THE 1798 REBELLION IN IRELAND

1. Background to the rebellion

The last decade of the 1700s was a most important time in Irish history. Republicanism and
Loyalism both found real identity, the Orange Order and Maynooth College were both
founded as the century ended with the rebellion in Ireland and the subsequent Act of Union.
The repercussions of these events define Irish history even up to the modern day.

The rebels were very influenced by the effects of uprisings in America, France and Australia.
They seized the opportunity to try to create a society not based on religion but based on
democratic principles and freedom of expression. This policy was to prove popular with Irish
people of different creeds who all wanted the same thing, freedom from English rule.

This philosophy was to provide a means whereby counter-revolutionaries could try to
disrupt the organisation by inciting sectarian hatreds and fears within the movement.

Protestant ascendancy

The social and political systems in Ireland in the 1790s was such that the vast majority of
the population of over 5 million people were excluded. Only the ruling Protestant class,
comprising of about 10% of the population, were entitled to vote or to sit in parliament. The
vast majority of the land in Ireland was owned by Church of Ireland emigrants from
England. Ireland was independent in theory but in practice it was ruled by the English
parliament who severely restricted the growth of the Irish economy. The presbyterian class
were also excluded and many emigrated to America to seek out a more favourable situation.

The effects of worldwide revolution

It is not surprising, therefore, that when the American colonists revolted against British
government in the 1770s, they found a sympathetic ear amongst their kin in Ireland. In
1778 France, Britain’s traditional enemy, entered the war on the American side, thus
threatening Ireland with invasion. The British government was caught without an army to
defend Ireland, since its regular troops had been sent to America, nor the revenue to raise
an alternative, due to the economic dislocation caused by the war. An Irish Protestant army,
the Volunteers, was raised to fill the breach, financed locally. Unfortunately for government
it became the focus for various grievances, both political and economic. A convention of
Ulster Volunteers (predominantly Presbyterian) at Dungannon in 1782 demanded
parliamentary reform (a broadening of the franchise and the abolition of ‘rotten’ boroughs)
and Catholic emancipation (the abolition of remaining anti-Catholic laws). However a
national Volunteer convention the following year split on the Catholic question and
Volunteering declined thereafter.

The United Irishmen and the Catholic Convention

The outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789 with its ideals of liberty, equality and
fraternity provided fresh impetus to the reform movement in Ireland. In the autumn of 1791
Societies of United Irishmen were founded in Belfast and Dublin with the twin aims of
parliamentary reform and Catholic emancipation. The leading ideologue was Theobald Wolfe
Tone, a Church of Ireland lawyer from Dublin, who, having witnessed the disarray of the
Volunteers on the Catholic question years earlier, was determined to forge a united reform
movement of the various denominations. In addition he increasingly focused critical
attention on the cornerstone of the existing Irish political system, ‘the connection with
England’, although his evolution into fully fledged separatist and republican was to take a
while longer. He found willing allies amongst the middle class leaders of the Catholic
Committee who had recently displaced their more conservative land-owning predecessors.
Determined to push more aggressively for concessions from government the new Catholic
Committee appointed Tone as their secretary and over the course of 1792 mobilised for a
‘Catholic Convention’ held in the Tailors’ Hall, Dublin in December. The Convention
presented its demands directly to the London government, over the head of the implacably
hostile Dublin administration. The London government, anxious to maintain the loyalty of
the Catholic majority in the face of the impending war with revolutionary France, conceded
almost all of the demands, except the right of Catholics to sit in parliament.

Popular politics and Defenderism

The Catholic Convention had a politicising effect out of all proportion to the 233 delegates
who directly participated. The delegates were elected in a series of meetings that reached
down to parish level involving broad sections of the people in political activity for the first
time. At the same time the country was awash with a deluge of political pamphlets. In
particular the campaign politicised and broadened the horizons of the Defenders. This
shadowy organisation first made its appearance in County Armagh in the late 1780s as a
defence against the arms raids on Catholics of the ‘Peep o’ Day Boys’, forerunners of the
Orange Order, who, as a symbol of Protestant supremacy, were anxious to maintain the ban
on Catholics bearing arms. By 1792/93 Defenderism had spread throughout south Ulster
and north Leinster (it had even penetrated into Dublin City), and its propaganda had
become more articulate and socially radical in tone. Throughout this period Tone, Samuel
Neilson, Thomas Russell, and other radical United Irishmen, established contact with them
which was to provide the basis for a mass-based revolutionary United Irish organisation
later in the decade.

