Sir
Irish History
And
The Fighting Irish
And
The Fighting Irish
An Overall Picture
John Perrot was another Lord Deputy of Ireland and member of the English establishment list of
butchers. He was born at Haroldston St Issells, near Haverfordwest, Wales. In 1570 Perrot reluctantly accepted the newly created post of Lord President of the Irish Province of Munster, which was then undergoing the first of the Desmond Rebellions. He landed at Port Waterford in February the following year and during the course of a vigerous campaign in which he pursued James Fitzmaurice Fitzgerald the province was reduced to peace. In one grisly incident after his forces had slain 50 of the Irish rebels, Perrot sought to awe the Geraldine loyalists by having the heads of the dead men fixed to a market cross in Kilmallock. Perrot's presidency was marked by over 800 hangings, most of them by martial law.
Sir John Perrot
The Desmond war lasted three more years, altogether five. When it terminated the " pacification " was continued.
English adventurers flung themselves on the confiscated lands. Sir Walter Raleigh raided over the thousands of acres assigned to him, and smoked the ' Virginia weed ' in Youghal after work that would discredit a savage chief.
There is a preternatural Figure in Irish Myth: The Red Swineherd. Where it passes, where it lays it foot, smoke and flames and blood and death and destruction are there. It comes out of some antique past, some dread forgotten ritual. The figure of the Myth was upon Munster. Beneath it the little figures of men move: the mail clad gall-oglach, the swift running Kerne, the red-coated, iron-plated soldiers; Irish nobles and Chiefs, the marshals of England's forces. Away from all these, from Irish and Norman Chiefs, the MacCarthys, the Desmonds, the
O' Sullivans, all the princelings, away from the English Deputies, marshals and adventurers, thirsting for Munster soil, glance at the unnamed people of Ireland who suffered so greatly. Munster was the fairest province in Ireland. It had 1,500 schools. When the Munster wars ended, when Elizabeth sent her thanks to Sir George Perrin ( Perrin reported that he had " left neither corn, nor horn, nor house unburnt " between the two ends of Munster ) For the pacification of the province, the schools had been wiped out. The storm of battles and skirmishes, of sieges of intrigues, of massacres is the shifting blood-red veil above the homes of thousands.
That was no barbarous land where scholars filled the schools, where science and the classics were taught; where the pride of youth was stimulated, the imagination fired by the Hero-Tales of Ireland. It is a psychological fact that the Elizabethan Englishman, many of them brave, gallant and chivalrous, became barbarians in their contact with Ireland. The old Greeks explain the reason for the fall. It is Pride and Injustice; these things bring moral death. In their attempt to conquer Ireland the avenging Furies fell upon them.
Carew, the Devonshire knight, in his Pacata Hibernia writes that English soldiers entered an Irish camp, " Found none but hurt and sick men, whose pains and lives they soon determined. " And again that he having burnt all the houses and corn and taken great prey diverted his forces into another place, " and harrowing the country, killed all mankind that were found therein for a terror to those who would relief to the runagate traitors. " He passed into Arleagh woods " where we did the like, not leaving behind us man or beast, corne or cattle. " The slaughter continued after the war had ended. " Those whom the sword could not reach were deliberately given a prey to famine. "
" The English nation " says Froude, " was shuddering over the atrocities of the Duke of Alva. Yet Alva's bloody sword never touched the young, the defenceless . . . Sir Peter Carew has been seen murdering women and children and babies that had scarcely left the breast. "
Spenser, the English poet, to whom Raleigh had given a few acres of the forty thousand he had seized, saw still living creatures " creeping out of every corner of the woods and glens on their hands, for their legs would not bear them. They did eat the dead carrion where they could find them, yea. and one another soon after. " he thinks English rule can never be secure till the Irish race is exterminated. The gentle English idyllist suggests a way. The people are not to be allowed to till their land or pasture their cattle next season, then " they will quickly consume themselves and devour one another. " English law had made a breach in Connaught. A Lord President was appointed, and a court held. From Sligo to Limerick men were netted and brought before it. The head of the Burkes, Clanrickard a " queen's " man, was seized and sent to Dublin. Then all the Burkes loosened their swords in their scabbards and sprang into rebellion. The rebellion grew and strengthened, before the " strong measures " of the Lord President. The Lord deouty, Fitzwilliam, an old man, afflicted by ills of the body, crafty, cautious, treacherous, freed Clanrickard and sent him down to make terms. The bloody hand was stayed; for a moment there was peace in Connacht. Soon the disarmed catholics were taken and hanged. Surrendered garrisons were put to the sword. A search for ' rebels ' in West Connaught saw women and boys and old men, and all who came in Sir Richard Bingham's way, slain.
