WEXFORD REBELLION

• High point - capture of Wexford town 30 May

• No news - communications disrupted• Expecting French landing• Boat captured 2 June - Dublin not taken -

other counties failed• Decision - break out of county - New Ross,

Newtownbarry (Bunclody), Arklow

REBELLION

• Army divides

• Half marches to New Ross

• Town had been reinforced

• Attacked on 5 June - took most of town - fierce street fighting, huge casualties - rebels run out of ammunition - counter attack, rebel retreat

NEW ROSS

• Biggest battle of rebellion - 2,000 rebels dead

• Rebel army disperses - 10,000 down to 2-3,000

• Atrocity stories - Scullabogue - barn containing loyalist prisoners set on fire

ARKLOW

• 9 June attack

• As New Ross, fierce street fighting, rebels driven back

ARKLOW

• 9 June attack

• As New Ross, fierce street fighting, rebels driven back

• Decision - continue field battles or guerilla?

• Stay with field - camp near Enniscorthy

STATE CAMPAIGN

• Lull of ten days after Arklow

• Rebellion in Antrim and Down

• Advance into Wexford from North and South-west

• Vinegar Hill 21 June - victory for government - many rebels escape

FINAL EXPEDITIONS

• To provoke rebellion elsewhere

• Carlow, Kilkenny, Queen’s (Laois), return to Wexford, defeated 26 June

• Wicklow, Kildare, Meath, defeated 14 July

SECTARIAN?

• Presented as sectarian in much history writing

• Not sectarian in origin - but sectarian incidents

• Sectarian aftermath - burning of Catholic chapels - 27 in North Wexford, 15 in South Wicklow, 16 in rest of country

WHY SUCCESS AND DURATION?• Unique nature of society

• Topography

• Initial success

• Slow government response - Rebellion in Antrim and Down

WHY SUCCESS AND DURATION?• Unique nature of society

• Topography

• Initial success

• Slow government response - Rebellion in Antrim and Down

REBELLION IN ANTRIM AND DOWN• No rebellion in May 1798

• Rising in June

• Short initial success, then rapid and total defeat

• Nothing elsewhere in Ulster

UNITED IRISHMEN IN ULSTER• Founded in Belfast

• Largest membership

• State regarded Ulster as centre of sedition - focus of counter-terror campaign

WHY NOT A LARGER REBELLION?• Moderates left from 1793 on

• Aims become more radical - others leave

• Gradual disillusion with France, French Revolution - conquered territories, American shipping

STRENGTH IN ULSTER COUNTRYSIDE• Tenant farmers, weavers

• Surge after Bantry Bay

• Peak in summer 1797 - c.50,000

• Destroyed by state campaign

• Focus shifted to Leinster

• May 1798 - nothing in Ulster

WHY EAST ULSTER?

• Different to rest of Ulster

• Majority Presbyterian - up to 90%

WHY EAST ULSTER?

• Different to rest of Ulster

• Majority Presbyterian - up to 90%

• 20 ministers involved, 3 executed

• Landed elite Anglican, political power Anglican

WHY EAST ULSTER?

• Elsewhere in Ulster - more Anglican

WHY EAST ULSTER?

• Elsewhere in Ulster - more Anglican

• Popular loyalism Anglican - eg. Yeomanry corps

• North Down - difficult to establish yeomanry

REBELLION

• After arrest of leadership March 1798 - little communication with Dublin

• No rebellion in May

• Late May - Ulster leadership meets

• Younger more radical members elect leader - Henry Joy McCracken - plan rebellion

REBELLION IN ANTRIM

• Belfast not a possible target

• Antrim town - magistrates meeting 7 June - focus of attack

• Elsewhere units take own town, march on Belfast

REBELLION IN ANTRIM

• Night of 6-7 June

• Took Larne

• Attacked Ballymena

• Large force assembled near Glenarm

• Attack on Coleraine

REBELLION IN ANTRIM

• Main attack - Antrim town

• State decision - withdraw to Belfast or defend town

• State troops were reinforced

• Attack unsuccessful

• Rebels disperse

REBELLION IN ANTRIM

• Ballymena held for 3 days

• ‘Committee of Public Safety’

• State army arrives, offers amnesty

• Most take

• Similar in Glenarm

REBELLION IN DOWN

• Newtownards captured

• Bangor captured - cannon taken from ships

• Attack on Portaferry

• 9 June - ambush of state force at Saintfield - heavy losses

REBELLION IN DOWN

• Early victory in Saintfield encourages turnout (like Wexford)

• 5,000 join rebel army

• Moves to Ballynahinch 11 June

• State troops withdraw to fortified towns

REBELLION IN DOWN

• 12 June - state army leaves Belfast

• Bombards rebel camp

• 13 June Battle of Ballynahinch

• Total defeat of rebels

• Severe reprisals - dozens hanged, houses burned

REBELLION IN ANTRIM AND DOWN• Like Kildare and Carlow - brief, easily

defeated

• Fought over wide area

• Perhaps 20,000 ‘turned out’

1798 & PRESBYTERIANISM

• A Presbyterian rebellion

• Most rebels + involvement of clergy

• Overall, a minority of Presbyterians - the radical republican element

• 1798 marked end of influence of this element

1798 & PRESBYTERIANISM

• Alliance with Catholics in 1790s

• Tone’s Argument

• Failure of rebellion - two groups moved apart again

• Presbyterians gradually become anti-Catholic, conservative

1798 & PRESBYTERIANISM

• Alienation also from France

• Initially welcomed revolution

• French regime seen as more aggressive during 1790s

• Process continued after 1800 - no longer a republic, settled with papacy

PRESBYTERIANISM AFTER 1800• Settlement with state - payment of

ministers

• Evangelicalism after 1820 - missionary drives - alienate Catholic church

• Ultimately sided with Anglicans in ‘Ulster Protestantism’