Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford, Ireland.
Telephone : 053 9237596 / 7
Email :
info@1798centre.ie
Women
of 1798
Mary Doyle of Castleboro, Suzy Toole, Madge Dixon, Jane Barber, Elizabeth Richards
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Information on the women of 1798 relies mainly on their own accounts and on contemporary ballads.
There is little mention of women in the written histories of the country. They did not have a vote or could not
hold property in their own right. However, we know that many accounts of 1798
state that the rebels were
accompanied by large numbers of women and children as they moved from place to place.
It is unthinkable to suggest that all these women were an idle burden on the rebels. At this time in history
women were used to hard work. They worked as hard as their male counterparts, in fields ploughing, reaping and
toiling, carding and spinning.
There is every indication that women were active in intelligence gathering and fought with courage in the
Rebellion Sir Jonah Barrington makes the
observation that on Vinegar Hill "a great many women mingled with their
relatives and fought with fury".
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Heroines |
Many heroines had no chronicler but Mary
Doyle of Castleboro stands out for her gallantry at the Battle of New Ross.
She cut off the cross belts of the fallen dragoons with a bill hook and handed them together with the cartouche boxes [cases for
holding gun cartridges], to her comrades.
She is referred to in P. F. Kavanagh’s 'A popular history of the Insurrection
of 1798' as "An amazon named Doyle, who marched with
the insurgent army and bore herself as gallantly as the most courageous man". There is no conclusive
evidence as to what happened
to Mary Doyle after the Battle of Ross but it is thought that she perished in the flames that consumed much of the town at that
time.
Joseph Holt records in his Memoirs: "We had several women in the camp", and he describes how the women were engaged in making
gun powder.
Not only did the women make ammunition but
in some instances they were used as "moving magazines".
Holt tells the story of Suzy Toole, daughter of Phelim Toole, a
blacksmith near Annamoe in County Wicklow.
She was about thirty years of age in 1798 and was employed in the forge with her
father. In her capacity as a "moving magazine"
she secured ball cartridge and ammunition from
disaffected soldiers.
She hid the ammunition in her clothing and she brought intelligence on the
movements of the King’s troops along with securing
provisions of food and fruit for the insurgents.
Holt describes Suzy Toole as being "5’8" tall when she stood upright
… Her face when young was broad as a full moon and her nose
nearly flat to her face, having been broken by a stone in a
faction fight…. Her eyes were black and sparkling. What they would have
been in a handsome face, with a decent
nose between them, I will not venture to say." Suzy Toole may not have been blessed with
great beauty
but she did manage to gain a place in history. She is buried in Glendalough.
Madge Dixon, née Stafford of Screen, managed to gain her place in
history, albeit as a notoriously cruel woman.
She was married to Thomas Dixon, son of a publican in Castlebridge near
Wexford town.
Dixon, who was a sea captain was also a Captain in the United Irish Society.
He was accompanied at all times throughout the ’98 campaign by his wife.
Musgrave in his Memoirs described her as "remarkable for
the ferocity of her disposition".
There exists the strange story of Madge Dixon, proceeding to the home of Colonel le
Hunte at Artramont about four miles from
Wexford. On discovering orange coloured furniture in the
house she declared she had discovered where the Orangemen held their
lodge.
Taking an orange fire-screen from the le Hunte home and bearing it aloft she
entered Wexford town on horseback.
There she attempted to raise a body of people to take Colonel le Hunte and have his
blood. However, he was reprieved due to the
intervention of Bagenal Harvey, Cornelius Grogan and Matthew
Keogh.
The women who fought physically in 1798 were, with some exceptions low on the
social scale and when mentioned in the histories,
the terms used to describe them show that they were not
measuring up to what was expected of women by nineteenth century
standards.
A more passive form of patriotism was expected of women. Indeed it was the more
acceptable form of feminine heroism.
The patriot woman was one who was prepared to sacrifice her sons, her
husband and brothers in the country’s cause while behaving
in a manner which would ease the choice which
men were called upon to make between family and country.
Two Protestant women, Jane Barber and Elizabeth Richards,
eyewitnesses to many of the events of 1798 recorded their
experiences in their diaries. |
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