Robert Emmet (4 March 1778 – 20 September 1803) was an Irish Republican, orator and rebel leader. Following the suppression of the United Irish uprising in 1798, he sought to organise a renewed attempt to overthrow the British Crown and Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland, and to establish a national representative government. As had the United Irishmen in 1798, Emmet entertained hopes of French assistance and of coordination with radical militants in Great Britain. In Ireland, however, many of the surviving veterans of '98 hesitated to lend their support, and his rising in Dublin in 1803 proved abortive.