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The Initial Phase
1793-1804
[The Grail of Catholic
Emancipation
Copyright
© 2002 by Desmond Keenan Click on links below to go the various sections; click on top to return to top of page *******************************************************************************
Aftermath of the Relief Act 1793 (January
1793 to June 1794) .....................................
The Coming of Earl Fitzwilliam (June 1794
to March 1795) ....................................... (March 1795
to June 1798) ....................................... (June 1798
to February 1801) .................................. (February 1801 to May 1804) This
chapter recounts the reactions to the passing of the Relief Act in 1793, the
expectations and disappointments caused by the appointment of Earl Fitzwilliam
as Lord Lieutenant, the various difficulties and disturbances arising from the
French Revolution and the United Irishmen leading up the passing of the Act of
Union with Aftermath of the Relief Act 1793 (January 1793 to
June 1794)
[January 1793]
The Catholic delegation from [February 1793]
Neither
Westmoreland the Lord Lieutenant nor Hobart his Secretary, were favourable to
the claims of the Catholics. In view of the international situation Pitt
hastily sent instructions to Westmoreland to bring in a generous measure for
Catholic Relief, so [April 1793]
The Catholics in the two kingdoms concurred with them, and awaited a more
propitious moment before asking for a further instalment. The Irish Catholic
Committee appointed a sub-committee to wind up its financial affairs and
dissolved itself on 23 April 1793. They stated that there was no longer a need
for a specifically Catholic body to agitate and they could take part in the
normal political process (SNL 27
April 1793). Before dissolving itself the committee remunerated its assistant
secretary the Protestant barrister Theobald Wolfe Tone. The sub-committee did
not dissolve itself, and in 1806 the treasurer, Denis Thomas O’Brien, reported
that there was still £360 in government stocks to hand (DEP 30 Dec. 1806). All the delegates to the Catholic Convention
attended the Court of King’s Bench to take the oath of allegiance. There was
great rejoicing among the Catholics at the passing of the Act. Some Catholics
were called to do service on Grand Juries. James Plunkett of Monaghan was the
first Catholic to be appointed a magistrate. Another Catholic, James Scully,
was appointed a magistrate, and deputy governor of his county, and was summoned
to Grand Jury service. Denis O’Conor of Ballinagare was made a deputy governor
of Roscommon, and his son Owen O’Conor made a magistrate. Some Catholic lawyers
like William Bellew were called to the bar. Catholics were allowed to study for
degrees in Trinity College, Dublin. The members of the late committee gave a dinner
to their supporters, the Duke of Leinster, and the new Earl of Moira. The
eighteen-year-old Daniel O’Connell was sent to the Inns of Court in London to
study for the bar. (At the age of sixteen he had been sent to study at the
English College of St. Omer in North Eastern France, and was transferred to the
College at Douai also in North Eastern France where he studied for a few months
under Dr William Poynter who was prefect of studies there. He later denied that
he was intended for the priesthood. He experienced the French Revolution at
first hand when the college was suppressed in the autumn of 1792. He returned
to Ireland in January 1793.) But
there was also a great resistance on the part of many Protestants in Ireland to
allowing the appointment of Catholics to those posts to which they now had
access. While eight Catholic gentlemen were called to the county of Dublin
Grand Jury none at all were called to the city of Dublin Grand Jury. The
omission was pointed. Several Catholic merchants petitioned to be made freemen
of the Corporation of Dublin but all were rejected. In Galway however several
were made freemen of the corporation of Galway city. Some of the trade guilds
of Dublin, like that of the Tailors, admitted Catholic tailors to their guild, but
others like the Shoemakers did not. Those Catholics who were admitted to the
freedom of some guilds were refused the freedom of Dublin by the city’s Common
Council. Several Catholics were admitted to the freedom of Galway. It was not
necessary to be a freeman of a guild to become a freeman of the city. In fact,
tradesmen were normally admitted as freemen of the city first by the mayor, and
afterwards to the freedom of their respective guilds (SNL 31 Oct. 1793). . Edward Byrne, the leader of the Catholics in
Dublin, a very rich merchant, was rejected by the guild of Merchants. The
reason for the rejection by 67 votes to 63 was given by Sir Edward Newenham,
that if Catholics were admitted to the guilds they would elect only Catholic
mayors and sheriffs and all Protestants would be put out of their jobs. By
October 1793, the editor of Saunders
Newsletter considered that the Act would have to be amended. From
the very start it was clear that the greatest resistance not only to granting
further Catholic claims, but of allowing them their rights under the existing
laws came from the corporations of towns and cities. The ‘Orange’ or
‘Ascendancy’ faction had its deepest roots in the corporations. The reason was
that they expected that the Catholics would not only replace them in their
offices, but would also exercise the patronage connected with the various posts
to appoint only their friends and relatives. This was a very important, if
rarely acknowledged factor in Irish life where who you knew was always more important
than what you knew. While aristocratic leaders like the Earl of Fingall or Sir
Edward Bellew had no intention of being other than completely impartial we can
assume that the popular faction led first by Keogh and later by O’Connell fully
intended replacing Protestants with Catholics whenever they could. Resistance
to Catholic claims was fuelled less by bigotry than by self-preservation. Wolfe
Tone, the former assistant secretary to the Catholic Committee, had a different
grievance, that when the vote was extended to the forty-shilling freeholders,
no change in the manner of electing to parliament had been made. Tone was a
strange character. His grandfather had been in the service of Arthur Wolfe,
hence Wolf Tone’s name. He was the son of a wealthy Dublin coachmaker who sent
him the Trinity College, Dublin for his education. He became a lazy and
ignorant barrister who had proposed various schemes to the British Government
for founding colonies (with Tone as governor of course) which were politely
rejected (DNB). He turned to politics
instead. Neither the Whig nor Tory parties would offer him a seat, nor could he
afford to purchase one, nor to fight a contested election. He could see no hope
of advancement unless Ireland was completely separate from England. This idea
was stimulated by the outbreak of the French Revolution, and the fact that its
principles were spreading among the Presbyterians in the north of Ireland. Tone
gradually became a republican, and joined those in Belfast who celebrated the
anniversary of the fall of the Bastille. He aimed at uniting Presbyterians and
Catholics to fight if necessary for full independence. He was helped in this by
the Catholic leader John Keogh who secured for him the post of assistant
secretary to the Catholic Committee. Keogh had succeeded in getting Richard
Burke, son of Edmund Burke, dismissed. Tone discharged this post with
satisfaction, though he contributed little overall to the passing of the Relief
Act. But the association with Tone, even in this limited way, was to prove very
disadvantageous to the Catholics, for grounds were given for confusing
agitation by the Catholics for civil rights with a secret conspiracy to
overthrow the Government. Keogh was oblivious to the difficulties that his
association with Tone brought to the Catholics. But like many members of the
United Irishmen themselves he was ignorant of Tone’s real intentions. The
United Irishmen were originally mostly Whig Protestants from the North of
Ireland. They were inspired partly by the Volunteer movement of the 1780’s and
partly by democratic principles springing from the French Revolution. The
society was originally just another of the Whig clubs who followed the
principles of Charles James Fox. It was founded by a group that included Tone,
William Drennan, Thomas Neilson, Samuel Neilson, Henry Joy McCracken, and
Thomas Russell. Tone, with the help of Drennan, developed a similar club in
Dublin. When they were formed in 1791 their objectives and methods were
entirely constitutional: to secure rights for the Catholics and a considerable
measure of reform of Parliament. At that period Belfast was perhaps the most
liberal and tolerant town in Ireland. But many of them became disillusioned
when Pitt ruled out parliamentary reform for the foreseeable future. Pitt was
influenced in this decision by the activities of French agents in England. It
was Tone’s idea to unite Protestant, Roman Catholic and Presbyterian under the
common name of Irishman. But his vision did not embrace the Orange faction against
which the others were to unite, and if necessary to slay them in battle. [July 1793] The Irish Volunteers
had held a national convention of delegates in 1783 to make demands of the
Government. The new United States held a Convention in 1787. In 1792, the
revolutionaries in France summoned a national convention. In 1793, the Catholic
Committee in Ireland summoned a national convention of delegates to demand
rights for Catholics, but it dissolved itself immediately the Relief Act was
passed. Finally, in 1793 the United Irishmen called for a National Convention.
The United Irishmen at the time were simply aiming for a reform of Parliament.
This was too much for Pitt who felt that any elected representative body other
than Parliament could be a threat to Parliament. He was at this time clamping
down on possible revolutionary movements in England, and even had the Habeas Corpus Act that guaranteed the
personal liberty of each individual suspended. His actions, as his biographer
conceded, cannot be wholly justified (DNB).
But the laws he imposed in England were much more severe than those imposed on
Ireland, where no restrictions were placed on the press. He had the Convention
Act (1793) passed by the Irish Parliament. This was introduced in the Irish
House of Lords in July. It was not aimed at the Catholic convention but at the
proposed convention of the United Irishmen whose aims were more overtly
political. The attorney general (Arthur Wolfe, Lord Kilwarden) expressly stated
that the Act was not aimed at the Catholic Convention but against another
society. But the Act was used against Catholics until 1829 every time they
attempted to show the broad base of their support by means of elected
delegates. The Act did not bother the English Catholics, or the aristocratic
Catholics in Ireland and their supporters. They were happy to pursue their aims
by the ordinary means of the time when the support of several noblemen was
regarded as more important than the support of a multitude of landless men.
(William Wilberforce pursued his highly successful campaigns against slavery
within the same constraints.) The Convention Act annoyed Keogh who had
quarrelled with the aristocracy, and later Daniel O’Connell who hated playing
second fiddle and required a popular mandate. In 1793 the Society of United
Irishmen was largely innocuous, and Keogh’s association with it was not
sinister. Like the Catholic Committee, it could have continued its campaigns in
a perfectly legal manner. But the actions of the Government directed against various
members of it and the total refusal of the Government to consider parliamentary
reform, together with the republican aspirations of some of its members, led
them to communicate with the French government and to form themselves into a
secret society within the original society. There
were sporadic outbreaks of Defenderism in the course of 1793. In June 1793
there were serious disturbances in Wexford, and Edward Hay, a Catholic
gentleman and future Catholic Secretary joined with other local gentlemen to
put them down. More of a problem was the outbreak of widespread resistance to
compulsory balloting for the militia that had been embodied at the outbreak of
the War. It was rumoured that the militia could be forced to serve overseas.
The militia was a local defence force; raised to defend their own counties, but
which could be asked to serve anywhere in Ireland. [September 1793] In
September 1793 the Protestant bishop of Winchester wrote to Sir John Coxe
Hippisley the agent of the British Government concerned with contacts with the
Papal States. He was a barrister of independent means who was residing in
Italy. The bishop expressed a desire to see closer links with the Papal States.
