HISTORY OF THE WAR. CHAP. XVII. Origin, Progress, and Termination of the Rebellion in Ireland-Subjugation of Switzerland by the French-Downfall of the Papal Power, and Misfortunes of Pius VI-Affairs of the Smaller States of Italy-Humiliation of his Sardinian Majesty The French take Possession of Turin. G REAT Britain had defeated the fleets of her combined enemies, and foiled them in their plan of invasion; but it yet remained to frustrate their secret machinations. Disappointed in their design of seducing our seamen from their allegiance, the emissaries of France directed their attention to Ireland. That kingdom now became the field on which they practised their intrigues against the English government, and it must be acknowledged that their efforts were attended by too much success: but the turbulent scenes to which they gave occasion, will not be reviewed with unmixed regret by those who consider them as the immediate cause of the subsequent union between the sister kingdon.s. The Irish catholics had been gratified by the repeal of those penal statutes which had been enacted against them in ages of persecution, and had been admitted to a community of commercial privileges with the English. But while they acknowledged the supremacy of the pope, whose power and influence might interfere with the allegiance they owed to their natural sovereign, it was deemed unsafe to admit them to state appointments or to a seat in the Irish legislature, because the great majority which they formed would have endowed them with the whole power of the state, and the protestants who did not constitute above a third part of the in habitants, and whom, from the time of the The genius of the present times was It may be doubted, however, whether the demands or expectations of the catholics at large, would ever have been sup ported and enforced by the most distant indication of rebellion. The majority of those who took a conspicuous part in the subsequent atrocities, were the outcasts of protestant society, imbued with revolutionary principles, and rendering the 202 demand of catholic emancipation a stalkinghorse to their own ambitious and revolutionary views. The great majority of the catholics kept aloof from the unfortunate contest, and the numbers of the lower orders of that persuasion, who followed the standard of rebellion, was by no means in proportion to the diffusion of the Roman catholic religion. To promote the changes which they affected to desire, a number of turbulent individuals formed a society, in which they assumed the name of United Irishmen. This institution projected and organized by Wolf Tone, proposed to connect the whole Irish nation together, with the professed purpose of effecting a reform in parliament, and an equalization of catholic with protestant privileges. The plan of union combined secresy of proceeding with efficacy of council and of conduct. No meeting was to consist of more than twelve persons; five of these meetings were represented by five members in a committee, vested with the management of all their affairs. From each of these committees which were styled Baronial, a deputy attended in a superior committee that presided over all those of the barony or district. One or two deputies from each of these superior committees composed a committee of the whole county, and two or three from every county committee composed a provincial committee. The provincial committees, chose in their turn, five persons to superintend the whole the whole business of the union they were elected by ballot, and known only to the secretaries of the provincial committees, who were, in virtue of their office, the only scrutineers. Though their power therefore was great, their agency was invisible, and they were obeyed without being seen or known. Many misguided protestants accustomed to regard the Roman catholics as the cause of every evil by which the country was afflicted, and alarmed by the formidable numbers of the United Irishmen, formed counter-associations, and assumed assumed the name of Orange-men, in honor of king William, the vindicator of protestant security, and the establisher of protestant property and power in Ireland. The Orange-men proposed to disarm the catholics. Bodies of the latter associated to resist the attempt, and assumed the name of Defenders. Various quarrels occurred between the Orange-men and the Defenders, accompanied by many scenes of murder and depredation. Neither the prevailing disorder nor the several machinations were unknown to the French rulers; they dispatched one Jackson, a native of Ireland, and a protestant clergyman, but now an emissary of France, as a spy to Great Britain and to Ireland. In the latter country he formed a connection with Wolf Tone, Hamilton Rowan, and some of their associates, and proposed a plan of insurrection, which might facilitate an invasion from France. In England, Jackson had confided his treasonable plans to Cockayne, an attorney, who communicated his projects to Mr. Pitt, and undertook to accompany Jackson to Ireland, with an intention to discover his further views and intrigues, a service for which he was to receive £300, should his discoveries lead to the traitor's conviction. Cockayne being thus engaged to accompany his friend to Ireland, and pretending to participate in the plot, was introduced to Rowan and other conspirators. A plan was formed for the invasion of Ireland, and Jackson wrote several letters to correspondents abroad, explaining the state of that country, and the outlines of the project. The letters being sent to the post-office, Cockayne, who had perused them all, gave information to government; the letters were seized; and Jackson was tried. Cockayne was the sole oral evidence, but the papers, coinciding with his testimony rendered the case so clear, that the jury, without hesitation, found the defendant guilty. The prisoner was condemned to die, but escaped execution by the perpetration of suicide. By this discovery the correspondence with France was suspended; Tone and Rowan made their