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Tag Archives: Murrough O’Brien (1st Earl of Inchiquin)


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Death of Terence O’Brien, Catholic Bishop of Emly

Terence Albert O’Brien (Irish: Muiris Ó Briain Aradh), Irish priest of the Dominican Order and Roman Catholic Bishop of Emly, dies on October 30, 1651.

O’Brien is born into the Gaelic nobility of Ireland at Cappamore, County Limerick in 1601. Both of his parents are from the derbhfine of the last Chief of the Name of Clan O’Brien Arradh and claim lineal descent from Brian Boru. His family owns an estate of 2,500 Irish acres centered around Tuogh, which is later confiscated by the Commonwealth of England. He joins the Dominicans in 1621 at Limerick, where his uncle, Maurice O’Brien, is then prior. He takes the name “Albert” after the Dominican scholar Albertus Magnus. In 1622, he goes to study in Toledo, Spain, returning eight years later to become prior at St. Saviour’s in Limerick. In 1643, he is provincial of the Dominicans in Ireland. In 1647, he is consecrated Bishop of Emly by Giovanni Battista Rinuccini.

During the Irish Confederate Wars, like most Irish Catholics, O’Brien sides with Confederate Ireland. His services to the Catholic Confederation are highly valued by the Supreme Council. He treats the wounded and supports Confederate soldiers throughout the conflict. He is against a peace treaty that does not guarantee Catholic freedom of worship in Ireland and in 1648 signs the declaration against the Confederate’s truce with Murrough O’Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin, who has committed atrocities such as the Sack of Cashel against Catholic clergy and civilians, and the declaration against the Protestant royalist leader, James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond, in 1650 who, due to his failure to resist the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland is not deemed fit to command Catholic troops. He is one of the prelates, who, in August 1650 offers the Protectorate of Ireland to Charles IV, Duke of Lorraine.

In 1651, Limerick is besieged and O’Brien urges a resistance that infuriates the Ormondists and Parliamentarians. Following surrender, he is found ministering to the wounded and ill inside a temporary plague hospital. As previously decided by the besieging army, O’Brien is denied quarter and protection. Along with Alderman Thomas Stritch and English Royalist officer Colonel Fennell, he is tried by a drumhead court-martial and sentenced to death by New Model Army General Henry Ireton. On October 30, 1651, O’Brien is first hanged at Gallows Green and then posthumously beheaded. His severed head is afterward displayed spiked upon the river gate of the city.

After the successful fight that is eventually spearheaded by Daniel O’Connell for Catholic emancipation between 1780 and 1829, interest revives as the Catholic Church in Ireland is rebuilding after three hundred years of being strictly illegal and underground. As a result, a series of re-publications of primary sources relating to the period of the persecutions and meticulous comparisons against archival Government documents in London and Dublin from the same period are made by Daniel F. Moran and other historians.

The first Apostolic Process under Canon Law begins in Dublin in 1904, after which a positio is submitted to the Holy See.

In the February 12, 1915 Apostolic decree, In Hibernia, heroum nutrice, Pope Benedict XV formally authorizes the formal introduction of additional Causes for Roman Catholic Sainthood.

During a further Apostolic Process held in Dublin between 1917 and 1930 and against the backdrop of the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War, the evidence surrounding 260 alleged cases of Roman Catholic martyrdom are further investigated, after which the findings are again submitted to the Holy See.

On September 27, 1992, O’Brien and sixteen other Irish Catholic Martyrs are beatified by Pope John Paul II. June 20th, the anniversary of the 1584 execution of Elizabethan era martyr Dermot O’Hurley, is assigned as the feast day of all seventeen. A large backlighted portrait of him is on display in St. Michael’s Church, Cappamore, County Limerick, which depicts him during The Siege of Limerick.