In October, Edmund Burke wrote to Hippisley in the same sense. In the same
month the Pope, Pius VI, decided to send a personal envoy to London. He chose a
Scottish lawyer, Charles Erskine, who had taken holy orders as a sub-deacon,
and was commonly called Monsignor Erskine. He was to bring the Pope’s thanks
for the Government’s generosity to the émigré clergy and for the British
protection of the Papal States. He was not officially received, but the
Government promised to continue its protection. Early in the War a fleet under
Admiral Hood was sent to the Mediterranean but had difficulty in getting
supplies locally. Hood approached an English gentleman, presumably Hippisley,
to ask the Pope if supplies could be purchased in the Papal States. The Pope
ordered the necessary supplies to be transported to the coast, all customs duties
to be remitted, and a discount of 40% to be allowed on the price. He also
ordered gunpowder to be supplied (Vane-Stewart, Ward I). The
idea of state provision for the Catholic clergy by the British Government rose
again in 1793. The general idea was to bind the Catholic clergy closer to the
Government, and make them less dependent financially on their parishioners. The
Irish Catholic clergy had no lands or endowments, and were entirely dependent
of contributions from their flocks. It had been proposed fifteen years earlier
by Frederick Augustus Hervey, fourth Earl of Bristol, and Protestant bishop of
Derry. It had been opposed at the time by Archbishop Troy of Dublin and
Archbishop Butler of Cashel. When the matter was raised again 1793 Troy again
opposed it. In October 1793 rumours were circulating in Dublin that the
Government intended endowing four ecclesiastical colleges, one in each
ecclesiastical province. The Irish bishops approached the Irish Secretary
(Hobart) to discuss the matter. (As the sinecure office of Irish Secretary
virtually lapsed in 1794 with the death of John Hely-Hutchinson, the term Irish
Secretary is used to refer to the Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant. The offices
were amalgamated in 1801, but from 1795 onwards the two offices were granted to
the same person.) Around
this time too those Protestants who opposed the Catholic claims, the ‘Orange’
or ‘Ascendancy’ faction, were coming to the conclusion that Protestantism in
Ireland would only be safe if there were a political union between Ireland and
the great Protestant state of England. The ‘patriot’ tide of 1782 was beginning
to recede, and conditions were becoming more favourable for Pitt’s plan for a
union of the two parliaments. [December 1793] In
December 1793 some of the leading Dublin Catholics began to prepare a petition
to have the defects of the 1793 Act emended, because the corporations were
frustrating its aims. In the event no petition was presented in 1794. [January 1794] the
execution of the French queen, Marie Antoinette, on 16th October
1793 and the commencement of the Reign of Terror (5th September 1793
to 27th July 1794) under the Committee of Public Safety, removed any
lingering doubts about the nature of French Revolution, and both Parliaments
united behind Pitt. More and more of the Whigs were attracted to Pitt’s policy
regarding France. In the Irish Parliament Henry Grattan remained in opposition
but supported the Government’s policy regarding the War. Agrarian terrorism
continued in Ireland, and some of the United Irishmen began to consider an
armed rebellion with the support of Revolutionary France. In the north of
Ireland Protestants were beginning to organise themselves against the Catholic
Defenders. [May 1794] In May Richard Brinsley Sheridan with
Fox’s support, brought forward a measure to rectify the anomaly between the
appointment of army officers in Ireland and in England. His motion seems to
have been badly drafted, and Henry Dundas the Home Secretary, said it tended to
abolish all tests and moved the previous question. (A formal motion has the
effect of terminating a debate without taking a vote.) As Dundas’s formal
motion was carried Sheridan’s failed. Saunders
Newsletter had expected that a motion
would be brought forward to close the loopholes in the 1793 Act, and in particular
to allow them to be sheriffs so that they could not be excluded by malignant
Grand Juries. But no motion was brought forward in Parliament. Neither
Westmoreland or Hobart did anything to assist the Catholics, and Pitt was
ill-advised to leave them to execute a measure to which they were opposed. Fox brought forward a motion favouring the
ending of the War but got almost no support.
[Top] The Coming of Earl Fitzwilliam (June 1794 to March
1795)
[June
1794] Despite a great naval victory on 1st June 1794 (known as
the Glorious First of June), the War was going badly for England and the army
had been defeated at Tournai. Pitt was introducing legislation of increasing
severity in England, and the Habeas
Corpus Act was virtually suspended. He wished to strengthen his majority in
Parliament, and an important group of Whigs led by the Duke of Portland agreed
to join his ministry. The ministry had to be re-organised and posts found for
the newcomers. Portland became Home Secretary. One of these Whigs, Earl
Fitzwilliam, contacted Grattan and the Ponsonby family to see if they would
support Pitt in the Irish Commons. By August rumours were rife in Dublin that
Earl Fitzwilliam was to be the new Lord Lieutenant, that the Orange faction was
out, and the Ponsonbys were in. Indeed Earl Fitzwilliam intended making George
Ponsonby attorney general. Fitzwilliam was married to Lady Charlotte Ponsonby
daughter William Ponsonby, 2nd Earl of Bessborough, and sister to
the 3rd earl. George Ponsonby was a grandson of the 1st
Earl of Bessborough in the cadet branch. Another rumour went round that the new
Irish Secretary was bringing over proposals for a new emancipation Bill. On the
28 July 1794 the execution of Robespierre marked the end of the Reign of
Terror. But the tide of war was turning in France’s favour, the Revolutionary
armies having been reorganised by Lazare Carnot the ‘Organiser of Victory’. [August 1794]
In August 1794 Fitzwilliam informed Grattan that he was indeed to be the next
Lord Lieutenant. Grattan went to London to hold discussions with the Duke of
Portland, and agreed to support the Government from the backbenches. But the
Orange faction in September 1794 also sent representatives to England. They
claimed to be the Government’s loyal supporters and said they should not be
dismissed from office to make room for appointees of Earl Fitzwilliam. The
outgoing Lord Lieutenant, the Earl of Westmoreland supported them, and wrote to
Pitt saying how much he was indebted to them, and asked that all his
appointments be allowed to stand. There is no doubt that Westmoreland intended
to support the anti-Catholic faction. But it would seem that the person who
co-ordinated the plot was John Beresford who had been managing Pitt’s affairs
in the Irish Parliament since 1784. When Fitzwilliam finally got to hear of this
he was astonished. Every new administration made its own appointments and
rewarded its own supporters. This was the principle on which the Duke of
Portland and his party had accepted office, and on which Fitzwilliam had
accepted the Lord Lieutenancy. It was inconceivable that anyone should be tied
to his predecessor’s appointments. Ponsonby was a man of great weight and
influence, and firmly attached to the crown (SNL
16 May 1795). The cabinet temporised, not wishing to lose the support of the
Orange faction who had a majority in the Irish Parliament. There was a rumour
in Dublin that they might go into opposition. Westmoreland was to be recalled
but restrictions were to be placed on Fitzwilliam’s powers of dismissal and
appointment. It was left to the Duke of Portland to explain these restrictions
to Fitzwilliam, but apparently Fitzwilliam was not paying much attention, or
was unaware of the extent of the restrictions. Among those to be retained was
the attorney general of Ireland John Toler (later first Earl of Norbury) an
unbending opponent of the Catholic claims, though Fitzwilliam had designated
Ponsonby for this job. Nor was he aware of how the Orange faction regarded the
restrictions. In September 1794 Westmoreland’s departure was announced. [November 1794]
Fitzwilliam was formally appointed on 26 November 1794. By then it was known in
Dublin that the Orange faction would not be dismissed, and it was regarded as a
mark of their triumph that Portland and Fitzwilliam did not resign. It was
however reported that Grattan had got what he wanted regarding Emancipation.
George Damer, Viscount Milton was made Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant. [December 1794]
On 23rd December 1794 a catholic meeting was held in Dublin with
Edward Byrne in the chair. As a Relief Act was expected in the next session
they wished to have a petition to Parliament for relief prepared and signed in
advance. The meeting resolved to petition ‘for the total repeal of the penal
and restrictive laws’. A committee consisting of Doctors MacNevin and Ryan, and
Messrs Byrne, MacDonnell, Braughill, Sweetman, Hamill, McCormick, and Keogh,
were appointed to supervise the presentation of the petition. This was a
meeting of the Catholics of Dublin only. The very rich merchant, Edward Byrne,
was the recognised leader of the Catholics in Dublin. Richard McCormick
described himself as Secretary of the Catholics of Dublin. Petitions were
adopted in other counties as well. [January 1795]
Earl Fitzwilliam landed in Dublin on 4th January 1795, and before he
was two days in Ireland, as he later recounted, he found how far his hands were
tied regarding appointments. On 8th January he dismissed Beresford,
Commissioner of Customs, Edward Cooke, Military Under-secretary, Wolfe, the
attorney general, and Toler, the solicitor general. One of them, Beresford,
went to Weymouth in England to explain matters as they saw them to the king in
person and was re-instated, while he was told that the resignations of Wolfe
and Toler would not be accepted. With regard to Toler, he had been informed
that he was not to be removed unless an alternative suitable post was provided
for him. As Toler, a not very learned lawyer, was later made Chief Justice of
Common Pleas (i.e. civil actions), there is little doubt that this was the way
Pitt had intended Fitzwilliam to proceed. Fitzwilliam was not distinguished for
his tact or skill in management. On 14th January Edward Byrne led a
procession of Catholic gentlemen from the Rotunda to the Castle to present
their address of welcome. The first appointment Fitzwilliam made was of his
personal secretary the Rev. Mr O’Beirne to be bishop of Ossory. It was rumoured
in Dublin that George Ponsonby was to replace Beresford, John Philpot Curran to
replace Toler, Col. Doyle to replace Cooke, and Lodge Morres to replace
Sackville Hamilton as Civil Undersecretary. The
discussions continued with the Irish Catholic bishops over the foundation of a
Catholic college, and whether the Irish bishops would accept state provision
for the clergy, and some form of royal nomination or veto, and whether the
Government could nominate professors. Troy consulted the other bishops who
replied that the Government could not be allowed to nominate either professors
or bishops. In fact, the very learned Benedict XIV in a letter to the bishop of
Breslau in 1748 had clearly stated that direct nomination could not be allowed
to a non-Catholic. However, Dr. Thomas
Hussey, then a chaplain at the Spanish Embassy in London, wrote to Burke on 29
January saying that he thought some kind of veto was being considered, probably
in the form that the priests in a vacant dioceses would present three names to
the king so that he could choose one. According to Cannon, it would seem that
this meeting of all the Irish bishops was the first ever held, at least in
modern times. These meetings of the Irish bishops were not synodal in form and
involved only the bishops. There were no representatives of the lower clergy,
laity, or religious orders, and they could make no laws. Their sole purpose was
decide if possible on a common policy. After 1815, the bishops’ conference
seems to have taken joint control of the Irish colleges on the Continent
(Cannon). The meetings of the Bishops’ Conference continue to this day. The
Irish Parliament opened on 24 January 1795. Grattan sat on the Government
benches. Fitzwilliam had been given instructions not to bring in a further
measure for Catholic relief, and if others brought forward such a proposal he
should do his best to have it postponed. Only if he was unable to secure a
postponement and the measure was likely to pass, was he to give Government
support. This was obviously the message given to Grattan as well. Fitzwilliam,
in his opening address did not mention a measure for the Catholics, but Grattan
moved the acceptance of the speech and was seconded by the Hon. Mr. Stewart.
Grattan referred to the Government’s proposal to build a new Catholic college
for candidates to the priesthood in Ireland. Many petitions for further relief
were sent in from various parts of Ireland. On 26 January Grattan presented the
petition from the Catholics of Dublin but did not move on it. On 29 January,
the king wrote to Pitt expressing his disquiet over Fitzwilliam’s actions
(Barnes). [February 1795]
On the 5 February Portland, the Home Secretary, presented Fitzwilliam’s
dispatches to the cabinet and expressed his own concurrence with Grattan’s
proposed Bill. In accordance with the Act of 1782 the king could no longer
modify an Irish Bill but had either to accept it or reject it in its entirety.
The king was not satisfied with some of the proposals and on 6 February wrote
to Pitt setting out his own ideas. He maintained that the admission of
religious dissenters to all offices was contrary to the practice of every
European state, and furthermore it was not a matter to be settled by the
cabinet alone, but by the whole Government, consisting of king, Lords, and
Commons. (Clearly George did not understand the implications of the 1782 Act,
for by that Act the Lords and Commons were those of Ireland.) The cabinet instructed Fitzwilliam not to
commit the Government to the support of Grattan’s Bill. It is not clear if
Grattan was informed of this. On
12 February 1795 Grattan moved that a Bill for the further relief of the
Catholics should be brought in and leave was given. Though this was a private
member’s bill, it was felt that it had the backing of the Government, and it
was expected that it would be rapidly passed. Saunders Newsletter expected that up to ninety members (out of 300)
would vote against it. But first it had to be submitted to the Privy Council in
London for approval. On 19 February the cabinet decided to recall Fitzwilliam
and replace him with another Portland Whig, Earl Camden. Ponsonby seems to have
been informed of this decision and to have concurred. There was no intention of
getting rid of Ponsonby or Grattan, so some at least of Fitzwilliam’s
appointments might still be approved. Pitt had no intention of positively
backing the anti-Catholic faction even if he was dependent on their majority in
the Irish Commons. Fitzwilliam’s list of changes was in fact quite modest and
reasonable, but exaggerated rumours about his intentions had probably been
circulated. There is little doubt too that Beresford had poisoned the mind of
the king about what was being proposed to do for the Catholics. Fitzwilliam
later had an interview with the king and found him misinformed on various
matters. Again, the claims of people like Keogh for total emancipation probably
did great harm. The cabinet too may have thought that Fitzwilliam had committed
himself too firmly to the support of Grattan’s Bill for him to withdraw his
support. Nor should we imagine that Grattan had gone further that Pitt wished
when the matter was discussed the previous autumn. Though some think it
possible that Grattan too had read more into Pitt’s words than was intended.
