by Des Ekin
For the northern insurgents, the march home was an excruciating ordeal – a seemingly endless hell in which every freezing river held lethal flash-floods, every castle held a hostile army and every village was full of enemies bent on revenge. Except in this case, the enemies weren’t the English. They were the Irish whose lands had been burned by the chieftains on their way south. They swooped on the weary insurgents at every turn, driving them into rivers where hundreds were drowned.
‘Many more were drowned on their retreat than were killed [at Kinsale],’ said O’Neill’s trumpeter Shane Sheale. ‘As a herd of swine would take to the water for fear, so they did, and were drowned in great numbers.’ Soldiers who fell down exhausted in the swamps were trampled into the slime for the sake of their firearms. ‘They that would kiss them in their going forward did both strip them and shoot bullets at them in their return,’ Sheale recalled.
Carew claimed: ‘A troop of women would have beaten his army.’
Those lucky enough to make it back were determined to stay there even if the Spanish sent a new armada.
—O’Neill can go if he pleases, Sheale said. But he won’t find a man to go with him.
Five days after the battle, an exhausted and bedraggled figure stumbled through a side gate of Kinsale.
It was Alférez Bustamante, who had endured an epic trek by night across hostile countryside in a bid to rejoin his unit in the town. After the battle, he had retreated with the other Spanish survivors to Castlehaven. Instead of remaining there in comparative safety, he footslogged the seventy kilometres back to Kinsale. ‘I could keep out of danger only by travelling by night, and with extreme care,’ he wrote.
Bustamante found his comrades still traumatised by the defeat. No one knew what had happened to the Irish chieftains. Águila had asked them for support. They had replied that they were unable to help him. Meanwhile, the town’s hospital was packed with nine hundred groaning sick and wounded, and the meagre food supplies were almost exhausted. ‘Within eight days,’ wrote Bustamante, ‘the dearth of food would force us out.’
The Spanish survivors felt no loyalty towards O’Neill. ‘They rail much against Tyrone,’ Carew says, ‘… [and] task him with cowardice.’ The Spanish and the English agreed that Felipe III had been duped. ‘[The] poor Spaniards have an Irish trick played on them,’ crowed another English writer, ‘in a triple turn betwixt their heads and their shoulders.’
Águila asked Bustamante if Castlehaven could hold out. Bustamante told him it couldn’t. It had no bastions or earthworks, only a mediaeval wall.
The commander took Bustamante aside. He told him he was going to seek a peace deal before Blount realised their true predicament.
—If we can leave with honour, undefeated, we will come to terms, he said. If not, then we will all die here in the fields of Quinsale.
Bustamante knew that his commander meant every word.
—It is what we are expected to do, Águila said.
As dawn broke on the last day of 1601, Águila sent out a trumpeter for parlay.
‘[I] pray Your Lordship to send hither a person of weight and trust,’ he wrote.
Blount had many good candidates for the job of negotiator. He selected Sir William Godolphin, another Essex protégé. Godolphin had excelled in the fiercest fighting during the siege, and currently bore a fresh thigh-wound inflicted by a halberd at Millwater Ford. In fact, one early historian credited Godolphin with the entire victory, claiming he ‘broke through the whole body of the Spaniards and rebels, entirely routing them’. But that wasn’t the only reason why the Cornishman was chosen to beard Águila in his lair. The main reason has rarely, if ever, been mentioned by historians.
William Godolphin had an account to settle with Águila. And it was intensely personal. To find out what it was, we must briefly fly back in time, to another place and another war.
Brittany in July 1595. Águila, the Spanish commander at Blavet, was still smarting from the loss of his fort at El Leon and was planning a punitive strike on his enemy’s home turf. His target: Cornwall in the southwest of England. This expedition, now virtually forgotten, was spectacularly successful. History would record it as the last Spanish invasion of England.
In mid-July, Águila despatched four hundred musketeers under a Carlos de Amezola. The fleet that transported them was commanded by none other than Pedro de Zubiaur. At daybreak on 23 July, four ships dropped anchor at Mount’s Bay and landed two hundred troops. The two villages of Mouse-hole and Paul were ‘burn’d and spoil’d’. The Spaniards boasted: ‘We burned more than four hundred houses, some outlying hamlets and three ships.’