escape. Lord Fitzwilliam was by this time arrived in Ireland, commissioned to comply with the demands of the catholics, and thus, as it was imagined, to terminate the 1 In opera seized great quantities of arms. Whoever can conceive the image of a country rent by faction, threatened with a rebellion of its own people, and an invasion from a foreign enemy, ravaged by a desperate banditti, who committed every kind of enormity in the prosecution of their revolutionary plans, and, distressed by the dreadful consequences of martial law, will have some idea of the state of Ireland at this period. As an expedient for its relief, an attempt was made by the Whig party in the English parliament, for the removal of the most important pleas, by which the malcontents justified their proceedings by moving for a parliamentary reform. But the motion was rejected by a great majority on the ground of the danger which would attend the measure at so critical a period. progress of disaffection. His efforts, however, were ineffectual, and upon his return to England, the discontent became still more deep and general. From this time the United Irishmen proceeded in their arrangements with greater vigor and dispatch a military organization took place in the several provinces; arms were procured, pikes fabricated, and every preparation made for the immediate prosecution of their schemes. The activity of the leaders was unwearied, and extensively successful. They established a correspondence with the French government in France, through the medium of their Irish associates who had escaped after the apprehension of Cockayne; and the directory agreed to assist the Irish with a considerable body of forces, to enable them to throw off their connection with England, and form themselves into a republic. The offer was accepted, and lord Edward Fitzgerald and Mr. Arthur O'Connor, were appointed to arrange the terms of a treaty. For this purpose they went to France, met general Hoche in the summer of 1796, and arranged the business of the projected invasion, which was designed to be executed in the following November. In the latter end of autumn, however, intelligence arrived from France, In July, the malcontents received inthat the expedition was deferred till the formation, that two armaments, one from following spring. In the mean time the Holland and the other from Brest, were conspiracy proceeded with so much ready to sail for Ireland as soon as they secresy, that though the penetration of the should be able to elude the British fleets. Irish government discovered that there They therefore postponed their intended were strong grounds of suspicion, no rise, and waited with impatience for the precise information was obtained. On arrival of their expected auxiliaries. The the 14th of April, however, 1797, they defeat of the Dutch fleet in October, was learned that a number of seditious people a fatal blow to their hopes; and they were to meet at a house in Belfast. On now began to entertain a just suspicion this information, the place of meeting was of the designs of the French government entered by a party of the military, and against their independence. When they two of the associating committees were reflected upon the manner in which the found actually sitting their papers were Dutch provinces were oppressed, and seized, and documents were obtained how subservient the crown of Spain had which contained the most ample evidence been rendered to their dictates, they of the nature and extent of the plot in conceived suspicions that, under the agitation. Government immediately em- pretence of establishing a republic in ployed the most vigorous precautions Ireland, the directory intended to subject against the impending danger, enforced them to their dominion or to their absolute the act against illegal conventions, and control. These suspicions were confirmed were when, instead of 10,000 auxiliaries which they requested, the French government insisted on the necessity of sending to their assistance an army of 50,000 men. Men of reflection were convinced, that conquest was the object of that tyrannizing power, and that the confederates were intended to be the instruments of its ambitious schemes, which were to lead the conquest of Great Britain, or its reduction to the same reproachful state of humiliation to which other powers had suffered themselves to be degraded. On ascertaining that the Irish averse to their plan of invasion, the French directors turned their attention to objects which they deemed more advantageous and more practicable. They received the propositions of the conspirators with coolness; and the Irish, despairing of any effectual resistence from the French republic, prepared for an insurrection without waiting for co-operation from the continent. In the spring of 1798, they employed themselves in dispositions for war, and were guilty in the mean time, of the most savage atrocities. Conciliatory measures were at this moment brought forward in the house of peers by an Irish nobleman, after deploring the outrages committed on his countrymen by the infliction of martial law, recommended a parliamentary reform as the most rational and effectual means of restoring the national tranquillity. He was answered by the lord chancellor and lord Glentworth, who opposed to his arguments and his advice, that conciliatory expedients had been already tried, and gave it as their opinion, that nothing but force could subdue the glaring spirit of revolt which had manifested itself among the confederates. The motion was rejected, and this result was unexpectedly justified by a resolution of the confederates to pay no attention to any offer from either house of parliament, and that nothing should be deemed satisfactory but a total emancipation of their country. Such was the secrecy of the chief conspirators, that though the plot was discovered, the plotters were unknown. At last one Reynolds, who had become an United Irishman, was struck with remorse, and prevailed upon by a friend, to disclose the names