Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html TheThe 171717989898 rebellionrebellion inin IrelandIreland

In June of 1795 several Irish Protestants gathered on top of Cave Hill, overlooking This article by Andrew Flood was first Belfast. They swore " never to desist in our efforts until we had subverted the published (1998) in Red & Black authority of England over our country and asserted our independence". Three Revolution. It is based on a years later 100,000 rose against Britain in the first Irish republican insurrection. much longer draft which Andrew Flood examines what they were fighting for and how they influenced includes discussion of the modern Irish nationalism. radical politics of the period and the pre-rebellion In 1798 Ireland was shook by a mass rebellion for democratic rights and organisation of the United against British rule. 200 years later 1798 continues to loom over Irish Irishmen. This can be read politics. The bi-centenary, co-inciding with the ‘Peace process’, has at- on the internet at tracted considerable discussion, with the formation of local history groups, http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/andrew/1798.html the holding of conferences and a high level of interest in the TV documen- taries and books published around the event. on land and sea, their hairbreadth es- It is rightly said that history is written by trated by the treatment of two portraits of capes and heroic martyrdom, but have the victors. The British and loyalist histo- prominent figures in the rebellion. Lord resolutely suppressed or distorted their rians who wrote the initial histories of the Edward Fitzgerald had his red cravat2 writings, songs and manifestos.”3 rising portrayed it as little more than the painted out and replaced with a white one. In short, although the name of the United actions of a sectarian mob intent on massa- Father Murphy had his cravat painted out Irishmen was honoured, their democratic cring all Protestants. Later reformers and replaced with a priest's collar! Within ideas were buried even before the forma- sought to hide the program of 1798 to unite parts of republicanism and the left there tion of the 26 county state. Irishmen regardless of creed. After 1798 have been attempts to rescue this history, they turned to the confessional politics of starting with the memoirs of United Irish- In the 1840’s Ireland once again fell under mobilising Catholics alone. Daniel men like Myles Byrne who chose exile over the influence of a wave of international O’Connell, the main architect of this policy, compromise. But, all too often, this history radicalism. They sought to uncover the went so far in 1841 as to denounce the has been crushed beneath histories de- real aims of the 1798 rebellion. The repub- United Irishmen as “... wicked and signed to fulfil the needs of the British and lican organisation of the 1840’s, the Young villianously designing wretches who fo- Irish ruling class. Irelanders “celebrated the United Irish- mented the rebellion”.1 men not as passive victims or reluctant James Connolly neatly described the Irish rebels, but as ideologically committed revo- So the first response to the Loyalist history nationalist version of 1798 thus lutionaries with a coherent political strat- in Ireland was an alternative but parallel “The middle class “patriotic” historians, egy”.4 They placed a marker on the grave history produced to suit a Catholic nation- orators, and journalists of Ireland have of the key United Irishmen leader, Wolfe alist agenda. Both of these agendas neatly ever vied with one another in enthusias- Tone, at Bodenstown. Paying homage at dovetailed in showing the rising as a fight tic descriptions of their military exploits the grave is an essential annual rite for for “faith and fatherland”. This is illus- any party wishing to claim the republican legacy. These different histories mean that even within republicanism there was little agree- ment about what the real legacy of 1798 was. In 1934 when Protestant members of the Republican Congress arrived at Bodenstown with a banner proclaiming ‘Break the connection with capitalism’ they were physically assaulted and driven off by IRA members. Of particular note is the way the women of 1798 have either been written out of his- tory altogether or exist only as the faithful wives of the nationalist histories and the blood crazed witches of the loyalist ac- counts. Like other republicans of that period the United Irishmen - for the most part - did not see a role for women, al- though “one proposal was made that women Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html The complete subjection the peasantry were subjected to is hinted by a traveller through Ireland at the time who wrote Irish Labour History web “A landlord in Ireland can scarcely in- vent an order which a servant, labourer, or cottier dares to refuse to execute. ... A poor man would have his bones broken if page and email list he offered to lift a hand in his own defence . . . Landlords of consequence http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/ireland_history.html have assured me that many of their Irish labour history discussion list cottiers would think themselves hon- oured by having their wives and daugh- 9 If you are interested in Irish history and would like to ters sent for to the bed of their master." discuss labour and radical history with others then this There were famines in 1740, ’57, ’65 and list is for you. It is unmoderated but people who ’70. The first of these alone killed 400,000.10 persistently post off topic messages will be removed. The arrival of capitalism had seen the Subscribe by sending a blank message to beginnings of a working class. There were [email protected] , at least 27 labour disputes in Dublin from (you can unsubscribe by mailing 1717 to 1800 and the formation of the early [email protected]) trade unions had started11 . “There were 50 combinations in 27 different trades in Dub- should have the vote as well”5 . Neverthe- occurred in Wexford in the south, and An- lin in the period 1772-95. There were at less a number of women, including Mary trim and Down in the north. Elsewhere least 30 food riots ... in the period 1772- 12 Ann McCracken, played an important role there were minor skirmishes. By the au- 94..” from an early period in promoting the or- tumn - despite a small French landing - the This atmosphere of