But if Pitt was already considering coupling Emancipation with an Act of Union
a certain vagueness in his words might be expected. Pitt knew, and Wellington
much later was to find out, that until the king was won over, it was best to
say as little as possible. There can be little doubt that Beresford’s direct
approach to the king, and his considerable exaggerations wrecked Pitt’s chances
of getting even minor improvements to the 1793 Act accepted by the king. In any
case, the Portland Whigs in London did not support Fitzwilliam. More
interestingly, George Ponsonby supported Pitt in the Irish Parliament. Rumours
about Fitzwilliam’s recall or resignation were soon circulating in Dublin. The
Whig Sir Lawrence Parsons wished to restrict the Government’s Money Bill
because the Government was not keeping its part of the bargain. A meeting of
the Dublin Catholics was held in Francis Street chapel on 23 February 1795 to
protest against the reported departure of Fitzwilliam, and to choose a
deputation to proceed to London with their petition. Those chosen were Edward
Byrne, John Keogh, and Baron Hussey. The were accompanied by the Secretary of
the Irish Catholics, Mr Wolfe Tone (Tone resigned from this office on 28 April
(SNL 13 March, 5 April 1795). They
had sailed from Dublin on 4 March and arrived in London on the 9th.They
were received by the king who promised a reply through the Lord Lieutenant. A
deputation was sent from Wexford as well. One of the delegates was an energetic
young man called Edward Hay who collected 22,251 signatures before going to
London. When in London he got introductions to Fox and Burke and kept up a
correspondence with them. He was later to be Secretary of the Irish Catholics
for many years. [March 1795]
On 7 March 1795, the king asked the Lord Chancellor (Loughborough), Lord
Kenyon, and the Archbishop of Canterbury whether the concession of Emancipation
was contrary to his coronation oath. In his letter to Kenyon, the king pointed
out that there were now only four Acts which affected the papists in Ireland,
the Act of Supremacy and Uniformity, the Test Act, and the Bill of Rights. He
asked how the king could give his assent to the repeal of any of these acts
without breaching his coronation oath (SNL
15 June 1827). Only the archbishop replied definitely that such a concession
would violate his oath, so the king remained doubtful. But this question was
always to worry the king (Barnes). The text of the oath was, ‘I promise to do
the utmost in my power to maintain the laws of God, the true profession of the
gospel and the Protestant reformed religion established by law, and I will
preserve unto the bishops and clergy of this realm, and to the churches
committed to their charge, all such rights and privileges as by law do or shall
appertain unto them, or any one of them.’ The Protestant editor of Saunders Newsletter said he was at a
loss to understand how the measure of Catholic Emancipation could be supposed
to be a violation of the coronation oath (SNL
13 Feb 1801) On 13 March Earl Camden was appointed as the new Lord Lieutenant. The
recall of Earl Fitzwilliam has a memorable place in Irish history, but was
momentous chiefly for its effect on the Protestant United Irishmen than on the
Catholics. The Dublin merchants under Keogh, who was the driving spirit,
proceeded without the Catholic aristocracy and were politely brushed off. Despite
their own self-importance, nobody else took them seriously. Nor perhaps did
many Irish Catholics believe that Keogh’s truculent approach was the best
advised. Nor, at that stage of the War was his association with Wolfe Tone
likely to advance his cause. Neither the Government nor Tone told him that
certain members of the United Irishmen were known to be communicating with
France. The inner core of the United Irishmen were at this time transforming
themselves into a secret oath-bound society aiming at starting a revolution
with the assistance of France. A young man of 21 with strong Whig views named
Valentine Brown Lawless (Lord Cloncurry) had finished his studies and his
Continental travels returned to Ireland at the time of Fitzwilliam’s recall and
enthusiastically joined the United Irishmen. He was offered only the first
innocuous oath with nothing in it about secrecy, which he took. The new oath
was introduced in May 1795. But in 1798 he was considered to be a member of the
oath-bound secret society. Daniel O’Connell returned to Ireland in 1796 and
apparently was offered the old oath which he took (Luby). Tone escaped
prosecution for treason by doing a deal with the Government that if charges
were dropped he should go to America, and sailed from Belfast on 13 June with
the aim of assisting the revolution from outside Ireland. But Keogh, like
Cloncurry, knew nothing of this.
[Top] Earl Camden (March 1795 to June 1798)
[March
1795] The appointment of John Jeffreys Pratt, 2nd Earl Camden,
as Lord Lieutenant did not mark a change in Government policy, but a return to
what had always been intended. Thomas Pelham (afterwards 2nd Earl of
Chichester) became Irish Secretary. Pelham was also a Portland Whig. The
instructions to Camden were to try to conciliate all parties. Beresford was
restored to office, though this displeased Pelham who wrote to Portland that
this was putting the interest of a faction before that of the nation. Pelham
wished to retain Ponsonby and Grattan but they unwisely crossed the floor to
join the Opposition. Fitzwilliam departed on 25 March and Camden arrived on the
31 March. Camden also brought Robert Stewart (Castlereagh) with him. Robert
Stewart got the courtesy title of Viscount Castlereagh on 8 August 1796 when
his father was made Earl of Londonderry. (His father was made Baron Londonderry
in 1789, Viscount Castlereagh in 1795, Earl of Londonderry in 1796, and Marquis
of Londonderry in 1816 and that remained the family title. He had married
Camden’s sister as his second wife.) Castlereagh was lieutenant colonel of the
Londonderry militia, but Camden used him for particular tasks. One of these was
to persuade the young men in county Down who were openly drilling to abandon
the United Irishmen. In drilling they carried their shovels as muskets. He had
joined a Whig club in 1790 but was from now on a convinced supporter of Pitt,
and was accused by some of his old associates of betraying their principles. [April
1795] On 9 April 1795 an enormous crowd estimated at 4,000 people, tried to
cram itself into Francis Street chapel to hear the report of the deputation.
Keogh made the report. A letter from the Duke of Portland was read out and part
of another expressing the desire that the Catholics would not raise the question
of Emancipation again until the War was over. Dr Ryan denounced an Act of Union
which he said was referred to in a letter of Fitzwilliam to Lord Carlisle (SNL 10 April 1795). James Ryan recorded
much later that the Catholic body ‘in a state of great excitement and
disappointment entered into a resolution never again to assemble as a distinct
body, but at once to co-operate with the Dissenters of the North of Ireland in
their endeavours to promote a reform in the representation in the then House of
Commons’ (DEP 28 Jan 1834). This
determination, he went on, threw the Catholics into the arms of aspiring
agitators like Arthur O’Connor and Thomas Addis Emmet, (leading United
Irishmen), and this led to the sanguinary events in 1798. On
13 April Grattan introduced a motion on the recall of Fitzwilliam, but it was
defeated. He maintained that Fitzwilliam had only accepted office on the
condition that a Relief Bill would be brought in and certain officers
dismissed, and these matters were clearly understood. In this he was supported
by Mr George Ponsonby and his brother Mr William Brabazon Ponsonby (SNL 22 April 1795). The Hon. Mr. Stewart
opposed Grattan. Castlereagh seems to have grasped the situation better than
Ponsonby and Grattan for he supported Pelham. The work of Castlereagh and
Cornwallis later would have been much easier if they had had the consistent
support of these two. Nor do their grounds for deserting Camden seem adequate.
They could hardly complain if the Orange faction retained much of their influence
if they refused to accept office under Camden. Neither Castlereagh nor Arthur
Wellesley saw any need to resign, and Fitzwilliam cheerfully accepted another
office. Wellesley had been aide-de-camp in Dublin Castle from 1787 to 1793, but
in 1795 Camden refused an office to Lieutenant-colonel Wellesley who had
returned from the War in the Low Countries and had learned ‘what one ought not
to do’. After this refusal he rejoined his regiment and sailed for the Indies.
Arthur was joined by his elder brother Richard, Lord Mornington (Marquis
Wellesley) a personal friend of Pitt, who went to India as Governor General of
Bengal. Pitt’s policy remained unchanged,
but the Government was no longer supporting Grattan’s Catholic Relief Bill
(1795). Pelham introduced the Government’s proposals for a single new Catholic
college. He noted that the Government would have not patronage or role in
appointments, nor would it have any share in its direction. The Government
would pay a sum of £10,000 and an annual grant thereafter for its maintenance.
In the course of the debate Grattan said that Fitzwilliam had plans for two
Protestant schools, i.e. for Dissenters. Pelham replied he was not informed of
this but was prepared to listen to any proposals. Leave was given to bring in a
Bill for the Maynooth College, and Pelham along with Mr Robert Stewart were
asked to prepare it. In the English House of Lords, Fitzwilliam, assisted by
Lord Moira, got a debate on his recall and denounced Westmoreland for trying to
tie his hands over appointments. It was extraordinary, he said, how some Irish
officials had dashed to London as soon as they were relieved of office. Mr
Ponsonby had not done so. [May
1795] The Second Reading of Grattan’s Relief Bill took place on 5 May 1795.
Maurice Fitzgerald, the twenty one year old Knight of Kerry, in a maiden speech
supported Grattan. The debate commenced at 5 p.m. on Monday evening and
continued until 10.30 a.m. the following morning, being one of the longest
debates ever recorded in the Irish Parliament. Inevitably the Catholic
Committee was associated with the United Irishmen, and the fact that Tone was
treating with the spy of the French Government, the Rev. William Jackson. The
Bill was defeated by 155 votes to 84 and discussion of the question ceased in
Parliament for ten years. It was Pitt’s growing conviction that Emancipation
would have to be tied to an Act of Union. The Rev. William Jackson was dealing
with Tone, but committed suicide in prison when on trial for high treason. It
was for this reason that Tone entered into a compact to go into voluntary
exile. Immediately on the defeat of this Bill, the transformation of a Whig
club, the United Irishmen into a secret society commenced in Ulster. The date
given for this is 10 May 1795, but the organisation of the other provinces did
not commence for another eighteen months, which explains why Cloncurry was
offered only the old oath. Even so, by May 1798 only Ulster and Leinster were
properly organised, and even in Leinster Wexford had hardly been touched. The Government proceeded with the
erection of the new college on land near the town of Maynooth. Control of the
college was entrusted to a panel of leading Catholic laymen drawn for the most
part from the nobility. There were also representatives of the Government and
the Catholic bishops on the Board. The Government representatives were to be
the Lord Chancellor of Ireland and the Chief Justices of the other three
courts. Their presence was purely symbolic and they rarely attended. Meetings of
the Board were chaired, in the absence of the Lord Chancellor by the highest in
dignity of those present. This was either Arthur James Plunket, 8th
Earl of Fingall or Sir Edward Bellew. The Chief Justices attended the triennial
visitations. This structure should be carefully noted for it was on it that the
proposed commissions for the royal veto and the examination of correspondence
with Rome would have been based. Had the matter been proceeded with in 1799,
there would have probably been little resistance either to the veto or state
provision (Healey). Ward notes that the question of the royal veto went back to
1795 when the Government first began taking an interest in Catholic Church
affairs (Ward II). Coxe Hippisley continued his one-man
crusade in Rome. The Holy See opened its archives to his inspection. Two
matters in particular bothered him. One was the fact that England had no
Catholic bishops but vicars apostolic appointed by the Pope. He was informed
that there was no sinister plot to take over England involved in this, and that
the Pope was willing to restore bishops duly elected by Englishmen according to
the norms of canon law. The restoration of the English hierarchy would have
been an integral part of Pitt’s settlement. But it was not to take place for
more than half a century. The other point that bothered him was the choice of
friars as bishops. The Cardinal Secretary of State assured him that it would be
quite easy to ensure that friars did not become bishops in His Majesty’s
dominions if that were the royal wish (Vane Stewart). Despite Hippisley’s
efforts and those of Cardinal Erskine, diplomatic relations were not
established between Britain and the Papal States. (Erskine was in England from
1793 to 1801. He was made a cardinal in 1803 and was appointed a member of the
Congregation of Propaganda and Cardinal Protector of Scotland; Catholic Encyc.) [July
1795] In Ireland Ribbonism and Defenderism had flared up again. As the
Catholic terrorism grew so too did Protestant working class counter-terrorism.
