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Title: Secret Service Under Pitt

Author: William John Fitzpatrick

Release Date: January 25, 2016 [EBook #51030]

Language: English

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PREFACE

These rough notes—begun long ago and continued at slow intervals—were put aside during the onerous task of editing for Mr. Murray the O'Connell Correspondence. The recent publication of Mr. Lecky's final volumes, awakening by their grasp a fixed interest in pre-Union times, and confirming much that by circumstantial evidence I had sought to establish, affords a reason, perhaps, that my later researches in the same field ought not to be wholly lost. Mr. Lecky's kindness in frequently quoting me[1] merits grateful acknowledgment, not less than his recognition of some things that I brought to light as explanatory of points to which the State Papers afford no clue. This and other circumstances encourage me in offering more.

My sole purpose at the outset was to expose a well-cloaked case of long-continued betrayal by one of whom Mr. Froude confesses that all efforts to identify had failed;[2] but afterwards it seemed desirable to disclose to the reader a wider knowledge of an exciting time.[3] In various instances a veil will be found lifted, or a visor unlocked, revealing features which may prove a surprise. Nor is the story without a moral. The organisers of illegal societies will see that, in spite of the apparent secrecy and ingenuity of their system, informers sit with them at the [Pg vi]same council-board and dinner-table, ready at any moment to sell their blood; and that the wider the ramifications of conspiracy, the greater becomes the certainty of detection.

It may be that some of these researches are more likely to interest and assist students of the history of the time than to prove pleasant reading for those who take up a book merely for enjoyment. Yet if there is truth in the axiom that men who write with ease are read with difficulty, and vice versâ, these chapters ought to find readers. Every page had its hard work. Tantalising delays attended at times the search for some missing—but finally discovered—link. Indeed, volumes of popular reading, written currente calamo, might have been thrown off for a tithe of the trouble.

'If the power to do hard work is not talent,' writes Garfield, 'it is the best possible substitute for it. Things don't turn up in this world until somebody turns them up.' Readers who, thanks to Froude and Lecky, have been interested by glimpses of men in startling attitudes, would naturally like to learn the curious sequel of their subsequent history. This I have done my best to furnish. The present volume is humbly offered as a companion to the two great works just alluded to. But it will also prove useful to readers of the Wellington, Castlereagh, Cornwallis, and Colchester Correspondence. These books abound in passages which, without explanation, are unintelligible. The matter now presented forms but a small part of the notes I have made with the same end.

A word as regards some of the later sources of my information. The Pelham MSS. were not accessible when Mr. Froude wrote. Thomas Pelham, second Earl of Chichester, was Irish Secretary from 1795 to 1798, but his correspondence until 1826 deals largely with Ireland, and I have read as much of it as would load a float. Another mine was found in the papers, ranging from 1795 to 1805, which filled two iron-clamped chests in Dublin Castle, guarded with the Government[Pg vii] seal and bearing the words 'Secret and Confidential: Not to be Opened.' These chests were for a long time familiar objects exteriorly, and when it was at last permitted to disturb the rust of lock and hinge, peculiar interest attended the exploration. Among the contents were 136 letters from Francis Higgins, substantially supporting all that I had ventured to say twenty years before in the book which claimed to portray his career. But neither the Pelham Papers in London nor the archives at Dublin Castle reveal the great secret to which Mr. Froude points.

That so many documents have been preserved is fortunate. Mr. Ross, in his preface to the Cornwallis Correspondence, laments that 'the Duke of Portland, Lord Chancellor Clare, Mr. Wickham, Mr. King, Sir H. Taylor, Sir E. Littlehales, Mr. Marsden, and indeed almost all the persons officially concerned, appear to have destroyed the whole of their papers.' He adds: 'The destruction of so many valuable documents respecting important transactions cannot but be regarded as a serious loss to the political history of these times.'

I have freely used the Registry of Deeds Office, Dublin—a department peculiar to Ireland. Originating in penal times, its object was to trace any property acquired by Papists—such being liable to 'discovery and forfeiture.' This office served as a valuable curb in the hands of the oppressor, and ought to prove a not less useful aid to historic inquirers; but, hitherto, it has been unconsulted for such purposes. Few unless legal men can pursue the complicated references and searches, and—unlike the Record Office—fees attend almost every stage of the inquiry. Here things stranger than fiction nestle; while the genealogist will find it an inexhaustible store.

I have to thank the Right Hon. the O'Conor Don, D.L.; Sir William H. Cope, Bart.; Mrs. John Philpot Curran;[Pg viii] Daniel O'Connell, Esq., D.L.; D. Coffey, Esq.; Jeremiah Leyne, Esq.; the late Lord Donoughmore, and the late Mr. Justice Hayes for the communication of manuscripts from the archives of their respective houses. The Rev. Samuel Haughton, F.T.C.D., kindly copied for me some memoranda made in 1798 by the Rev. John Barrett, Vice-Provost T.C.D., regarding students of alleged rebel leanings. Sir Charles Russell, when member for Dundalk, obligingly made inquiries concerning Samuel Turner; Mr. Lecky transcribed for me a curious paper concerning Aherne, the rebel envoy in France, and has been otherwise kind. My indebtedness to Sir Bernard Burke, Keeper of the Records, Dublin Castle, dates from the year 1855.

The late Brother Luke Cullen, a Carmelite monk, left at his death a vast quantity of papers throwing light on the period of the Rebellion. No writer but myself has ever had the use of these papers, and I beg to thank the Superior of the Order to which Mr. Cullen belonged for having, some years ago, placed them in my hands.

The array of notes and authorities on every page is not the best way to please an artistic eye; but in a book of this sort they are indispensable and would be certainly expected from the oldest living contributor to 'Notes and Queries.'

While there are many persons who enjoy a fox hunt, there are others would vote it a bore; and readers of this mind had better, perhaps, pass over the various stages of my chase after Samuel Turner, and come to something that may suit them better.

49 Fitzwilliam Square, Dublin:
New Year's Day, 1892.

CONTENTS

[Pg 1]

SECRET SERVICE UNDER PITT

CHAPTER I
A MYSTERIOUS VISITOR

It is now some years since Mr. Froude invested with new interest the Romance of Rebellion. Perhaps the most curious of the episodes disclosed by him is that where, after describing the plans and organisation of the United Irishmen, he proceeds to notice a sensational case of betrayal.[4]

[Pg 7]

The betrayer, before his interview with Downshire closed, supplied him with a list of the Executive Committee of United Irishmen. This list, duly given by Mr. Froude, includes—

Lord Downshire, who negotiated in this affair, had weight with Pitt. The husband of an English peeress, and the son of Lord North's Secretary of State, he was a familiar figure at Court. He had sat for two English constituencies; and in the Irish Parliament as senator, borough proprietor, governor of his county, and one of the Privy Council, he wielded potent sway. His later history and fall belong to chapter ix.

CHAPTER II
ARRESTS MULTIPLY

It was not easy to separate the threads of the tangled skein which Mr. Froude found hidden away in the dust of the past. But, lest the process of unravelling should tax the reader's patience, I have transferred to an Appendix some points of circumstantial evidence which led me, at first, to suspect, and finally to feel convinced, that 'the person' was no other than Samuel Turner, Esq., LL.D., barrister-at-law, of Turner's Glen, Newry—one of the shrewdest heads of the Northern executive of United Irishmen.[27] Pitt made a good stroke by encouraging his overtures, but, like an expert angler, ample line was given ere securing fast the precious prey.

