Do the events of 250 years ago, such as the American Declaration of Independence, have any relevance to life in N. Ireland today? Let’s hope so, because the DUP Minister, Gordon Lyons, has decided to spend £425,000 of public finance to celebrate this event.
Possibly the DUP will want to focus on the role of emigrants from Ulster who brought their sense of independence to America and played a role in rebelling against Britain. However, the influence of this time was a two-way process and the ideas that supported an armed rebellion against the British in America would later be used to support an armed rebellion by Presbyterians against British control in Ireland.
An Englishman called Thomas Paine travelled to America in 1774 and wrote a famous 1776 pamphlet called ‘Common Sense’ in which he derides the idea of a hereditary monarchy and argues that America has to break away and make the rule of law their ‘king’. As well as providing intellectual support for the American War of Independence, Paine’s pamphlet and ideas found their way to both England and France. Both countries tried to censor the pamphlet but when the French had their own rebellion 13 years later, Paine was treated as a hero by the French public and he was elected to the French National Convention in 1792.
As many historians such as Robert Kee and Simon Schama have pointed out, an idea or event in one country at a particular time can be exported and have significant effects in other countries at a later time. The world is a political system where people have their effect, but so too do ideas that sweep across the world at particular times. The powerful German Chancellor Otto von Bismark described this effect as follows: “The statesman’s task is to hear God’s footsteps marching through history, and to try and catch on to His coattails as He marches past“. Similarly, in her wonderful play, ‘The Long March’ Anne Devlin makes the comparison between civil rights marchers at the start of the Troubles taking part in a march of history that began before they were born and continuing after they are gone.
Almost immediately, Thomas Paine responded with a defence of the French revolution in his famous ‘Rights of Man’ pamphlet which he insisted was sold in cheap editions so that working people could read it. This sold over one million copies within the UK and tens of thousands in Ireland, with it being read and discussed in ale houses and Meeting Houses (Presbyterian and Quaker places of worship) across Ireland.
Note that one book sold did not equal one reader, with books being read aloud in taverns and coffee houses for those who were illiterate or passed hand-to-hand among the new politically aware business class.
It is important to note that at this time in Britain and Ireland there was a shift in the power balance away from the traditional wealth of landowners and towards the new wealth of business people who valued literacy and new ideas. These people were open to ideas about people having rights and about hereditary wealth and power becoming a thing of the past.
The Presbyterian Dissenters
A Covenant is an agreement or treaty. Presbyterians are sometimes referred to a Covenanters, because Presbyterians traditionally did not accept the ‘divine right of Kings’. We believed instead in a three-way agreement between God, the Ruler and the people. We believed in conditional loyalty to the ruler; loyalty was only required if the Ruler keeps their end of the bargain and treats the people fairly while respecting God’s law. Because of this, Presbyterians in Ireland were particularly open to the ideas coming from America, from France and from people like Thomas Paine.
It should be remembered that, back then, Presbyterians were not considered to be ‘proper Protestants’, unlike the Anglican Church of Ireland which was the official established church until 1869. This meant that Presbyterian and Catholic farmers were paying tithes (taxes) towards the upkeep of the Anglican churches until 1870s and this was obviously a source of common discontent, uniting Catholics with Dissenters (Presbyterians).
A further example of this disparity can be seen in the fact that many Ulster towns have an area called ‘The Glebe’. This was an area of land set aside during the Plantation which would be rented out to provide an income for the local Church of Ireland clergy – other churches could not benefit. In some towns, you will see an old, grand house called “The Glebe House.” This was the official residence of the Church of Ireland Rector. Because they had the income from the Glebe land and the Tithes, these rectors were often among the wealthiest and most influential people in a rural Irish community.
At this time several Presbyterian ministers such as William Steel Dickson of Portaferry gave sermons supporting extending the vote to Catholics, as well as opposing the war against American independence, and as a result were sometimes accused of being ‘papist at heart’.
