The Dock And The Scaffold By Unknown

The Manchester Tragedy and the Cruise of the Jacknell [Illustration: THE “ERIN’S HOPE” SALUTING THE GREEN FLAG.] “GOD SAVE IRELAND.” “Far dearer the grave or the prison Illum’d by one patriot’s name, Than the trophies of all who have risen On liberty’s ruins to fame.” MOORE The 23rd day of November, 1867, witnessed a strange and memorable scene in the great English city of Manchester. Long ere the grey winter’s morning struggled in through the crisp frosty air–long ere the first gleam of the coming day dulled the glare of the flaming gas jets, the streets of the Lancashire capital were all astir with bustling crowds, and the silence of the night was broken by the ceaseless footfalls and the voices of hurrying throngs. Through the long, dim streets, and past the tall rows of silent houses, the full tide of life eddied and poured in rapid current; stout burghers, closely muffled and staff in hand; children grown prematurely old, with the hard marks of vice already branded on their features; young girls with flaunting ribbons and bold, flushed faces; pale-faced operatives, and strong men whose brawny limbs told of the Titanic labours of the foundry; the clerk from his desk; the shopkeeper from his store; the withered crone, and the careless navvy, swayed and struggled through the living mass; and with them trooped the legions of want, and vice, and ignorance, that burrow and fester in the foetid lanes and purlieus of the large British cities: from the dark alleys where misery and degradation for ever dwell, and from reeking cellars and nameless haunts, where the twin demons of alcohol and crime rule supreme; from the gin-palace, and the beer-shop, and the midnight haunts of the tramp and the burglar, they came in all their repulsiveness and debasement, with the rags of wretchedness upon their backs, and the cries of profanity and obscenity upon their lips. Forward they rushed in a surging flood through many a street and byway, until where the narrowing thoroughfares open into the space surrounding the New Bailey Prison, in that suburb of the great city known as the Borough of Salford, they found their further progress arrested. Between them and the massive prison walls rose piles of heavy barricading, and the intervening space was black with a dense body of men, all of whom faced the gloomy building beyond, and each of whom carried a special constable’s baton in his hand. The long railway bridge running close by was occupied by a detachment of infantry, and from the parapet of the frowning walls the muzzle of cannon, trained on the space below, might be dimly discerned in the darkness. But the crowd paid little attention to these extraordinary appearances; their eyes were riveted on the black projection which jutted from the prison wall, and which, shrouded in dark drapery, loomed with ghastly significance through the haze. Rising above the scaffold, which replaced a portion of the prison wall, the outlines of a gibbet were descried; and from the cross-beam there hung three ropes, terminating in nooses, just perceptible above the upper edge of the curtain which extended thence to the ground. The grim excrescence seemed to possess a horrible fascination for the multitude. Those in position to see it best stirred not from their post, but faced the fatal cross-tree, the motionless ropes, the empty platform, with an untiring, insatiable gaze, that seemed pregnant with some terrible meaning, while the mob behind them struggled, and pushed, and raved, and fought; and the haggard hundreds of gaunt, diseased, stricken wretches, that vainly contested with the stronger types of ruffianism for a place, loaded the air with their blasphemies and imprecations. The day broke slowly and doubtfully upon the scene; a dense yellow, murky fog floated round the spot, wrapping in its opaque folds the hideous gallows and the frowning mass of masonry behind. An hour passed, and then a hoarse murmur swelled upwards from the glistening rows of upturned faces. The platform was no longer empty; three pinioned men, with white caps drawn closely over their faces, were standing upon the drop. For a moment the crowd was awed into stillness; for a moment the responses, “Christ, have mercy on us,” “Christ, have mercy on us,” were heard from the lips of the doomed men, towards whom the sea of faces were turned. Then came a dull crash, and the mob swayed backwards for an instant. The drop had fallen, and the victims were struggling in the throes of a horrible death. The ropes jerked and swayed with the convulsive movements of the dying men. A minute later, and the vibrations ceased–the end had come, the swaying limbs fell rigid and stark, and the souls of the strangled men had floated upwards from the cursed spot–up from the hateful crowd and the sin-laden atmosphere–to the throne of the God who made them. So perished, in the bloom of manhood, and the flower of their strength, three gallant sons of Ireland–so passed away the last of the martyred band whose blood has sanctified the cause of Irish freedom. Far from the friends whom they loved, far from the land for which they suffered, with the scarlet-clad hirelings of England around them, and watched by the wolfish eyes of a brutal mob, who thirsted to see them die, the dauntless patriots, who, in our own day, have rivalled the heroism and shared the fate of Tone, Emmett, and Fitzgerald, looked their last upon the world. No prayer was breathed for their parting souls–no eye was moistened with regret amongst the multitude that stretched away in compact bodies from the foot of the gallows; the ribald laugh and the blasphemous oath united with their dying breath; and, callously as the Roman mob from the blood-stained amphitheatre, the English masses turned homewards from the fatal spot. But they did not fall unhonoured or unwept. In the churches of the faithful in that same city, the sobs of mournful lamentation were mingled with the solemn prayers for their eternal rest, and, from thousands of wailing women and stricken-hearted men, the prayers for mercy, peace, and pardon, for the souls of MICHAEL O’BRIEN, WILLIAM PHILIP ALLEN, and MICHAEL LARKIN, rose upwards to the avenging God. Still less were they forgotten at home. Throughout the Irish land, from Antrim’s rocky coast to the foam-beaten headlands of Cork, the hearts of their countrymen were convulsed with passionate grief and indignation, and, blended with the sharp cry of agony that broke from the nation’s lips, came the murmurs of defiant hatred, and the pledges of a bitter vengeance. Never, for generations, had the minds of the Irish people been more profoundly agitated–never had they writhed in such bitterness and agony of soul. With knitted brows and burning cheeks, the tidings of the bloody deed were listened to. The names of the martyred men were upon every lip, and the story of their heroism and tragic death was read with throbbing pulse and kindling eyes by every fireside in the land. It is to assist in perpetuating that story, and in recording for future generations the narrative which tells of how Allen, O’Brien, and Larkin died, that this narrative is written, and few outside the nation whose hands are red with their blood, will deny that at least so much recognition is due to their courage, their patriotism, and their fidelity. In Ireland we know it will be welcomed; amongst a people by whom chivalry and patriotism are honoured, a story so touching and so enobling will not be despised; and the race which guards with reverence and devotion the memories of Tone, and Emmett, and the Shearses, will not soon surrender to oblivion the memory of the three true-hearted patriots, who, heedless of the scowling mob, unawed by the hangman’s grasp, died bravely that Saturday morning at Manchester, for the good old cause of Ireland. Early before daybreak on the morning of November 11th, 1867, the policemen on duty in Oak-street, Manchester, noticed four broad-shouldered, muscular men loitering in a suspicious manner about the shop of a clothes dealer in the neighbourhood. Some remarks dropped by one of the party reaching the ears of the policemen, strengthened their impression that an illegal enterprise was on foot, and the arrest of the supposed burglars was resolved on. A struggle ensued, during which two of the suspects succeeded in escaping, but the remaining pair, after offering a determined resistance, were overpowered and carried off to the police station. The prisoners, who, on being searched, were found to possess loaded revolvers on their persons, gave their names as Martin Williams and John Whyte, and were charged under the Vagrancy Act before one of the city magistrates. They declared themselves American citizens, and claimed their discharge. Williams said he was a bookbinder out of work; Whyte described himself as a hatter, living on the means brought with him from America. The magistrate was about disposing summarily of the case, by sentencing the men to a few days’ imprisonment, when a detective officer applied for a remand, on the ground that he had reason to believe the prisoners were connected with the Fenian conspiracy. The application was granted, and before many hours had elapsed it was ascertained that Martin Williams was no other than Colonel Thomas J. Kelly, one of the most prominent of the (O’Mahony-Stephens) Fenian leaders, and that John Whyte was a brother officer and co-conspirator, known to the circles of the Fenian Brotherhood as Captain Deasey. Of the men who had thus fallen into the clutches of the British government the public had already heard much, and one of them was widely known for the persistency with which he laboured as an organiser of Fenianism, and the daring and skill which he exhibited in the pursuit of his dangerous undertaking. Long before the escape of James Stephens from Richmond Bridewell startled the government from its visions of security, and swelled the breasts of their disaffected subjects in Ireland with rekindled hopes, Colonel Kelly was known in the Fenian ranks as an intimate associate of the revolutionary chief. When the arrest at Fairfield-house deprived the organization of its crafty leader, Kelly was elected to the vacant post, and he threw himself into the work with all the reckless energy of his nature. If he could not be said to possess the mental ability or administrative capacity essential to the office, he was at least gifted with a variety of other qualifications well calculated to recommend him to popularity amongst the desperate men with whom he was associated. Nor did he prove altogether unworthy of the confidence reposed in him. It is now pretty well known that the successful plot for the liberation of James Stephens was executed under the personal supervision of Colonel Kelly, and that he was one of the group of friends who grasped the hand of the Head Centre within the gates of Eichmond Prison on that night in November, ’65, when the doors of his dungeon were thrown open. Kelly fled with Stephens to Paris, and thence to America, where he remained attached to the section of the Brotherhood which recognised the authority and obeyed the mandates of the “C.O.I.R.” But the time came when even Colonel Kelly and his party discovered that Stephens was unworthy of their confidence. The chief whom they had so long trusted, and whose oath to fight on Irish soil before January, ’67, they had seen so unblushingly violated, was deposed by the last section of his adherents, and Colonel Kelly was elected “Deputy Central Organiser of the Irish Republic,” on the distinct understanding that he was to follow out the policy which Stephens had shrunk from pursuing. Kelly accepted the post, and devoted himself earnestly to the work. In America he met with comparatively little co-operation; the bulk of the Irish Nationalists in that country had long ranged themselves under the leadership of Colonel W.R. Roberts, an Irish gentleman of character and integrity, who became the President of the reconstituted organization; and the plans and promises of “the Chatham-street wing,” as the branch of the brotherhood which ratified Colonel Kelly’s election was termed, were regarded, for the most part, with suspicion and disfavour. But from Ireland there came evidences of a different state of feeling. Breathless envoys arrived almost weekly in New York, declaring that the Fenian Brotherhood in Ireland were burning for the fray–that they awaited the landing of Colonel Kelly with feverish impatience–that it would be impossible to restrain them much longer from fighting–and that the arrival of the military leaders, whom America was expected to supply, would be the signal for a general uprising. Encouraged by representations like these, Colonel Kelly and a chosen body of Irish-American officers departed for Ireland in January, and set themselves, on their arrival in the old country, to arrange the plans of the impending outbreak. How their labours eventuated, and how the Fenian insurrection of March, ’67, resulted, it is unnecessary to explain; it is enough for our purpose to state that for several months after that ill-starred movement was crushed, Colonel Kelly continued to reside in Dublin, moving about with an absence of disguise and a disregard for concealment which astonished his confederates, but which, perhaps, contributed in no slight degree to the success with which he eluded the efforts directed towards his capture. At length the Fenian organization in Ireland began to pass through the same changes that had given it new leaders and fresh vitality in America. The members of the organization at home began to long for union with the Irish Nationalists who formed the branch of the confederacy regenerated under Colonel Roberts; and Kelly, who, for various reasons, was unwilling to accept the new regime, saw his adherents dwindle away, until at length he found himself all but discarded by the Fenian circles in Dublin. Then he crossed over to Manchester, where he arrived but a few weeks previous to the date of his accidental arrest in Oak-street. The arrest of Colonel Kelly and his aide-de-camp, as the English papers soon learned to describe Deasey, was hailed by the government with the deepest satisfaction. For years they had seen their hosts of spies, detectives, and informers foiled and outwitted by this daring conspirator, whose position in the Fenian ranks they perfectly understood; they had seen their traps evaded, their bribes spurned, and their plans defeated at every turn; they knew, too, that Kelly’s success in escaping capture was filling his associates with pride and exultation; and now at last they found the man whose apprehension they so anxiously desired a captive in their grasp. On the other hand, the arrests in Oak-street were felt to be a crushing blow to a failing cause by the Fenian circles in Manchester. They saw that Kelly’s