Loyalist reaction

Meanwhile the upholders of the status quo in Ireland were not idle in the face of these
challenges. Along with the carrot of concessions to Catholics went the stick of repression:
the gunpowder act which placed restrictions on firearms; the militia act, which envisaged a
largely Catholic rank-and-file home defence force officered by Protestants, and which
provoked widespread disturbances; and the convention act, which outlawed any repeat of
December 1792′s ‘Back Lane parliament’. The latter in particular stymied United Irish plans
for a repeat of that success on the issue of parliamentary reform. An Ulster convention,
dominated by United Irishmen, demanding parliamentary reform met at Dungannon in
February 1793 just before the convention act was passed. The Dublin Society of United
Irishmen was dispersed in May 1794, a fate shared by like-minded reform movements in
England and Scotland. In the circumstances of Britain’s war with revolutionary France
demands for reform were equated with subversion. The war acted as a pressure-cooker
polarising the situation even further and Ireland became a crucial theatre in this wider
ideological struggle. At grassroots level the struggle was joined by the Defenders who
became increasingly bold in their actions. As law-and-order deteriorated in the countryside
government repression intensified, culminating in commander-in-chief Carhampton’s brutal
campaign against the Defenders in 1795. Liberal Protestant opinion was outraged at the
scale of the illegalities many suspected Defenders were transported without a trial. The
government response was the insurrection act which retroactively enshrined Carhampton’s
activities in law.

The Orange Order and the founding of Maynooth

Sectarian hostilities flared up anew in County Armagh, culminating in the expulsion of
thousands of Catholics and in the foundation of the Orange Order, dedicated to the
maintenance of Protestant ascendancy. Under landlord and government sponsorship it
spread rapidly over the following years providing the government with a mass-based
counter-revolutionary alternative to the United Irishmen. A more subtle variation of the
overall counter-revolutionary strategy was the foundation of a Catholic seminary at
Maynooth. Catholic seminarians would no longer be obliged to get educated in France where
many of them had developed an enthusiasm for the revolution. Thus the government
cultivated the support of a Catholic hierarchy itself fearful of the spread of ‘French
principles’.

The recall of Fitzwilliam

Early in 1795 the arrival of Fitzwilliam as lord lieutenant had raised Catholic hopes only for
Those hopes to be dashed by his sudden recall having over-stepped his brief. His successor
Camden reinstated the policy of defending Protestant Ascendancy at all costs. The United
Irishmen, meanwhile, had continued to meet clandestinely under various guises. The recall
of Fitzwilliam removed whatever lingering hope they may have entertained for constitutional
reform. The Catholic Committee dissolved itself (on the basis that ‘there was no longer a
Catholic question only a national question’); a new constitution was drawn up for a single
mass-based revolutionary United Irish organisation; and Tone was dispatched to France (via
America) to solicit military aid for an armed revolution.

Bantry Bay and the ‘dragooning of Ulster’

By the end of 1796 Tone’s mission had borne fruit in the form of the dispatch of 16,000
French troops under General Hoche to Bantry Bay. Bad weather and bad French
seamanship, however, prevented the landing of the force which in all probability could have
liberated the country. Within Ireland, meanwhile, the United Irishmen had build a
formidable underground network, especially in Ulster where they claimed 100,000 armed
and organised men. While they waited confidently for another French invasion attempt,
government forces went on the offensive. Throughout the spring and summer of 1797 the
army under General Lake, augmented by the Orange Order, was let loose on the people of
Ulster. The ‘dragooning of Ulster’ effectively disarmed and crippled United Irish organisation,
especially in the middle and south of the province.

