Battle of Aughrim
| date | July 12 jul. / July 22, 1691 greg. |
|---|---|
| place | Aughrim , County Galway , present-day Ireland |
| output | Defeat of the Jacobites |
| Parties to the conflict | |
|---|---|
|
Jacobites - French and Irish troops |
Troops of Wilhelm III. of Orange-Nassau - Irish, Dutch, English, Scottish, Danish and Huguenot troops |
| Commander | |
| Troop strength | |
| 18,000 men | 20,000 men |
| losses | |
|
4,000 dead and around 3,000–4,000 prisoners or missing persons |
3,000 dead |
1688–1691
Dromore - Derry - Bantry Bay - Newtownbutler - Carrickfergus - Newry - Cavan - Boyne - Athlone (1) - Limerick (1) - Cork - Athlone (2) - Aughrim - Limerick (2)
The Battle of Aughrim ( English Battle of Aughrim , Irish Cath Eachroma ) was the decisive battle of the war between the two kings in Ireland. It was fought between troops of the Jacobites (supporters of the deposed King James II. ) And the Wilhelmites (supporters of Wilhelm III. ) On July 22, 1691 near the small village of Aughrim in the Irish county of Galway .
The battle is considered one of the bloodiest on Irish soil; more than 7,000 people were killed. The defeat of the Jacobites marked the practical end of Jacobism in Ireland, although the city of Limerick held out until the autumn of 1691. As a result, the French had to largely withdraw from the Irish front in the War of the Palatinate Succession .
The campaign
In the summer of 1691 the Jacobites were on the defensive. Last year they had withdrawn behind the Shannon , which looked like a huge moat around the province of Connacht with fortresses in Sligo , Athlone and Limerick . In this position the Jacobites hoped to receive military assistance from Louis XIV of France via the port cities in order to be able to recapture the rest of Ireland.
Godert de Ginkell , the Dutch general of the Wilhelmites, broke this line of defense by crossing the Shannon at Athlone and taking the city after a bloody siege. The Marquis de St Ruth , the French general the Jacobites, came too late to save Athlone, since he has yet to collect his troops and new dig had. Some of these new troops came from the Rapparees , a type of Irish guerrilla fighters. Ginkell advanced through Ballinasloe on the main road to Limerick and Galway until his advance by St. Ruth's army at Aughrim was stopped on July 22, 1691. Both armies were around 20,000 strong. St. Ruth's soldiers were mostly Irish Catholics, while Ginkell's army was composed primarily of English, Scottish, Danish, Dutch, French (again mostly Huguenots) and Irish Protestants.
Lineup
The Jacobites had positioned themselves very favorably at Aughrim. St. Ruth had positioned his infantry along the ridge of a ridge called Kilcommadan Hill. The hill was lined with small stone walls and hedges that separated the fields from each other. These obstacles could be used by embankments to cover the infantry of the Jacobites. To the left of the Jacobite position was a moor with only a single dam. The village of Aughrim and a ruined castle towered over it all. On the other, the open flank, St. Ruth deployed his best infantry units under his deputy commander, the Chevalier de Tessé, and most of his cavalry under Patrick Sarsfield .
The army looked out over a bog with passages on either side. The passage to the right was a small ford over a stream through the moor. The crossing on the left was an old, damaged dam, which only allowed two horses to pass at a time, and was 60 yards long. Above the dam and about 35 meters to the left was Aughrim Castle, where St. Ruth Colonel Walter Burk was stationed with two hundred men. St. Ruth arranged his army in two ranks. The cavalry on the right flank in front of the Sutherland regiments and the Dragoons consisted of the regiments of the Duke of Tyrconnell , the Earl of Abercorn, and Colonel Edmund Prendergast. This wing was supposed to ensure that the enemy riders did not break through on the right flank over the ford and the narrow point over the swamps. Overall, the English troops had twice the number of cavalry, while the Irish had a slight advantage in the infantry.
Lieutenant General de Tessé and Major General Patrick Sarsfield , later Earl of Lucan, were posted here. The other lieutenant general, the Marquis d'Usson, was sent to Galway after the siege of Athlone. On the left flank St. Ruth placed the riders of the Earl of Lucan, as well as the riders under Colonel Henry Luttrell , Colonel John Parker and Colonel Nicholas Purcell along with a division of Dragoons. Lord Galmoy and his regiment were held back behind the second line of foot soldiers as an emergency reserve. Major General Sheldon was entrusted with the leadership of the left wing , the front row was under the command of Henry Luttrell. Their main task was to defend the dam through the moor, near which two regiments of foot soldiers had been positioned.