One can trace, through the public journals of the time, that the betrayer's disclosures to Downshire were followed by a decided activity on the part of the Irish Government. The more important of the marked men were suffered to continue at large, but the names having been noted Lord Camden was able, at the threatened outburst of the rebellion, to seize them at once. Meanwhile an influential London paper, the 'Courier' of November 24, 1797, gave a glimpse of the system that then prevailed by announcing the departure from Dublin for England of Dr. Atkinson, High Constable of Belfast, charged, it is said, with full powers from Government to arrest such persons as have left Ireland, and against whom there are charges of a treasonable or seditious nature.

[Pg 9]

'The young apostate of Down'—thus indicated for English readers ninety years ago—was Lord Castlereagh, afterwards Minister for Foreign Affairs, and well twitted by Byron for his Toryism; but who, in 1790, had been elected, after a struggle of two months' duration and an outlay of 60,000l., Whig Member for Down. Like Pitt, he began as a reformer; like Disraeli, he avowed himself a Radical; and presided at a banquet where toasts were drunk such as 'Our Sovereign Lord the People.' Ere long his policy changed, and his memory is described as having the faint sickening smell of hot blood about it.

Mr. Froude's work has been several years before the world; it has passed through various editions. Thousands of readers have been interested by his picture of the muffled figure gliding at dark to breathe in Downshire's ear most startling disclosures, but no attempt to solve the mystery enshrouding it has until now been made.[29]

The name of Samuel Turner obtains no place on the list of Secret Service moneys[30] expended by the Irish Government in 1798—thus bearing out the statement of Mr. Froude that the name of the mysterious 'person' was not revealed in the most secret correspondence between the Home Office and Dublin Castle. At the termination of the troubles, however, [Pg 10]when the need of secrecy became less urgent, and it was desirable to bestow pensions on 'persons who had rendered important service during the rebellion,' the name of Samuel Turner is found in the Cornwallis Papers as entitled to 300l. a year. But a foot-note from the indefatigable editor—Mr. Ross—who spared no labour to acquire minute information, confesses that it has been found impossible to procure any particulars of Turner.

For years I have investigated the relations of the informers with the Government, and Samuel Turner is the only large recipient of 'blood-money' whose services remain to be accounted for. Turner's name never appeared in any printed pension list. Mr. Ross found the name at Dublin Castle, with some others, in a 'confidential memorandum,' written for the perusal of the Lord Lieutenant, whose fiat became necessary. The money was 'given by a warrant dated December 20, 1800,' but the names were kept secret—the payments being confidentially made by the Under-Secretary.

At this distance of time it is not easy to trace a life of which Mr. Ross, thirty years earlier, failed to catch the haziest glimpse; but I hope to make the case clear, and Turner's history readable.

Previous to 1798 he is found posing in the double rôle of martyr and hero—winning alternately the sympathy and admiration of the people. Mr. Patrick O'Byrne, an aged native of Newry, long connected with an eminent publishing firm in Dublin, has replied to a letter of inquiry by supplying some anecdotes in Turner's life. It is a remarkable proof of the completeness with which Turner's perfidy was cloaked that Mr. O'Byrne never heard his honesty questioned.[31]

[Pg 12]

The general accuracy of Mr. O'Byrne's impressions is shown by the 'Life and Confessions of Newell the Informer,' printed for the author at London in 1798.[32] Newell travelled with the staff of Lord Carhampton, and in April, 1797, witnessed the scene between Turner and him.

Newell's pamphlet, which created much noise at the time and had a large circulation, did not tend to weaken popular confidence in Turner. It appeared soon after the time that he had begun to play false; but Newell, with all his cunning, had no suspicion of Turner.

The late Mr. J. Mathews, of Dundalk, collected curious details regarding the rebel organisation of Ulster in 1797. With these details the name of Samuel Turner is interwoven, but, although the object of Mathews was to expose the treachery of some false brothers, he assigns to Turner the rank of a patriot and a hero. How the authorities, by a coup, made a number of arrests, is described; and how Turner, after some exciting adventures, got safely to France.[33]

The spy on this occasion was Mr. Conlan, a medical practitioner in Dundalk. A sworn information, signed by Conlan, is preserved among the Sirr MSS. in Trinity College, Dublin. It is dated 1798, when Turner himself was betraying his own colleagues to Pitt! Conlan states that one evening, after Turner had left his house at Newry to attend a meeting of United Irishmen at Dundalk, the officer in command at the barracks of Newry got orders to march on Dundalk and arrest the leaders. An officer's servant apprised Corcoran, who was an adherent of Turner's. Corcoran mounted a horse and galloped to Dundalk, where he arrived in time to warn Turner. Conlan recollected Turner and Teeling travelling through Ulster and holding meetings for organisation at Dundalk, Newry, Ballinahinch (the site of the subsequent battle), Ronaldstown, Glanary, and in Dublin at [Pg 13]Kearn's, Kildare Street,[34] where the principal meetings were held.[35]

I find in the Pelham MSS. the examination of Dr. John Macara, one of the Northern State prisoners of 1797. It supplies details of the plan of attack which had been foiled by the arrests. 'Newry was to be attacked by Samuel Turner, of Newry aforesaid, with the men from Newry and Mourn.'[36]

It was not Conlan alone who reported Turner's movements to the Crown. Francis Higgins, the ablest secret agent of Under-Secretary Cooke, announces that Turner had sent 'letters from Portsmouth for the purpose of upholding and misleading the mutinous seamen into avowed rebellion;'[37] and some weeks later he states that 'Turner had returned from Hamburg with an answer to the Secret Committee of United Irishmen.'[38]

We know on the authority of James Hope, who wrote down his 'Recollections' of this time at the request of a friend, that Turner, having fled from Ireland, filled the office of resident agent at Hamburg of the United Irishmen. The Irish envoys and refugees, finding themselves in a place hardly less strange [Pg 14]than Tierra del Fuego, ignorant of its language, its rules and its ways, sought on arrival the accredited agent of their brotherhood, hailed him with joy, and regarded the spot on which he dwelt as a bit of Irish soil sacred to the Shamrock. The hardship which some of the refugees went through was trying enough. James Hope, writing in 1846, says that Palmer, one of Lord Edward's bodyguard in Dublin, travelled, 'mostly barefooted, from Paris to Hamburg, where he put himself into communication with Samuel Turner.' The object of Palmer's mission was to expose one Bureaud, then employed as a spy by Holland. 'Palmer,' writes Hope, 'gave Turner a gold watch to keep for him.' He enlisted in a Dutch regiment, and was found drowned in the Scheldt. 'When Turner,' adds Hope, 'was applied to for the watch by Palmer's sister, he replied that he forgot what became of it.'

Hamburg in troubled times was a place of great importance for the maintenance of intercourse between England and France. Here, as Mr. Froude states, 'Lord Downshire's friend' had vast facilities for getting at the inmost secrets of the United Irishmen. Hope's casual statement serves to show how it was that this 'person' could have had access to Lady Edward Fitzgerald's confidence, and that of her political friends at Hamburg.

