bloody and guilty men that ever were under the Sun and fly the Kings Justice with reflection and scorn upon the State that was pursuing them for their Crimes and to avoid the inward stings of Guilt or Apprehensions of Punishment run head-long into open and a vowed Guilt among those who were under Gods Vengeance and the Kings I leave this to your Lordships more serious second thoughts Being out of the danger of Justice though your Lordship cared little for the Justices as how could your Lordship when you were associated with those who had bid defiance to God and the King yet your Lordship quickly saw a proof how civil and merciful they had been to you hitherto when they upon your escape shewed you they had power enough to pursue you and pillage and burn your House in your Mountain view and use your Family as Enemies which they might have done before but their constant course was to endeavour the re-gaining those who had faltered in their Allegiance and not to increase the number which was too heavy upon them already Your Lordship at length arrived to the beloved place designed the City of Kilkenny Head Quarters of the Confederate Rebels where you found many of your acquaintance preparing for their natural defence seeing no distinction made or safety but in Arms. Your Lordships heart was now at rest among your Friends and Relations to whom indeed after committing all the wickedness their hand of violence could reach to being defeated in several Battels by his Majesties Forces and driven into their Holds defence became natural their Crimes having left them no hopes but in Arms and who could expect no distinction to be made where they were universally involved in the same black guilt For this end your Lordship saith they had chosen a Council formed an Oath of Association made Four Generals of the Four Provinces caused a Seal to be made raised Monys constituted a General Assembly c. all ensigns of the more than Regal Power they had usurped To this Council your Lordship was sent for and being well prepared by those inclinations which made you forsake the Kings Government and the Laws you quickly closed with them upon the grounds before expressed and upon consideration of their model of Government and very reasonable as your Lordship judged it Oath of Association which your Lordship prints at large and their desiring your conjunction with thanks returned your Lordship engaged your self to run a Fortune with them upon very ill principles if anger and revenge inclined you to it as much as any other consideration which you intimate though you say you cannot resolve It s strange how the Earl of Castlehaven and Lord Audley in England could close so cordially with the Irish who had shed so much innocent English Blood in full peace and think himself justified by such an account of his ingagement as this unless he had been resolved in the justice of their cause from the beginning however he carried it with seeming fairness to the Lords Justices till he got out of their reach But ingaged your Lordship was and being thus Confederate and having taken the Oath of Association becoming one of their Council and General of the Horse under Preston and giving the most specious account you can of your proceedings in that quality Truth being the greatest and best friend I had rather one or several Persons and Families should lie under the Consequences of its impartiality than that the English Nation and Protestant Religion should suffer by a timorous unworthy concealing or withholding any part of it And since your Lordship to palliate or justifie your own Actions and the Confederate Irish Cause endeavours to render the generality of the English Protestants Criminal your Lordship must not think it much that I one of English Race and for Religion of the Church of England should be a little plain in their Justification and Defence and for that end remove the mask your Lordship hath put upon the face of Affairs by continuing my Remarques upon your Lordships Memoires And first to the constitution of a Council it was made up of Members uncapable of that trust by Law In the Oath of Association and Propositions grounded thereon there is not a word but breaths high Treason except the first thirteen lines which set up the Kings Name and Authority only in pagentry and mockery to be crucified and contradicted by all that follows and yet this Oath your Lordship held very reasonable as the case then stood that is when you and your Confederates were incouraged or heightned with a Power able as you fancied to make good what you had sworn And suitable to this ungodly trayterous Oath where all the subsequent proceedings of the Confederates their Councils at home and their Actions abroad their Cessations and pretended Peaces which I shall take notice of more particularly in their respective series of time The general Assembly met the 24th of October 1642 your Lordship saith it differ'd nothing from a Parliament but that the Lords and Commons sate together and not in two Houses Was this so inconsiderable a difference in the Opinion of a Peer of England as well as Ireland or fit for one of so noble Extraction to be submitted to against Honour Law and right Reason But the truth is and I speak it for the honour of the Nobility of Ireland the Rebels had not debauched enough of them either for interest or number to bear the Countenance of a House of Peers or to be of any considerable figure among that People who having cast off Majesty could not be warmed by the beams thereof which I count the Nobility but they resolved of course into common persons again and had but single Votes among the Croud instead of those Honourable Priviledges and Negative Voice which their Ancestors had acquired as the just reward of their faithfulness to the Crown in former times and in all Defections and Rebellions since the subjection of that Nation to England And this your Lordship ingeniously confesseth and saith we see it was a force-put upon you and you hoped in time the storm being passed to return to your old Government under the King Here you own the being fallen from it but could your Lordship imagine or any others believe this Cob-web pretence possible were you not all ingaged by the bond of an Oath to the contrary and to preserve your new upstart treasonable Model and Constitution and that the storm should never cease till you had by Arms attained a confirmation of all that you had done for which by the said Oath you renounced the receiving any Pardon or Protection but by your own Sword But that Assembly differed also from a Parliament in this That it was called by a packt party of bloody Papists in Rebellion and Confederacy and had neither Legal nor Regal Authority But to conciliate credit and belief you add That there were many learned in the Law amongst you whom
