Derry

All the boldest spirits of the unconquerable colony had repaired to William's camp.

Mitchellburn was there with the stubborn defenders of Londonderry, and Wolseley with the warriors who had raged the unanimous shout of Advance on the day of Newton Butler.

Sir Albert Cunningham, the ancestor of the noble family whose seat now overlooks the Boyne, had brought from the neighbourhood of Lough Erne a gallant regiment of dragoons, which still glories in the name of Ennis Killen, and which has proved on the shores of the Euxine that it has not degenerated since the day of the Boyne.

End of section 1 Section 2 of Chapter 16 of The History of England This is a LibriVox recording.

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For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by S.T. Macduff The History of England by Thomas Babington Macaulay Chapter 16 Section 2 Walker, notwithstanding his advanced age and his peaceful profession, accompanied the men of Londonderry and tried to animate their zeal by exhortation and by example.

He was now a great prelate.

Ezekiel Hopkins had taken refuge from Popish persecutors and Presbyterian rebels in the city of London, had brought himself to swear allegiance to the government, had obtained a cure, and had died in the performance of the humble duties of a parish priest.

William III and Mary II.

The Story of Brave Londonderry.

Although most of the people received William and Mary joyfully, some, chiefly in Ireland and Scotland, still looked upon James as the rightful king.

In Ireland especially there were many Roman Catholics who would not acknowledge a Protestant king.

James landed at a town called Kinsale, and the Irish people welcomed him with great joy.

But he felt disheartened almost at once, for there had already been much fighting, and the country through which he had to pass was desolate and deserted, and at times he and his men could find hardly enough food to keep them from starving.

Most of the Protestants had fled from the land or had shut themselves up in the two towns of Enniskillen and Londonderry.

The soldiers of James besieged both these towns, but it was round Londonderry that the greatest fight took place.

The garrison of Downes sacked the celebrated shrines and tomb of Patrick, Bridget, and Columkill.

The garrison of Carrickfergus ravaged Rathlin Island and attacked Derry, from which, however, they were repulsed with severe loss by John the Proud.

But the most lamentable scene of spoliation, and that which excited the profoundest emotions of pity and anger in the public mind, was the violation of the churches of St. Kieran, the renowned Clonmacnoise.

this city of schools had cast its cross-crowned shade upon the gentle current of the upper shannon for a thousand years danish fury civil storm and norman hostility had passed over it leaving traces of their power in the midst of the evidences of its recuperation the great church to which pilgrims flocked from every tribe of erin on the ninth of september st kieran's day the numerous chapels erected by the chiefs of all the neighboring clans the halls hospitals book-houses nunneries cemeteries granaries all still stood awaiting from christian hands the last fatal blow

His father had procured at the same time for an illegitimate son, Faradoc, or Matthew of Dundalk, the title of Baron of Dungannon, with the reversion of the earldom.

When, however, John the Proud came of age, he centred upon himself the hopes of his clansmen, deposed his father, subdued the baron, and assumed the title of O'Neill.

In 1552 he defeated the efforts of Sir William Brabazon to fortify Belfast, and delivered Derry from its plunderers.

From that time till his tragical death, in the ninth year of Queen Elizabeth, he stood unquestionably the first man of his race, both in lineage and action.

I've just been to Ireland where I originated from.

I grew up in Derry, the oldest of eight children.

um, in a, uh, a landscape that was, uh, politically and religiously, um, a battleground.

Um, and I guess to some extent in my home, uh, that was, you know, with eight kids and, you know, very busy lifestyle.

yeah.

And so to what extent did the sort of sectarian troubles impact on your early life? Was it a feature? Was it not? Was it completely out of the house? Or was it something which...

We impacted everyone in Derry.

So

The revenues of the city of Dublin were seized, and most of the churches converted into prisons.

And had it not been for the resolution and uncommon bravery of the garrisons in the city of Londonderry, and the town of Inniskillen, there had not one place remained for refuge to the distressed Protestants in the whole kingdom; but all must have been given up to King James, and to the furious Popish party that governed him.

The remarkable siege of Londonderry was opened on the eighteenth of April, 1689, by twenty thousand Papists, the flower of the Irish army.

The city was not properly circumstanced to sustain a siege; the defenders consisting of a body of raw undisciplined Protestants, who had fled thither for shelter, and half a regiment of Lord Mountjoy's disciplined soldiers, with the principal part of the inhabitants, making in all seven thousand three hundred and sixty-one fighting men.

The besieged hoped, at first, that their stores of corn and other necessities would be sufficient; but by the continuance of the siege their wants increased, and these became at last so heavy that for a considerable time before the siege was raised a pint of coarse barley, a small quantity of greens, a few spoonfuls of starch, with a very moderate proportion of horse-flesh, were reckoned a week's provision for any soldier; and they were, at length, reduced to such extremities that they ate dogs, cats, and mice.

As the calamities of the besieged were great, so likewise were the terrors and sufferings of their Protestant friends and relations, all of whom, even women and children, were forcibly driven from the country thirty miles round, and inhumanly reduced to the sad necessity of continuing some days and nights without food or covering, before the walls of the town; and were thus exposed to the continual fire both of the Irish army from without, and the shots of their friends from within.

But the succors from England happily arriving put an end to their affliction, and the siege was raised on the thirty-first of July, having been continued upwards of three months.

The day before the siege of Londonderry was raised, the Inniskillers engaged a body of six thousand Irish Roman Catholics, at Newtownbutler, or Crowncastle, of whom near five thousand were slain.

We were part of that whole advancement of Republican objectives of building Sinn Féin's radical activist-based Republican Party and at the same time contributing to the creation of a peace process while standing against military occupation and during suppression.

This Sunday is the ninth Chieftain's Walk in Derry.

It's organised in Martin's memory and to raise money for charity.

The first year that I was there, the walk went to the Stone Fort at Greenan and the Iliac on the Inishowen Peninsula.

And I walked there with him on many occasions.

It's a place of quiet beauty with amazing panoramic views.

On one side, you can see Derry City in the distance.

Greenland also overlooks Ennishown and then Sheldon.