CHAPTER III
FATHER O'COIGLY HANGED

Mr. Froude, after a perusal of the letters of Downshire's friend, and other documents, states that a priest named O'Coigly or Quigley 'had visited Paris in 1797, returned to Dublin, and had been with Lord Edward Fitzgerald at Leinster House; that he was now going back to Paris, and Arthur O'Connor determined to go in his company.[39] Their mission, though ostensibly for presenting an address from the London corresponding society of United Irishmen to the French Government, was really for the double purpose of urging upon it the prompt despatch of an invading fleet to Ireland, and of deposing the Irish envoy, Lewins, who, instead of Turner, had begun to be suspected. Mr. Lawless, afterwards Lord Cloncurry, invited O'Coigly to dinner in London; and it was on this occasion that O'Connor met the priest for the first time. O'Coigly, under the name of Captain Jones, with Allen[40] seemingly as his servant, and Leary, left London for Margate, on their mission of mystery. O'Connor travelled by another route to Margate, took the name of Colonel Morris, and was accompanied by Binns. On the following day, at the King's Head Inn, Margate, all the party were arrested by two Bow Street officers. O'Coigly and O'Connor had dined at Lawless's lodgings more than once; and here, though not necessarily with his knowledge, the travelling arrangements seem to have been made. Whether Turner was a guest does not appear; but he was certainly in London at this time, and as one of the Executive [Pg 16]Committee is likely to have been invited. Presently it will be shown that from this quarter came all the information which enabled Pitt to seize O'Connor and O'Coigly at Margate en route to France, although, to elude observation, they had journeyed by different roads. The prisoners, meanwhile, were removed to London, examined before the Privy Council, and then transmitted to Maidstone Jail to await their trial. The source of the information which caused these historic arrests on February 27, 1798, has hitherto remained a mystery. Father O'Coigly, while in jail, wrote some letters, in which he failed to avow his share in the conspiracy, but admitted to have made a previous visit to Cuxhaven. This was part of the city of Hamburg. Turner, in addition to being the official agent of the United Irishmen at Hamburg, was an old Dundalk acquaintance of O'Coigly's, and no doubt was promptly hailed by the country priest.

Turner and O'Coigly are mentioned in Hughes's information. They belonged to the same district organisation. After describing Teeling, Turner and Lowry working in concert in 1797, Hughes adds that priest Quigly or O'Coigly introduced him at that time to Baily and Binns.[41] The paper revealed by Mr. Froude, now shown to be Turner's, and other letters from the same hand in the 'Castlereagh Papers,' show that the writer always felt a strong dislike to work with the 'Papists,' especially priests. 'Casey, the red-faced, designing Dublin priest,' was one of the leading men he met in Dublin, and whose 'prudence or cowardice' disgusted him. Immediately after O'Coigly's return to London we find the authorities on his track. The priest himself refers to an abortive attempt to arrest him by night at Piccadilly.[42] Mr. Froude, dealing with this case, does not seem to have suspected that the arrival in London of Downshire's friend, at the time of the arrests at Margate, was other than accidental. Yet clearly it was business of no ordinary moment which brought him back to London [Pg 17]at this time. It will be remembered that, panic-stricken and fearing death from the assassin's knife, he had returned to Hamburg in October 1797, ere an answer came from Pitt to the proposition of betrayal conveyed by Lord Downshire.

After describing the arrest at Margate of Father O'Coigly, O'Connor, and Binns, Mr. Froude writes:—

It may be observed here—en parenthèse—that Downshire must have felt conflicting emotions when called upon to communicate information which might bring Lord Edward to the block. His father had married the sister of James, Duke of Leinster; Lord Edward was, therefore, the first cousin of Lord Downshire.

One of the most truthful chapters of the laudatory life of Reynolds, the informer,[48] is that aiming to show that he could not have been the spy who caused the arrests at Margate. But the biographer is unable to offer any suggestion as to who that agent was—so carefully veiled from Reynolds, one of their own confidential prompters, was the part played by Turner in that episode.

The information which led to the arrest of O'Connor, O'Coigly, and his companion cannot have come from Ireland, because in the 'Book of Secret Service Monies expended in the Detection of Treasonable Conspiracies' no entry appears connected with the above incident, unless 'Dutton's Expenses going to England to attend Quigly's Trial,' and where he had merely to swear to the priest's handwriting. For his courage in doing this—having once seen him sign a lottery ticket at Dundalk—50l. is paid to 'Dutton on June 12, 1798.' The names of Newell and Murdoch certainly appear in the 'Secret Service Money' book about that time; but it is clear from Newell's narrative—doubtless a genuine and frank confession—that neither he nor Murdoch had any hand in tracing the movements of O'Coigly and O'Connor.

Lord Castlereagh was now acting for Pelham as Chief Secretary for Ireland. On July 25, 1798, a secret letter—printed[Pg 19] in the 'Castlereagh Papers'—is addressed to him from the Home Office:—

Some of the letters of 'Lord Downshire's friend,' not being forthcoming in the official archives, Mr. Froude assumed that they had been destroyed; but, however masked, they are recognisable in the 'Castlereagh Correspondence.' Several anonymous papers, furnishing information of the movements of the United Irishmen about Hamburg and elsewhere, crop up in that book, having been enclosed from Whitehall for the guidance of Dublin Castle. One of these letters makes special reference to information already sent to Lord Downshire.[54]

[Pg 20]

Another long letter of the same batch will be found the first placed in the second volume of Castlereagh, though an examination of it shows that it belongs to the middle of the previous volume. Detailed reference is made to Father O'Coigly's mission and movements, both in France and in London. One is struck by the accuracy of its information regarding the Ulster United Irishmen, of whom Turner was one. Of MacMahon, who travelled to Paris with O'Coigly, we learn that, 'tired of politics, especially those of France, he is to write to Citoyen Jean Thomas,[55] à la poste restante à Hamburg, whom he looks on as a good patriot.'[56] It will be remembered that a similar phrase occurs in the letter of Downshire's friend, printed by Froude, i.e. Rowan had 'professed himself sick of politics.' Again, 'I found Maitland and Stewart, of Acton, both heartily sick of politics.'

How to hang O'Coigly was now the difficulty. The Government knew—from somebody who had worked with him—that he was deep in the treason; but nothing could persuade the informer to prosecute him openly.

On April 11, 1798, Wickham writes from Whitehall:—

The secret adviser who, as Portland said, 'should be detained,' worked his brain until at length a man, hailing from a place suspiciously familiar to Turner, is sent for to swear to the point. Samuel Turner, formerly of Newry, had intimate knowledge of every man in the place. One Frederick Dutton, described as 'of Newry,' was now subpœnaed by the Crown to swear to O'Coigly's handwriting in a letter addressed to Lord Edward Fitzgerald. 'He claimed to have seen Coigly write his name for the purpose of getting a watch raffled which [Pg 21]belonged to a poor man under sentence of death.' Dutton had been a dismissed servant and had kept a public-house at Newry without a licence.[58]

Turner—it seems absurd to doubt the identity—got back to London on Tuesday, May 15, 1798. What secret help he gave to the law officers can only be inferred, for they pledged themselves that he should never be asked to come forward publicly. Though O'Connor, O'Coigly, and Binns[59] were arrested on March 1, their trials did not take place till late in May 1798. The Duke of Norfolk, Lords Moira, Suffolk, Oxford, John Russell, and Thanet, Fox, Sheridan, Whitbread, Erskine, Grattan, all testified to O'Connor's character. All the prisoners were acquitted, except the priest, notwithstanding that Lord Cloncurry paid a counsel to defend him. He was hanged on Penenden Heath, June 7, 1798. Judge Buller had leant heavily on O'Coigly in his charge.

Lord Holland adds that when the Judge was descanting on the mildness and clemency of the Administration, O'Coigly quietly took a pinch of snuff and said 'Ahem!'

When no evidence was produced in court which could legally ensure a verdict against O'Coigly, it seems reasonable to assume from the tone of the law officers and the Judge that they possessed some secret knowledge of his guilt, for in point of fact, though O'Coigly declared his innocence, he was deeply pledged to the conspiracy.

'O'Connor was leaving the court in triumph,' writes Mr. Froude, 'but the Government knew their man too well to let him go so easily. He was at once re-arrested on another charge, and was restored to his old quarters in Dublin Castle.'[62] From whom the fatal whisper came does not appear, but the sequel seems to leave no doubt that to Turner it was due. MacMahon and other prominent rebels were Presbyterian clergymen of Ulster. It was an object now with those who desired the collapse of the conspiracy to detach the Presbyterian party from the 'Papists.' Binns was a staunch Presbyterian rebel, a colleague of O'Coigly. In a letter dated Philadelphia, 1843, Binns, addressing Dr. Madden, states that great efforts were used to try and persuade O'Coigly to implicate him, 'offering Mr. Coigly his life if he would criminate me agreeable to the instructions of the Government, which proposal he indignantly refused to accede to. Though heavily ironed, he pushed the gentlemen out of his cell, when he there lay under sentence of death.'