From this Protestant reaction arose the long-lived Orange Order. The word
‘Orange’ was used to refer to strict supporters of William of Orange, but it
came to mean those Protestants who opposed further concessions to the
Catholics. It was often used by Catholics to refer to any Protestants. It was
widely believed by Catholics that an Orange jury would always side with the
Protestant in a dispute between a Catholic and a Protestant. The Protestants
assumed that in many parts of Ireland no jury would convict Catholic terrorists
no matter what the evidence. The county or baronial, police forces, the ‘ould
barnies’ were useless in any kind of disturbance. (A barony was a sub-division
of a county). Many Protestants joined local horsed defence groups, or the
yeomanry from 1796 onwards. Yeomanry was not made legal in Ireland until the
following year. Many companies of yeomanry refused to accept Catholics in their
ranks, but this was not universal. Many too acquired a reputation for great
brutality when dealing with disturbances but often those making such
allegations were not unbiased. Edward Cooke, whom Fitzwilliam had wanted to
remove, was in favour of developing an all-Protestant yeomanry. This view was to surface at various times,
and had the merit that it would be force the Government could rely on. But
successive governments preferred to enlist Catholics as far as the laws
allowed. The only reliable forces in Ireland for enforcing law and order,
combating smuggling and agrarian crime, guarding gaols and escorting prisoners
were the regiments of the line. But splitting them up into small groups all
over Ireland to do police work was very bad for discipline. It is rather
strange at this point to find Grattan insisting that the newly-formed Dublin
police should be disbanded and the old night-watch restored. (The city of
London likewise totally refused to accept Peel’s Metropolitan Police in 1829.)
In the disturbed years that lay ahead the city of Dublin had no police force.
Some counties were taking steps to establish a county police force under the
County Police Act (1787) which allowed armed constables The usual pattern of agrarian crime
and counter-crime was disturbed when the United Irishmen turned into the path
of revolution. The leaders were young Protestant gentlemen from Belfast and
Dublin who tried to build up a military organisation over the whole country. It
can be assumed, though there is no direct proof of the matter, that most of the
Catholic working classes who joined them were already members of the various
agrarian gangs. There are no records of any disputes between Whiteboys and
United Irishmen such as occurred nearly a century later between the Ribbonmen
and the Land League. The exception to this was in Ulster where republican
principles were widely spread among the Protestant linen workers in counties
Antrim and Down. Only in these two counties could the United Irishmen really
claim to have success. But over most of Ireland it really made no difference if
raids for firearms were made on behalf of the Whiteboys or the United Irishmen.
What the leaders of the United Irishmen were oblivious of, though it was
obvious to everyone else, was that if they established an independent republic
in Dublin on the most idealistic and democratic lines, local government and
consequently the local rackets would be in the hands of these Catholics. Recruitment for the armed forces in
Ireland since the outbreak of the War was high. Many joined the army or the
navy, and many more, after an initial resistance joined the militia. At least 100,000 passed through Duncannon
Fort alone on their way to enlist. The only hope the United Irishmen had of a
successful revolution was if they could persuade the Catholic enlisted men in the
line and militia regiments to join them. In this they signally failed.
Lieutenant General Lord Carhampton was sent to Connaught to suppress the
Defenders. Those that he apprehended he normally allowed to enlist in the navy.
But Saunders Newsletter reported that
his leniency was not so effective against the Defenders as it had been against
the Whiteboys (SNL 31 July 1795). [August 1795]
Archbishop Troy issued a pastoral letter in August 1795 to his diocese
condemning agrarian crime. He denounced their attacks on the priests, and their
imposition of unlawful oaths, and said it was a greater sin to keep such an
oath than to break it. He imposed excommunication on all members of oath-bound
societies. Open battles took place in Ulster between the Defenders and various
Orange groups. The most famous of these, called the Battle of the Diamond after
a village in Armagh, was fought on 21 September 1795. After this some local
magistrates in Armagh decided to form the Ulster workmen into a disciplined
body under their own direction and to be called the Orange Order. This was not
an armed body, but its members were advised to join the yeomanry or the militia
to protect their homes in a legal manner against the Defenders. The name was
unfortunate, for just at this time the Protestant Peep o’Day Boys also began to
call themselves Orangemen. [February 1796] The
situation in Ireland was becoming more disturbed. The Irish Catholics took no
action when Parliament opened. The Government introduced an Insurrection Act
(1796) to give itself greater powers to act against disturbances. It also
passed an Indemnity Act (1796) to prevent actions in the courts against any of
Lord Carhampton’s officers who might not have acted in a strictly legal fashion
when disarming Connaught. The fear of a French invasion began to pre-occupy the
minds of the Government. On 26 April 1796 the Lord Lieutenant and the Lord
Chancellor laid the foundation stone of the new Catholic College at Maynooth.
The French army in Italy had been placed under a young twenty seven year old
Corsican general called Bonaparte on 27 March 1796. He defeated the Sardinians
and then the Austrians, and the occupied the part of the Papal States called
the Legations, so that the Pope too had to seek an armistice. As most of the
European powers withdrew from the coalition against the French the Pope had to
agree to severe French terms in July 1796. The ports were to be closed to
France’s enemies, part of the papal lands were to be transferred to France,
French armies were to have free passage across the papal states, and a huge
cash indemnity had to be paid to France. The kingdom of Naples then seized
parts of the Papal States on its southern side. This left the Pope with only
one reliable ally, the Protestant state of England. Captain Nelson in the Agamemnon rescued the Stuart Pretender
Cardinal Yorke, gave him money, and landed him in Austrian territory. [Autumn 1796]
Catholic affairs receded into the background, as the activities of the United
Irishmen grew, and the French were known to be preparing a fleet for the invasion
of Ireland. Yeomanry units were set up all over Ireland, the officers in many
places being Catholics. Daniel O’Connell finished his studies for the bar in
the Inns of Court in London in 1796, and was called to the Irish bar in 1798,
being one of the first Catholics to be called. The lawyers attached to the
courts in Dublin formed their own corps, and two young Catholic barristers,
O’Connell and Noel Purcell O’Gorman enrolled with them and went on patrols at
night. O’Connell was rapidly disillusioned with the United Irishmen. (In June
1798 he prudently retreated to his home in Kerry). The Irish Parliament was
recalled early, on 13 September 1796, and a Suspension of Habeas Corpus Act
(1796) was passed. The Dublin Journal
noted that this was usual when an invasion was expected. [December 1796]
The year ended with a report that 17 French warships under Admiral Hoche had
arrived at Bantry Bay in Cork.. They had sailed from France on 27 December 1796
with 43 ships and 14,000 men on board. As it happened Castlereagh was with his
regiment in Limerick and they received orders to march towards the coast, and
everywhere received support of the local Catholic population. The French had
arrived in the wrong part of Ireland; only in Antrim and Down was there any considerable
organised support for them. (As events were to prove, it was the only serious
attempt at a French invasion in the whole course of the war. The French troops
did not even disembark, having become separated from the transports with the
ammunition.) [February 1797]
Napoleon, having succeeded against the Austrians, announced on 1 February 1797
that the armistice with the Pope was broken and the following day invaded the
Papal States. Napoleon seized the papal province of Romagna and added it to the
papal legatine provinces of Bologna and Ferrara, and the duchies of Reggio and
Modena to form the Cispadane Republic, later enlarged as the Cisalpine
Republic. Getting these territories back with the assistance of Castlereagh was
Cardinal Consalvi’s chief preoccupation after Waterloo. The Pope was forced to
sign the Treaty of Tolentino on 19 February 1797 agreeing to these terms. Ireland
was growing more disturbed, but Camden rejected a suggestion of Portland that
future measures of parliamentary reform and relief for the Catholics should be
considered (Camden DNB). Camden
preferred to use the troops to disarm the population, especially in the
Protestant parts of Ulster where the danger of revolution was greatest. [May 1797]
In May a Secret Committee of Parliament was set up to examine documents of the
United Irishmen captured in Belfast and it reported (11 May 1797) that it was
now clearly established that the United Irishmen were no longer merely seeking
Catholic Emancipation and Reform of Parliament but were plotting an armed
insurrection. On the following day a number of men in the Monaghan militia
confessed that they had taken the oath of the United Irishmen, and begged
pardon. It is probable that they had taken the same oath as Lord Cloncurry. On
15 May Castlereagh moved that the House join the Lords in an address to the
Lord Lieutenant for an amnesty for those who had taken the United Irish oath
through intimidation or misrepresentation. Grattan and his friends refused to
concur with the motion but it was carried without a division. The text
contained thanks to the Lord Lieutenant for measures already taken, which
explains the action of the Whigs. William Ponsonby brought forward a motion in
favour of parliamentary reform and emancipation, but the Government opposed
this on the grounds that the time was inopportune. The motion was defeated by
117 votes to 30 (SNL 16 May 1797).
Four men in the Monaghan militia were court martialled and shot for accepting
commissions in the rebel corps. Some soldiers in the Louth militia, after being
court martialled asked to be allowed to volunteer for foreign service in the
army and their request was acceded to. It is clear that, especially in Ulster,
there was much confusion regarding the United Irishmen and the Defenders. The
Defenders were distinguished from the ordinary agrarian terrorists not by their
methods but by their aims that were purely sectarian. They were a purely
Catholic body that was organised specifically to fight Protestants. Defenders
too might organise and drill large bodies of men locally to be prepared for
large-scale clashes with the local Orangemen, especially on a fair day. Pitt
sounded out Fitzwilliam to find out would the Irish Whigs support the
Government if Emancipation were conceded, and Fitzwilliam replied that only the
dismissal of Lord Clare (Fitzgibbon) and his associates would satisfy
them. Camden, hearing of this approach
to the Ponsonbys, wrote to Pitt not to concede Emancipation except in the
context of an Act of Union (Bolton). But he also considered that a new
parliament would be more likely to concede Emancipation than the last one that
had voted three times against it. Just at
this time Pelham approached Archbishop Troy about a royal veto. They met on 23
May 1797, and Pelham asked could the Pope give a power of nomination. As he
informed Dr Plunket of Meath on the same day, Troy replied that the Pope could,
but had never done so except in cases where the clergy had estates or revenues
under the patronage of the crown. Troy re-stated his objection to state
payment. Pelham asked him to consider the case where the Government provided
the revenues to the bishops and clergy. Troy replied that he doubted the
ability of the state to provide such a large sum. But even if it did, it would
undermine the preaching of the Catholic clergy to keep the peace, because their
preaching would be attributed merely to self-interest. Troy did not mention
what he had in mind, that state payment would encourage the most forward and
least submissive to their bishops, and intriguing clergy would get livings, not
the most meritorious. The Irish bishops were prepared however, as a compromise,
to accept a royal veto (Ward II; In March 1850 the judicial committee of the
privy council over-ruled the bishop of Exeter regarding the appointment of
vicar, the Rev. George Gorham, whom he regarded as unsuitable. The ‘Gorham
judgement’ definitively established that laymen had the final say in
appointments in the Established Churches.) It should be noted that though many people regard
canon law as a complete and clear-cut body of laws, it was actually several
collections of various canons of various local or ecumenical councils which
various canonists down the centuries had reduced to some kind of order. It was
not codified until 1917. It is perhaps true to say that there were more
exceptions than rules as various places benefited from various bulls,
privileges, indults, and dispensations. What Troy was making plain here was his
total objection to a system where all the clergy were paid, and consequently
were appointed and promoted by the crown. In such a system the authority of the
bishops would virtually disappear. Just about this time the Irish bishops were
finally able to enforce their claim that they alone had the right to appoint
(as distinguished from approve) all parish priests, and to appoint, move, or
remove all curates. No longer could a priest appear and claim that he had been
appointed by the lay patron or by the Holy See. As the saying is ‘The devil is
in the detail’ and it was precisely the details rather than the principles
regarding the appointment of bishops and the payment of the clergy which was to
cause so much dispute over the next twenty years. The Catholic laymen were only
interested in the principles, but the bishops were very much concerned with the
detail. State provision could be acceptable if it took the form of a perpetual
royal grant, and was paid through the bishop of each diocese. It would be
unacceptable if it were the subject of an annual debate in Parliament, and was
paid directly to each priest by a commission of laymen. The state paid the
professors in Maynooth through an annual bulk grant, and soon county Grand
Juries were to pay prison chaplains. This latter was to cause conflict when
certain Protestant Grand Juries tried to insist on a right to appoint the
Catholic chaplains they paid. (The Presbyterian regium donum or royal gift was
paid through an agent, a clergyman elected by the Synod.) [July 1797]
The Lord Lieutenant dissolved parliament on 11 July 1797 and called a general
election. A group of Dublin freemen met to decide on tactics. They included
Oliver Bond, Thomas Addis Emmet, John Keogh, Valentine Lawless (Cloncurry) and
James Tandy. Oliver Bond was United Irishman and a member of its Leinster
Directory and the mainspring of the movement to establish an independent Irish
republic. Thomas Addis Emmet also belonged to the Directory. Many drew the
conclusion that Keogh and Cloncurry were also members of the Directory, which
they were not. In the new Parliament, out of the 300 members elected no more
than 50 could be regarded as Whigs. Most of the Tories were returned by the
boroughs. Defence and finance were the major problems facing the new Parliament
and it was becoming clear that paying for its share of the War was straining
Irish resources to their limits. The War was going badly for Pitt. There were
mutinies in the navy, and the last remaining partner in the First Coalition,
Austria, made peace with Napoleon at Campoformio on 17 October 1797. The First
Coalition thus ended. [December 1797]
The very able General Sir Ralph Abercromby was sent to replace Lord Carhampton
as commander-in-chief in Ireland. Carhampton was blamed for the excesses
committed by his troops in disarming the peasants. But his departure from
Ireland was caused by his promotion to be Master General of the Ordnance.