capture would dishearten every section of the organization; they knew that the broad meaning of the occurrence was, that another Irish rebel had fallen into the clutches of the British government, and was about to be added to the long list of their political victims. It was felt by the Irish in Manchester, that to abandon the prisoners helplessly to their fate would be regarded as an act of submission to the laws which rendered patriotism a crime, and as an acceptance of the policy which left Ireland trampled, bleeding, and impoverished. There were hot spirits amongst the Irish colony that dwelt in the great industrial capital, which revolted from such a conclusion, and there were warm, impulsive hearts which swelled with a firm resolution to change the triumph of their British adversaries into disappointment and consternation. The time has not yet come when anything like a description of the midnight meetings and secret councils which followed the arrest of Colonel Kelly in Manchester can be written; enough may be gathered, however, from the result, to show that the plans of the conspirators were cleverly conceived and ably digested. On Wednesday, September 18th, Colonel Kelly and his companion were a second time placed in the dock of the Manchester Police Office. There is reason to believe that means had previously been found of acquainting them with the plans of their friends outside, but this hypothesis is not necessary to explain the coolness and sang froid with which they listened to the proceedings before the magistrate. Hardly had the prisoners been put forward, when the Chief Inspector of the Manchester Detective Force interposed. They were both, he said, connected with the Fenian rising, and warrants were out against them for treason-felony. “Williams,” he added, with a triumphant air, “is Colonel Kelly, and Whyte, his confederate, is Captain Deasey.” He asked that they might again be remanded, an application which was immediately granted. The prisoners, who imperturbably bowed to the detective, as he identified them, smilingly quitted the dock, and were given in charge to Police Sergeant Charles Brett, whose duty it was to convey them to the borough gaol. The van used for the conveyance of prisoners between the police office and the gaol was one of the ordinary long black boxes on wheels, dimly lit by a grating in the door and a couple of ventilators in the roof. It was divided interiorly into a row of small cells at either side, and a passage running the length of the van between; and the practice was, to lock each prisoner into a separate cell, Brett sitting in charge on a seat in the passage, near the door. The van was driven by a policeman; another usually sat beside the driver on the box; the whole escort thus consisting of three men, carrying no other arms than their staves; but it was felt that on the present occasion a stronger escort might be necessary. The magistrates well knew that Kelly and Deasey had numerous sympathisers amongst the Irish residents in Manchester, and their apprehensions were quickened by the receipt of a telegram from Dublin Castle, and another from the Home Office in London, warning them that a plot was on foot for the liberation of the prisoners. The magistrates doubted the truth of the information, but they took precautions, nevertheless, for the frustration of any such enterprise. Kelly and Deasey were both handcuffed, and locked in separate compartments of the van; and, instead of three policemen, not less than twelve were entrusted with its defence. Of this body, five sat on the box-seat, two were stationed on the step behind, four followed the van in a cab, and one (Sergeant Brett) sat within the van, the keys of which were handed in to him through the grating, after the door had been locked by one of the policemen outside. There were, in all, six persons in the van: one of these was a boy, aged twelve, who was being conveyed to a reformatory; three were women convicted of misdemeanours; and the two Irish-Americans completed the number. Only the last-mentioned pair were handcuffed, and they were the only persons whom the constables thought necessary to lock up, the compartments in which the other persons sat being left open. At half-past three o’clock the van drove off, closely followed by the cab containing the balance of the escort. Its route lay through some of the principal streets, then through the suburbs on the south side, into the borough of Salford, where the county gaol is situated. In all about two miles had to be traversed, and of this distance the first half was accomplished without anything calculated to excite suspicion being observed; but there was mischief brewing, for all that, and the crisis was close at hand. Just as the van passed under the railway arch that spans the Hyde-road at Bellevue, a point midway between the city police office and the Salford gaol, the driver was suddenly startled by the apparition of a man standing in the middle of the road with a pistol aimed at his head, and immediately the astonished policeman heard himself called upon, in a loud, sharp voice, to “pull up.” At the spot where this unwelcome interruption occurred there are but few houses; brick-fields and clay-pits stretch away at either side, and the neighbourhood is thinly inhabited. But its comparative quiet now gave way to a scene of bustle and excitement so strange that it seems to have almost paralysed the spectators with amazement. The peremptory command levelled at the driver of the van was hardly uttered, when a body of men, numbering about thirty, swarmed over the wall which lined the road, and, surrounding the van, began to take effectual measures for stopping it. The majority of them were well-dressed men, of powerful appearance; a few carried pistols or revolvers in their hands, and all seemed to act in accordance with a preconcerted plan. The first impulse of the policemen in front appears to have been to drive through the crowd, but a shot, aimed in the direction of his head brought the driver tumbling from his seat, terror-stricken but unhurt; and almost at the same time, the further progress of the van was effectually prevented by shooting one of the horses through the neck. A scene of indescribable panic and confusion ensued; the policemen scrambled hastily to the ground, and betook themselves to flight almost without a thought of resistance. Those in the cab behind got out, not to resist the attack, but to help in running away; and in a few minutes the strangers, whose object had by this time become perfectly apparent, were undisputed masters of the situation. Pickaxes, hatchets, hammers, and crow-bars were instantly produced, and the van was besieged by a score stout pairs of arms, under the blows from which its sides groaned, and the door cracked and splintered. Some clambered upon the roof, and attempted to smash it in with heavy stones; others tried to force an opening through the side; while the door was sturdily belaboured by another division of the band. Seeing the Fenians, as they at once considered them, thus busily engaged, the policemen, who had in the first instance retreated to a safe distance, and who were now reinforced by a large mob attracted to the spot by the report of firearms, advanced towards the van, with the intention of offering some resistance; but the storming party immediately met them with a counter-movement. Whilst the attempt to smash through the van was continued without pause, a ring was formed round the men thus engaged, by their confederates, who, pointing their pistols at the advancing crowd, warned them, as they valued their lives, to keep off. Gaining courage from their rapidly-swelling numbers, the mob, however, continued to close in round the van, whereupon several shots were discharged by the Fenians, which had the effect of making the Englishmen again fall back in confusion. It is certain that these shots were discharged for no other purpose than that of frightening the crowd; one of them did take effect in the heel of a bystander, but in every other case the shots were fired high over the heads of the crowd. While this had been passing around the van, a more tragic scene was passing inside it. From the moment the report of the first shot reached him, Sergeant Brett seems to have divined the nature and object of the attack. “My God! its these Fenians,” he exclaimed. The noise of the blows showered on the roof and sides of the van was increased by the shrieks of the female prisoners, who rushed frantically into the passage, and made the van resound with their wailings. In the midst of the tumult a face appeared at the grating, and Brett heard himself summoned to give up the keys. The assailants had discovered where they were kept, and resolved on obtaining them as the speediest way of effecting their purpose. “Give up the keys, or they will shoot you,” exclaimed the women; but Brett refused. The next instant he fell heavily backwards, with the hot blood welling from a bullet-wound in the head. A shot fired into the key-hole, for the purpose of blowing the lock to pieces, had taken effect in his temple. The terror-stricken women lifted him up, screaming “he’s killed.” As they did so, the voice which had been heard before called out to them through the ventilator to give up the keys. One of the women then took them from the pocket of the dying policeman, and handed them out through the trap. The door was at once unlocked, the terrified women rushed out, and Brett, weltering in blood, rolled out heavily upon the road. Then a pale-faced young man, wearing a light overcoat, a blue tie, and a tall brown hat, who had been noticed taking a prominent part in the affray, entered the van, and unlocked the compartments in which Kelly and Deasey were confined. A hasty greeting passed between them, and then the trio hurriedly joined the band outside. “I told you, Kelly, I would die before I parted with you,” cried the young man who had unlocked the doors; then, seizing Kelly by the arm, he helped him across the road, and over the wall, into the brick-fields beyond. Here he was taken charge of by others of the party, who hurried with him across the country, while a similar office was performed for Deasey, who, like Colonel Kelly, found himself hampered to some extent by the handcuffs on his wrists. The main body of those who had shared in the assault occupied themselves with preventing the fugitives from being pursued; and not until Kelly, Deasy, and their conductors had passed far out of sight, did they think of consulting their own safety. At length, when further resistance to the mob seemed useless and impossible, they broke and fled, some of them occasionally checking the pursuit by turning round and presenting pistols at those who followed. Many of the fugitives escaped, but several others were surrounded and overtaken by the mob. And now the “chivalry” of the English nature came out in its real colours. No sooner did the cowardly set, whom the sight of a revolver kept at bay while Kelly was being liberated, find themselves with some of the Irish party in their power, than they set themselves to beat them with savage ferocity. The young fellow who had opened the van door, and who had been overtaken by the mob, was knocked down by a blow of a brick, and then brutally kicked and stoned, the only Englishman who ventured to cry shame being himself assaulted for his display of humanity. Several others were similarly ill-treated; and not until the blood spouted out from the bruised and mangled bodies of the prostrate men, did the valiant Englishmen consider they had sufficiently tortured their helpless prisoners. Meanwhile, large reinforcements appeared on the spot; police and military were despatched in eager haste in pursuit of the fugitives; the telegraph was called into requisition, and a description of the liberated Fenians flashed to the neighbouring towns; the whole detective force of Manchester was placed on their trail, and in the course of a few hours thirty-two Irishmen were in custody, charged with having assisted in the attack on the van. But of Kelly or Deasey no trace was ever discovered; they were seen to enter a cottage not far from the Hyde-road, and leave it with their hands unfettered, but all attempts to trace their movements beyond this utterly failed. While the authorities in Manchester were excitedly discussing the means to be adopted in view of the extraordinary event, Brett lay expiring in the hospital to which he had been conveyed. He never recovered consciousness after receiving the wound, and he died in less than two hours after the fatal shot had been fired. Darkness had closed in around Manchester before the startling occurrence that had taken place in their midst became known to the majority of its inhabitants. Swiftly the tidings flew throughout the big city, till the whisper in which the rumour was first breathed swelled into a roar of astonishment and rage. Leaving their houses and leaving their work, the people rushed into the streets, and trooped towards the newspaper offices for information. The rescue of Colonel Kelly and death of Sergeant Brett were described in thousands of conflicting narratives, until the facts almost disappeared beneath the mass of inventions and exaggerations, the creations of excitement and panic, with which they were overloaded. Meanwhile, the police, maddened by resentment and agitation, struck out wildly and blindly at the Irish. They might not be able to recapture the escaped Fenian leaders, but they could load the gaols with their countrymen and co-religionists; they might not be able to apprehend the liberators of Colonel Kelly and Captain Deasey, but they could glut their fury on members of the same nationality; and this they did most effectually. The whole night long the raid upon the Irish quarter in Manchester was continued; houses were broken into, and their occupants dragged off to prison, and flung into cells, chained as though they were raging beasts. Mere Irish were set upon in the streets, in the shops, in their homes, and hurried off to prison as if the very existence of the empire depended on their being subjected to every kind of brutal violence and indignity. The yell for vengeance filled the air; the cry for Irish blood arose upon the night-air like a demoniacal chorus; and before morning broke their fury was to some extent appeased by the knowledge that sixty of the proscribed race–sixty of the hated Irish–were lying chained within the prison cells of Manchester. Fifteen minutes was the time occupied in setting Kelly free–only fifteen minutes–but during that short space of time an act was accomplished which shook the whole British Empire to its foundation. From the conspiracy to which this daring deed was traceable the English people had already received many startling surprises. The liberation of James Stephens and the