An Irish Regiment in Carcassonne

Did you know that over 260 years ago, Caserne Laperrine, the large military barracks beside Les Jacobins and originally built from 1709 to 1735, was once host to a battalion of Irish soldiers, part of Dillon’s Regiment from 1763 to 1764? Amongst them were many famous officers in the regiment, including some of the extended Dillon family and James O’Moran, at the time a sous-lieutenant and eventually a general. Building on earlier research carried out by the late Pierre Costeplane, we provide additional evidence that points to the possible presence in Carcassonne of Theobald Dillon, later a general who was famously assassinated by his own soldiers at Lille in 1792.

What Was Dillon’s Regiment?

During a period of peace in France, Caserne Laperrine, then the Royal Barracks of Carcassonne, hosted a battalion from Dillon’s Regiment for 6½ months, from 16th September 1763 to 31st March 1764. A battalion is about 1000 soldiers, and this battalion is reported to have had 13 companies, including a company of grenadiers. So that would have been a lot of former Irish stationed in Carcassonne. But what was Dillon’s Regiment, and where did it get its name?

The Dillon line associated with this regiment stretches back to Irish Catholic gentry primarily from the Midlands (Westmeath) and the West (Roscommon, Galway), and before that to Sir Henry Dillon (Henri de Léon) of Brittany who came with the Normans to Ireland in 1185, as Prince (later King) John’s secretary. Dillon’s Regiment was established in 1688 in Ireland for the Jacobites by the 7th Viscount Dillon, Theobald Dillon (d. 1691), a great-grandson of the 1st Viscount Dillon (d. 1625; as an aside, his daughters Cecily and Eleanor co-founded the Irish Poor Clares with others in 1629). 

Theobald’s son Count Arthur Dillon (1670-1733) brought the regiment to France in 1690 as part of the Irish Brigade during the Williamite War, with his sons leading it from 1730 until 1747, but the brigade then remained without a Dillon as colonel proprietor for 20 years, including during its time at Carcassonne.

Do We Know Which of the Irish Were in Carcassonne?

Around the time of the brigade arriving from Montpellier to Carcassonne in 1763, the 1763 edition of Roussel’s Military State of France lists a Sheldon as Second Colonel/Brigadier (likely François-Raphaël Sheldon, son of Dominic Sheldon, and cousin to Arthur’s wife Christina Sheldon, a maid of honour to Queen Mary of Modena of England, Scotland and Ireland). In the 1764 edition of the same book, some very Irish names are listed as officers under then Colonel Commandant Sheldon: Lieutenant-Colonel Nihell (de Nihel, a variant of O’Neill), Major O’Connor, Aide-Major White (Captain), Sous­-Aide-Major MacDermott, and Treasurer MacKinay (this treasurer function was suppressed in 1764). In the 1765 edition, a promoted Lieutenant-Colonel O’Connor appears to have replaced Nihell in 1764 (also confirmed here), and his own place has been taken by a Major Bourke, which gives us six names who would have been present in Carcassonne. [O’Connor became colonel commandant in 1766.]

Coincidentally in 1763, the youngest son of Arthur Dillon, Arthur Richard Dillon, was appointed Archbishop of Narbonne (this archdiocese included the diocese of Carcassonne).

During this period, officers often visited the lodge of “Perfect Truth” (one of a number of lodges in Carcassonne) in the Freemason Orient of Carcassonne, and there are various records found by Pierre Costeplane in his excellent article The Irish in Carcassonne which lists at least 10 additional names of those Irish officers who frequented the lodge. Some of these names can also be found associated with Dillon’s Regiment in various editions of Roussel’s Military State of France, but also in the History of the 87th Line Infantry Regiment. In advance, it is useful to learn (as I did) that the three levels of Freemasonry are apprentice, companion, and master:

