Although the Duke of Berwick was the nominal Commander-in-Chief, his youth, and the distractions incident to youth, left the more mature and popular Sarsfield the possession of real power, both civil and military. Every fortunate accident had combined to elevate that gallant cavalry officer into the position of national leadership.
He was the son of a member of the Irish Commons, proscribed for his patriotism and religion in 1641, by Anna O'Moore, daughter of the organizer of the Catholic Confederation. He was a Catholic in religion, spoke Gaelic as easily as English, was brave, impulsive; handsome, and generous to a fault, like the men he led. In Tyrconnell's absence every sincere lover of the country came to him with intelligence, and looked to him for direction. Early in November he learned through his patriotic spies the intention of the Williamites to force the passage of the Shannon in the depth of winter. On the last day of December, accordingly, they marched in great force under Kirke and Lanier to Jonesboro', and under Douglas to Jamestown. At both points they found the indefatigable Sarsfield fully prepared for them, and after a fortnight's intense suffering from exposure to the weather, were glad to get back again to their snug quarters at Parsonstown.
Early in February Tyrconnell landed at Limerick with a French fleet, escorted by three vessels of war, and laden with provisions, but bringing few arms and no reinforcements. He had brought over, however, 14,000 golden louis, which were found of the utmost service in re-clothing the army, besides 10,000 more which he had deposited at Brest to purchase oatmeal for subsequent shipment. He also brought promises of military assistance on a scale far beyond anything France had yet afforded. It is almost needless to say he was received at Galway and Limerick with an enthusiasm which silenced, if it did not confute, his political enemies, both in Ireland and France.
During his absence intrigues and factions had been rifer than ever in the Jacobite ranks. Sarsfield had discovered that the English movement on the Shannon in December was partly hastened by foolish or treacherous correspondence among his own associates. Lord Riverston and his brother were removed from the Senate, or Council of Sixteen—four from each province—and Judge Daly, ancestor of the Dunsandle family, was placed under arrest at Galway. The youthful Berwick sometimes complained that he was tutored and overruled by Sarsfield; but though the impetuous soldier may occasionally have forgotten the lessons learned in courts, his activity seems to have been the greatest, his information the best, his advice the most disinterested, and his fortitude the highest of any member of the council. By the time of Tyrconnell's return he had grown to a height of popularity and power, which could not well brook a superior either in the cabinet or the camp.
On the arrival of the Lord Lieutenant, who was also Commander-in-Chief, the ambition of Sarsfield was gratified by the rank of Earl of Lucan, a title drawn from that pleasant hamlet, in the valley of the Liffey, where he had learned to lisp the catechism of a patriot at the knee of Anna O'Moore. But his real power was much diminished. Tyrconnell, Berwick, Sir Richard Nagle, who had succeeded the Earl of Melfort as chief secretary for King James, all ranked before him at the board, and when Saint Ruth arrived to take command-in-chief, he might fairly have complained that he was deprived of the chief reward to which he had looked forward.
The weary winter and the drenching spring months wore away, and the Williamite troops, sorely afflicted by disease, hugged their tents and huts. Some relief was sent by sea to the Jacobite garrison of Sligo, commanded by the stout old Sir Teague O'Regan, the former defender of Charlemont. Athlone, too, received some succours, and the line of the Shannon was still unbroken from Slieve-an-iron to the sea. But still the promised French assistance was delayed. Men were beginning to doubt both King Louis and King James, when, at length at the beginning of May, the French ships were signalled from the cliffs of Kerry. On the 8th, the Sieur de Saint Ruth, with Generals D'Usson and De Tesse, landed at Limerick, and assisted at a solemn Te Deum in St. Mary's Cathedral. They brought considerable supplies of clothes, provisions, and ammunitions, but neither veterans to swell the ranks, nor money to replenish the chest. Saint Ruth entered eagerly upon the discharge of his duties as generalissimo, while Sarsfield continued the nominal second in command.
CHAPTER IX.
THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR—CAMPAIGN OF 1691—BATTLE OF AUGHRIM—CAPITULATION OF LIMERICK.