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Death of Rory O’Moore, Organizer of the Irish Rebellion of 1641

Sir Rory O’Moore (Irish: Ruaidhrí Ó Mórdha), Irish politician and landowner also known Sir Roger O’Moore or O’More or Sir Roger Moore, dies in obscurity on February 16, 1655. He is most notable for being one of the four principal organizers of the Irish Rebellion of 1641.

O’Moore belongs to an ancient Irish noble family descended from Conall Cernach. He is born in either County Laois, around 1600, or more likely at Balyna, his father’s estate in County Kildare.

O’Moore’s uncle, Rory O’More, Lord of Laois, had fought against the English during the Tudor conquest of Ireland. In 1556, Queen Mary I confiscates the O’Mores’ lands and creates “Queens County” (modern-day County Laois). Over 180 family members, who are peaceful and have taken no part in any rebellion, are murdered with virtually all of the leaders of Laois and Offaly by the English at a feast at Mullaghmast, County Kildare, in 1577. Rory Óg and his wife Maighréad O’Byrne, sister of Fiach MacHugh O’Byrne, are hunted down and killed soon afterwards. This leads to the political downfall of the O’Moore family as their estates are given to English settlers.

Given the causes of the rebellion and the Crown’s weakness during the Bishops’ Wars into 1641, O’Moore plans a bloodless coup to overthrow the English government in Ireland. With Connor Maguire, 2nd Baron of Enniskillen, he plans to seize Dublin Castle, which is held by a small garrison, on October 23, 1641. Allies in Ulster led by Sir Phelim O’Neill are to seize forts and towns there. The leaders are to assume the governing of their own country and with this provision offer allegiance to King Charles. They are betrayed, and the plan is discovered on October 22 and the rising fails in its first objective. O’Neill has some success, and O’Moore quickly succeeds in creating an alliance between the Ulster Gaelic clans and the Old English gentry in Leinster.

In November 1641, the Irish forces besiege Drogheda, and a royalist force comes north from Dublin to oppose them. O’Moore is one of the leaders of the rebel army that intercepts and defeats the relief force at the Battle of Julianstown on November 29.

In the ensuing Irish Confederate Wars, a major achievement by O’Moore is to recruit Owen Roe O’Neill from the Spanish service in 1642. He commands the Confederate forces in what is now County Laois and County Offaly, which remain peaceful, and helps arrange alliances with Murrough O’Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin, in 1647 and James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond, in 1648. The resulting larger alliance fails to stop the Cromwellian invasion of Ireland (1649–53) in which an estimated third of the Irish population dies.

The Irish historian Charles Gavan Duffy writes: “Then a private gentleman, with no resources beyond his intellect and his courage, this Rory, when Ireland was weakened by defeat and confiscation, and guarded with a jealous care constantly increasing in strictness and severity, conceived the vast design of rescuing the country from England, and even accomplished it; for, in three years, England did not retain a city in Ireland but Dublin and Drogheda, and for eight years the land was possessed and the supreme authority exercised by the Confederation created by O’Moore. History contains no stricter instance of the influence of an individual mind.”

Bishop Michael Comerford writes that after O’Moore’s defeat at the Battle of Kilrush in April 1642 he retires and dies in Kilkenny city in the winter of 1642–43, having co-founded the Irish Catholic Confederation there a few months earlier. However, this ignores his contacts with Inchiquin and Ormonde in 1647–48.

In 1652, O’Moore goes to Inishbofin off the coast of Galway, one of the last Catholic strongholds, but as the parliamentary forces approach, he makes arrangements to flee. Walter Lynch, Bishop of Clonfert, sails in the last ship to leave the island without waiting for O’Moore, who is forced to make his own way. He finally escapes into Ulster but dies in obscurity on February 16, 1655. He is buried at Steryne churchyard, in the parish of Magilligan, County Londonderry.

St. Colman’s Church on the island once bears a tablet with the inscription: “In memory of many valiant Irishmen who were exiled to this Holy Island and in particular Rory O’More a brave chieftain of Leix, who after fighting for Faith and Fatherland, disguised as a fisherman escaped from his island to a place of safety. He died shortly afterwards, a martyr to his Religion and his County, about 1653. He was esteemed and loved by his countrymen, who celebrated his many deeds of valour and kindness in their songs and reverenced his memory, so that it was a common expression among them; ‘God and Our Lady be our help and Rory O’More’.”

