106 1650. Relations with Scotland and Ireland. CHAPTER XIX THE SUBJUGATION OF IRELAND FOR the future stability of the Commonwealth it was of preeminent importance that its relations with Scotland and Ireland should be wisely ordered. Unfortunately, England's claim to attach either of these countries to herself rested on conquest, and it is in the nature of conquest to be a source of weakness. What was true of both was especially true of Ireland, where differences of blood and religion combined with memories of by-past deeds of cruelty to evoke a spirit of opposition far more bitter than even the mastery of the sword could arouse, and to justify in the eyes of Irishmen a prolongation of what was in reality a hopeless struggle. May. Ireland after Cromi well's departure. 1 When Cromwell returned to England after the surrender of Clonmel, there was but one army which could be supposed capable of holding the field against the English— the Ulster force once led by Owen O'Neill, but now under the strange command of Emer McMahon, Bishop of Clogher. Enticed by information that Coote and Venables were at a distance from one another, he dashed forwards into county Londonderry, stormed Dungevin Fort, and even reduced Ballycastle, on the distant coast of Antrim.2 Then followed the inevitable retreat. Pursued by Coote with less than half his numbers, the episcopal commander insisted on standing at bay at Scarriffhollis, about two miles from Letterkenny. In vain June 21. The battle of Scarriffhollis. For the circumstances of his election see vol. i. 153. 2 The Bishop of Clogher to Ormond, June 1; Coote to Ireton, July 2; Gilbert's Contemporary Hist. of Affairs in Ireland, ii. 422, iii. 147. 1650 THE NORTHERN IRISH CRUSHED 107 were the warnings of Henry O'Neill, Owen's son, and of other officers who had stood high in Owen's favour, and who now told his incompetent successor that the worst way of dealing with an English enemy was to meet him in a pitched battle. Their caution was justified by the result. Of 6,000 Irishmen some 2,000 were slaughtered on the field. What was more disastrous still was that the greater number of the trained officers, versed in the wiles of war under their beloved chief, either met their deaths foot to foot with the enemy or were captured and mercilessly executed. Henry O'Neill and the Bishop himself were amongst the latter number.1 The Irish Without an army in the field submission was only a question of time; and though fresh troops were subsequently collected to oppose the invaders, they had neither left without the numbers nor the organisation which might have an army. enabled them to hold head against their welldisciplined antagonists. Under Ireton, therefore, who remained Nature of the Irish resistance. as Lord Deputy after the departure of his father-inlaw, the military operations dwindled into a succession of sieges diversified by efforts to repress the rapine of the natives, who carried off their spoil to the fastnesses of bog or hill. It was of little moment whether these predatory bands dignified themselves with the name The Tories. of soldiers, or were mere outlaws, commonly known as Tories in either case they were well pleased to carry off the goods of an Englishman, and still better pleased to ruin such of their own countrymen as had demeaned themselves by seeking the protection of the invaders. The first three months after Ireton had been named Lord Deputy were occupied by five sieges. Tecroghan submitted to Reynolds on June 25; Carlow to Sir Hardress Five sieges. Waller on July 24; Waterford to the Lord Deputy himself on August 6; Charlemount to Coote on the 14th; and Duncannon Fort to Cooke on the 17th of the same Aphorismical Discovery, Gilbert's Contemporary Hist. of Affairs in Ireland, ii. 82; Letters in Several Proceedings, E, 777, 22; Advices of James Haws, July 1, Carte MSS. xxviii. fol. 105. month.' In none of these cases was any cruelty used or any penalty inflicted upon the garrisons or inhabitants. At Waterford alone was there any indication that a penalty might possibly follow at a future time. The inhabitants who elected to remain within the walls were told that, if a warning were given them to depart, they would be allowed three months for the removal A threat of of their property. 2 The clause bears evidence of a conviction rising in Ireton's mind that, if the country was to be firmly held, it would be necessary to re-people the fortified towns with settlers of English birth, as Cromwell had suggested after the massacre at Wexford. Of fortified towns in Ireland but three-Limerick, Galway, and Athlone-still held out against the invaders. The Ireton deceived by Dillon. importance of Athlone lay in its guarding the first bridge crossing the Shannon, and thus affording a practicable route by which an army could advance into Connaught across a river fringed with bogs. It is probable that if Cromwell had been in command he would have turned his attention primarily to the capture of Athlone; and it is certain that, had he done so, he would have thrown himself as energetically into the task before him as though everything depended on his own exertions. Ireton was unwearied in his attention to duty, and self-willed in the maintenance of his own opinion; but he had none of the qualifications of a great commander. He fancied that he could win Athlone by treachery, and opened up a negotiation with Lord Dillon for the betrayal of the town-a negotiation which Dillon accepted with the object of spinning out time in order to render a serious attack on Limerick impossible before the close of the season.3 'Hewson to Lenthall, June 29: Several Proceedings, E, 777, 22; Coote to Lenthall, August 22, ib. E, 780, 17; Preston to Ormond, June 18, Carte MSS. xxvii. fol. 695; A Perf. Diurnal, E, 780, 1; Diary of a Parliamentary Officer, Gilbert, iii. 219. 