Maolmhuire/ Sir Myles Mac Sweeney, Chief of Doe, had been arrested and was being transported to Dublin for trial on a charge of treason when he jumped from the ship and swam across the Foyle to rejoin the forces of Red Hugh O'Donnell. To the great embarrassment of his jailers Myles had upheld his reputation - 'that you would not find in the waters of any river in Ireland an eel as slippery as Sir Myles Mac Sweeney Doe'.

A private ceremony to mark Myles' escape was held on the River Foyle earlier that week when Tom Sweeney (cf. "The current Mac Sweeney Doe" on this web site) the senior member of the tenth generation descended from Maolmhuire/ Sir Myles went by boat to the place where Myles jumped from the ship. Tom swam the escape route and placed on the riverbed a plaque bearing Mac Sweeney arms. The stone on which the arms were carved, was obtained from the site of a house that stood in Derryveigh (Co. Donegal) prior to the notorious evictions of 1861 and which had been the home of Eamon Rua Mac Sweeney Head of the House of Doe (1834 -c1855) and father of the celebrated 19th century piper Tarlagh Mac Sweeney - an Píobaire Mór. In Sept. 1835, the distinguished scholar Dr. John O'Donovan met Eamon Rua Mac Sweeney in Donegal and recorded his lineage and verified that he was the lineal legitimate descendant of Maolmhuire/ Sir Myles Mac Sweeney Doe - and heir of Doe and Fanad.

Maolmhuire/ Myles was inaugurated Chief of Doe in the spring of 1596. Three years later, in 1599, Red Hugh O'Donnell and Myles disagreed and it is alleged that O'Donnell hanged sixteen of Myles' men. Soon afterwards, Myles joined the English accusing Red Hugh of making advances towards his wife. The English accepted his story and were well pleased to have a powerful warrior in their ranks. Soon afterwards, Myles was knighted, by the Earl of Essex, for bravery in battle, and awarded a handsome pension of six shillings a day by the usually parsimonious Queen Elizabeth I. However, Myles preferred to serve Red Hugh O'Donnell and two centuries after his death we find Dr. John O'Donovan travelling through Donegal and enquiring in his Survey Letters 'what finally happened Sir Malmurry Macswinnedó, whom the Queene gave six shillings a day pension unto for his bravery and pretended fidelity to the English cause'.

Myles' pretended fidelity to the English cause was evident early in 1600. A letter dated November 11, 1599 that Myles addressed to Sir Robert Cecil, the Lord Lieutenant bears Myles' signature. Some months later, the English authorities requested Myles to surrender his lands in Donegal under the surrender and regrant system. However, Myles seems to have forgotten that he could write because he placed an X on the document instead of his signature. Interestingly, the document in question is dated April 1, 1600.

The English had a run of bad luck while Myles was with them. In August 1599, the Lord President of Connaught, Sir Conyers Clifford, accepted his advice and attempted to force a pass on the Curlew mountains, with weary troops, and was defeated by the forces of Red Hugh O Donnell. Clifford was slain and English officers who survived the battle reported that they lost 'because they had been badly advised'. In May 1600, Myles arrived in Lough Foyle with an English invasion fleet under the command of Sir Henry Dowcra. Myles and his company of English soldiers were sent with a detachment of troops to attack O Doherty at the Grianán of Alleach. Dowcra tells us the detachment advanced further than planned because they were `drawn on' when Myles's company continued to advance. Red Hugh O'Donnell ambushed the detachment and Dowcra had to commit most of his army to rescue them and suffered losses.

Before 'Breake of Day' on July 29,1600, when most of the English garrison in Derry were asleep, Myles ordered his company to drive the English cavalry horses towards a valley where Red Hugh O'Donnell 'with 600 Foote and 60 horse' lay in ambush. O'Donnell, in collusion, swooped and, according to John O'Donovan, made off with one hundred and sixty of Dowcra's two hundred horses, and not sixty as reported. Dowcra led an attempt to retrieve the horses and a skirmish ensued and Dowcra was rendered unconscious from a head wound inflicted by Hugh, son of Hugh Dubh O'Donnell, of Ramelton. Dowcra's wound confined him to bed for two weeks and to his quarters for another week. When he recovered he arrested Myles' manservant who confessed that he had been carrying messages between Myles and Red Hugh. Accordingly, Myles was arrested and placed aboard a ship for transportation to Dublin for trial and for what appeared to be a certain hanging.

