The Rebels of Ireland

  And when it was over, and the papist Irish were scattered and driven out, then the soldiers of Christ should receive their recompense and inherit the earth. The five hundred pounds that, seven long years ago, he had ventured in the cause would be repaid with Irish land; and upon that land he’d build his portion of the holy city, and take a godly wife, and settle down, and look after his uncle in his old age. His sword, his wealth, his life: he had offered all. He was a soldier for Christ, an adventurer for God. If, as he dared to hope, he had been chosen as one of the Elect, he had also paid for his salvation. It was knowing all this, as he did, that Barnaby Budge with a courageous heart approached the breach in the dark walls of Drogheda.

  He felt a faint tap of wind on his cheek and glanced upwards. The wind seemed to be changing. The grey clouds were churning in the sky, as if they might fly apart.

  Cavalry forward, the order had come. Cromwell himself had summoned them. And who could refuse when the leader himself showed no fear? Twice his men had been driven back from that breach. The dead were lying in heaps. But Cromwell had dismounted, unsheathed his sword, and led the third charge himself. Cromwell, valiant for God.

  “Will we follow him?” Barnaby shouted to his men.

  “Into the mouth of hell!” they roared.

  There was only one way to get over the pile of rubble that was the breach, however.

  “Dismount,” he ordered quietly. And taking his horse’s reins, he led them across on foot. A couple of musket balls hissed by, but he ignored them.

  The scene before him on the other side was terrible. The fighting had moved past the trenches to the high mound behind. He walked his troop through the churchyard, which was strewn with bodies. Coming to the foot of the mound, he paused. Aston and a company of men had gone up into the little fort at the top but, seeing their position was hopeless, had decided to give up. If they had hoped to save their lives, however, they were mistaken. The Roundhead troops were in the tower already, and a series of furious shouts were coming from above.

  “They want his wooden leg,” the officer standing at the base explained. “It’s supposed to be full of gold.”

  Now there were cries of rage from above, followed by a series of sickening cracks. It sounded to Barnaby as if the troops were beating Aston’s brains out with the wooden leg.

  “They didn’t find the gold,” the officer remarked drily.

  At this moment, from the other side of the mound, Cromwell himself appeared. He nodded to Barnaby.

  “Take your men across the drawbridge and secure the northern gates,” he ordered. He gave him a stern look. “We have the main enemy force trapped in the town, Captain Budge. Break Drogheda and we break all Ireland. Let none escape. Do you understand?”

  “I do, Sir.”

  “No quarter, Captain Budge. They have deserved none; they shall receive none.” He paused, glanced up at the tower, and looked thoughtful for a moment before gazing hard at Barnaby again. “It is the Lord who has brought us here and delivered to us this town. Victory belongs to Him alone.”

  “God’s will be done,” answered Barnaby firmly. And as his troops clattered over the drawbridge a few moments later, he gave the order: “Draw your swords.”

  The onslaught of the Roundheads across the drawbridge had been so sudden that the defenders had no time to regroup. There were street battles going on all over the northern section of the town.

  And the scattered Royalist troops were being cut down like grass. Riding up the main street, he had to pick his way over the fallen bodies. Coming to an open yard which gave onto a little garden, he found a young officer and his company. They had captured a dozen of the Royalists, who had surrendered their weapons.

  “No quarter,” he told the young fellow. “General Cromwell’s orders.” And when the officer started to protest, “I gave them my word,” Barnaby said, and shook his head. “Remember what they have done to Protestant women and children. Kill them all.” And he stayed there a few moments while the Roundheads went to work with their swords, to ensure that it was quickly done.

  Two hundred yards ahead, a huge battle was in progress around the big church of Saint Peter. There were shouts, bangs, crashes, and the constant crack of musket fire. But Barnaby had his instructions, which were clear. He must secure the gates. There were two gates to the northern part of Drogheda, and he knew, from a map the officers had studied the previous week, exactly where they were. They lay at each end of a long cross-street, one in the eastern and one in the western wall. The eastern being closer, they rode quickly towards that. Here and there, he saw faces peering through half-closed shutters from the upper floors of the houses along the street. But they seemed to be ordinary townspeople who had remained behind. That could be checked later. The enemy, however, appeared to be all in the streets. Reaching the eastern gate, he found it was already secured, with a troop of infantry on guard. Instructing them on no account to open it, he turned back, therefore, towards the western side.

  As they crossed the main axis of the town, he glanced up towards the big church where the battle was taking place. There were shouts and cries from that direction, but he did not hear the same sounds of battle as he had done before. Something had changed. Then, glancing down at the roadway, he realised that the open gutter that ran along the centre of the street was running with a shallow stream of blood. They were putting the Irish papists to the sword. He had seen streams of blood before on the battlefield, but never quite like this. They must have slaughtered several hundred already.

  It was a bloody business, but he knew it must be carried through. And when he thought of the huge and bloody slaughter of innocents of which these accursed people were guilty themselves, he hardened his heart, knowing the Lord’s work was being done.

