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Clare's Dragoons | |
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Active | 8 August 1674 (first regiment) 1696-1745 France |
Allegiance | Charles II of England & France |
Type | Infantry |
The Clare's Regiment, later known as Clare's Dragoons, was initially named O'Brien's Regiment after its originator Daniel O'Brien, 3rd Viscount Clare raised a mounted dragoon regiment during the Jacobite war. When Clare's Dragoons left Limerick with the Flight of the Wild Geese they became a regiment of infantry. Clare's Dragoons remained loyal to the dethroned James II of England and fought against the army of William III of England, during the Williamite War in Ireland.
Commanded by | appointed | regiment known as | |
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Daniel O'Brian, Viscount Clare | 8 August 1674 | Clare's Regiment of Foot | Irish regiment of the Dutch States Army |
Sir John Fenwick | 2 August 1675 | Fenwick's Regiment of Foot | Dutch Service |
Henry Wisely or Wesley | 11 September 1676 | Wisely's Regiment of Foot | Dutch Service |
Thomas Monk | 10 December 1680 | Monk's Regiment of Foot | Dutch Service to 1685 |
Thomas Tollemache | 24 March 1688 | Tollemache's Regiment of Foot | English Establishment from 1685 |
Edward Lloyd | 1 May 1689 | Lloyd's Regiment of Foot | |
Thomas Fairfax | 6 November 1694 | Fairfax's Regiment of Foot | |
Thomas Pearce | 5 February 1704 | Pearce's Regiment of Foot | |
Sir John Cope | 17 October 1732 | Cope's Regiment of Foot | |
Alexander Irvine | 1737 | Irvine's Regiment of Foot |
On 1 July 1751 a royal warrant provided that in future regiments would not be known by their colonels' names, but by their "number or rank". Accordingly, Lieutenant-General Irvine's Regiment was redesignated as the 5th Regiment of Foot.
The Irish Brigade was a brigade in the French army composed of Irish exiles. It was formed in May 1690 when five Jacobite regiments were sent from Ireland to France in return for a larger force of French infantry who were sent to fight in the Williamite war in Ireland. The Irish Brigade served as part of the French Army until 1792. These five Jacobite regiments, comprising about 5000 men, were named after their colonels: Lord Mountcashel, Butler, Feilding, O'Brien and Dillon. They were largely inexperienced and the French immediately disbanded Butler's and Feilding's, either incorporating their men into the remaining three regiments or sending them back to Ireland. The remaining three regiments, Mountcashel's, O'Brien's and Dillon's, formed the Irish Brigade which served the French during the remainder of the Nine Years War (1689–97).
Under the terms of the Treaty of Limerick signed in October 1691, which ended the war between King James II and VII and King William III in Ireland, a separate force of 12,000 Jacobites arrived in France in an event known as the Flight of the Wild Geese. These were kept separate from the Irish Brigade and were formed into King James's own army in exile, albeit in the pay of France. Lord Dorrington's regiment, later Rooth or Roth, following the Treaty of Ryswick in 1698, was formed from the former 1st and 2nd battalions James II's Royal Irish Foot Guards formerly on the Irish establishment of Britain.
Le régiment de Clare was a French regiment of the Ancien Régime. It first entered service in France when it was shipped to France as part of a troop exchange in April 1690 during the Jacobite War forming part of Justin McCarthy, Viscount Mountcashel's Irish Brigade.
Note : another regiment, régiment de Bulkeley, briefly took the name of régiment de Clare between 1691 and 1693.
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There were two Irish regiments in French service that bore at some time the name of Clare and of O'Brien. The original O'Brien's Regiment was placed on the French establishment in 1689, and after being renamed as Clare's Regiment in 1691 it was renamed again in 1694 as Lee's Regiment.
The second Clare's Regiment which was raised in 1696. This second regiment is the one referred to in the Clare's Dragoons song. This regiment too was briefly named O'Brien's Regiment. In 1775 this second Clare's Regiment was disbanded and its troops incorporated into Berwick's Regiment.
‘Clare’s Dragoons’ survives today as the regimental march of the 27th Infantry Battalion of the Irish Defence Forces.
"Clare's Dragoons" | |
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Song | |
Songwriter(s) | Thomas Davis |
Chorus:
The Royal Scots Greys was a cavalry regiment of the British Army from 1707 until 1971, when they amalgamated with the 3rd Carabiniers to form the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards.
The Flight of the Wild Geese was the departure of an Irish Jacobite army under the command of Patrick Sarsfield from Ireland to France, as agreed in the Treaty of Limerick on 3 October 1691, following the end of the Williamite War in Ireland. More broadly, the term Wild Geese is used in Irish history to refer to Irish soldiers who left to serve in continental European armies in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.
The Irish Brigade was a brigade in the French Royal Army composed of Irish exiles, led by Lord Mountcashel. It was formed in May 1690 when five Jacobite regiments were sent from Ireland to France in exchange for a larger force of French infantry who were sent to fight in the Williamite War in Ireland. The regiments comprising the Irish Brigade retained their special status as foreign units in the French Army until nationalised in 1791.
The Williamite War in Ireland took place from March 1689 to October 1691. Fought by Jacobite supporters of James II and his successor, William III, it resulted in a Williamite victory. It is generally viewed as a related conflict of the 1688 to 1697 Nine Years' War.
The Battle of Aughrim was the decisive battle of the Williamite War in Ireland. It was fought between the largely Irish Jacobite army loyal to James II and the forces of William III on 12 July 1691, near the village of Aughrim, County Galway.
The Battle of Newtownbutler took place near Enniskillen in County Fermanagh, Ireland, in 1689 and was part of the Williamite War in Ireland between the forces of William III and Mary II and those of King James II.
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Limerick, a city in western Ireland, was besieged twice in the Williamite War in Ireland in 1689–1691. On the first occasion, in August to September 1690, its Jacobite defenders retreated to the city after their defeat at the Battle of the Boyne. The Williamites, under William III, tried to take Limerick by storm but were driven off and had to retire into their winter quarters.
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The 6th (Inniskilling) Dragoons was a cavalry regiment in the British Army, first raised in 1689 as Sir Albert Cunningham's Regiment of Dragoons. One of the regiment's most notable battles was the Battle of the Boyne in July 1690. It became the 6th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Dragoons in 1751. The regiment also fought with distinction in the Charge of the Union Brigade at the Battle of Waterloo and again as part of the successful Charge of the Heavy Brigade against superior numbers at the Battle of Balaclava during the Crimean War. The First World War sounded the death knell for mounted cavalry as it became apparent that technology had moved forward with greater destructive power and made horsed cavalry redundant on the modern battlefield. The British Army reorganised and reduced its cavalry corps by disbanding or amalgamating many of its famous cavalry regiments. The Inniskillings was one of those affected. It saw service for two centuries, including the First World War, before being amalgamated with 5th Dragoon Guards to form 5th/6th Dragoons in 1922.
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The 8th King's Royal Irish Hussars was a cavalry regiment in the British Army, first raised in 1693. It saw service for three centuries including the First and Second World Wars. The regiment survived the immediate post-war reduction in forces, and went on to distinguish itself in the battles of the Korean War, but was recommended for amalgamation in the 1957 Defence White Paper prepared by Duncan Sandys. The regiment was amalgamated with the 4th Queen's Own Hussars, to form the Queen's Royal Irish Hussars in 1958.
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