short-lived insurrection that filled the snow-capped hills with hardy fugitives, six months before, had both occasioned deep excitement in England; but nothing that Fenianism had yet accomplished acted in the same bewildering manner on the English mind. In the heart of one of their largest cities, in the broad daylight, openly and undisguisedly, a band of Irishmen had appeared in arms against the Queen’s authority, and set the power and resources of the law at defiance. They had rescued a co-conspirator from the grasp of the government, and slain an officer of the law in the pursuit of their object. Within a few minutes’ walk of barracks and military depots,–in sight of the royal ensign that waved over hundreds of her Majesty’s defenders, a prison van had been stopped and broken open, and its defenders shot at and put to flight. Never had the English people heard of so audacious a proceeding–never did they feel more insulted. From every corner of the land the cry swelled, up for vengeance fierce and prompt. Victims there should be; blood–Irish blood–the people would have; nor were they willing to wait long for it. It might be that, falling in hot haste, the sword of Justice might strike the innocent, and not the guilty; it might be that, in the thirst for vengeance, the restraints of humanity would be forgotten; but the English nature, now thoroughly aroused, cared little for such considerations. It was Irishmen who had defied and trampled on their power; the whole Irish people approved of the act; and it mattered little who the objects of their fury might be, provided they belonged to the detested race. The prisoners, huddled together in the Manchester prisons, with chains round their limbs, might not be the liberators of Colonel Kelly–the slayers of Brett might not be amongst them; but they were Irishmen, at any rate, and so they would answer the purpose. Short shrift was the cry. The ordinary forms of law, the maxims of the Constitution, the rules of judicial procedure, the proprieties of social order and civilization, might be outraged and discarded, but speedy vengeance should, at all hazards, be obtained: the hangman could not wait for his fee, nor the people for their carnival of blood; and so it was settled that, instead of being tried at the ordinary Commission, in December, a Special Commission should be issued on the spot for the trial of the accused. On Thursday, the 25th of October, the prisoners were brought up for committal, before Mr. Fowler, R.M., and a bench of brother magistrates. Some of the Irishmen arrested in the first instance had been discharged–not that no one could be found to swear against them (a difficulty which never seems to have arisen in these cases) but that the number of witnesses who could swear to their innocence was so great, that an attempt to press for convictions in their cases would be pertain to jeopardize the whole proceedings. The following is a list of the prisoners put forward, the names being, as afterwards appeared, in many cases fictitious:– William O’Mara Allen, Edward Shore, Henry Wilson, William Gould, Michael Larkin, Patrick Kelly, Charles Moorhouse, John Brennan, John Bacon, William Martin, John F. Nugent, James Sherry, Robert McWilliams, Michael Maguire, Thomas Maguire, Michael Morris, Michael Bryan, Michael Corcoran, Thomas Ryan, John Carroll, John Cleeson, Michael Kennedy, John Morris, Patrick Kelly, Hugh Foley, Patrick Coffey, Thomas Kelly, and Thomas Scally. It forms no part of our purpose to follow out the history of the proceedings in the Manchester court on the 25th of September and the following days: but there are some circumstances in connection with that investigation which it would be impossible to pass over without comment. It was on this occasion that the extraordinary sight of men being tried in chains was witnessed, and that the representatives of the English Crown came to sit in judgment on men still innocent in the eyes of the law, yet manacled like convicted felons. With the blistering irons clasped tight round their wrists the Irish prisoners stood forward, that justice–such justice as tortures men first and tries them afterwards–might be administered to them. “The police considered the precaution necessary,” urged the magistrate, in reply to the scathing denunciations of the unprecedented outrage which fell from the lips of Mr. Ernest Jones, one of the prisoners’ counsel. The police considered it necessary, though within the courthouse no friend of the accused could dare to show his face–though the whole building bristled with military and with policemen, with their revolvers ostentatiously displayed;–necessary, though every approach to the courthouse was held by an armed guard, and though every soldier in the whole city was standing to arms;–necessary there, in the heart of an English city, with a dense population thirsting for the blood of the accused, and when the danger seemed to be, not that they might escape from custody–a flight to the moon would be equally practicable–but that they might be butchered in cold blood by the angry English mob that scowled on them from the galleries of the court house, and howled round the building in which they stood. In vain did Mr. Jones protest, in scornful words, against the brutal indignity–in vain did he appeal to the spirit of British justice, to ancient precedent and modern practice–in vain did he inveigh against a proceeding which forbad the intercourse necessary between him and his clients–and in vain did he point out that the prisoners in the dock were guiltless and innocent men according to the theory of the law. No arguments, no expostulations would change the magistrate’s decision. Amidst the applause of the cowardly set that represented the British public within the courthouse, he insisted that the handcuffs should remain on; and then Mr. Jones, taking the only course left to a man of spirit under the circumstances, threw down his brief and indignantly quitted the desecrated justice hall. Fearing the consequences of leaving the prisoners utterly undefended, Mr. Cottingham, the junior counsel for the defence, refrained from following Mr. Jones’s example, but he, too, protested loudly, boldly, and indignantly against the cowardly outrage, worthy of the worst days of the French monarchy, which his clients were being subjected to. The whole investigation was in keeping with the spirit evinced by the bench. The witnesses seemed to come for the special purpose of swearing point-blank against the hapless men in the dock, no matter at what cost to truth, and to take a fiendish pleasure in assisting in securing their condemnation. One of the witnesses was sure “the whole lot of them wanted to murder everyone who had any property;” another assured his interrogator in the dock that “he would go to see him hanged;” and a third had no hesitation in acknowledging the attractions which the reward offered by the government possessed for his mind. Men and women, young and old, all seemed to be possessed of but the one idea–to secure as much of the blood-money as possible, and to do their best to bring the hated Irish to the gallows. Of course, an investigation, under these circumstances, could have but one ending, and no one was surprised to learn, at its conclusion, that the whole of the resolute body of stern-faced men, who, manacled and suffering, confronted their malignant accusers, had been committed to stand their trial in hot haste, for the crime of “wilful murder.” Of the men thus dealt with there are four with whose fate this narrative is closely connected, and whose names are destined to be long remembered in Ireland. They have won for themselves, by their courage, constancy, and patriotism, a fame that will never die; and through all future time they will rank beside the dauntless spirits that in days of darkness and disaster perished for the sacred cause of Ireland. Great men, learned men, prominent men they were not–they were poor, they were humble, they were unknown; they had no claim to the reputation of the warrior, the scholar, or the statesman; but they laboured, as they believed, for the redemption of their country from bondage; they risked their lives in a chivalrous attempt to rescue from captivity two men whom they regarded as innocent patriots, and when the forfeit was claimed, they bore themselves with the unwavering courage and single-heartedness of Christian heroes. Their short and simple annals are easily written, but their names are graven on the Irish heart, and their names and actions will be cherished in Ireland when the monumental piles that mark the resting-places of the wealthy and the proud have returned, like the bodies laid beneath them, to dust. William Philip Allen was born near the town of Tipperary, in April, 1848. Before he was quite three years old his parents removed to Bandon, County Cork, where the father, who professed the Protestant religion, received the appointment of bridewell-keeper. As young Allen grew up, he evinced a remarkable aptitude for the acquirement of knowledge, and his studious habits were well known to his playmates and companions. He was a regular attendant at the local training-school for the education of teachers for the Protestant schools of the parish, but he also received instruction at the morning and evening schools conducted under Catholic auspices, in the same town. He was not a wild boy, but he was quick and impulsive,–ready to resent a wrong, but equally ready to forgive one; and his natural independence of spirit and manly disposition rendered him a favourite with all his acquaintances. The influence and example of his father did not prevent him from casting a wistful eye towards the ancient faith. His mother, a good pious Catholic, whose warmest aspiration was to see her children in the fold of the true church, encouraged this disposition by all the means in her power, and the result of her pious care shortly became apparent. A mission, opened in the town by some Catholic order of priests, completed the good work, which the prayers and the example of an affectionate mother had commenced; and young Allen, after regularly attending the religious services and exercises of the mission, became so much Impressed with the truth of the lectures and sermons he had listened to, that he formally renounced the alien religion, and was received by the respected parish priest of the town into the bosom of the Catholic Church. His only sister followed his example, while his brothers, four in number, remained in the Protestant communion. The subject of our sketch was apprenticed to a respectable master carpenter and timber merchant in Bandon, but circumstances highly creditable to the young convert induced the severance of the connection before his period of apprenticeship was expired, and we next find him working at his trade in Cork, where he remained for some six months, after which he returned to Bandon. He next crossed over to Manchester, at the request of some near relatives living there. Subsequently he spent a few weeks in Dublin, where he worked as builder’s clerk; and finally he revisited Manchester, where he had made himself numerous friends. It was in the summer of ’67 that Allen last journeyed to Manchester. He was then little more than nineteen years old, but there is reason to believe that he had long before become connected with the Fenian conspiracy. In his ardent temperament the seeds of patriotism took deep and firm root, and the dangers of the enterprise to which the Fenians were committed served only to give it a fresh claim upon his enthusiastic nature. When Colonel Kelly quitted Dublin, and took up his quarters in Manchester, Allen was one of his most trusted and intimate associates; and when the prison door grated behind the Fenian leader, it was Allen who roused his countrymen to the task of effecting his liberation. Allen had by this time grown into a comely young man of prepossessing appearance; he was a little over the middle height, well shaped, without presenting the appearance of unusual strength, and was always seen neatly and respectably dressed. His face was pale, and wore a thoughtful expression, his features, when in repose, wearing an appearance of pensiveness approaching to melancholy. His eyes were small, the eyelids slightly marked; a mass of dark hair clustered gracefully over a broad pale forehead, while the absence of any beard gave him a peculiarly boyish appearance. Gentle and docile in his calmer moments, when roused to action he was all fire and energy. We have seen how he bore himself during the attack on the prison van, for he it was whom so many witnesses identified as the pale-faced young fellow who led the attack, and whose prophetic assurance that he would die for him, greeted Colonel Kelly on regaining his freedom. During the magisterial investigation he bore himself firmly, proudly, and, as the English papers would have it, defiantly. His glance never quailed during the trying ordeal. The marks of the brutality of his cowardly captors were still upon him, and the galling irons that bound his hands cut into his wrists; but Allen never winced for a moment, and he listened to the evidence of the sordid crew, who came to barter away his young life, with resolute mien. The triumph was with him. Out of the jaws of death he had rescued the leader whose freedom he considered essential to the success of a patriotic undertaking, and he was satisfied to pay the cost of the venture. He had set his foot upon the ploughshare, and would not shrink from the ordeal which he had challenged. Amongst the crowd of manacled men committed for trial by the Manchester magistrates, not one presented a finer or more impressive exterior than Michael O’Brien, set down in the list above given as Michael Gould. Standing in the dock, he seemed the impersonation of vigorous manhood. Frank, fearless, and resolute, with courage and truth imprinted on every feature, he presented to the eye a perfect type of the brave soldier. He was tall and well-proportioned, and his broad shoulders and well-developed limbs told of physical strength in keeping with the firmness reflected in his face. His gaze, when it rested on the unfriendly countenances before him, was firm and undrooping, but a kindly light lit his hazel eyes, and his features relaxed into a sympathising and encouraging expression, as often as he glanced at Allen, who stood behind him, or bent his gaxe upon any of his other fellow-prisoners. O’Brien was born, near Ballymacoda, County Cork, the birthplace of the ill-fated and heroic Peter Crowley. His father rented a large farm in the same parish, but the blight of the bad laws which are the curse of Ireland fell upon him, and in the year 1856, the O’Briens were flung upon the world dispossessed of lands and home, though they owed no man a penny at the time. Michael O’Brien was apprenticed to a