O’Neill had not ammunition to continue the defence, and he knew that there was no hope of relief. About 9 o’clock the same night he slipped out quietly by the bridge and made his way to Waterford, advising the mayor to make the best terms he could. White accordingly capitulated both for the inhabitants and for the garrison. All arms and ammunition in the town were surrendered, the civil population being guaranteed protection ‘for life and estate, from all plunder and violence of the soldiery.’ Next morning the besiegers marched in, and though Cromwell was angry at being outwitted, the conditions were kept. The garrison were pursued and stragglers cut off, amongst whom there were probably some women and at least one priest. On reaching Waterford admission was denied by Preston to O’Neill’s men. There was plague both in his camp and in the city, and after a time he ordered his foot soldiers to shift for themselves. He and Fennell, with the horse, made their way to Limerick.[175]
Inchiquin and Broghill march.
Battle of Macroom, April 10.
Inchiquin was in Kerry in January, whence he invaded Limerick with three regiments of cavalry, sweeping away the cattle and devastating most of the county. Broghill and Henry Cromwell fell upon his camp towards the end of March, and drove him across the Shannon ‘with more cows than horses.’ Inchiquin’s men were chiefly English, and some of the officers were shot as deserters from the Parliament. After this Broghill joined Cromwell, who was then preparing to attack Clonmel, and was detached by him to deal with a force of 4000 foot and 300 horse which had been raised in Kerry, chiefly by the exertions of Boetius Egan, Bishop of Ross, an Observant friar promoted by Rinuccini. The Irish, bent on relieving Clonmel, advanced to Macroom, and garrisoned Carrigadrohid Castle on the Lee, which Broghill reached on April 8. He had 1500 cavalry, and hurried on, leaving a like number of foot to guard his rear. He seems to have had no guns with him, but the Irish probably thought he had, for they burned Muskerry’s castle at Macroom, and assembled in the park. They were raw levies and probably badly armed, for they were routed in a very short time, ‘though in a place,’ says Broghill, ‘the worst for horse ever I saw, and where one hundred musketeers might have kept off all the horse of Ireland.’ Several hundred were killed, and among the prisoners were the bishop and Lord Roche’s son, the high sheriff of Kerry, who was in equal authority with him. Carrigadrohid was taken by parading pieces of timber with teams of oxen, as if they were guns. ‘I gave orders,’ says Broghill, ‘that if the garrison in it delivered it not up, we should hang the bishop before it. The former not being done the latter was.... The bishop was wont to say there was no way to secure the English but by hanging them. That which was his cruelty became his justice.’ The castle was then surrendered on fair terms, and Broghill went back to the siege of Clonmel.[176]
Cromwell leaves Ireland, May 26.
His plans of reform.
Cromwell quitted Ireland on May 26, leaving Ireton as his deputy. His last extant letter before going was to Hewson, in favour of young Lord Moore, son of the brave soldier who was killed at Portlester, and grandson of Lord Chancellor Loftus. Moore had fought against Cromwell, who nevertheless ordered that he should be ‘fairly and civilly treated, and that no incivility or abuse be offered unto him by any of the soldiery, either by restraining his liberty or otherwise; it being a thing which I altogether disprove and dislike that the soldiers should intermeddle in civil affairs farther than they are lawfully called upon.’ Necessity afterwards devised the major-generals, but it was to civil justice, to a Matthew Hale rather than a Desborough, that Cromwell looked for real improvement. It was a crime, he said, ‘to hang a man for six and eightpence, and I know not what—to hang for a trifle and commit murder.’ In Ireland particularly much might be done for the poor people by the cheap and impartial administration of justice. They had suffered more by the oppression of the great than any ‘in that which we call Christendom. And indeed they are accounted the bribingest people that are, they having been inured thereto.’ And he rightly considered that the best guarantee for purity was to pay good fixed salaries to the judges and to get rid of the fees and perquisites which had been a ‘colour to covetous practices.’[177]
Inchiquin charged with treachery
Submission of Protestant Royalists.
Easy terms given.