A witness to James's stay in Dublin was William King, Dean of St Patrick's, who remained in the city and became effective ruler of the diocese. (Later he was Archbishop of Dublin.) He deplored the number of churches taken over and the fact that priests and friars 'multiplied in Dublin to three or four hundred at the least... there were not more lusty plump fellows in the town than they'. His journal noted how in February 1689 Protestants were deprived of arms when Tyrconnell commanded citizens to bring their 'swords, bayonets, firearms and others to the door of their respective churches, an occasion for looting by the soldiery detailed to ensure it was done'. At the approach of Schomberg's army Dr King was imprisoned in the wardrobe tower of Dublin Castle, where he and a number of other influential fellow citizens could look down on the courtyard and the rooftops of the city. They listened to rumours.

'August 23rd, 1689: There happened a scuffle in town between some Frenchmen and Irish soldiers, two of ye Irish were killed as reported. September 15th: Word was sent to me...the bells were forbidden to be rung and services prohibited in all churches by ye government. September 16th: The scholars were turned out of ye College...October 22nd: Mass was said in the College Chapel and the College Library delivered to Dr Moore and some Fryers and priests.' (Only the vigilance of this Catholic Provost, Dr Michael Moore, prevented the library's destruction during the occupation of the college.) 'I heard yre were no less than 12,000 men in Dublin armed. November 17th: The King went to Christ Church to Mass. November 18th: Some soldiers brought in about 38 prisoners into ye Castle yard said to be taken of ye enemy; but others said only 14 of them had bin soldiers, ye rest were poor country people. We observed several little boys about 12 or 14, one of ym was brought in a car being sick and dying, ye rest were tyed with hay or straw ropes to one another...'

Another diarist, the young English Jacobite, John Stevens, was in Dublin during the harsh winter of 1689-90. There was no coal, since the import of coal from England had been suspended, turf was too expensive for most people and the soldiers cut down the available trees. Food grew scarce. Stevens was billeted in Trinity, where he spent his endless spare time bewailing lost opportunities and the frolics of the court at the Castle where the king was trying to reconcile the differences between his English and Irish supporters. Stevens was disgusted by the drunkenness and loose living that he saw in Dublin, 'a seminary of vice, a living emblem of Sodom'. His namesake, Richard Steevens, the benefactor of Steevens' Hospital, also commented on the licentiousness of the period. 'Drunkenness was so easily procured that no liquors were strong enough, nor no days long enough to satiate some overhardened drunkards... the women were so suitable to the times that they rather enticed men to lewdness than carried the last face of modesty.' John Stevens' colonel Henry Fitzjames, a natural son of the king, spent his time 'in following the court, in walking the town... in drinking and such idle and foolish divertisements of youth'. The winter passed; on May 19th Stevens' regiment was reviewed by the King on Oxmantown Green. A little over two months later it was routed at the Boyne and made its way back to Dublin. 'I wonder that I outlived the miseries of this dismal day.'

During the battle the population of Dublin was confined to the city. Gates were closed and Protestants ordered to remain indoors which gave rise to ugly rumours that Tyrconnell intended to take many away as hostages. By five o'clock on the long summer's day they could watch the first stragglers from James's defeated army arriving outside the walls. Soon the streets were filled with exhausted soldiers. James came and went, fleeing through Bray to Waterford and France. On the morning of July 2nd Tyrconnell reached the city to find a state of confusion. Changes were swift; the garrison was withdrawn and Robert Fitzgerald, a son of the 16th Earl of Kildare, took over the Castle. He tried to protect the Catholic minority whose shops and houses were beginning to be looted. On July 4th a troop of dragoons from William's army came to take charge of the stores. In their joy people pulled the soldiers out of their saddles and hugged the horses. After camping at Finglas King William rode into Dublin on Sunday, July 6th, to hear a sermon preached by Dr King. A Protestant wrote how 'there was very great joy when we crept out of the houses and found ourselves as it were in a new world'. Another account tells how 'they ran about shouting and embracing one another and blessing God for his wonderful deliverance... the streets were filled with crowds and shouting and the poor Roman Catholics now Iying in the same terrors as we had done some days before...'

part 1

From the Appletree Press title: A Little History of Ireland, click here for more information or here to buy the book from Amazon. Also from Appletree: A Short History of Ireland, available from Amazon.com. Click here for more information.