2 Articles of Waterford, Several Proceedings, E, 778, 17. 3 The author of the Aphorismical Discovery (Gilbert, ii. 107-113), with his fine nose for treason to the Irish cause, tells the story in full 1650 IRETON TRICKED 109 Having thus founded his plans for the remainder of the campaign on the supposed treachery of an enemy rather than Aug. on his own efforts, Ireton marched leisurely north Ireton advances leisurely. wards along the western foot of the Wicklow highlands, wasting time in the glens in burning the cottages and destroying the crops of the tribesmen whom he was unable to follow into the recesses of the hills.1 Before long news arrived which seems to have convinced Ireton that the resistance of the Irish would break down without much trouble on his own part. News from the West. June. Limerick The divisions between Ormond and the Celtic population of the West had been long notorious. In June, Limerick had refused admission to a garrison selected for its defence by the Lord Lieutenant; and it was not till July 15 that he yielded so far as to appoint Hugh O'Neill, the gallant defender of Clonmel, to the governorship of the city, at the same time permitting him to choose the regiments to be employed in the garrison.2 resists Ormond. July 15. Hugh governor of belief that Dillon was in reality a traitor. Dillon, however, had written to Ormond, on August 6 (ib. iii. 171): "The enemy desires much to speak with me, but it shall be your Excellency's commands that will guide me in that particular, as it doth in all other things. If your Excellency conceives it not proper for me to give them a meeting by reason of the trust reposed in me by his Majesty, I believe no other prejudice can happen thereout, which I humbly offer to your Lordship's consideration, if you esteem it one. I am confident that it would subject my person to the scandal of those that are not acquainted with my intentions, but that I value not in respect of doing his Majesty the least service that is; certainly it's the time I have taken to consider of this business that has stayed the enemy's advance to this place ere now, and doubt not of their being here very soon. If our forces be here before them, according [to] your Excellency's orders, the enemy will have a hard tax of it." Writing on August 16 (ib. iii. 172) Dillon laments the insufficiency of his numbers, and adds that he had written to Clanricarde to bring all his forces to Athlone, a message which he would never have sent if he had intended to betray the place. 1 Basil to Lenthall, September 13, Several Proceedings, E, 780, 17; Diary of a Parliamentary Officer, Gilbert, iii. 220. 2 Commission to O'Neill, July 15, Carte MSS. clxii. p. 247. The previous correspondence is scattered over vol. xxviii. of the same collection. Aug. 12. The pre Worse was still to come. The majority of the Roman Catholic prelates, like the Limerick citizens, suspected the Protestant Lord-Lieutenant of complicity with the enemy. Accepting as undoubted truth every calumny raised against him, they met at Jamestown to consider the situation of the country, and on August 12 deposed him from the authority he had received from the King, at the same time launching an excommunication against all who presumed to contravene their decree. As for their country, they had no other remedy to propose but to commend it to the Divine protection. "We well understand," they said, "the present condition of this nation is more inclining to ruin and despair than recovery. . . Though this nobleman hath left us nothing but weakness and want and desolation, and that the enemy is rich, strong, and powerful, God is stronger and can help us, and for His own name's sake will deliver us." 1 lates depose Ormond. The prelates and the nation. ... It might seem as if the prelates were bent on reviving the days of Hildebrand. In reality they were the mouthpiece of a nation borne down by a flood of disaster. Their hearts were with their own people. It was not so much Ormond in person whom they defied as Ormond representing an alien sovereign who regarded the loyalty of Irishmen as no more than a counter in his game, and who, at that very moment, had suffered himself to become a tool in the hands of the Presbyterian Scots. Aug. 30. Well might Ireton think that the Lord had delivered his enemies into his hands. On August 30 he was so confident of success that he ventured to divide his army, sending Ireton sends Sir Hardress Waller to close round Limerick on the east, whilst he himself was to make for Athlone. There, if, as he fully expected, he gained possession of the town by treachery, he would be in a position, after effecting a junction with Coote, to march down the farther bank of the Shannon and to straiten Limerick on the western side of the river.2 Waller against Limerick. 1 Cox, Hib. Anglicana, ii. App. xlviii. 2 That he had formed the latter plan is not shown by any evidence, but it arises out of the situation, and in 1651 Ireton established himself on |