an escape and save your self in the Irish Quarters which your Lordship did and give us a Relation of the manner of it and how your Lordship took your way towards the Mountains of Wickow where being come you cared little for the Justices though before Dinner your escape being discovered on notice given to the Justices you were pursued by a party of Horse taking their way to your House at Madingstowne which they invested in the night but not finding your Lordship after possessing themselves of what your Lordship had within and without they killed many of your Servants and burnt the House Your Lordship kept on your way to Kilkenny as much through the Fast Countrey as you could till you arrived where you found the Town very full and many of your acquaintance all preparing for their Natural Defence seeing no distinction made or safety but in Arms. To this end your Lordship saith They had chosen amongst themselves out of the most eminent Persons a Council and gave it the Title of The Supream Council of the Confederate Catholicks of Ireland and formed an Oath of Association by which all were bound to obey them They had made Four Generald of the Four Provinces Preston of Leinster Barry of Munster Owen-Roe Oneal of Vlster and one Burk of Connaught and being to give Commissions they caused a Seal to be made which was the Seal of the Council Your Lordship saith you were sent for to this Council to tell your Story which you did And being asked what you intended to do you answered to get into France and so to England upon which they told you their condition and what they were doing for their preservation perswading you to stay with them being your Lordship was beloved in the Countrey had three Sisters married amongst them was persecuted upon the same score they were and ruined so that you had no more to lose but your Lives You took two or three days to think of this Proposition examining the Model of Government they had prepared against the meeting of the general Assembly and most particularly their Oath of Association which your Lordship judged to be very reasonable as the case stood On the whole matter you returned to this Council Thanked them for their good Opinion of you and engaged your self to run a Fortune with them Whether Anger and Revenge did not incline you to it as much as any other consideration you say you cannot resolve but this you well remember that you considered how you had been used and seen your House burning as you passed by besides that you were a light man with no charge and not any hopes of redress from the King who was then engaged in an intestine War Now being thus a Confederate and having taken the Oath they made your Lordship one of the Council and General of the Horse under Preston The Assembly met the 24th of October 1642. It differed nothing from a Parliament other then that the Lords and Commons sate together and not in two Houses This your Lordship saith we see was a force-put upon you and you hoped in time the storm being passed to return to your old Government under the King You had many Learned in the Law amongst you whom you incouraged to keep you as near the Old Government as might be holding to the Ancient Laws of the Land That Assemby without delay approved all the Council had done and settled a Model of Government viz. That at the end of every General Assembly the Supreme Council should be Confirmed or Changed as they thought sit That it should consist of Twenty five six out of each Province three of the six still Resident 〈…〉 was your Lordship with 〈…〉 to any Province but to the Kingdom in general Every Province had a Provincial Assembly which met on occasions and each Countrey had Commissions for Applotting Money within themselves as it came to their stâ—â—res upon the general Applotment of the Province Many other things there were as to Government If a better came to them written in Irish it would be wondred at and hardly could one be found to read it You say you were not in case to bring to Justice those that begun the Rebellion But you never saw any of them esteemed or advanced The general Assembly being put off the Generals fell to their work and your Lordships General took in Burras Fort Faukland and Barrish in the Kings County where you were with him Your Lordship was also with this General the 18th of March 1642 when he was beaten at Rose by the Marquess of Ormond and by Collonel Monk since Duke of Albermarie at Timochoe in the Queens County the Fifth of October 1642. Yet afterwards he besieging Ballynekill in the same County you ventured once more with him where he having intelligence that Major General Crawford was Besieging Ballybritas a Castle belonging to the Viscount Clanmalleer he sent your Lordship with a party of Fifteen hundred Horse and Foot to endeavour the succouring of that place which your Lordship did and Crawford drawing off in passing the River of the Barrow in a Skirmish had his Thigh broken with a Musket Shot You returned as Ballynekill was rendred After this your Lordship remained at Kilhenny with the Supream Council and Preston went into the lower parts of the Province with the Army of whose Absence the Enemies Garrisons in the County of Catherlagh and Queens County taking advantage allarm'd the County of Kilkenny even to the Gates of the City Your Lordship was then by the Council commanded to go against them And therefore having gotten together about 2000 Men with some Cannon you marched to Ballynunry