draper in Youghal, and earned, during the period of his apprenticeship, the respect and esteem of all who knew him. He was quiet and gentlemanly in manners, and his character for morality and good conduct was irreproachable. Having served out his time in Youghal, he went to Cork, and he spent some time as an assistant in one of the leading drapery establishments of that city. He afterwards emigrated to America, where some of his relatives were comfortably settled. Like many of the bravest of his fellow-countrymen, the outbreak of the civil war kindled a military ardour within his bosom, and O’Brien found himself unable to resist the attractions which the soldier’s career possessed for him. His record throughout the war was highly honourable; his bravery and good conduct won him speedy promotion, and long before the termination of the conflict, he had risen to the rank of lieutenant. When his regiment was disbanded he recrossed the Atlantic, and returned to Cork, where he again obtained employment as assistant in one of the large commercial establishments. Here he remained until the night before the Fenian rising, when he suddenly disappeared, and all further trace was lost of him, until arrested for participation in the attack upon the prison van in Manchester. Close by his side in the dock stood Michael Larkin, an intelligent-looking man, older looking than most of his fellow-prisoners. The following are a few facts relating to his humble history:– “He was,” writes a correspondent who knew him, “a native of the parish of Lusmagh, in the south-western corner of the King’s County, where for many generations his ancestors have been residents on the Cloghan Castle estate (then in the possession of the O’Moore family), and where several of his relatives still reside; and was grandson to James Quirke, a well-to-do farmer, who was flogged and transported in ’98 for complicity in the rebellion of that time, and whose name, in this part of the country, is remembered with pleasure and affection for his indomitable courage and perseverance in resisting the repeated allurements held out by the corrupt minions of the crown to induce him to become a traitor to his companions and his country. But all their importunities were vain; Quirke steadily persevered in the principles of his gallant leader, Robert Emmett. Larkin’s father was a respectable tradesman, carrying on his business for many years in his native parish; he removed to Parsonstown, where he contrived to impart to his son Michael, a good English education, and then taught him his own profession. When Michael had attained a thorough knowledge of his business, he was employed till ’58 at Parsonstown; he then went to England to improve his condition, and after some time he married, and continued to work on industriously at his business till May, ’67, when he visited his native country to receive the last benediction of his dying father. He again returned to England with his wife and family, to resume his employment. After some time he was arrested for assisting to release two of his fellow-countrymen from bondage. I cannot attempt to enumerate the many good qualities of the deceased patriot: the paternal affection, exhibited from the earliest age; the mildness and affability of manner, good temper, affectionate and inoffensive disposition; his sobriety and good moral conduct–endeared him to all who had the pleasure and honour of his acquaintance. Throughout his whole life he was remarkable for his ‘love of country,’ and expressions of sincere regret for the miserable condition of many of his countrymen were ever on his lips. He was, in the true sense of the idea, a good son, an affectionate husband and father, and a sincere friend.” On Monday, October 28th, the three Irishmen whose lives we have glanced at were placed at the bar of the Manchester Assize Court, and formally placed on their trial for wilful murder. With them were arraigned Thomas Maguire, a private belonging to the Royal Marines, who was on furlough in Liverpool at the time of Kelly’s liberation, and who was arrested merely because he happened to be an Irishman, and who, though perfectly innocent of the whole transaction, had been sworn against by numerous witnesses as a ringleader in the attack; and Edward O’Meagher Condon (alias Shore), a fine-looking Irish-American, a citizen of the State of Ohio, against whom, like his four companions, true bills had been found by the Grand Jury. It would take long to describe the paroxysms of excitement, panic, and agitation that raged in the English mind within the period that intervened between the committal of the prisoners and the date at which we are now arrived. Nothing was heard of but the Fenians; nothing was talked of but the diabolical plots and murderous designs they were said to be preparing. The Queen was to be shot at; Balmoral was to be burned down; the armouries had been attacked; the barracks were undermined; the gas works were to be exploded, the Bank blown up, the water poisoned. Nothing was too infernal or too wicked for the Fenians, and every hour brought some addition to the monstrous stock of canards. North and south, east and west, the English people were in a ferment of anxious alarm; and everywhere Fenianism was cursed as an unholy thing to be cut from society as an ulcerous sore–to be banned and loathed as a pestilence–a foul creation with murder in its glare, and the torch of the incendiary burning in its gory hand. Under these circumstances, there was little chance that an unprejudiced jury could be empanelled for the trial of the Irish prisoners; and their counsel, seeing the danger, sought to avent it by a motion for the postponement of the trials. The Home Secretary was memorialed on the subject, and the application was renewed before the judges in court, but the efforts to obtain justice were fruitless. The blood of the British lion was up; with bloodshot eyes and bristling mane he stood awaiting his prey, and there was danger in trifling with his rage. Even Special commissicns were voted slow, and a cry arose for martial law, Lynch law, or any law that would give the blood of the victims without hindrance or delay. So the appeal for time was spurned; the government was deaf to all remonstrance; British bloodthirstiness carried the day, and the trials proceeded without interruption. We have not patience to rehearse calmly the story of these trials, which will long remain the reproach of British lawyers. We shall not probe the motives which led to the appointment of two such men as Justice Mellor and Justice Blackburne as Judges of the Commission, but history will be at no loss to connect the selection with their peculiar character on the bench. Nor shall we analyze the speeches of the Attorney-General and his colleagues, in which the passions and prejudices of the jury were so dexterously appealed to. The character of the evidence demands more study. The witnesses consisted of the policemen present at the attack, the prisoners who were locked with Kelly and Deasey in the van, and the bystanders who saw the affray or assisted in stoning the prisoners before and after they were captured. They swore with the utmost composure against the four prisoners. Allen was identified as one of the leaders, and he it was whom most of the witnesses declared to have fired through the door. On this point, indeed, as on many others, there was confusion and contradiction in the evidence: some of the witnesses were sure it was O’Brien fired through the door; others were inclined to assign the leading part to Condon; but before the trial had gone far, it seemed to be understood that Allen was the man to whom the death of Brett was to be attributed, and that the business of the witnesses was to connect the other prisoners as closely as possible with his act. On one point nearly all of the witnesses were agreed–whoever there might be any doubt about, there could be none concerning Maguire. Seven witnesses swore positively to having seen him assisting in breaking open the van, and some of them even repeated the words which they said he addressed to them while thus engaged. On the evening of Friday, November 1st, the trials terminated. It was past five o’clock when Judge Mellor concluded his charge. The court was densely crowded, and every eye was strained to mark the effect of the judge’s words upon the countenances of the prisoners; but they, poor fellows, quailed not as they heard the words which they knew would shortly be followed by a verdict consigning them to the scaffold. Throughout the long trial their courage had never flagged, their spirits had never failed them for an instant. Maguire, who had no real connection with the other four, and who knew that the charge against him was a baseless concoction, did, indeed, betray traces of anxiety and bewilderment as the trial progressed; but Allen, O’Brien, Larkin, and Condon went through the frightful ordeal with a heroic display of courage to which even the most malignant of their enemies have paid tribute. The judge has done, and now the jury turned from the box “to consider their verdict.” An hour and twenty minutes they remained absent; then their returning tread was heard. The prisoners turned their eyes upwards; Maguire looked towards them, half hopefully half appealingly; from Allen’s glance nothing but defiance could be read; Larkin fixed his gaze on the foreman, who held the fatal record in his hand, with calm resolution; while a quiet smile played round O’Brien’s lips, as he turned to hear the expected words. “Guilty!” The word is snatched up from the lips of the foreman of the jury, and whispered through the court. They were all “guilty.” So said the jury; and a murmur of applause came rolling back in response to the verdict. “Guilty!” A few there were in that court upon whom the fatal words fell with the bitterness of death, but the Englishmen who filled the crowded gallery and passages exulted at the sound: the vengeance which they longed for was at hand. The murmur died away; the sobs that rose from the dark recesses where a few stricken-hearted women had been permitted to stand were stifled; and then, amidst breathless silence, the voice of the Crown Clerk was heard demanding “if the prisoners had anything to say why sentence of death should not be pronounced on them.” The first to respond was Allen. A slight flush reddened his cheeks, and his eyes lit up with the fire of enthusiasm and determination, as, advancing to the front of the dock, he confronted the Court, and spoke in resolute tones as follows:– “My Lords and Gentlemen–It is not my intention to occupy much of your time in answering your question. Your question is one that can be easily asked, but requires an answer which I am ignorant of. Abler and more eloquent men could not answer it. Where were the men who have stood in the dock–Burke, Emmett, and others, who have stood in the dock in defence of their country? When the question was put, what was their answer? Their answer was null and void. How, with your permission, I will review a portion of the evidence that has been brought against me.” Here Mr. Justice Blackburne interrupted. “It was too late,” he said, “to criticise the evidence, and the Court had neither the right nor the power to alter or review it. If,” he added, “you have any reason to give why, either upon technical or moral grounds, the sentence should not be passed upon you, we will hear it, but it is too late for you to review the evidence to show that it was wrong.” “Cannot that be done in the morning, Sir,” asked Allen, who felt in his heart how easily the evidence on which he had been convicted might be torn to shreds. But the Judge said not. “No one,” he said, “could alter or review the evidence in any way after the verdict had been passed by the jury. We can only” he said in conclusion, “take the verdict as right; and the only question for you is, why judgment should not follow.” Thus restricted in the scope of his observations, the young felon proceeded to deliver the following patriotic and spirited address:– “No man in this court regrets the death of Sergeant Brett more than I do, and I positively say, in the presence of the Almighty and ever-living God, that I am innocent, aye, as innocent as any man in this court. I don’t say this for the sake of mercy: I want no mercy–I’ll have no mercy. I’ll die, as many thousands have died, for the sake of their beloved land, and in defence of it. I will die proudly and triumphantly in defence of republican principles and the liberty of an oppressed and enslaved people. Is it possible we are asked why sentence should not be passed upon us, on the evidence of prostitutes off the streets of Manchester, fellows out of work, convicted felons–aye, an Irishman sentenced to be hung when an English dog would have got off. I say positively and defiantly, justice has not been done me since I was arrested. If justice had been done me, I would not have been handcuffed at the preliminary investigation in Bridge-street; and in this court justice has not been done me in any shape or form. I was brought up here, and all the prisoners by my side were allowed to wear overcoats, and I was told to take mine off. What is the principle of that? There was something in that principle, and I say positively that justice has not been done me. As for the other prisoners, they can speak for themselves with regard to that matter. And now with regard to the way I have been identified. I have to say that my clothes were kept for four hours by the policemen in Fairfield-station, and shown to parties to identify me as being one of the perpetrators of this outrage on Hyde-road. Also in Albert-station there was a handkerchief kept on my head the whole night so that I could be identified the next morning in the corridor by the witnesses. I was ordered to leave on the handkerchief for the purpose that the witnesses could more plainly see I was one of the parties who committed the outrage. As for myself, I feel the righteousness of my every art with regard to what I have done in defence of my country I fear not. I am fearless–fearless of the punishment that can be inflicted on me; and with that, my lords, I have done. (After a moment’s pause)–I beg to be excused. One remark more. I return Mr. Seymour and Mr. Jones my sincere and heartfelt thanks for their able eloquence and advocacy on my part in this affair. I wish also to return to Mr. Roberts the very same. My name, sir, might be wished to be, known. It is not William O’Meara Allen. My name is William Philip Allen. I was born and reared in Bandon, in the county of Cork, and from that place I take my name; and I am proud of my country, and proud of my parentage. My lords, I have done.” A sign of mingled applause and admiration rose faintly on the air, as the gallant young Irishman, inclining his head slightly to the Court, retired to