"Patrick led his men in the attack on the castle of Lord Charlemont at Moy. They sacked the castle, drove the English away. That was when Patrick was a young man, and before Shane was born. The years passed, and for a while the Donnellys at Ballydonnelly Castle were left to themselves. Shane was born. He grew up to be a fine young man, good to his neighbours, kind to the family's tenants. Even when he was small he had learned to ride a horse and to shoot and to hunt so that he could live off the land on the Altmore mountain. When he was just twenty years old, the English came again. The Englishmen were led by Sir Toby Caulfield, who was a harsh man. The English came with overwhelming force and they killed Patrick Modardha, and they captured the castle at Ballydonnelly. Shane fought as long as he was able and then slipped away and climbed high up onto the Altmore mountain. From there he could see the burning and pillaging and thieving of the English soldiers and the 'gallowglasses' who were paid to fight for them. On that first evening, as he saw far below him the climbing smoke from the Donnelly home and their cattle barns, Shane swore to himself that he would take his revenge of the English for what they had done. At first he joined the rapparee band of Redmond O'H anion of Armagh, who was called Terror of the Fews, and then when Redmond had been killed, he formed his own band of free men. He lived wild on the mountain with them. All his teeth fell out, and he was known as Shane Bearnagh, which is Shane Gap-tooth. In all of the band he was the most powerful man, and it was said of him that his toothless gums could bite through a thin plate of iron as if it were gingerbread. The band of Shane Bearnagh became the most famous group of resistance fighters in the whole of Ireland. Down in the valley, Ballydonnelly was now renamed Castlecaulfield and Sir Toby Caulfield lived in Shane's castle, and had taken all the land that had belonged to Shane's family…



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