Mobile Version
|
Register
|
Login
home
|
speak out!
|
content zone archives
|
"speak out!" archives
|
vote on it
|
soap opera
|
pub crawl
|
links
|
contact us
|
search
Follow us!
Speak Out! - Gaelic Games
Notices
"Speak Out!" Home
|
Topic Listing
|
Post New Topic
|
Post Reply
Yesterday's HOT topics
|
Today's HOT topics
| Jump to:
All Topics
Topic:
322 years ago today - 27th Of August 1690 - lest we forget the heroic people of Limerick
William M.C.O'Brien
(235 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 10:02
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
In the afternoon of the 27th of August 1690, a storming party, leaping up from the trenches, entered the breach, supported in the rear by 10,000 men. They fired their muskets and threw their hand grenades among the defenders: but were met by a terrible fire from all sides, front and flanks. Nearly all the front ranks were destroyed, and the rest showed signs of wavering; but thousands of resolute men pressed on from behind, and the Limerick men, now sore pressed, began to yield in their turn.
From every convenient standpoint the citizens viewed the terrible fight, but could see little through the thick cloud of smoke and dust. When they became aware that the assailants were prevailing, they rushed down in crowds from their secure resting-places, and seizing every available weapon, joined eagerly in the fray. Even the women--more active still than the women of Derry--rushed to the very front, and regardless of danger, flung stones and bottles and missiles of every kind in the very faces of the assailants.
The Brandenburgh regiment, fighting steadily, had advanced to the Black Battery and were swarming round and over it; when suddenly the magazine was exploded, and battery and Brandenburghers were blown into the air in horrible confusion.
For four hours this dreadful conflict raged, and a cloud of smoke and dust, wafted by a gentle breeze, reached the whole way to the top of a high hill sixteen miles off. The assailants, unable to withstand the tremendous and unexpected resistance, at last yielded, and turning round, rushed back through the breach in headlong confusion.
King William had witnessed the conflict from Cromwell's fort; and having seen the repulse of his best troops, he returned to the camp deeply disappointed. Over 2,000 of his men were killed or wounded: the loss of the Irish was comparatively small.
William raised the siege, which had lasted three weeks, and returned to England, leaving general De Ginkel in command; and on the 31st of August the army marched away from the city.
The heroic defenders of Limerick had, almost without ammunition, repulsed a well - equipped veteran army directed by a great general who had never been foiled before.
lopper
(1,990 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 10:12
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
An ancient city well studied in the arts of war.
N16
(1,724 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 10:14
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
I read a very interesting book some time ago writen by Charles French Blake Forster. Details what happened in the aftermath of the Boyne, Aughrim and the siege of Limerick.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_French_Blake-Forster
Here is the full text.
http://www.archive.org/stream/irishchieftains00forsgoog/irishchieftains00forsgoog_djvu.txt
William M.C.O'Brien
(235 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 10:48
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Thanks N16 - will look at this for sure. Extremely interesting period in Irish history. Pity a bit more isn't made of it in Limerick especially. This should be a marked event annually. Could become a big tourist opportunity if managed correctly & more importantly might instill a bit of local pride too. I'm reading a book on Patrick Sarsfield at the moment - this fella's story is worth a hollywood blockbuster for sure !
lopper
(1,990 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 11:07
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
There's long been talk about the statue of Sarsfield being moved from its fairly hidden location in the grounds of St John's.
If it were moved to either John's Square or near the castle it would be bringing one of the few historically interesting statues around to a wider audience.
The city has a very interesting and eventful history, it is a pity we are so slow to embrace it.
N16
(1,724 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 11:24
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Originally posted by William M.C.O'Brien:
Thanks N16 - will look at this for sure. Extremely interesting period in Irish history. Pity a bit more isn't made of it in Limerick especially. This should be a marked event annually. Could become a big tourist opportunity if managed correctly & more importantly might instill a bit of local pride too. I'm reading a book on Patrick Sarsfield at the moment - this fella's story is worth a hollywood blockbuster for sure !