  The western gate lay less than four hundred yards away. But the broad street that led to it was not empty. A band of infantry troops had just gathered there. There were pikemen and musketeers, and they were quickly getting into battle order. There looked to be a hundred men or more. From a side street now, half a dozen cavalry came out, making a screen in front of the troops. He glanced back. He had twenty men, mounted and armed like himself. And the enemy, who must realise what was being done up at the church, were doubtless determined to sell their lives dear. To one of his men he called back, “Find reinforcements.” The enemy might be desperate, but his troops were battle-hardened veterans, and soldiers of Christ besides. Cromwell himself had ordered him to secure the gate. God would protect them. He measured the enemy before him with a practised eye.

  And just at that moment, a rift opened in the clouds and a great shaft of evening sunlight burst down upon the very place where the enemy horsemen were, flashing its sudden fire, blinding them for an instant. And seeing this, Barnaby knew with an utter certainty that this was a sign from God, lighting his way like a pillar of fire to the promised land.

  “Not my arm, O Lord, but Thine,” he murmured, and raising his sword high in the air so that it caught the sun with an answering flash, he called his men to charge.

  Then Barnaby Budge fought for the Lord, as his horse bounded forward and he crashed into the enemy, striking this way and that as the blood of the Irish beasts burst out. The horsemen were down, the footmen were falling, the papists were parting before him as he hacked, and slashed, and struck for the Lord.

  Shouts behind him. He glanced back. Roundhead reinforcements had come. So be it. The enemies of the Lord were scattering. He spurred forward and cut them down as they ran.

  They were fleeing into yards and alleys, running down the street. He could see the gate, a hundred yards ahead. It was open. He started towards it.

  As he did so, he saw a papist soldier at the side of the street, dressed as a horseman but without any horse, cowering by the entrance to an alley. The villain had snatched up a little child and was clasping it across his chest, his round red face gazing up at him, seemingly transfixed. Did he think to escape justice by such means?

  He
wheeled his horse and struck him with a single, slashing blow that burst through the wretch’s collar and chest and carved through the child as well.

  No doubt the child was a papist, too. No matter. He wheeled his horse again. There were still papist soldiers between him and the gate. There was still much work to be done.

  And as he turned and raced at them, and struck again, and saw them fall, and felt the sun’s rays upon his face, Barnaby knew the glory of God, and that the strength of the Lord was in his arm, and that he should receive the promised land of which he was owed five hundred pounds.

  So it was, that evening in Drogheda, that the Royalist garrison perished, English and Irish, Protestant and Catholic. Two thousand five hundred were put to the sword, many after surrendering their weapons.

  Rumour was that the townspeople also were slaughtered, and doubtless some few of them were, though the evidence is dubious.

  But who should say, even if it were true, that the slaughter was shocking? When kings and parliaments decided men’s faith, to differ meant bloodshed. It could not be otherwise. For a hundred years, since Luther and Calvin split Christendom, it had been the same; for generations to come, the bloodshed would continue. All over Europe, the faithful were falling, Catholic to Protestant, Protestant to Catholic. It was all one and the same.

  THE STAFF OF SAINT PATRICK

  1689

  MAURICE SMITH gazed at the ancient chest. He’d been meaning to open it for years.

  Outside, it was a bright March day, and the breeze made its way to Rathconan with a faint hiss, like the whisper of faith itself coming up from the sea.

  The chest had belonged to his father. It had been kept in storage since Walter Smith had disappeared. Maurice knew it contained some old papers, but that was all he knew; and his father had not been there to ask.

  No one had ever known what happened to Walter Smith. It had been supposed that he must have been robbed and murdered somewhere when he had gone away. One or two people had suggested he might even have joined the Royalist forces; but that seemed out of character, and there was certainly no proof of such a thing. It was just as well. Had he been involved in the fighting, things might have gone harder with his family after Cromwell’s victory.

  Whatever had become of Walter, his papers and other personal effects had been stored. When life in Dublin had become impossible for a Catholic merchant, Maurice himself had left for France. The Doyles had kindly taken in his mother, Anne; and the chest of papers, together with the other effects, had been transferred to their attic. There they had remained, even after his return, until he had collected them a few years ago.

  He had to admit, it had really been laziness on his part not to have sorted the chest before. But now, with such wonderful events taking place—and the promise of so many good things for the Catholics of Ireland—it had occurred to him that if, by chance, there were any deeds or other documents in his family’s favour hidden away in the chest, this would be the time to find them. He’d discovered that the chest was locked with three different locks; but amongst his father’s effects there had been quite a collection of keys, and he had found the ones relating to the chest easily enough. Having unlocked it, therefore, he dragged it near to a window and, sitting himself on a stool, opened the lid.

  At first, he was a little disappointed. The documents all seemed to relate to the old Guild of Saint Anne and not to the family at all. But finding that they went back to the days of the Reformation itself, he started to read them and found such a rich history of the life of the faithful in those days that he soon became quite engrossed. An hour passed before he came to a document on thick paper, carefully folded and closed with a red wax seal, on which was written in a bold hand:

  DEPOSITION OF MASTER MACGOWAN

  CONCERNING THE STAFF

  The seal had never been broken. He broke it, and began to read. And as he did so, he gasped.

