In the pre-dawn darkness, patriot musket men were stationed parallel to the anticipated line of advance, concealed behind the rock outcrops and scrub while hundreds of pikemen waited out of sight.

As dawn broke, the British column walked unsuspectingly into the trap and suffered a close-range volley of musket fire followed by a massed pike charge into the line, giving the soldiers no chance of regrouping.

Unnerved by the annihilation of his support column and by the prospect of attack from United Irishmen armed with artillery, Fawcett ordered his men to retreat to Duncannon, thus abandoning his original mission to relieve Wexford.

Meanwhile, the commander of the British garrison at Wexford, General Maxwell, concerned by the non-arrival of the troops from Duncannon and by reports of fighting, led a force of cavalry in the direction of the Three Rocks to meet the expected reinforcements.

The garrison was well away before the United Irishmen forces entered the town, freeing prisoners such as Bagenal Harvey, setting up a Committee of Public Safety derived from the French model, and even organising a makeshift navy to protect the harbour.