I am very interested in the history of this period and think that a film should be made about it. That book goes into what happened at the battle of Aughrim in great detail - and the expolits of Patrick Sarsfield, a true Irish patriot. No reason why a completely factual block-buster couldnt be made - something too that would tell both sides of the story and maybe do something to bring Protestants and Catholics in Ireland closer together as the Battle of the Boyne was the prelude to the Battle of Aughrim.
Well worth getting your hands on a copy of that book - its told in a narative format which makes it great reading.
carryharry
(4,804 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 11:34
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Whats that book called N16?
N16
(1,724 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 11:38
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Originally posted by carryharry:
Whats that book called N16?
The Irish Chieftains, or, a struggle for the Crown
Written by Charles French Blake-Forster
You can get it on Amazon. We have an original copy at home.
William M.C.O'Brien
(235 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 11:39
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Good point re: moving Sarsfield's statue to a more prominent location - maybe have it more elevated & have lighting on it at night time too.
carryharry
(4,804 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 11:42
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Originally posted by N16:
The Irish Chieftains, or, a struggle for the CrownWritten by Charles French Blake-ForsterYou can get it on Amazon. We have an original copy at home.
Thanks lad, will def look it up.
perth06
(1,943 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 11:57
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Have you read Irish Battles by G.A. McCoy it includes a good account of the Boyne and Aughrim?
Originally posted by N16:
I am very interested in the history of this period and think that a film should be made about it. That book goes into what happened at the battle of Aughrim in great detail - and the expolits of Patrick Sarsfield, a true Irish patriot. No reason why a completely factual block-buster couldnt be made - something too that would tell both sides of the story and maybe do something to bring Protestants and Catholics in Ireland closer together as the Battle of the Boyne was the prelude to the Battle of Aughrim.
Well worth getting your hands on a copy of that book - its told in a narative format which makes it great reading.
N16
(1,724 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 12:06
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Originally posted by perth06:
Have you read Irish Battles by G.A. McCoy it includes a good account of the Boyne and Aughrim?
No - havent read that one but will look out for it.
perth06
(1,943 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 12:15
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
If you have an e-mail I can send it on to you
Originally posted by N16:
No - havent read that one but will look out for it.
William M.C.O'Brien
(235 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 12:15
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
I recently read a good account of the Battle of Aughrim by Michael McNally - http://www.amazon.com/Battle-Aughrim-1691-Michael-McNally/dp/0752446878
i visited the battlefield a few months ago. Nice centre there & the battlefield positions for both sides are well signposted - but again a lot more could be done. Still, when you've read into it it's great to actually be there & try to visualize the scale of it in your mind's eye.
N16
(1,724 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 12:43
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Originally posted by perth06:
If you have an e-mail I can send it on to you
I had a new email address set up for this user ID after my old one got banned - but I cant for the life of me remember what it is. I'll see if I can get something set up later on - bit wary of giving out personal emails or that on forums.
perth06
(1,943 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 13:01
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
I hear ya but I have one that I use for forums only like boards etc.
Originally posted by N16:
I had a new email address set up for this user ID after my old one got banned - but I cant for the life of me remember what it is. I'll see if I can get something set up later on - bit wary of giving out personal emails or that on forums.
William M.C.O'Brien
(235 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 14:18
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
The Blacksmith of Limerick
Robert Dwyer Joyce (1830–1883)
HE grasped his ponderous hammer, he could not stand it more,
To hear the bombshells bursting, and thundering battle’s roar;
He said, “The breach they ’re mounting, the Dutchman’s murdering crew,—
I ’ll try my hammer on their heads, and see what that can do!
“Now, swarthy Ned and Moran, make up that iron well; 5
’T is Sarsfield’s horse that wants the shoes, so mind not shot or shell.”
“Ah, sure,” cried both, “the horse can wait, for Sarsfield ’s on the wall,
And where you go, we ’ll follow, with you to stand or fall!”
The blacksmith raised his hammer, and rushed into the street,
His ’prentice boys behind him, the ruthless foe to meet; 10
High on the breach of Limerick, with dauntless hearts they stood,
Where bombshells burst, and shot fell thick, and redly ran the blood.
“Now look you, brown-haired Moran, and mark you, swarthy Ned,
This day we ’ll prove the thickness of many a Dutchman’s head!