O’More marries Jane Barnewall, daughter of Sir Patrick Barnewall, of Donabate, County Dublin, and his second wife Mary Bagenal. They had two sons and four daughters. His daughter Anne marries Patrick Sarsfield from an Old English Catholic family from The Pale. His grandsons include Patrick Sarsfield, 1st Earl of Lucan, who leads a Jacobite force in the Williamite War in Ireland, and his brother William Sarsfield, whose descendants include all the Earls of Lucan and the 4th and all subsequent Earls Spencer, through which O’More is an ancestor to Diana, Princess of Wales.

The Balyna estate is inherited from Calvagh O’More by Rory’s brother Lewis. Balyna is passed down to Lewis’s last surviving O’More descendant, Letitia, who is also descended from Rory O’More because her grandfather married a second cousin. Letitia marries a Richard Farrell in 1751. This Farrell family henceforth takes the surname More O’Ferrall.

The Rory O’More Bridge in Dublin is renamed after him. The film Rory O’More, made by the Kalem Company in 1911, directed by Sidney Olcott and Robert G. Vignola, sets O’More’s rebellion in 1798 rather than the 17th century, and moves the action to the Lakes of Killarney.


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The Battle of Knocknanauss

The Battle of Knocknanauss is fought on November 13, 1647, during the Irish Confederate Wars, part of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, between Confederate Ireland’s Munster army and an English Parliamentarian army under Murrough O’Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin. The battle results in a crushing defeat for the Irish Confederates.

In the summer of 1647, Murrough O’Brien (later created the Earl of Inchiquin), commander of the English Parliamentarian forces in Cork, ravages and burns the Confederate territory in Munster. This causes severe food shortages and earns O’Brien the Irish nickname, Murchadh na d’Tóiteán (Murrough the Burner). In addition, Inchiquinn takes the Rock of Cashel, which is garrisoned by Confederate troops and rich in emotive religious symbolism. In the sack of the castle, O’Brien’s troops massacre the garrison and all the clergy they find there.

The Confederates’ Munster army is incapable of stopping O’Brien because of political infighting between officers who support a deal with the English Royalists and those who reject such a deal. Eventually, in reaction to the sack of Cashel and famine conditions, the Confederate Supreme Council replaces Donough MacCarthy, 2nd Viscount Muskerry, as commander of the Munster army with Theobald Taaffe, 1st Earl of Carlingford, and order him to bring O’Brien to battle.

Taaffe is an English Catholic and not an experienced soldier. Although he has an excellent contingent of veteran troops under Alasdair Mac Colla, most of his men are similarly inexperienced. Furthermore, the Irish troops are demoralised by the internal factionalism in their ranks and most of them have little loyalty to Taafe. O’Brien, on the other hand, has been commanding his force since 1642 and is well experienced in battle. His troops are a mixture of well trained Parliamentarian soldiers from England and British settlers who have been driven from their homes in the Irish Rebellion of 1641. The two armies meet at Knocknanuss near Mallow, approximately 29 kilometers north of Cork.

The battle that follows is essentially an uncoordinated rout of the Irish forces. Taaffe positions his men on either side of a hill, so that they cannot see one another. The result is that one wing of the Confederate army has no idea of what the other wing is doing. Mac Colla’s men charge the Parliamentarians opposite them putting them to flight and killing a large number of them. Thinking the battle is over, they then take to looting the enemy’s baggage train.

