We Shipped for the Barbadoes.” 345 
KINSALE. 
And in the winter of 1601—2 the aid came. A considerable force 
of Spaniards landed at Kinsale. The Lord Deputy collected what English and 
Irish troops he could and the few loyal or pseudo-loyal clans headed by the 
Barry, by the O’Brien, Karl of Thomond, and by the High Burke, Lord 
Clanricarde, and besieged the town. The Confederate chiefs marched 
from the North, O’Donnell by the most astounding marches any army 
ever made in winter with carriage, and blockaded the Deputy in his 
disease-smitten camp. Nearly all Munster, Gaelic and Norman, prepared 
to rise to join them. The pseudo-loyal watched the issue. A night 
attack was planned in conjunction with the Spanish commander., What 
exactly happened no one can say with confidence. One account says the two 
great Ulster dynasts quarrelled for the first time for precedence in the charge. 
Another says they went astray in the night march. Perhaps one Brian 
MacMahon of the Dartry really did betray the design to Carew for old sake’s 
sake and more recent gratitude fora bottle of whisky. Morbid conditions 
always breed such vermin and in Ireland they have never been conspicuous 
by absence. Still, usquebagh has also been plentiful at all times, and was 
likely to be less scarce with the rebel chiefs than with the hard pressed 
eputy. At all events when morning dawned the attack had miscarried and 
the Ulster forces were struggling ina bog. Mountjoy dealt his counter-stroke, 
broke the hesitating and scattered clans in bloody disorder if not rout. 
They rallied at Inishannon eight miles away but decided to await better aid 
from Spain rather than again attack, and Kinsale surrendered. If 
ever there was a decisive battle of the world one was fought on that raw 
December morning of 1691 at Kinsale. There the feeble and expiring 
bantling of the British Empire was saved from destruction. The chiefs had 
never been beaten before. Mountjoy’s army was reduced to half by disease 
and desertion. Of the remnant the Irish majority was ready to change sides. 
The Ulster forces were better disciplined, equally equipped and better led 
hitherto, than the High Queen’s troops, Had there been any other issue of that 
fatal night attack we should be now speaking Dutch in Demerara and plan- 
ning a trip to Amsterdam for the holidays. 
O'Donnell handed over his command to his brother Rory and went 
oversea to Spain for aid, obtained it but died of poison by the hand 
of Carew’ envoy. O'Neill who was wounded retreated sullenly 
northward and fought on for two years. His allies fell away. 
Ulster’s sons forsook their strong one. Even Rory O'Donnell after a gallant 
fight was forced to make a separate peace. O’Neill’s chief Urraght, or 
tributary chief, ‘O’Cahan, Lord of the great county of Derry, was bought by 
the Government by the offer of independence of his tribal lord. But none, 
bought or unbought, would betray the prince of Ulster. The land was wasted 
from end to end. The crops were cut down by Mountjoy’s armies, the cattle 
driven off and the people starved to death in large numbers. In the words 
of Aubrey de Vere, written of the Desmond War but equally appropriate 
here|:— 
