26 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, 



de Serrant tlie regiment maintairLed its old traditions down to tlie 

 Revolution, Tvlien it merged ia the 92nd Eegiment of the Army 

 of France. But its officers ^rere still, for the most part, Irishmen, 

 and on the fall of the Uouxhons, it was natural that the representatives 

 of a traditional loyalty to hereditary right should prefer the Fleur-de- 

 lys to the Tricolor. The successors of those who had refused to 

 concur in the English Eevolution were too proud of their consistent 

 loyalty to he content to accept the French one. Almost without 

 exception its officers followed their Colonel, Count "^alsh, in his refusal 

 to serve under the banner of the Eepublic, and were among those who, 

 in 1794, accepted with alacrity the invitation conveyed to the Colonels 

 of the three surviving regiments of Dillon, Berwick, and TTalsh by 

 the Duke of Portland, to take service under the British Crown under 

 the title of the Irish Brigade.^ It was intended that the regiment 

 should be placed upon the Irish Establishment, and be recruited 

 exclusively in Ireland for service abroad ; and its officers came over to 

 raise a fresh corps in Ireland. But the times were out of joint for 

 such an enterprise. The emigrant officers found Ireland in a turmoil 

 of agitation, which had much more in common with the France of the 

 Eevolution than with that of the ancien regime, and their efforts were 

 almost entirely unsuccessful. The Eebellion of 1798 quickly follow- 

 ing, put a final end to whatever hopes might have previously been 

 entertained, by filling the English G-ovemment with misgivings as to 

 the use to which an Irish Catholic Brigade might possibly be turned 

 in spite of the unquestioned loyalty of its leaders. Eecruits being 

 forthcoming in quite insufficient numbers, it was found necessary to 

 amalgamate the regiments forming the Brigade, with the result that no 

 place remained for many of the returned officers. TTeak and insufficient 

 in numbers the corps was sent to Xorth America and the "West Indies, 

 but it was found impossible to maintain the Brigade as an independent 

 organization, and within a few years it had ceased to exist. 



This last chapter in the history of the regiment is a sad one. ITaking 

 every allowance for the exacerbation of feeling at the time, the treat- 

 ment accorded to the returned officers was little creditable to Irishmen 

 of any shade of opinion ; whilst the conduct of the War Office in regard 

 to their pay and allowances was equally deserving of disapproval. 

 Wolfe Tone, in his Joiimal for 1796, describes how the officers 

 intending to go to Mass on Christmas Day in full uniform were 

 obliged to give up the idea for fear of being hustled by the populace 



1 See note added in the Press. 