revolutionary ideas on ganisation, and a Society of United Irish- rebellion had been defeated, tens of thou- the one hand, and brutal oppression on the women was established in 1796.6 sands were dead and a reign of terror had other, was the climate in which the United spread over the country. In the run up to the rebellion, women were Irishmen were born in 1791. This initially reformist organisation, at first composed particularly active in subverting the Mili- Origins of the rising tia. They would swear in soldiers and also of the Protestant middle class was to choose The 1798 rising occurred at a unique mo- spread rumours that the troops were going within a few years to take the path of ment in world politics, the point at which to be sent abroad. Women were active in launching a democratic and anti-colonial parliamentary democracy (and capitalism) the rebellion, not just in ‘traditional roles’ revolution. was replacing absolute monarchy (and feu- of medical aid etc., but also in quite a dalism). The American Revolution of 1771- Leadership Vs masses number of cases as combatants. However, 81 and the French Revolution of 1789 were almost all of these roles seem to be ones According to the Report of the Secret Com- the key inspirations for those who were to that individual women demanded and mittee of the House of Lords - shortly before lead the rebellion in Ireland. Wolfe Tone fought for, there is little evidence of any the United Irishmen were founded - Tone, described how “the French Revolution be- serious effort on the part of the United Samuel Neilson and others in the north came the test of every man’s political creed, Irishmen to mobilise women. circulated a Secret Manifesto to the Friends and the nation was fairly divided into two of Freedom in Ireland. Towards the end An overview of the Rebellion great parties – the aristocracy and demo- this contained a description of past move- crats”.8 In the Autumn of 1791, societies of United ments that was to prove prophetic as a Irishmen were formed in Belfast and Dub- To this was added the severe oppression description of events in 1798 lin. Initially the organisation limited itself the majority of Irish people lived under. “When the aristocracy come forward, the to calling for democratic reforms including The country was bitterly divided , two wars people fall backwards; when the people Catholic emancipation7 . In response to had been fought in the previous century come forward, the aristocracy, fearful of popular pressure, the British government with the combatants split along religious - which effectively ruled Ireland - initially lines. The native Catholic landowning granted some reforms. This period of re- class had been forced either to surrender form ended in 1793, when war broke out their lands or to convert to the Anglican between revolutionary France and Brit- religion. In parts of the country, in particu- ain. lar the North-East, even the ordinary Catholic tenants had been forced off the In December of 1796 the United Irishmen land, to be replaced with Presbyterian came the nearest they would to victory, ‘planters’ brought over from Scotland. This when 15,000 French troops arrived off left a legacy of sectarian rivalry which Bantry Bay. Bad weather prevented the helped the British to ‘divide and rule’. landing and saved Britain from defeat. After Bantry Bay, Irish society was bit- Although some reforms had been won, the terly polarised as loyalists flocked to join situation by the 1780’s was that the coun- the British army and the United Irish- try was ruled by Anglican landowners, men’s numbers swelled massively. with Presbyterian landowners having only limited political power, and Catholic land- By the Spring of 1798, a campaign of Brit- owners none. Beyond this, the mass of the ish terror was destroying the United Irish- population, Catholic, Protestant (Anglican) men organisation and many of the leaders and Dissenter (Presbyterian) had virtu- had been arrested. The remaining leaders ally no rights at all. In 1831 there were felt forced to call an immediate rising, even 6,000 absentee landlords, who owned over though this would be before French aid 7,000,000 acres. could arrive. The date was set for May 23rd. A number of factors undermined the rising in Dublin. However major risings Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html being left behind, insinuate themselves Before 1794 the role consigned by republi- taken. Yes, the United Irishmen had turned into our ranks and rise into timid lead- can leaders to the masses was one of fairly to the ‘men of no property’, but the leader- ers or treacherous auxiliaries.”13 passive displays of support for change. For ship still intended to run the show, and example Illuminations (where people put with French help hold back the masses if Once the United Irishmen had decided to lights in their windows) were important to necessary. take the direction of rebellion, they had to show the level of public support. win the mass of the people actively to join After 1794, with the turn towards revolu- in such a rebellion. To do this they high- Following the 1794 banning of the Dublin tionary politics and the need to mobilise lighted the economic advantages of reform. United Irishmen the masses became more the masses, the class basis of the United Gaining the vote for rich Catholic land- actively involved. Riots were organised by Irishmen underwent a radical change. owners would mean little to those paying the United Irishmen, particularly around Dublin membership of artisans, clerks and rent for this land. the arrival of the new Viceroy, Camden, in labourers rose to nearly 50% of the total.17 March 1795, when aristocrats were stoned Dr Willam James MacNeven, under inter- Other popular political societies in Dublin in the streets of Dublin. rogation by the House of Lords in 1798, in the 1790’s included ‘the Strugglers’. One when asked if Catholic emancipation or As public demonstrations were banned, judge referred to “the nest of clubs in the parliamentary reform mobilised ‘the lower various ruses were used to gather United city of Dublin”. Their membership was orders’ said “I am sure they do not under- Irishmen together. Race meeting were said to consist of “The younger part of the stand it. What they very well understand is used as pretexts for mass assemblies. Mock tradesmen, and in general all the appren- that it would be a very great advantage to