In the battle, James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde defeated Thomas Preston, 1st Viscount Tara, and an Irish Confederate army north of the town of New Ross in the nearby townland of Ballinvegga, County Wexford. Ormonde hoped to link up with the Cork based forces of Inchiquin and so marched from Dublin via Carlow to besiege the Confederate garrison at New Ross. The fighting at New Ross was fierce, the defenders inflicting substantial casualties on the besiegers. Having had to lift the siege, Ormonde attempted to return to Dublin via the northwest Blackstairs Mountains, where he was intercepted by Preston. Ormonde's force seems to have been vastly outnumbered by Preston's Confederate soldiers (Ormonde claimed they were over 10,000 strong) but Ormonde had six cannon. Following some confused figh