Irish Republic (1798)
The Irish Republic of 1798, more commonly known as the Republic of Connacht, was a short-lived state proclaimed during the Irish Rebellion of 1798 that resulted from the French Revolutionary Wars. A client state of the French Republic, it theoretically covered the whole island of Ireland, but its functional control was limited to only very small parts of the Province of Connacht. Opposing British forces were deployed across most of the country including the main towns such as Dublin, Belfast and Cork. Proclamation. At the time of the Rebellion of 1798 a force of 1,000 French  soldiers under General Jean Joseph Amable Humbert landed at Killala in County Mayo. General Humbert proclaimed the Irish Republic in his declaration to the people upon landing in Ireland on 22 August 1798: After the nascent Republic's victory at the Battle of Castlebar which took place on 27 August 1798, General Humbert, on 31 August 1798, issued the following decree, which "inter alia" appointed John Moore as the President of the Government of the Province of Connacht: The rebel republic was a client state of the French Republic and was very short lived. Nevertheless, among the things which President  Moore did have time to do was to issue ""paper money to a considerable extent...[i]n the name of the French Government"". Despite their general anti-clericalism and hosility to the Bourbon monarchy, the French Directory suggested to the United Irishmen in 1798 restoring the Jacobite Pretender, Henry Benedict Stuart, as Henry IX, King of the Irish. This was on account of General Humbert landing a force in County Mayo for the Irish Rebellion of 1798 and realising the local population were devoutly Catholic (a significant number of Irish priests supported the Rising and had met with Humbert, although Humbert 's Army had been veterans of the anti-clerical campaign in Italy). The French Directory hoped this option would allow the creation of a stable French client state in Ireland, however, Wolfe Tone, the Protestant republican leader, scoffed at the suggestion and it was quashed, with an Irish Republic proclaimed. Defeat. On 8 September 1798, just weeks after its proclamation, the progress of the new Republic was ended at the Battle of Ballinamuck. President Moore was captured by the British in Castlebar under Lieut.-Col. Crawford. He died while in custody the following year. General Humbert and his men were taken  by canal to Dublin and repatriated. The British army then slowly spread out into the rebel held Province of Connacht in a brutal campaign of killing and house burning which reached its climax on 23 September 1798 when Killala was stormed and retaken with much slaughter. Members of the Irish Republic such as George Blake were hunted down and hanged with many other suspected insurgents including Fr Andrew Conroy who led French and Irish forces to Castlebar through the bogs west of Lough Conn.