funerals with up to 2,000 ‘mourners’ would tices”. The informer Higgins described them to be relieved from the payments of be held, sometimes the coffin would actu- these clubs as comprising “King killers, tithes and not to be fleeced by the land- ally contain arms. In the countryside mass Paineites, democrats, levellers and United lords”14 In 1794 they asked “Who makes potato diggings (often for imprisoned Irishmen”.18 them rich? The answer is obvious - it is the United Irishmen) were organised and of- industrious poor”. ten conducted as military drills. These The link with the ‘Defenders’ were a way of seeing who would turn out A central part of the strategy for mass Historian Nancy Curtin points out that and how well they would follow orders. rebellion was to build links with the al- “Some united Irish recruiters ... suggested ready established movements, and in par- that a major redistribution of land would This following of orders was central to the ticular the Defenders. The Defenders had follow a successful revolution” and that as preparation for rebellion, as the United started as a local ‘faction’ (gang) in Ar- a result “To a certain extent republicanism Irishmen’s leadership wanted to be able to magh and were initially non-sectarian, became associated in the common mind control and discipline the masses in the their first Captain being Presbyterian.19 . with low rents, the abolition of tithes and a event of a rising. This was also why a Armagh was the scene of intense political tax burden borne by the wealthy and idle French landing was central. The French agitation around the arming of Catholics, rather than by the poor and industrious”15 army would help not just to beat Britain, with the Protestant Orange Order20 con- but also to control the masses. The original The Union doctrine; or poor man’s cat- ducting armed attacks on Catholics. How- strategy for the rebellion was for only a few echism, was published anonymously as ever the arming of the Catholics had “the thousand United Irishmen to join the army part of this effort and read in part full support of a radical section of Protes- of the French (and for these to be quickly tant political opinion” 21 . These origins disciplined). “I believe in a revolution founded on the are important, as later historians have rights of man, in the natural and This is the context in which Tone’s “Our attempted to portray the Defenders as imprescriptable right of all citizens to freedom must be had at all hazards. If the purely a Catholic sectarian organisation, a all the land ... As the land and its pro- men of property will not help us, they must sort of mirror image of the Orange Order. duce was intended for the use of man ’tis fall; we will free ourselves by the aid of that unfair for fifty or a hundred men to In 1795, up to 7,000 Catholics were driven large and respectable class of the commu- possess what is for the subsistence of out of Armagh by Orange Order pogroms. nity - the men of no property” must be near five millions ...”16 The United Irishmen provided lawyers to

Pitch capping, in which molten pitch was set alight on the victims head and the travelling gallows used to half-hang people. Tortures like these, along with flogging were used on thousands of people to try to force them to reveal the names of United Irishmen or the location of arms in 1797 and early 1798. Many died as a result of them. They were accompanied by a general campaign of looting and rape, along with transpor- tation of suspects to the fleet. This allowed the British forces to seriously undermine United Irishmen organisation and forced the remaining leadership to call a premature rising. Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html prosecute on behalf of the victims of Or- estates being confiscated.25 battle of New Ross, and on 9th the defeat at ange attacks. “Special missions were dis- the battle of Arklow was the last major Edward Fitzgerald, Neilson and the others patched there in 1792 and again in 1795 attempt to spread the rebellion to neigh- who planned the May 21st rising in Dublin and senior figures like Neilson, Teeling, bouring counties. were willing to risk this. But they were McCracken, Quigley and Lowry worked the arrested and removed from the scene by Wexford town was however liberated for area ceaselessly ... “.22 Many expelled May 19th. The British, on the information three weeks. At the time it was thriving Catholic families were sheltered by Pres- of informers, had seized the gathering point and had a population of 10,000, many of byterian United Irishmen in Belfast, and for the rising. In the confusion there was whom were Protestants. After liberation, later, Antrim and Down. These expulsions little chance of the rank and file of the a seven man directory of the main United facilitated the spread of Defenderism and United Irishmen gathering to create an Irishmen and a 500 strong senate took over fear of the Orange Order to other parts of alternative plan. And the second rank of the running of the town. Both of these Ireland. leadership, which could have created an included Catholic and Protestant mem- The Defenders were already politicised to alternative plan, failed to do so precisely bers. In addition each area / district had its some extent by the hope of French inter- because it now feared the uncontrolled own local committee, militia and elected vention and their anti- tax and anti-tithe ‘mob’. leader. The time before it was retaken was propaganda. They proclaimed “We have not sufficient for much constructive activ- Precisely as had been warned “when the lived long enough upon potatoes and salt; it ity beyond the printing of ration coupons. people come forward, the aristocracy, fear- is our turn now to eat mutton and beef” 23 . However the limited reorganisation of lo- ful of being left behind, insinuate them- Despite their rural origins the Defenders cal government that did occur, and its selves into our ranks and rise into timid were not a peasant movement but “drawn success in maintaining order until just leaders or treacherous auxiliaries.” from among weavers, labourers and tenant before the town fell, demonstrates the of- farmers ... and from the growing artisan The Wexford Republic ten denied political side of the Wexford class of the towns”. By 1795 there were rebellion.27 A limited rising occurred around Dublin some 4000 Defenders in Dublin, closely which was rapidly and