Ireland under the Tudors. Volume 3 (of 3)

During the autumn of 1598 and far into the winter, the affair hung fire, more perhaps from the difficulty of satisfying his demands for extraordinary powers than from any wish to refuse him the dangerous honour. Indeed, if we may believe Camden, his enemies foresaw his failure, and were only too anxious to help him to the viceroyalty on any terms. About the new year his appointment seemed to be certain, and by the first week in March everything was settled. ‘I have beaten Knollys and Mountjoy in the Council,’ Essex wrote in great exultation, ‘and by God I will beat Tyr-Owen in the field; for nothing worthy her Majesty’s honour hath yet been achieved.’ It is not in such boastful mood that great men are wont to put on their armour. And besides all this, Knollys was his uncle and Mountjoy his familiar friend.302

His uneasy ambition

It is, perhaps, hardly necessary to inquire how Essex came to desire such a thankless office as the government of Ireland. His ambition was not of an ignoble cast; but it is certain that he grasped greedily at every important command, and that he could scarcely brook a superior, or even a colleague. This was clearly shown in his ridiculous quarrel with the Lord Admiral about precedence, no less than in more important matters. He probably saw the Irish difficulty well enough, but any hesitation about incurring the risk of failure was more than counterbalanced by the fear of someone else gaining great glory.

Bacon’s excuses

Bacon had advised him to remain at Court, but to take Irish affairs under his special protection there, to consult with men who knew the country, to fill places with his own friends, and to patronise others who were likely to be useful. In short, he was urged to make what the newspapers now call political capital out of Ireland, but not to risk himself and his reputation there. While giving this counsel, Bacon had expressed a fear that the Earl was not the man to play such a game skilfully. And so it fell out. By the beginning of the year 1599 Essex saw that he would have to go. Years afterwards, when Elizabeth was gone, Bacon found that an inconvenient cloud hung over him on account of the part he had played. He then tried to persuade others, and possibly succeeded in persuading himself, that he had really ‘used all means he could devise’ to prevent Essex from venturing into Ireland. The fact seems to be that he kept quiet as long as the thing could have been prevented, and did not try to make Essex reconsider the matter when he decided to go. He afterwards said that he ‘did plainly see his overthrow chained as it were by destiny to that journey’; but at the time he did no more than warn him against possible failure from defects of temper, while he enlarged upon the great glory which would follow success. A comparison of extant letters shows that Essex himself was far more impressed than Bacon with the danger and difficulties of the Irish problem, though, when he was on the eve of setting out, his impulsive nature allowed him to brag of the great things that he was going to do.303

Opinions of Wotton and Bacon

‘I have heard him say,’ writes Wotton of Essex, ‘and not upon any flashes or fumes of melancholy, or traverses of discontent, but in a serene and quiet mood, that he could very well have bent his mind to a retired course.’ This is confirmed by other authorities, and indeed Essex, though he had a soldier’s courage, was by nature a student and a dreamer rather than a man of action. Circumstances brought him forward, and his character made him uncomfortable in any place except the highest. Bacon wished him to stay at court with a white staff, as Leicester had done, but the work was uncongenial. If he could have succeeded Burghley, perhaps he might have accepted the position; as it was Ireland offered him the kind of power which he most coveted, and though he was not blind to the danger of leaving a Hanno behind him, he fancied that he was fit to play the part of Hannibal. Just as he was starting Bacon wrote him a long letter of advice, reminding him that the Irish rebels were active and their country difficult, but reminding him also that ‘the justest triumphs that the Romans in their greatness did obtain, and that whereof the emperors in their styles took addition and denomination, were of such an enemy as this… such were the Germans and the Ancient Britons, and divers others. Upon which kind of people, whether the victory were a conquest, or a reconquest upon a rebellion or a revolt, it made no difference that ever I could find in honour.’ Years afterwards Bacon pleaded that he had done what he could to stop Essex, on the ground that the expedition would certainly fall short of public expectation and ‘would mightily diminish his reputation.’ Again he mentions the Germans and Britons, the woods and the bogs, the hardness of the Irishmen’s bodies, so that there can be no doubt about what he alludes to. We have the original letter, and Bacon stands convicted of misrepresentation, the grosser because careless observers might so easily confound it with the reality.304