in the County of Catherlagh and took it as also Cloghgrenan where the County of Wexford's Regiment mutined but were reduced and some Examples made served well for the future Your Lordship marched thence into the Queens County and Besieged Bellylenan Commanded by the Grimes's a valiant People with a strong Garrison But a great breach being made their Succour came by the way of Athy Your Lordship was not well at this Allarm but laid upon your Bed in your Tent. However you made no great matter of it knowing the Succour could not be considerable but your Lordship beating their Succour in their view the besieged Garrison yielded on condition to march out with their Arms. And then your Lordship was perswaded to head the Munster Forces of whose Success under your Command you give a full Relation and then returning to Kilkenny gave the Assembly an account of what had passed Soon after the Assembly being broke up and a Supream Council chosen to govern in their absence you retired to Kilkash your Brother Butler's House to rest your self The Council went to Ross and whilst they were there a Trumpet brought them a Letter from the Marquess of Ormond setting forth his being appointed by the King to hear your Grievances and to treat for an accommodation The particulars of the Letter you know
accidents as might happen in full peace and when the course of Justice is free But your Lordship saith that on this partly and partly on other occasions that preceded and some too that followed but you enumerate none the whole Nation finding themselves concerned took Arms for their own defence and partlcularly the Lords of the Pale did so who yet at the same time desired the Justices to send their Petition to the King which was refused This being the chief ground by which your Lordship would justifie the most formed and dangerous Conspiracy and Rebellion that ever was in that Kingdom since the Crown of Englands first Title thereunto which your Lordship being a Peer of England should have distinguished from a just and a lawful War but do not I must observe to your Lordship that its an ill way to acquaint the King with their pretended Grievances La main a lespe they should have done that if they had any before their treacherous and bloody Massacres and open Rebellion but indeed they had none to offer but what was the just return of their own black Actions for your Lordship knows as I have said before that by Committees of both Houses of Parliament in Ireland whereof most were Papists they had just before their Rebellion returned loaden with such Graces and Condescentions of Favour from the Crown as had been sufficient meeting with the least ingenuity gratitude and humanity to have made wavering Persons good Subjects but the Lord Macguires and others Confessions manifested that they had laid their Design of Treason too deep to retreat easily when they had once struck the stroak till finding their error not from remorse but from sense of danger imminent which must inevitably follow unless they could subdue England too At the first they made a loud cry of Grievances and at length bid fair as they had made Ireland a field of Blood and Desolation to disturb England also Concerning the further discouragement the Rebels received by Sir John Reads treatment and what that was and upon what grounds though I have all the passages thereof by me and will by no means allow of Racking any Man as being contrary to the Law of England yet I must observe that it was a very jealous time after so many thousands slaughtered barbarously in cold blood the Rebellion increasing every day too great a curiosity arising to know the bottom of the design that remedies proportionable might be applied and Sir John Read being one of the Kings Servants and a designing Papist being there so unseasonably without being able to give a good account of himself or business and going away Agent for the Rebels in Arms without leave of the State might make them exceed the strict bounds of Law in his Examination Your Lordship in the next place taking notice that you had tryed this and other ways to acquaint the King with your Grievances which I have shewed before were none and all failing an open War broke forth generally throughout the Kingdom this being a meer colour and pretence your Lordship unfortunately puts the effect before the pretended cause for by what you had said before and what the truth of the cause is the horrid Rebellion for it never merited the name of a War was universal before they so much as alleadged any Grievance Your next Memoire is of your entertaining my Lord of Ormond at Dinner after the Battle of Kilrush which you were a Spectator of and that some who came with him turned it another way publishing through the Army that it was a Feast for my Lord Mountgarret and the Rebels which through the English Quarters past for currant Here your Lordship by your own shewing intimates that though you were a Spectator from your own House of a Battle wherein the Crown lay at stake and had formerly discovered you had force enough to recover your Cat el taken away by the Rebels and apprehend some of their Leaders which you call Rogues yet though a Peer of both Kingdoms you would be no Actor though the Kings General was at your Gate doubting it seems the event of Battle but the success rendring my Lord of Ormond Victorious you set before him that Dinner which you had not strength to keep from him And indeed it was generally then held by the English that if the Rebels had gained the day your Lordship would more frankly have bid the Lord Mountgarret their General and a Butler also welcome to that Dinner than you did my Lord of Ormond and this is what passeth rant in this particular to this day which you believe was much the cause of that villainous proceeding as you call it fore-mentioned whereas it seems you were so far from being ill dealt with in the least that my Lord of Ormond your Guest though he might have justified his carrying you Prisoner with him to Dublin who would not assist him in Fight as your Tenure required left you as some think by a blameable omission Master of your own House