When in 1998, whilst visiting relatives in Ireland, I set my eyes upon “The year of Liberty - The great Irish rebellion of 1798” I knew I was going to be hooked on the subject. Over the years the members of our club have put up with this obsession of mine and together we’ve fought most of the major engagements on the wargames table, all except Vinegar Hill. This is mainly because I’ve had to wait until my figure collection was big enough and also due to the fact that I wanted to construct a purpose built hill for the occasion. Well not so much a hill but the entire area around Enniscorthy where the battle was fought so that it would fit on a 12ft x 6ft table.
The upshot of all of this has been a 3 week epic game that nearly but not quite turned the tables on history. So here it is the full autopsy of the battle of vinegar hill.
Background to the battle
In the late 1790’s the movement known as the United Irishmen (UI) had flourished as a political movement but because of its sympathies towards the emancipation of Irish Catholics it was forced to become an armed underground movement.
In December 1796 the French attempted to land 15,000 troops at Bantry bay in an effort to support a planned rising by the United Irishmen but the landing failed due to a winter storm and the rising was aborted.
The Irish Government, now unnerved by the fact that they could have had an armed insurrection on their hands, went to extreme lengths to find out who the rebel leaders were and over the next 18 months also attempted to suppress the movement. Through a combination of torturing suspects and the free quartering troops, which became known as the “Dragooning of Ulster”, it revealed large arsenals of Muskets and Pikes that the rebels had been stock piling and it looked like the movement was on the verge of collapse. With most of the leadership in prison and in an act of desperation the remaining council members launched what was initially a limited and uncoordinated rising in the eastern counties of Ireland.
The initial outbreak started on 23rd May and was confined to a ring of counties surrounding Dublin. Crown forces had largely suppressed these and secured the capital when news arrived on 29th May that County Wexford had risen. 1000 rebels had routed 100 men of the North Cork Militia in an open engagement at Oulart hill. This small victory was enough to swell their ranks to some 15,000. The outbreak was unexpected because the government had thought that Wexford was an inactive county and thus the garrison had only numbered a few hundred men.
Under the command of Father Murphy the rebel army stormed the town of Enniscorthy and then after destroying a relief column sent from Duncannon fort at the battle of Three rocks, captured the administrative centre of Wexford, Wexford town. The fall of Wexford was the highpoint of the rebellion with the UI ranks estimated to have swollen to over 35,000.
Whilst the outbreak in Wexford had been going on the commander in Chief of Ireland General Lake had been contending with yet another outbreak, this time in the North of Ireland because in early June Ulster rose. Culminating at the battle of Ballynahinch the rebels were defeated allowing General Lake to concentrate all his efforts on crushing the rebellion in Wexford.
During this period the rebel' campaign in Wexford had met with devastating defeats at New Ross, Arklow and Newtownbarry and these had the effect of corralling them within the county. However, the rebels were still in a strong position holding their own against continued attempts by the Crown Forces to break into County Wexford such as at the battles of Tuberneering and Foulksmill.
In the absence of their commander in Chief, the Reverend Philip Roche who was fighting in the west of county Wexford, the rebel council in Wexford town determined that the only way to settle matters was to have a major confrontation with the crown forces that were mustering on the borders of Wexford and it was decided that a stand would be made on Vinegar Hill. The decision to withdraw troops from the borders of Wexford was seen by many as the wrong thing to do but even after much opposition the decision made by the council prevailed and the army was ordered to fall back. This manoeuvre effectively lost all the gains the rebels had made in Wexford and would allow the Crown Forces to advance unchallenged.
In the mean time General Lake had been formulating a plan in which six Brigades would “Beat the rebels before them as on a grouse shoot then surround and destroy them”. Misinterpreting the rebel withdrawal to Vinegar Hill as an all out retreat General Lake must have thought that his plan had had an almost immediate effect without his men even firing a shot.
General Lake was confident that a well disciplined military force could easily beat an undisciplined “rabble” as had already been seen during previous engagements early on in the campaign at Antrim, Ballynahinch and Tara Hill where the Rebels had melted away once they came under organized Artillery and volley fire.
However, the United Irish in Wexford had had a month of continuous fighting in which to hone their military skills and they weren’t the undisciplined rabble that Lake perceived them to be. For the United Irish the battle of Vinegar hill was not about holding onto the hill but about defeating the crown forces in one last great battle and from this point on I shall move away from the historical account and explain how the game unfolded.
During this narrative you shall here me refer to the “English” as Crown forces. I’ve done this because firstly Ireland was not part of the Union at this point in time and secondly there were very few English troops involved most of them being Scottish Fencible units, Irish Militia or Yeomanry.
by Steve Cast
Bibliography
The Wexford rising in 1798. It’s causes and course
Charles Dickenson
ISBN 0-09-478390-X
Ireland 1798 the battles
Art Kavanagh
ISBN 0-9524785-4-4
The memoirs of Myles Byrne Vol 1
Myles Byrne
ISBN 978-1110971879
The Irish Militia 1793 – 1802. Irelands forgotten army
Ivan F. nelson
ISBN 9-781846-82073
An Ascendancy Army. The Irish Yeomanry 1796 - 1834
Allan Blackstock
ISBN 1-85182-329-8
The year of Liberty. The great Irish rebellion of 1798
Thomas Pakenman
ISBN 1-85799-050-1
The year of Liberty. The great Irish rebellion of 1798 illustrated edition
Thomas Pakenman
ISBN 0-297-82386-8
Royal Irish regiment of Artillery
Major J.J Crooks
ISBN 9-78184-5741-730
The Wexford insurgents of ’98 and their march into Meath
Eamon Doyle
No ISBN