Abercromby asked for Sir John Moore as his assistant. Both were professional
soldiers with strict ideas about military discipline. Lord Clare, Beresford,
and John Foster would have preferred General Lake who was more ruthless in
searching out rebels instead of Abercromby. As the year ended, rioting in Rome
led to a second French invasion under General Berthier. [February 1798]
Berthier entered Rome and the Pope left Rome for Pisa. Ecclesiastical property
was sequestered. French guards replaced the Swiss Guards, and the Pope was
escorted to Siena, and from thence he was removed in May to a Carthusian
monastery in Florence where he was detained for nine months (Ward I). Towards
the end of 1798, in view of the great age of the Pope (he was 81) the cardinals
asked for a bull modifying the procedure for electing a Pope, and he granted
it. The English, Irish, and Scotch Colleges in Rome were closed, but the French
gave the professors and students passports to return home. They arrived in
London in June 1798 (SNL 16 June
1798). Until the re-capture of Rome by Captain Troubridge in the Culloden in
September 1799 communication with Rome virtually ceased. [March 1798]
Pelham’s health deteriorated so that he was compelled to return to England.
Though not formally appointed to the office until July, Castlereagh discharged
its duties from March onwards. The hard-liners in the Tory faction rejected any
concessions to the Catholics or the rebels, and the policy of disarming
continued. Though Irish mythologists have fondly cherished the brutality of
this process it is difficult to ascertain the actual facts. Gentlemen of equal
authority on either side affirmed and denied the use of torture. There can be
little doubt that torture was actually used, but this was not the policy of
either the Government or of the senior British generals. Nor was it the policy
of the United Irish leaders. But brutalities and counter-atrocities are inevitable
in any civil war, as this had become. Among the lower ranks on either side were
those whose families had suffered at the hands of the opposing side. Edward Hay
specifically mentioned the use of the pitch-cap by Orange supporters in the
North Cork militia. (Half-melted pitch was poured on the heads of those with
short hair. The United Irishmen favoured cropped heads; hence their popular
name Croppies. In some case the pitch ran into their eyes; in other cases it
burned the scalp. In all cases it was painful and difficult to remove (Hay). (The alleged atrocities on either
side, and by the crown forces during this period have passed into the legends
of Irish history, but it was not necessary for the purposes of this book to
investigate what substance there was in them. The Catholic bishops and almost
all the priests supported the crown forces.). [May 1798]
The leaders of the United Irishmen, long known to the Government from spies who
had infiltrated the senior ranks of the United Irishmen, were arrested, preventing
a concerted effort between the various parts of Ireland, and the French fleet.
The arrest and dispersal of the leading directors of the United Irishmen
prevented any co-ordination. Archbishop Troy wrote a pastoral letter to be read
at each mass until further notice exhorting all Catholics to leave the United
Irishmen. The Catholic lay leaders including the lords Fingall, Southwell,
Gormanston, and Kenmare, and Sir Edward Bellew and Sir Thomas Burke published
an address on the same lines to all Irish Catholics. It would appear that it
was about this time that Pitt decided to link Emancipation to an Act of Union
(Ward II; Bolton). The
disturbances first broke out in Wexford, and the failure of the local yeomanry
to quash them immediately led to a widespread uprising in Wexford. But this
particular rising had little to do with the United Irishmen and was more
concerned with local issues. Though it has achieved an honoured place in Irish
mythology the rising in Wexford had little for anyone to be proud of. As Edward
Hay of Wexford remarked later rumour and counter-rumour wrought both sides to a
pitch of fury and animosity. Not for the last time the British Government had
to try to govern while at the same time keeping two antagonistic factions from
each other’s throats. The Orange faction could have had much more support for
law and order if they had accepted offers of help from Catholics, but in many
cases they refused it. All the early fights were between equally unskilled
combatants, the largely unskilled and undrilled peasantry who armed themselves
with any agricultural weapon or with captured guns, and the scarcely better
trained militia and yeomanry companies on the other. These latter had of
necessity to fight in ad hoc groups
and do their best to defeat such bodies of rebels they met and were often
overwhelmed by drunken mobs. A month later when they were joined by some
regiments of the line and steadied by experienced officers they did much
better. (Over Ireland as a whole, the United Irishmen had assembled 48,000
assorted guns, and 70,000 pikes. This latter out-of-date weapon could be made
locally by blacksmiths, voluntarily or otherwise. The theory was that a strong
but compact body of pikemen could overwhelm any defence. But conditions that
favoured pikemen were more likely to favour cavalry, and the Government was not
short of these. The chance of pikemen defeating regular infantry, well drawn-up
and well supplied with ammunition, was nil. Much of the fighting on the
Government’s side was done by the Irish militia regiments and by the Irish
yeomanry. It was in Wexford that the rebels had the greatest initial success.
Thereafter, large bodies of rebels were fairly easily broken up by field guns.
The rebels dispersed into uninhabited tracts and supported themselves by
plunder. Indeed from the very start they had to support themselves by plunder (SNL 15 Sept. 1798). In May the great forces Napoleon had gathered
sailed for Egypt, leaving only a token force of ships carrying arms and
ammunition to assist the United Irishmen. Pitt managed to put together the
Second Coalition consisting of Britain, Austria, Russia, and Turkey, and
initially it had considerable success.
[Top] Cornwallis and Castlereagh (June 1798 to February
1801)
[June 1798]
On 13 June the king gave his assent to an Act of Union but not to further
emancipation of the Catholics. On 14 June 1798, the Government appointed the
experienced soldier Charles Cornwallis (1st Marquis Cornwallis) as
Lord Lieutenant to replace Earl Camden, believing that the situation needed the
control of an experienced general. But General Lake had won at Vinegar Hill
just as Cornwallis was arriving in Dublin. The rebels in Wexford massacred 95
Protestants in cold blood on 20 June 1798. Further massacres were prevented
only because the rebels were summoned to the camp at Vinegar Hill where General
Lake defeated their main body the following day. The insurrection spread to the
north of Ireland, but the authorities and the army had had plenty of time to
prepare. Though large bodies assembled it was only a matter of time until they
were dispersed. As they came from the most Protestant areas of Antrim and Down,
few if any Catholics were involved. Some Catholic priests in Wexford had joined
the rebels to the disgust of Catholic gentlemen like Edward Hay who considered
them a disgrace to their Church. Though few in number it allowed Protestant
extremists to associate Catholic priests with plots of rebellion and a French
invasion. Castlereagh was retained as acting Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant
and Irish Secretary, and on 24 July was formally appointed to those posts. [August 1798]
A token French force under General Humbert arrived at Killala on the west coast
of Ireland. The single French regular battalion had an initial success against
the local militia and yeomanry regiments, but these rallied and boxed in the
French. Only a small number of the local Whiteboys joined the French, so the
French commander surrendered on 9 September, and was given parole as a prisoner
of war. The French commander believed that the Whiteboys had joined him
principally to get arms. The French had nothing but contempt for the kind of
ruffians that joined them. He was
treated with the courtesy accorded to officers at the time and several
prominent people in Dublin called on him (SNL
14, 17 September 1798). On 3 August 1798 Admiral Nelson eliminated the chances
of a French invasion for several years by signally destroying the French fleet
at the Battle of the Nile. Cornwallis followed a policy of punishing only the
ringleaders, and pardoning those he regarded as their unfortunate dupes. Wolfe
Tone had made his way to France, and was commissioned into the French army.
This commission he believed would save him from being hanged as a traitor if he
were captured. He sailed in a small French squadron under Admiral Bompart on 20
September 1798 but a powerful English squadron intercepted them. Tone was
captured, tried for treason, and was sentenced to be hanged, but committed suicide
in prison. His long association with Keogh was remembered. Keogh had been
arrested as a United Irishman in 1796 but later released. He appears to have
done nothing in 1798. But it was all too easy to associate the Catholic
Committee with the United Irishmen, and those Catholic priests who led the
rebels to burning and looting Protestant homes, and the massacres of
Protestants, despite the fact that the members of the Catholic Committee
actively supported the Government. The principal events in the spring and summer
of 1798 can be summarised as follows. The French imprisoned the Pope, and he
and his successor remained within French controlled lands until 1813. The
Government decided on an Act of Union conjoined if possible with Emancipation
for lay Catholics, state provision for the Catholic clergy, and at least a
royal veto over the appointment of Catholic bishops. The Catholic bishops had
already conceded the possibility of a veto. The Catholic bishops and most of
the clergy and all the Catholic gentry stood by the crown. A rebellion led by
Protestant Whigs but manned by Catholic peasants occurred on a surprisingly
large scale. Its most distinguished and long-remembered feature was the
violence of the atrocities and counter-atrocities committed in Wexford. The
Royal Navy put an end to any immediate prospect of a French invasion. Two very
able administrators, Cornwallis and Castlereagh were able to regain control of
the various local yeomanry and militia units, and also to enforce Pitt’s wishes
over the hard-line Protestants in the Irish Government. Cornwallis and
Castlereagh were much more independent of the Orange faction than Camden had
been. However,
the savagery and brutality on both sides in this internecine struggle cast a
long shadow over the future. It marked the lives of two men in particular; a
young curate named Rev. Daniel Murray, who fled for his life when the yeomanry
ravaged his parish when searching for rebels. He escaped to Dublin where
Archbishop Troy recognised his extraordinary qualities and kept him by his
side. The other was the young lawyer, Daniel O’Connell, who saw exactly the
kind of Catholics the United Irishmen recruited, and heard at first hand about
all the atrocities committed by both sides once law and order broke down, and
how neither the Government or the military authorities could control their men
or their junior officers once they were dispersed to hunt down rebels. All his
life he was utterly opposed to the use of violence to achieve any end. He tried
to disabuse young Americans of any romantic notions about the Rising they had
heard in America. [September 1798]
The yeomanry was stood down from permanent duty. Cornwallis hoped that
Emancipation would be an integral part of the Union but Pitt told him this was
not possible in the circumstances. He wrote to Pitt on 30 September 1798 saying
that he was not prepared to have the exclusion of the Catholics an integral
part of the Union as Lord Clare (Fitzgibbon) wanted. Pitt agreed that there
would be no anti-Catholic stipulation in the Act of Union. Cornwallis deplored
the fact that England seemed to be making a Union, not with Ireland, but with a
party in Ireland (Barnes). A majority of the cabinet agreed on the necessity
for Emancipation. The difficulty lay with the king. Lord Clare favoured the Act
of Union but without the concession to the Catholics. He considered that the
chief opposition to the Union would come from the ‘jobbers’ (those who
improperly use a public office, trust, or service for personal gain or party
advantage OED). Clare succeeded in
getting the Union Act and the Emancipation Act separated. [November 1798]
Early in November Castlereagh saw Lord Fingall and Lord Kenmare separately and
secured their agreement with the Government’s proposals. Cornwallis was able to
report to the Duke of Portland in December that the leaders of the Irish
Catholics concurred with the Government’s proposals and considered that it
would be easier to get an Emancipation Bill through a United Parliament than
through an Irish Parliament. They also, he said, wished to see state provision
for the clergy. [December
1798] He also reported that Archbishop Troy concurred, but he seems to have
misunderstood Troy who was personally totally opposed to state provision for he
considered it would lessen the authority of the bishops. But Troy reported his
conversation with Castlereagh several months (17 August 1799) later to Cardinal
Borgia in Rome. According to Troy, Castlereagh had said that the participation
of some of the clergy in the late rebellion had made it desirous of the king
having a greater control over them. The king felt that the dependence of the
clergy on the laity made them vulnerable to pressures from their flocks. It
would be suitable if the king had in the rest of his dominions the rights he
had in Quebec regarding the appointment of bishops, namely the right to present
to the Pope the names of the clergy he deemed suitable. Troy commented that few
priests were involved in the late rebellion, and it was not proved that their
participation was caused by their dependence on their flocks, that a salaried
clergy would not be respected, that very much money would be required, and that
only the Pope could decide such matters. The Pope was then in captivity. On the
question of the Union, Troy said that he had not personally formed his opinion,
but he knew the project was widely disliked. He promised Castlereagh he would
consult the other bishops. Troy wrote to the other three archbishops, to his
own suffragan bishops, and to other prelates. It was the conclusion of the
bishops that it was necessary in the circumstances of the time to concede
something. Lord Fingall called a meeting of the leading Catholic laymen in his
own house. Thirty seven of them met on 15 December 1798 but there was considerable
disagreement among them. Some felt that the Act of Union contained nothing for
Catholics, that they would have a better chance of obtaining Emancipation in
their own Parliament, and they still could retain their Parliament. Troy
reported to Castlereagh that the Catholic laymen had decided to take no stance
as a body on the question of the Union. Cornwallis reported this to Portland on
5 December with the comment that some of the Catholics, the Earls of Fingall
and Kenmare in particular, were highly in favour. They were also in favour of
state provision (Derry; Vane-Stewart). Time was running out for Castlereagh,
for he had to present his Bill when Parliament re-assembled in January. On 21
December 1798, the Cabinet agreed Castlereagh’s proposals for the Act of Union. [January 1799]
Cornwallis warned Portland (2 January 1799) that the sentiments of the leading
Catholics (presumably the leading merchants in Dublin) towards the Union were
more lukewarm than those expressed by Kenmare and Fingall. In a later letter
(25 January) Cornwallis said he thought the lukewarmness flowed from a desire
to bargain, or to get an explicit recognition of their claims.(The merchants
and masters of the trades in Dublin could expect a loss of trade if a
parliament no longer met in Dublin.) The
trustees of Maynooth met at Lord Kenmare’s on 16 January 1799, and on three
subsequent days the episcopal trustees discussed the ecclesiastical points
involved. It is unlikely that any laymen were present at these discussions,
though Fingall was informed of their outcome (SNL 23 June 1815, quoting Extracts from Parliamentary Documents
relating to the Roman Catholics ordered to be printed 12 May 1815; Ward II.)