Hurrah! upon their bloody path they ’re mounting gallantly; 15
And now the first that tops the breach, leave him to this and me!”
The first that gained the rampart, he was a captain brave,—
A captain of the grenadiers, with blood-stained dirk and glaive;
He pointed, and he parried, but it was all in vain,
For fast through skull and helmet the hammer found his brain! 20
The next that topped the rampart, he was a colonel bold,
Bright, through the dust of battle, his helmet flashed with gold.
“Gold is no match for iron,” the doughty blacksmith said,
As with that ponderous hammer he cracked his foeman’s head.
“Hurrah for gallant Limerick!” black Ned and Moran cried, 25
As on the Dutchmen’s leaden heads their hammers well they plied.
A bombshell burst between them,—one fell without a groan,
One leaped into the lurid air and down the breach was thrown.
“Brave smith! brave smith!” cried Sarsfield, “beware the treacherous mine!
Brave smith! brave smith! fall backward, or surely death is thine!” 30
The smith sprang up the rampart, and leaped the blood-stained wall,
As high into the shuddering air went foemen, breach, and all!
Up, like a red volcano, they thundered wild and high,
Spear, gun, and shattered standard, and foemen through the sky;
And dark and bloody was the shower that round the blacksmith fell; 35
He thought upon his ’prentice boys,—they were avengéd well.
On foemen and defenders a silence gathered down;
’T was broken by a triumph-shout that shook the ancient town,
As out its heroes sallied, and bravely charged and slew,
And taught King William and his men what Irish hearts could do! 40
Down rushed the swarthy blacksmith unto the river side;
He hammered on the foe’s pontoon to sink it in the tide;
The timber it was tough and strong, it took no crack or strain;
“Mavrone! ’t won’t break,” the blacksmith roared; “I ’ll try their heads again!”
He rushed upon the flying ranks, his hammer ne’er was slack, 45
For in through blood and bone it crashed, through helmet and through jack;—
He ’s ta’en a Holland captain, beside the red pontoon,
And “Wait you here,” he boldly cries; “I ’ll send you back full soon!
“Dost see this gory hammer? It cracked some skulls to-day,
And yours ’t will crack if you don’t stand and list to what I say: 50
Here! take it to your curséd king, and tell him softly too,
’T would be acquainted with his skull if he were here, not you!”
The blacksmith sought his smithy, and blew his bellows strong;
He shod the steed of Sarsfield, but o’er it sang no song.
“Ochone! my boys are dead,” he cried; “their loss I ’ll long deplore, 55
But comfort ’s in my heart,—their graves are red with foreign gore!”
gaultier
(162 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 17:30
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
Great thread. Many thanks William and especially N16
perth06
(1,943 Posts)
Posted:
27-Aug-2012 17:47
Quote
Edit
Delete
Report Post
Post Reply
This might be of interest to some
Sarsfield, Patrick, Jacobite first earl of Lucan (d. 1693), army officer, was the second son of Patrick Sarsfield of Tully Castle, co. Kildare, and Anne O'More, a daughter of the confederate leader Sir Rory O'More. The family estates were confiscated in the Cromwellian settlement, but Tully was restored to his father in 1661, and it is there that Sarsfield was brought up.
The Catholic soldier
His eldest brother, William (d. 1675), married Mary Walter, the sister of James Scott, duke of Monmouth, and Sarsfield began his military career in Monmouth's regiment which was then serving in Flanders in French pay. In 1678 he went to London where he took a captain's commission in a new regiment to be raised in Ireland by Thomas Dongan. When news of the Popish Plot broke, Sarsfield was arrested and held at Chester on his way to take up his new post. The regiment was never formed and, as a Roman Catholic, he was barred from pursuing a military career. For the next seven years he led a dissolute life in London where he lost at least three duels, was involved in two abductions of young widows, and was arrested for threatening Ford, Lord Grey, who had made a supposedly anti-Irish remark. The duke of Berwick described Sarsfield as ‘a man of huge stature, but without sense, very good natured and very brave’ (Wauchope, 93).