Difficulties and delays

About the beginning of December the number of Essex’s army was fixed at 14,000. Then there was talk of a smaller establishment, and the affair went through the usual hot and cold phases of all suits at Elizabeth’s court. Spenser had experienced the miseries of hope deferred, and Shakespeare saw the spurns which patient merit of the unworthy takes. ‘Into Ireland I go,’ writes the Earl on New Year’s day; ‘the Queen hath irrevocably decreed it, the Council do passionately urge it, and I am tied in my own reputation to use no tergiversation.’ He had many misgivings, but had decided in his own mind that he was bound to go. ‘The Court,’ he admitted, ‘is the centre, but methinks it is the fairer choice to command armies than humours.’ In the meanwhile the humour changed daily. Essex was not patient, and the whole wrangle must have been inexpressibly distasteful to him. On Twelfth-day the Queen danced with him, and it was decided that he should start in March. Three weeks later there were fresh difficulties about the excessive number of gentlemen whom he proposed to take with him. As late as March 1, it seemed doubtful whether the Queen’s irrevocable decree would not after all be altered. Mountjoy, who had a much cooler head, had earnestly advised his friend to leave nothing to chance, to his enemies’ pleasure, or to official promises, and it is to the Earl’s consciousness that this advice was sound, that the delays must be chiefly attributed. On March 6 letters patent were passed, releasing him from the arrears of his father’s debts incurred in the same thankless Irish service, and six days later he was formally appointed Lord Lieutenant. That title had not been granted since the return of Sussex thirty-seven years before.305

Departure of Essex

On March 27 Essex took horse at Seething Lane, accompanied by a brilliant suite. Prayers were offered in the churches for his success against the imitators of Korah and Absalom, in whose cases God had manifested to the world his hatred of all rebellion against His divine ordinance, and foreshadowing His probable care for an anointed queen. ‘Do not,’ said the Anglican divines, ‘punish our misdeeds by strengthening the hands of such as despise the truth.’ Through Cornhill and Cheapside, and for more than four miles out of town, the people thronged about their favourite, with such cries as ‘God bless your lordship! God preserve your honour!’ The day was very fine at starting, but ere Islington was passed there came a black north-easter with thunder, hail, and rain; and some held it for a bad omen. Nor did the popular hero travel as though he loved the work or believed in himself. On April 1 he was at Bromley, bitterly complaining that the Queen would not make Sir Christopher Blount a councillor, and announcing that he had sent him back. ‘I shall,’ he wrote, ‘have no such necessary use of his hands, as, being barred the use of his head, I would carry him to his own disadvantage, and the disgrace of the place he should serve in.’ The place was that of Marshal of the army, which Blount did actually fill, and there is no reason to suppose that he would have been any useful addition to the Council. Such virtues as he had, and they were not many, were those of the camp. On the 3rd, Essex was at Tamworth, and on the 5th at Helbry, the island off the Dee which Sir Henry Sidney had found so wearisome. The wind did not serve, and there was a delay of a week before he sailed from Beaumaris, having ridden over Penmaen Mawr, ‘the worst way and in the extremest wet that I have endured.’ After a bad passage Dublin was reached on the 15th. William, 13th Earl of Kildare, ‘with eighteen of the chiefs of Meath and Fingal’ set out to follow in the Lord Lieutenant’s wake. The vessel, built for speed and probably overpressed with canvas, foundered in mid-Channel, and all on board perished.306

Great expectations, which cool observers do not share

The public expectation from the mission of Essex was such that Shakespeare ventured to suggest a possible comparison between him and the victor of Agincourt. Had he succeeded he would have been the hero of the Elizabethan age, greater in the eyes of his contemporaries than Norris or Raleigh, greater even than Drake. His task was, indeed, no light one, for the rebels in arms were estimated at very nearly 20,000 men, of which less than half were in Ulster. In the south and west the chief towns and many detached strongholds were held for the Queen, but in the northern province her power was confined to Carrickfergus and Newry, Carlingford, Greencastle, and Narrow Water, all on the coast, and to one castle in the inland county of Cavan. The preparations were on a scale suitable to the emergency, for 16,000 foot and 1,400 horse far exceeded the usual proportions of a viceregal army. Nor was it composed wholly of raw levies, for Essex insisted on having Sir Henry Docwra, with 2,000 veterans, from Holland; his plan being so to distribute them that some seasoned soldiers should be present everywhere. But there had always been corruption in the Irish service, and cool observers thought it necessary to make allowance for false musters and cooked returns. A crowd of adventurous young gentlemen accompanied Essex, among whom was John Harrington, the Queen’s godson, and by her much admired for his wit. Harrington was advised, by a friend at court, to keep a secret journal in Ireland, for future use in case of disaster. ‘Observe,’ says the letter, ‘the man who commandeth, and yet is commanded himself. He goeth not forth to serve the Queen’s realm, but to humour his own revenge.’ There were spies about him, ‘and when a man hath so many shewing friends, and so many unshewing enemies, who learneth his end here below?’ Cecil cautioned Secretary Fenton that the new Lord Lieutenant thought ill of him because of his friendship with Sir John Norris. Justice Golde of Munster, who knew his country well, hoped Essex’s ‘famous victory in mighty Spain would not be subject to receive blemish in miserable Ireland.’ It did not require the penetration of a Bacon to see that the expedition was likely to end in failure, and in the ruin of the chief actor.307

