Arklow.

Their associates at Gorey had alfo remained fome CHAP. days without enterprise, after the defeat of Wal- XLIII. pole's troops, and the retreat of Loftus, wafting Battle of their time in the burning of Carnew, the trials of June 9, prifoners for orangifm, and the plundering of houfes. 1798. At length, affembling at Gorey on the ninth of June, they advanced northward to form a junction with a body of infurgents in the county of Wicklow, for the attack of Arklow, a poft which they might have feized without oppofition at any time before the very day of the attempt. Here the loyalists, who had retreated from the county of Wexford, had been ordered to furrender their arms at the barrack with promife of restoration ; but these arms, on the news of the defeat at Clough, were formed into a pile and burned, to prevent, as was alleged, their becoming a prey to the rebels. But the difarming of their owners tended to weaken the royal caufe; and piftols of high value, fuppofed to have perifhed in this conflagration, were feen afterwards in the poffeffion of military gentlemen. While the garrison was preparing for flight, to escape from the victorious rebels, whofe onfet was expected, a guard was placed on the bridge to prevent any people from leaving the town until it fhould have been previously evacuated by the troops. By this management the whole multitude of fugitive women, difarmed men, and children of the loyalift party was deftined to fall into the hands of the enemy, if they had arrived. What could be the motive? To expect that thus would be prevented the intelligence

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CHAP. of defeat, which was carried by various roads, from being propagated northward, would be abfolutely childish. To leave a helpless people a prey for the foe, to impede purfuit, would be as ufelefs as cruel. On the retreat of the garrifon, before day, in the morning of the fifth of June, the rebel force at Gorey might have feized Arklow, purfued the fugitive troops to Wicklow, which muft in that cafe have been abandoned to their encreafing multitude, continued their courfe to Bray, and thence to the immediate vicinity of the capital, in which and the neighbouring counties many thousands awaited fuch a fignal to rife in arms.

The dreaful state of things, to which misconduct on one fide had left the kingdom expofed, was fortunately prevented by mifconduct on the other. The opportunity was neglected: Arklow remained unmolested, though defenfelefs: the fugitive garrifon was remanded to its poft: fome other troops followed; and, at the critical moment, the day of attack, arrived the fencible regiment of Durham, commanded by colonel Skerrett, a brave and accomplished officer, to whom Ireland is indebted for the defense of this then most important ftation. The royal force confifted of fixteen hundred men, arranged in lines, with artillery in front, fo as to cover three fides of the town, the fourth of which was guarded by the Ovoca river. The army of the affailants amounted to above twenty thoufand, of whom four or five thousand carried guns, but were very fcantily furnished with ammunition, the want

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of which is affigned as the cause of their four days CHAP. delay at Gorey. The approach of a column, which advanced by the fea fhore, was fo rapid, that a part of it entered, and fired what is called the Fishery, composed of thatched cabins inhabited by fishermen. A guard of yeomen cavalry, ftationed in that quarter, had no other means of escape than galloping through the flames; and moft of them were fo terrified that they stopped not their flight till they had croffed, by fwimming their horfes, at the extreme peril of. drowning, the broad ftream of the Ovoca. This body of affailants was easily repulsed; but, if a great force had been directed to that point, the town very probably would have been taken.

Happily, to the rebel force, where the main attack was directed, the most efficient part of the royal army was oppofed, the Durham regiment, whofe line extended across the fields, in front of the barrack, to the road leading from Gorey. General Needham, the firft in command, had with laudable attention to the object of defenfe, given difcretionary orders to colonel Skerrett to exert his abilities and fkill to the best of his judgement. As the rebels at first poured their fire from the fhelter of ditches, where they could be little affected by the oppofite fire of the foldiery, Skerrett commanded his men to stand with ordered arms, their left wing covered by a breast-work, their right by a natural rifing of the ground, until the enemy, leaving their cover, fhould advance to an open attack. Thrice was made this attack with fuch impetuofity, that the affailants

rufhed

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CHAP. rufhed within a few yards of the cannons' mouths: but they were received with fo clofe and effective a fire as to be repulfed with great flaughter in every attempt. During the whole engagement, which lafted four hours, from about four o'clock in the afternoon, this regiment maintained as perfectly unbroken ranks as at parade, though fometimes obliged to fhift its ground, to avoid being enfiladed by a cannon, which was fo well directed by Efmond Kyan, a chief among the infurgents, that by a fhot from it the carriage of one of the battalion guns was broken. At length general Needham, who had difplayed all the perfonal courage which could be useful in his place, perhaps apprehenfive that the pikemen of the affailants, none of whom had hitherto come into action, might, under the fhadow of the near approaching night, make, as was far from impoffible, an irrefiftible onfet, fent to notify to Skerrett the expediency of arranging matters for a retreat. The latter returned a determinate answer in the negative, declaring that in that cafe all would be loft. Fortunately nocturnal fighting was not in the plan of these infurgents, who, exhaufted of ammunition, and difcouraged by the fall of Michael Murphy, a priest, their principal commander, ceafed from combat as foon as darkness came, and retired unpurfued toward Gorey.

As the rebels could not without fruitlefs danger be molefted in their retreat by the garrifon, they had fufficient leisure to carry away their wounded. Confequently their lofs is unknown, but may have

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amounted to three or four hundred. Of the royal CHAP. troops also the number of killed and wounded is unknown to me, except of the Durham regiment, which out of three hundred and fixty loft twenty men. The importance of this repulse can be fully appreciated only by thofe, who know in what state the country then was, the general indifcipline then prevalent in the royal army here, and the danger to which the capital would have been expofed, if the infurgents had gained Arklow and followed the blow.