The Battle of Swatragh was fought on 18 October 1642 when the Ulster Protestant "Laggan Army" attacked and routed an Irish Confederate army led by Seamus Hennessey as it traversed Covenanter-held territory in Northern Ireland.
Following a campaign against the Parliamentarians of Munster that met with mixed results, Hennessey put together a new army of Irish Catholic volunteers and headed north to Ulster to aid the Confederate war effort against the Presbyterian Scots. By then, the Confederates had taken Belfast, but Protestant settler armies continued to menace the north. While visiting local villages like Newry and Lurgan to buy supplies and recruit volunteers, Hennessey's army was beset by Robert Stewart's Laggan Army at Swatragh.
Though the two armies were notionally evenly-matched and the Irish held the high ground, the Protestants had superior-quality soldiers, including armored swordsmen, harquebus and sabre-wielding cavalrymen, and a troop of musketeers. As the Protestants opened fire on the Irishmen from a distance, the Irishmen, wielding spears, pikes, and farm implements, were forced to charge downhill from their advantageous hilltop position and engage the Scots on level ground. In the ensuing battle, the well-equipped Scots butchered the Irishmen, and Hennessey was knocked out. Hennessey and the 29 survivors of his army were able to flee towards Belfast, forcing Stewart to withdraw rather than risk being attacked by Belfast's sizeable Confederate garrison.