We have seen that when severely tried he resorted to snuff. He had other small consolations. Even in his irons he talked irony. One of several letters of protest addressed by the priest to Portland, shortly before his death, tells him that he is 'one of his Grace's envoys to the other world, charged with tidings of his mild and merciful administration.'

[Pg 23]

As O'Coigly's memory has been all but beatified as a martyr's, it is due to the interests of historic truth to add—especially after the remarks of Lord Holland—the following from a letter written by Arthur O'Connor in 1842:—

O'Connor's promised work, however, never appeared.

As regards Dutton, the witness who swore to O'Coigly's handwriting, his subsequent career was cast on a spot also frequented by Turner.[63] He is found at Cuxhaven, not very far from Hamburg, and, until 1840, holding office in its postal and diplomatic departments, and the husband of a lady well connected.[64] Cuxhaven, as gazetteers record, was from 1795 a place of the utmost importance for the maintenance of intercourse between England and the Continent.

CHAPTER IV
THE BETRAYER'S INTERVIEW WITH TALLEYRAND

The letters of secret information in the well-known 'Castlereagh Correspondence' being mostly without date are inserted regardless of chronological sequence, and are often, from dearth of explanation, wholly unintelligible. One of these secret reports follows a letter of Portland's[65]—to be found later on—regarding the intercepted memorial which Dr. McNevin had addressed to the French Government. The particular references to Lord Downshire, to Hamburg, to Fitzgerald, and to the North of Ireland, of which Turner was a native—not to speak of his 'tone of injured innocence,' 'the dread of those from whom I come as to the ascendency of the Papists'—all point to him as the writer.

His tone as usual is hostile to Lewins, a Roman Catholic envoy of great honesty, whose reputation he is ever seeking to injure; and the intrigue, it may be added, very nearly succeeded in getting Lewins superseded. Mr. Froude, it will be remembered, when describing his unmasked informer writes:

It was in February, 1798, that Mr. Froude's spy reappeared in London.[66] He had interviews at the Home Office, where he received some instructions, which are not stated. [Pg 25] Camden urged Portland to beg of him to give evidence publicly, and to offer reward to any amount. But all to no effect. At last it was decided, as the next best thing to do, 'that he should open a correspondence with the principal conspirators, by which means you may be apprised of their intentions.' This is exactly what he is now found doing. On April 17 he goes to Paris, no doubt sent by the Home Office, to ascertain what arrangement had been made by O'Coigly and O'Connor as regards the long-sought French expedition to Ireland.

De la Croix will be chiefly remembered as the Minister for Foreign Affairs with whom Tone had to do. But he had been personally offensive to Lord Malmesbury, the English Minister, and M. Talleyrand was appointed to succeed La Croix on July 15, 1797.[67]

The following letter is to be found in the 'Castlereagh Papers' (i. 231-6), and derives additional importance from its close connection with Talleyrand:—

[Pg 27]

Thus far the letter of Turner to Talleyrand—for Turner it assuredly is. It does not follow that the Minister believed all he was told. The quondam Bishop of Autun could read a soul. He was a diplomat, however, and showed to his visitor that cautious courtesy which he had learned when a bishop. He who said that speech is given to conceal thoughts,[71] was not the man to be at once swayed by words. The despatch now before us had been addressed to the Home Office, and must be one of the papers Mr. Froude thought destroyed. The copy of his letter to Talleyrand having been submitted to Portland, the spy thus resumes:—

Turner then adds:—[74]

The spy's letter then proceeds:—

It is quite clear that the above letter was written by the same nameless spy who poses in Froude's book as 'Lord [Pg 31]Downshire's friend.' 'One of his letters, dated November 19, 1797, is preserved,' writes Mr. Froude; but, no doubt, a few others are preserved too, and may be found in the correspondence of Lord Castlereagh. How they escaped destruction is a marvel. Wickham, on January 11, 1799, writes, regarding 'United Irishmen' at Hamburg: 'The enclosed very curious papers the Duke of Portland desires may be laid before the Lord Lieutenant, and afterwards destroyed.'

So careful was the spy of his reputation that he vouchsafes not a signature. Internal evidence, however, shows that he was the man who made his disclosure to Downshire, and was by him put in correspondence with Portland.

From the letter just quoted it appears that, after his efforts to pick news from Talleyrand and fish in Irish channels at Paris, he returned, viâ Cuxhaven, to London, where he arrived on Tuesday night, May 15, 1798. This date is worthy of note. The spy feared to show himself in London and felt that his life was unsafe. What brings him back to London on May 15, 1798? His favourite post was Cuxhaven or Hamburg. O'Coigly, Binns, and Leary, though arrested in March en route to France, were not put on their trial until Monday, May 21, 1798. This case is reported at extraordinary length in Howell's 'State Trials' and would fill a volume. Scott, afterwards Lord Eldon, prosecuted. The mass of secret information which the Crown contrived to acquire strikes very forcibly. Letters written in cipher by O'Coigly to Lord Edward Fitzgerald and others are translated and expounded by Scott. All the parties concerned in the conspiracy had false names. Mrs. Mathiessen[83] is called 'Marks;' 'a man going to William's,' means 'going to France,' etc. It was largely on evidence of this sort that O'Coigly was convicted and hanged.[84]

The betrayer tells Talleyrand that 'the spirit of the North was completely broken.' In point of fact, however, it was in the North that the real martial spirit of the United Irishmen [Pg 32]blazed, and there the best battles were afterwards fought under the leadership of Orr and Monroe. Turner was anxious to make the French turn their thoughts of invasion to other points on the Irish coast, and he so far succeeded that in August, 1798, Humbert's expedition, embracing not 1,000 men, landed at Killala, among the starved and unarmed peasantry of Connaught. He calculated on meeting enthusiastic support; but, as Mr. Lecky says, it soon became apparent how fatally he had been deceived. After winning one battle, and losing another, Humbert surrendered to Cornwallis.

'May I assure them that you'll come in three months?' Talleyrand is asked. The object of this and other questions, which, to a casual reader, seem hardly consistent with Turner's treachery to his friends, is now pretty plain. Great doubt prevailed as to whether an invasion of Ireland was really to be attempted. The First Consul blew hot and cold upon it. If the spy, as an envoy of the United Irishmen, could only extort from Talleyrand an explicit reply in writing avowing the intention to invade, and telling the exact time on which the descent on Ireland was to be made, England would thus be well prepared, and her fleet able to destroy the French armament as she had already destroyed that of De Winter. Why Bonaparte, at first so anxious for invasion, should have changed his mind, is explained, in the recently published Memoirs of Gouverneur Morris, as due to the conflicting reports of Irish envoys. At St. Helena he told Las Cases that his mistake in '98 was to have gone to Egypt and not to Ireland.[85]

Mr. Froude states that the betrayer had discovered one of the objects of the Papists to be the seizure of property, and had determined to separate himself from the conspiracy. Attention is requested to that part of the foregoing letter[86] where the writer refers to the Cromwellian holders of estates in Ireland, and asks that every individual be guaranteed his [Pg 33]property without respect to old Catholic claims and to their political conduct prior to the time of actual invasion. Samuel Turner represented some of the Cromwellian Settlers, and 'his most particular friends,' as he calls them, were amongst those who held grants of land in succession to the old Papist proprietary. The descendants of these men viewed invasion with alarm, lest their lands should go, just as the property of the Papists had already gone.[87]

Talleyrand's caution in talking with Turner contrasts with the freedom with which he opened his mind on the same subject to his confrères. A very important book was published in 1890 at Paris by M. Pallain, 'Talleyrand sous le Directoire.' It depicts his diplomatic life, and gives the pith of his despatches. From Turner and Duckett he probably derived some impressions regarding Great Britain and Ireland. He augurs well from the Irish rebellion, which has been 'cemented,' adds Talleyrand, 'by the blood of celebrated victims.' The first victim was the Rev. William Jackson, in 1794. Talleyrand urges the invasion of Ireland and the establishment of an Irish Republic 'for the instruction or chastisement of England.' 'Nelson's fleet,' he says, 'is manned almost exclusively by Irishmen,' and that their patriotism 'will teach them to see in the English their oppressors and enemies.' Talleyrand's sketch of 'Irish Landed Proprietors' is full and curious.

