John and Bernard MacSheehy

An Irish Legion standard bearer

The MacSheehys of Killarney had a long association with France. the most eminent member of the clan was probably Bernard (or Brian) MacSheehy (Dublin, 1774-Eylau, 1807). His grandfather, who had the same name, was born in Killarney of a renowned military family in the first decade of the 18th century and fought for the French as a captain in the FitzJames cavalry regiment of the Irish Brigade . One of his four sons - also called Bernard - was the father of the Bernard (or Brian) that interests us.

Bernard MacSheehy was an ardent revolutionary. He, like his uncle (see below) was actually arrested and interned as a British subject in 1793 while he was a 19-year-old student at the Collège des Irlandais. However, he was released when he requested French citizenship and offered to join the revolutionary army. MacSheehy then denounced the clerical heads of at the Collège des Irlandais as "counter-revolutionaries". In the college, according to MacSheehy, refractory bishops and priests, "followed by a huge crowd of fanatics, celebrated baptisms, confirmations, secret marriages and ordinations and launched tirades against the principles of revolution."

In 1796, he was sent to Ireland to report on conditions in the country prior to the disastrous French expedition that landed in Bantry Bay the same year. After returning, he was appointed adjutant to Wolfe Tone, who described him as a "sad blockhead". In 1798, he accompanied Napoleon on his Egyptian expedition before becoming adjutant-general of the Irish Legion, stationed in Brest, in 1803 ahead of a planned invasion of Ireland. However, as a result of his role in a fatal duel between two officers (Sweeny and Corbet) MacSheehy was kicked out of the Irish Legion and became a colonel and aide-de-camp of Napoleon, beside whom he was killed by a cannon ball at the battle of Eylau in February 1807 (a battle fought and won by the French in thick snow).

Irish Regiment standard bearer

Miles Byrne, who had also joined the Irish Legion in Brittany, had little time for MacSheehy. “Unfortunately for the Irish officers,” he writes, “he proved himself quite unfit to remain at their head. He was capricious, passionate and vindictive; consequently, not impartial as a chief should be…he used, or abused, the confidence with which the War Ministry entrusted him…They [a Commandant Blackwell was also sent packing]were not soon forgotten by their countrymen, who had to remain in the Legion to suffer from having had chiefs so incapable of commanding respect for themselves.”

Before being forced out, MacSheehy even found a position in the Legion for his nephew, Patt MacSheehy, who became a "captain". But, says Miles Byrne, he became involved in a separate dispute with the mayor’s son in the town in which the Legion was stationed, and subsequently “found unfit to command and retired.” After the collapse of invasion plans, the Irish Legion formed the backbone of the 3rd Foreign Regiment (Irish). It wore green uniforms (see photo) and at one stage comprised five battalions. Its officers were mostly exiled United Irishmen and former officers of the French royalist army. The regiment was disbanded in 1815 after the fall of Napoleon - but not before its 1st Batallion had distinguished itself during the defence of Walcheren and Flushing (1809) under William Lawless.

John MacSheehy (Killarney, 1745-Paris, 1815) was Bernard MacSheehy's uncle and son of the original Bernard (or Brian) MacSheehy. Having studied medicine in Paris, he rose to become premier médecin to Louis XVI, a conseiller du roi and a chevalier de l'ordre du roi (St. Michel). (Fellow Irishman, John O’Reilly, was also one of Louis XVI’s doctors, while one Owen O’Shiel was for a long time one of Louis XIV’s favourite physicians). In 1782, John MacSheehy married a French woman who bore him two sons, Patrice Maurice MacSheehy - who served as an officer in the French navy and was killed at the battle of Trafalgar in 1805 - and Jean Bernard Louis MacSheehy - who, like his cousin, fought at the battle of Eylau. Although wounded, Jean-Bernard survived the battle and went on to fight for Napoleon in Austria and Spain. In all, he went through 12 campaigns, was wounded six times and was showered with the highest military medals. He retired from the army in 1834 with the rank of lieutenant-colonel.

Probably because of his links to the deposed king, John MacSheehy (père) was subjected to a dawn raid on November 8, 1793 as part of a general clampdown on foreigners. Actually, he had been denounced by his nephew, the “insufferable coxcomb” (another Wolfe Tone comment) Bernard MacSheehy! Described in the police documents held at the Archives Nationales as “un natif de Query en Irlande”, John MacSheehy was living at the time at 763 rue d'Enfer (address no longer exists). Despite MacSheehy's claims that he was to all intents and purposes a Frenchman (having lived in France for 29 years), all his letters and papers were sealed. Later that same day, MacSheehy seems to have got drunk (“il nous a paru avoir imbibé du vin, ce qui le met hors de raison”, says the police report) and kicked up ructions over custody of his papers. Finally, unable to deal with a drunken Irishman in full flight, the police ended up handing the sealed documents back to MacSheehy, making him sign an oath that he would not break the seal before releasing him.