2. The rebellion

The United Irishmen go-it-alone

By the winter of 1797/98, with hopes of a renewed French attempt fading, the United
Irishmen were forced to adopt a go-it-alone military strategy focused on Dublin. Their
organisation was strengthened in and around the capital and it also expanded in south
Leinster. The planned insurrection was to have been a three-phased affair: the seizure of
strategic positions within Dublin city; co-ordinated with the establishment of a crescent of
positions outside in north County Dublin, Meath, Kildare and Wicklow; and backed up by the
engagement of government forces in the counties beyond to prevent reinforcement.
Disaster struck on 12 March 1798 with the arrest of most of the Leinster leadership. Further
arrests on the very eve of the rising in May effectively decapitated the movement. The
seizure of Dublin from within was aborted; as they waited for orders that never came,
United Irish positions outside the city succumbed one by one; of the counties beyond, only
in Wexford did the United Irishmen meet with success. A fortnight later (7-9 June), despite
the mauling at the hands of Lake’s forces the year before, the United Irishmen of Antrim
and Down managed to rise up but they too were quickly defeated.

Wexford

The Wexford insurgents met with a string of early successes but were ultimately prevented
from spreading the insurrection beyond their own county by defeats at New Ross (5 June)
and Arklow (9 June). Massive government forces began to move in for the decisive military
showdown at Vinegar Hill, outside Enniscorthy (21 June). Although the insurgents suffered
defeat, the bulk of their forces escaped encirclement and carried on the struggle for another
month, one group in the Wicklow mountains and the other in a ‘long march’ into the
midlands before being worn down and forced to surrender. A month later (22 August) over
a thousand French troops under General Humbert landed at Killala, County Mayo, but it was
too little too late. Despite some initial successes, including a spectacular victory at
Castlebar, Humbert and the United Irishmen who flocked to his standard were defeated at
Ballinamuck, County Longford (8 October). The insurrection of 1798 was over.

3. Effects of the Rebellion

The defeat of the United Irishmen also signalled the end of Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland
as the Act of Union of 1800 abolished the parliament in College Green and moved all
authority back to the parliament in London.

Some United Irishmen welcomed this development as the first step on the road to
parliamentary reform as did many of the Catholic peasantry who envisaged their election in
the English parliament. Catholic Emancipation followed in 1929 by which time the context
had changed from being a wholly national issue to being a Catholic issue.

The United Irishmen ideals of a non-sectarian democracy became obscured by the politics of
the ballot box based on religion. The rebellion of 1798 heightened the awareness to the
Catholic peasantry of the situation that they were in and showed them that there may be
alternatives to be won.

Daniel O’Connell, the Irish Famine, Parnell, Davitt and the land reform movements, all did
the same thing as the majority of people in Ireland demanded more and more freedom and
privilege.

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THE EASTER RISING IN IRELAND, 1916

1. BACKGROUND TO THE RISING

THE IRISH REPUBLICAN BROTHERHOOD (IRB)

One of the main and lasting effects of the Great Famine of 1845-47 was
emigration. The ‘Coffin Ships’ carried tens of thousands of the poorest Irish
people who fled Ireland to avoid starvation. They created a new Irish nation
within America whilst remembering the injustice of the English occupation of their
homeland as well as harboring a deeply felt hatred of landlords and evictions.

A Clann na Gael source estimated that there were over one and one half million
people of Irish birth in America towards the end of the nineteenth century. These
people supported the republican cause by giving money, weapons and,
significantly, a propaganda machine which has continued to this day.

The Irish Republican Brotherhood was formed in a Dublin timber-yard on Saint
Patricks Day in 1858. James Stephans was assisted by Thomas Clarke Luby,
James Denieefe, Garret O Shaugheynessy and Peter Langan.

Joe Denieefe brought financial support back from America. He had left Ireland
after the Ballingarry defeat in 1848. James Stephens , Michael Doheny and the
John O’Mahony fought in Ballingarry in 1848. Stephens was injured but still
manage to escape to Paris where he familiarised himself with the revolutionary
tactics of that country. He came back to Ireland to try to establish an
underground organisation to remove the English from Ireland.

