THE POPE'S IRISH BRIGADE.

Wellington Independent, Volume XVI, Issue 1490, 22 January 1861, Page 4

THE POPE'S IRISH BRIGADE.

The following letter is from an officer in the Pope's Irish Brigade :«— " Rboanlti, Sept. 22. — My dear Sir, I wrote to you a week ago (the letter was not received) bidding you adieu for ever, and a few hours afterwards we marched oS to meet the enemy, preoeded by Gen. do Lamorioiere. We were of the brave Pimodan's division. The battle commenced furiously,. and would have been more severe but for the oowardioe of an Italian regiment, who passed over to the euomy, and by whose hands it is generally belied Geueral Pimodan fell mortally wounded;. the Swiss ran away, and left me alone with 30 men to fight against a

whole regiment of Sardinians. What could I do but retreat ?— which I effected by getting into Loretto. After 24 hours waiting iv expectation of assistance, I was i oompelled to capitulate, and surrendered as prisoners of war. The Sardinians received me and my gallant comrades with military respect, suoh as dipping their colours, &c. When the fight commenced we were only 5000 strong ; there were against us 32,000 men, with ten batteries of English rifled oannon. The brave Jharaorioiere was forced to dash through the enemy amid a shower of shell and grape, and suoceeded in getting into Anoona. The gajrison of Spoleto contained only 300 men, and my gallant countrymen held out as long as it was | possible, and inflicted severe punishment on the enemy. lam told that 600 Sardinians fell, besides several officers. Be so good as to write to my father at Bologna, and tell him I am to march immediately with my men to Genoa, aud thenoe to prooeed to France.

The correspondent of the Morning News sends home a long account of the fall of Spoleto, and of the deeds of the Irish Brigade previous to the capitulation. In ■ the course of a highly- coloured narrative the writer says :— " Thef's cannot have been much more than 700 or 800 men, if so many, in Spoleto, while the attacking force was at least 15,000 or 20,000 men, A counoil was held, and, of oourse instantaneous surrender was proposed by some as the most military course in the faoe of such odds. O'Reilly, at least, for the Irish in the garrison (two companies, 260 men), utterly declined to be a party to any such proceedings ; and deolared that a man who would take upon himself to even announce such a step to his men would run the peril of his life. The council was violently distracted on the point of capitulation or no capulation, but ultimately an express was sent off to Rome, to the Minister of war, announcing that it was resolved to defend the town as best they could, and that, come what might, the Irish companies were resolved to hold the citadel till the courier returned, or blow it into fragments. In the morning the Irish at dawn went to mass, and I believe every individual man among them approaohed the Holy Communion ! In an hour or two afterwards they were called upon to meet the foe ! The Sardinians poured in through two of the chief streets, attempting at first nothing of a cannonade, and evidently confident of carrying the place against such a mere handful of men at the bayonet's p >int. They reckoned rashly ; for hours they were held at bay. Little, of course, could be done in the streets by suoh a small body against 10,000 or 12,000 men, and at last pressed on every, point, O'Reilly threw himself into the citadel to make a last stand for life or death. They threw themselves upon the walls, and from the tattered loopholes rained ' the leaden hail* with deadly effect upon the besiegers. But those old walls proved miserable defences, and the enemy, after a brief but deadly struggle of this kind, soon dashed at the old gate. A crush, a roar, and a petard blows it into fragments. Then the struggle commenced indeed. It poured the besiegers into the outer yard, which I should mention does not belong at all to the oitadol proper. However, a bloody reception met them there. The Irish had two guns loaded with grape, planted inside in a position co nmanding the entrance, and uo sooner was the Piedraontese column seen through the smoke of the gateway than a murderous fire was opened, mowing them down litterally like corn before the sickle. Again, again, again the besiegers dashed thiough the gate; again, again, and again a perfect hail of grapeshot from the two pieces in the yard, and musketry from the citadel walls behind, met them from the Irish inside ; while .shouts that would stir many a heart at home in Ireland, plainly told that the brave fellows. felt but too well the honour of Ireland was on the awful stake of the day. It was mid-day, and the outer yard was still unearned, and the oitadel itself behind untouohed. The Piedmontese brought up a pieoe or two themselves, and after the first discharge poured en masse through the gate. My informant asserts that of the heroic Irishmen who fought those guns inside not one man escaped. They were bayoneted at their posts 1 This, however, was but the outer yard, and the heavy price at which it had been carried suggested to the besiegers ; an easier and more certain way of dealing with the oitadel than risking another vain glorious effort at an assault or escalade. They drew off, and in an hour opened fire from their heavy artillery, planted on the small hills outside, at a distance at which the old metal in the fortress was utterly unable to even as much as reply. A message was sent by the Piedmontese commander offering them the honours of war if they surrendered. O'Reilly made his answer in the midst of his men, and amid shouts that one would hate thought proclaimed a victory, not the desperate resolve of meu rejecting their sole ohance of life. " Return," said O'Reilly, ' and. tell your commander that we are Irishmen, and that we hold this oitadel for God and the Pope. The Irish who serve the Pope are ready to die, but not to surrender ! " The white flag returned. The fire opened ouce more, while the Irish could do nothing but look hopelessly on, their pieces being of nothing like the same calibre. A second summons to surrender and the same unswer returned. By three o'clock there were five breaches effected, in fact the walls were in ruins. At this juncture the Papal delegate, with authority that left O'Reilly no resource but obedience,

'ordered him imperatively to capitulate. This time O'Reilly sent out the white^ flag-bearer. The Sardinians undertook to let the Irish march out with the honours of war — an undertaking, however, if made at all, not kept. How was this end of their bloody struggle received by the Irish ? With feelings of grief and distraction, whioh one simple incident illustrates curiously enough. As the Irish' oompanies were drawn up inside, and the Sardinians filiug in according to terras of capitulation, one of our countrymen, utterly unable to brook the sight, seized a large jar, bottle, or other vessel of some sort whioh chanced to be tying by, aud with one blow all but brained one of the Sardinians. It was the work of a moment, when the impetuous Celt, and one of his companions, who made a stroke in his defence, fell before a platoon, riddled with Sardinian bullets. O'Reilly and all the prisoners were marched off next day to Alessandria."