Hello and welcome to the Irish History podcast. My name is Finn Dwyer.

Now June 5th, 1798 stands out as one of the most harrowing days, not only in the story of the 1798 rebellion, but Irish history more broadly.

It witnessed one of the bloodiest battles

of the revolt at the town of New Ross, but also a massacre at a place called School of Bogue,

which was an atrocity that had a profound legacy and remains controversial up to this day.

Now this is part eight of my series that explores the story of the 1798 Rebellion.

It is the second last episode in this series. We only have one more to go. To begin this part

of the story though, I want to take you to Dublin in early June, where forces loyal to the British

government unleashed a reign of terror against rebels after the revolt

in the capital failed. This is really important because it reveals how those in power

were actually living in fear even though they unleashed this reign of terror because history

in Ireland was reaching a crossroads. This will prepare us then to travel south to Wexford.

Now there we'll need to backtrack a little. At the end of the last episode in the series,

we heard how the Wexford rebels realized they were for the time being, fighting alone after the rebellion elsewhere had failed.

I want to look at how that news reached Wexford and how the rebels reacted because it has such

a profound impact on the whole trajectory of the entire rebellion. Then we'll be ready for the bloody

struggle at New Ross. From there we'll follow the story to School of Bogue and an extremely

dark chapter in this history. And finally to close out the episode, we have to travel north

to Belfast. Because while the city had remained at peace in the opening week or so of the

rebellion, everyone knew this couldn't last. The northeast was, after all, the heartland of the

revolutionary movement. We've a lot to get through, but it's a great story.

Now, I have made a map that shows some of the places mentioned in this episode.

...