The accession of James II in 1685 brought about a change in Sarsfield's fortunes. During Monmouth's rebellion he served as a gentleman volunteer in Theophilus Oglethorpe's reconnaissance party which dogged the rebels in their progress through the west country. He was wounded in the skirmish at Keynsham and was clubbed from his horse and left for dead during the battle of Sedgemoor (5 July 1685). After the rebellion had been crushed he was rewarded with a commission in an English regiment of horse. He was one of those Catholics exempted by the king from taking the oaths of allegiance and supremacy and in 1686 was the lieutenant-colonel under John Churchill of the 4th troop of Life Guards. He was promoted colonel when James's reign was brought to crisis in 1688, and in September was sent to Dublin on an urgent but fruitless mission to Richard Talbot, earl of Tyrconnell, to get Irish troops sent to England.
When the prince of Orange invaded England, Sarsfield was the only officer of his rank to strike a blow for James. On 20 November 1688 he led his Horse Guards in a successful but bloody skirmish at Wincanton. After James fled to France, Sarsfield was approached by the new government to persuade Tyrconnell to relinquish power in Dublin and thereby avoid civil war. Sarsfield refused and William was advised that as he ‘was a man of a desperate and daring nature it might be advisable to secure him for fear he might assassinate his person’ (Wauchope, 43). Sarsfield's troop was disbanded in January 1689, and he was allowed to join King James in exile.
With James II in Ireland
In March 1689 Sarsfield sailed with James's fleet to Ireland, where he was promoted brigadier. His first task was to reform the oversized, newly raised regiments that could be neither paid nor equipped. He was chosen as one of the members for co. Dublin in King James's Dublin parliament which opened on 7 May 1689, although it is doubtful that he ever took his seat. After Lord Kingston abandoned Sligo in April, Sarsfield was sent with 2000 men to secure the town against the Williamite garrison at Enniskillen. He occupied Sligo in early May and on 4 May he laid siege to Ballyshannon. To prevent its relief he detached some of his troops along the Enniskillen Road. This detachment was scattered by a larger force led by Thomas Lloyd at the ‘break of Belleek’ (7 May 1689), forcing Sarsfield to raise the siege and withdraw to Manorhamilton. He entered into negotiations with Gustavus Hamilton, the governor of Enniskillen, for the exchange of the Sligo leader, Terence McDonogh, and others captured at Ballyshannon. Having no prisoners of war to hand over, he resorted to rounding up those Sligo protestants who had stayed behind and taken protection, and holding them in Sligo gaol. This tactic enraged Hamilton, but nevertheless forced him to allow the exchange. Following this Berwick addressed Sarsfield in correspondence as ‘Deare Notorious’.
Sarsfield successfully kept the enemy out of Connaught for the next three months, boasting from his camp in co. Leitrim that ‘I am so well posted that I do not fear them were they double the number’ (Wauchope, 69). Plans were laid for him to mount a joint attack on Enniskillen with Justin MacCarthy, but before they could join forces MacCarthy was defeated at Newtownbutler on 31 July 1689, the same day on which the siege of Londonderry was raised. Finding himself isolated in the north-west, Sarsfield abandoned Sligo to the Enniskilliners. He arrived in Dublin in mid-August to report to James, and was given command of a further force with which to retake Sligo. He reached Roscommon on 12 October 1689 and by forced marches quickly retook Jamestown and Boyle, and chased Thomas Lloyd and the Enniskillen troops out of Sligo on 15 October 1689. Six hundred Huguenot troops stranded in the stone fort held out against him for six days, during which Sarsfield made the last use of a mobile siege tower in the British Isles. Articles of surrender were signed on 21 October 1689 and Sarsfield entertained the officers to dinner before allowing them to march to Enniskillen. As they crossed the bridge out of Sligo, he stood on the parapet with a bag of gold in his hand in an unsuccessful attempt to lure their men into James's army. Leaving Henry Luttrell as governor of Sligo, he returned to Dublin.