They moved on to Newlyn and Penzance, where they celebrated Mass at a local church and left a poem warning that they would return to make it into a friary. As they proceeded to sack Penzance, the Deputy Lieutenant of Cornwall, sixty-year-old Sir Francis Godolphin, tried desperately to mount a defence. But the local militia deserted him in terror. He could persuade only a dozen of his own servants to join him. They had two guns. In Penzance marketplace, his pathetic Dad’s Army formed a thin line against four hundred heavily armed Spaniards. When the Spanish burned the town around them, Godolphin’s defenders were forced to withdraw. A subsequent English investigation found that Penzance would have been saved ‘had the people stood with Sir Francis Godolphin … but the common sort utterly forsook him’. It was the sort of heroic stand that Águila would have admired and respected.
And now, in Kinsale, one man was chosen to negotiate an end to Águila’s second great strike against the Queen. He was thirty-four-year-old William Godolphin – Sir Francis’s son.
A circle of history was about to be closed.
Godolphin didn’t know what to expect as he picked his way through the scarred and potholed streets of Kinsale. The wreckage was a testimony to the effectiveness of the English barrage – and yet the besiegers could not take the town without inflicting carnage upon themselves.
After the usual military courtesies, he found himself face-to-face with a bearded man who exuded an air of authority and determination.
—I have found your commander to be a sharp and powerful opponent, yet an honourable enemy, Águila said.
Godolphin remained silent. His role at this stage was only to listen.
—In contrast, Águila continued, I have found my Irish allies weak, barbarous and perfidious.
The English officer nodded. He wondered where all this was leading.
—Because of my admiration for the one and my distaste for the other, said Águila, I propose to hand over Kinsale and the other ports. Then we will depart on honourable terms that are fitting to men of war.
Having put forward the idea, Águila’s attitude suddenly hardened.
—But do not mistake our attitude for weakness, he warned. If your commander insists on dishonourable terms, he will find us ready to bury ourselves alive, and endure a thousand deaths, rather than yield.
Blount must have felt like cheering, but he couldn’t accept without some bluff and bluster. The negotiations continued through Godolphin.
—We have just defeated your allies and cut off your only source of aid, Blount reminded Águila. We could take Kinsale in a very short time. Yet we know that Her Majesty would not want her victory to be blemished by needless bloodshed. We will entertain your offer on two conditions. Firstly that you surrender all your arms, artillery and treasure. And secondly, that you yield up all Her Majesty’s subjects.
He meant, of course, the Irish insurgents.
Águila was incandescent with fury at the very suggestion.
—I speak on behalf of every last one of my men, he said. We would rather endure the greatest of misery rather than be guilty of so foul a treason.
And that was not all.
—If you so much as mention such disgraceful terms again, Águila warned, my previous offer is withdrawn and your commander should return to his sword. When we meet in the breach, I will lay five hundred of your best men in the e
arth.
Águila finished by justifying his decision to make a deal. Was he trying to convince Blount, or himself?
His mission had been to join the chieftains. Now that they had fled, he felt relieved of his duty. ‘I expected long in vain … [they were] every hour promising to relieve us,’ he pointed out. ‘[But I] saw them at last broken with a handful of men, blown asunder into divers parts of the world – O’Donnell into Spain, O’Neill to the furthest of the north.’
Behind all this bombast lay a desperate need for peace on both sides.
What Águila was really thinking was this: He was down to 1,800 effective fighters. He was almost out of food. He had been deserted by his allies. He was running out of time. ‘If the enemy knew what was going on in the matter of food and men,’ he said later, ‘they would never have [entered negotiations].’
Meanwhile, what Blount was really thinking was this: It was important to get the Spaniards out before their reinforcements arrived. His own army had been so seriously reduced that it was almost as weak as it had been at the beginning. ‘The sufferings of a winter’s siege [fell] more upon us in the field than upon them in the town,’ he said.
