August 15th 1798: The Freeman's Journal reports on the 9th that Peter Finnerty, printer of the proscribed Press, is bailed on surety of £1,000 and good behaviour for seven years. Also noted is the transportation sentence imposed in Derry of Inishowen (Donegal) man John Scott for encouraging John Stewart to "accept a Captain's commission among st the United Irishmen".
The same paper carries resolutions issued by Irish prisoners of war in St Charles's Pri son, Orleans (France). They loyally assert their opposition to being separated from their "fellow subjects and prisoners of Great Britain, by ordering the latter to be sent to Valenciennes, and us to Cambray".
An officer based in Lisburn (Antrim) writes to Lt-Col Lee in England on the 10th to relate how three yeomen of the Marquis of Hertford's corps under suspicion of wrongdoing "were civil enough . . . to threaten my life by popping their pistols at my head".
One is to be censured for his original infraction but the writer, seeking a court martial, is perplexed by "paltry" excuses that yeomen are "not amenable to the Mutiny Act".
He conjectures that this is "merely a subterfuge to avoid exasperating a numerous class of people called Orange men who begin to feel their own strength & one day or other will perplex the government as much as the United men".
On the 12th the Viceroy directs that Wexford rebel An drew Martin suffer death on schedule but should not have his decapitated head placed "in a conspicuous part" of Enniscorthy. Violence flares in an unexpected quarter on the 13th when 40 rebels kill three members of Capt William Meredith's Mount Eagle Loyal Cavalry at Castleisland barracks (Kerry).
A Cork correspondent says the trio were awaiting "the re turn of the remainder of the corps" from patrol when "attacked by a considerable number of villains and murdered in a most barbarous manner. Whatever arms and ammunition they could find, the murderers took off with them. The names of two of the unfortunate sufferers were Boyle, the other Harold."
State Solicitor Kemmis learns from Tralee that there is a company of south Mayo militia at Dingle to ward off the "catching contagion".
Francis Dobbs, speaking in the House of Commons on the 15th, welcomes proposals to compensate loyalists for losses arising from the Rebellion.
He argues that money should also be given to "the unfortunate poor wretches who had been deluded into rebellion and had now returned to their allegiance, as would enable them to build habitations . . . and return to their wonted habits of industry, instead of resorting to the horrid alternative of pillage and outrage to procure themselves food".
Dobbs condemns "several" incidents in Wicklow in which pardoned rebels were "shot with protections in their pockets, though unarmed, and though no new offence had been committed by them."
Diarist Dorothea Herbert records new details of the recent clash at Slievenamon/ Nine-Mile-House where the Tipperary rebels make their strongest showing to date.
"The Rebels advanced to the Mountain of Slievenamon and the Army went out against them and had a smart Battle with them six Miles from Carrick. As the Rebels were in prodigious numbers we expected to see them enter the Town at Night but our small handful of Troops entirely defeated them and took a number of prisoners." A wounded Curraghmore Ranger takes two prisoners who "were instantly condemned to be shot though he made every Interest to save them".