Brutal Repression
Because of the above reasons, Presbyterians across Ireland were sympathetic to rebellion against British rule in 1798, and referred to the Rising as ‘the turn-out’. However, because of poor planning and some bad luck the rebellion failed and retribution was swift and brutal.
Towns considered unionist today were deliberately torched by British forces in 1798, with Ballymoney, Ballynahinch, Saintfield and Antrim all suffering significant damage. Several Presbyterian ministers were hanged and hundreds of ordinary people lost their lives; others through influence or good luck were allowed to escape to America. Many ordinary people were subjected to public torture such as lashings, half-hangings or pitch capping, or suffered transportation to the colonies. A reign of terror was imposed to prevent any repeat.
The Presbyterian minister Rev. Robert Magill witnessed the execution of rebels as a ten-year-old boy and thirty years later clearly recalled ‘the awful spectacle of human heads fastened on spikes and placed on the Market-house of Ballymena. When I looked up and saw the hair of the heads waving to and fro in the wind, I felt sensations indescribable’. He also described seeing ‘Samuel Bones, of Lower Broughshane, receive 500 lashes, 250 on the back, and 250 on the buttocks,’ with his flesh reduced to jell’.
In Ballymoney, at the corner of Pyper Row and Main Street a local United Irishman was hanged at the town clock. Alexander Gamble had been offered the opportunity to save his life if he would give up the names of other members of the Irish Volunteers but declined. He was alleged to have refused an offer of clemency in return for becoming an informer as he would die someday, and he knew not how soon; but it should never be cast in the face of his children that their father betrayed others to save himself.’ He left behind a wife and seven children. His body was buried underneath the town clock where it fell, no funeral was permitted.
In 1883, men working on foundations for a building discovered his body underneath the road and his great grandchildren had it reburied in the old graveyard.
Another Ballymoney family, the Caldwells, came very close to seeing their son executed; the 18-year-old Caldwell was sentenced in Coleraine to be hanged and beheaded, with his head intended for display on a spike. Through his father’s influence, he was granted a last-minute reprieve but was banished from Ireland and sailed for America. In America Richard Caldwell continued to oppose British rule and died as a Captain in the US army leading his troops against the British in the 1812 War.
In addition to these repressive measures, the British government took political action to split the bond between the Presbyterians and their Catholic neighbours, addressing the grievances that encouraged the rebellion, but only for dissenting Protestants. Presbyterians were no longer barred from political or public office (unlike Catholics) and more generous donations were granted from the public purse to Presbyterian churchmen. Presbyterians were encouraged to join the Yeomanry (local militias) and the Orange Order.
Personal Note
I grew up in a strongly Presbyterian family in Ballymoney, Alexander Gamble was hanged at the end of my street and I attended the same Presbyterian Church building that he probably attended, but the role of the Presbyterians in the 1798 rebellion was almost forgotten. We didn’t talk of this at all. We Presbyterian’s were loyal, we were unionists.
In secondary school the 1798 Rising was mentioned in a clinical way as part of history, as were Belfast Presbyterians like Henry Joy McCrackenbut there was surprisingly little focus on local events. It was only through meeting John Robb (a local surgeon and later a member of Seanad Éireann) that I began to discover the depth of Presbyterian involvement and complexity of the local Presbyterian heritage.
The £425,000 of public money allocated by the DUP to celebrate American Independence is a significant financial outlay and must be used correctly. The media, the universities and the Presbyterian Church should ensure that the complexity of Presbyterian history is not obscured.
At the time of the Declaration of Independence, the Presbyterians of Ulster opposed British rule in Ireland as much as they did in the USA.
At this time several Presbyterian ministers such as William Steel Dickson of Portaferry gave sermons supporting extending the vote to Catholics, as well as opposing the war against American independence and as a result were sometimes accused of being ‘papist at heart’.
Arnold is a retired teacher from Lisburn, now living in Belfast.
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