Denieefe and Luby traveled the country extensively and organised military groups
called ‘circles’. They formed oathbound secret societies of loyal patriots. Popular
opinion did not support the revolutionary ideals of the IRB nor did the Church
whop were strongly opposed. The mainstream support came from the poorer
classes who, despite their poverty, were often highly idealistic.

At the time of the 1867 rising the membership of the IRB was estimated at over
80,000.

INFORMERS

Informers such as Corydon and Magle did untold damage to the IRB by betraying
their oath and giving information to the English.

The Fenian movement split in America in 1865. John O’Mahony took over from
the Stephans. O’Mahony was later himself to be deposed when his hesitation in
calling an insurrection dissatisfied the soldiers he commanded (many of which
were veterans of the American Civil War). Colonel Thomas J. Kelly,
was appointed Chief of Staff of the IRB in 1867 and departed for Ireland.

A rising was planned for February 1867. Chester Castle in England was to be
attacked and simultaneous raids in Ireland were to be carried out. The English
knew in advance however as the informer, Corydon, kept them informed.

The news had not filtered through to the Fenians in Ireland and sporadic battles
took place in Kerry and Dublin.

THE MANCHESTER MARTYRS

The IRB was reorganised in Manchester in July of 1867 and a supreme council
elected. Colonel Kelly and Jim Deasy were captured by the English and then
rescued by the Fenians in a daring raid in which a police officer was killed. Allen,
Larkin and O’Brien were hanged for their complicity in the events and they
became known as ‘The Manchester Martyrs’.

These mass funerals and events with the Land League focused the minds of the
popular masses on the injustice of English rule in Ireland.

CLAN NA GAEL

The IRB delegates in Manchester broke away from the feuding factions of
Fenianism in America and supported Clan na Gael who were founded there in
June of 1867. The objectives of Clann na Gael was to secure an independent
Ireland and to assist the IRB in achieving this aim. John Devoy was the mainstay
behind the Clan.

Devoy became involved in the ‘New Departure’ and assisted Davitt and Parnell in
their fight against the landlords. Independence remained his main aim however
as he felt that the Land League was not militant enough to remove the landlords.

Devoy, assisted by Doctor Pat McCartan, founded a newspaper, ‘The Gaelic
American’.

Doctor Pat McCartan transferred from Clan na Gael to the newly formed
‘Dungannon Clubs’, a separatist organisation which was denounced by the
Church.

Tom Clarke became a member of the Supreme Council of the IRB in 1909 and
helped form the revolutionary paper ‘Irish Freedom’. He became the link with
Clan na Gael in America.

In 1912 the IRB sent Sean MacDiarmada as a delegate to the Clan convention
and he succeeded in securing the enormous sum of $20,000 for the IRB at home.

IRISH VOLUNTEERS

In November 1913 the Irish Volunteers were formed in Dublin and 4,000 enrolled
on that first night. In 1914 Padraig Pearse went to America to raise funds to save
his Gaelic school, St. Enda’s. This was achieved and Pearse turned his attention to
revolutionary matters.

On his return from America he sought 1,000 rifles from McGarrity. He as assisted
by Seán Mac Diarmada, Eamonn Ceannt and Seán Fitzgibbon. Pearse was
convinced that the revolutionary force in Ireland had never been better organised
or equipped. His speech in 1914 reflected this:-

” It is my matured conviction that, given arms, the Volunteers who have
adhered to us as against Redmond may be depended upon to act
vigorously, courageously, promptly, and unitedly if the opportunity comes.
We are at the moment in an immensely stronger position than ever
before. The whole body of Volunteers that has supported our stand against
recruiting may be looked upon as a separatist body. In other words, the
separatist organisation has been multiplied by a hundred.

In Dublin, we have some 2,500 admirably disciplined, drilled, intelligent,
and partly armed men. Nationalist Ireland has never before had such an
asset. Our main strength is in Dublin, but large minorities support us
everywhere, especially in the towns and in the extreme South and West.
We expect to have 150 companies, representing 10,000 to 15,000 men,
represented by delegates at next Sunday’s Convention.

