Ireland under the Stuarts and During the Interregnum, Vol. 1 (of 3), 1603-1642Bagwell, Richard
History
Ireland under the Stuarts and During the Interregnum, Vol. 1 (of 3), 1603-1642
Bagwell, Richard
Ireland -- History -- 17th century
The Four Masters say, and this has often been repeated, that Paulet
struck O'Dogherty, and that the insult drove him into rebellion. Paulet
was certainly abusive, but a blow is not anywhere mentioned in the
State correspondence, though no Englishman then in Ireland had anything
to say in favour of the unfortunate governor, nor by Docwra, who could
scarcely be ignorant of so remarkable a fact. O'Sullivan Bere, who
published his history at Lisbon in 1621, says Paulet threatened to
have O'Dogherty hanged, but he had evidently not heard of any blow.
The Four Masters wrote in Donegal, between 1632 and 1636, but it is
not certain that any of them were in Ireland in 1608; at all events
there was time for the growth of a traditional addition to the facts.
Whatever may have been the immediate cause of his outbreak, O'Dogherty
behaved with so much treachery as to throw doubt upon all his recent
professions. He invited Captain Hart, the governor of Culmore fort, to
visit him at Buncrana. He complained that Lady O'Dogherty, who was of
the Pale and had English tastes, suffered from the want of society, and
therefore Mrs. Hart was pressed to accompany her husband. After dinner
O'Dogherty took Hart into an upper room under pretence of privacy,
spoke of Paulet's harsh conduct, and told his guest that he must die
or surrender Culmore. Being disarmed, and told to choose, Hart refused
to betray his trust. Lady O'Dogherty then entered the room in tears,
upbraided her husband and his accomplices, and called heaven to witness
that she was no party to the plot. O'Dogherty threatened to throw both
her and his prisoner over the walls, and told Mrs. Hart that she must
devise some means of seizing Culmore or die with her husband, her
children, and the whole garrison. He swore upon a book that not one
person should suffer if the fort were yielded quietly. At last she was
frightened into going with O'Dogherty to Culmore and calling out some
of the guard, saying that her husband lay hard by with a broken arm.
Once outside the gate they were seized by the Irish, who rushed in and
took the fort, surprising the rest of the garrison in their beds. Hart
and his family were ferried over the Foyle and told to go to Coleraine,
the soldiers escaping to Lifford during the confusion of that night.[47]
[Sidenote: O'Dogherty surprises Derry.]
[Sidenote: Treatment of the garrison.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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