Ward in 1911 noted that a similar plan for state provision and veto existed in
Mauritius. Mauritius was a French colony captured by the British in 1810. The
decisions of the bishops were,
1)
It
was admitted that a provision for the Roman Catholic clergy of this kingdom
competent and secured ought to be thankfully accepted.
2)
That
in the appointment of the prelates of the Roman Catholic religion to vacant
sees within this kingdom such interference of government as may enable it to be
satisfied of the loyalty of the person appointed is just and ought to be agreed
to.
3)
Agreeably
to the discipline of the Roman Catholic Church these regulations can have no
effect without the sanction of the Holy See; which sanction the Roman Catholic
prelates of this kingdom shall, as soon as may be, use their endeavours to
procure. They
added five rules to be followed in the conduct of elections by the clergy of a
vacant diocese. It is interesting that the clergy were to elect one priest, as usual, who obtained more than half
the votes, and were to send his name to the bishops of the province, who might
accept the choice or choose a different priest. This person’s name was to be
sent to the Government, who would either accept it and send it on to Rome, or
reject it and return the name to the bishops who will convene another election.
It is notable here that the bishops were claiming the right of election, and
not of choosing three names to forward to the Pope to make his choice from.
Rome was never to concede this return to the ancient practice. With regard to
the appointment of parish priests, the bishops were satisfied that appointments
would remain with them, subject only to the condition that the person appointed
should take the oath of loyalty to the crown (Ward II). If the ‘as usual’ is
pressed, it would seem that the common practice at this time was for the
priests of the diocese to select one candidate whose name was presented to the
remaining bishops of the province for confirmation and forwarding to Rome. In addition, a small committee of
bishops consisting of the two primates, Archbishops O’Reilly and Troy, and Dr.
Plunket of Meath to treat with the Government regarding state provision were
appointed. The Vicar Apostolic of the London District (Douglass) does not
appear to have heard of the proposals before 1801. The editor of the Dublin Evening Post later accused Dr.
John Milner the English priest and controversialist of concurring with the
Irish bishops in 1799, but it is unclear how he heard of them. Castlereagh’s
claim that the bishops offered him the veto in 1799 would seem to distort facts
slightly. For them it was in the circumstances a necessary evil and the least
worst option. Not all the bishops were equally
enthusiastic. It was considered that four bishops were opposed to the
proposals, Coppinger of Cloyne, O’Shaughnessy of Killaloe, Young of Limerick,
and Power of Waterford. But the unexpected defeat of Castlereagh’s Bill for the
Union removed the urgency, and a turn in British fortunes in the War meant that
communication with Rome, if not with the Pope, became feasible. Captain
Troubridge recaptured Rome in September 1799. Troy’s letter to Cardinal Borgia
was sent on 17 August 1799. On 24 January 1799 the Irish Whigs
led by Ponsonby combined with dissatisfied Tories to defeat Castlereagh’s Bill.
A motion against the Union proposed by Sir Lawrence Parsons was carried by five
votes. The set-back was less serious
than it seemed for the opposition was made up of such diverse elements that it
could not act in concert. The Government normally had a majority in the Irish
House of Commons, and their supporters realised that their votes had suddenly
become valuable. But there was no more corruption in passing the Act of Union
than there was in any other Act, but the Government’s supporters could afford
to increase their usual demands (Bolton). The opposition too had to make
promises to their supporters regarding what they would get if they defeated the
Government and came to power. Those Catholics who wanted to again petition the
Irish Parliament for Emancipation dropped their plan. Cornwallis wrote to
Portland that it was not in the interest of the Irish Catholics to support the
Union if they could get emancipation without it for they are increasing while
the Protestants are not. [February
1799] At this point Sir John Coxe Hippisley, no longer living in Rome,
began to interest himself in Irish Catholic affairs. He was a born meddler.
Hippisley’s letter had been concerned with the religious orders. Troy replied
on 9 February 1799 thanking him for his interest, and informed him that at
their late meeting he and two other bishops were authorised to treat with
Castlereagh regarding state provision. He praised Pitt’s speech regarding the
Act of Union (Vane-Stewart). In the course of the year Catholic opinion
gradually turned in favour of the Union. Hippisley then proceeded to give
Castlereagh the benefit of his advice. [March
1799] The French in Italy decide to move the Pope to France. [July 1799]
But as Troy informed Castlereagh the bishops could not give any political
directions to their flocks for such direction would be much resented by them
(Vane-Stewart). Dillon of Tuam and Bray of Cashel considered any such direction
would produce the contrary effect. Dr Francis Moylan, Catholic bishop of Cork,
spent a week with the Duke of Portland’s home at Bulstrode to discuss affairs.
Moylan was strongly in favour of the Union. He accepted the bishops’ proposal
on the veto and state provision in 1799, but later became a strong opponent of
them. Archbishop Healey noted later that the ‘patriots’ denounced Troy and Moylan
as ‘Castle bishops’, but add that ‘they cannot with a shadow of truth be
described as subservient to the Government’ (Healey). Healey noted too that
Troy, despite Lord Norbury’s famous pun, was not a bon vivant. (Referring to a visit of Eneas MacDonnell to the
archbishop, Norbury remarked ‘Behold the pious Aeneas coming from the sack of
Troy’). John Keogh’s denunciation of some of the bishops that they were ‘old
men, used to bend to power’ simply means that they did not agree with Keogh’s
bull-at-a-gate tactics. The War, up to the Peace of Amiens
in 1801 had a curious seesaw character, now favouring one side and now the
other. When it was renewed under Napoleon’s firm and total command in 1803 its
character had changed. Between 1803 and the Battle of Jena (14 October 1806)
Napoleon swept all before him in a series of staggering and crushing victories.
By that time, the Allied armies were beginning to get his measure, and though
Napoleon continued to win battles it was at an increasingly heavy cost. But
many of the battles were actually drawn, as the defeated side was able to
withdraw in good order. As usually happens in such cases, the countries with
the largest populations could most easily stand the war of attrition. The
enormous losses in the campaign in Russia in 1812 could never be made good. For
the British, the tide of war turned slightly earlier, though they did not have
to face Napoleon himself until Waterloo. Nelson largely destroyed the combined
French and Spanish fleets at Trafalgar in October 1805 and a British force in
Calabria destroyed a larger French force at Maida in July 1806. In 1799 matters were not going well
for the French. Napoleon, then only one among numerous generals in the
Revolutionary Army, was cut off in Egypt by Nelson, and then blocked at Acre in
Palestine by Sir Sidney Smith who was assisting the Turks. On the Continent,
especially in Northern Italy, the French armies were falling back and a
decision was taken to remove the Pope from Tuscany to France. It was at this point,
that Captain Troubridge in the Culloden, re-occupied Rome, but one ship’s
company could not protect an entire state if the French returned. When the Pope
was in Florence the British representative there offered asylum to the Pope in
British territories. The British agent in Rome assisted members of the British
and Irish religious communities to recover their properties. [August
1799] On 29 August 1799 the old Pope died in Valence in France, and a new
Pope was not elected until the following March. Napoleon, hearing of the
successes of the Second Coalition in Northern Italy, abandoned the army in
Egypt and Palestine, and established what was virtually a military dictatorship
in December 1799, though he was called First Consul. The cardinals, after the Pope’s
death made their way to Venice in Austrian territory. No change could be made
in the way Irish bishops were chosen until there was a new Pope. But an
Emancipation Bill could not be prepared until the Act of Union was passed, and
it could not be introduced until both Parliaments re-assembled in January 1800.
Neither Pitt nor Troy was anxious to rush matters. Castlereagh was kept busy
trying to get parliamentary support for the Union Bill, so narrowly and
surprisingly defeated in 1799. The proposed terms of the Union were
generous to Ireland. The most important benefit to Ireland was the right of
access to British trade throughout the world, and the protection of the British
navy and consular service. (The young American republic had to build its own navy
to protect its ships overseas.) The leading Irish Catholics pressed Cornwallis
for clarification regarding what was on offer. As Castlereagh put it, attempts
were made ‘to bring Government to an explanation, which of course had been
evaded’ (Barnes). Cornwallis sent him over to London to find out what exactly
was intended. The problem for Pitt which this direct question posed was that he
could give no direct answer, for he still had to persuade a reluctant king to
make further concessions to the Catholics, and he really had no idea what
George would concede or when. Castlereagh found the cabinet in principle
favourable to Emancipation, though some of its members doubted the advisability
of admitting them to the most senior offices. The difficulty with the king was
explained to him, no doubt in indirect terms suitable for the ears of a very
young and very junior minister. He was aged thirty. As far as the sentiments of
the cabinet were concerned, Cornwallis need have no hesitation in calling on
the support of the Catholics. No definite promise of Emancipation was to be
given, for the cabinet felt that it was inexpedient at this time. He could, if
necessary, explain to the leading Irish Catholics the grounds he had for his
assurances to them. This can probably be translated that Cornwallis could
explain the situation regarding the king to noblemen like Fingall and Kenmare.
It is difficult to determine how much ordinary people knew about the king’s
mind on the matter. The king’s personal views were never discussed openly. But
on the other hand indiscreet gossips abounded, what are called nowadays
‘sources close to the palace’. (The
office of Irish Secretary was regarded as suitable for a young man at the start
of his career as it had no executive duties attached to it. Castlereagh,
Wellington, and Napoleon were all born in 1769. Napoleon at the age of thirty
became First Consul. Arthur Wellesley had reached the rank of colonel.
Castlereagh, as the eldest surviving son of a minor Irish nobleman, had a
certain advantage over Wellesley who was only the fourth son of an equally
minor Irish nobleman. It was an age when family connections were all important.
Daniel Murray, the son of a farmer, was born in 1768, and had reached the rank
of temporary curate. Murray and Wellington died in 1852, Napoleon in 1821, and
Castlereagh in 1822. Archbishop Troy, born 1739, died in 1823. Daniel O’Connell
was slightly younger than the others, being born in 1775.) Castlereagh’s
chief task in building up a majority for the Government was to offer suitable
recompense to those who lost financially, or in their interests. The chiefs of
those were the owners of boroughs. The ownership of a parliamentary borough,
like that of a commission in the army, or an office with fees attached, was regarded
as property that that could be bought and sold, and therefore had a price. As
these offices offered occasions for corruption. Castlereagh wrote of the need
to ‘secure to the crown the fee simple of Irish corruption which is considered
by so many as their means of getting forward and which they all took as
materially terminated by a Union’ (Hinde, Castlereagh).
