350

ORGANIZATION OF UNITED MEN. [CHAP. X.

the Provincial committee, were arrested at the house of Oliver Bond, a merchant in Dublin. Thomas Addis Emmett, Doctor M'Nevin, Oliver Bond, John Sweetman, a brewer, two Jacksons, ironmongers, and Richard M'Cormick, a tradesman, were also apprehended; and warrants were issued against Wm. Sampson, a lawyer, and Lord Edward Fitzgerald. The latter escaped, and the former was some weeks afterwards taken at Whitehaven. The papers of the committee were brought to the Government, and these disclosed the extent of the conspiracy.† The Privy Council examined the prisoners, ordered the Castle to be put in a state of defence, augmented the military force in the city, and on the 30th issued a proclamation, which stated

"That a traitorous conspiracy, existing within the kingdom, for the destruction of the established government, had been considerably extended, and had manifested itself in acts of open rebellion; and that in consequence thereof the most direct and positive orders had been issued to the officers commanding his Majesty's forces to employ them with the utmost vigour and decision for the immediate latter to bring him forward in society. Under the Duke of Wellington, in the Peninsular war, he was made postmaster of Lisbon, and was also called on a grand jury of the county of Middlesex, which excited no inconsiderable indignation.

* Their names were those of men in the middling rank of life, possessed of little influence, and very little property; quite insignificant, and incapable of raising or conducting a civil war, if it had not been for Mr. Pitt and Lord Clare.

Peter Ivers, County of Carlow; Laurence Kelly, Queen's County; George Cummin, Kildare County; Edward Hudson, Grafton Street John Lynch, Marey's Abbey; Lawrence Griffin, Carlow County; Thomas Reynolds, Clomellon; John M'Cann, Church Street; Patrick Devine, Dublin County; Thomas Traynor, Poolbeg Street; Wm. Michael Byrne, Wicklow County; Christopher Martin, Dunboyne; Peter Bannon, Queen's County; James Rose, Dublin County.

The number of armed men in the province of Leinster only amounted up to the 20th of February, 1798, to 67,295, and their treasury but to 1485l. 4s. 9d.

In the County of Wicklow, 12,895 men; Carlow County, 9,414; Kildare County, 10,863; Queen's County, 11,689; Meath County, 14,000; Kilkenny County, 604.

The return made to the Irish Parliament, of the arms seized and

;

CHAP. X.] COMPOSITION OF INSURRECTIONISTS. 351

suppression of this conspiracy, and for the disarming of the rebels, and all disaffected persons, by the most summary and effectual measures.'

It is worth while to examine the composition and character of the party who brought about the insurrection, and subsequently caused the Union. They were, in a great degree, democratic. They had given proofs of their existence as far back as 1782, on the repeal of the 6th of Geo. I.,— in the election of a military convention in 1783, -in their proceedings towards a measure of reform in 1784; in the formation of the United Irishmen in 1791; in the proceeding in 1793 with regard to the Catholics in the north, and in Dublin;-in their attacks on the opposition in 1793, and on Mr. Grattan and the supporters of the war in 1794. The tendencies of this party were Republican, independent of, and uninfluenced by the higher orders, by the aristocracy, or by the Parliamentary opposition, the latter of whom they had repeatedly attacked, and the former of whom they looked on with aversion, as purchased by the minister to betray the people. They were composed (with regard to their magnitude) of the most active of the old Volunteers. They conceived that they had procured the trade and constitution of their country in 1779 and 1782, and they expected great changes therefrom. They taken by the military under fifteen generals throughout Ireland, from March to August, 1798, shows how inefficient and ill arranged the preparations of the insurgents must have been; they only amounted to 48,109 guns; 1755 bayonets; 4,463 pistols; 4,183 swords; 70,630 pikes; 248 blunderbusses; 22 ordnance; 119 musket barrels. Numbers of these arms belonged to well affected persons, and to the gentry of the country, who were obliged to give them up to Government. Such was the case at Tinnehinch and its vicinity; but they served to swell up the number, and so cast obloquy upon the people.

* In his Life of Pitt, Gifford, as well as other writers, connects the United party with the members of the Opposition; but on examination, it will appear that they generally attacked them, never consulted them, and greatly mistrusted them.-See Tone's Memoirs.-Evidence before Secret Committee.-Pieces of Irish History, &c.