make way at the front, of the bar for one of his companions in misfortune. But his chivalrous bearing and noble words woke no response within the prejudice-hardened hearts of the majority of his auditors; they felt that the fearless words of the fearless youth would overbear all that his accusers had uttered, and that the world would read in them the condemnation, of the government and of the people whose power he so bravely defied. Michael Larkin spoke next. He looked a shade paler than on the first day of the trial, but no want of resolution was expressed in his firm-set face. He gazed with an unquailing glance round the faces eagerly bent forward to catch his words, and then spoke in distinct tones as follows:– “I have only got a word or two to say concerning Serjeant Brett. As my friend here said, no one could regret the man’s death as much as I do. With regard to the charge of pistols and revolvers, and my using them, I call my God as a witness that I neither used pistols, revolvers, nor any instrument on that day that would deprive the life of a child, let alone a man. Nor did I go there on purpose to take life away. Certainly, my lords, I do not want to deny that I did go to give aid and assistance to those two noble heroes that were confined in that van–Kelly and Deasey. I did go to do as much as lay in my power to extricate them out of their bondage; but I did not go to take life, nor, my lords did anyone else. It is a misfortune there was life taken, but if it was taken it was not done intentionally, and the man who has taken life we have not got him. I was at the scene of action, when there were over, I dare say, 150 people standing by there when I was. I am very sorry I have to say, my lord, but I thought I had some respectable people to come up as witnesses against me; but I am sorry to say as my friend said. I will make no more remarks concerning that. All I have to say, my lords and gentlemen, is that so far as my trial went and the way it was conducted, I believe I have got a fair trial. So far as my noble counsel went, they done their utmost in the protection of my life; likewise, my worthy solicitor, Mr. Roberts, has done his best; but I believe as the old saying is a true one, what is decreed a man in the page of life he has to fulfil, either on the gallows, drowning, a fair death in bed, or on the battlefield. So I look to the mercy of God. May God forgive all who have sworn my life away. As I am a dying man, I forgive them from the bottom of my heart. God forgive them.” As Larkin ceased speaking, O’Brien, who stood to the right of him, moved slightly in advance, and intimated by a slight inclination to the Court his intention of addressing them. His stalwart form seemed to dilate with proud defiance and scorn as he faced the ermine-clad dignitaries who were about to consign, him to the gibbet. He spoke with emphasis, and in tones which seemed to borrow a something of the fire and spirit of his words. He said:– “I shall commence by saying that every witness who has sworn anything against me has sworn falsely. I have not had a stone in my possession since I was a boy. I had no pistol in my possession on the day when it is alleged this outrage was committed. You call it an outrage, I don’t. I say further, my name is Michael O’Brien. I was born in the county of Cork, and have the honour to be a fellow-parishioner of Peter O’Neal Crowley, who was fighting against the British troops at Mitchelstown last March, and who fell fighting against British tyranny in Ireland. I am a citizen of the United States of America, and if Charles Francis Adams had done his duty towards me, as he ought to do in this country, I would not be in this dock answering your questions now. Mr. Adams did not come though I wrote to him. He did not come to see if I could not find evidence to disprove the charge, which I positively could, if he had taken the trouble of sending or coming to see what I could do. I hope the American people will notice that part of the business. [The prisoner here commenced reading from a paper he held in his hand.] The right of man is freedom. The great God has endowed him with affections that he may use, not smother them, and a world that may be enjoyed. Once a man is satisfied he is doing right, and attempts to do anything with that conviction, he must be willing to face all the consequences. Ireland, with its beautiful scenery, its delightful climate, its rich and productive lands, is capable of supporting more than treble its population in ease and comfort. Yet no man, except a paid official of the British government, can say there is a shadow of liberty, that there is a spark of glad life amongst its plundered and persecuted inhabitants. It is to be hoped that its imbecile and tyrannical rulers will be for ever driven from her soil, amidst the execration of the world. How beautifully the aristocrats of England moralise on the despotism of the rulers of Italy and Dahomey–in the case of Naples with what indignation did they speak of the ruin of families by the detention of its head or some loved member in a prison. Who have not heard their condemnations of the tyranny that would compel honourable and good men to spend their useful lives in hopeless banishment.” The taunt went home to the hearts of his accusers, and, writhing under the lash thus boldly applied, Judge Blackburne hastened, to intervene. Unable to stay, on legal grounds, the torrent of scathing invective by which O’Brien was driving the blood from the cheeks of his British listeners, the judge resorted to a device which Mr. Justice Keogh had practised very adroitly, and with much success, at various of the State trials in Ireland. He appealed to the prisoner, “entirely for his own sake,” to cease his remarks. “The only possible effect of your observations.” he said, “must be to tell against you with those who have to consider the sentence. I advise you to say nothing more of that sort. I do so entirely for your own sake.” But O’Brien was not the man to be cowed into submission by this artful representation. Possibly he discerned the motive of the interruption, and estimated at its true value the disinterestedness of Judge Blackburne’s “advice.” Mr. Ernest Jones in vain used his influence to accomplish the judge’s object. O’Brien spurned the treacherous bait, and resolutely proceeded:– “They cannot find words to express their horror of the cruelties of the King of Dahomey because he sacrificed 2,000 human beings yearly, but why don’t those persons who pretend such virtuous indignation at the misgovernment of other countries look at home, and see if greater crimes than those they charge against other governments are not committed by themselves or by their sanction. Let them look at London, and see the thousands that want bread there, while those aristocrats are rioting in luxuries and crimes. Look to Ireland; see the hundreds of thousands of its people in misery and want. See the virtuous, beautiful, and industrious women who only a few years ago–aye, and yet–are obliged to look at their children dying for want of food. Look at what is called the majesty of the law on one side, and the long deep misery of a noble people on the other. Which are the young men of Ireland to respect–the law that murders or banishes their people, or the means to resist relentless tyranny and ending their miseries for ever under a home government? I need not answer that question here. I trust the Irish people will answer it to their satisfaction soon. I am not astonished at my conviction. The government of this country have the power of convicting any person. They appoint the judge; they choose the jury; and by means of what they call patronage (which is the means of corruption) they have the power of making the laws to suit their purposes. I am confident that my blood will rise a hundredfold against the tyrants who think proper to commit such an outrage. In the first place, I say I was identified improperly, by having chains on my hands and feet at the time of identification, and thus the witnesses who have sworn to my throwing stones and firing a pistol have sworn to what is false, for I was, as those ladies said, at the jail gates. I thank my counsel for their able defence, and also Mr. Roberts, for his attention to my case.” Edward Maguire spoke next. He might well have felt bewildered at the situation in which he found himself, but he spoke earnestly and collectedly, nevertheless. He had had an experience of British law which, if not without precedent, was still extraordinary enough to create amazement. He knew that he had never been a Fenian; he knew that he never saw Colonel Kelly–never heard of him until arrested for assisting in his liberation; he knew that while the van was being attacked at Bellevue, he was sitting in his own home, miles away; and he knew that he had never in his life placed his foot in the scene of the rescue; yet there he found himself convicted by regular process of law, of the murder of Constable Brett. He had seen witness after witness enter the box, and deliberately swear they saw him take a prominent part in the rescue. He saw policemen and civilians coolly identify him as a ringleader in the affair; he had heard the Crown lawyers weave round him the subtle meshes of their logic; and now he found himself pronounced guilty by the jury, in the teeth of the overwhelming array of unimpeachable evidence brought forward in his defence. What “the safeguards of the Constitution” mean–what “the bulwark of English freedom,” and “the Palladium of British freedom” are worth, when Englishmen fill the jury-box and an Irishman stands in the dock, Maguire had had a fair opportunity of judging. Had he been reflectively inclined, he might, too, have found himself compelled to adopt a rather low estimate of the credibility of English witnesses, when they get an opportunity of swearing away an Irishman’s life. An impetuous man might have been goaded by the circumstances into cursing the atrocious system under which “justice” had been administered to him, and calling down the vengeance of Heaven on the whole nation from which the perjured wretches who swore away his life had been drawn. But Maguire acted more discreetly; he began, indeed, by declaring that all the witnesses who swore against him were perjurers–by vehemently protesting that the case, as regarded him, was one of mistaken identity; but he shortly took surer ground, by referring to his services in the navy, and talking of his unfailing loyalty to “his Queen and his country.” He went through the record of his services as a marine; appealed to the character he had obtained from his commanding officers, in confirmation of his words: and concluded by solemnly protesting his perfect innocence of the charge on which he had been convicted. While Maguire’s impressive words were still ringing in the ears of his conscience-stricken accusers, Edward O’Meagher Condon commenced to speak. He was evidently more of an orator than either of those who had preceded him, and he spoke with remarkable fluency, grace, and vigour. The subjoined is a correct report of his spirited and able address:– “My Lords–this has come upon me somewhat by surprise. It appeared to me rather strange that upon any amount of evidence, which of course was false, a man could have been convicted of wilfully murdering others he never saw or heard of before he was put in prison. I do not care to detain your lordships, but I cannot help remarking that Mr. Shaw, who has come now to gloat upon his victims, alter having sworn away their lives–that man has sworn what is altogether false; and there are contradictions in the depositions which have not been brought before your lordships’ notice. I suppose the depositions being imperfect, there was no necessity for it. As to Mr. Batty, he swore at his first examination before the magistrates that a large stone fell on me, a stone which Mr. Roberts said at the time would have killed an elephant. But not the slightest mark was found on my head; and if I was to go round the country, and him with me, as exhibiting the stone having fallen on me, and him as the man who would swear to it, I do not know which would be looked for with the most earnestness. However, it has been accepted by the jury. Now he says he only thinks so. There is another matter to consider. I have been sworn to, I believe, by some of the witnesses who have also sworn to others, though some of them can prove they were in another city altogether–in Liverpool. Others have an overwhelming alibi, and I should by right have been tried with them; but I suppose your lordships cannot help that. We have, for instance, Thomas, the policeman, who swore to another prisoner. He identified him on a certain day, and the prisoner was not arrested for two days afterwards. As for Thomas, I do not presume that any jury could have believed him. He had heard of the blood-money, and of course was prepared to bid pretty high for it. My alibi has not been strong, and unfortunately I was not strong in pocket, and was not able to produce more testimony to prove where I was at exactly that time. With regard to the unfortunate man who has lost his life, I sympathize with him and his family as deeply as your lordships or the jury, or anyone in the court. I deeply regret the unfortunate occurrence, but I am as perfectly innocent of his blood as any man. I never had the slightest intention of taking life. I have done nothing at all in connection with that man, and I do not desire to be accused of a murder which I have not committed. With regard to another matter, my learned counsel has, no doubt for the best, expressed some opinions on these matters and the misgovernment to which my country has been subjected. I am firmly convinced there is prejudice in the minds of the people, and it has been increased and excited by the newspapers, or by some of them, and to a certain extent has influenced the minds of the jury to convict the men standing in this dock, on a charge of which–a learned gentleman remarked a few nights since–they would be acquitted if they had been charged with murdering an old woman for the sake of the money in her pocket, but a political offence of this kind they could not. Now, sir, with regard to the opinions I hold on national matters–with regard to those men who have been released from that van, in which, unfortunately, life was lost, I am of opinion that certainly to some extent there was an excess. Perhaps it was unthought, but if those men had been in other countries, occupying other positions–if Jefferson Davis had been released in a northern city, there would have been a cry of applause throughout all England. If Garibaldi, who I saw before I was shut out from the world had been arrested, was released, or something of that kind had taken place, they would have applauded the bravery of the act. If the