Later Revolts

While O'Connell's agitation to restore the Irish Parliament was going on, a new party came into existence in Ireland. This party consisted, to a large degree, of young men, who desired, not only that should the Irish Parliament be revived, but that Ireland should become altogether independent of England. Its members were not satisfied with the moderate demands of O'Connell; nor did they accept O'Connell's idea, that in no event should Irishmen fight for their liberties. They believed that when all other means of securing the freedom of their country failed, Irishmen should take up arms in her cause. The leading spirits of this "Young Ireland" party, as it was called, were Thomas Davis, John Blake Dillon, Gavan Duffy, Smith O'Brien, John Mitchel, Thomas Francis Meagher, and John Martin. All of them were young men. Dillon and Duffy were Catholics. O'Brien, Mitchel, Davis, and Martin were Protestants. Every one of these men was an undoubted patriot.

The first step of the Young Ireland party was to found a newspaper, which they called "The Nation" (1842). It forcibly advocated Ireland's cause. It presented vivid pictures of the wrongs under which Ireland was suffering. It did not approve of O'Connell's course and methods. The ability with which "The Nation" was conducted won for it wide-spread influence in Ireland. Soon after O'Connell's death, John Mitchel, impatient of the delay of the Young Irelanders in taking up arms, founded another paper, "The United Irishman," which boldly advocated insurrection. Mitchel was arrested, tried for treason, and transported beyond seas for fourteen years. Immediately another paper, "The Irish Tribune," edited by Kevin Izod O'Doherty, was issued, urging the people to rebel; and soon after, yet another journal, edited by John Martin, and devoted to the same object, made its appearance. O'Doherty, Martin, and others were arrested; and the government made a strenuous attempt to crush out Irish disaffection by suspending the habeas corpus act.

These events were followed by the breaking-out of the third French revolution. The Young Ireland party caught from France the spirit of revolt (1848). Smith O'Brien took the lead of the Irish insurgents. With Dillon and Meagher, he made a desperate effort to persuade the people at various points to rise in arms. The attempt, however, was a disheartening failure. In two or three places disturbances occurred, but the triumph of the government was easy. The leaders were speedily captured. O'Brien and Meagher were transported for life, and O'Doherty and Martin for ten years. Dillon escaped to the United States. Duffy was released, after a failure to convict him. In the following year, another feeble attempt at insurrection was made, but was quickly suppressed. The wretchedness of the Irish tenantry again caused a marked increase in emigration. The landlords exacted rents which it was impossible for the tenants to pay; and, when they did not pay, the landlords remorselessly turned them out of their little holdings, often to starve or freeze to death by the roadside.

For many years after the failure of the rising of Young Ireland, indeed, the history of the island consists of the story of the miseries produced by the Irish land-system. Not only did the landlords demand high rents, and "evict," or turn out, the tenants unable to pay them; but they also reaped the advantage of the added value of the land, caused by the improvements made upon it by the tenants. When such improvements had been added, the rents were raised in consequence of the increase thus effected in the value of the land. This was called "rack-renting." The officers of the law aided the landlords to collect their rents and to turn out their tenants. The tenants had no protection from any source. Thousands were thus reduced to the most desperate poverty. The result was, that many acts of violence took place in different parts of the island. Landlords and their agents went about in peril of their lives. Cattle were maimed; and houses, barns, and hay-ricks were burned. The attempts made by the British Parliament to remedy these terrible evils in Ireland were fitful, and did not prove effectual.

Ten years after the suppression of the Young Ireland revolt, another and far more formidable society was formed, for the purpose of obtaining the separation of Ireland from Great Britain by force of arms (1858). The leaders of the Young Ireland revolt had been amnestied, and were once more free men. Some of them had returned home; and these entered upon a fresh effort to secure freedom for their country. They formed what is now famous as the "Fenian brotherhood." At its head was James Stevens, a resolute and able man, who had taken part in the rising of 1848. At first it seemed as if the Fenian conspiracy would be as short-lived as that of Young Ireland. Its secret meetings were revealed to the government, and its chiefs were arrested and thrown into jail. But it was aided and supported, to an extent that no previous conspiracy had been, by the Irish in the United States. Branches of the society were formed in American cities and towns. Funds were raised, and men provided, for the operations of the brotherhood.

In the year following the close of the American civil war (1866), the Fenians had become a widespread and powerful association. A Fenian paper, "The Irish People," had been established. Stevens, the "head center" of the Fenians, who had been captured, had escaped from prison, and was again actively employed in the projects of the society. The arrest and transportation of some of the other leaders had only increased the popularity of the brotherhood among the Irish. The American Fenians organized a well-trained force, which invaded Canada, defeated the Canadian volunteers sent to oppose them, and were only deterred from a further advance by the intervention of the United States. At about the same time a plot was formed by the Fenians in England to seize the castle of Chester, and thence make a descent upon Ireland. This project was revealed to the British cabinet by treacherous Fenians, and was therefore not attempted. Early in the following year, the Fenians tried to incite a general revolt in Ireland; but this, too, proved an utter failure. The government had again suspended the habeas corpus; and, following upon the discomfiture of the Fenian plans, large numbers of those who had been concerned in them, were arrested, hastily tried, convicted, and punished with imprisonment and transportation.

In spite of all these failures, Fenianism was not yet crushed. Two startling events, which took place in the same year (1867), reminded the world that its fierce spirit still survived. The first of these events occurred at Manchester, England. Two Fenians were one day being taken in a prison-van from the court-house, where they had just been convicted, to jail. As the van was passing through the streets, it was assailed by a party of armed Irishmen, who attempted to rescue the prisoners. In the struggle which ensued, a policeman named Brett was killed by the assailants. The latter were captured; and, after a brief trial, three of them—O'Brien, Larkin, and Allen—were condemned to death and executed. Their fate caused intense agitation throughout Ireland. The three men were looked upon as martyrs; and great gatherings took place in Ireland, to celebrate their funerals. Many prominent Englishmen tried to save their lives, but the appeals of men like John Bright and John Stuart Mill proved unavailing.

THE MANCHESTER TRAGEDY.

Less than a month after the execution of the Manchester rescuers, a barbarous attempt was made to blow up Clerkenwell prison in London. Some Fenians were incarcerated in this prison, and one of their comrades, a man named Barrett, took it into his head to try to release them by shattering the prison-wall with gunpowder. He placed a barrel of powder near the wall, and set it off. The result was, not to effect the escape of the Fenian prisoners, but to kill several innocent persons, and to injure many more. Nothing could be more stupid or cruel than this crime. It made Fenianism obnoxious to many Irishmen who had before sympathized with the society, and it aroused indignation throughout the world. Barrett was tried and hung. But the Manchester and Clerkenwell affairs had at least one striking result. They showed how bitterly the Irish continued to regard the unjust laws, institutions, and oppressions, to which they were still subjected by English power; and they aroused a great English statesman to sternly resolve that he would seek out, and try to remedy, the evils which had created and fostered Irish discontent.