brutally suppressed. On 21st the final major battle of the ‘Wex- linked with many of the republican clubs Loyalists and British forces unleashed fur- ford republic’ was fought at Vinegar Hill. in the city. The complex nature of the ther terror in the rest of the country. In It had taken some 20,000 British soldiers Defenders is illustrated as “in Dublin there Wicklow and North Wexford this included three weeks to crush the 30,000 Wexford were Protestant Defenders” even though the execution of over 50 United Irish pris- rebels who were “utterly untrained, practi- “revenge against Protestants was certainly oners, the murder of civilians and the burn- cally leaderless and miserably armed”.28 an important element in Defender think- 24 ing of homes. ing” . Events in Antrim/Down There was United Irishmen organisation The Orange Order attacks had inevitably The North had also seen a savage cam- in this area, Wexford town was considered introduced sectarianism into the Defend- paign of British torture which had terri- the preferred landing place for the French. ers. But the United Irishmen saw this fied, disorganised and disarmed many of But the bulk of the 300 or so United Irish- sectarianism as being due to the influence men here do not appear to have been pre- of priests, and directed only against Prot- paring for a rising. One historian of the estant landlords. This was to prove a rebellion, Dickson, reckons that “with- serious under estimation, particularly out- out a French landing and without side of the north. the compulsion applied by the The Rebellion magistrates and their agents ... there would have been no Wex- In December of 1796, a French Fleet ap- ford rising at all”.26 and his peared off the shores of Bantry Bay with account demonstrates that the 15,000 French soldiers and Wolfe Tone. early battles were spontaneous Rough seas and inexperienced sailors pre- clashes. The all important initial vented a landing which would have liber- victory was at Oulard, where there ated the country from British rule. The was no real rebel commander and British campaign of terror against the some of the United Irishmen were United Irishmen which followed was seri- armed only with stones. ously undermining the organisation by 1798. In the Spring of 1798, pressure was The Oulard victory demonstrated mounting for a rising without the French, that the British army were not un- and after the arrest of most of the Leinster beatable. This, and the increasing leadership a date for the rising was set by repression, saw hundreds and then those who escaped. thousands flock to join the rebel hilltop encampments. However the The key to the rising was to be Dublin. It superior tactics, arms and training was intended to seize the city and trigger a of the British forces was to prove message to the rest of the country by stop- a match for the rebels. On 4th ping the mail coaches. However, although and 5th June the rebellion thousands turned out for the rising in the suffered its most decisive city, it ended up as a fiasco with almost no defeat at the fighting. The reasons why this happened can be found in the class basis of the lead- ership of the United Irishmen. Henry Joy McCracken, Once it was clear that the rising was going executed in to happen without the French, it was also Belfast at the age clear that there was no mechanism to hold of 31. back the workers and peasants from going beyond the bourgeois democratic and sepa- ratist aims of the rising. The key informer who betrayed the Dublin rising, Reynolds, had turned because of fears of his ancestral Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html the United Irishmen. General Knox had part in the major battles (more turned out the Wexford massacres, often making quite told General Lake that his methods were but missed the major battles).29 false claims about their scale, who was also intended to “increase the animosity massacred and why they were massacred. Like the Wexford rising, the Northern between the Orangemen and the United Musgraves (the main loyalist historian) in rebels succeeded in winning minor skir- Irishmen”. Robert Simms who was Adja- his coverage of the rebellion gives only 2% mishes against the British but were de- cent-General of the United Irishmen in the of his writing to the Antrim and Down feated in the major battles by the north simply refused to acknowledge that rebellion while 62% of his coverage concen- experienced and better equipped. As in the signal from Dublin indicated he should trates on Wexford.32 The limited accounts Wexford, the British burned towns, vil- rise. Instead, presumably in part for the given of the Northern rising portray it as lages and houses they considered sympa- class interests already outlined, he pre- idealistic Presbyterians being betrayed by thetic to the rebels and massacred both ferred to wait for the French. their Catholic neighbours and so learning prisoners and wounded during and after to become ‘good loyal Orange men’. The Nevertheless, the rank and file were deter- the battles. After the battle of Antrim, scale of British and loyalist massacres of mined there should be a rising and the some were buried alive.30 these Presbyterians is seldom mentioned. lower officers with Henry Joy McCracken The last major battle of the Northern ris- (who had just returned from jail in Dublin) ing was at Ballynahinch on 13th June. By The Centenary forced Simms to resign on June 1st and got the time the French arrived in Killala in More than anything else the Catholic na- an order for a rising at a delegate meeting August, it was too late, although their tionalist history of the rising was deter- on June 2nd. This delay meant it was not initial success does suggest that either the mined by the needs of the Catholic church till 5th that the rising started in Antrim, Wexford or Antrim rebels may have been when faced with the socialist influenced and 7th in Down. In the course of this much more successful if they had the ben- Fenian movement one hundred years later. delay, the northern rising was further efit of even the small number of experi- Patrick Kavanagh’s ‘A Popular history of weakened. Three of the United Irishmen enced French troops and arms later landed the insurrection of 1798’, published in 1870 colonels gave the plans to the British, tak- at Killala. was the major work from this perspective. ing away any element of surprise and al- This ‘history’ had several aims; to hide the lowing them to prepare for the rising. Some 32 United Irishmen leaders were role of the church hierarchy in condemning executed in the North after the rising, More seriously, stories started reaching the rising (and instead claim that the including two Presbyterian ministers. the north from the Wexford rebellion with church led the rising); to blame the failure Henry Joy McCracken in hiding after the the newspapers “rivalling rumour in por- of the rising on underground revolutionary rising, wrote a letter to his sister in which traying in Wexford an image of Catholic organisation (as an attack on the Fenians); he sums up the cause of the failure of the massacre and plunder equalled only by and to minimise the involvement of North- rising as “the rich always betray the poor”. legends ...”