captives of King Theodore had been released, that too would have been applauded. But, as it happened to be in England, of course it is an awful thing, while yet in Ireland murders are perpetrated on unoffending men, as in the case of the riots in Waterford, where an unoffending man was murdered, and no one was punished for it. I do not desire to detain your lordships. I can only say that I leave this world without a stain on my conscience that I have been wilfully guilty of anything in connexion with the death of Sergeant Brett. I am totally guiltless. I leave this world without malice to anyone. I do not accuse the jury, but I believe they were prejudiced. I don’t accuse them of wilfully wishing to convict, but prejudice has induced them to convict when they otherwise would not have done. With reference to the witnesses, every one of them has sworn falsely. I never threw a stone or fired a pistol; I was never at the place, as they have said; it is all totally false. But as I have to go before my God. I forgive them. They will be able to meet me, some day, before that God who is to judge us all, and then they and the people in this Court, and everyone, will know who tells the truth. Had I committed anything against the Crown of England, I would have scorned myself had I attempted to deny it; but with regard to those men, they have sworn what is altogether false. Had I been an Englishman, and arrested near the scene of that disturbance, I would have been brought as a witness to identify them; but being an Irishman, it was supposed my sympathy was with them, and on suspicion of that sympathy I was arrested, and in consequence of the arrest, and the rewards which were offered, I was identified. It could not be otherwise. As I said before, my opinions on national matters do not at all relate to the case before your lordships. We have been found guilty, and, as a matter of course we accept our death as gracefully as possible. We are not afraid to die–at least I am not.” “Nor I,” “Nor I,” “Nor I,” swelled up from the lips of his companions, and then, with a proud smile, Condon continued:– “I have no sin or stain upon me; and I leave this world at peace with all. With regard to the other prisoners who are to be tried afterwards, I hope our blood at least will satisfy the cravings for it. I hope our blood will be enough, and that those men who I honestly believe are guiltless of the blood of that man–that the other batches will get a fair, free, and a more impartial trial. We view matters in a different light from what the jury do. We have been imprisoned, and have not had the advantage of understanding exactly to what this excitement has led. I can only hope and pray that this prejudice will disappear–that my poor country will right herself some day, and that her people, so far from being looked upon with scorn and aversion, will receive what they are entitled to, the respect not only of the civilized world, but of Englishmen. I, too, am an American citizen, and on English territory I have committed no crime which makes me amenable to the crown of England. I have done nothing; and, as a matter of course, I did expect protection–as this gentleman (pointing to Allen) has said, the protection of the ambassador of my government. I am a citizen of the State of Ohio; but I am sorry to say my name is not Shore. My name is Edward O’Meagher Condon. I belong to Ohio, and there are loving hearts there that will be sorry for this. I have nothing but my best wishes to send them, and my best feelings, and assure them I can die as a Christian and an Irishman; and that I am not ashamed or afraid of anything I have done, or the consequences, before God or man. They would be ashamed of me if I was in the slightest degree a coward, or concealed my opinions. The unfortunate divisions of our countrymen in America, have, to a certain extent, neutralized the efforts that we have made either in one direction or another for the liberation of our country. All these things have been thwarted, and as a matter of course we must only submit to our fate. I only trust again, that those who are to be tried after us, will have a fair trial, and that our blood will satisfy the craving which I understand exists. You will soon send us before God, and I am perfectly prepared to go. I have nothing to regret, or to retract, or take back. I can only say, GOD SAVE IRELAND.” Again were the voices of his companions raised in unison. “God save Ireland!” they cried defiantly, in chorus. “God save Ireland!” The cry rung through the packed justice-hall, and fell on the ears of its blood-thirsty occupants like the voice of an accusing angel. “God save Ireland,” they said; and then the brave-hearted fellows gazed fiercely around the hostile gathering, as if daring them to interfere with the prayer. “God save Ireland!”–from the few broken-hearted relatives who listened to the patriots’ prayer the responsive “Amen” was breathed back, and the dauntless young Irishman continued:– “I wish to add a word or two. There is nothing in the close of my political career which I regret. I don’t know of one act which could bring the blush of shame to my face, or make me afraid to meet my God or fellow-man. I would be most happy, and nothing would give me greater pleasure than to die on the field for my country in defence of her liberty. As it is, I cannot die on the field, but I can die on the scaffold, I hope, as a soldier, a man, and a Christian.” And now the last was spoken. As true Irishmen and as true patriots they had borne themselves. No trace of flinching did they give for their enemies to gloat over–no sign of weakness which could take from the effect of their deathless words. With bold front and steady mien they stood forward to listen to the fatal decree their judges were ready to pronounce. The judges produced the black caps, with which they had come provided, and then Justice Mellor proceeded to pass sentence. No person, he said, who had witnessed the proceedings could doubt the propriety of the verdict, which, he insisted, was the result of “a full, patient, and impartial investigation.” He made no distinction. “I am perfectly convinced,” he said, “that all of you had resolved, at any risk, and by any amount of dangerous violence and outrage, to accomplish your object; and that, in fact, Charles Brett was murdered because it was essential to the completion of your common design that he should be.” The stereotyped words of exhortation to repentance followed, and then the judge concluded:– “The sentence is that you, and each of you, be taken hence to the place whence you came, and thence to a place of execution, and that you be there hanged by the neck until you shall be dead, and that your bodies be afterwards buried within the precincts of the prison wherein you were last confined after your respective convictions; and may God, in His infinite mercy, have mercy upon you.” With quiet composure the doomed men heard the words. They warmly shook hands with their counsel, thanked them for their exertions, and then, looking towards the spot where their weeping friends were seated, they turned to leave the dock. “God be with you, Irishmen and Irishwomen!” they cried and, as they disappeared from the court, their final adieu was heard in the same prayer that had swelled upwards to heaven from them before– “GOD SAVE IRELAND!” [Illustration: “GOD SAVE IRELAND!”] Scarcely had the Manchester courthouse ceased to echo those voices from the dock, when the glaring falseness of the verdict became the theme of comment amongst even the most thoroughgoing Englishmen who had been present throughout the trial. Without more ado, down sate some thirty or forty reporters, who, as representatives of the English metropolitan and provincial press, had attended the Commission, and addressed a memorial to the Home Secretary, stating that they had been long accustomed to attend at trials on capital charges; that they had extensive experience of such cases, from personal observation of prisoners in the dock and witnesses on the table; and that they were solemnly convinced, the swearing of the witnesses and the verdict of the jury to the contrary notwithstanding, that the man Maguire had neither hand, act, nor part in the crime for which he had been sentenced to death. The following is the petition referred to:– We, the undersigned members of the metropolitan and provincial Press, having had long experience in courts of justice, and full opportunity of observing the demeanour of prisoners and witnesses in cases of criminal procedure, beg humbly to submit that, having heard the evidence adduced before the Special Commission, on the capital charge preferred against Thomas Maguire, private in the Royal Marines, we conscientiously believe that the said Thomas Maguire is innocent of the crime of which he has been convicted, and that his conviction has resulted from mistaken identity. We, therefore, pray that you will be pleased to advise her Majesty to grant her most gracious pardon to the said Thomas Maguire. This was a startling event; it was a proceeding utterly without precedent. Nothing but the most extraordinary circumstances could have called it forth. The blunder of the jury must have been open, glaring, painfully notorious, indeed, when such an astonishing course was adopted by the whole staff of the English Press. It was most embarrassing. For what had those newspaper reporters seen or heard that the jurors had not seen and heard?–and yet the jurors said Maguire was guilty. What had those reporters seen or heard that the judges had not seen and heard?–and yet the judges said they “fully concurred in the verdict of the jury.” The reporters were not sworn on the Evangelists of God to give a true deliverance–but the jurors were. The reporters were not sworn to administer justice–were not dressed in ermine–were not bound to be men of legal ability, judicial calmness, wisdom, and impartiality–but the judges were. Yet the unsworn reporters told the government Maguire was an innocent man; while judge and jury told the government–swore to it–that he was a guilty murderer! What was the government to do? Was it to act on the verdict of newspaper reporters who had happened to be present at this trial, and not on the verdict of the jury who had been solemnly sworn in the case? Behind the reporters’ verdict lay the huge sustaining power of almost universal conviction, mysteriously felt and owned, though as yet nowhere expressed. Everyone who had calmly and dispassionately weighed the evidence, arrived at conclusions identical with those of the Press jury, and utterly opposed to those of the sworn jury. The ministers themselves–it was a terribly embarassing truth to own–felt that the reporters were as surely right as the jurors were surely wrong. But what were they to do? What a frightful imputation would public admission of that fact cast upon the twelve sworn jurors–upon the two judges? What a damning imputation on their judgment or their impartiality! Was it to be admitted that newspaper reporters could be right in a case so awful, where twelve sworn jurors and two judges were wrong? And then, look at the consequences. The five men were convicted in the one verdict. There were not five separate verdicts, but one indivisible verdict. If the (jurors’) verdict were publicly vitiated–if the government confessed or admitted that verdict to be false–it was not one man, but five men, who were affected by it. To be sure the reporters’ jury, in their verdict, did not include Allen, O’Brien, Larkin, and Shore; but was it to be conveyed by implication that omission from the reporters’ verdict of acquittal was more fatal to a man than inclusion in the verdict of guilty by a sworn jury? Might not twenty, or thirty, or forty men, quite as intelligent as the reporters, be soon forthcoming to testify as forcibly of Allen, O’Brien, Larkin, and Shore, as the Press-men had testified of Maguire? Was it only reporters whose judgment could set aside the verdict of sworn jurors, endorsed by ermined judges? But, in any event, the five men were convicted by the one verdict. To cut that, loosed all–not necessarily in law, perhaps, but inevitably as regarded public conscience and universal judgment; for there was not in all the records of English jurisprudence a precedent for executing men on a verdict acknowledged to have been one of blunder or perjury. Clearly, if the jurors were to be told by the government that, in a case where life and death hung on the issue, they had been so blinded by excitement, passion, or prejudice, that they declared to be a guilty murderer a man whose innocence was patent even to unofficial lookers-on in court, the moral value of such a verdict was gone–ruined for ever; and to hang anyone on such a verdict–on that identical verdict, thus blasted and abandoned–would, it was pointed out, be murder, for all its technical legality; neither more nor less, morally, than cool, deliberate, cold-blooded murder. Everybody saw this; but everyone in England saw also the awkward difficulty of the case. For, to let Allen, O’Brien, Larkin, and Shore go free of death, in the face of their admitted complicity in the rescue, would baulk the national demand for vengeance. It was necessary that some one should be executed. Here were men who, though they almost certainly had had no hand in causing, even accidentally, the death of Brett, dared to boast of their participation in the affray in the course of which that lamentable event unhappily occurred–that rescue which had so painfully wounded and humiliated English national pride. If these men were saved from execution, owing to any foolish scruples about hanging a possibly–nay, probably–innocent man along with them, a shout of rage would ascend from that virtuous nation amongst whom Charlotte Winsor, the professional infant-murderess, walks a free woman, notwithstanding a jury’s verdict of wilful murder and a judge’s sentence of death. So, for a time it seemed that, notwithstanding the verdict of the reporters, the government would act upon the verdict of the jury, and assume it to be correct. No doubt Maguire might be innocent, but it was his misfortune to be included in an indivisible verdict with other men, who, though perhaps as guiltless as he of wilful murder, were surely guilty of riot and rescue, aggravated by the utterance of the most bitter reflections on the British Constitution, which all men know to be the “envy of surrounding nations.” If they were not guilty of the crime laid against them on the trial, they were guilty of something else–they had outraged British pride. It was necessary they should die; and as Maguire’s verdict was not separate from theirs, he must die too, rather than that they should escape. But after a while the idea gained ground in England that this would be rather too monstrous a proceeding. Maguire’s utter innocence