involvement in the Waterloo campaign was significant. The Irish engagement with this hugely historic epic event at the turn of the 19th century has yet to become popularly appreciated and properly applauded. Thousands of Irish soldiers both by birth and descent were eagerly engaged on the battlefield, among the ranks, high up, and all the way throughout the chain-of-command, some even conspicuous by individually noteworthy and otherwise gallant actions. Overall, the presence, posture, and performance of the Irish at the Battle of Waterloo is a proud and compelling story.
The Irish involvement at the Battle of Waterloo is a true story which has not figured prominently, if at all, in the cultural narrative of an independent Ireland to-date. It has been a story lost within the accounts of the magnificence of the suspense, the anxious uncertainty, the excitement of the action, central to the relating of the causes, course, and consequences of the battle itself. It is timely and important at the book’s outset to remind ourselves of the magnitude of such an encounter. The battle was a hostile confrontation involving vast groups using lethal means. It was the violent imposition of will, one man’s madness manifest in might proving right. The battle was raw, frightening and ugly, it was noisy, bloody and confused. It was the ruthless killing in great numbers of its participants. It was where the feared momentum of a French attacking manoeuvre met the steely strength of Anglo-Allied static defence, a thrusting energy hitting unyielding resilience, impetus against steadfastness. Butchery was done and slaughter resulted. The attrition of hideous death was horrible and widespread, the woundings atrocious. Heads, bodies, and arms were atomised by cannon balls, the brutal breaking of bone, mangling of limbs and torsos, men and horses, the extinguishing of precious lives by the arbitrary disintegration of bodily structures immense. In the midst of this maelstrom soldiers stood or advanced in columns and awaited their individual fate, with fate itself deciding. There was courage and cowardice; mercy and cruelty; impetuousness and procrastination; panic and calmness; clarity and confusion; organisation and disorganisation; there was good, bad, and no leadership, and there were momentary misunderstandings and miscommunications leading to momentous mistakes. Napoleon said he lost Waterloo because of the ‘obstinate bravery of the British troops’ (thousands being Irish). Wellington said of the 1st Battalion of the 27th Inniskillings, ‘they saved the centre of my line’. Napoleon said of them, ‘I have seen Russian, Prussian, and French bravery, but anything to equal the stubborn bravery of the regiment with castles in their caps, I have never witnessed.’
Wellington has often been quoted (and criticised) for describing his soldiers as ‘the scum of the earth’, but seldom quoted was his proud addition, ‘it is really wonderful that we should have made them the fine fellows they are’. It was the raw material he was referring to, how the men presented on enlistment, not the finished article, the trained soldier, disciplined, drilled, with a noted proficiency for ‘clockwork musketry’ while standing steady, staunch, and silent. He was particularly proud of his Peninsular War participants, the backbone of whom were largely Irishmen. Wellington often said of this army that it was one with which ‘I could have done anything’. This Peninsular War army, on the war’s cessation in 1814, was largely dispersed to North America, Ireland, and the West Indies, however, and significantly, Wellington had available to him a sufficient portion of them come June 1815. In a Brussels park just before the opening of the Waterloo campaign proper, Wellington was asked by a companion (a British parliamentarian named Thomas Creevey) with whom he was walking about the possible outcome of the approaching hostilities. Wellington pointed to an off-duty British infantryman who happened to stroll by, and said, ‘There, it all depends upon that article whether we do business or not. Give me enough of it (them), and I am sure.’ In the event, he was just about to have ‘enough of them’ on the field of Waterloo, and just ‘enough of them’ were Irish.
Ireland, the Irish, and an exploding Europe
Saltpetre, sulphur, and charcoal combined is an explosive mix called gunpowder. This black blend of chemical substances resulted in a new and devastatingly effective technology that revolutionised European warfare, bringing about a complete rethinking of defence works and battlefield tactics. More especially, massed infantry with muskets closely packed in huge formations now dominated the battlefield. Massed musket volleys allied with artillery cannon shot could decide the outcome of battles.
Manufacturing gunpowder was a difficult, dangerous process and involved many skills. Ballincollig Royal Gunpowder Mills in County Cork was one of three Royal gunpowder mills that manufactured gunpowder to meet the demands of the British army during the Napoleonic Wars. In close proximity to Cork City and one of the world’s largest natural harbours, second only to Sydney, the gunpowder mill was of great strategic importance. Originally opened in 1794 as a private enterprise producing blasting powder for construction works, mining, and quarrying, the mills attracted the attention of the British Board of Ordnance after the 1798 Rebellion, and on its purchase in 1805 was expanded tenfold with 12 new mills added to the complex, as well as new processing buildings and homes for the workers. Security was an issue, and a cavalry barracks was constructed in 1810, its garrison providing military escorts for the wagons of gunpowder to Cork harbour. With its multitude of ports and harbours and its access to shipping routes to Europe, North America, and elsewhere, Ireland had always been well situated to facilitate the strategic movement of British forces around the world. There was a reverse side to this. Philip II of Spain had once said, ’If England you wish to gain, with Ireland you must begin’. In 1601, Don Juan d’Aquilla was dispatched with a Spanish expedition to Ireland and together with the Irish was narrowly defeated at the Battle of Kinsale, County Cork. The lesson was not lost on the English and they held onto Ireland mainly for military reasons. Two centuries later, as the 19th century dawned, the British empire and France were engaged in a brutal war. The armies of France, forged in the turmoil of the French Revolution and under the brilliant leadership of Napoleon Bonaparte, had won repeated victories against the Ottoman Empire, Austria, Prussia, and Russia. With the continent under French control, the threat of invasion now hung over Britain. Only the English Channel protected the British from their age-old enemies. To counter this perceived threat, the government of King George III increased military garrisons and strengthened fortifications throughout Britain and Ireland.
Group of Cavalry in the Snow by Jean Louis Ernest Meissonier, 1815-1891, National Gallery of Ireland.
The French in Killala Bay by William Sadler the Younger, National Gallery of Ireland.
The Robust engaging The, Hoche off Tory Island by John Thomas, National Gallery of Ireland.
Special consideration was given to the defences of Ireland, as French strategy in recent years had been to incite and assist armed rebellion by means of military intervention. In 1796, Theobald Wolfe Tone, a leader in the United Irishmen organisation, attempted to land in Bantry Bay, County Cork, with a force of 15,000 men and 43 ships provided by France and commanded by the French General Lazare Hoche. The invasion fleet arrived in Bantry Bay on the evening of 21 December. Soon after its arrival, and before the troops could disembark, bad weather intervened in the shape of storm force winds that drove the ships out to sea again. In the climatic year of 1798 Ireland once again featured in the French war plans. On 22 August three ships containing a force of 1,100 men commanded by General Jean-Joseph Humbert landed in Killala Bay, County Mayo, their orders to make contact with the United Irishmen and assist them in establishing an independent Irish republic. Humbert and his Irish allies defeated a British force sent to stop them at the Battle of Castlebar. The subsequent retreat of the British forces became known to the locals as ‘The Castlebar Races’. Humbert’s triumph was destined to be short-lived; a British force commanded by Lord Cornwallis met and defeated his army at the Battle of Ballinamuck on 8 September.
Watching events from France, Wolfe Tone was disappointed but not discouraged by the failed invasion. Once again he sought and
