The term “Wild Geese” refers to the
young men of Ireland forced to leave their beloved homeland for service in the
armies of Europe and America. They are all the Irish men and women who have
left Ireland for the freedom they could not achieve at home.
The first flight of the Wild Geese took
place after the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. The Irish, under the command of
Patrick Sarsfield, supported King James II, the Catholic King of England, in
his fight against William of Orange. Upon losing their stronghold at Limerick
in 1691, the Irish forces surrendered. According to the rules of warfare of the
time, the victorious William gave Sarsfield a choice: return to his lands in
Ulster and swear allegiance to Parliament and the new king, or take his army
and leave Ireland forever. Sarsfield departed Ireland with 10,000 soldiers for
service in France, and thus, the first flight of the Wild Geese had begun.
A second flight of the Wild Geese, as
Shane and his friends from Deceptive Hearts see it, took place in the mid-19th Century,
when An Gorta Mor (the Great Hunger)
and the tyranny of the landlords drove the starving masses away from their
beloved emerald shores, scattering the Irish to the four winds.
The Wild Geese Series is dedicated to
those brave adventurers who sought a better life in the New World.
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