Lecture 3: Fenianism
Themes that dominated
Irish life and politics 1848 –
c. mid 1870s
The altered social balance in the countryside
The development of expatriate nationalism
The modernisation of Ulster’s economy &
politics
The emergence of a disciplined nationalist
parliamentary party
‘A whole variety of parties and
groups emerged, some
campaigning on the issue of the
land, and especially tenant right;
some concerned to promote the
interests of their particular
social or religious constituency.’
Boyce, Nineteenth Century Ireland,
p136.
Politics in post-Famine
Ireland
1. Tenant League
2. Catholic Defence
Association
3. Protestant Conservatism
Irish Tenant League
Formed in Dublin in 1850
Campaigned for a redress of agrarian
grieveances
Operated on an all island basis
Formed the Indepdendent Irish Party
with the ‘Irish Brigade’
National Association
Formally instituted in Dublin in December
1864
Facilitated co-operation between Irish
Catholics and English radicals
Promoted disestablishment
Fenianism – origins
Developed in the absence of a
viable constitutional movement
Offered rhetoric, recreation, status
and the prospect of patriotic glory
Denis Dowling Mulcahy, Thomas Clarke Luby and
John O’Leary
Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa
(1831-1915)
The I.R.B.
Dedicated to secrecy
A conspiratorial pledge bound
society
Establishment of a democratic
Irish republic
Committed to insurrection
Organised Fenianism was patchy
Strongest in Munster and
Leinster
1864: 54,000 recruits
Appealed mainly to artisans,
shop assistants, travelling
salesmen, farmers’ sons
Fenian prisoner, Hugh McGriskin, 31 May
1865
Fenianism: The social aspect
A young men’s movement – 87% of
Fenians in HCSA files were under 36
years of age
Fenianism in mid 1860s was converted
to a social purpose
Provided young men with a forum for
fraternal association & communal selfexpression
‘However strongly they may
have repudiated allegiance to
the queen in their initiation
oath, the Fenians we have been
looking at here were from the
point of view of social history
easily recognisable and fairly
typical mid-Victorians.’
Comerford, R.V., ‘Patriotism as
Pastime’, p250.
‘Ireland’s opportunity will come
when England is engaged in a
desperate struggle with some
great European power or European
combination, or when the flame of
insurrection has spread through
her Indian Empire, and her
strength and resources are
strained.’
John Devoy, Irish American Fenian
The Fenians in 1865
Stephens – 1865 would be a year of decision, a year
in which, with American assistance, he would
probably lead a rising in Ireland
John O’Mahoney sent large sums of money to Ireland
from America
Irish-American veterans of the Civil War were sent to
Ireland to take charge of the rebel army
6,000 firearms and an estimated 50,000 men willing
to participate
By 1866 the IRB was on the defensive
September 1865: Offices
of the Irish People raided
February 1866: Habeas
Corpus suspended in Ireland
December 1866: Stephens
stands down
February 11 1867: 1,000 Fenians
turn out to raid the arsenal at
Chester
February 1867: Minor uprising in
Co. Kerry
February 10 1867: Executive
committee transforms itself into a
Provisional Government of Ireland
Illustration entitled ‘The Irish Fenian
Executive’
Fenian bond for twenty dollars,
signed by John O’Mahony, 1866
A skirmish between troops and Fenians in Co.
Tipperary, March 1867
The Battle of Tallaght, 5 March 1867
‘The aftermath of the 1867 rising had in
some ways a much more fundamental
political impact than the military
episodes of February and March: the
immediate fall-out from the ’67 certainly
stimulated a much more intense and
sympathetic popular interest than the
botched manoeuvres of the rebels.’
Jackson, A, Ireland: 1798-1998, pp1023.
Fenian attack on a prison van in
Manchester, September 1867
The ‘Manchester Martyrs’
Tipperary election address, 1869
Cartoon published by Punch in 1867 after the
Clerkenwell explosion
Proclamation offering one thousand pounds for the
capture of James Stephens, January 1866
Courtroom scene, Kilmallock, Co.
Limerick, 1867