Williamite War in Ireland - Campaign in Ulster

Campaign in Ulster

After William's landing in England, James' Lord Deputy in Ireland, Richard Talbot, 1st Earl of Tyrconnell took action to ensure that all strong points in Ireland were held by garrisons of the newly recruited Irish Catholic army, loyal to James. The northern province of Ulster, which had the heaviest concentration of English and Scottish settlers, was the only part of Ireland where Talbot encountered significant resistance.

By November 1688, only the walled city of Derry had a Protestant garrison. An army of around 1,200 men, mostly "Redshanks" (Highlanders), under Alexander MacDonnell, 3rd Earl of Antrim, was slowly organised (they set out on the week William of Orange landed in England). When they arrived on 7 December 1688 the gates were closed against them and the Siege of Derry began. While the Jacobites appeared to have great advantages in terms of numbers in Ireland, in fact, the troops raised by Tyrconnell were mainly hastily conscripted peasant bands, most of them poorly armed and trained. Nevertheless, a Jacobite force under Richard Hamilton routed a Protestant Williamite militia in an encounter at Dromore, County Down (known as the Break of Dromore) on 14 March 1689 and occupied eastern Ulster.

When James was deposed and fled to France, King Louis XIV of France (already at war with William of Orange) supported him with troops and money to help him regain his crown, though he stipulated that the French troops he sent to Ireland would have to be made good by the sending of the same number of Irish recruits to France.

On 12 March 1689 James landed in Kinsale, Ireland, with 6,000 French soldiers. He first marched on Dublin, where he was well received and, with a Jacobite army of Catholics, Protestant Royalists and French, then marched north, joining the Siege of Derry on 18 April. James found himself leading a predominantly Irish Catholic movement, and on 7 May he presided over an Irish Parliament composed almost entirely of Catholic gentry. He reluctantly agreed to the Parliament's demand for an Act declaring that the Parliament of England had no right to pass laws for Ireland. He also agreed, again reluctantly, to restore to Irish Catholics the lands confiscated from their families after the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland, by confiscating the lands of those (predominantly Protestants) who opposed him and supported William. This parliament was later named the Patriot Parliament by Irish nationalists.

British Williamite warships arrived off Derry to relieve the besieged city on 11 June, but refused to risk shore guns until, ordered by Marshal Frederic Schomberg, they broke through and ended the siege on 28 July 1689.

In nearby Enniskillen, just south of Derry, armed Williamite civilians drawn from the local Protestant population organised a formidable irregular military force. Operating with Enniskillen as a base, they carried out raids against the Jacobite forces in Connacht and Ulster. A poorly trained Jacobite army led by Justin MacCarthy, Viscount Mountcashel assembled at Dublin and marched against them. On 28 July 1689, MacCarthy's force was defeated at the Battle of Newtownbutler. Many of the Jacobites' troops fled as the first shots were fired, and up to 1500 of them were hacked down or drowned when pursued by the Williamite cavalry. Partly as a result of this defeat and partly because of a major Williamite landing in the east of the province, most Jacobite troops were withdrawn from Ulster and encamped near Dundalk.