. Many of these stories were ern Presbyterians and democratic ideals. He was captured and executed in Belfast false although some Protestant men had In so far as they are mentioned the view is on July 16th. been killed in Enniscorthy. The distorted that “it was the turbulent and disorderly version that reached the north by 4 June Post rebellion republicans Presbyterians who seduced the law abiding (before the rising) was that “at Enniscorthy Catholics”. 33 After the rising it was in the interests of in the county of Wexford every Protestant those who had led it to minimise their This history has therefore emphasised the man, woman and child, even infants, have involvement by insisting they were igno- rebellion in Wexford and elevated the role been murdered”. Alongside this were manu- rant dupes or forced by ‘the mob’ to take of the handful of priests who played an factured items like a supposed Wexford part. A song asks “Who fears to speak of active part. Father Murphy thus becomes Oath “I, A.B. do solemnly swear ... that I ’98?”. People researching oral histories the leader of the rising. The fight was for will burn, destroy and murder all heretics have indicated that the answer was ‘just ‘faith and fatherland’, as a statue of a up to my knees in blood”. about everyone’. Even the year of death on Pikeman draped in rosary beads which Later commentaries tried to deny the scale the gravestones of those who died in the was erected in Enniscorthy on the hun- of the Northern rising, or have claimed rising was commonly falsified. The reason dredth anniversary of the rising proclaims. that many Presbyterians failed to turn was the British campaign of terror, which Finally, the role of the United Irishmen is out. However, given all of the above, what carried on into the following century with minimised. The leadership role of United is truly remarkable is how little effect all chapel burning’s and deportations of cart Irishmen like Baganal Harvey, Matthew this had, in particular as by 5th the Wex- loads of suspects. Keogh and Edward Lough, who were Prot- ford rising had clearly failed to spread. Of estant, is glossed over. The failure of the In Wexford, where the death penalty still the 31,000 United Irishmen in the area of rebellion is ‘explained’ by the inevitability applied to anyone who had been a United the northern rising, 22,000 actually took of revolutionary movements being betrayed Irish officer, it was a common defence for by informers. Patrick Kavanagh presents ex-leaders to claim they were forced into Father Murphy as the sole heart of the their role by mobs of rebels. This explana- insurrection, and the United Irishmen as Earl Camden, the tion was handy for both the official and British Viceroy at “riddled by spies, ruined by drink, with Catholic nationalist versions of the his- self-important leaders ... “. 34 the time of the tory. It suggested that the Protestant rebellion portion of the leadership was coincidental Issues of ‘98 in what was otherwise a confessional or To a large extent, these histories shaped sectarian rising, depending on your point the popular understanding of the rising. of view. This deception was credible be- In this limited space it is impossible to cause the United Irishmen membership address all the issues they raise. But there lists for Wexford were never captured. This is a need for current revolutionary organi- allowed ex-rebel leaders like Edward Hay sations in Ireland to dispel the illusions to argue that “there were fewer United created of the past. This is particularly Irishmen in the county of Wexford then in true with regard to Protestant workers in 31 any other part of Ireland” . the north who are largely unaware that it The Orange Order was their forefathers who invented Irish republicanism, nor indeed that the first On the loyalist side, the Orange Order Republican victim of a showtrial and ex- needed to minimise Presbyterian involve- ecution was a Presbyterian from ment in the rising and portray it as a Ballymena, Willam Orr. purely sectarian and Catholic affair. So loyalist accounts have tended to focus on Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html The current debate on the release of politi- cal prisoners could be much informed if Orr’s pre-execution words were remem- bered “If to have loved my country, to have known its Wrongs, to have felt the Injuries of the persecuted Catholics and to have united with them and all other Religious Persuasion in the most orderly and sangui- nary means of procuring Redress - If these be Felonies I am a Felon but not otherwise ...". 35 The role of the Catholic church Although, by 1898, the Catholic church would choose to pretend it had led the Wexford rising, in 1798 nothing could be further from the truth. Dr Troy, Arch- bishop of Dublin, said within days of the rising (27 May 1798) that “We bitterly lament the fatal consequences of this anti- Christian conspiracy”. In fact the Catholic hierarchy was opposed A loyalist cartoon of United Irishmen training to the radical ideas of the rebellion and, and democratic while the southern was a Militia and later Yeomanry that was especially since the opening of the Catholic Catholic and sectarian. extremely sectarian in composition, in the seminary at Maynooth, stood beside Brit- words of Dickson in Wexford “these Yeo- ain and the Irish Protestant Ascendancy Although the population (and thus the man were almost entirely a Protestant class. Three days after the rebellion had rebels) in the north were mainly Presbyte- force”.41 This Yeomanry was responsible started, the following declaration came out rian and