...there
was a short postscript to the rebellion of 1798 that must be mentioned
because, for all its near-farcial character, its myth-making qualities
were to be more pervasive in Irish history than those of 1789
itself. This was the rebellion of Robert Emmet in Dublin in
1893.
In fact it turned out to be a
street riot rather than a rebellion, though Emmet, an attractive
figure who had been a United Irishman, was inspired by all his former
colleagies' high ideals. Indeed it eas his desire to assert
those ideals in the face of the ignominy of his failure that led him
to his most important contribution to the future: his speech from the
dock before execution.
His plan had been ambitious: to
seize Dublin Castle as a signal to the rest of the country to rise in
arms. A proclamation of 'the Irish Republic' had been printed;
contacts arranged with a band of outlaws who had been hiding out in
the Wicklow Hills ever since 1798. But the only part of the plan
that really worked was the printing of the Proclamation of the
Republic which was coming wet off the presses as the military arrived
to seize it. (One of Emmet's arms depots in Dublin had
accidently blown up the week before, alerting the Government to what
was afoot.)
In the end, where Emmet had
hoped to assemble 2,000 men to attack the Castle he mustered only
eighty, and these armed with pikes and blunderbusses, set forth into
the night of Saturday, 23 July 1803, headed by Emmet himself carrying
a drawn sort. Part of his following detached themselves to pike
to death Lord Kilwarden, the Chief Justice, who happened to be passing
through the streets in a coach at the time. Emmet, appalled by
the bloodthirsty rioting into which his bid to establish an Irish
Republic immediately degenerated, abandoned the project and took
himself inot hiding where he remained for a month before being caught,
tried and excecuted. His speech from the dock which immortalized
him in Irish history contained the phrase:
Let no man write my
epitaph... When my country takes her place among the nations of the
earth, then, and not till then let my epitaph be written.