The battle
The battle began with an attack by Ginkell on the open flank of the Jacobites with cavalry and infantry. This attack was repulsed by determined counterattacks by the Jacobites. The Wilhelmites interrupted their attack and buried themselves behind wooden stakes to protect themselves against the opposing cavalry. During this retreat, the French Huguenots were left to their own devices, as a result of which they found themselves exposed to the Jacobite fire on low ground and suffered great losses. Contemporary reports say the grass was slippery with blood. Since that day the area of the southern flank of the battlefield has been known to the locals as "Bloody Hollow" . In the center, the Wilhelmian infantry under General Hugh Mackay attempted a frontal attack on the Jacobite infantry on Kilcommadan Hill. The Wilhelmine troops, mostly English and Scots, had to conquer each trench one by one, only to find that the Irish had retreated behind the nearest line of defense to fire at them from there. In total, the Wilhelmian infantry made three attacks, the first of which advanced the furthest. Eventually their last attack was repulsed by the cavalry with great losses and pursued into the moor, where more soldiers were killed or drowned. During the pursuit, the Jacobites were able to arrest a battery of Wilhelmian cannons.
So Ginkell was the only way to try to attack the left flank of the Jacobites over the dam through the moor. The Jacobites were actually in an almost invincible position there, as they were secured by the defenders in the castle and the Wilhelmites were concentrated on the narrow path. But the Irish troops were running out of ammunition. Mackay carried out this fourth attack, led mainly by the cavalry, in two groups. He led one along the dam, the other parallel to it to the south. The Jacobites responded with massive fire from the castle, but then found that their reserve ammunition was too large for the muzzle of their rifles. The ammunition was of British manufacture, while the muskets came from France, where different dimensions were used. When the bombardment subsided, the Wilhelmites attacked again with a halfway rested regiment of Anglo-Dutch cavalry under Henri de Massue . Since they now only faced little resistance, the Wilhelmites managed to cross the dam and reach the village of Aughrim without major losses.
A unit of Jacobite cavalry under Henry Luttrell had been held in reserve to protect this flank. But instead of launching a counterattack, Luttrell ordered his people to withdraw. The route he used for this is now known as Luttrell's Pass . Luttrell was suspected of having been paid by the Wilhelmites and was murdered in Dublin after the war - presumably for this reason . The castle fell quickly and its Jacobite garrison surrendered.
“[The] fire from the castle on the right […] was insignificant for it slew but a few in the passage. The reason of it was given because the men had French pieces, the bore of which was small and had English ball which was too large. "
“[The] fire from the castle on the right […] was insignificant, but it killed a few on the way. The reason for this was that the men had French pieces [guns / rifles] with small muzzles and English bullets that were too big. "
The Jacobite general Marquis de St. Ruth believed after the third attack on the Wilhelmine positions that he could win the battle. He was heard shouting, “ They are running, we will chase them back to the gates of Dublin! ”(German:“ They run away, we chase them back to the gates of Dublin! ”) However, when he wanted to gather his cavalry for a counter-attack in order to throw back the Wilhelmine horsemen, he was beheaded by a cannonball . Now the Jacobite positions quickly collapsed. Demoralized by the death of their commander, their riders fled the battlefield. This enabled the Wilhelmites to lead more troops to the front and encircle the Jacobite lines. The Jacobites' right flank was now also aware that the situation was hopeless and began to disintegrate as well, although Sarsfield tried to fight a retreat. So the Jacobite infantry remained completely defenseless and completely surrounded on Kilcommadan Hill. The infantrymen sought their salvation head over heels in flight, where they were mercilessly slaughtered by the Wilhelmine cavalry. Many had ditched their weapons in order to run faster. George Storey, an eyewitness, said the bodies covered the hill and looked like a flock of sheep from a distance.
Aftermath
Estimates of army's casualties vary. There is unanimous agreement that between 5000 and 7000 men lost their lives in battle. Recent studies estimate the losses of the Wilhelmites at around 3,000 men, usually given as 1,000 to 2,000, while around 4,000 Jacobites fell. At that time, the Wilhelmites reported only 600 men as casualties after the battle, while they claimed to have killed 7,000 Jacobites. Many Jacobite officers had died in the battle and were very difficult to replace. In addition, an additional 4,000 Jacobite soldiers had either deserted or been captured. They had also lost much of their equipment.
