7. The insurrection was crushed at the Battle of Rouse Hill
Government troops encountered the massed Irish convicts near a site known as Rouse Hill, now within the confines of the city of Sydney. The Irish called the conflict the Second Battle of Vinegar Hill, after a battle between Irish revolutionaries and British troops at a site so named in Ireland in 1798. The government troops, commanded by Major George Johnston, sent forth a Catholic priest to convince the convicts to surrender without bloodshed. Cunningham, who had by then declared himself the King of the Australian Empire, refused. When the government troops were in position they opened fire, maintaining it for about a quarter of an hour.
The troops then charged, Cunningham was cut down in the melee which followed, and the convicts fled or surrendered. Small bands continued to remain free for several days following the battle. Cunningham survived, though badly wounded, and was taken prisoner along with most of the other convicts later described by the authorities as the leaders of the rebellion. At least fifteen convicts were killed at Rouse Hill, and several more were killed in the ensuing weeks, some by pursuing soldiers. Others seized the opportunity to settle personal vendettas and killed fellow convicts. It was the worst convict rebellion in Australian history.