For his role in the Battle of Antrim, boy (16) was hanged in front of his distraught mother

REVENGE can be an ugly thing.

It can be a fine, blood-red line between justice and retribution.

The language speaks for itself. Rebellions are seldom suppressed - they are crushed.

Examples have to be made. The violent consequences of rising up must be clear: take up arms and heads will roll.

And that’s precisely what happened in the aftermath of the Battle of Antrim in 1798.

Dozens of the perceived ringleaders were hanged, then beheaded - their heads put on spikes to stand as a grisly warning to others.

In Ballymena, the townsfolk were not impressed by this final indignity, but when they were threatened by a £500 fine a volunteer stepped forward to hack at the dead. Rough justice indeed.

Leaders of the United Irishmen knew that they could expect no less, if their uprising failed.

But justice was not applied discriminately. Not all the people executed were leaders of men.

This is the story of a boy called William.

There is some dispute about his surname, with some opting for Nelson and others Neilson. Mary Ann McCracken, sister of Henry Joy who was hanged for leading the attack on Antrim, knew Willie’s mother and she went with Neilson, so we’ll go with that.

The 16-year-old lived in Ballycarry, midway between Carrrick and Larne, with his mother and his older brothers, Samuel and John.

Rebellion was in the air in 1798, and the Neilson boys were ready to rise. It was not a matter of if, but when.

When news filtered through that magistrates had been summoned to a meeting at Antrim Courthouse on June 7, the date was set.

Samuel and John rallied the local United Irishmen, ordering them to make ready to march on Donegore Hill before the final attack.

Desperate for weapons, they raided the local inn looking for arms - but Willie was sent on a mission of his own.

He was tasked with taking a message to the insurgents at Islandmagee, imploring them to make for Donegore too.

Time was of the essence so he ‘borrowed’ a horse belonging to loathed landlord Richard Kerr.

He knew Willie. After all, the boy’s family lived in one of his run down properties.

Mission complete, he joined his brothers and the ever-growing ranks gathering on the outskirts of Antrim.

They had fire in their bellies, but they were no match for the troops of the crown and many were doomed to die on Antrim’s streets that day. Many would join them in an early grave in the days to come.

The crackdown was swift and cruel.

Neilson was back in Ballycarry playing marbles with his friends in the village’s main street when he was arrested.

Initially, the family were not unduly concerned. After all, his role had been peripheral. The horse had been returned safe and well.

And, of course, there was the small matter of his ‘extreme youth’.

He was placed in the same cell as his elder brother John, and was said to be in good spirits.

Then the mood darkened. At midnight an order came through that he was to be removed and taken to another prison.

He was torn from the arms of his brother and hurried to the new jail, where Samuel, was confined.

Willie was offered a pardon, on condition of giving information against the leaders at Antrim.

When he rejected the proposal, ‘strenuous efforts’ were made to induce him to change his mind - to no avail.

He requested that his own minister should be brought to him, and the Rev. Mr. Bankhead was duly summoned.

In the morning he implored to see his brother Sam, and that wish was also complied with.

He encouraged the lad to hold his nerve and tell the authorities nothing. It was to be a fateful decision.

Then patience finally ran out. The boy would hang - and they would do it in the most brutal fashion.

He was bundled onto a cart and driven back to Ballycarry in chains, sitting upon the very coffin he would be placed in.

Within a mile of the village he was met by his mother, who was on her way to visit her imprisoned family.

The soldier attempted to keep her back, but her boy caught her hand, exclaiming ‘Oh, my mother’ before she was dragged away.

The grim procession continued on into Ballycarry to the Neilson homestead. They were going to hang him from a tree outside his home.

Willie begged for them to reconsider for the sake of his mother and they agreed to carry out the dreadful sentence a short distance away.

But his mother and two younger sisters would not let him face his fate alone.

As he took his last few steps, his mother said he breathed his last with dignity.

She later said she was struck by how handsome he had become, ‘fair and blooming with light hair and, with his open shirt neck, looking even younger than he was’.

“His presence of mind never forsook him. He made a last effort on behalf of his brothers, begging that his death might expatiate their offences,“ she said.

He also requested that his body be given to her.

As the noose was lowered, an attempt was made to cover Willie’s face, but he refused. Defiant to the end, he said he had ‘done nothing to be ashamed of’.

And with that he was gone.

Mrs Neilson was given his earthly remains, but her ordeal was not over yet.

Soldiers surrounded the house that night and forbade any callers, to prevent a wake. They also followed to the graveyard, to ensure the family received no comfort in their darkest our.

In the days that followed, Kerr the landlord evicted them from their home.

But what of the other Neilson boys?

Samuel was banished for life, but died in 1799 on the ship taking him to exile.

John, who had been among the leaders at Donegore, was banished for seven years but he managed to escape and fled to America.

Before the uprising he had been apprenticed to a prominent Belfast architect, James Hunter - and he was a talented craftsman.

And he put those skills to surprising use in the new world.

In 1804 he was naturalised in Philadelphia, and was soon taken on by President Thomas Jefferson as an architect and builder.

He lived and worked at Jefferson’s large estate, Monticello, near Charlottesville, Virginia, from 1804 to 1808, and then at President James Madison's nearby estate, Montpelier, in 1809–10.

His most important architectural work, perhaps, was done at Upper Bremo estate from 1817 to 1820.

During the same period of his life John served to interpret Jefferson's plans for the construction of the new University of Virginia; his efforts are particularly noteworthy in the rotunda, pavilion IX, and pavilion X on the university grounds.

He became ill with an aggravated cold around Christmas 1826 and died in June of the following year. He bequeathed his possessions to his widow Mary, who had remained in County Antrim, and to several other beneficiaries including a portion of his estate to Mary Ann McCracken ‘the friend of my family and sister of the late Henry Joy McCracken’.

In 1993 a tablet to his memory, and fellow Ulster man James Dinsmore, was erected in the grounds of the University.

At his grave in Maplewood Cemetery, Charlottesville, Virginia the inscription describes him as ‘United Irishman, Political Exile’.

For the Neilson family, 1798 had changed everything.

In a small corner of an old churchyard overlooking the sea rests William. And the message on his stone is even more stark.

With the same defiance he showed in his short life, it reads ‘The Ballycarry Martyr’.