of any participation whatsoever in the rescue was too notorious. The character of the witnesses on whose evidence he was convicted became known: some were thieves, pickpockets, or gaol-birds of some other denomination; others were persons palpably confused by panic, excitement, passion, or prejudice. True, these same witnesses were those who likewise swore against Allen, Larkin, O’Brien and Shore. Indeed, a greater number swore against Maguire than against some of the others. Nevertheless, the overwhelming notoriety of the jury’s blunder or perjury, in at least his case, became daily more and more an obstacle to his execution; and eventually, on the 21st of November, it was announced that his conviction had been cancelled, by the only means existing under the perfect laws of Great Britain–namely, a “free pardon” for a crime never committed. The prison doors were opened for Maguire; the sworn jurors were plainly told in effect that their blunder or perjury had well-nigh done the murder of at least one innocent man. The judges were in like manner told that shorthand-writers had been more clear-headed or dispassionate to weigh evidence and judge guilt than they. The indivisible verdict had been openly proclaimed worthless. The news was received with a sense of relief in Ireland, where the wholesale recklessness of the swearing, and the transparent falseness of the verdict had, from the first, created intense indignation and resentment. Everyone knew and saw that, whatever might have been the participation of those men in the rescue of Colonel Kelly, they had not had a fair trial; nay, that their so-called trial was an outrage on all law and justice; that witnesses, jurors and judges, were in the full fierce heat of excitement, panic, and passion–much more ready to swear evidence, to find verdicts, and to pass sentences against innocent men than they themselves were, perhaps, conscious of while labouring under such influences. The public and official recognition of the falseness and injustice of the Manchester verdict was therefore hailed with intense satisfaction. Maguire was at once liberated; Allen, Larkin, Shore, and O’Brien were still detained in custody. It was universally concluded that, notwithstanding the abandonment by the Crown of the verdict on which they had been sentenced, they, because of their admitted complicity in the rescue, would be held to imprisonment–probably penal servitude–for a term of years. Considerable astonishment was excited, some days subsequently to Maguire’s pardon, by a statement that, in the case of the other prisoners included in the verdict, “the law should take its course.” No one credited this declaration for an instant, and most persons felt that the Crown officials were indulging in an indecent piece of mockery. Amidst this universal incredulity, however–this disdainful and indignant disbelief–the prisoners’ solicitor, Mr. Roberts, vigilant and untiring to the last, took the necessary steps to pray arrest of execution pending decision of the serious law points raised on the trial. Some of the most eminent counsel in England certified solemnly that these points were of the gravest nature, and would, in their opinion, be fully established on argument before the judges; in which event the conviction would be legally quashed, independently of the substantial abandonment of it as false and untenable by the Crown in Maguire’s case. The first idea of the merest possibility–the faintest chance–of the remaining four men being executed on the vitiated verdict, arose when it became known that the judges, or some of them, had informally declared to the government (without waiting to hear any argument on the subject) that the points raised by the prisoners’ counsel were not tenable, or were not of force. Mr. Roberts was officially informed that the sentence would infallibly be carried out. By this time barely a few days remained of the interval previous to the date fixed for the execution, and the strangest sensations swayed the public mind in Ireland. Even still, no one would seriously credit that men would be put to death on a verdict notoriously false. Some persons who proposed memorials to the Queen were met on all hands with the answer that it was all “acting” on the part of the government; that, even though it should be at the foot of the scaffold, the men would be reprieved; that the government would not–dare not–take away human life on a verdict already vitiated and abandoned as a perjury or blunder. The day of doom approached; and now, as it came nearer and nearer, a painful and sickening alternation of incredulity and horror surged through every Irish heart. Meanwhile, the Press of England, on both sides of the Channel, kept up a ceaseless cry for blood. The government were told that to let these men off, innocent or guilty, would be “weakness.” They were called upon to be “firm”–that is, to hang first, and reflect afterwards. As the 23rd of November drew near, the opinion began to gain ground, even in England, that things had been too hastily done–that the whole trial bore all the traces of panic–and that, if a few weeks were given for alarm and passion to calm down, not a voice would approve the Manchester verdict. Perceiving this–perceiving that time or opportunity for reflection, or for the subsidence of panic, would almost certainly snatch its prey from vengeance–a deafening yell arose from the raving creatures of blood-hunger, demanding that not a day, not an hour, not a second, should be granted to the condemned. Still the Irish people would not credit that, far towards the close of the nineteenth century, an act so dreadful durst be done. During all this time the condemned lay in Salford gaol, tortured by the suspense inevitably created by Maguire’s reprieve. Although every effort was made by their friends to keep them from grasping at or indulging in hope, the all-significant fact of that release seemed to imperatively forbid the idea of their being executed on a verdict whose falseness was thus confessed. The moment, however, that the singular conduct of the judges in London defeated the application of Mr. Roberts, they, one and all, resigned themselves to the worst; and while their fellow-countrymen at home were still utterly and scornfully incredulous on the subject, devoted their remaining hours exclusively to spiritual preparation for death upon the scaffold. It was now that each character “rushed to its index.” It was now–within the very shadow of death–in the most awful crisis that can test the soul–that these men rose into the grandeur and sublimity of true heroism. They looked death in the face with serene and cheerful composure. So far from requiring consolation, it was they who strove most earnestly to console the grieving friends they were leaving behind; imploring of them to exhibit resignation to the will of God, and assuring them that, ignominious as was death upon the gallows, and terrible as was the idea of suffering such a fate unjustly, it was “not hard to die” with a clear and tranquil conscience, as they were dying, for the cause of native land. It may be questioned whether the martyrology of any nation in history can exhibit anything more noble, more edifying–more elevating and inspiring–than the last hours of these doomed Irishmen. Their every thought, their every utterance, was full of tenderness and holiness–full of firmness and cheerful acceptance of God’s will. The farewell letters addressed by them to their relatives and friends–from which we take a few–amply illustrate the truth of the foregoing observations. Here is O’Brien’s last letter to his brother:– New Bailey Prison, Salford, Nov. 14th, 1867. My dear brother–I have been intending to write to you for some time, but having seen a letter from a Mr. Moore, addressed to the governor of this prison, and knowing from that that you must be in a disagreeable state of suspense, I may therefore let you know how I am at once. With reference to the trial and all connected with it, it was unfair from beginning to end; and if I should die in consequence it will injure my murderers more than it will injure me. Why should I fear to die, innocent as I am of the charge which a prejudiced jury, assisted by perjured witnesses, found me guilty of? I will do judge and jury the justice of saying they believed me guilty of being–a citizen of the United States, a friend to liberty, a hater of relentless cruelty, and therefore no friend to the British government, as it exists in our beautiful island. I must say, though much I would like to live, that I cannot regret dying in the cause of Liberty and Ireland. It has been made dear to me by the sufferings of its people, by the martyrdom and exile of its best and noblest sons. The priest, the scholar, the soldier, the saint, have suffered and died, proudly, nobly: and why should I shrink from death in a cause made holy and glorious by the numbers of its martyrs and the heroism of its supporters, as well as by its justice? You don’t, and never shall, forget that Peter O’Neill Crowley died only a short time since, in this cause. “Far dearer the grave or the prison, Illum’d by one patriot name, Than the trophies of all who have risen On liberty’s ruins to fame.” I should feel ashamed of my manhood if I thought myself capable of doing anything mean to save my life, to get out of here, or for any other selfish purpose. Let no man think a cause is lost because some suffer for it. It is only a proof that those who suffer are in earnest, and should be an incentive to others to be equally so–to do their duty with firmness, justice, and disinterestedness. I feel confident of the ultimate success of the Irish cause, as I do of my own existence. God, in His great mercy and goodness, will strengthen the arm of the patriot, and give him wisdom to free his country. Let us hope that He, in His wisdom, is only trying our patience. The greater its sufferings, the more glorious will He make the future of our unfortunate country and its people. The shriek of the famine-stricken mother and the helpless infant, as well as the centuries of misery, call to heaven for vengeance. God is slow, but just! The blood of Tone, Fitzgerald, Emmett, and others has been shed–how much good has it done the tyrant and the robber? None. Smith O’Brien, McManus, and Mitchel suffered for Ireland, yet not their sufferings, nor those of O’Donovan (Bossa) and his companions, deterred Burke, McAfferty, and their friends from doing their duty. Neither shall the sufferings of my companions, nor mine, hinder my countrymen from taking their part in the inevitable struggle, but rather nerve their arms to strike. I would write on this subject at greater length, but I hope that I have written enough to show you that if a man dies for liberty, his memory lives in the breasts of the good and virtuous. You will also see that there is no necessity for my father, mother, sisters or relations fretting about me. When I leave this world it will be (with God’s help) to go to a better, to join the angels and saints of God, and sing His praises for all eternity. I leave a world of suffering for one of eternal joy and happiness. I have been to Holy Communion, and, please God, intend going shortly again. I am sorry we cannot hear Mass; the good priest is not allowed to say it in this prison. Give my love to my father and mother, to Mary, Ellen, John Phillips, Tim, Catherine, uncles, aunts, and cousins. Farewell. From your affectionate brother, MICHAEL O’BRIEN (alias William Gould). The following is one of Allen’s letters to his relatives, written the day before his execution:– Salford, New Bailey Prison, Nov. 23rd, 1867. TO YOU, MY LOVING AND SINCERE DEAR UNCLE AND AUNT HOGAN, I suppose this is my last letter to you at this side of the grave. Oh, dear uncle and aunt, if you reflect on it, it is nothing. I am dying an honourable death: I am dying for Ireland–dying for the land that gave me birth–dying for the Island of Saints–and dying for liberty. Every generation of our countrymen has suffered; and where is the Irish heart could stand by unmoved? I should like to know what trouble, what passion, what mischief could separate the true Irish heart from its own native isle. Dear uncle and aunt, it is sad to be parting you all, at my early age; but we must all die some day or another. A few hours more and I will breathe my last, and on English soil. Oh, that I could be buried in Ireland! What a happiness it would be to all my friends, and to myself–where my countrymen could kneel on my grave. I cannot express what joy it afforded me, when I found Aunt Sarah and you were admitted. Dear uncle, I am sure it was not a very pleasant place I had to receive you and my aunt; but we must put up with all trials until we depart this life. I am sure it will grieve you very much to leave me in such a place, on the evidence of such characters as the witnesses were that swore my life away. But I forgive them, and may God forgive them. I am dying, thank God! an Irishman and a Christian. Give my love to all friends; same from your ever affectionate nephew, W.P. ALLEN. Pray for us. Good bye, and remember me. Good bye, and may heaven protect ye, is the last wish of your dying nephew, W.P. ALLEN. Larkin was the only one of the condemned four who was married. There were to weep his fall, besides his aged parents, a devoted wife and three little children–all young; and it redounds rather to his honour, that though flinching in nowise, lacking nought in courageous firmness, home ties were painfully strong around his heart. With him it was anguish indeed to part for ever the faithful wife and the little ones who used to nestle in his bosom. Ah! he was never more to feel those little arms twining round his neck–never more to see those infant faces gazing into his own–never more to part the flaxen curls over each unfurrowed brow! Henceforth they would look for his coming and hearken for his footfall in vain! They would call upon him, and be answered only by the convulsive sobs of their widowed mother. And who would now fill his place for them, even as bread-winner? Mayhap, when he lay in the grave, these cherished little ones, for whom he would draw the life-blood from his heart, would feel the hunger-pangs of orphanage in squalid misery and obscurity! But no. If such a thought approached Larkin’s heart, it was at once repelled. Assuredly, he had more faith in his countrymen–more faith in the fidelity and generosity of his race–than to believe they would suffer one of those orphans to want loving, helping, guiding hands. As he himself said, he was not, after all, leaving them fatherless; he was bequeathing them to Ireland and to God. And the Father of the Fatherless, even on the instant, raised up a friend for them–sent an angel missioner of blessed comfort to give poor Larkin, even on the brink of the grave, assurance that no pang of