those in the south mainly Catho- in part for the savage repression that pre- of Maynooth lic, both armies contained considerable ceded the rising and the initial house and number of both religions. I’ve already “We, the undersigned, his Majesty’s most chapel burning during it. Col. Hugh Pearse mentioned some of the Protestant leaders loyal subjects, the Roman Catholics of observed “in Wexford at least, the miscon- in the south. Indeed, if partly to head off Ireland, think it necessary at this mo- duct of the Militia and Yeomanry ... was sectarian tension within the rebel army, ment publicly to declare our firm attach- largely to blame for the outbreak ... it can United Irishmen commander Roche issued ment to his Majesty’s royal person, and only be said that cruelty and oppression a proclamation on 7th June “to my Protes- to the constitution under which we have produced a yet more savage revenge”.42 tant soldiers I feel much in dept for their the happiness to live ... We cannot avoid gallant behaviour in the field”. For the When faced with a Protestant Landlord expressing to Your Excellency our regret reasons discussed below, the Wexford ris- class mobilising a mainly Protestant local at seeing, amid the general delusion, ing was seriously mired by sectarianism, army to torture them and burn their chap- many, particularly of the lower orders, but right to the end there were Protestants els, it is perhaps unsurprising that many of our own religious persuasion engaged among the rebels. It is still remembered Catholics were inclined to identify Protes- in unlawful associations and practises” around Carlow that after the battle Father tants as a whole as the problem. The (30 May 1798) John Murphy was hidden by a Protestant United Irishmen organisation in the area This was signed by the President of the farmer, only to be betrayed by a Catholic before the rising was too small to make Royal College of Maynooth and 2000 of the the next day. much progress in overcoming this feeling, Professors and students, 4 lords and 72 and in fact one of their tactics added to the It is true that in the north there were baronets.36 One of the Wexford rebels, sectarian tension. There were Orange sectarian tensions present, a Catholic Myles Byrne, wrote afterwards that “priests Lodges in Wexford and Wicklow. As else- United Irish officer urged a column of Pres- saved the infamous English government in where, there is evidence that the United byterians to “avenge the Battle of the Ireland from destruction”.37 Irishmen deliberately spread rumours of Boyne”40 just before the battle of Antrim! an Orange plot to massacre Catholics. The Also in the north, at Ballynahinch, the Individual Catholic priests like Father intention was that the Catholics would Defenders (who would have been over- Murphy played an important leadership join the rebellion in greater numbers, but whelmingly Catholic) fought as a distinct role in the rising, alongside the mostly such rumours inevitably heightened dis- unit. However the figures show that thou- Protestant United Irishmen leaders. Ac- trust of all Protestants. cording to Dickson “at least eleven Catholic sands of Catholics and Protestants turned curates took an active part and of these out and fought side by side in a series of The Wexford massacres 38 battles, despite the obvious hopelessness three were executed”. But their own Throughout the Wexford rising, sectarian of the situation. Bishop described the rebel priests after the tensions were never far from erupting. rebellion as “excommunicated priests, Protestants in Wicklow and This was expressed throughout the rising drunken and profligate couple-beggars, the as a pressure on Protestants to convert to 39 very faeces of the Church”. . Their role in Wexford Catholicism, particularly in Wexford town the leadership of the rising was against the There were stronger sectarian elements in where “Among the insurgent rank and file wishes of the hierarchy and out of a moti- the Wexford rising. To understand where ... heresy hunting became widespread ... vation to protect their parishioners from these came from, we need to look at events Protestants found it prudent to attend mass Loyalist atrocities. immediately before the rising. About 25% as the only means of saving their lives.”43 of the population was Protestant, these When the rebels carried out massacres Was the rebellion Protestant in the included a few recently arrived colonies they often had strong sectarian under- north and Catholic in the south? that must have displaced earlier Catholic tones. Loyalist historians and even A more complex attempt to deny the legacy tenants and thus caused sectarian ten- Pakenham, the most widely read historian of 1798 is to suggest that the northern and sions. of the rising, are guilty of distorting the southern risings were not really connected. nature of these massacres by claiming only The high percentage of Protestants in That the northern rising was Presbyterian Protestants were executed. Wexford also made it possible to construct Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html The reality of the Wexford massacres was A proclamation from Wexford on 9th June 1798 and Irish nationalism that the victims tended to be landlords, or called to “protect the persons and proper- The debate around nation is in itself some- the actual agents of British rule like mag- ties of those of all religious persuasions who thing that divides the Irish left. In particu- istrates and those related to them or in have not oppressed us”49 and on 14th June lar after the partition of Ireland in 1922, service to them. Anyone suspected of being the United Irishmen oath was introduced there has been a real and somewhat suc- an Orangeman was also liable to be ex- to the Wexford army. None of this is to cessful effort to divide people into two na- ecuted. Massacres were also a feature of deny that there were sectarian tensions tions. One consists of all the people in the the rebellion in the north, where no sectar- and indeed sectarian elements to the mas- south along with northern Catholics. Ca- ian motive can so easily be attached. A sacres, perhaps most openly after the rebel tholicism is a central part of this definition, rebel unit near Saintfield (in the north), army had abandoned Wexford. Thomas with the Catholic Church being given an led by James Breeze, attacked and set fire Dixon and his wife then brought 70 men