English adventurers flung themselves on the confiscated lands. Sir Walter Raleigh raided over the thousands of acres assigned to him, and smoked the ' Virginia weed ' in Youghal after work that would discredit a savage chief.
There is a preternatural Figure in Irish Myth: The Red Swineherd. Where it passes, where it lays it foot, smoke and flames and blood and death and destruction are there. It comes out of some antique past, some dread forgotten ritual. The figure of the Myth was upon Munster. Beneath it the little figures of men move: the mail clad gall-oglach, the swift running Kerne, the red-coated, iron-plated soldiers; Irish nobles and Chiefs, the marshals of England's forces. Away from all these, from Irish and Norman Chiefs, the MacCarthys, the Desmonds, the
O' Sullivans, all the princelings, away from the English Deputies, marshals and adventurers, thirsting for Munster soil, glance at the unnamed people of Ireland who suffered so greatly. Munster was the fairest province in Ireland. It had 1,500 schools. When the Munster wars ended, when Elizabeth sent her thanks to Sir George Perrin ( Perrin reported that he had " left neither corn, nor horn, nor house unburnt " between the two ends of Munster ) For the pacification of the province, the schools had been wiped out. The storm of battles and skirmishes, of sieges of intrigues, of massacres is the shifting blood-red veil above the homes of thousands.
That was no barbarous land where scholars filled the schools, where science and the classics were taught; where the pride of youth was stimulated, the imagination fired by the Hero-Tales of Ireland. It is a psychological fact that the Elizabethan Englishman, many of them brave, gallant and chivalrous, became barbarians in their contact with Ireland. The old Greeks explain the reason for the fall. It is Pride and Injustice; these things bring moral death. In their attempt to conquer Ireland the avenging Furies fell upon them.
Carew, the Devonshire knight, in his Pacata Hibernia writes that English soldiers entered an Irish camp, " Found none but hurt and sick men, whose pains and lives they soon determined. " And again that he having burnt all the houses and corn and taken great prey diverted his forces into another place, " and harrowing the country, killed all mankind that were found therein for a terror to those who would relief to the runagate traitors. " He passed into Arleagh woods " where we did the like, not leaving behind us man or beast, corne or cattle. " The slaughter continued after the war had ended. " Those whom the sword could not reach were deliberately given a prey to famine. "
" The English nation " says Froude, " was shuddering over the atrocities of the Duke of Alva. Yet Alva's bloody sword never touched the young, the defenceless . . . Sir Peter Carew has been seen murdering women and children and babies that had scarcely left the breast. "
Spenser, the English poet, to whom Raleigh had given a few acres of the forty thousand he had seized, saw still living creatures " creeping out of every corner of the woods and glens on their hands, for their legs would not bear them. They did eat the dead carrion where they could find them, yea. and one another soon after. " he thinks English rule can never be secure till the Irish race is exterminated. The gentle English idyllist suggests a way. The people are not to be allowed to till their land or pasture their cattle next season, then " they will quickly consume themselves and devour one another. " English law had made a breach in Connaught. A Lord President was appointed, and a court held. From Sligo to Limerick men were netted and brought before it. The head of the Burkes, Clanrickard a " queen's " man, was seized and sent to Dublin. Then all the Burkes loosened their swords in their scabbards and sprang into rebellion. The rebellion grew and strengthened, before the " strong measures " of the Lord President. The Lord deouty, Fitzwilliam, an old man, afflicted by ills of the body, crafty, cautious, treacherous, freed Clanrickard and sent him down to make terms. The bloody hand was stayed; for a moment there was peace in Connacht. Soon the disarmed catholics were taken and hanged. Surrendered garrisons were put to the sword. A search for ' rebels ' in West Connaught saw women and boys and old men, and all who came in Sir Richard Bingham's way, slain.
