His character.
It had long been evident to Clanricarde, as well as to Ormonde and his friends abroad, that the power of the Parliament would establish itself in Ireland. But it was their policy to keep the flag of Royalty flying as long as possible, on the chance of some foreign complication. That this stubborn attitude increased the ultimate sufferings of the Irish masses is very probable. As early as the beginning of February, Charles, with many expressions of gratitude and confidence, gave Clanricarde free leave to quit Ireland when he thought fit, but adding that ‘the keeping up of the war there in any kind, either offensive or defensive, is of the highest importance to us and our service that can be performed; as the contrary would be of the greatest prejudice to all our designs.’ Six weeks later he wrote holding out hopes of further help from the Duke of Lorraine, and directing that no declaration should be issued which might increase the friction with the clerical party. The two letters reached Clanricarde together in the following August, when they were too late to have any significance. Meanwhile, in May, a second letter was given to Castlehaven, and forwarded by a sure hand, authorising the Deputy to leave his post at any time. This letter, though apparently not extant, probably reached its destination much sooner than the other two, and justified Clanricarde in making terms when he did. In the meantime, he succeeded in getting a considerable force together, with which, after blowing up several castles, he swooped down upon the fort at Ballyshannon and took it by assault, dismissing the survivors unhurt and substituting his own garrison of 300 men. He took Donegal also, but the success was only transient, for he had no means of feeding his men but by seizing cattle, and thus involuntarily making the task of the Parliamentarians easier. Venables came up from Down to join Coote, and they soon took Sligo and retook the other two places, giving punctual quarter in their turn. At the end of June the Lord Deputy, who, Ludlow says, was practically surrounded in the island of Carrick, made terms for himself, but none for his vast estates. He was left free to go abroad where he pleased with not more than twenty servants, to remain in Ireland for three months, and to enlist 3000 men for foreign service. In the meantime he was to divest himself of his viceregal authority and do no hostile act. Six weeks later he was excepted by Act of the English Parliament from pardon for life and estate, but was nevertheless left unmolested at his own place at Somerhill in Kent. His health had never been good, and was not improved by his campaigning, but he lived till 1657, and was buried in Tonbridge Church. He was not a great general, but to most people he appeared, and still appears, as a loyal and worthy man. To the ultramontane clergy of his own day he was, as an independent Catholic who cared little for a nuncio’s censures, more hateful even than the heretic Ormonde. Bishop French says he put Cæsar before God, and Bishop Lynch that the Ulster men refused to follow him because he disdained to receive absolution from Rinuccini’s excommunication. The British officer so often quoted says, on the contrary, that the Irish were well satisfied with him as true both to King and Church, ‘being a good Roman Catholic,’ and that he surrendered only because he could not fight Coote and Venables combined. ‘Neither, indeed, was he ever practised in that trade [war], though a very fine, devout, liberal, hospitable gentleman, as any is in Ireland in his time, as I have heard many aver.’[230]
Case of Anthony Geohegan.
Loyalty the idol of Dagon.
Before finally leaving Clanricarde and the Duke of Lorraine something must be said of the case of Anthony Geohegan, which had no important results, but which shows how incompatible were the Royalist and clerical ideals. Geohegan had been preferred by Rinuccini at the early age of twenty-four to the nominal dignity of the mitred abbacy of Connall. Towards the end of 1650 he was studying divinity and canon law at Paris, and in correspondence with Abbot Crelly, who was in London, hoping against hope that the Parliament would grant toleration to his Church. He offered to go to Ireland if wanted, and Crelly reported this to Rome. Dean Massari, Rinuccini’s old lieutenant, was Secretary of Propaganda, and gladly accepted the young priest’s offer. He reached Galway on March 14, 1651, while De Henin was there, with instructions to further the appointment of a Catholic protector, and he stayed on after the Lorraine envoy’s departure. Clanricarde suspected that he was working against him, and some of his letters were intercepted, in one of which he said that ‘if the service of God had been as deep in the hearts of our nation as that idol of Dagon, a foolish loyalty, a better course for their honour and preservation had been taken in time.’ He had noticed that at Limerick those favourable to Ormonde had got better terms than others, and he thought the Independents who professed liberty of conscience more likely to grant reasonable terms to the Irish than those who maintained the Church of England and the recusancy laws. Clanricarde would have tried Geohegan as a traitor, but the clergy took their stand upon the bull In Cœna Domini, and maintained that no lay governor or judge could try a priest. They had their way, and Geohegan was, of course, exonerated from all blame.[231]
The Irish leaders submit. Fitzpatrick, March 1652.
Even before the surrender of Galway, the Irish leaders began to make terms for themselves and their followers. Of these, the first was John Fitzpatrick, who had lately distinguished himself by taking and holding Meelick. On March 7 he agreed to transport 4000 foot and 300 horse to a state in amity with the Commonwealth, pay being given to them in the meantime, and hopes were held out as to his property. He made no conditions for his father and mother, or for the Catholic religion; whereupon a declaration was published against him, and he was excommunicated. ‘Some of his party,’ say the Parliamentary Commissioners, ‘have been cut off by the enemy, who did also cut off the ears of some whom they took prisoners.’ The men were not popular, having lived by plunder, and the Government were glad to send them to Spain. Fitzpatrick and his father were both excluded by Act of Parliament from pardon for life or estate, but he afterwards married Ormonde’s sister and was restored in 1661 to broad lands in the Queen’s County. His mother, says Ludlow, ‘was found guilty of the murder of the English, with this aggravation, that she said she would make candles of their fat. She was condemned to be burned, and the sentence was executed accordingly.’[232]
O’Dwyer, March 23.
Usual terms of surrender.
The next important chief to surrender was Colonel Edmund O’Dwyer, who commanded in Tipperary and Waterford. He and his men had quarter for life and personal property only, with liberty to serve any friendly foreign State. Murderers of the English, members of the first General Assembly or Supreme Council, homicides after quarter given, deserters, and every ‘priest or other of the Romish clergy in orders,’ were excluded. By the end of June, when Clanricarde came to terms, the Parliament had not many enemies left in the field, though a few strongholds held out for some months longer. The articles of surrender, or authentic copies, are for the most part extant, and the terms granted generally amounted to little more than life and personal liberty to those who had not committed murder. Where priests are not specially excluded, they are generally left tacitly to the mercy of the victors. Landed property was to be distributed according to such qualifications as Parliament might determine. In one case Sir Hardress Waller undertook ‘industriously to solicit’ the authorities that priests who were not charged with any crime except officiating as such should be free to go beyond seas.[233]