informal veto for many decades over state to the home of Hugh McKee, a well known into the town during the night “from the policy in the south. To a large extent this loyalist and informer, burning him, his northern side of the Slaney” and plied them definition is tacitly accepted by many parts wife, five sons, three daughters and house- with whiskey. The following day a massa- of the Republican movement today. Francie maid to death.44 cre started at 14:00 and lasted over five Molloy’s 1996 election campaign posters - hours. Up to 97 were murdered. Loyalist historians are also guilty of ignor- based on there being 20,000 more nation- ing or minimising the causes of most of the However, even here, not all the 260 prison- alists (i.e. Catholics) than Protestants in massacres, the far larger massacres by ers from whom those massacred were se- Mid-Ulster - is a case in point. This has led British army and loyalist forces of civil- lected could be described as innocent to a situation where those responsible for ians, rebel prisoners and wounded. The victims. One of those killed (Turner) was sectarian murders of Protestants were not greatest of these was the massacres during seen burning cab- treated as seriously by the republican move- and after the battle of New Ross where ins in Oulard ment as informers or even those judged even the Loyalist historian Rev. James shortly before the guilty of ‘anti-social’ crime. Gordon admits “I have reason to think more battle there.50 An- However, the south has started to emerge men than fell in battle were slain in cold other prisoner who from under the long dark shadow of Catho- blood”45 . The scale of this massacre can survived was Lord lic nationalism, in the urban centres at only be guessed at, but after the battle 3, Kingsborough, least. De Valera’s comely maids at the 400 rebels were buried, 62 cart loads of commander of the Crossroads and the threat of the Bishop’s rebel bodies were thrown in the river and hated North Cork crosier have faded into a distant and bi- many others (particularly wounded) were Militia and popu- zarre past. burned in the houses of the town. Accord- larly regarded as ing to many accounts the screams of having introduced However in the north, the ideology of a wounded rebels being deliberately burned the pitch cap tor- ‘Protestant state for a Protestant people’ is alive may have played a significant part in ture, in which the still strong. Particularly in recent years, the murder of 100 loyalist civilian prison- victims head was this has seen the political decision of north- ers at nearby Scullabogue on the morning set on fire.51 Most ern loyalists to start referring to them- of the battle. significantly this selves as British or ‘Ulster-Scots’. This is massacre happened a quite remarkable robbing of even the At Scullabogue around 100 were murdered, when the rebel history of loyalism, and would have been 74 were burned alive in a barn, (nine of army had withdrawn an insult to even the Orangemen of 1798, whom were women and 8 of whom were from the town and one of whom James Claudius Beresford Catholic) and 21 men were killed on the stopped when rebel declared he was “Proud of the name of an front lawn. A survivor, Frizel stated that forces returned. Irishman, I hope never to exchange it for the cause was the rumour that the military that of a colonist”.52 were murdering prisoners at New Ross.46 It is an unfortunate At least three Protestants were amongst feature of some re- A couple of years after the rising, Britain the rebels who carried out these killings. publican and left succeeded in forcing the Irish Parliament The presence of Protestants amongst the histories of 1798 to pass an ‘Act of Union’ which effectively murderers and Catholics among the vic- that the sectarian dissolved that parliament and replaced it tims gives the lie to the claim that this was nature of the Wex- with direct rule from Westminster. It is a simple sectarian massacre. ford massacres is ei- ironic that 36 Orange Lodges in Co. Ar- ther avoided or magh and 13 in Co. Fermanagh declared The leadership of the rebellion, both United minimised. To against this Act of Union. Lodge No. 500 Irishmen and the Catholic priests, tried to northern Protestant work- declared it would “support the independ- defuse the sectarian tension and prevent ers today this merely appears to confirm ence of Ireland and the constitution of 1782” massacres. On 7th June, Edward Lough, an impression that this is the secret agenda and “declare as Orangemen, as Freeholders, commander of the Vinegar Hill camp, is- of the republican movement. The stories - as Irishmen that we consider the extinction sued a proclamation “this is not a war for both true and false - of sectarian massacres of our separate legislature as the extinction religion but for liberty”.47 Vinegar Hill was in Wexford that were circulated in the of the Irish Nation”.53 the site of many individual executions over North before and during the rising must the 23 days the rebel camp existed there. have undermined the unity of the United What was the nation fought for Between 300 and 400 were executed, most Irishmen. Although the Wexford leader- were Protestant although Luke Byrne, one in 1798? ship did act to limit sectarianism, in hind- of the organisers of the executions, is quoted The rewriting of the history of 1798 by sight it is obvious that the United Irishmen as saying “If anyone can vouch for any of loyalists and nationalists alike has a com- were complacent about sectarianism the prisoners not being Orangemen, I have mon purpose, which is to define being ‘Irish’ amongst the Defenders and in Wexford no objection they should be discharged” as containing a requirement to being a more could and should have been done. In and indeed all captured Quakers were Catholic. The greatest defeat of 1798 is the particular the final and most blatantly released.48 In general, throughout Wex- success of this project, in particular after sectarian massacre, at Wexford bridge, ford Quakers who were Protestant but not partition when the southern and northern could probably have been avoided if the associated with loyalism were well treated states adopted opposed confessional defi- Dixons, the couple at the centre of it, had by the rebels, but did suffer at the hands of nitions of themselves. One legacy of that been silenced. They had spent the period of the loyalists. failure is that in 1998 we not only live on a the rebellion in Wexford trying to whip up divided island but that the vast majority of a pogrom. Originally from Red & Black Revolution - see http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr.html our hospitals and schools are ei- 15The United Irishmen, ibid, p. ther Catholic or Protestant. 