Another man who, besides Talleyrand and Grégoire, dealt cautiously with Turner was Stone, as Turner in his secret letter to the Home Office admits. Stone had been tried in England for high treason and sent into exile.[88] At Hamburg [Pg 34]and at Paris he belonged to the set mentioned by Mr. Froude's cloaked spy[89] as including Lady Edward Fitzgerald (Pamela), Lady Lucy Fitzgerald, Mrs. Matthiessen, and General Count Valence. Madame de Genlis in her 'Memoirs' mentions Stone conjointly with her daughter Madame de Valence and her 'niece' Pamela.[90]

CHAPTER V
LORD CLONCURRY SHADOWED

Discoveries and arrests now multiplied, despite the care with which Reinhard and Lady Edward persuaded themselves that all negotiations had been fenced.

Lord Cloncurry in his Memoirs writes of his 'dear friend Lord Edward Fitzgerald,' and readers of that book will remember the touching narrative given of the writer's arrest and long confinement in the Tower. This peer seeks to show that he himself was innocent of treason, but Mr. Froude states, after studying the letters of Lord Downshire's friend, that 'Lord Cloncurry was a sworn member of the Revolutionary Committee.'[91] The betrayer's first interview with Downshire took place on October 8, 1797. In that interview he ranked among the marked men, Lawless, afterwards Lord Cloncurry. During the next month we find his movements narrowly watched. One of Mr. Froude's sensational surprises is a statement in reference to this subsequent British Peer and Privy Councillor. Pelham, Chief Secretary for Ireland, writing to the Home Office on November 7, 1797, refers to the fact—if fact it is—that

[Pg 36]

A story never loses in its carriage; and Portland was perturbed by the news. The Hamburg spy, who was the first to mention Lawless's name, was now consulted.

Two secret letters from the Home Office, dated June 8, 1798, and printed in Lord Castlereagh's 'Correspondence,' speak of a communication received from 'a person in Hamburg,' and how

Lord Cloncurry states that the Duke of Leinster, Curran, and Grattan, who happened to be visiting him, were also [Pg 37]taken into custody; but this statement is not wholly borne out by contemporary accounts.

Wickham's second letter of June 8, 1798, recurs to the arrests and speaks of 'most secret, though accurate, intelligence received from Hamburg,' adding:—

'Braughall' was another name which will be found in the list written out by Downshire from his visitor's dictation. Lord Cloncurry, in his Memoirs, describes Braughall as 'his business agent and confidential friend;' while Tone constantly refers to him in cordial terms. The newspapers of the day record his arrest and how 'papers of a very seditious nature were found in his house.'[99] Among them was a letter from Lawless urging him to contribute to the defence of unfortunate O'Coigly, and mentioning that 'Little Henry' had munificently subscribed. This passage, Lord Cloncurry states, was interpreted at Dublin Castle as referring to Henry Grattan, though the writer meant Mr. Henry of Straffan, brother-in-law to Lord Edward Fitzgerald, and as [Pg 38]the result of this mistake Grattan was placed under arrest, but speedily liberated.

A memoir of O'Coigly is furnished by Dr. Madden in the first edition of his 'United Irishmen,' and embodies information derived from Cloncurry. Deferring to the Hon. Mr. Lawless, when in London, he says: 'Every Irishman who frequented his house was vigilantly watched by agents of a higher department than the police.' Pelham says that he sent Captain D'Auvergne on board the packet with Lawless, charged to find out where he went to in London; and it would seem that during the tedious journey of those days, Lawless suspected D'Auvergne's mission. 'The agent of a higher department than the police' would also apply to Turner, who was in London at this time. Who was the detective who had his berth next to young Lawless on board the boat, sat and chatted with him in the coach to London, and afterwards dogged his steps? Letters furnishing secret information, and signed 'Captain D'Auvergne, Prince of Bouillon,' may be found in the 'Castlereagh Papers.'[100] This personage represented an old and illustrious French family. The Prince, finding his patrimony sequestered during the Revolution, looked out for a livelihood, and seems to have been not fastidious as to the sort. Cloncurry states that when bidding good night at the house of a friend, he would say, 'I haven't the conscience to keep my poor spy shivering longer in the cold.' After 1798, D'Auvergne's usual post was Jersey, whence his letters in the 'Castlereagh Papers' are dated, and furnish the fruit of espionage, including all warlike preparations made by the French at Brest.[101]

[Pg 39]

Mr. Froude quotes a letter from Portland, part of which is to the same effect as that already given, and announcing the discovery of important papers 'in Mr. Lawless's [Cloncurry's] possession that tend directly to show his connection with some of the most desperate of the Republican party in England, as well as with those who are in habitual communication with the French agents at Hamburg; and yet,' he continued, 'under present circumstances, and with evidence of the nature of that of which the Government here is in possession, strong and decisive as it is, none of those persons can be brought to trial without exposing secrets of the last importance to the State, the revealing of which may implicate the safety of the two kingdoms.'[102] But although the leading men could not be brought to trial, it was fit to hold them fast, that thus the teeth of the conspiracy might be drawn. One important man—Stewart of Acton—was certainly let out on bail; but he was a cousin of Lord Castlereagh's.

These rough notes ought not to close without some notice of a reply to Portland's criminatory remarks, which the late Lord Cloncurry has placed on record. When the 'Castlereagh Papers' appeared he was an octogenarian and enjoying, it is to be hoped, an unimpaired memory; but it is an open secret that the book known as 'Lord Cloncurry's Personal Memoirs' was fully prepared for publication, and its style strengthened throughout, by a practised writer connected with the Tory press of Dublin, and who believed that Cloncurry had been wrongly judged in 1798.

On the other hand, it is stated in a letter to the Home Office, dated July 24, 1799, that rebel despatches had been regularly addressed to Mr. Lawless in the Temple, 'whose fate,' it is added, 'is much lamented at Paris.'[104] Lord Cloncurry himself admits that in the autumn of 1797 he was elected—but without his desire or knowledge—a member of the Executive Directory of the United Irishmen, 'when, for the first and only time, I attended a meeting held at Jackson's in Church Street.'[105] This date furnished fresh proof of the promptitude and accuracy of Turner's information to Downshire (supplied also in the autumn of 1797)—information which revealed the adhesion of Lawless, afterwards Lord Cloncurry, to the Executive Directory. Jackson's name is also to be found in the list as dictated by Turner. Of course Lawless must have been already a United Irishman, or he could not be eligible for election to a seat in the Directory. Binns, who was arrested with O'Connor and O'Coigly at Margate, says: 'Coigly was no stranger to Lawless; he made him a United Irishman in his father's house, in Merrion Street, Dublin.'[106] Cloncurry's Memoirs state merely that O'Coigly, who was the finest-looking man he had ever seen, presented to him a letter of introduction, descriptive of Orange persecution, which it was alleged he had suffered.