This small, compact, perfectly disciplined, determined separatist force is
infinitely more valuable than the unwieldy, loosely-held together mixum-
gatherum force we had before the split. The Volunteers we have with us
now may be relied upon to the death, and we are daily perfecting their
fighting effectiveness and mobilisation power. It seems a big thing to say,
but I do honestly believe that, with arms for these men, we shall be ready
to act with tremendous effect if the war brings us the moment.

The spirit of our Dublin men is wonderful. They would rise tomorrow if we
gave the word. A meeting of Dublin officers the other night was as
exhilarating as a draught of wine.

We gain daily in the country as Redmond’s treachery or imbecility
becomes more manifest. The recruiting campaign has failed utterly, and
already he is a discredited politician.”

THE GAELIC LEAGUE AND THE GAA

The IRB were influential in many cultural and national organisations. Most of the
leaders like Pearse, Plunket and McDonagh were fluent Irish speakers and were
members of the Gaelic League. The Gaelic Athletic Association (the GAA) was
formed by Cusack in November 1884.

THE GREAT WAR 1914-18

At the outbreak of the first world war, Redmond urged the Irish Volunteers to join
in the fight against the oppressors of small nations (Germany). 170,000 of the
Volunteers supported Redmond whilst 11,000 supported Pearse.

Tom Clarke urged the Supreme Council of the IRB that a rising must happen
before the end of the war, especially as the Irish Home Rule bill had been
suspended at the outbreak of the war. Pearse, Plunket and Ceannt drafted the
first military plans.

ROGER CASEMENT

Prior to the rising and thanks to Hobson, Casement and Childers, guns were
landed at Howth and Wicklow. Casement went to Germany where he published
the Irish cause in German newspapers. His efforts to secure weapons were dealt
a severe blow when he and the weapons they were attempting to smuggle into
the country were captured on Banna Strand.

Casement, an English subject, was eventually convicted of treason and hanged.

PLANS FOR THE RISING

Thomas Clarke was the main instigator of the rising, supported by Pearse, Seán
Mac Diarmada, Eamonn Ceant and Seán T. O Ceallaigh who went to America for
further assistance. Thomas McDonagh, Joseph Plunket and James Connolly. were
later brought on to the Supreme Council.

During all this activity Eoin McNeill was unaware of the secret body that was
organising the rising. Few penetrated the IRB as they prepared for the rising.

James Connolly used his paper ‘The Workers’ Republic’ to call for an armed revolt.
He used the Citizens Army to protect the paper.

The Irish Volunteers were holding recruiting meetings throughout Ireland and
training enthusiastically. They awaited the signal to act as the rising had been set
for Easter Saturday, 22nd of April, 1916.

Setbacks to the plan included the capture of Casement and the weapons, the
capture of Austin Stack, commandant of the Kerry Brigade and the discovery of
the plans for an uprising following a raid on German officials in New York.

The Supreme Council decided unanimously decided to proceed with the uprising
despite the fact that they knew it had little chance of success. It was decided to
strike on Easter Monday. In spite of the order from McNeill not to revolt, over
2,000 soldiers made a strike for freedom.

2. THE INSURRECTION

On Easter Monday, 24th April, 1916 the GPO was occupied by the revolutionary
forces. Pearse read the Proclamation of the Republic to a bemused gathering:

POBLACHT NA H EIREANN
THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT
OF THE
IRISH REPUBLIC
TO THE PEOPLE OF IRELAND

IRISHMEN AND IRISHWOMEN: In the name of God and of the dead generations
from which she receives her old tradition of nationhood, Ireland, through us,
summons her children to her flag and strikes for her freedom.

Having organised and trained her manhood through her secret revolutionary
organisation, the Irish Republican Brotherhood, and through her open military
organisations, the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army, having patiently
perfected her discipline, having resolutely waited for the right moment to reveal
itself, she now seizes that moment, and, supported by her exiled children in
America and by gallant allies in Europe, but relying in the first on her own
strength, she strikes in full confidence of victory.