Interestingly, the two sides privately held opposing views on the value of the other three ports. While Águila considered them weak and indefensible, Blount and Carew saw them as almost unassailable. Carew compared them to Águila’s Breton strongholds at Blavet and El Leon.
Despite all the bravado, negotiations continued. Eventually, on 2 January, a deal was struck. Águila’s forces would yield up Kinsale, Castlehaven, Baltimore and Bearhaven in return for safe passage back to Spain – not only for the Spaniards but also for ‘other nations whatsoever’, a crucial clause that included the Irish insurgents. In the event, ‘a great company’ of Irish was protected by this provision. In a major coup, Águila also retained all his treasure, guns, ammunition and flags. Honour was upheld. He would leave Kinsale undefeated.
However, there was one stipulation that was destined to damage Águila personally – although he did not know it yet. He was to remain in Ireland until the last ships left. This gave O’Donnell plenty of time to trash his reputation in Spain.
After the agreement was signed, the two commanders dined together in the Spital Hill camp. Next day, Carew dined with Águila in Kinsale and saw at close quarters the damage his guns had inflicted on the now ‘miserable’ town.
One week later, on 9 January, Blount formally lifted his siege. The gates of Kinsale swung open and remained open as Águila and his principal captains rode off to Cork city to stay as hostages. Afterwards, the councillors of Kinsale approached Carew and asked for their seal and mace back. Carew, still annoyed by the warm welcome given to the Spanish, told them they would get their town back if they rebuilt it stone by stone … at their own expense.
The peace deal was controversial and unpopular. Sceptics on both sides began studying the fine print to find loopholes. Secretary Cecil noticed that the agreement covered this Spanish expedition, but not any future one. Many in London felt the deal ‘too weak’, he complained. If Spain sent another five thousand troops, they could coldly sacrifice Águila. ‘Who doth know that they might not be commanded to abandon Don Juan?’ he asked.
Cecil was equally prepared to throw Blount to the wolves. In a guarded letter to Carew, he insinuated that Carew should prepare to move suddenly against Águila’s Spaniards by orchestrating ‘a breach of some formal article’.
In Kinsale, Oviedo was working hard behind Águila’s back to undo the deal. He wrote to the Duke of Lerma urging him to tear up the treaty. ‘We can easily get out of the agreement,’ he said, claiming that the English would technically break the treaty if they couldn’t get everyone home within one month. He must have been confused, to say the least, because there is no month’s deadline mentioned in the treaty.
With a blatant disregard for the facts, Oviedo claimed that the chieftains had come south with 8,800 troops and that they could reorganise ‘very easily’ to join the Spanish in Kinsale.
—We have 3,400 soldiers and a good supply of munitions and money, he claimed.
In reality, Águila had only 1,800 effective fighters, and the insurgents’ army of around 5,000 was irreparably scattered.
Fr Archer was equally indignant.
—Águila claimed he was forced to come to terms through a shortage of soldiers, the cleric fumed. In fact, we have 3,300 troops who are fit to fight.
Papal Nuncio Mansoni claimed that the Spanish could renege on handing over the other ports using the technicality that it was Zubiaur, not Águila, who was in command there. Unfortunately for his case, Zubiaur had already set sail for home.
It was Donal Cam O’Sullivan Beare who lodged the most convincing, and most heartbreaking, objection. His castle was his ancestral home, and Águila had no right to give it away. ‘All of us who took the part of the King are on the verge of ruin,’ he said, adding that his family and dependants would be ‘driven to run to the mountains, there to live like wolves’. Presciently, Donal Cam forecast that the outlook would be bleak for the Gaelic race.
He predicted: ‘The spirit of our people [will be] broken.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
‘A BARBAROUS NATION FOR WHICH CHRIST NEVER DIED’
AN OFFICER named Martin de Oleaga was the first to bring the bad news of the defeat back to Spain. He said that the Irish chieftains, with six to seven thousand infantry and six hundred horse, had been ‘surprised’ by the English near Kinsale. ‘They fell upon the weakest of the Irish squadrons, and beat them, whereupon the rest fled without fighting,’ his report read.
