferings of other villages and towns. The first trial was the quartering of the yeomen, "from whose bosom," writes this gentle lady, "pity seemed banished." The Suffolk Fencibles and the Ancient Britons were next quartered on the unfortunate inhabitants. Then commenced the cruel torturing, for which the yeomen and militia obtained an eternal reprobation; the public floggings, of which she writes thus—"the torture was excessive, and the victims were long in recovering, and in almost every case it was applied fruitlessly;" yet these demons in human form never relaxed their cruelty. "The village, once so peaceful, exhibited a scene of tumult and dismay; and the air rang with the shrieks of the sufferers, and the lamentations of those who beheld them suffer."[[583]] Then follow fearful details, which cannot be given here, but which prove how completely the people were driven into rebellion, and how cruelly they were punished. Reprisals, of course, were made by the unfortunate victims; and on one occasion, Mrs. Leadbeater relates how Priest Cullen begged the life of a young man on his knees, and, as a reward of his humanity, was apprehended soon after, and condemned to death. The most cruel scene of all was the murder of the village doctor, a man who had devoted himself unweariedly to healing the wounds of both parties; but because he attended the "rebels," and showed them any acts of common humanity, he was taken before a court-martial, and "hacked to death" by the yeomen with their swords. "He was alone and unarmed when seized," writes Mrs. Leadbeater, "and I believe had never raised his hand to injure any one."
The French allies of Irish insurgents appear to have a fatality for arriving precisely when their services are worse than useless. On the 22nd of August, 1798, Humbert landed at Killala with a small French force, who, after a number of engagements, were eventually obliged to surrender at discretion.
Ireland having been reduced to the lowest state of misery and servitude, the scheme for which much of this suffering had been enacted was now proposed and carried out. The first parliamentary intimation was given in a speech from the throne, on the 22nd of January, 1799; a pamphlet was published on the subject by Mr. Cooke, the Under-Secretary; but it required more cogent arguments than either speeches from the throne or pamphlets to effect the object of Government. Mr. Pitt had set his heart upon the Union, and Mr. Pitt had determined that the Union should be carried out at any expense of honour. The majority of the Irish lawyers protested against it. The Irish people, as far as they dared do so, opposed it. At a meeting of the Irish bar, on the 9th of December, there were 166 votes against the Union and only thirty-two in favour of it. The published correspondence of Lord Cornwallis and Lord Castlereagh has revealed an amount of nefarious corruption and treachery at which posterity stands aghast. "These noblemen," writes Sir Jonah Barrington, "seemed to have been created for such a crisis, and for each other. An unremitting perseverance, an absence of all political compunctions, an unqualified contempt of public opinion, and a disregard of every constitutional principle, were common to both." But Lord Cornwallis had some compunctions; for he wrote to General Ross, describing his office as "the most cursed of all situations," and expressing, in language more forcible than gentlemanly, his ardent desire to "kick those whom his public duty obliged him to court."
The immediate arrangements made for carrying out the Union were extremely simple. A scale of "compensation" was arranged—a word which could, by a slight perversion of the ordinary meaning of the English language, be used as a new form of expressing what was formerly called bribery. Every one was promised everything that he wished for, if he would only consent to the measure. The Catholics were to have emancipation, the Protestants ascendency, the bar promotion, the people higher wages, the boroughmongers magnificent compensation. FitzGibbon, who had been made Lord Clare, and was then Chancellor, bribed, threatened, and cajoled the Upper House; Mr. Secretary Cooke employed himself with equal ability in the Lower House. Grattan had left Ireland; Flood was in retirement; the members of the bar who had voted against the Union were dismissed from office, and the Prime Serjeant, Mr. FitzGerald, was the first victim. The thirty-two who formed the minority were at once removed. I have not space for the details of the various attempts which were made to pass the unpopular measure. Barrington has given a list of the members for the Union, and the rewards they received. His description of the last night of the Irish Parliament is too graphic to be omitted:—
"The Commons' House of Parliament, on the last evening, afforded the most melancholy example of a fine, independent people, betrayed, divided, sold, and, as a State, annihilated. British clerks and officers were smuggled into her Parliament, to vote away the constitution of a country to which they were strangers, and in which they had neither interest nor connexion. They were employed to cancel the royal charter of the Irish nation, guaranteed by the British Government, sanctioned by the British Legislature, and unequivocally confirmed by the words, the signature, and the Great Seal of their monarch.
"The situation of the Speaker on that night was of the most distressing nature. A sincere and ardent enemy of the measure, he headed its opponents; he resisted with all the power of his mind, the resources of his experience, his influence, and his eloquence. It was, however, through his voice that it was to be proclaimed and consummated. His only alternative (resignation) would have been unavailing, and could have added nothing to his character. His expressive countenance bespoke the inquietude of his feeling; solicitude was perceptible in every glance, and his embarrassment was obvious in every word he uttered.
"The galleries were full, but the change was lamentable; they were no longer crowded with those who had been accustomed to witness the eloquence and to animate the debates of that devoted assembly. A monotonous and melancholy murmur ran through benches, scarcely a word was exchanged amongst the members, nobody seemed at ease, no cheerfulness was apparent, and the ordinary business, for a short time, proceeded in the usual manner.
"At length the expected moment arrived. The order of the day for the third reading of the Bill for a 'Legislative Union between Great Britain and Ireland,' was moved by Lord Castlereagh. Unvaried, tame, coldblooded, the words seemed frozen as they issued from his lips; and, as a simple citizen of the world, he seemed to have no sensation on the subject.
"At that moment he had no country, no God but his ambition: he made his motion, and resumed his seat with the utmost composure and indifference.
"Confused murmurs again ran through the House; it was visibly affected. Every character in a moment seemed involuntary rushing to its index—some pale, some flushed, some agitated; there were few countenances to which the heart did not despatch some messenger. Several members withdrew before the question could be repeated, and an awful momentary silence succeeded their departure. The Speaker rose slowly from that chair which had been the proud source of his honours and of his high character; for a moment he resumed his seat, but the strength of his mind sustained him in his duty, though his struggle was apparent. With that dignity which never failed to signalize his official actions, he held up the Bill for a moment in silence; he looked steadily around him on the last agony of the expiring Parliament. He at length repeated, in an emphatic tone, 'As many as are of opinion that this Bill do pass, say aye.' The affirmative was languid but indisputable; another momentary pause ensued; again his lips seemed to decline their office; at length, with an eye averted from the object which he hated, he proclaimed, with a subdued voice, 'The Ayes have it.' The fatal sentence was now pronounced; for an instant he stood statue-like; then indignantly, and with disgust, flung the Bill upon the table, and sunk into his chair with an exhausted spirit.
"An independent country was thus degraded into a province—Ireland, as a nation, was extinguished."
