Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 49.djvu/302

  1884); Healy's Hist. of Kilkenny (Kilkenny, 1893); cf. arts. Rinuccini, Giovanni Battista, and Walsh, Peter.] 

ROTHE, MICHAEL (1661–1741), Irish general in the French service, born at Kilkenny on 29 Sept. 1661, was the second son of Edward Rothe (‘FitzPeter’), the great-grandson of John Rothe of Kilkenny, father of David Rothe [q. v.], bishop of Ossory, by Catherine (Archdekin). In 1686 the army in Ireland was remodelled and increased, and Michael Rothe received a commission as lieutenant in the king's royal Irish regiment of footguards, of which the Duke of Ormonde was colonel. At the revolution the regiment maintained its allegiance to James II, under the command of its lieutenant-colonel, William Dorrington (by whose name it afterwards became known), and Rothe was promoted captain in the command of the first or king's own company. By James's charter he was named an alderman of Kilkenny. He served with his regiment throughout the campaign of 1689–91, and fought at the battle of the Boyne (1 July 1690), where his kinsman, Thomas Rothe of the Irish lifeguards, lost his life. After the treaty of Limerick his regiment elected to enter the French service, and set sail for France in the autumn of 1691. For his adhesion to the Stuart cause, Rothe was attainted and his estate forfeited; his large brick mansion in Kilkenny was sold at Chichester House, Dublin, in 1703, and purchased for 45l. by Alderman Isaac Mukins (cf., Landed Gentry, p. 513; , Antiquities of Irish-town, p. 487; , Kilkenny). On their arrival in France the Irish regiments were mustered at Vannes in the south of Brittany, and were there reviewed by James II in January 1692. Rothe's regiment was incorporated with the Irish brigades in the service of France, and was stationed in Normandy as part of the army destined for the invasion of England. This design was frustrated by the English victory off Cape La Hogue; but in 1693 Rothe saw active service in Flanders under the Marshal de Luxembourg, taking part in the capture of Huy, the battle of Landen, where William III and the allies were defeated on 29 July 1693, and the taking of Charleroi in the following October. In 1694 he served with the army of Germany, and in 1695 with the army of the Moselle. After the peace of Ryswick, King James's regiment of footguards was formed, by an order dated 27 Feb. 1698, into the regiment of Dorrington, and Rothe was made its lieutenant-colonel by commission of 27 April. Promoted colonel in May 1701, he served during that year with the army of Germany under the Duke of Burgundy and Marshal de Catinat. In 1703 he joined the army of Villars in the Vosges, and took part in the capture of Kehl, the storming of Hornberg in the Black Forest, the combat of Munderkingen, and the first battle of Hochstadt, in which the French gained the day; he did not follow Villars in 1704 in his campaign against the Camisards, but served under his successor, Marshal Marsin, and shared in the rout of the French at Blenheim, where his regiment had the good fortune to escape being captured. Created brigadier, by brevet dated 18 April 1706, he was again attached to the army of the Rhine under Villars, and was present at the reduction of Drusenheim, of Lauterburgh, and of the Ile de Marquisat (Mém. de Maréchal Villars, ed. Vogüé, 1887, ii. 202, 213). In 1707, under the same general, he was at the carrying of the lines of Stolhoffen, the reduction of Etlingen, of Pfortzeim, of Winhing, of Schorndorf, at the defeat and capture of General Janus, the surrender of Suabsgemund, and the affair of Seckingen, while, by order of 31 Oct., he was employed during the winter in Alsace. He continued with the army of the Rhine under Berwick until June 1709, when he was transferred to Flanders and highly distinguished himself at the battle of Malplaquet. In the absence of Dorrington he commanded his regiment, which was engaged, in the centre, in the very hottest of the battle. When the left of the French army recoiled before the tremendous fire of the British right, Villars brought up the Irish brigade to its support. Rothe and Cautillon led a successful charge, crying ‘Forward, brave Irishmen! Long live King James III!’ Thirty officers of his regiment were killed. Appointed maréchal-de-camp or major-general by brevet of 29 March 1710, and being next in command to M. du Puy de Vauban in the remarkable defence of Bethune against the Duke of Marlborough, he so distinguished himself that Louis XIV, by brevet of 15 Dec., named him for the second commandership of the order of St. Louis that should become vacant (see, Hist. of the late War, 1713, p. 334). After serving another sixteen months in Flanders, he obtained this honour on 9 April 1712, and served during the following summer at the taking of Douay, Quesnoy, and Bouchain. In 1713 he took a prominent part under Villars in the reduction of Friburg and Landau by the army of the Rhine. Upon the death of Lieutenant-general Dorrington on 11 Dec. 1718, by commission dated the following day the command of the regiment was transferred to