The Spanish Council of State told the King it regretted the defeat of O’Neill and O’Donnell, whose support had been crucial. ‘The few troops we have there can hardly hold out,’ it predicted, adding: ‘The worst of it is that Your Majesty’s prestige is at stake.’
The Council said there was no prospect of sending aid to Águila due to lack of resources. ‘If the time were further advanced,’ it mused, ‘… galleys might be sent to rescue Don Juan or take him to a safer place; but that is not to be thought of, at least until the end of April … The great difficulty is the troops which must be raised, for there are none.’
In the meantime, it would be great if Águila could just hang on. ‘It will be most advantageous,’ wrote the Council, ‘to keep that thorn in their flesh.’
Young King Felipe took the news surprisingly well. He certainly didn’t blame Águila for the defeat – on the contrary, he promised to richly reward him. ‘I recognise that our only hope now rests upon your bravery and prudence, which I prize highly,’ he wrote to his besieged commander on 20 January. Felipe praised his commander’s ‘spirit and experience’, and in a final footnote, promised: ‘You, and the army that is with you, shall experience my liberality and thanks.’
They were words that Juan del Águila would later recall with bitterness … as he was hauled before a Spanish court martial.
After Carew despatched Richard Boyle on his epic trip to London, news of the surprise defeat flashed across Europe. The Venetian ambassador in Paris reported that the Irish and Spanish had marched to the relief of Kinsale when ‘nel quale essendi fuggiti li Irlandes li Spagnoli furono rotti’ – the Irish ran away and the Spanish were routed. He added: ‘The Spanish were left to the mercy of the English, who with only 1,000 foot and 300 horse routed the whole army … 1,200 were left dead on the field, 800 wounded.’
The Venetians predicted: ‘Don Juan del Águila will not be able to hold out for long.’
There were sighs of relief in Paris for, as the Venetian diplomats had warned, a Spanish success would have necessitated a French invasion of Ireland to restore the balance of power.
As O’Donnell sailed south with Zubiaur, the unwitting Don Martin de la Cerda was sailing north toward Kinsale with the two hundred soldiers and a cargo of food and ammunition. However, most of his fleet was forced back to Spain by a howling gale. Only two ships made i
t to Kinsale. They arrived on 4 January, when the ink was scarcely dry on the two-day-old agreement.
Blount sent a boatful of eleven men to greet him.
—You can approach safely, they said. Peace has been made. Don Juan del Águila and Charles Blount are now good friends.
But Cerda was taking no chances. He snatched the eleven men and headed home ‘with all speed’. In Spain, the news of the deal was greeted with scepticism. ‘There is, up to the present, no confirmation of this,’ cautioned the Council of State.
The Spanish diarist Luis Cordóba was bemused. ‘Although it is said that Águila made a deal with the English, which lets him leave Ireland and gives him passage back to Spain with his people, it is doubtful,’ he wrote in late February.
But when questioned separately, the eleven men stuck to their story.
—We personally saw Don Juan dine with Charles Blount, they said.
The Council decided to send two fast ships to Ireland to verify the news. In the meantime, they continued to plan a Fourth Wave of eight ships which would carry supplies and munitions to Ireland. More should follow and ‘every possible effort [be] made to relieve Don Juan’.
‘Don Juan and I are good friends.’
The wording of Blount’s message to Cerda was warmer than it needed to be in order to describe a temporary accommodation between enemies. The truth was that he had forged a friendship with the crusty Spanish commander. They were enjoying their conversations over dinner in the bishop’s house in Cork city. The two military buffs probably re-fought many a classic battle late into the night. At one stage Águila talked of ‘the kind friendship which your Lordship has shown to me’.
The Spanish commander said he would be glad to leave Ireland. ‘Truly,’ he told Blount, ‘I think that when the Devil took our Saviour Jesus Christ to the pinnacle of the Temple and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, he kept Ireland hidden … to keep it for himself. For I believe that it is the Inferno itself, or some worse place.’