Sir Richard Bingham
Into Leinster, too, English Law had driven a wedge. Many of England's Deputies had seized Offaly and Leix, the territories of the O' Connors and the O' Mores. They had planted the English settlers; abolished the ancient territorial names and in Irish blood rechristened them King's and Queen's counties. The dispossessed Chiefs and their clansmen bided their time. A noble boy grew up among them, and in mannhood became an avenging sword. This was Ruari Og O' More. He attacked the homes of the English settlers; burnt their towns; took the governor of Leix and a Privy Councillor prisoners; made truces and kept them. After six years of successful guerialla warfare he fell when reconnoitring a force brought against him. His soldiers avenged his death and put the army to flight. His name remained an inspiration to the oppressed Irish, down to the present day. " God bless Our Lady, and Rory O' More! "
The English troops were commanded in Leix and Offaly by a Sir Francis Cosby. This man gave a banquet in the Rath of Mullaghmast in Kildare. And he stretched out friendly hands to the O' Conors and O' Mores and their followers. He invited them to the banquet. He gave it in the Queens name; he promised her protection. They went.
One gentleman, arriving late, suspected something, and paused. Guests went in, he saw, but none came out. Advancing he reconnoitred, beheld salughtered bodies, and being now attacked himself cut his way through and escaped. Of the O' Mores alone, one hundred and eighty were murdered. Cosby lived at Strabally. A tall tree with spreading branches grew before his door, upon which he hanged men, women and children. If he hanged a mother and an infant he hanged the child in the mother's hair.* ( * Ireland under Elizabeth. O' Sullivan 1621 )
And a day of reckoning came. In the Battle of Glenmalure Cosby fell in a rout when the soldiers of the Feach O' Byrne cut down the flying forces of Lord Gray. O' Byrne, there in the Wicklow mountains, had held his country against all attempts by the English to seize it. Gray, newly arrived in Dublin, thought at one stroke to break O' Byrne's power. he gathered a great army and marched into Wicklow. He believed he had trapped O' Byrne. The glen was deep. Its sides dark wooden heights and rocks; a shallow stream with a rugged bed flowed through. he raised an earthwork across the mouth that the flying Irish might be trappped and cut down there. To see the flight and slaughter he went up on a height, and his courtiers and staff. His soldiers entered the glen. There was no sight of the enemy. The watchers began to laugh. The laughter and silence was shattered as the wooden areas came to life with screaming Irishmen. Bullets of the Irish swept into the enemy line. O' Byrne's men sprang from the tree clad slopes, leapt over the rocks, and threw themselves upon the flanks of the foe. Gray and his jesters fled. Of the great force with which he had marched out of Dublin, but a few broken companies returned.
The English troops were commanded in Leix and Offaly by a Sir Francis Cosby. This man gave a banquet in the Rath of Mullaghmast in Kildare. And he stretched out friendly hands to the O' Conors and O' Mores and their followers. He invited them to the banquet. He gave it in the Queens name; he promised her protection. They went.
One gentleman, arriving late, suspected something, and paused. Guests went in, he saw, but none came out. Advancing he reconnoitred, beheld salughtered bodies, and being now attacked himself cut his way through and escaped. Of the O' Mores alone, one hundred and eighty were murdered. Cosby lived at Strabally. A tall tree with spreading branches grew before his door, upon which he hanged men, women and children. If he hanged a mother and an infant he hanged the child in the mother's hair.* ( * Ireland under Elizabeth. O' Sullivan 1621 )
And a day of reckoning came. In the Battle of Glenmalure Cosby fell in a rout when the soldiers of the Feach O' Byrne cut down the flying forces of Lord Gray. O' Byrne, there in the Wicklow mountains, had held his country against all attempts by the English to seize it. Gray, newly arrived in Dublin, thought at one stroke to break O' Byrne's power. he gathered a great army and marched into Wicklow. He believed he had trapped O' Byrne. The glen was deep. Its sides dark wooden heights and rocks; a shallow stream with a rugged bed flowed through. he raised an earthwork across the mouth that the flying Irish might be trappped and cut down there. To see the flight and slaughter he went up on a height, and his courtiers and staff. His soldiers entered the glen. There was no sight of the enemy. The watchers began to laugh. The laughter and silence was shattered as the wooden areas came to life with screaming Irishmen. Bullets of the Irish swept into the enemy line. O' Byrne's men sprang from the tree clad slopes, leapt over the rocks, and threw themselves upon the flanks of the foe. Gray and his jesters fled. Of the great force with which he had marched out of Dublin, but a few broken companies returned.
