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Battle of Knocknanuss
Part of the Irish Confederate Wars and Wars of the Three Kingdoms
The Rock of Cashel, sacked by English Parliamentarian troops before the battle of Knocknanauss
Date November 1647 Location Knocknanauss, Cork, southern Ireland Result English Parliamentarian Victory
Combatants
Irish Confederate Catholics Munster army and some Highland Scots	English Parliamentarians
Commanders
Viscount Taafe Alasdair MacColla	Murrough O'Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin
Strength
c6000	6-7000
Casualties
over 3000	1000

The Battle of Knocknanauss was fought in 1647, during the Irish Confederate Wars, part of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, between Confederate Ireland’s Munster army and an English Parliamentarian army under Inchiquinn. The battle resulted in a crushing defeat for the Irish Confederates. When combined with the battle of Dungans Hill, it led to the collapse of the Confederate Catholic cause and forced them to make a deal with the English Royalists.

In the summer of 1647, Murrough O’Brien, Earl Inchiquinn, commander of the English Parliamentarian forces in Cork, ravaged and burned the Confederate territory in Munster. This caused severe food shortages and earned Inchiquinn the Irish nickname, Murchadh na doiteann (Murrough the burner). In addition, Inchiquinn took the Rock of Cashel, which was garrisoned by Confederate troops but was also rich in emotive religious symbolism. In the sack of the castle, Inchiquinn's troops massacred the garrison and also all the Roman Catholic clergy they found there.

The Confederate’s Munster army was incapable of stopping Inchiquinn because of political infighting between officers who supported a deal with the English Royalists and those who rejected such a deal. Eventually, in reaction to the sack of Cashel and when near famine conditions were approaching as a result of Inchiquinn’s pillaging, the Confederate Supreme Council replaced Donagh MacCarthy, Viscount Muskerry, as commander of the Munster army with Viscount Taafe and ordered him to bring Inchiquinn to battle.

Taafe was an English Catholic and not an experienced soldier. Moreover, although he had an excellent contingent of veteran troops under Alasdair MacColla, most of his men were similarly inexperienced. Furthermore, the Irish troops were demoralised by the internal factionalism in their ranks and most of them had little loyalty to Taafe. Inchiquinn, on the other hand, had been commanding his force since 1642 and was well tried in battle. His troops were a mixture of well trained Parliamentarian soldiers shipped from England and British settlers who had been driven from their homes in the Irish Rebellion of 1641. The two armies met at Knocknanauss, near Mallow in County Cork in November 1647.

The battle that followed was essentially an uncoordinated rout of the Irish forces. Taafe positioned his men on either side of a hill, so that they could not see one another. The result was that one wing of the Confederate army had no idea of what the other wing was doing. MacColla’s men charged the Parliamentarians opposite them putting them to flight and killing a large number of them. Thinking the battle was over, they then took to looting the enemies baggage train. However, on the other wing, Inchiquinn’s cavalry had charged the raw Irish horsemen, causing them to run away. Despite Taafe’s desperate attempt to rally them, the Irish infantry followed suit, many of them being cut down by the pursuing roundheads. The pursuit continued for miles and not only resulted in heavy causalties among the Irish, but also in the loss of most of their equipment and supplies. MacColla and his men, surrendered when they realised what had happened but were subsequently killed by their captors. Around 3000 Confederates died at Knocknanauss, and up to 1000 English Parliamentarians.

• Irish Confederate Wars
• Confederate Ireland
• Irish battles