However, on the other wing, O’Brien’s cavalry has charged the raw Irish horsemen, causing them to run away. Despite Taaffe’s desperate attempt to rally them, the Irish infantry follow suit, many of them being cut down by the pursuing roundheads. The pursuit continues for miles and not only results in heavy casualties among the Irish, but also in the loss of most of their equipment and supplies. Inchiquin loses several senior officers, including the Judge-Advocate, Sir Robert Travers. Mac Colla and his men surrender when they realise what has happened but are subsequently killed by their captors. Around 3,000 Confederates die at Knocknanauss, and up to 1,000 English Parliamentarians. The carnage does not stop after the fighting is finished. The next day a couple of hundred Irish soldiers are found sheltering in a nearby wood. These are promptly put to the sword.

When combined with the Battle of Dungan‘s Hill in County Meath, the defeat leads to the collapse of the Confederate Catholic cause and forces them to make a deal with the English Royalists.


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The Sack of Cashel

rock-of-cashel

The Sack of Cashel (also known as the Massacre of Cashel) is a notorious atrocity which occurs in County Tipperary on September 15, 1647, during the Irish Confederate Wars, part of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms.

In the summer of 1647, Murrough O’Brien, 6th Baron Inchiquin, the Irish Protestant commander of the Protestant army of Cork, commences a campaign against the Irish Catholic strongholds in Munster. The counties of Limerick and Clare are raided, and he soon turns his attention to the bountiful eastern counties of Munster. In early September, his forces quickly take the Cahir Castle in Tipperary. This strong castle is well positioned to become a base for the Cork Protestant army, and it is used to raid and devastate the surrounding countryside. The Munster army under Lord Taaffe does not make any serious effort to oppose Inchiquin, probably the result of the political scheming of Donough MacCarty, 2nd Viscount Muskerry and other powerful Irish lords who hope to keep the Munster army intact for their own ends. As such, Inchiquin is allowed to make a major push towards the town and ecclesiastical centre of Cashel.

Inchiquin has already launched two minor raids against Cashel, and he now has the opportunity to launch a major assault. The Parliamentarian forces first storm nearby Roche Castle, putting fifty warders to the sword. This attack terrifies the local inhabitants of the region, some of whom flee to hiding places, while hundreds of others flee promptly to the Rock of Cashel, a stronger place than the town itself. Lord Taaffe has placed six companies in the fortified churchyard that sits upon the rock, and considers the place defensible, though he himself does not stay to put it to the test, leaving command to the Governor Lieutenant-Colonel Butler.

Arriving with his army at the Rock, Inchiquin calls for surrender within an hour. The defenders of the churchyard offer to negotiate but that is refused, and on the afternoon of September 15 the assault commences. The Parliamentarians are first reminded of earlier atrocities against Protestants, and then begin to deploy. The attack is led by around 150 dismounted horse officers with the remainder of the infantry following. Troops of horse ride along the flanks of the advancing force to encourage the infantry. The Irish soldiers attempt to drive off the attackers with pikes while the civilians inside hurl rocks down from the walls. In turn the attackers hurl firebrands into the compound, setting some of the buildings inside on fire. Although many are wounded, the Parliamentarians gradually fight their way over the walls, pushing the garrison into the church.

Initially, the Irish defenders manage to protect the Church, holding off the attackers trying to get through the doors, but the Parliamentarians then place numerous ladders against the many windows in the church and swarm the building. For another half an hour fighting rages inside the church, until the depleted defenders retreat up the bell tower. Only sixty soldiers of the garrison remain at this point, and they thus accept a call to surrender. However, after they have descended the tower and thrown their swords away, all are killed.

In the end all the soldiers and most of the civilians on the Rock are killed by the attackers. The Bishop and Mayor of Cashel along with a few others survive by taking shelter in a secret hiding place. Apart from these a few women are spared, after being stripped of their clothes, and a small number of wealthy civilians are taken prisoner, but these are the exceptions. Overall, close to 1,000 are killed, amongst them Lieutenant-Colonel Butler and catholic scholar Theobald Stapleton. The bodies in the churchyard are described by a witness as being five or six deep.