119 - 120 16quoted in 1798: the United The United Irishmen’s core project, Irishmen and the early Trade to replace the name of Irishman for Unions, Mary Muldowney in the labels of Catholic, Protestant Anarchism SIPTU Fightback No 7 and Dissenter was not an abstract 17The United Irishmen, ibid, nationalist one. It came from a 1994 concrete analysis that unless this 18The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p77 - was done then no progress could be 79 made because a people divided were 19The United Irishmen, ibid, p easily ruled. Here lies the greatest in Ireland 149. 20 gulf with ‘republicans’ today who Then known as the ‘Peep O Day boy’ after their practise of carrying reverse this process and imagine out dawn raids on Catholic homes that such unity can only be the 21The Defenders, p18, Deirdre outcome rather than the cause of Lindsay, in 1798 ; 200 years of progress. resonance, Ed. Mary Cullen 22The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p128 The rebellion of the United Irish- 23The Defenders, p19, ibid men was not a rebellion for four 24 Ibid, p20-22 abstract green fields, free of John 25Citizen Lord : Lord Edward Bull. It was inspired by the new Fitzgerald, 1763 - 1798, Stella ideas of equality, fraternity and Tillyard, p246 liberty coming out of the French 26 The Wexford Rising in 1798, revolution. Separatism became a Charles Dickson, 1955, p36 necessary step once it was realised 27The Wexford Republic of June that fulfilling these ideas required On the web: 1798 : A story hidden from the ending of British rule. For http://surf.to/anarchism history, Kevin Whelan in 1798 ; many it also represented a rebel- 200 years of resonance, Ed. lion against the ownership of land Mary Cullen by a few, and for some a move 28The Wexford Rising in 1798, towards an equality of property. News as it happens: ibid, p41 29The United Irishmen, ibid, Those leaders who planned the ris- Join the Irish anarchist news list by p260 -267 ing were part of a revolutionary sending an email to [email protected] with the 30Revolt in North, Charles wave sweeping the western world, Dickson, 1960, p135 they were internationalists and in- message subscribe ainriail 31History of the Insurrection in deed an agreement for distinct re- the county of Wexford, 1798 publics was drawn up with the 32The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p138 33 United Scotsmen and the United English- ibid, p150 and profissions agree. If Orange and 34 men.54 They corresponded with similar ibid, p170 Green min, no longer were seen, min. 35 societies in Paris and London. Some, like Willam Orr, pre-hanging declaration, 2.45pm, Och, naboclis, how easy ould Ireland 14 October 1796 Thomas Russell, were also active anti- we’d free.” 36The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p 16 slavery campaigners. As Connolly puts it 37Memoirs, Vol. 1, p39 (1906) 1Freeman’s Journal, 22 May, 1841 “these men aimed at nothing less than a 38The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p 17 2 Which represented not only a revolutionary badge but a social and political revolution such as had 39 A vindication of the Roman Catholic Clergy of been accomplished in France, or even defence of the execution of the French king Louis. 3Labour and Irish History, James Connolly, ChVII the town of Wexford during the late unhappy greater”.55 4The Tree of Liberty, Radicalism, Catholicism and rebellion, pub 1799 40 None of this is to claim that socialism was the Construction of Irish Identity 1760 - 1830, When Catholics and Protestants fought on Kevin Whelan, p167 opposite side on the agenda in 1798. Common ownership 41 5A history of the Irish Working Class, Peter The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p13 of the means of production would not be- 42Col. Hugh Pearse in ‘Memoir of the life and come a logical solution for some years yet, Berresford Ellis, 1972, p71 6 service of Viscount Lake’ (1744 - 1808) p95 when large numbers of people started to The Women of 1798 : Representations and realities by Dáire Keogh in 1798 ; 200 years of quoted in The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p12 work in situations where they could not 43 resonance, Ed. Mary Cullen The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p 18 simply divide up their workplace. But 44 7 Catholic emancipation was the demand for the removal APRN, 11 May 1998 45 there is no denying that radical ideas that of laws that discriminated against Catholics The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p116 are well in advance of today’s republicans 8quoted in Labour and Irish History, ibid, Ch VII 46Ibid, p129 were on the agenda of many in 1798. 9Arthur Young, in his Tour of Ireland quoted in 47Ibid, p126 Labour and Irish History, ibid, chap IV 48Ibid, p77 The central message of 1798 was not Irish 49 10A history of the Irish Working Class, ibid, p54 Ibid, 1955, p126 unity for its own sake, indeed the strongest 50 11The United Irishmen, Nancy Curtin, 1994, p 147 Ibid, 1955, p62 opponents of the British parliament had 12 The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p92 51Ibid, 1955, p149 been the Irish ascendancy, terrified that 13Quoted in Labour and Irish History, ibid, Chap 52Revolt in North, ibid, p243 direct rule might result in Catholic eman- VII 53Ibid, p243 cipation. Unity offered to remove the sec- 14The United Irishmen, ibid, p28 54A history of the Irish Working Class, ibid, p72 tarian barriers that enabled a tiny 55Labour and Irish History, ibid, Chap VII ascendancy class to rule over millions with- out granting even a thimble full of demo- cratic rights. The struggle has progressed Red & Black Revolution is published by the since as many of these rights have been Workers Solidarity Movement who have a web won, but in terms of creating an anarchist society the words of James Hope, the most page at http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/wsm.html. proletarian of the 1798 leaders still apply Their postal address is WSM, PO Box 1528, Dublin8, Ireland “Och, Paddies, my hearties, have done wid your parties. Let men of all creeds