Powers given to Essex

The Lord Lieutenant’s commission was of the most ample kind. He was authorised to lease the land of rebels generally, and more particularly to give or grant property affected by the attainder of Tyrone and others in Tyrone, Tyrconnell, Fermanagh, Leitrim, and the Route, exceptions being made in favour of O’Dogherty and Sir Arthur O’Neill, as rebels by compulsion rather than through disloyalty. Officers not holding by patent he was empowered to dismiss, and even patentees might be suspended. He might grant pardons for all treasons, but in Tyrone’s case he was only to pardon for life, and not for lands, and to exact some guarantee before giving even life and liberty to one who had ‘so vilely abused her mercy.’ That ‘capital traitor’ was in no case to be spared without due submission first made in all lowly and reverend form. The power of making knights had usually been granted to viceroys, and had been sometimes abused by them. This touched Elizabeth in her tenderest point, for it was by not letting it become too cheap that she had made knighthood a real defence of the nation. Essex was charged to ‘confer that title upon none that shall not deserve it by some notorious service, or have not in possession or reversion sufficient living to maintain their degree and calling.’308

Sir Arthur Chichester

Among the officers serving under Essex in Ireland was Sir Arthur Chichester, whose value he had learned during the Cadiz expedition. In his capacity of Earl Marshal he directed Chichester to take a muster of 2,600 at Chester; but it was to Cecil that the latter owed his appointment to command a regiment of 1,200 men, and it was to him that he applied for the pay due to his brother John when slain at Carrickfergus, remarking at the same time that he was a ‘better soldier than suitor.’ Cecil had protested against so able a man being wasted in the command of a mere company. Chichester landed at Dublin; and went to Drogheda, which Essex visited on purpose to review a regiment of which he had heard so much. The veterans, who came straight from the strict school of the Ostend siege, made an imposing show on parade, and the Lord Lieutenant thoughtlessly charged them with his mounted staff. The pikemen did not quite see the joke, and stood so firm that Essex had to pull his horse back on its haunches, and ‘a saucy fellow with his pike pricked his Lordship (saving your reverence) in the rump and made him bleed.’ Chichester was sent to his brother’s old post at Carrickfergus, and there he was generally quartered till the end of the war and of the reign.309

Essex postpones his departure for Ulster

‘This noble and worthy gentleman our lord and master,’ said Wotton, who was one of his secretaries, ‘took the sword and sway of this unsettled kingdom into his hands 15th instant,’ adding that the Bishop of Meath preached a grave, wise, and learned sermon on the occasion. Essex was instructed to inform himself by conference with the Council, and the result of several meetings was a resolution not to attack Tyrone and O’Donnell, but rather to plague those Leinster allies who had lately taken a solemn oath of allegiance to them in Holy Cross Abbey. Want of forage, involving lean cattle and weak draught-horses, was the reason given for inaction; but it is proverbial that a council of war never fights, and the Lord Lieutenant was but too ready to adopt a dilatory policy. ‘A present prosecution in Leinster, being the heart of the whole kingdom,’ was what the Council advised, and if that plan had been adhered to, there was a good deal to be said in its favour. About 30,000 rebels were reported to be in arms altogether; and of these the home province contained 3,000 natives, besides 800 mercenaries from Ulster. The mountains of Wicklow and Dublin had not been quieted by the death of Feagh MacHugh; his sons, with other O’Byrnes and O’Tooles, still carried on the war, while the bastard Geraldines and a remnant of the Eustaces were out in Kildare. Carlow and Wexford were terrorised by Donell Spaniagh and his Kavanaghs. Owen MacRory commanded a powerful band of O’Mores in Queen’s County, and in King’s County there were still many unsubdued O’Connors. Lord Mountgarret and the O’Carrolls were also reckoned as rebels. Meath and Westmeath were full of armed bands, while Longford and Louth had suffered greatly by incursions from Ulster. A force of 3,000 foot and 300 horse was sent forward to Kilcullen, and on May 10 Essex set out from Dublin to take the command.310

