Anthony Perry

A measure of this success was evident by the fact that the brutal coercion campaign unleashed by the Government 1797–98 did not identify Wexford as a United Irish stronghold until barely a month before the eventual outbreak.

[citation needed] The arrival of the counter-insurgency campaign in Wexford, embodied by the dispatch of the North Cork Militia, ensured that high-profile radicals like Perry would be the first to be subjected to arrest and interrogation.

A bloody series of raids for arms and attacks on loyalist forces ensued across the northern half of the county countered by roaming bands of yeomen burning and killing indiscriminately.

The victory at Tuberneering shocked the military who withdrew as far as Wicklow town to regroup in safety and gave Perry his nickname the "screeching general" from his practice of screaming at the enemy when leading rebel attacks.

The march on Arklow was also a leisurely affair with Perry having to personally plead with his men to desist from delaying by countless pausing for hurrahs as they passed his house en route.

Perry and the surviving column then left Wexford and reached the Wicklow hills on 5 July, having fought off a pursuit led by General James Duff (who ordered the Gibbet Rath executions) at the battle of White Heaps/Ballygullen.

Some rebels took to the hills to fight on in a protracted guerrilla war; some returned to their homes; but the bulk set off on a march into the midlands to revive the rebellion under the effective leadership of Perry and Fr.

[citation needed] A desperate decision was taken to hook up with the rebels in Ulster and the surviving column of no more than 1,000 men was constantly harried by pursuing Government troops until forced to stand and fight on 14 July at Knightstown Bog some miles north of the River Boyne in Co Meath, where they were scattered and defeated.

[6] Some rebel units managed to reform and the decision was made to head back to Wexford but the surviving column was intercepted and met final defeat on the evening of the same day at Ballyboghill (County Dublin).