[September 1799]
In September Archbishop Dillon of Tuam wrote to Troy, and Dr Moylan of Cork
wrote to Coxe Hippisley that public opinion was turning towards the Union.
Cornwallis and Castlereagh proceeded to enlist the support of the Catholics on
the basis of the explanations given by the cabinet. [November 1799]
Lord Hobart warned Pitt that Cornwallis and Castlereagh seemed to have
misunderstood the views of the cabinet (Bolton). But it would seem that Pitt as
well over-estimated the staunchness of the members of the cabinet in favour of
Emancipation. The ultimate card that Pitt felt he could play would be the
threat of resignation of the entire cabinet. As George could only then send for
the Whigs who were even more in favour of Emancipation, he would be forced to
concede defeat. As in the American War, after Yorktown, he would have to back
down as gracefully as he could manage. [December 1799]
As the year ended, such cardinals as could attend met for a conclave in Venice
under Austrian protection. After a 14-week conclave an Italian Benedictine
cardinal was elected Pope under the name Pius VII. [January 1800]
On 13 January 1800, some Dublin Catholics led by the twenty five-year-old
barrister, Daniel O’Connell got permission from Cornwallis to hold an
anti-Union rally. O’Connell noted that because the Catholics had decided not to
act as a body on secular political questions word had gone round that they
favoured the Union. This Catholic meeting was therefore called to refute this.
It was to be another decade however before O’Connell became a leading player.
Though the Dublin Catholics declared against the Union, the Catholics in Meath
led by Lords Fingall, Gormanston, Netterville, and Trimleston, Bishop Plunket
of Meath, and Randall MacDonnell declared in its favour (SNL 15 January, 14 February 1800). Opposition to the Union was
strongest in Dublin where the mercantile classes feared that the city would
lose its prosperity if it ceased to be a capital. The barristers in Dublin also
feared a loss of business from lack of Government transactions. In the event it did not matter. Dublin’s
prosperity and size increased immensely as it became the hub of the road
system, and later of the railways. Already a regular journey by coach could be
made to Cork a hundred and sixty miles away in two and a half days, down from
five or six days a decade earlier. [March 1800] This time the
Government had no difficulty in getting the Act of Union passed through both
Houses in both Parliaments. In the English House of Lords, Lord Holland tried
to get Emancipation tied into the British Act but failed. The Act of Union
(1800) was to come into force on 1 January 1801. It received the royal assent
on 1 August. [June 1800]
The Austrians decided not to detain the new Pope in their territories, so he
was permitted to return to Rome that was then under the control of the Kingdom
of Naples. [July 1800]
The new Pope agreed to state provision in the case of Emancipation. Coxe
Hippisley sent a copy of a recent letter from Cardinal Borgia dated 20 July
which stated that the Pope approved of ‘un
honesta provisione’ (an adequate provision) for the Catholic clergy. The
letter had been read by the Pope and approved of by him (Vane-Stewart). The
implication of course was that a negative veto on the appointment of bishops
would also be conceded. (This was made explicit in 1805 by Cardinal Borgia in a
letter to Milner.) [August 1800]
The Irish Parliament sat for the last time on 1 August 1800. [September 1800]
Unfortunately, at this juncture Pitt fell ill, and was also in very distressed
circumstances. It was a time of great difficulty for him. The Second Coalition
was failing. The cost of the War was enormous. To meet the cost of the war
taxes had to be raised, but Pitt had also to borrow heavily, at high interest
rates in the City of London. The price of ordinary foods soared. In his
personal finances he was also over-stretched. As a younger son, he had few
sources of private income. As an honest politician, he had no source of income
from that quarter. Nor was he a member of the armed forces, the Church or the
bar, from which he might derive an income. He never had a sufficient income to
allow him to marry. On 30
September 1800 Pitt called a cabinet meeting. He wished to secure a united
front in the cabinet with regard to the abolition of the sacramental test,
state provision for Catholic and Dissenting clergy, and the commutation of
tithes in both kingdoms (Pitt in DNB).
The Lord Chancellor, Loughborough, had some scruples about removing the oaths
of supremacy and abjuration. The Oath of Abjuration required by 13th
William III required to person taking it not to recognise the claims of the
Stuarts to the throne of England. The Oath of Supremacy recognised the king as
head of the Church of England in accordance with the statute 26 Henry VIII. The
relevance of these oaths is not obvious. In a letter to Castlereagh on 23 March
1801, Edward Cooke, the Under-secretary said that Pitt had sent the papers on
the Catholic question to the king on 13 September 1800, and had raised the
matter with him on the 13 and 18 December 1800 (Vane-Stewart). Loughborough,
with the king at Weymouth, however, showed the agenda of the proposed cabinet
meeting to the king who became annoyed that the cabinet was discussing a matter
that he had forbidden to be discussed without his prior permission. The idea
that a cabinet needed the prior permission of the king to discuss any subject
was rejected by every cabinet. It would appear that the disclosure of the
cabinet’s discussions to the king was accidental, but it did alert the king to
the fact that the matter was being discussed behind his back, and also probably
to the fact that there were divisions in the cabinet regarding the matter.
Arthur Wellesley, far away in India, considered that the king was mad before he
forbade the consideration of Emancipation. He wrote, ‘I conclude that the
derangement of the King’s mind was the cause of his opposition…he must have
known of [his ministers’] intentions respecting the Catholicks when they
…carried through the Union’ (Longford). The
king was aware of Loughborough’s own worries at least by 13 December 1800
(Barnes). Pitt’s position was weaker
than he thought. Like many men of limited intelligence and ability the king
resented being manipulated by more clever and able men. George in fact was
already looking for a way to replace Pitt. With regard to Emancipation George
had long since made up his mind; he was totally opposed to it. But Pitt still
believed he could not dismiss a united cabinet who were in favour. By this time
several senior members of the cabinet, including Portland, were having doubts
about Emancipation. Castlereagh informed Moylan that Emancipation had been
carried in the cabinet, with the proviso that the king in an episcopal election
should be free to choose one of three names presented to him (Ward 1). [December 1800]
In December John Toler was created Baron Norbury, Viscount Donoughmore was made
Earl of Donoughmore, and Viscount Kenmare was made Viscount Castlerosse and
Earl of Kenmare. Castlereagh’s biographer remarked that the 20 new baronies and
15 promotions in the peerage as favours to those who had assisted the Government
were not regarded as excessive by contemporary standards. Castlereagh was
pressing on with his plans for the payment of the clergy, and received from Dr
Troy details of the number of priests and men and women members of religious
orders. Napoleon
swiftly smashed Pitt’s Second Coalition (now including Great Britain, Portugal,
Russia, Turkey, Naples, and Austria) by defeating Austria at Marengo (June
1800) and Hohenlinden (December 1800). He opened negotiations with the Pope for
a Concordat before Pitt could do so. The peace party was gaining strength in
England, and it was felt that if Pitt were removed, a peace with France could
be obtained. The British House of Commons was dissolved on 31 December 1800. The
king received letters from the Protestant archbishops of Canterbury and Armagh,
and from Loughborough stating their objections to Emancipation (George III DNB), while neither Pitt nor the other
ministers communicated with the king on the subject. [January 1801]
On 1 January 1801, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland came into
existence formally. The balloting of Irish borough members, now reduced to one
per borough to the new House of Commons commenced. The county members simply
took their seats in the new House. George Ponsonby lost his seat as a borough
member and had to stand for a by-election in Wicklow county, and won the seat.
On 1 January 1801 Castlereagh wrote a long letter to Pitt pointing out that he
and Cornwallis had been given to understand that the cabinet supported Emancipation
and had so informed the Irish Catholic leaders. On 21 January 1801 the Earl of
Fingall called on Cornwallis and informed him that the Irish Catholics were
proposing to get up a petition for Emancipation to the United Parliament.
Cornwallis asked him to use his influence to dissuade the Catholics from such
an untimely step. He also asked the Earl of Donoughmore to use such influence
as he had with the Catholics in the same direction. At
a levee on 28 January 1801 the king asked Henry Dundas, the Secretary for War
‘what the ministers were going to throw at his head, and pointing at
Castlereagh said the proposed scheme ‘was the most Jacobinical thing I have
ever heard of’. When Dundas attempted a reply the king said ‘None of your
Scotch metaphysics’. The king required the Speaker of the House of Commons,
Henry Addington, to make known his sentiments to Pitt. Pitt replied on 31
January 1801 saying that he and the majority of the cabinet considered that
concessions to the Catholics and Dissenters were essential for the peace in
Ireland. He concluded by saying that if his majesty did not agree he must
tender his resignation (SNL 15 June
1827). [February 1801] The
king replied that he gave his consent to an Act of Union based on a trust that
no more Catholic legislation would be brought in. He was not prepared to
discuss a subject with ministers who were not prepared to discuss the subject
with him. He must accordingly ‘yield to his entreaties of retiring from the
Board of Treasury’. Several of the cabinet, including Pitt’s brother the Earl
of Chatham, did not see a need to press matters as far as resignation. But
Pitt, with several others, felt that they had already committed themselves to
the Irish Catholics to such an extent that they would have to resign. The king
asked Addington to form a ministry. On 5 February George accepted Pitt’s
resignation. By the 13 February, the resignation of Pitt was common knowledge
in Dublin, and on the following day it was known that he was to be succeeded by
Mr Addington. About 10 February George
showed great signs of agitation, and by 22 February his mental alienation was
unmistakable. In Dublin it was clearly recognised that the Lord Chancellor,
Lord Clare, had won. Lord Clare’s position now was a very strong one, for it was
chiefly due to his support that Castlereagh carried the Act of Union. On the 7 February 1801, the first parliament
of the United Kingdom opened, and as expected the king’s address contained no
mention of a measure of relief for the Catholics. It was reported however that
Lord Cornwallis would proceed with such a Bill in accordance with his promise.
Cornwallis and Castlereagh also felt that they had committed themselves to the
Catholics and considered that they must resign. But until either the king recovered
or a regent was appointed no replacements could be made. Addington included in
his cabinet two young men. One was Robert Banks Jenkinson, then Lord
Hawkesbury, and later 2nd Earl of Liverpool. The other was Spencer
Perceval. Both were future prime ministers. Cornwallis refused to serve in a
cabinet that excluded the Catholics, but accepted a very important naval
appointment as the admiral in charge of the defence of the Channel. The
question of a limited regency was again raised. It was considered that if a
regency was declared the Prince of Wales would ask Lord Moira to form a
ministry. The king blamed Pitt for causing his injury and extracted a promise
from him that he would never again disturb him with proposals for Emancipation.
Pitt agreed, doubtless recognising that worries regarding the coronation oath
were at the back of the king’s attacks. Nobody expected that the ailing
sixty-three year old monarch would live for another twenty years. Nor that the
Prince of Wales would desert the Whigs. The War of the Second Coalition
virtually came to an end when Austria and France concluded a peace treaty at
Luneville on 9 February 1801.
