Qualla: Battle of Curlew Pass

Battle of Curlew Pass: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. The road ran through the bog. Limestone slabs six or seven feet wide laid edge to edge, with stretches of soft black peat between them, climbing the low spine of the Curlew Mountains north of the town of Boyle. On the afternoon of 15 August 1599 - a feast day, the Assumption of Mary, harvest weather hot and still - Sir Conyers Clifford led 1,500 English infantry and 200 cavalry up that road toward Sligo. He had been told the pass was undefended. He was wrong. Inside the woods on either side, Conor MacDermott had hidden six hundred musketeers and archers. Behind the ridge beyond, out of sight, Red Hugh O'Donnell had concealed the main Irish infantry. And waiting in the trees, with one hundred and sixty heavy axemen, was Brian Og O'Rourke of the Breifne. The English would not reach Sligo.

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Image: Unknown author | Public domain

Battle of Curlew Pass: Connacht's Last Chieftain

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Joli, CC BY-SA 3.0. The Nine Years' War had begun in Ulster in 1593 and by 1599 it had spread to most of Ireland. Hugh O'Neill of Tyrone and Red Hugh O'Donnell of Tirconnell led a Gaelic alliance that had handed England its worst defeat in Ireland at the Yellow Ford only a year before. The 2nd Earl ...

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Image: Joli | CC BY-SA 3.0

Battle of Curlew Pass: Ninety Minutes of Smoke

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Amandasbutterflies, CC BY 3.0. The first barricade between Boyle and Ballinafad was lightly held. The Irish there fired a few shots and fell back on horseback to warn the main army. Clifford pushed on, his musketeers leading the column up the rocky bog-road. Hit-and-run fire began from the trees on the flanks ...

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Image: Amandasbutterflies | CC BY 3.0

Battle of Curlew Pass: Like Folding Doors

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Joseph Christian Leyendecker (1874 - 1951), Public domain. Then Brian Og O'Rourke led his gallowglasses out of the trees. These were the heavy axemen of the Gaelic world - tall, mailed Scottish-Irish professional soldiers carrying two-handed Lochaber axes - and they had been waiting for this moment. A contemporary account describes the i...

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Image: Joseph Christian Leyendecker (1874 - 1951) | Public domain

Battle of Curlew Pass: Aftermath in Two Pieces

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Gavigan 01 at English Wikipedia, CC BY 2.5. Brian Og O'Rourke had Clifford's head cut off and sent it back to O'Donnell, who had watched without joining the fight; the head was carried to Collooney Castle and shown to its defenders, who surrendered within days. The trunk MacDermott took to the monastery on Trinity Island i...

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Image: Gavigan 01 at English Wikipedia | CC BY 2.5