Campaign in Leinster

From Kilcullen bridge on the Liffey to Athy bridge on the Barrow, the line of march lay through a wooded country, and stray shots, which did no harm, were fired at advanced parties. Athy was found to be decayed through the disturbed state of the country, but the castle was surrendered without difficulty, and Ormonde made his appearance, accompanied by his kinsmen Lords Mountgarret and Cahir, both of whom had been considered in rebellion. About 200 rebels showed themselves, but retired to bogs and woods on the advance of Southampton with a detachment. Lord Grey de Wilton was carried by his impetuosity further forward than his orders warranted, and was placed under arrest for a night. Both lords had cause to regret what was perhaps an ill-judged exercise of authority. Sir Christopher St. Lawrence here distinguished himself by swimming across the Barrow, recovering some stolen horses, and returning with one of the marauder’s heads.

Owen MacRory O’More

After three or four days the provision train came up, and Maryborough was relieved; the rebels not venturing to make their threatened attack at Blackford near Stradbally. From Maryborough, which Harrington calls ‘a fort of much importance, but of contemptible strength,’ Essex made his way to Lord Mountgarret’s house at Ballyragget. The line of march lay through a wooded pass; where the O’Mores had dug ditches and made breastworks of the fallen trees. Essex showed both skill and activity, but he lost three officers and several men; and the natives could hardly have hoped to stop a viceregal army between Dublin and Kilkenny. One Irish account says the English loss was great, and another notes the capture of many plumed helmets, from which the place was named the ‘pass of feathers.’ The accounts agree that Owen MacRory had not more than about 500 men with him, and Harrington says he offered to have a fight with sword and target between fifty chosen men on each side. Essex agreed to this, but the Irish did not appear. The Lord Lieutenant did not risk as much as Perrott had formerly done, when he proposed to decide the war by a duel with Fitzmaurice, but Ormonde must have remembered that day well, and can hardly have thought this later piece of knight-errantry much less foolish.311

Campaign in Munster

The Kilkenny people expressed their joy at the arrival of Essex ‘by lively orations and silent strewing of the streets with green herbs and rushes,’ and he received a similar welcome at Clonmel. But he did not like the Latin oration delivered at the latter town: it adjured him not to bear the sword of justice in vain, while he anxiously protested that it was for the exercise of clemency that ‘her Majesty had given him both sword and power.’

Siege of Cahir

Essex was now in Munster, and his resolution first to subdue the home province had been thrown to the winds. Derrinlaur Castle, which annoyed the navigation of the Suir, was surrendered; its indefensibility had been proved in 1574, and the fate of the garrison was doubtless well remembered. Another castle higher up the river gave more trouble. Lord Cahir was in the viceregal camp, but his brother James (called Galdie or the Englishman) undertook to defend the family stronghold, and it was necessary to bring up heavy artillery. The want of foresight which characterised this campaign was conspicuously shown here. The battering train, ‘one cannon and one culverin,’ was brought up by water to Clonmel, but no draught horses had been provided, nor were there any means of strengthening the bridges, which might sink under so unusual a weight. The guns were slowly dragged by men all the way to Cahir, of the strength of which there is an elaborate official account. The critical Harrington admits that it was not built with any great art, but that nature had made it practically impregnable, which was not true even in those days. An assault would have been difficult, for the castle was then surrounded by water; but a battery, which completely commanded it, was easily planted near the site of the present railway station. Lord Cahir called upon his brother to surrender, but was answered by threats and insults. Two days later the guns came, were placed at once in position, and opened fire in a few hours; but the carriage of the largest ‘brake at the second shot,’ and took a day and a half to repair. A ball stuck in the culverin, but that too was cleared in time, and fifty rounds from this light piece was enough to silence the garrison on that side. An orchard under the south-west wall was occupied the same night, and most of the garrison escaped by the left bank of the river; but two of the English captains were killed. Before a breach could be effected the White Knight threw in reinforcements, and the besiegers made another lodgment at the north-east end of the island. The cannonade was renewed at close quarters, and on the night of the third day the garrison made a sally. The intended assault had been assigned to Sir Charles Percy and Sir Christopher St. Lawrence, with four companies of the Flanders veterans, who repulsed the attack and entered the castle along with the Irish, of whom about eighty were killed. A few escaped by swimming, and the guns were soon mounted on the deserted walls. Having repaired damages and placed a garrison of 100 men in the castle, the Lord Lieutenant marched northward along the left bank of the Suir. He made much of this siege, which was the single thing he had to boast of in Munster, but it was a small matter after all. A year later James Butler, with sixty men, again got possession of this ‘inexpugnable’ fortress without firing a shot, but soon surrendered to Carew, whose bare threats were enough to secure his object.312