Lawless and O'Coigly had opinions in common; and both [Pg 41]were much together in London. The former never forgave O'Connor for having—as he said—unfairly sacrificed O'Coigly during the trials at Maidstone.[107] In collecting evidence to hang the priest, renewed attention fell upon Lawless. His first imprisonment lasted for six weeks. On April 14, 1799, on the eve of his marriage with Miss Ryall, who at last died of a 'broken heart,' he was again arrested on Portland's warrant and committed to the Tower, where he remained two years. Lord Cloncurry states that his father, in dread of confiscation following his son, left away from him 65,000l. However, the Irish rebel lived to become a British peer, a Privy Councillor, and the adviser of successive Viceroys. Dr. Madden, who received much help from Cloncurry when compiling his 'Lives of the United Irishmen,' states that Robert Emmet dined with this peer in Paris, previous to leaving France on his ill-fated enterprise; and Madden, in his second edition (ii. 137), says he knows not how to reconcile the account of the interview, as supplied in 'Cloncurry's Personal Memoirs,' with a verbal account of the same given by his lordship to himself.

The list noted by Downshire from the dictation of his visitor, though complete as regards the Rebel Executive of 1797, far from embraced all the names which more careful thought must have brought to the recollection of the informer. It had now become second nature to him to discharge, almost daily, letters of fatal aim, jeopardising the lives and reputations of men who implicitly trusted him. He also, as it appears, 'opened a correspondence' with leading United Irishmen. It is not sought to be conveyed that all the information came from Turner; but the following remarks of Mr. Froude, although they repeat a few names already mentioned, are important, as connecting 'Lord Downshire's friend' with the harvest of captures in midsummer 1798:—

The question was even mooted as to whether he and others should not be excepted by name from the Bill of Indemnity, or even specially attainted by a Bill of Pains and Penalties, in consideration of the impossibility of convicting them by the ordinary course of the law.[110]

Turner's knowledge and duties as a United Irishman having been mainly confined to Ulster, it seemed strange that one of the Northern Committee could be so intimate with O'Connor and Lord Edward. Even in the betrayer's first interview with Downshire he reveals much intimate acquaintance with both. All this can be readily understood now. In November, 1796, O'Connor took a house near Belfast, preparatory to offering himself for the representation of Antrim. Dr. Madden states that Lord Edward and O'Connor lived together for some months, and during their stay maintained friendly intercourse with the Northern leaders.[111] Soon after we find the command in Ulster assigned to O'Connor. 'Arthur O'Connor,' resumes Mr. Froude, describing the events of December, 1797, 'after spending a few months in the Castle,'[112] had been released on bail, Thomas Addis Emmet and Lord Edward Fitzgerald being his securities. "The person" who had come to Lord Downshire had revealed the secret of the visit to Switzerland; but without betraying his authority Camden could not again order O'Connor's arrest.'[113] After an interval, however, and [Pg 43]at a critical moment, O'Connor was apprehended anew, and he remained a State prisoner until 1802.

At an early stage of this chase I met with the seeming difficulty that the name of Samuel Turner appears in the list of leading rebels which 'the person' gave to Lord Downshire.[114] In undertaking to give a complete list of the Executive Committee, he could not well omit his own name. No doubt to invest it with increased importance, he puts it next after those of Lord Edward and Arthur O'Connor (the nephew of Lord Longueville), and before Stewart of Acton and the future Lord Cloncurry. The act is consistent with the usual swagger of the man, and shows the ingenuity by which he hoped to baffle all subsequent evidence of his treachery.

Lord Camden writes: 'The intelligence with which we are furnished would, if certain persons could be brought forward, be sufficient to bring the conspiracy to light, defeat its ill consequences, and make a salutary impression on the minds of the people.'[115] 'Unfortunately,' comments Mr. Froude, '"certain persons" declined to be brought forward. Pelham, when in London, made large offers to Lord Downshire's friend, but without effect.'

CHAPTER VI
THE MASK TORN OFF AT LAST

Mr. Froude, quoting from the betrayer's letter to Downshire, writes:—'I went to Harley Street, where Fitz[116] told me of the conduct of the Catholics to him and his friends. He said he would prevail on O'Connor, or some such,[117] to go to Paris; if not, he would go himself, in order to have Lewins removed.'

Lord Edward came to this decision obviously on the representations made by his false friend regarding Lewins. The false friend will be found impugning Lewins on every opportunity. Turner and Lewins, it may be repeated, clashed as rival envoys; Lewins, a Catholic, represented the Leinster Directory, while Turner claimed to represent the Northern. Turner worked his pen and tongue to such purpose that he at last succeeded in convincing Lord Edward of Lewins's treachery. Binns, in his narrative, states that 'O'Coigly had been commissioned by the Executive to supersede Lewins in Paris, whom some suspected of betraying the interests of Ireland.'[118]

The letter from Hamburg (first revealed by Mr. Froude) continues:—

One of the many unexplained letters in the Castlereagh Correspondence finds its keynote here. In August, 1798, Wickham, of the Home Office, writes as follows to Castlereagh, who then held O'Connor a prisoner in Dublin.[123] Wickham's object, though shrouded in mystery, was no doubt to check the accuracy of 'Lord Downshire's friend,' and to weigh the marketable value of his services:—

Fifty pages may be turned ere the answer to this letter comes. It is headed 'Secret,' and bears date 'Dublin Castle, August 17, 1798.' All my circumstantial evidence, aiming to show that Turner is the man whom Mr. Froude could not identify, is crowned by this letter. Castlereagh thus replies to Wickham:—

[Pg 47]

The above paragraph is one of much importance. Richardson I have discovered to be another alias of the hydra-headed Turner. Distinct proof of this will be found presently. Castlereagh continues:—

Ordinary students of history are not free to search the papers of the Home Office, London after the date 1760; and the present writer ventured to ask Mr. Lecky whether he had met the name of Turner in his inquiries. The object of Mr. Lecky's history is distinct from mine, and his researches have taken a different direction; but he could not fail to observe, he said, that the Government correspondence threw not much light on questions of espionage, 'for names of informers,' he adds, 'are nearly always concealed.' However, on referring to his notes, it appeared that 'Richardson' was the pseudonym of Samuel Turner. While thanking my correspondent, I thought it well to remind him that in the 'Castlereagh Papers'[130] 'Furnes' is stated to be the alias for this man. And I added, in order to guard against mistake, that one Thomas Richardson, a Liberal magistrate for Tyrone, was confined, in 1797, with Neilson and Teeling. The historian's reply is very satisfactory:[131] 'Samuel Turner wrote his letters to the British [Pg 48]Government under the name of Richardson. This,' adds Mr. Lecky, 'is not a matter of inference, but of distinct proof.'

Once only 'Richardson' is mentioned in 'Castlereagh.' It was the false name by which the Home Office, when obliged to communicate with Dublin Castle, masked Samuel Turner, LL.D., of the Irish Bar. Lord Castlereagh's letter to the Home Office confirms the intimate knowledge possessed by Turner of the doings of O'Connor and Lord Edward Fitzgerald. O'Connor was now—August, 1798—in an Irish dungeon; and Lord Castlereagh having, as he says, pressed him to answer certain questions, adds: 'This perfectly agrees with Richardson's information, which states that Lord Edward and O'Connor met Hoche and arranged the invasion.'

Besides his horror of martyrdom by the knife, Turner had a lively dread of the martyrdom of exposure and social ostracism. Jackson's trial in 1794 had the effect of deterring approvers. Curran's skill in torturing such persons was marvellous; and Mr. Froude declares that he stretched Cockayne as painfully as ever the rack-master of the Tower stretched a Jesuit. 'He made him confess that he had been employed by Pitt, and showed that, if Jackson was a traitor to the State, Cockayne was a far blacker traitor to the friend who trusted him.'[132]

'Richardson' is now shown to be the same man as he who gave his information to Downshire; and that 'Richardson' was an assumed name for Samuel Turner.[133] Thus the question [Pg 49]of identity is established without appealing to further evidence. But inasmuch as my efforts to track Turner open up facts long forgotten, and others new to the historian, some readers may not object to follow.