The slaughter is followed by extensive looting. There is much of value inside, for apart from pictures, chalices and vestments of the church, many of the slain civilians had also brought their valuables with them. The sword and ceremonial mace of the mayor of Cashel, as well as the coach of the bishop are captured. The plunder is accompanied by acts of iconoclasm, with statues smashed and pictures defaced. The deserted town of Cashel is also torched.

The atrocity at Cashel causes a deep impact in Ireland, as it is the worst single atrocity committed in Ireland since the start of fighting in 1641. Previously, the most infamous massacre amongst the Catholic population is that at Timolin in 1643, when 200 civilians are killed by James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond‘s English Royalist army, but many more than this are killed at Cashel, and the Rock of Cashel is one of the chief holy places of Ireland. The slaughter of the garrison at Cashel and the subsequent devastation of Catholic held Munster earns Inchiquin the Irish nickname, Murchadh na Dóiteáin or “Murrough of the Burnings.”


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The Battle of Rathmines

The Battle of Rathmines is fought in and around what is now the Dublin suburb of Rathmines on August 2, 1649, during the Irish Confederate Wars. It is fought between an English Parliamentarian army under Michael Jones which holds Dublin and an army composed of Irish Confederate and English Royalist troops under the command of the James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond.

By 1649, Ireland has already been at war for eight years, since the outbreak of the Irish Rebellion of 1641. The English Parliament holds only two small enclaves, Dublin and Derry, in Ireland.

In July 1649, Ormond, marches his coalition forces of 11,000 men to the outskirts of Dublin with the intent of taking the city from its Parliamentary garrison, which had landed there in 1647. Ormond takes Rathfarnham Castle and camps at Palmerston Park in Rathgar, about 4 km south of the city. The area from Ormond’s camp to the city of Dublin is now a heavily urbanised area, but in 1649, it is open countryside. Ormond begins inching his forces closer to Dublin by taking the villages around its perimeter and to this end, sends a detachment of troops to occupy Baggotrath Castle, on the site of present-day Baggot Street bridge. For reasons which have never been clear, they take several hours to reach Baggotrath, a distance of about a mile, and they arrive to find that the Parliamentary troops have already occupied the castle.

However, Ormond is not expecting Michael Jones, the Parliamentary commander, to take the initiative and has not drawn up his troops for battle. Unfortunately for the Royalists, this is exactly what Jones does, launching a surprise attack on August 2 from the direction of Irishtown with 5,000 men and sending Ormond’s men at Baggotsrath reeling backwards towards their camp in confusion.

Too late, Ormond and his commanders realise what is going on and send units into action piecemeal to try to hold up the Parliamentarian advance, so that they can form their army into battle formation. However, Jones’ cavalry simply outflanks each force sent against them, sending them too fleeing back south through the townland of Rathmines. The battle becomes a rout as scores of fleeing Royalist and Confederate soldiers are cut down by the pursuing Roundheads. The fighting finally ends when the English Royalist troops under Murrough O’Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin, mounts a disciplined rearguard action, allowing the rest to get away. Ormond claims he has lost less than a thousand men. Jones claims to have killed around 4,000 Royalist or Confederate soldiers and taken 2,517 prisoners, while losing only a handful himself. Ormond certainly loses at least one leading officer, Christopher Plunkett, 2nd Earl of Fingall, who is fatally wounded and dies in Dublin Castle a few days later. Ormond also loses his entire artillery train and all his baggage and supplies.

In the aftermath of the battle, Ormond withdraws his remaining troops from around Dublin, allowing Oliver Cromwell to land in the city at Ringsend with 15,000 veteran troops on August 15. Cromwell calls the battle “an astonishing mercy,” taking it as a sign that God has approved of his conquest of Ireland. Over the next four years he completes the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland.

Without Jones’ victory at Rathmines, the New Model Army would have had no port to land at in Ireland and the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland would have been much more difficult. Ormond’s incompetent generalship at Rathmines disillusions many Irish Confederates with their alliance with the English Royalists and Ormond is ousted as commander of the Irish forces the following year.