[Top] Addington and Harwicke (February 1801 to May 1804)
[February 1801] Another
Portland Whig, Philip Yorke, 3rd Earl of Hardwicke, was appointed
Lord Lieutenant and he wrote to Cornwallis telling him of his prospective
appointment and asked his advice regarding the Catholic question. Pitt wrote to
Cornwallis explaining the circumstances of his resignation. Cornwallis on 13
February 1801 sent for Archbishop Troy and Lord Fingall and explained the
circumstances, and gave them two papers on the subject to be circulated in
Ireland (Vane-Stewart; see SNL 4
March 1801 for what seems to be a conflation of the papers.) Cornwallis
believed that he had an explicit commitment in writing from Pitt that the Act
of Union would be followed by an Emancipation Act (SNL 26 January 1828). Apparently, about this time the English and
Scottish vicars apostolic were informed, probably by Dr Moylan, on the
discussions regarding the bishops (Ward I). [March 1801]
Hardwicke was formally appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland on 17 March 1801
and he arrived in Ireland and was sworn into office on 25 May 1801. He was
originally a supporter of Fox, but followed the Duke of Portland in joining
with Pitt. Harwicke had not yet made up his mind on the question of
Emancipation and wished for guidance on the subject. At first he had an open
mind regarding the Catholic question, but came round to favour Emancipation. He
wished to be fair-minded and even-handed, but like all the British
administrators until Marquis Wellesley he failed to recognise that the only way
to be fair to the Catholic was to clear their hard-line opponents out of Dublin
Castle. Surprisingly, too, most of these hard-liners who had strongly opposed
the Union quickly accepted office in the United kingdom (Beckett). It was an
age when almost all public appointments were made by patronage, the
requirements for a post were minimal, and each side had to reward its own
supporters. (For a legal appointment, the only requirement was that the
appointee had ‘kept terms’ and eaten the requisite number of dinners in the
Inns of Court. He was not required actually to know anything about the law. For
an appointment in the Church, one had to be an ordained minister. There was no
need to know any divinity. Only in the navy and in the Royal Artillery was some
professional competence required.) But it was also fortuitous that power of the
anti-Catholic clique remained for twenty years. The king could have died at any
time, and the Whigs come to power. The Whig ministry of All the Talents could
have survived. After the death of Pitt a new Prime Minister could have decided
to end the War. But after the Duke of Portland succeeded in forming a ministry
the Tories remained in office until 1830. In 1812, both Lord Moira and the
Marquis Wellesley failed to get sufficient support to form cabinets. All the
Lords Lieutenant appointed up to 1820 were given the same basic instructions,
to keep the peace, and to try to reconcile the warring factions. There was no
anti-Catholic policy either in politics or in religion. Nor was there any
anti-Catholic bias in the administration of the laws. It was just that until
Catholics were allowed into offices with patronage over jobs Catholics would
not get their fair share of jobs. In the circumstances of the time and place
that would have meant a minority of jobs. People are inclined to forget that
although those baptised Catholics formed three quarters of the population,
Catholics of wealth and position were few compared with their Protestant
counterparts. Voting rights were tied strictly to what a person was expected to
pay in taxes, and most people felt that this was proper. In the event the king recovered fairly
quickly. By 14 March his recovery seemed so far advanced for Pitt finally to
leave office. Hardwicke was appointed on 17 March but Cornwallis stayed until
he was sworn in on 25 May 1801. No Lords Justices were appointed to cover a
vacancy. Pitt’s resignation and those of Cornwallis and Castlereagh were
formally accepted and Addington took over as Prime Minister. The offices of
Irish Secretary and Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant were combined. After Castlereagh’s
resignation Charles Abbot, an Englishman, was appointed, but was replaced in
February 1802 by William Wickham. There followed 8 Secretaries in the following
8 years. Abbot remained in London to conduct the business in Parliament, and
arrived in Ireland in July 1801.The emergency legislation of the previous
decade due to expire was renewed. Cornwallis
and Castlereagh had to explain the debacle to the Irish Catholic leaders. In
Dublin, Counsellor Bellew told Marsden the Under-secretary in Dublin that he
thought it would be possible to get a declaration from the Catholics
acquiescing in the postponement of Emancipation in the circumstances.
Cornwallis told Castlereagh on 18 March 1801 that he did not think the
Catholics were sufficiently united on the point to risk an attempt to get up an
address, especially as there were jealousies at Bellew’s taking the lead.
Bellew was associated with Fingall’s party, and as such detested by Keogh who
felt he ought to be the leader. [May
1801] Hardwicke arrived, and Cornwallis held an undress levee before he
departed. In October, the War came to a temporary halt with the negotiations
that led to the Peace of Amiens in March 1802. [August 1801]
The Irish bishops about this time received two letters from Rome, in which the
Holy See expressed disapproval of the way they had acted with regard to the
appointment of bishops and the acceptance of state provision for the clergy.
Troy replied on behalf of the bishops, explaining what they had agreed to and
why. One suspects that some Irish priests at Rome were deliberately supplying
misleading information to the Holy See. It would not be the last time (Cannon, DEP 15 Dec 1825). Irish bishops like
Curtis, Murray, and MacHale had on occasion to point out the Holy See had been
supplied with inaccurate or incorrect information. Rome was used to this, so
the first reply from Rome on any given point usually amounted to no more than
general warnings and exhortations to episcopal zeal. Or else it contained a
warning to local bishops not to decide on matters which the Pope had reserved
to himself or which infringed the privileges of the Holy See. Only after a
point had been discussed for several years was a decision finally made. They
Government did not proceed with Castlereagh’s plan for state provision for the
Catholic clergy, though it did increase the Regium
Donum to the Presbyterian clergy. On 7 August 1801 Rome expressed its
disapproval of state provision and the Irish bishops cheerfully acquiesced. The
Holy See had condemned state payment of clergy by the French Revolutionary
Government in 1791, and in Corsica, when occupied by the British from 1794 to
1796, had refused to countenance state provision there (SNL 13 May 1814; DEP 15
Dec 1825). The Irish bishops and clergy were not suffering hardship under the
system of voluntary contributions, and saw no need to change. On the other
hand, they saw several disadvantages in the state system. There the matter
rested as far as the Irish bishops were concerned. The
questions regarding the veto and state provision were dealt with at some
length, partly because of their connection with the Act of Union and partly
because of the major controversy between the ‘vetoists’ and ‘anti-vetoists’
over a decade later. This latter dispute was between Catholic lay would-be
politicians who considered their political implications. But at this stage very
few people knew of the negotiations that had already taken place. Castlereagh
who conducted them, Cornwallis, some members of the cabinet and the Irish Government,
and the Irish Catholic bishops. Of the Catholic laymen, probably only a handful
like Lord Fingall, Lord Kenmare, Sir Edward Bellew, and Counsellor Bellew, were
given some information, though they were not directly involved in Church
discipline. Pitt and the British and Irish Governments were seeking means to
combat the French Revolution, and the endemic agrarian disorders in Ireland
which the events in 1798 showed could, if combined with revolutionary
movements, produce a formidable conspiracy. It was felt that some direct
controls over the Catholic clergy would be useful, but the comparative ease
with which the various disturbances in were put down in 1798, and the general
loyalty of the Catholics, showed they were not essential. As far as the Holy See
was concerned, it seems to have been resolute against accepting state
provision, no doubt for the same reasons which influenced Troy and the Irish
bishops. It was opposed to direct nomination by non-Catholic sovereigns, but
was prepared to accept a negative veto, but saving the rights of the Irish
clergy and the Holy See. In other words, the Irish clergy would present the
Pope with a short list of names from which he would select. But the list would
first be shown to the Government that could object to one or more names and ask
for others to be substituted. In the event, no proposals were made to Rome
which were satisfactory in these three respects. As far as the Holy See was
concerned, there the matter rested. (How the Holy See expected the bishops and
priests to support themselves is not clear. That some religious orders of
friars should expect to live solely on the contributions of the faithful was
approved. It was expected that the parochial clergy would have a secure income,
usually from endowments of land. But as Ireland came under Propaganda and was
regarded as a mission land, the dependence of the parish clergy on free
contributions of their parishioners was condoned. The question of the possible
subservience of the clergy to popular feeling did not arise at this time,
though it did later in the century.) There
is one last piece of the jigsaw concerning relations with Rome that must be
fitted in if only because both the British Government and the Irish bishops
took careful note of it. This was the concordat between the French Republic
under Napoleon and the Pope which was signed on 15 July 1801. It was expected
that the concordat between the Pope and the British monarchy would be concluded
shortly and would be on similar lines. The French Government and others who had
seized Church property were allowed to retain it. The Government was to pay
suitable salaries to the clergy. The state was given the power of direct
nomination of bishops; the number of bishops was to be reduced, the Pope was to
depose those bishops who did not resign. In England the émigré clergy were not
pleased, but the matter was handled sensitively by the vicar apostolic of the
London District, Dr. John Douglass, who was content with the vaguest and most
loosely-worded submissions. Dr Milner, then a priest in the Midland District,
and not really concerned in the matter, insisted that only a full and explicit
submission should be allowed. Castlereagh,
as MP for county Down, was not prepared to drop his pet project, and continued
with the matter though it was no longer his concern. Addington however asked
him to pilot some bills concerning the disturbed state of Ireland through the
Commons. He was soon advising the Government on the commutation of tithes,
state provision for the Catholic clergy, the admission of Catholics to
Parliament and the building of fortifications against a French invasion in
Ireland (Castlereagh DNB). In July
1802, strongly pressed by Pitt, he rejoined the Government as President of the
Board of Control (of India) with a seat in the cabinet. Thereafter he was
little involved with Ireland, though he always strongly supported the Catholic
claims. Castlereagh wrote to Addington on 21 July 1801, and told him he had
been taking soundings among the Irish Catholics. Though some of the more
democratically inclined, as in the Presbyterian Church, disapproved, he felt
that Troy, Moylan, and Fingall supported the proposals (Vane-Stewart).
Addington did not take up his proposals [1803] In
April the war with Napoleon was resumed, and the Papal States were immediately
invaded. In July, a young barrister called Robert Emmet made an inept attempt
to start another rebellion, but its only result was the murder of a fair-minded
judge called Lord Kilwarden. Archbishop Troy issued a pastoral letter
condemning all who took part in it, and praised the conciliatory policy of the
Earl of Hardwicke. Other leading Catholics in Dublin also condemned the murder.
Fingall, Gormanston, Archbishop Troy, Archbishop O’Reilly, and several other
leading Catholics presented an address to Hardwicke deploring the outrage. Dr
Coppinger of Cloyne issued a pastoral denouncing Emmet, and praising Hardwick’s
mild administration. He exhorted all members of his diocese to prepare for
defence against a French invasion. It was, he said, an act of religion to join
this war against irreligion (On 26 September the bishops of Connaught issued a
joint pastoral against the adoption of ‘French principles’ SNL 19 August, 6 October 1803). Fingall was then given a commission
as a magistrate. When granting him this commission, the new Lord Chancellor,
Lord Redesdale, exhorted Fingall to inculcate loyalty among the Catholics in
county Meath. But he went on to attack the teaching of the Catholic Church and
its bishops that the Roman Church was the only true Church. To teach that,
Redesdale maintained was implicitly to preach rebellion, for it implied that
the Church of which His Majesty was Head was a false Church, and common people
might think they were free from allegiance to the crown. A public exchange of
letters occurred, and Fingall was able to show that Redesdale was totally
ignorant of Catholic theology. . Dr
John Milner was made a vicar apostolic (bishop) in 1803, and was pursuing his
lifelong feud with Charles Butler. He made various enquiries in Rome regarding
what had been or could be conceded, but was just furnished with the replies
that Rome had already sent to the Irish bishops. A letter of Propaganda to Dr
Luke Concanen OP, agent of the Irish bishops in 1805 again re-stated the
position. A copy of this letter was published in Milner’s Orthodox Journal in May 1814 (DEP
15 Dec 1825).Bishop Douglass, vicar apostolic of the London District, obtained
the appointment of Dr William Poynter, now back in England as his co-adjutor
with right of succession. Pointer succeeded Douglass in 1812. [1804]
In February 1804 Charles Butler wrote to Lord Fingall and said he had seen the
exchange of letters with Redesdale and denied he had any part in publishing
them. He informed him that Pitt’s friends say he will not bring in a measure
for Catholic relief during the present king’s reign. At this stage, the English
lay Catholics, especially those in the London area were better placed to
maintain contacts with Pitt and the leading Whigs. It was unfortunate, that Dr
Milner regarded them as heterodox in doctrine. It is also unfortunate that the
Irish bishops decided to use Milner as their London agent rather than be guided
by the more moderate counsels of the other vicars apostolic with whom Milner
was perpetually at war. In
April 1804 Pitt decided that he could stand Addington’s management of the War
no longer. A French invasion seemed imminent. He wanted to form a broad-based
coalition, including Fox, and Lords Grenville, Spencer, and Fitzwilliam. The
king refused to allow Fox into the cabinet, and Lord Grenville and the others
refused to serve without Fox. Addington did not join him either. Pitt’s team
when he got it together lacked big names, but it included capable young men
like Castlereagh, Hawkesbury, Perceval, and Canning, besides the Duke of
Portland. The young men were known as Mr Pitt’s friends. Four of the above were
to become Prime Minister, and they formed the nucleus of the Tory Party in the
nineteenth century. Pitt took over the reins on 10 May 1804. Of the twelve
members in the cabinet, only two, Pitt and Castlereagh, were in the Commons (DNB). |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Copyright Desmond J. Keenan, B.S.Sc.; Ph.D. ;.London, U.K.
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