As regards Lord Edward's meeting with Hoche, more than once referred to in Turner's letter to Lord Downshire and in the correspondence of the Home Office, M. Guillon, a recent investigator,[134] could find no trace of it in the French official archives. Special efforts were made at the time to veil this historic interview. No wonder, therefore, that Mr. Froude, in introducing the information furnished by Downshire's mysterious visitor, points specially to the secret meeting with Hoche, and how Hoche himself had not revealed it even to Tone.[135]

Wickham was but carrying out Portland's behest in signifying to Castlereagh that O'Connor, then a prisoner, should be questioned on points of which the Home Office had acquired private knowledge. On August 23, 1798, the same polite pumping of O'Connor is urged—a task fraught with no great labour to a man of Castlereagh's tact and powers of persuasion. 'A private communication,' Wickham writes, 'of the names of the persons with whom Mr. O'Connor corresponded abroad, would answer the particular purpose required by the Duke of Portland.' The 'particular' object is not explained. It was probably that the spy might, as previously suggested, cultivate epistolary relations with the men whom O'Connor[136] would admit to have been his correspondents.[137]

[Pg 50]

Teeling, one of the Northern leaders, who had been closely associated with Turner, gives a curious glimpse of the easy intercourse which Castlereagh would maintain with his captives. Sometimes he made the arrests himself in the first instance, and afterwards could charm his prisoners by drawing silken bonds around them. Teeling was accompanied by his father on horseback, when 'we met,' he writes, 'Lord Castlereagh, who accosted us with his usual courtesy. We had proceeded up the street of Lisburn together, when, having reached the house of his uncle, the Marquis of Hertford, we were about to take leave of his lordship. "I regret," said he, addressing my father, "that your son cannot accompany you," conducting me at the same moment through the outer gate, which, to my inexpressible astonishment, was instantly closed, and I found myself surrounded by a military guard.' Teeling, later on, describes a visit paid by Castlereagh to him when a prisoner:—

CHAPTER VII
DR. MACNEVIN'S MEMORIAL INTERCEPTED

Although the spy did not confide to Lord Downshire until October 1797 his name and secrets, there is reason to believe that he had furnished information previously. To enhance his importance he probably said nothing of this. As Mr. Froude observes, he painted his own conduct in the colours he thought best. This man had long played fast and loose. So early as May 1797 Turner was viewed with suspicion. The Castlereagh Papers contain a bundle of intercepted letters addressed by Reinhard, the French Minister at Hamburg, to De la Croix, head of the Foreign Office, Paris, of whom Tone often speaks with affection.[140] These letters, as already stated, mention Turner under the name of Furnes, which we learn from the Castlereagh Papers was an alias of Turner.[141] He is praised for his zeal and patriotism; but in one letter Reinhard is found struggling with a painful misgiving. The suspicion is so dark that he does not like to write even the name of Furnes, but makes dots to tally with the letters composing it, and no name was better known to De la Croix. At last Reinhard tries to banish the thought as an unworthy suspicion; and a subsequent letter of his reinstates Turner in full prestige.

The letter which expresses suspicion bears date May 31, but is confusingly assigned, in the Castlereagh Papers, to the year 1798. Its reference to Hoche, however, shows that it was written during the previous year—his death having occurred on September 15, 1797.

[Pg 53]

It seems needless to point out that this must be the 'person' whom Mr. Froude describes as being introduced by Lady Edward Fitzgerald, and having the ear of Reinhard at Hamburg; and there is hardly less doubt that the man thus noticed was the same who, having got into debt with his [Pg 54]friends, addressed himself to Pelham as early as 1796. His secret letter to Pelham will be seen presently. Meanwhile the same sensitive pride and the same revengeful spirit when that pride was once wounded is also traceable in the details revealed to Lord Downshire next year. Judging from the slippery and impulsive character of the man, I cannot doubt that previous to his mission to London in October 1797, for the purpose of making a final bargain with Pitt, he had coquetted with Dublin Castle.

Lewins and Turner were rival envoys—Lewins represented the Leinster Directory; Turner claimed to speak for Ulster. Of Lewins, who stands above all suspicion, Reinhard writes to De la Croix in 1797:—'I think L.... incapable of treachery, but capable of imprudence. I should not answer thus concerning the other. What seems further to concur in the support of my hypothesis is, that Mr. L. before his departure made it a point of great importance to ascertain whether there was any other envoy from Ireland, who addressed himself to me, and that he begged me not to give my confidence to any other than to him alone. I refrained from giving these tidings to General Hoche, not only because my means of corresponding with him are uncertain, but because all the letters from Frankfort announce his departure for Paris.'

It may not have struck Mr. Froude, as it certainly strikes me, that the man he describes[144] as visiting Lord Downshire, and at the last moment offering to betray, was the same person whom the historian, one hundred pages previously, notices as an informer, 'in the closest confidence of the Northern Leaders, but whose name is still a mystery.'

It will be seen that Pelham's correspondent of 1796 had fallen into debt and difficulties. This at first seems not consistent with the statement of Mr. Froude that Downshire's visitor was the son of a gentleman of good fortune in the North. But it is easy to see that the son himself had got into pecuniary straits. He tells Downshire of the expenses he is under, and asks Pitt for a 'cool 500l.'[145] to begin with.

[Pg 55]

In addition to a judgment debt of 1,500l. which Jacob Turner in his will forgives his son Samuel,[146] I find, on examining the records of the three Law Courts, that another judgment debt of 800l. was marked against Samuel Turner on January 26, 1793.[147]

Speaking of informers, Mr. Froude writes under date 1796:—

The Informer concludes with these words:—

So much for the informer who sought the ear of the Irish Secretary in 1796. His close connection with the Northern leaders, his air of mystery, his hatred of the priests and the Catholic Committee, even his style and tone, the reference to Hoche, the prediction that the Protestants would suffer if the rebels won—all point to him as the same person who made overtures to Pitt, through Downshire, in October 1797. The alleged disaffection of the militia and the danger which menaced the estates of the aristocracy again crop up in Turner's letter to Talleyrand.[151] In both cases the same stipulation is made that he should not be called upon to give evidence publicly—the same nervous temperament is revealed. Downshire's visitor expressed mortal terror lest his life should pay the forfeit of his startling whisper. The same fear—and I believe I may add, presentiment—pervades the letter to Pelham in 1796. 'Don't name it,' he writes; 'if it get out they will know whence it came, and my life will be the certain forfeit.'[152] The 'secret' which the informer of '96 told Pelham [Pg 57]was what Mr. Fronde describes as 'a curious story.' 'To show you that they tell me their secrets,' writes the informer to Pelham, 'here is the account told me of the death of Mr. McMurdoch of Lurgan.'[153] From searches made in the Registry of Deeds Office, Dublin, I find that Samuel Turner was closely connected with Lurgan, and in a way which gave double facilities for acquiring its secrets.[154]

The reader might glance once more at Mr. Froude's account of the visit to Lord Downshire on that dark October night in 1797. The betrayer's disguise and stealthy nervous gait as though some avenging power were on his track, are things worth noting. Why was he in such dread of assassination before he unfolded his story to Downshire? Surely he must have been conscious of having earned, for a long time before, the penalty of 'Ormond steel.'[155] This, according to Dr. Conlan's sworn testimony, was a specially familiar dogma with Teeling and Turner when organising treason in Ulster. The visit to Downshire was clearly prompted by greed. This peer had got the name of having secret service money at his disposal. 'Bank notes were offered to me,' observes James Hope, the working weaver of Belfast, 'if I would implicate Will Tennant, Robert Simms and others, and it was admitted that the money came from Lord Downshire.' This was probably among the efforts which were made to induce minor conspirators to give evidence publicly against their leaders, of whose treason the Crown had private knowledge through Turner.[156] McDougall's 'Sketches of Irish Political Characters,' [Pg 58]published in 1799, says of Lord Downshire (p. 20): 'His political conduct agrees very well with his motto, Ne tentes, aut perfice; he supports administration with all his might.' Downshire's visitor knew, therefore, that this peer, if he liked, could make good terms with Pitt. Much of the melodramatic character of the scene appears to have been designed to move Downshire. 'He saw Mr. Pitt' says Froude, 'who consented that "the person's" services should be accepted.'

