OLD NEWSPAPERS GO TO MUSEUM

LEINSTER  LEADER MAY 13 1978

Old newspapers go to museum

An item shortly to be added to the museum at Market House, Kildare, is a copy of a 1798 edition of the Dublin Journal newspaper which has special relevance to the Kildare area as it contains accounts of the rebellion in several areas of the county including the Curragh, Rathangan and Prosperous.

It is at present in the possession of Very Rev. E. Mulvihill, Parish Priest of Staplestown and Cooleragh, who found it accidentally in the loft of an old house undergoing renovation.  Considering its age and the haphazard conditions in which it seems to have survived, the paper is in remarkably good condition and the print quite legible.

Also in Fr. Mulvihill’s possession is a copy of the February 11th 1792 edition of the Dublin Evening Post which he will also donate to the Kildare museum.  Both papers have dampness stains at one edge but luckily the moisture did not spread to the remainder and destroy them. The Dublin Journal, dated Thursday May 31st 1798, has an account of the Gibbetrath massacre at the Curragh to which a monument now stands in Kildare town.

The Journal takes a strong anti-rebel line when describing events.  It says, “Surrounded at the Curragh, the cowardly rebels proposed an unconditional surrender; it was accepted; they were allowed to depart form a situation from which they could never have escaped; and as a natural consequence, betook themselves to other detachments of their own army, to new murders, and new insurrections.

“The only passenger on the Limerick Mail coach on the morning of Saturday last was Lieutenant William Giffard of the 82nd regiment, a son of Captain William Giffard of the Royal Dublin Militia; he was coming to Dublin to set off to his quarters at Chatham.  As the coach passed through Kildare, it was surrounded by a multitude of rebellious assassins, and this unhappy young Officer dragged out and butchered without mercy.  Such was the triumph of an army of murderers over a defenceless, innocent and amiable young gentleman, scarcely seventeen years of age, and such are the villains with whom the King’s troops were allowed to treat.

“General Duff, with the City of Dublin Regiment and a party of Dragoons, by forced marches reached Kildare on Tuesday morning; he found the rebels, nothwithstanding their pretended submission, in arms. The first object which struck the eyes of the soldiery in the street of Kildare was the mangled body of their beloved William Giffard….The audacity of the rebels induced them to fire upon the troops, who needed little provocation to fall upon the murderers of their friend.

“The soldiers took ample revenge, the cowardly assassins fled in every direction, and of the party which remained in Kildare, very few were left to rejoin the ranks of treason.

“At Rathangan, Mr. Spencer, the Duke of Leinster’s agent, a gentleman who deserved more kindness at the hands of the insurgents, was murdered with unexampled circumstances of barbarity.

“….It is beyond question that the capitulation at the Curragh has only served to invigorate rebellion……..Such was the unanimous sentiment of reprobation expressed against the acceptance of this capitulation, that two very distinguished Members of Parliament are, it is said, pledged to institute a serous enquiry this day, to ascertain the ground upon which it was entered into.  The body of Lieutenant Giffard was interred at Kildare on Tuesday with military honours.

“…On Tuesday evening were interred in St. Kevin’s Church yard the remains of the late Henry Stamer, Esq., who was most barbarously murdered in the midst of his own tenantry at Prosperous on  Thursday last by the rebels.  The only pretext for the above assassination was, his being a good landlord, a vigilant and humane magistrate and having accepted a commission to raise a company of volunteers in his own town which he never could effect from the rebellious principles of the miscreants, who had too deeply established their diabolical system in the town of Prosperous.”

The paper also contains an extract of a letter from Major General Sir James Duff to Liet. Gen. Lake, dated Monasterevan, May 29th 1798.  It refers to his march from Limerick to Dublin referred to above says, “By means of cars for the infantry I reached this place (Monasterevan) in forth eight hours.  I am now at seven o’ clock this morning marching to surround the town of Kildare, the head quarters of the rebels, with seven pieces of artillery, one hundred and fifty Dragoons and three hundred and fifty infantry, determined to make a dreadful example of the rebels.

“I hope to be able to forward this to you by the mail coach, which I will escort to Naas.  I am sufficiently strong. P.S. two o’clock P.M., Kildare.  We found the rebels retiring from the town on our arrival, armed.  We followed them with the dragoons.  I sent on some of the Yeomen to tell them, on laying down their arms, they should not be hurt.  Unfortunately some of them fired on the Troops; from that moment they were attacked on all sides; nothing could stop the rage of the Troops.  I believe from two to three hundred of the rebels were killed.  We have three men killed and several wounded.  I am too fatigued to enlarge.”

Extract of a letter from Lieut. Col. Longfield of the North Cork Militia, to Lieut. Gen. Craig, dated at Rathangan 29th May 1798, “I arrived near this town at eleven o’clock and perceiving the Rebels to have taken a position at the upper end of the town near the Church, and that they had in some parts barricaded the streets and drawn chains across others, I placed my battalion guns in front.

“Supported by the infantry, and stationing the cavalry so as to support both, and commenced by firing upon the town with the cannon, after the second discharge of which I perceived the Rebels to fly in all directions.  I then gave orders for the cavalry to charge, which was executed by Captain Pack, and the detachment of the 5th Dragoon Guards, with the greatest spirit and judgment.

“Lord Trawly joined me immediately before the action with a Sergeant and twelve of the Romney Fencibles, and six of the Yeomen Cavalry, who assisted with equal spirit in their charge.  There are between fifty and sixty of the rebels killed.”

The Dublin Evening Post of six years earlier gives a hint of the forchcoming rebellion with declarations of loyalty from various towns around the country.  But not having the rebellion to contend with, it has space for reverences of a more general kind such as to a Masked Ball given by Mrs. John Latouche at Harristown, Co. Kildare; an announcement of a “meeting of the trustees of the  Turnpike Road form Naas to Maryborough” at the House of Lords; lettings of land at Nicholastown, Kilcock; Glenaree, Co. Kildare, and Knockbellane,  Ballyfolane, Cloughogue and Suirlock’s Leap, Co. Wicklow; and a notice to possible claimants on the estate of the deceased Richard Beauchamp of Narraghmore.

Re-typed by Mary Murphy