THE .KIDNAPPING OF RElD HUGH 1J1ad he ~ad the remotest chance, he sox1s acted as_agents between -Red _Hugh would :certainly have been the ring- and his friends ou_tside. After Hugh's leader? esc;ape. Fergus sent messages to him It is highly unlikely that with the by his servant,, O'Hanley, to whom wealth and influence of the Earl be- Hugh presented a horse :which O'Hanhind him, Hugh would have been al- ley gallantly christened "O'Donnell." loiwed to suffer the semi-starvation of Other visitors were, a devoted servant, the g,rate if there was a "better prison" who visited him disguised as a horsein "the upper rooms" to which ·a little boy; Edwa1rd Eustace, and Richard gold w0<uld have admittted him. Indeed, Weston, a .man of a speeial trust with if O'Cler1y is to be 1relied upon., he the Earl and his chief aiuditor. These Jeav-es no shadow of doubt that Hugh visitors must greatly have enlivened was somewhere upstairs_- at least l:n tr.-e bleakness of the prisone·r's life and 'the day-and .that the first escape doubtless they brought him comforts was made boldly from the main gate of in the shape of extra food and clothes. the Castle. After describing the fosse, It was Richard Weston 1who was portC'ullis, drawbridge and the guard e_ntrusted with the task of sm1Uggling on the 1gate, he tells_ us tpat Hugh and in to Hugh "certain silk called Sairsinet his companions pianned to slide dciwn to make him a line to slide down by." from one of the windows above "until Another <probable visitor was a gentlethey alighted on the bridge outside the man from Athboy called Henry Dowddoor of the castle." To effect an esc·a.pe all, <who occupied a key position in the at this point the :prisoners mrust there- seeond escape, though what exact part fore have been in one or other of the he 1played is unfortunately very obGa1te Towers, which iwe have akeady scure. It is curious that this name seen-were used as pifisons. O'Clery's should have been connected again account is clear and closely d·etailed; with Red Hugh, as another Dowdall__, he .may have had it from a pa.rticipant, Geo:rge,, a fisherman of the Bann and even frcm Red Hugh himself. a hawk-fancier-had been clapped After the failure of the first esica.pe, into the Castle "for his knavery in the Hugh was returned to the Castle Qnce taking of Re.d Hugh" Standish O'Grady more. It is possible he was iconsigned assumed that the pa.rt played by Dowthis time to either the Bermingham or dall (or Dudall) <was a villainous Qne, the Gunner's Tower, foT in the final but it is clear that his sympathies were e.scape 'We know that he had t,0 man- Irish and violently anti-English. oeuvre the Castle ditch~actually a According to Walter Reagh Fitzmill race beyond the south curtain and gerald, Henry Dowdall was responsible not,, techni:cally, the fosse at all. He for Hugh's final escape and it is very 1was still permitted to receive visitors tantalising that at present we know and a.m,ong these was Fergus O'Farrell, so little about him. High Sheriff of Longford, •and his O'Sullivan also describes the rope sons, who were friends of ",great ac- used in the escape as silk and says that quaintance and familiarity" and who it was very long. Sp·e·aking of Delvin's not only visited him fr.equently. but escape, Chichester described the Castle wrote to him as well. Fergus was a wall as being "of g1reat height"-Deldose friend of O'Rourke, also of the vin's rope 1was thirty yards long. The Baron of Delvin; one of hi:s sons was perilous character of these eseapes bea .friend of Feagh MacHugh O'Byrn·e. comes vividly apparent when we re· Delvin and O'Byrne were both involv- member that the silk sarsnet can only ed in the plans for the escape and it have been smuggled in length by is not unlikely that Fergus and his ·length and then spliced tcgether-not 461.
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