We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland, and to
the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible. The
long usurpation of that right by a foreign people and government has not
extinguished the right, nor can it ever be extinguished except by the destruction
of the Irish people. In every generation the Irish people have asserted their right
to national freedom and sovereignty; six times during the last three hundred
years they have asserted it to arms. Standing on that fundamental right and
again asserting it in arms in the face of the world, we hereby proclaim the Irish
Republic as a Sovereign Independent State, and we pledge our lives and the lives
of our comrades-in-arms to the cause of its freedom, of its welfare, and of its
exaltation among the nations.

The Irish Republic is entitled to, and hereby claims, the allegiance of every
Irishman and Irishwoman. The Republic guarantees religious and civil liberty,
equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens, and declares its resolve to
pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and all of its parts,
cherishing all of the children of the nation equally and oblivious of the differences
carefully fostered by an alien government, which have divided a minority from the
majority in the past.

Until our arms have brought the opportune moment for the establishment of a
permanent National, representative of the whole people of Ireland and elected by
the suffrages of all her men and women, the Provisional Government, hereby
constituted, will administer the civil and military affairs of the Republic in trust for
the people.

We place the cause of the Irish Republic under the protection of the Most High
God. Whose blessing we invoke upon our arms, and we pray that no one who
serves that cause will dishonour it by cowardice, in humanity, or rapine. In this
supreme hour the Irish nation must, by its valour and discipline and by the
readiness of its children to sacrifice themselves for the common good, prove itself
worthy of the august destiny to which it is called.

Signed on Behalf of the Provisional Government.

Thomas J. Clarke,
Sean Mac Diarmada,
Thomas MacDonagh,
P. H. Pearse,
Eamonn Ceannt,
James Connolly,
Joseph Plunkett

The Volunteers seized and fortified six positions In Dublin city: the GPO, the Four
Courts, Boland’s Mill, St. Stephen’s Green, Jacobs Factory and the South Dublin
Union. Attempts to seize Dublin Castle and Trinity College failed. This latter
failure severely restricted the Volunteers mans of communicating with each other.

The failure of the country to rise made it impossible to prevent the arrival of
English reinforcements. By Wednesady the revolutionaries were outnumbered by
20 to 1. The English secured a cordon about the city and closed in. They
concentrated their attack on the GPO whilst none of the other strongholds came
under the same sort of concentrated bombardment.

A gun-ship, the Helga, arrived in Dublin and field-guns were mounted on Trinity
College. The effect of the continuous shelling of O’Connell St. virtually destroyed
it and the surrounding areas. By Friday the GPO was engulfed in flames and
Pearse gave the order to surrender. 450 people, many of whom were civilians,
were dead with over 2500 wounded. The city was in ruins with the damage
estimated at a massive 2 Million pounds.

Over 3,500 people were subsequently arrested country-wide (including DeVelera
and Collins), although 1,500 were freed after questioning. 1,841 of these were
interned without trial in England, and 171 were tried by secret court martial
resulting in 170 convictions. 90 were sentenced to death but 75 of these
sentences were commuted to life imprisonment. The seven signatories of the
proclamation of independence (Pearse, Connolly, Clarke, MacDonagh,
MacDermott, Plunkett, and Ceannt) were all executed to the outrage of the Irish
public who had now begun to revise their opinion of the insurgents to that of a
heroic nature.

3. EFFECTS OF THE REBELLION

The rising was critical in terms of the overall fight for an Irish Republic.

For the first time the masses of the country wanted an end to English rule.
Nationalism swept the country especially as the details of the secret executions
became known.

National attention was brought to the Irish cause and to the oppressive ways in
which the English ruled the country.

These realisations were in all probability the main aim of the insurgents. The War
of Independence which followed in 1919, the subsequent Civil War of 1922, the
formation of the Irish Free State in 1923 and the declaration by Costello of an
Irish Republic can all be traced back to the events of Easter week, 1916.

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