The French ambassador, the comte d'Avaux, approached James in the hope that Sarsfield would be released to command a proposed Irish brigade in France. Sarsfield's reputation in Ireland, wrote d'Avaux in October 1689, ‘is greater than that of any man I know. He is brave but above all he has a sense of honour and integrity in all that he does’. James refused: ‘When I asked him for Sarsfield … he stormed around the room three times in a temper’ (Wauchope, 93). The difficulty was eventually overcome by the appointment of Justin MacCarthy. About this time, probably at the end of 1689, Sarsfield married Lady Honora Bourke [see below], a fifteen-year-old daughter of William Bourke (or de Burgh), seventh earl of Clanricarde (d. 1687), and Lady Helen MacCarthy (d. 1722).
In the spring of 1690 Sarsfield was posted to guard the frontier, first at Cavan and then at Finnea. In late June he joined forces with the main army, which took up a position on the Boyne River. At the battle of the Boyne (1 July 1690), the main body of the Jacobite army, including Sarsfield's brigade, marched 4 miles west of the crossing point to prevent a flank attack. In consequence he took no part in the fighting at Oldbridge where King William forded the river and defeated that part of the army commanded by Tyrconnell and Richard Hamilton. After the battle King James fled to France and the Irish army re-formed at Limerick where the senior officers were called to a general council of war. Tyrconnell told the meeting that he was persuaded that Limerick could not withstand a siege and that he proposed to bring the war to an end by negotiating a treaty. In the consequent uproar, Sarsfield was established as the leader of the no surrender party. Confident that the overwhelming majority of the officers were intent on fighting on, Sarsfield plotted to overthrow the viceroy. In order not to alienate King James, he intended to replace him with the duke of Berwick, James's son. The conspiracy failed when Sarsfield approached Berwick, who threatened to expose the conspirators if they continued.
The Ballyneety raid and the defence of the Shannon
On 28 July, while Limerick was being prepared for the coming siege, Sarsfield led an expedition to relieve Athlone. The besieging forces retreated on hearing rumours of his approach, and Sarsfield returned to Limerick on 8 August 1690, the same day that King William arrived outside the walls and summoned the city to surrender. On receiving intelligence that the Williamite siege train was some two days behind the main army, Sarsfield resolved to save the city by destroying the artillery. He set out on his celebrated raid with 600 horsemen on the evening of 10 August, crossed the Shannon at Killaloe, and led his men into the Silvermine Mountains. Two nights later, in the early hours of 12 August 1690, he attacked the siege train while it camped at Ballyneety, near Cullen, co. Tipperary, some 12 miles from Limerick. Tradition records that the password for the night was ‘Sarsfield’. He is said to have answered the sentry ‘Sarsfield is the name, and Sarsfield is the man!’ (Wauchope, 134). The wagons were burnt and the artillery pieces were crammed with gunpowder, jammed muzzle first into the ground, and discharged. Although only two of the eight siege guns were split, the general destruction of stores and gunpowder proved fatal to King William's attempt on Limerick. Sarsfield told a prisoner that if he had failed he would have considered the war lost and would have returned to France. He escaped with the horses and recrossed the Shannon at Portumna. The siege was delayed while fresh supplies were brought to Limerick. The weather deteriorated, and William was obliged to attack a too narrow breach in the walls which allowed the Irish a victory (27 August 1690) in which he lost 2000 men. ‘The ill success at Limerick was well known to be owing to the want of ammunition occasioned by Sarsfield falling upon the artillery’, wrote George Clarke, William's secretary at war (ibid., 153). The siege was raised on 31 August, and William left Ireland on 5 September. Tyrconnell also left Ireland in September to report to King James in France and to beg for French aid for the coming campaign. He left the government to Berwick and a council of twelve, one of whom was Sarsfield.
