The Battle of Castlebar

August 27, 1798:

 Wolfe Tone's United Irish and French forces clash with the British Army in the Battle of Castlebar, part of the Irish Rebellion of 1798, resulting in the creation of the French puppet Republic of Connaught. The long-awaited French landing to assist the Irish revolution begun by Theobald Wolfe Tone's Society of United Irishmen had taken place five days previously on 22 August, when almost 1,100 troops under the command of General Jean Joseph Amable Humbert landed at Cill Chuimín Strand, County Mayo. Although the force was small, the remote location ensured an unopposed landing away from the tens of thousands of British soldiers concentrated in the east in Leinster, engaged in mopping up operations against remaining pockets of insurgents. The nearby town of Killala was quickly captured after a brief resistance by local yeomen; Just south, Ballina was taken two days later following the rout of a force of cavalry sent from the town to oppose the Irish march. Following the news of the French landing, Irish volunteers began to trickle into the French camp from all over Mayo.
The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Lord Cornwallis, requested urgent reinforcements from England but in the interim all available forces were concentrated at Castlebar under the command of General Gerard Lake, the victor of the Battle of Vinegar Hill. The build-up of the British forces at Castlebar had reached 6,000 soldiers with dozens of artillery pieces and huge caches of supplies by dawn of 27 August.
The British had barely completed their new deployment when the Franco-Irish army appeared outside the town at about 6.00 a.m. The newly sited British artillery opened up on the advancing French and Irish and cut them down in droves. French officers, however, quickly identified an area of scrub and undergrowth in a defile facing the centre of the artillery line which interfered with, and provided some cover from, the British line of fire. The French launched a bayonet charge, the ferocity and determination of which unnerved units of the militia stationed behind the artillery. The militia units began to waver before the French reached their lines and eventually turned in panic and fled the battlefield, abandoning the gunners and artillery. Some soldiers of the Longford and Kilkenny militias ran to join the republicans and even joined in the fighting against their former comrades. A unit of cavalry and British regular infantry attempted to stand and stem the tide of panic but were quickly overwhelmed.