The last pitched battle of the rebellion of 1798
On the morning of 5 July 1798 the Rebels fought the Army (under James Duff) for two hours at the Battle of Ballygullen (near Craanford), where a large number of Rebels were killed and wounded. This was the last pitched battle of the rebellion in Wexford as the surviving active rebels sought to spread the rebellion by marching towards Ulster and Munster until their defeat on 14 July. Some groups stayed in Wexford carrying on guerrilla warfare with the last faction, led by James Corcoran, surviving until their eventual destruction in February 1804. Others, like Miles Byrne fought on in a different way. After Emmet’s failed Rebellion of 1803, in which Byrne was involved, he escaped to France. There he enlisted in the French Army and fought the British in this guise on many subsequent occasions.