and without the least damage done you though much happened after to the Kingdom by your liberty of which you were for some time restrained in the Sheriffs hands and after ordered to be removed to the Castle of Dublin which you say startled you and it brought to your thoughts the proceedings against the Earl of Strafford c. whereupon you made an escape probably in the manner related But here your Lordship not distinguishing times and I not having Papers by me am so doubtful of an intermixture of Affairs to your advantage that I must reserve the unfolding thereof to another tfme when I shall be able exactly to shew you the times of your Lordships appearing and joyning with the Rebels and of the proceeding against the Earl of Strafford and how they preceded on the other I shall only for the present observe how that great personage though more innocent than your Lordship could pretend to never sled his Tryal well knowing that would have fixed more guilt upon him in construction of Law than could be proved against him and judged it more honourable to hazard the losing of his Head than his Innocency Your Lordships Wisdom took a contrary course and concluding that Innocency was a scurvy plea in an angry time as in deed it is in any times where it is so thin laid that gross guilt appears under it you find it safer to arraign the state than to abide a Tryal and accordingly taxing them for passion and partiality and to be of the Parliaments perswasion when your Lordship would have had them and the whole Kingdom of yours and by what means time hath manifested you resolved to attempt an escape and save your self in the Irish Quarters which your Lordship did to the Mountains of Wicklow where being come you cared little for the Justices Is it possible if your Lordship had thought your self innocent that you would seek safety or count your self safe among the most enormously
Majesties Pardon if the Acts of Parliaments have not precluded you for it s more than I know if all your Lordships active Services in Ireland be not yet liable to the utmost penalties and Severities of the Law So far are they from being fit to be offered as entertainment to his Majesty by an Epistle Dedicatory as your Lordship hath done I find your Lordship in several places reflects upon those who broke the first Peace and call it unparallell'd breach of Faith punished by heavy Judgments from Heaven and yet this was the Confederates own Act. But as if the breach of the Oath of Allegiance by the Irish and their treacherous and bloody defection from the Crown of England were a Peccadillo your Lordship hardly takes notice of it but repines at the forfeiture of Estates grounded thereupon though God and Man agreed in that Vengeance and Punishment And let this Rebellion be compared to all before it there will not appear since the English Title to Ireland so just and clear grounds of forfeiture and extirpating a Nation as have done upon this but the King hath mingled Mercy with Justice and though by a Providence from Heaven to the English the Marquesses of Ormond and Clanrickard his Majestles chief Governors incouraged the Irish to keep up a War against the English wherein they were so much hardened to their ruin that they were at length intirely subdued without condition to any save for life and left to be as miserable as they had made others in all other respects yet multitudes of them have been restored and must yet own their Lives and Estates to the Clemency of the King and the mildness of the English Government which they had cast off and put themselves under a Forreign Yoke which neither we nor our Fathers were able to bear The Wisdom of God thus punishing one sin of theirs with another till they are scarce a People and the English and Protestant interest never more flourishing in that Kingdom Insomuch that it would be now the greatest folly imaginable in the Government of England and Ireland ever to suffer the Papists to grow capable of raising such a Rebellion again which they will certainly do when able Bigottery and sottish Ignorance both of Priests and People in Religion being the growing root of mischief there Upon the whole since the Cobweb excuses your Lordship hath made cannot cover the Blood that hath been shed or bring quiet to the Consciences of any that had hand therein and since your Lordship so well knows the Temper and Constitution of the Irish by your long continuance and interest among them I cannot but yet hope and therefore do with the most friendly adjurations beseech your Lordship herein that the zeal which you yet seem to have for the King his Laws and the English Government will incline you to let him know the truth you cannot be ignorant of that they are a Nation never to be trusted till reformed that so his Majesty and his English Subjects may run no more hazards of suffering by confidence in them or regard to their Crocodile Tears and groundless Complaints by which they have deceived the English in all times And that by your Repentance imitating your Ghostly Father Peter Walsh his Advice to his Countrey Men for Repentance and change of Principles your Lordship may give another instance to the World that Allegiance and the Religion you profess may dwell in the same Breast then which nothing can more conduce to divert the Irish from future Attempts of Rebellion My Lord I find many Queries fit to be made on your Memoires and many other particulars a Redire therein but you will perhaps think I have done too much already I shall therefore reserve these to another opportunity and here close in the wonted manner with the assurance of my being saving in the Irish Confederacy and Matter of Religion My Lord Your Lordships Affectionate Friend and Servant Postscript THis Letter was written as appears in August 1680 presently after the Earl of CASTLE-HAVEN had Published his Memoires with a Dedication only to the King but since his Lordships Receipt of this Letter he was it seems convinced of the necessity of writing the Epistle to the Reader in Condemnation of the Irish Rebellion which his Lordship hath since caused to be Printed with the said Memoires FINIS