352

CAUSES OF THE INSURRECTION. [CHAP. X.

expected, and had a right to expect, a change of persons and system in the Government-they were mistaken. They had a right to expect a great improvement in the conduct of Parliament -they were disappointed. They expected an independent Parliament-they found a dependent one; they found a corrupt one; they found an incoherent one. Naturally and justly they grew discontented, and sought for reform; and if they had discovered any ability, they would have succeeded; had they remained quiet, and not circulated their imprudent addresses; if they had waited, and not broken out into open war, they would have united all parties against Mr. Pitt; for he had behaved very ill to Ireland-he nearly lost the country, and wholly lost her affections, and all without any justification whatever. He found the people united-he left them divided; and he ran the risk of dismembering the empire, both from internal commotion, and foreign invasion. The Government had acted most violently; they had suffered the military to act shamefully; they kept up an army that was an instrument of power against the privileges of the people, but not of protection; and when the French came, the army was found so bad, that one of its best generals, (Sir Ralph Abercromby) declared it to be incapable; and if the French had landed 10,000

*

"General Orders.

Dublin, 26 Feb. 1798. "The very disgraceful frequency of courts martial, and the many complaints of irregularities in the conduct of the troops in this kingdom, having too unfortunately proved the army to be in a state of licentiousness, which must render it formidable to every one but the enemy, the Commander-in-Chief thinks it necessary to demand from all Generals commanding districts and brigades, as well as commanding officers of regiments, that they exert for themselves, and compel from all officers under their command, the strictest and most unremitting attention to the discipline, good order, and conduct of their men, such as may restore the high and distinguished reputation the British troops have been accustomed to enjoy in every part of the world. It becomes necessary to recur, and most pointedly to attend to the standing orders of the king

CHAP. X.] UNITED MEN CHIEFLY PROTESTANTS. 353

men, they could have taken the country. But Mr. Pitt's violent measures were lost in the necessity of the times, and in the excesses of the people, both of which screened and saved him; for the authors of the insurrection could make out no case: the acts of the Government would have justified every thing but war. The creating of fifteen new places to buy the Parliament, thereby having a majority of thirty on a division, together with their violent acts in order to force on the Union; this and other corrupt measures, would have gone a great way to prove that the Government wanted to subvert the Constitution; but there could not be any case at that time made out to prove the necessity of rebellion. In fact, it was not to procure Catholic emancipation, or Parliamentary reform, though they were used as instruments to increase their party, that in latter years the United Irish aimed at, but the subversion of all government except a democracy. The leaders felt few of the grievances they complained of: they were chiefly Protestants;* and as to Catholic emancipation, they confessed it had partly been obtained; a few discontented lawyers and doctors, who, when they saw France in

dom, which at the same time that they direct military assistance to be given at the requisition of the civil magistrates, positively forbid the troops to act (but in case of attack) without his presence and authority, and the most clear and precise orders are to be given to the officer commanding the party for this purpose."

*The leaders of the United Irish were in general adverse to the admission of the Catholics into their Union-Tone and Neilson in particular. The latter was well known to have said to a Dublin merchant who was a Protestant,, and in extensive dealings with all classes— "The worst of the business is, that we must get these Catholics to join us." Tone also said to another individual, "As to the Catholics, they have been driven into the rebellion." From the statement already made, it will be observed that in 1797, the number of United men in Protestant Ulster amounted to near 100,000 men, while in 1798, in the larger and more Catholic Province (that of Leinster), they only amounted to 67,295. It however served the party to represent it as a 66 Popish Rebellion," as Sir Richard Musgrave, Gifford, and others have done.

354

CAUSES OF THE INSURRECTION.

[CHAP. X. rebellion, strove not to establish a good constitution, but to subvert all constitution whatsoever, and establish a democracy; and they not only destroyed the democracy, but the Constitution.

Before the insurrection, Ireland had increased in wealth and commerce; but so ignorant were the leaders of the insurgents, that they had not even an account of her trade, her exports, her imports, her revenue, her taxes; they issued no manifesto; they had no declaration like the Americans in 1776; so that the people knew not what they meant to remedy. They were men without politics, and whose formation was on the worst principle possible,—namely, to separate from the landed interest* both English and Irish, so that they united against themselves the party whose aid was necessary to carry their objects into effect. Some of the leaders had talents, but no integrity, and little ability: the best was Emmett, but he was not fit or capable to be the head of such a party. If he had counselled them to resist legally, and not proceed to violence, he would have succeeded, and defeated both Mr. Pitt, and Lord Clare. Mr. Pitt would have yielded, and would have given up the Irish minister; but he bought and kept the Minister because he had lost the people. Yet, although they stand without justification, they are not by any means without an apology: first, the wildness of the times; next, the execrable government of Lord Clare, and Lord Carhampton, who seemed to excuse their birth by wreaking their vengeance upon their country; and hence it is easy to conceive how men of strong national feelings, high spirit, good principles, and great ardour, could

* In the Banishment Act, 38 Geo. III. c. 78, which contains two pages of the exiles' names, there are only nine persons who are designated "esquires."