poverty should ever wound those little ones thus awfully bereaved. One day the confessor met the prisoners with beaming face, holding in his hand a letter. It was from the Dowager Marchioness of Queensbury, to the condemned Irishmen in Salford gaol, and ran as follows:– MY DEAR FRIENDS– It may be that those few lines may minister some consolation to you on your approaching departure from this world. I send you by the hands of a faithful messenger some help for your wife, or wives, and children, in their approaching irreparable loss, and with the assurance that so long as I live they shall be cared for to the utmost of my power. Mr. M’Donnell, the bearer of this for me, will bring me their address, and the address of the priest who attends you. It will also be a comfort for your precious souls, to know that we remember you here at the altar of God. where the daily remembrance of that all-glorious sacrifice on Calvary, for you all, is not neglected. We have daily Mass for you here; and if it be so that it please the good God to permit you thus to be called to Himself on Saturday morning, the precious body and blood of our Lord and Saviour and our Friend will be presented for you before God, at eight o’clock, on that day–that blood so precious, that cleanses from all sin. May your last words and thoughts be Jesus. Rest on Him, who is faithful, and willing and all-powerful to save. Rest on Him, and on His sacrifice on that Cross for you, instead of you, and hear Him say, “To-day thou shalt be with me in Paradise.” Yet will we remember your souls constantly at the altar of God, after your departure, as well as those whom you leave in life. Farewell! and may Jesus Christ, the Saviour of sinners, save us all, and give you His last blessing upon earth, and an eternal continuance of it in heaven. CAROLINE QUEENSBURY. This letter enclosed L100. On hearing it read, poor Larkin burst into tears; the other prisoners also were deeply affected. Surely, never was act more noble! Never was woman’s sex more exalted–never was woman’s mission more beautifully exemplified, than by this glorious act of bravery, tenderness, and generosity. Two days before the fatal 23rd, the calm resignation which the condemned by this time enjoyed was once more cruelly disturbed, and almost destroyed. Once again the government came to fill their hearts with the torturing hope, if not, indeed, the strong conviction, that after all, even though it should be at the foot of the gallows, they would one and all be reprieved. Another man of the five included in the vitiated verdict was reprieved–Shore was to have his sentence commuted. This second reprieve was the most refined and subtle torture to men who had made up their minds for the worst, and who, by God’s strengthening gracs, had already become, as it were, dead to the world. It rendered the execution of the remaining men almost an impossibility. Maguire notoriously was innocent even of complicity in the rescue–the verdict of the sworn jury, concurred in by the “learned judge,” to the contrary notwithstanding. But Shore was avowedly a full participator in the rescue. He was no more, no less, guilty than Allen, Larkin, O’Brien. In the dock he proudly gloried in the fact. What wonder if the hapless three, as yet unrespited, found the wild hope of life surging irresistibly through heart and brain! To the eternal honour of the artisans of London be it told, they signalized themselves in this crisis by a humanity, a generosity, that will not soon be forgotten by Irishmen. At several crowded meetings they adopted memorials to the government, praying for the respite of the condemned Irishmen–or rather, protesting against their contemplated execution. These memorials were pressed with a devoted zeal that showed how deeply the honest hearts of English working-men were stirred; but the newspaper press–the “high class” press especially–the enlightened “public instructors”–howled at, reviled, and decried these demonstrations of humanity. The Queen’s officials treated the petitions and petitioners with corresponding contempt; and an endeavour to approach the Sovereign herself, then at Windsor; resulted in the contumelious rejection from the palace gate of the petitioners, who were mobbed and hooted by the tradesmen and flunkeys of the royal household! In Ireland, however, as might be supposed, the respite of Shore was accepted as settling the question: there would be no execution. On the 21st of November men heard, indeed, that troops were being poured into Manchester, that the streets were being barricaded, that the public buildings were strongly guarded, and that special constables were being sworn in by thousands. All this was laughed at as absurd parade. Ready as were Irishmen to credit England with revengeful severity, there was, in their opinion, nevertheless, a limit even to that. To hang Allen, O’Brien, and Larkin now, on the broken-down verdict, would, it was judged, be a measure of outrage which even the fiercest hater of England would frankly declare too great for her. A few there were, however, who did not view the situation thus. They read in the respite of Shore, fear; and they gloomily reflected that justice or magnanimity towards the weak seldom characterizes those who exhibit cowardice towards the strong. Shore was an American. By this simple sentence a flood of light is thrown on the fact of respiting him alone amongst the four men admittedly concerned in the rescue. Shore was an American. He had a country to avenge him if legally slaughtered on a vitiated verdict. To hang him was dangerous; but as for Allen, Larkin, and O’Brien, they had no country (in the same sense) to avenge them. America was strong, but Ireland was weak. If it was deemed dangerous to sport with the life of the American, it was deemed safe to be brutal and merciless towards the Irishmen. On these the full arrear of British vengeance might be glutted. But there were not many to discern, in the first flush of its proclamation, this sinister aspect of Shore’s respite. The news reached Ireland on Friday, 22nd November, and was, as we have already said, generally deemed conclusive evidence that the next day would bring like news in reference to Allen, Larkin, and O’Brien. Early next morning–Saturday, 23rd November, 1867–men poured into the cities and towns of Ireland reached by telegraphic communication, to learn “the news from Manchester.” Language literally fails to convey an idea of the horror–the stupefaction–that ensued when that news was read:– “This morning, at eight o’clock, the three condemned Fenians, Allen, Larkin, and O’Brien, were executed in front of Sulford Gaol.” Men gasped in awe-struck horror–speech seemed denied them. Could it be a dream, or was this a reality? Had men lived to see the day when such a deed could be done? For the reason that incredulity had been so strong before, wild, haggard horror now sat on every countenance, and froze the life-blood in every heart. Irishmen had lain quiescent, persuaded that in this seventh decade of the nineteenth century, some humanizing influences would be found to sway that power that in the past, at least, had ever been so merciless to Irish victims. But now! Alas!– In that dreadful hour the gulf between the two nations seemed widened and deepened, until it gaped and yawned wide, deep, and dark as hell itself. There was a scowl on every brow. Men went about–sullen, moody, silent, morose–with clenched teeth and darkened faces, terrible passions raging in their bosoms. For all knew that the sacrifice of those three Irish patriots was a cold-blooded and cowardly act of English policy, more than a judicial proceeding–an act of English panic, cowardice, hate, and terror. All knew that Allen, Larkin, and O’Brien would never have been hanged on the evidence of those forsworn witnesses, and on the verdict of that jury whose perjury or blunder was openly confessed and proclaimed, but for the political aspirations and designs of which the rescue was judged to be an illustration. Had their offence been non-political, they would not have been held a day on such a verdict. They were put to death for their political opinions. They were put to death for political reasons. Their execution was meant to strike terror into Irishmen daring to mutter of liberty. Had they been Americans, like Shore, they would have been respited; but as they were Irishmen, they were immolated. The full story of how those patriots met their fate at the last reached Ireland two days afterwards, and intensified a thousandfold the national emotions. Men were alternately melted into tears or maddened into passion as they read that sad chapter of Irish martyrdom. Even before the respite of Shore the government had commenced the most formidable military preparations in view of the bloody act of State policy designed for the 23rd. Troops were hurried by rail to all the English cities and towns where an “Irish element” existed; and Manchester itself resembled a city besieged. The authorities called for “special constables,” and, partly attracted by the plenteous supply of drink and free feeding;[1] and partly impelled by their savage fury against the “Hirish” or the “Fenians,”–suddenly become convertible terms with English writers and speakers–a motley mass of several thousands, mainly belonging to the most degraded of the population, were enrolled. All the streets in the neighbourhood of the prison were closed against public traffic, were occupied by police or “specials,” and were crossed at close intervals by ponderous wooden barriers. Positions commanding the space in front of the scaffold were strategetically scanned, “strengthened,” and occupied by military. The scaffold was erected in a space or gap made in the upper part of the outer or boundary wall of the prison in New Bailey-street. The masonry was removed to the width necessary for the scaffold, which was then projected over the street, at the outer side of the wall. It was approached or ascended from the prison yard below, by a long wooden stair or stepladder, close alongside the wall on the inside. Against the wall on the inner side, on either hand of the scaffold, were erected platforms within about four feet below the wall coping. These platforms were filled with soldiers, “crouching down,” as the reporters described, “with the muzzles of their rifles just resting on the top of the wall.” The space in the street immediately beneath the scaffold was railed off by a strong wooden barrier, and outside this barrier were massed the thousands of police, special constables, and volunteers. [Footnote 1: The Manchester papers inform us that the specials were plentifully fed with hot pork pies and beer ad libitum, which seemed to have a powerful effect in bringing in volunteers from the lower classes.] On Friday the doomed men took leave for the last time of the few relatives allowed to see them. The parting of Larkin and his family is described as one of the most agonizing scenes ever witnessed. Poor Allen, although not quite twenty years of age, was engaged to a young girl whom he loved, and who loved him, most devotedly. She was sternly refused the sad consolation of bidding him farewell. In the evening the prisoners occupied themselves for some time in writing letters, and each of them drew up a “declaration,” which they committed to the chaplain. They then gave not another thought to this world. From that moment until all was over, their whole thoughts were centred in the solemn occupation of preparing to meet their Creator. In these last hours Father Gadd, the prison chaplain, was assisted by the Very Rev. Canon Cantwell and the Rev. Father Quick, whose attentions were unremitting to the end. From the first the prisoners exhibited a deep, fervid religious spirit, which could scarcely have been surpassed among the earliest Christian martyrs. They received Holy Communion every alternate morning, and spent the greater part of their time in spiritual devotion. On Friday evening they were locked up for the night at the usual hour,–about half-past six o’clock. In their cells they spent a long interval in prayer and meditation–disturbed ever and anon, alas! by the shouts of brutal laughter and boisterous choruses of the mob already assembled outside the prison walls. At length the fated three sought their dungeon pallets for the last time. “Strange as it may appear,” says one of the Manchester papers chronicling the execution, “those three men, standing on the brink of the grave, and about to suffer an ignominious death, slept as soundly as had been their wont.” Very “strange,” no doubt, it appeared to those accustomed to see criminals die; but no marvel to those who know how innocent men, at peace with God and man, can mount the scaffold, and offer their lives a sacrifice for the cause of liberty. Far differently that night was spent by the thronging countrymen of Broadhead, who came as to a holiday to see the “Fenians” die. Early on the preceding evening crowds had taken up their places wherever the occupying bodies of military, police, or specials did not prevent; and the pictures drawn of their conduct by the newspaper reporters, one and all, are inexpressibly revolting. It was the usual English crowd assembled to enjoy an execution. They made the air resound with laughter at obscene jokes, shouts, cries and repartees; and chorused in thousands [beneath the gallows!] snatches of “comic” ballads and pot-house songs, varied by verses of “Rule, Brittania” and “God save the Queen,” by way of exultation over the Irish. Once or twice, in the early part of the night, the police had to remove the mob from the portion of the prison nearest the condemned cells, as the shouts and songs were painfully disturbing the hapless men engaged at that moment preparing for eternity. Saturday, the 23rd November, dawned misty, murky, dull, and cold over Salford. During the first hours after the past midnight the weather had been clear and frosty, and a heavy hoar covered the ground; but as daylight approached, a thick mist or fog crept like a pallid pall over the waking city. The condemned were roused from sound and tranquil slumbers about a quarter to five o’clock. Having dressed, they attended Mass, Rev. Canon Cantwell, Rev. Mr. Gadd, and Rev. Mr. Quick officiating. They heard this, their last Mass, with a fervour and solemnity which no words could describe. The Holy Sacrifice having been offered, the condemned and the three priests remained in prayer and spiritual exercises until seven o’clock, when the prisoners partook of breakfast. “The last preparations,” says an English eye-witness, “were then begun. At twelve minutes to eight o’clock the executioner, Calcraft, and his assistant, were introduced into the cell in which the prisoners were placed, and the process of pinioning their arms was gone through. The priests stood by the side of the unhappy men,