and proceedings of the secret committees, to the government. On this discovery fourteen of the delegates were seized in the house of Mr. Oliver Bond. Lord Edward Fitzgerald effected his escape; but, being afterwards discovered, resisted the officers sent to ap-. prehend him, was mortally wounded in the scuffle, and died a few days afterwards. The remaining remaining conspirators, now grown desperate, proposed a general insurrection; but captain Armstrong, a militia officer, who had insinuated himself into their confidence, apprized the government of their desigus. The two Sheares of Dublin, Neilson of Belfast, and several other chiefs, were arrested on the 23rd of May. A plot laid by the conspirators for taking by surprise the camp, the artillery, and the castle of Dublin, was frustrated by a timely discovery; and their plans were disconcerted by the arrest of those chiefs on whose conduct they relied. But they persevered in their designs, though deprived of their leaders and ill provided for hostilities. They rose, in arms in different parts of the kingdom, and, though they were defeated in several encounters, yet their behaviour proved them to be no contemptible adversary. They laid siege to Wexford, and, after defeating the garrison in an engagement near its walls, made themselves masters of the place. The formidable aspect which they assumed, and the courage which they displayed in several subsequent actions with royalists, convinced the government that the most speedy and vigorous operations were necessary to suppress them. Alarmed at the progress which they were making in the province of Munster, the lordlieutenant dispatched general Lake with a strong body of forces to check their advance. That officer, attacking them in their principal station near Euniscorthy, gained a complete victory after a desperate conflict. They fled on all sides: the insurgents in Wexford surrendered, and all the rebels, except those banditti who chose to live by plunder, availed them selves of the general pardon offered to those who should return to their allegiance, and retired quietly to their own homes. A similar result attended the revolt which took place in the counties of Down and Autrim, the insurgents being defeated in a hard-fought' battle at Ballinahinch. Immediately subsequent to these successes, lord Cornwallis was appointed to the station of lord-lieutenant; and that he might carry the olive-branch in one hand while he bore the sword in the other, he was commissioned to offer a general pardon to all who submitted, with the exception of very few of the most notorious rebels. The expedience of this measure was soon evinced. Before the minds of men were recovered from the agitation into which they were thrown by the rebellion in Munster and Ulster, their attention was called to another quarter by a very alarming affair in the province of Connaught. The agents of the Irish rebels in France, self-deluded by their own passions, and deceived by the representations of their correspondents, had persuaded the directory that the Irish nation was ripe for revolt, and that, if a French force should appear off the coast, the flames of rebellion would instantly burst forth. In this persuasion expeditions had been repeatedly planned, which had been frustrated by the vigilance and good conduct of our naval commanders. The French government could not spare so large a force as would be required to accomplish their design of reducing Ireland under the dominion of their republic, while they were prosecuting war in SO many different quarters yet it was thought advisable to cherish in this country a spirit of rebellion, and to cause a diversion of the British forces, in favor of the French armies elsewhere employed, by sending a body of troops to the aid of the insurgents. In the prosecution of this plan, general Humbert was sent with about 1500 men and three frigates, to make a descent in the north of Ireland. That officer, appearing in the bay of Killala under English colours, easily effected a landing, having repulsed a small body of men who were hastily assembled to oppose him. So completely were the inhabitants deceived by the artifice of the French, that Edwin and Arthur Stock, the bishop's sons, and Mr. J. Rutledy, the port surveyor, were tempted to visit them, and were not undeceived till they were made prisoners. The British palace, to which the fencibles and yeomen retired after their repulse, being incapable of defence against the enemy's force, it was taken possession of by Humbert, who assured the bishop, on his appearing in the court yard, "that he came to give the inhabitants liberty, and to free them from the English yoke." Then hoisting a green flag with the Irish words, " Ering go bragh," Ireland for ever, in the front of the palace, he invited the people to join his standard, as the means of acquiring freedom and happiness. He assured them that the object of his expedition was to secure them from tyranny, to give them a free constitution under the protection of France, and to save from persecution the objects of religious intolerance. By the last assurance, the protestants, jealous of the catholics, and the catholics burning with resentment towards the protestants, were equally dissatisfied, and Humbert, by endeavoring to gratify the wishes and support the interests of each party, lost the favor of both. Surprised and disappointed by this result, he left colonel Charost to guard the palace of Killala, and advanced with all possible dispatch, to Castlebar, where, being reinforced by above 3000 rebels, he repulsed a body of forces brought against him by general Lake. His triumph, however, was of short duration. On the approach of an army under lord Cornwallis, Humbert, finding himself greatly outnumbered, embarked precipitately for France. The restoration of tranquillity was almost immediate. Holt, a daring and noted adventurer, surrendered himself to government the recal of lord Camden and the appointment of lord Cornwallis, was highly accept. ble to the Irish people; and the |