For these reasons Aughrim is to be seen as the decisive battle of the war of the Wilhelmites against the Jacobites in Ireland. The city of Galway surrendered after the battle without a fight on favorable terms and the main Jacobite army surrendered soon after at Limerick after a brief siege . According to one author, "the battle burned itself into the Irish consciousness" and became known in Irish language tradition as Eachdhroim an áir ("Slaughter of Aughrim"). The contemporary Gaelic poet Séamas Dall Mac Cuarta wrote of the death of the Irish: "It is at the slaughter of Aughrim that they are found, their clammy bones lying there unscathed." Another poet wrote: "Our friends, in great numbers and withered away Shape, remained lifeless and eaten by worms in the mountains. ”In 1885 the artist John Mulvany completed his painting about the battle. It was exhibited at the Gorry Gallery in Dublin in 2010.
Since the battle marked the end of the Irish Catholic resistance of the Jacobites, Aughrim was the center of the loyalist (especially that of the Orange Order ) celebrations on July 12th well into the early 19th century. After that, the battle in memory was pushed aside by the Battle of the Boyne , as the dates changed due to the switch from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar. The celebrations in Ireland are firmly linked to the date ("The Twelfth"), so that the Battle of Aughrim, which according to the old calendar still took place on July 12th, which was now July 22nd, is no longer on the usual day has been. It was also suggested that the Battle of the Boyne was preferred as a memorial point, because the behavior of the Irish troops there was more cowardly than at Aughrim, where they had actually fought valiantly.
The Aughrim battlefield became a stumbling block in Ireland for plans to build a new motorway right through the former battlefield. Historians, environmentalists and members of the Orange Order raised objections to the destruction of the battlefield in 1691. The motorway was opened in 2009.
literature
- Demetrius C. Boulger: The Battle of the Boyne, Together with an Account Based on French & Other Unpublished Records of the War in Ireland 1688–1691 Martin Secker, London 1911, archive.org
- Piers Wauchope: Patrick Sarsfield and the Williamite War . Dublin 1992.
- JG Simms: Jacobite Ireland . London 1969.
- GA, Hayes McCoy: Irish Battles . Belfast 1990.
- Eamonn O Ciardha: Ireland and the Jacobite cause - a Fatal Attachment . Dublin 2002.
- Padraig Lenihan: 1690, Battle of the Boyne . Tempus, 2003.
Web links
- on the Battle of Aughrim BBC History
- Battle site on Mapviewer at Ordnance Survey of Ireland
- Interview with historian Padraig Lenihan on the battle
- The Battle of Aughrim on historyireland.com
Individual evidence
- ↑ James Mac-Geoghegan: Histoire de l'Irlande ancienne et modern: tirée des monumens les… Volume 3, pp. 743–747 (French) Text Archive - Internet Archive . Translated into English as The History of Ireland, Ancient and Modern , Taken From the Most Authentic Records, and Dedicated to the Irish Brigade by Abbe Mac-Geoghegan by Patrick O'Kelly. ISBN 978-1-4255-6638-8
- ↑ Historical map of the battlefield ( Memento of the original from May 29, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. from the Ordnance Survey of Ireland
- ^ "Plunkett's Jacobite account" quoted in: Demetrius C. Boulger: The Battle of the Boyne . Martin Secker, London 1911, p. 238
- ^ Piers Wauchope: Patrick Sarsfield and the Williamite War , p. 232
- ↑ McCoy, p. 267 puts the Jacobite casualties at 4000 deaths, the Wilhelmian casualties at 2000 deaths.
- ↑ Padraig Lenihan gives in Consolidating Conquest: Ireland 1603-1727 , p. 186, the losses with "a fifth of the Irish army estimated at 20,000 men and at least 1200 allies killed in the initial battles".
- ^ Richard Doherty: The Williamite War in Ireland , p. 181
- ↑ Eamonn O Ciardha: Ireland and the Jacobite Cause - A Fatal Attachment , p. 82
- ↑ Article in the Irish Times of October 2, 2010
- ↑ Padraig Lenihan: The Battle of the Boyne , pp. 258-259: “The 18th century anniversaries of Boyne and Aughrim served as a fixed point for more popular commemorations with bonfires and parades. In this context "The Twelfth" was the reminder of the most symbolic battle, but actually referred to Aughrim. By the time Britain finally adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1752, July 1st was the anniversary of Boyne and July 12th was the anniversary of Aughrim. ”“ Aughrim emphasizes the heroism and martial qualities of the Jacobites with an approach that reconciles military achievement and valor the Wilhelmites bulges ... This portrayal of the Jacobites, favorable from many points of view, is less adequate to the communal Protestant rituals given the resurrection of Catholicism in the late 1790s. "
