John Boyle, in his “Battlefields of Ireland,” quotes Taylor, an English military author who fought at Aughrim, as saying: “Those [the Irish dead] were nearly all killed after the death of St. Ruth, for, up to that, the Irish had lost scarcely a man;” and, says he, further, “large numbers were murdered, after surrender and promise of quarter, by order of General Ginkel, and among those, so murdered, in cold blood, were Colonel O’Moore and that most loyal gentleman and chivalrous soldier, Lord Galway.” This same able writer, in concluding his graphic story of the famous battle, remarks, with indignant eloquence: “It is painful to speculate on the cause that left the Irish army without direction after the death of St. Ruth. Many have endeavored to explain it, but all—as well those who doubt Sarsfield’s presence on the field as those who maintain the contrary—are lost in conjecture, and none who participated in the battle, and survived it, has placed the matter beyond speculation. So leaving that point as time has left it, what appears most strange in the connection is the absence of all command at such a conjuncture. The disposition of the Irish troops, though dexterous, was simple. The day was all but won. The foiling of Talmash (Mackay) would have been the completion of victory. A force sufficient was on his front; a reserve more than ample to overwhelm him was on its way to the ground—nay, drawn up and even ready for the word. The few British troops that held a lodgment in the hedges, at the base of the hill, were completely at the mercy of those above them. It required no omniscient eye to see this, nor a voice from the clouds to impel them forward, and, surely, no military etiquette weighed a feather in opposition to the fate of a nation. Any officer of note could have directed the movement, and many of experience and approved courage witnessed the crisis. Yet, in this emergency, all the hard-won laurels of the day were tarnished, and land and liberty were lost by default! Nor can the rashness of St. Ruth, his reticence as to his plans, his misunderstanding with Sarsfield, nor the absence of the latter, justify the want of intrepid action among those present. This stands unexplained and inexplicable, nor will the flippant appeal to Providence, whose ways are too frequently offered as an excuse for human misconduct, answer here. The want of ammunition at such a moment was, no doubt, of some import, but the concurrence of events too plainly indicates that Aughrim was won by the skill of St. Ruth and the gallantry of his troops, and that it was lost through want of decision in his general officers, at a moment the most critical in the nation’s history.”