1. On 30th October 1763, Jacques Moran came as a prelude to many other officers and members of Dillon’s Regiment. This is likely the same Elphin-born James (Jacques) O’Moran, who grew up in Morin-la-Montagne, and had a long military career in the Americas and Europe, rising to general, but who was guillotined by the Revolutionary Tribunal in 1794.
2. The first of those others listed was an Edward Dillon, received as an apprentice on 6th November 1763. He is likely an elder brother of Theobald Dillon who visits later, and less likely to be their cousin le beau Dillon since he would have been just 13 (but who also had a three-years-older brother called Theobald!). This Edward Dillon was conferred as a master on 29th December. That was quick – what about companion level?! Unfortunately, we have no confirmed record of an Edward [Patrick Joseph Dillon Hussey] serving as of yet. Another Colonel Edward Dillon is mentioned fighting in Grenada in 1779, however we believe this to be “le beau” instead.
3. Next were officers O’Berin…
4. … and MacDermott (possibly the same listed by Roussel above), who were received as apprentices on 20th November and quickly became companions on 27th November. Also, on 1st January 1764, [Baron] O’Berin and MacDermott were made masters.
5. Henry O’Hagen was also received as an apprentice on 27th November, as a companion on 11th December, and a master on 1st January.
6. A certain Kelly, already initiated, visited with the also already-initiated Jacques Moran on 11th December.
7. Anselme [de] Nugent was received as an apprentice on 11th December, as a companion (and a member of the “Perfect Truth” lodge) on 27th December, and then as a master on 29th December; his name is mentioned in records here and here.
8. O’Connor visited on 27th December as well, and is said to be “venerable” which is what French masons sometimes use as a term for their masters. He is listed in lodge records as a lieutenant-colonel, but by Roussel in 1764 as a major. This discrepancy in rank is noted by Costeplane, but is explained by a promotion by 1764, also reflected in the 1765 edition of Roussel.
9. Another officer, Bernard Magennis or McGuinness, was received as an apprentice on 27th December, and as a companion on 1st January.
10. O’Brien from Berwick’s Regiment, already accepted as a mason in Dublin, also visited on 1st January and immediately became a master.
11. Next up is “cadet” (which as well as a rank can also be interpreted as younger brother in French) Theobald Dillon (probably a brother of the aforementioned Edward), who was received as an apprentice on 1st January, granted the rank of companion on request from Moran, and made a master on the same day! A banquet was held at the ‘daughter’ lodge “Perfect Harmony” in the Orient of Carcassonne in honour of [Theobald] Dillon, no doubt to benefit from the honour of having a member or members of the illustrious Dillon family in its ranks. We believe this is the future General Theobald Dillon (1745–1792), as he became a cadet in the regiment between 1760 and 1762, and he also had an elder brother named Edward. One minor complication here is that biographical records show him as having been promoted from cadet to sous-lieutenant in August 1763, although there may have been a delay in formalising this. Also, if we interpret cadet as being the term used for a second-born son, that links Theobald to Edward. An added element of confusion is that Costeplane conflates Theobald with distant cousin Charles Dillon (1745–1813), a grandson of Count Arthur Dillon born in the same year, describing him as the elder brother of future General Arthur Dillon (1750–1794), but that Arthur did not have a brother called Edward or Theobald.
12. Perhaps because of all of the above admissions, there was some local opposition to a proposal on 5th February to admit yet another officer from Dillon’s Regiment, Barthélemy Lynchagan. After quite some back and forth, including verbal support from his colleague McGuinness, it was accepted by a majority vote, with a later upgrade to companion carried out on 19th February. A proposal on 18th March to move him to masters level was postponed and not confirmed in writing before the regiment left Carcassonne at the end of the month.

Franco-Irish Military Connections by Genet-Rouffiac and Murphy (and in turn Irish Brigades Abroad by McGarry) references a 2003 lecture by Pierre Costeplane, saying that “officers who were masons could temporarily join local lodges”, and that “eighteen officers, including Theobald Dillon, [had] come ‘knocking as masons’ to the door of a respectable lodge known as ‘Saint Jean de la parfaite vérité’ in Carcassonne”.

Unfortunately for Carcassonne, Dillon’s Regiment left for Alais (Alès) at the end of March 1764, and no regiment immediately replaced them during what was a period of extreme turbulence for the city, when there were fever outbreaks, grain shortages in Italy and Spain, bread price rises, looting of wheat and corn, as well as other public threats and violence. The city’s councillors wrote to the military headquarters in Montpellier, seemingly to no avail, asking for “at least four companies from some regiment or another, to put us within reach of maintaining good order and public tranquillity”.

A later connection between the region and the (then-nationalised) 87th Regiment was in 1803 when the regiment is recorded as having received a large detachment of conscripts from Aude. We can perhaps imagine that many of these would have been from Carcassonne.