  It was clear that the merchant had given his Deposition verbally, and that it had been written down by one of the members of the guild. Sometimes it was in the first person; in other places it strayed into the third: “Master MacGowan swears that the events took place in exactly this manner.” But the subject was what mattered. For the staff of which he spoke was the Staff of Saint Patrick himself.

  The Bachall Iosa: the most sacred relic in Ireland. He knew the story of its destruction of course. Everybody did. Back in 1538, when the heretic monster King Henry VIII had ordered the holy relics of Ireland to be burned, the sacred Staff of Saint Patrick, that had been held in the hands of the saint himself more than a thousand years before, had been taken from Christ Church Cathedral and thrown on a public bonfire there, in the middle of Dublin. No greater sacrilege, no greater insult to Ireland, could have been imagined. The dark deed had never been forgotten. The Staff was gone.

  Or was it? There had been rumours since—occasional, muted whispers in the land—that the Staff might have been saved. There had been a claim that it was still in existence, some twenty years after its burning. Then nothing more had been heard. Maurice had always taken the claim to be a legend, and no more. Three years ago, a story was current in Dublin that the Staff had been seen in County Meath. But Maurice had never met anyone who’d actually set eyes on it. He suspected the story was a hoax.

  The Deposition of Master MacGowan said otherwise. On that terrible day, while the soldiers were bringing cartloads of sacred objects to the fire, he had run into the cathedral, seen the Staff already out of its case, and in a brief moment, when the attention of the king’s vandals was directed elsewhere, seized it and fled. He had taken the Staff to his own humble house. The following day, in the company of Alderman Doyle, he had gone quietly out of the city and conveyed the Staff to a devout family “known to the members of this guild,” in Kildare. No name was given. The matter was too secret for that. Maurice supposed it was probably one of the ancient families, the guardians of monasteries and providers of priests whose service to the Church sometimes stretched back almost to the days of the saint himself.

  The Deposition was corroborated and sworn to by Alderman Doyle. There was no doubt of its authenticity. And as he held it in his hand, and contemplated the implications of the document, Maurice began to tremble.

  For a start, the sightings of the Staff were surely genuine. One of the most sacred objects in all Christendom was residing, quite likely, within forty miles of Dublin. But more than that: for the bruised and humiliated Catholics of Ireland, here was a religious and national symbol, an object of pride, of veneration, of inspiration, waiting to be raised on high in their very midst. And now, if the Staff were held up before the people, and their heretic rulers dared to say that it was a fraud, here in his own hand was the living proof that it was genuine.

  That he should have found such a document, at such a time as this, could only mean one thing. It was a divine intervention, a sign from God. He quickly said a prayer.

  Next, he had to consider what to do. For the moment, it might be best to keep the matter confidential. The document had huge value, both to the Catholic cause and its enemies; but nobody knew of its existence. It would be perfectly safe locked in the chest. He ought to share the knowledge with someone, though. Someone he could trust. And he might need help as well. It did not take him long to think of an answer. Whose family was firmer in their faith, who had more discretion, than his own cousin Donatus Walsh? That afternoon, he wrote a short and carefully worded letter. He gave no details, but he told his cousin that he had a matter of the utmost importance to discuss concerning the faith, and asked to meet him urgently, by the old Tholsel in Dublin, in three days’ time, on Sunday. Then he gave it to a servant. The fellow could ride down and be in Dublin by nightfall. He could deliver it to the house in Fingal the next morning. As for the meeting in Dublin, the timing could not have been better. They would both be there anyway.

  For here was the reason why his discovery was so clearly a sign from God: Ireland had been given a Catholic King—and h
e was arriving in Dublin, on Sunday.

  The letter arrived while Donatus Walsh was out. He had gone to Saint Marnock’s well. Now, sinking to his knees, he gave thanks for Ireland’s deliverance.

  Forty years had passed since the terrible coming of Cromwell: forty years, during which the Walsh family had never lost faith, not even in the darkest days. And proof of God’s Grace had not been lacking. Yet who could have imagined the wondrous events unfolding now?

  Donatus loved this holy place. How often he had come here with his father, Orlando. And it was thanks to his father that he had been able to spend so much of his childhood in Fingal, on this estate he knew and loved so well. His father’s watchwords had been simple: keep faith; and hold on. He had never lost faith. For a while, he had been able to hold on.

  For after the terrible massacre at Drogheda, however much he had disliked doing it, Orlando had continued to supply Dublin Castle with rent and the Dublin troops with food. Cromwell had smashed his way through Ireland; but he had not remained long, and left his commanders to mop up. Despite the ruthless efficiency of their military operations, it had still taken them another couple of years before every corner of Ireland was completely subdued. During that time, when cash and food were scarce, the authorities had little reason to trouble themselves with the Walshes. But it could not last forever.

  Donatus had been nearly twelve when his father had returned from Dublin one day, looking grim, and announced: “They mean to transplant us.”

  “What do you mean—transplant?” his mother had asked.