Saint Ruth, with absolute powers, found himself placed at the head of from 20,000 to 25,000 men, in the field or in garrison, regular or irregular, but all, with hardly an exception, Irish. His and Tyrconnell's recent supplies had sufficed to renew the clothing and equipment of the greater part of the number, but the whole contents of the army chest, the golden hinge on which war moves, was estimated in the beginning of May to afford to each soldier only "a penny a day for three weeks." He had under him some of the best officers that France could spare, or Ireland produce, and he had with him the hearts of nine-tenths of the natives of the country.
A singular illustration of the popular feeling occurred the previous August. The Milesian Irish had cherished the belief ever since the disastrous day of Kinsale, that an O'Donnell from Spain, having on his shoulder a red mark (ball derg), would return to free them from the English yoke, in a great battle near Limerick. Accordingly, when a representative of the Spanish O'Donnells actually appeared at Limerick, bearing as we know many of his family have done, even to our day, the unmistakable red mark of the ancient Tyrconnell line, immense numbers of the country people who had held aloof from the Jacobite cause, obeyed the voice of prophecy, and flocked round the Celtic deliverer. From 7,000 to 8,000 recruits were soon at his disposal, and it was not without bitter indignation that the chief, so enthusiastically received, saw regiment after regiment drafted from among his followers, and transferred to other commanders. Bred up a Spanish subject—the third in descent from an Irish prince—it is not to be wondered at that he regarded the Irish cause as all in all, and the interests of King James as entirely secondary. He could hardly consider himself as bound in allegiance to that king; he was in no way indebted to him or his family, and if we learn that when the war grew desperate, but before it was ended, he had entered into a separate treaty for himself and his adherents, with William's generals, we must remember, before we condemn him, that we are speaking of an Hiberno-Spaniard, to whom the house of Stuart was no more sacred than the house of Orange.
The Williamite army rendezvoused at Mullingar towards the end of May, under Generals De Ginkle, Talmash and Mackay. On the 7th of June, they moved in the direction of Athlone, 18,000 strong, "the ranks one blaze of scarlet, and the artillery such as had never before been seen in Ireland." The capture of Ballymore Castle, in West-Meath, detained them ten days; on the 19th, joined by the Duke of Wurtemburg, the Prince of Hesse and the Count of Nassau, with 7,000 foreign mercenaries, the whole sat down before the English town of Athlone, which Saint Ruth, contrary to his Irish advisers, resolved to defend. In twenty-four hours those exposed outworks abandoned by the veteran Grace the previous year, fell, and the bombardment of the Irish town on the opposite or Connaught bank, commenced. For ten days—from the 20th to the 30th of June—that fearful cannonade continued. Storey, the Williamite chaplain, to whom we are indebted for many valuable particulars of this war, states that the besiegers fired above 12,000 cannon shot, 600 shells and many tons of stone, into the place. Fifty tons of powder were burned in the bombardment. The castle, an imposing but lofty and antique structure, windowed as much for a residence as a fortress, tumbled into ruins; the bridge was broken down and impassable; the town a heap of rubbish, where two men could no longer walk abreast. But the Shannon had diminished in volume as the summer advanced, and three Danes employed for that purpose found a ford above the bridge, and at six o'clock on the evening of the last day of June, 2,000 picked men, headed by Gustavus Hamilton's grenadiers, dashed into the ford at the stroke of a bell. At the same instant all the English batteries on the Leinster side opened on the Irish town, wrapping the river in smoke, and distracting the attention of the besiegers. Saint Ruth was, at this critical moment, at his camp two miles off, and D'Usson, the commandant, was also absent from his post. In half an hour the Williamites were masters of the heap of rubbish which had once been Athlone, with a loss of less than fifty men killed and wounded. For this bold and successful movement De Ginkle was created Earl of Athlone, and his chief officers were justly ennobled. Saint Ruth, over-confident, in a strange country, withdrew to Ballinasloe, behind the river Suck, and prepared to risk everything on the hazard of a pitched battle.