Assault on the Blackwater Fort
Who Fought
Irish alliance: approximately 240 (initial force of 40 under Art MacBaron O'Neill plus a secondary force of 200); English: approximately 26 (soldiers and families), led by Edward Cornwall
History & Significance
On 16 February 1595, a Gaelic Irish force assaulted and captured the English-held Blackwater Fort at Blackwatertown in County Armagh. The Irish were led by Art MacBaron O'Neill, brother of Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, and marked Tyrone's break with the English Crown as he openly waged war against the English forces in Ireland.
The assault focused on the English fort which sat at a bridge on the Blackwater River, marking the border between Counties Tyrone and Armagh. It was built on the orders of the 1st Earl of Essex in 1575 as an outpost of English military strength in the heart of Gaelic Ulster, but also to secure the power of the main Irish ally in the region, Hugh O'Neill, Baron of Dungannon. The fort was composed of a square earthwork bawn "twelve score yards in circuit" reinforced by two bulwarks and punctuated with gun loops in its ramparts. In one corner stood a wooden tower, four storeys tall, topped with a wooden walkway and a slate-covered building. It was accessed by two doors, one led out onto the ramparts, another led to a cellar. Each storey had defensive firing loops, also known as spike holes. This tower overlooked a road and bridge across the river. At the other side of the river, on the Tyrone side, was a stone tower. The stone tower controlled access to the bridge, as the road ran through it via large wooden doors.
Hugh O'Neill, lord of Tyrone, was thought an ally of the English Crown and he was supported by the English authorities in Dublin as a counterweight to the power of other native lords in Ulster, such as Sir Turlough Luineach O'Neill. However, encroachment by English authorities on the liberties of the native Irish lords in Ulster during the 1580s and early 1590s caused O'Neil to create an alliance of Irish lords, which looked to throw off English rule with the help of Philip II of Spain. From April 1593 O'Neill orchestrated a proxy war against the English using Hugh Maguire, Lord of Fermanagh, and Hugh Roe O'Donnell, Lord of Tyrconnell. They engaged the English in the west of Ulster while O'Neill, outwardly still loyal to the Crown, strengthened his power base in Ulster and subdued the Crown's Irish allies in the north. The Irish laid siege to Enniskillen Castle and defeated an English force sent to relieve it.
O'Neill's alliance was not limited to Ulster as he was allied to Fiach McHugh O'Byrne in Leinster. He had come under increasing pressure from Lord Deputy William Russell's military expeditions into the Wicklow Mountains. In desperation, Fiach McHugh asked that Tyrone offer help or at least raid the northern Pale to draw Russell out of Wicklow. O'Neill requested a meeting with Russell to discuss how to proceed but this was dismissed by the Lord Deputy as a ploy to draw him out of O'Byrne's lands. Therefore, to help O'Byrne, O'Neill made his first open move against the Crown.
The ground they fought on
The site of Assault on the Blackwater Fort lies on Sherwood Sandstone Group, bedrock that formed in the Ladinian. The rock here is sandstone, siltstone and mudstone.
- Irish: 23 killed (15 during the assault, 8 died later of wounds); English: few reported
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