As the Williamites withdrew into winter quarters Sarsfield was involved in the scramble for the forts on the Leinster side of the Shannon. In mid-September he took part in Berwick's unsuccessful attempt on Birr. Sarsfield's winter was spent in improving his strongholds along the Shannon, frustrating the Williamite attempts to get a toehold in Connaught, and in encouraging his irregulars, the ‘rapparees’, to plunder the Williamite garrisons scattered in winter quarters. Meanwhile his struggle against Tyrconnell flared up in the viceroy's absence. Berwick was compelled to allow a delegation to travel to King James in France to counter whatever might be said by Tyrconnell and to get the king to replace him. Sarsfield forced the removal of several of Tyrconnell's appointees, including Thomas Nugent, the secretary of state for war. Berwick felt obliged to make Sarsfield governor of Connaught, the only province in Jacobite hands, and of Galway, the principal port, allowing him control of all communication with France. When Berwick fell ill in the winter, Sarsfield became the de facto ruler of Jacobite Ireland. His administration was not a happy one, ‘for he was so easy that he would not deny signing any paper that was laid before him’ (Wauchope, 176). Sarsfield's delegation to James failed to get Tyrconnell replaced, and the viceroy returned from France on 14 January 1691, bearing a patent elevating Sarsfield to the earldom of Lucan. Lucan was confirmed in his rank as major-general and ordered to re-form the Irish army in readiness for the coming campaign. Nevertheless, there was no stop to the bickering in the army between the Lucan and Tyrconnell factions.
According to Berwick, after the Ballyneety raid, Lucan ‘considered himself to be the greatest general in the world’ (Wauchope, 154), and was reported to have boasted: ‘There are two factions here, Lord Tyrconnell's and mine; he can do whatever he wants, I do not care. I will always be stronger than him’ (ibid., 195). Of Tyrconnell, Lucan wrote:
He is very jealous and he despairs of the influence I have over the army. This perfidious and ungrateful man knows full well that during the siege of Limerick he would have been massacred without me, and he is not ignorant of the fact that I prevented and resisted the pressing entreaties of the whole army who adamantly wanted to remove him and proclaim me general in his place. (ibid., 194)
Tyrconnell, aware of Lucan's hold over the army, governed from Limerick and sent him back to Athlone to oversee the defence of the Shannon. Lucan and his faction eagerly awaited the arrival of a French commander who they hoped would put an end to Tyrconnell's interference in military matters. General Charles Charlmont, marquis de St Ruth (or St Ruhe), arrived in Limerick on 19 May 1691.
The fall of Athlone and the second siege of Limerick
St Ruth correctly anticipated that the enemy's first move of the campaign would be on Athlone. He gave the command of the town to one of his French lieutenant-generals and posted Lucan to the camp on the Roscommon side of the town. The Williamite general Ginckel began his attack on Athlone on 19 June 1691. During the siege Tyrconnell visited the army outside Athlone. Lucan was determined that he should neither interfere nor stay. ‘I was shocked to discover’, wrote Tyrconnell, ‘that while the enemy was within cannon shot of us, these men: Lord Lucan, Purcell and Luttrell: were spending all their time and effort taking round a petition calling for my resignation from the army’ (Wauchope, 208). Lucan's partisans circulated the rumour that Tyrconnell was receiving French gold in exchange for the Irish recruits who were to be sent to France, and one colonel went so far as to threaten to cut the ropes on Tyrconnell's tent if he did not return to Limerick. Athlone fell on 30 June 1691 in a way that brought severe criticism on St Ruth. Forced to withdraw the army westwards, he decided, against Lucan's advice, to meet Ginckel's army in a pitched battle rather than retreat to the fortifications of Limerick and Galway. At the battle of Aughrim (12 July 1691), Lucan commanded the right wing of the Irish army which was positioned along Kilcommodon Hill so as to block the road to Galway. Successive attacks on the Irish positions were beaten off but, late in the battle, St Ruth was killed by a cannon-ball. In the confusion that followed the left wing collapsed and as the day turned to dusk the battle became a rout. Lucan's cavalry covered the retreat, but he was unable to prevent the greatest slaughter of the war.
The remnants of the Irish army again fell back to the safety of Limerick's walls. While Ginckel first concentrated his efforts on Galway, which surrendered on 28 July 1691, Lucan led a force into Tipperary to destroy the forage and the stores between Cashel and Limerick in anticipation of a second siege. On 2 August, with Ginckel's army still three weeks away, Lucan discovered correspondence from the enemy addressed to his old friend and ally Henry Luttrell. Lucan had him arrested, to the delight of the French, who hoped that this signalled a reconciliation between Lucan and Tyrconnell. Their joy was short-lived. Within a fortnight Tyrconnell was dead. Although the civil government was nominally vested in the hands of three lords justices and the army was commanded by two French lieutenant-generals, Lucan was once again the power in the land.
