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The Occupying Forces

The military strength of the army in Ireland was laid down in 1699 as 12,000 men, provided they were not Irish, to be paid, however, out of the Irish revenue. Not until 1756 were Irishmen allowed to enlist, provided they were protestant. Although the formal ban on catholic enlistments was lifted only on the eve of the Union, Catholic Marines were known to have been recruited two years after protestants were admitted. (It is probable that it was as a Marine that Eoin Rua O Suilleabhain took part in Rodney's famous victory.)

The Irish Establishment, as it was called, of 14 April 1742 provided for four regiments of horse, seven of dragoons, and twelve of foot, totalling 14,167 all ranks. There were listed ten garrisons of forts. There were also since 1699 groups of buildings specially for the accomodation of soldiers, termed barracks, built at Nenagh and Thurles. Limerick and Dublin Royal Barracks followed in 1701. Drogheda and Rosscommon in 1702, Athy in 1710. Troops not accommodated in these forts and barracks had to be billeted in ale-houses or other private dwellings.

Carhampton wrote to the Duke of York 1795: "There is no part of the King's dominion so much exposed to the attempts of the enemy in this war as Ireland. It is high time to understand its situation, to take measures for its saftey, and no longer to delay, because its infatuated inhabitants seem lulled into a fatal security". By inhabitants he did not of course mean the Irish in general.

In 1797 Secretary Pelham wrote to the Duke that "the men who had enlisted (from two thirds to three fourths of each regt.) were mechanics and inhabitants of the towns, that the peasants could seldom be persuaded under any circumstances to quit their families and place of nativity.

In 1797, with so many regular troops required abroad the forces in Ireland consisted almost entirely of Irish, English and Scottish militia with some Irish yeomanry.