Death of Sir Thomas NorrisIrish tactics

The bridge at Golden was repaired and the army passed to Tipperary, where a letter was received from Sir Thomas Norris, whom Essex had already met at Kilkenny. The Lord President announced that he had been wounded in a skirmish with the Castleconnel Burkes, but he recovered sufficiently to accompany Essex in part of his Munster campaign. The wound seems to have been fatal at last, for on August he was dangerously ill, and in September commissioners were appointed to execute duties which had been neglected since his death. The Lord-Lieutenant himself was well received at Limerick, and entertained with two English orations, ‘in which,’ says Harrington, ‘I know not which was more to be discommended – words, composition, or oratory, all of which having their peculiar excellencies in barbarism, harshness, and rustical, both pronouncing and action.’ After several days’ rest the next operation was to revictual Askeaton, and the Sugane Earl showed himself at Adare with 2,000 or 3,000 men. The bridge was not defended, but the Irish galled the army in passing a boggy wood beyond the Maigue, and the soldiers ‘went so coldly on’ that Essex had to reproach their baseness. Harrington describes the enemy as ‘rather morrice-dancers tripping after their bag-pipes’ than soldiers, and declares that in all Munster they never once strayed from the edge of their woods ‘further than an old hunted hare doth from her covert for relief.’ Some fighting there was, and the official account makes much of the Irish losses and little of the Lord-Lieutenant’s; but Harrington says that Plunkett, an insurgent captain who was supposed to have shown slackness, had next day to give Desmond hostages for his good behaviour. As Essex passed through each hedge, the thorns closed behind him, and left the state of Munster unaltered.313

End of Munster campaignDeath of Sir Henry Norris

Askeaton was easily victualled by water from Limerick, and Essex turned aside to Conna near Lismore, where Desmond had his chief residence. The move was thought a strange one, and Harrington could only conjecture that he wished to ‘give the rebels an inexcusable provocation,’ but O’Sullivan, much less ingeniously, says that he did not dare to proceed further westward. At Finniterstown the army had to pass between two woods, and had a sharp fight with Desmond, who had been joined by Lord Fitzmaurice and some of the MacCarthies. Captain Jennings was killed, Sir Henry Norris had his leg broken by a bullet, and a third officer was shot through both cheeks. Norris ‘endured amputation with extraordinary patience,’ but died a few weeks afterwards, making the third of these famous six brothers who had fallen a victim to the Irish service. After an interval, which was allowed to elapse for fear of causing fresh sorrow, the Queen wrote to condole with Lord and Lady Norris on the ‘bitter accident’ which had deprived them of two more sons, and the survivor was ordered home from Holland to comfort them.

The army then marched by Croom to Bruff, whence Essex went with Ormonde, Blount, St. Leger, and Carew to consult the Lord President at Kilmallock. They agreed that there was no money, no magazine, no remnant of any kind of victual of her Majesty’s stores, cows enough for only two days, and hardly ammunition for three. On Norris promising to procure some beeves out of Lord Barry’s country and to send them to Conna the advance was resumed, the line of march being over the Ballyhoura hills to Glanworth and Fermoy. Essex himself went to Mallow, detached a party to Cork for the promised supplies, and then rejoined the army with Cormac MacDermot MacCarthy, who brought 100 cows and 200 kerne. There was some fighting, and Sir Henry Danvers was wounded between Fermoy and Conna; but the latter castle was dismantled. Lord Barry brought the convoy safely to Castle Lyons, and the Blackwater was passed at Affane, a ford which was only practicable for one hour at low water. The President returned from the neighbourhood of Dungarvan with 1,000 men, with which he expected to be able to maintain the war in his province, and Essex marched without fighting through Lord Power’s country to Waterford.314