The siege of Limerick began on 25 August, though it took Ginckel until 22 September to drive the Irish away from their positions on the co. Clare side of the river so that Limerick could be invested from both sides. Even then, Ginckel accepted that he did not have the means to storm the city and settled down to a blockade. His only fear was that Limerick would be relieved from the sea in the same way that Londonderry had been two years previously. Nevertheless, it was to the surprise of both the garrison and the besieging forces that Lucan sued for peace on 23 September 1691. The promised French supply fleet had not arrived and the Irish army was for the first time to be forced to winter within the city walls. Lucan demanded and was granted terms of surrender that would allow his men to travel to France. The treaty of Limerick was signed on 3 October 1691. It formed two separate sets of articles: the military articles which principally provided for the shipping to France of the Irish army, and the civil articles which sought, so far as the Jacobite negotiators were concerned, to safeguard the rights of the Irish until the return of the army, and to secure the property rights of those who swore allegiance to William and Mary. According to Bishop Burnet, during the cease-fire Lucan told some English officers: ‘As low as we are now, change but kings with us and we will fight it over again with you’ (Wauchope, 268).
Last years
Lucan left Ireland for the last time on 22 December 1691, having succeeded in getting over 12,000 Irish soldiers transported to France to join King James. He was rewarded with the colonelcy of the 2nd troop of Horse Guards and kept the rank of major-general in King James's army of exiles which was gathered in Normandy in preparation for an invasion of England. After the destruction of the French navy at the battle of La Hogue (19–24 May 1692) King James's army was amalgamated into that of Louis XIV and Lucan was given the equivalent rank of maréchal de camp. He joined the French army in Flanders and served as a volunteer at the battle of Steenkerke (3 August 1692). He was noted both for his bravery on the field and for his humanity after the battle in arranging passes so that English surgeons could tend to the prisoners of war. In the spring of 1693 he took up his command in the French army and was fatally wounded at the battle of Landen (29 July 1693). He died a few days afterwards in Huy.
In a continental context Sarsfield's military achievements were not great, but they threatened to change the history of his country at a time when the balance of Europe could well have been altered by events in Ireland. … By the time of his death Sarsfield was by far the best known and most loved of all Irishmen. With the exception of the early saints, none of his predecessors or his contemporaries have been written about as much as he has been, and no Irish leader until the times of Wolfe Tone a century later. (Wauchope, 1)
Lucan's wife, Honora [Honora Fitzjames, duchess of Berwick upon Tweed (1675–1698)], born at Portumna, co. Galway, had been evacuated to France during the war in Ireland before being joined by her husband in early 1692 at the Jacobite court in exile at St Germain-en-Laye. She was outlawed for her adherence to James II. Admired for her beauty, she was credited with the introduction of ‘les contradanses anglaises’ to the French court. With Lucan, she had one child, James Francis Edward (the Jacobite second earl), born in April 1693, three months before she was widowed. She married second, on 26 March 1695, James II's natural son James FitzJames, duke of Berwick (1670–1734). Her second son, James Francis (the second duke), was born on 19 October 1696. After suffering a miscarriage, she died of tuberculosis on 16 January 1698 in Pézenas in Languedoc and was buried in the English convent at Pontoise. Her widower had her heart removed and encased in a silver box. James Francis Edward Sarsfield, second earl of Lucan (1693–1719), served in both the French and Spanish armies. He died unmarried in St Omer aged twenty-six.
Piers Wauchope
"Speak Out!" Home
|
Topic Listing
|
Post New Topic
|
Post Reply
‘We talk just like lions, but we sacrifice like lambs…’.
Whatever Happened to….
Anyone you know in your club?
Bin Tags Don't Make a County
‘Some a’ Dem’ Lads are only Dow-en for the Showers….’
Heavenly Hurling: How the Gods pass their time...
GAA Time and Real Time
Saint Patrick and the camogie princesses
Keats and Chapman at the Munster Final
Mass, the Mater, ‘The Dergvale’ and Mullingar…
More "Content Zone" Topics >>
More "Speak Out!" Topics >>