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A great deal of lore surrounds this Redmond O’Hanlon, and many accounts of him have been written. He led a band of about fifty outlaws, and their activities were arranged by him with great precision and discipline. Their principal source of income was a ‘black rent’ or protection money which allowed safe passage to merchants, settlers, and other well-to-do people. Redmond enjoyed a reputation of scrupulous ‘honesty’ in adhering to the terms of such arrangements, and in the popular mind his role was seen as that of the noble bandit. He proclaimed himself ‘Chief Ranger of the Mountains, Surveyor-General of the High Roads, Lord-Examiner of all Travellers, and High Protector of his Benefactors and Contributors’. Repeated attempts to capture him and to offset his effectiveness proved a failure, and his reputation became so great that he was referred to in French newspapers as a Count.

The extent to which he had become a folk hero is clear from a chapbook written in the eighteenth century by John Cosgrave (Lives and Actons of the Most Notorious Irish Highwaymen, Tories and Raparees (9th Edn., Belfast 1776). [Ftn.] Reference is here made to the belief that Redmond’s mother had special dreams before his birth, and that he had a mark in the shape of ‘T’ on his breast when he was born. He was unusual in other ways also. Great play is made of his mastery of tricks and ruses:

He understood the art of dissimulation, or disguising himself, as well as any man - sometimes appearing like an officer, sometimes like a country gentleman, sometimes like a footman, and could alter the tone of his voice at pleasure, so that the soldiers seldom knew him though he often gave them money to drink.

The chapbook goes on to describe how, disguised as an officer, he once took on himself the direction of a party of soldiers sent out to arrest Redmond O’Hanlon; and how on another occasion he dressed himself as a country gentleman and was given a guard of soldiers to protect him from Redmond O’Hanlon! This latter account continues:

He and the men passed on very jocosely for about seven miles until, thinking himself safe enough, he told them he was out of danger and they might go back. Upon this he gave every man a piece of money and desired them to [182] make a discharge for joy on his safe passage, which they did. Then he desired them to charge and do the like again, until at length they told him their ammunition was spent. This was what he expected and, giving a whistle, a parcel of his gang sprang out of the thicket - who stripped the soldiers of their arms, money, accoutrements, and clothes. In which shameful condition they were obliged to go back to their quarters.

Another writer has expressed this image of Redmond in more precise terms:

If ever a mere mortal was possessed of the gift of ubiquity, Redmond O’Hanlon was - without any manner of question the man. He was everywhere, in fact, for those whom he looked for, and nowhere for those who looked for him. That was the most curious thing about Redmond - there was plenty of him where he could be spared, and the is greatest possible scarcity where he was wanted.

Such, of course, are the qualities of the successful outlaw - cleverness, mobility, and studied unpredictability. (On magic and invisibility, E. J. Hosbaum, Bandits , 1972, 51-52.) Others of his peers had these qualities in good measure, but Redmond is portrayed as the very personification of these subtleties. Having been taken by the soldiers once, he contrived to make them all drunk with whiskey and completed his triumph by tying them all up neck and heels and taking their weapons. According to this eighteenth-century account, Richard Power, ‘the greatest robber in Munster’, once travelled north ‘purely for the sake of seeing Redmond O’Hanlon, of whom he had heard abundance of fine stories’. The sequel is a dramatic encounter set in a time-honoured heroic situation - the two great men meet and contend without recognising each other:

When Power came near the place of Redmond’s abode he put up at an inn, but for some private reasons made no inquiry for that night. Observing a gentleman telling over a good sum of money, he took care to be informed which road he intended to take in the morning. Upon which he pursued him and overtook him at the side of a little wood. At coming up he demanded the gentleman’s money without [183] any more ado. The other told him he had money sure enough, but swore that whoever took it should fight for it. Upon which each of them discharged a pistol, without any damage; and then drew their swords, without much harm or advantage on either side. At length, looking on one another, they forebore a while, and agreed to alight and decide the quarrel on foot. Having alighted, the victory was contended for with equal bravery and loss of blood on both sides, until they were able to fight no longer.
 Sitting down to rest, the two fell into conversation and soon found out who each in fact was. Power accepted Redmond’s invitation to dine with him in the north but, ‘not relishing so much bannocks and oatmeal as he usually got in this place, he returned to his own country and surveyed only the Munster roads afterwards’. Later, however, Power was languishing in Clonmel jail, having been sentenced to death, and when Redmond heard this he decided on a daring raid to rescue his friend.
 Travelling south, he found means of communicating with Power, and they arranged that the rescue would be attempted when Power would be brought to the directed place of execution. This was some distance from Clonmel, and the four soldiers who were guarding the prisoner stopped at a tavern on the roadside for a drink. They were not long there when a strange gentleman entered and struck up a conversation with them. This stranger, who was a friendly fellow, plied the soldiers with wine and liquor in great plenty. At length, when they had been made sufficiently vague, a group of Redmond’s men entered, overcame the guard and freed the prisoner. When they had gone clean away, the strange gentleman (none other, of course, than Redmond in disguise) raised the hue and cry, and even ‘assisted’ the recovered soldiers in the hunt. He found little difficulty in becoming separated from them in the mountains, however, and soon rejoined his men and Power near the Bog of Allen.

Great though Redmond’s subtlety was, it is said that he was outwitted on one occasion, and this by a rather stupid-looking boy. This is a perennial theme in the lore of many heroes, and there is every indication that the account of how it happened to Redmond is unhistorical. The story parallels [184] ones told, for instance, of the great Scottish outlaw Rob Roy MacGregor, and the motif is found regarding robbery in late in mediaeval literature on the Continent. Our first instance of how Redmond was overcome by the boy is found in the eighteenth-century chapbook, and is clearly based on existing folklore at the time. Many versions of it have been collected from popular tradition in this century also, and it goes as follows:

A merchant in Dundalk was owed a large sum of money from one of his customers in Newry, but he could find nobody who was willing to collect it for fear of Redmond O’Hanlon, who was bound to waylay the bearer on the road. A certain youngster with a reputation for dullness and laziness overheard the Dundalk merchant lamenting his lot, and he offered to do the job if given a useless old horse for the road. This request was readily granted by the despairing merchant, and the boy set out.

On a lonely part of the road, he was accosted by Redmond, who enquired what his business was. The boy told him, and Redmond replied that he would meet him at the same spot on his return. Going on to Newry, he collected the money and set out back towards Dundalk. True to his word, Redmond appeared before him on the road and demanded that the money be handed over.
 ‘Well,’ said the youngster, ‘I never handed money into a man’s hand in my life, nor am I going to do it now!’ So he flung his bag of money away into the wood.
 Redmond jumped down off his horse to recover the bag. Once he was out of sight, the boy got off his own horse and mounted the outlaw’s fine charger. He rode off quickly to Dundalk, with the money safely hidden in his waistcoat. So Redmond was left with nothing for his troubles but a few coppers in the bag and the useless old nag which the roguish youngster had been riding.

Ftn. cites Cosgrave, Lives and Actions [... &c.] (1776); Dublin University Magazine, 1 (1847), p.43; and Michael J. Murphy, Now You're Talking (Belfast 1975), pp.55-57.