A letter written by Cecil (Lord Lieutenant) to Sir George Carew (President of Munster) indicates the fate that awaited Myles in Dublin. Cecil (in ignorance of Myles' escape) wrote that 'MacSwyne ne Doe a principal actor' in the theft of horses at Derry had been arrested and was being sent to Dublin, 'where', Cecil added, 'I trust a halter will save her Majesty's pension'. However, Myles had other ideas and when the opportunity arose he jumped into the Foyle 'they in the ship being so amazed with the suddenness of the fact, and doing nothing that took effect to prevent it.'

Historians warn us not to rely completely on English accounts of the conquest of Ireland, because, the English being the victors had the privilege of writing their version of events. Dowcra gives us two written versions of Myles' escape. Here is a portion of the report Dowcra sent to his superiors immediately after Myles' dramatic escape:

. 'My letters being sealed up and delivered to the messenger that stayed but for a tide to be gone, Captain Fleming's men, into whose ship I committed McSwyne Ne Doe, with special charge of safe looking after him, bring me word of his escape. The manner of it was thus. He kept his bed of a disease, which the surgeon of the army testifieth he was troubled withal indeed, and having the repair (i.e., visit, resort) of a lewd woman whom he kept (notwithstanding I had expressly forbidden her coming unto him), got knowledge when the boat was gone about other business and suddenly rose naked from his bed, the woman opening the cabin door at the very instant, and so leaped first into the waist of the ship, above the hatches, and then presently into the river. One shot with a great piece was only made after him, and the alarm given of his departure; but all in vain, for in sight of most of our men he recovered the shore on O'Cahan's side, and so away, before any man or boat we sent after could overtake him. The loss, more than the miss of due punishing a traitor, I think not great ...... I made choice of the ship to keep him in, rather than on land, because I thought it a place of far more security, and had long ere this dispatched him away to my Lord Deputy, with such accusations and evidence as I had gathered against him, but that the tempestuousness and contrariety of the winds hindered all shipping even to this day......'

......"Then did I also manifestly discover the Treachery of the said Moyle Morrogh Mac Swynedo" (Myles Mac Sweeney Doe) having intercepted the Messenger that he employed to O'Donnell in all his Business, out of whose mouth I got a full Confession of all his Practices and especially, that it was he that caused his men of purpose to drive forth our horses, I delivered him to Captain Fleming, who was then going to Dublin, to carry him to my lord Deputy, where to receive his trial, who putting him under hatches in his ship, and himself coming to shore with his Boat, the hatch being opened to set Beere, he (Myles) stepped up upon the Deck, and threw himself into the River, and so swam away....'

Family tradition holds that a horse was tethered and waiting for Myles on O Catháin's side (the east side) of the Foyle. Myles, naked, leaped onto the horse and galloped away treating Dowcra's soldiers watching the chase to the further indignity of watching the horse's rear end and Myles' rear end disappearing into the distance!

A few days after Myles' escape he led an assault on a weak point in Dowcra's defences and soon afterwards was appointed joint-commander of Red Hugh O Donnell's forces at Derry. A number of official records confirm that Myles was the only Mac Sweeney Chief from Tírconnell to accompany Red Hugh O Donnell to the battle of Kinsale, Dec. 24, 1601. State papers, dated November 1601, record that Donnchadh Mac Sweeney, Chief of Banagh surrendered to Niall Garbh and the English in mid-November, six weeks before the battle of Kinsale. Therefore, Donnchadh did not go to Kinsale with Red Hugh. Mac Sweeney Fanad did not go to Kinsale either. At the beginning of the New Year 1602, a week before any northern leader returned from Kinsale, Sir Henry Dowcra reported to the privy council that "he took in M'Swyne Fanaght" and others. Accordingly, Domhnall, Chief of Fanad, did not march south with Red Hugh. The Tírconnell Mac Sweeneys commanded by Maolmhuire/ Sir Myles Mac Sweeney fought as rearguard during O Donnell's retreat from Kinsale and, true to the galloglass tradition that "they were either victorious or died where they stood", many never returned.

Maolmhuire/ Sir Myles Mac Sweeney surrendered to the English in 1603 and received a pardon later that year. However, in 1608 he was arraigned for treason but managed to escape the charge. In 1615, he and his eldest son, Donnchadh Mór, were in trouble again when the English discovered documents implicating them in a plot to rescue Con O Neill (fifteen years old son of the Great Hugh O Neill, Earl of Tyrone) from Dungannon Jail. Seven years old Con had been left behind when his father and Rory O Donnell, Earl of Tírconnell, fled to the continent, 1607. Maolmhuire/ Sir Myles Mac Sweeney died soon after 1630 and his lands were confiscated.