Battle of Rathangan

Rathangan in County Kildare became a small but brutal test of the 1798 rebellion when United Irishmen under Captain Doorley seized the town on 24 May and held it against Captain James Spencer’s yeomanry. On 28 May, Lieutenant-Colonel Stephen Mahon split the 7th Dragoon Guards, sending one squadron inside while the other waited outside, triggering a pitched battle that left three hundred rebels and twenty British soldiers dead. The town resisted royal power for four days, then paid a heavy price for that resistance.