The Cabinet, we are told, was kept in ignorance of his name. But Pelham, the Irish Secretary previous to Castlereagh, seems to have known something of him already, for, as we learn, 'Pelham, when in London, made large offers to Lord Downshire's friend.'[157] That information had been given by Downshire's visitor prior to the interview of October 1797, I cannot doubt.[158] Mr. Froude, describing Lord Edward's visit to Hoche on the Swiss frontier,[159] writes: 'Hoche himself had not revealed it even to Tone, but Lord Edward was known to be intimate with Macnevin. He had been watched in London, and traced to the lodgings of a suspected agent of the French Directory.' Downshire's visitor, it will be remembered, had interviews with Lord Edward in London.

When the betrayer threw back his disguise, Downshire, we are told, recognised him at once. This, I suspect, was not [Pg 59]the first time that a communication reached Downshire from the same source. Dr. Madden quotes from the 'Northern Star' of September 16, 1796, a sensational account of the arrest at Belfast of Russell, Neilson, Sampson, and many others, and how the whole garrison, with its artillery, took part in the stirring scene, and it appears that Downshire helped to direct the proceedings. That day Neilson and Russell surrendered to his lordship, and Tone in his 'Diary' deplores the arrest as the heaviest blow which could fall on their cause.[160]

The name of the French agent in London is not mentioned by Mr. Froude. It is M. Jägerhorn, described by Reinhard, the French Minister at Hamburg, as 'that estimable Swede;' and concerning whom there is a mass of matter, often purposely misleading, in the Castlereagh Correspondence. Macnevin's memorial to the French Directory was betrayed to England in the summer of 1797. M. Jägerhorn was sent by France to treat with the Irish Directory. His mission, however, transpired, and means were taken to prevent him going farther than London, whereupon Lord Edward Fitzgerald was deputed to cross to England, and there confer with Jägerhorn.

Turner's fracas with the terrorist commander-in-chief, Carhampton, was supposed to have caused his retirement to Hamburg. But that scene, with its dialogue, may have been purely theatrical.[161]

In June 1797 Turner attends several meetings of the Ulster delegates in Dublin.[162] There it was that the 'prudence or the cowardice' of the Papist leaders in Dublin, as he says, disgusted him.[163] Why should the notorious Turner be allowed to go on to Dublin, and Jägerhorn be refused?

Samuel Turner saw a good deal of Lord Edward and Jägerhorn in London. We find traces of this knowledge in [Pg 60]Mr. Froude's notes of 'the person's' interview with Downshire—how he called Lord Edward 'Fitz' and had confidential talk with him in Harley Street. The spy tells Downshire soon after that Reinhard begged him to stay at Hamburg, 'as the only mode in which I could serve my country and the republic. I instantly acquiesced, and told him I had arranged matters with Lord Edward Fitzgerald in London for that purpose.'

Turner played his cards so well, and personated an ardent patriot so completely, that the suspicions of his fidelity which Reinhard[164] expressed on May 31 are found removed soon after. Dr. Macnevin, of Dublin, a chief in the Executive Directory, was now coming to Paris to ask French aid. Reinhard reports progress to De la Croix:—

Reinhard's despatch is continued at very great length, and those who care to read it should consult the 'Castlereagh Papers' (i. 282-6). He thus ends: 'I have just received a memorial in which M. Jägerhorn gives me an account of his journey. I will send it to you by the next courier. That [Pg 62]estimable Swede has again manifested great devotedness to the cause of liberty.'

By some marvellous sleight-of-hand Jägerhorn's secret report found its way to Whitehall, instead of to Paris, and may be read in the memoirs of Lord Castlereagh.[170] Two years later, the Swede will again be found tracked from Hamburg to London, and arrested on Portland's warrant.

Mr. Froude's allusion to the facilities of command exercised by 'the person' over Lady Fitzgerald's letter-bag, the hints he gave Downshire how secret letters from Hamburg were sealed and addressed, and how they might be intercepted, read, and then passed on,[171] are only those gleams of light that shine dimly in dark places, but enough, with present knowledge, to discern a good deal.

It will be remembered that Downshire's visitor, in his list of men marked out for doom, gave prominence to Dr. Macnevin, 'a Physician who had great weight with the Papists.' 'He (the betrayer) had discovered,' writes Froude, 'that the object of the Papists was the ruin and destruction of the country, and the establishment of a tyranny worse than that which was complained of.'

The famous memorial of Dr. Macnevin, embracing a full report on the state of Ireland, and appealing to France for help, was written at this time.[172] On arrival at Hamburg he entrusted it to Reinhard, the French minister there, by whom—as we learn from the 'Cornwallis Papers'—it was translated and forwarded to Paris. Mr. Froude thinks its betrayal to the English Cabinet a very remarkable circumstance, and the more strange because 'no suspicion has been suggested of Macnevin's treachery.' A hidden hand [Pg 63]contrived to pass on to Pitt this document destined to become historic.[173]

Wickham, writing to Castlereagh on August 15, 1798, states that the rebel executive committee directed Dr. Macnevin to proceed to Paris by the way of Hamburg; that the principal objects of his journey were to give additional weight and credit to the mission of Lewins, and to confirm the information that had already been transmitted.[174] Again the reader may be reminded that Lewins and Turner were rival envoys. Each is found constantly trying to circumvent the other. Turner, therefore, had a special object in foiling and intercepting Macnevin's memorial.

Reinhard, in the betrayed despatch of July 12, 1797, tells De la Croix, at Paris, that every confidence might be reposed in Lewins. Lewins' usual post was at Paris, just as Turner's was at Hamburg, but both passed to and fro. Of Lewins, Reinhard takes care to say that Macnevin

If it was Turner's interest to intercept Reinhard's letter establishing confidence in Lewins, it was still more his interest to keep back from Lewins a document which, while vindicating his name, would protect it from further attack; and this the 'Memorial' of Macnevin was designed to do.

Camden had now ceased to be Viceroy and was succeeded by Cornwallis.[176] The latter co-operates with the Home Secretary in screening from publicity the name of their informer. The report of the Secret Committee was now in progress. Cornwallis, writing to Portland, says:—

[Pg 64]

Portland duly acknowledged Lord Cornwallis's despatch,

[Pg 65]

The precautions taken to screen the betrayer were certainly very complete. Castlereagh tells Wickham (July 30, 1798):—

In June 1798 Lord Edward was dead. The Sheares's had been executed. Macnevin, O'Connor, T. Addis Emmet, and Sampson lay in prison in Dublin. Blood flowed on every side. The city was like a shambles. The State prisoners, on the understanding that executions should cease, and that they might be allowed to leave Ireland, consented to reveal, but without implicating individuals, the scheme of the United Irishmen. A prolonged secret inquisition by the Secret Committee took place. As soon as their evidence appeared, Macnevin and his fellow-prisoners complained, by a public advertisement, that the Crown officials who drew up the report of the Secret Committee had garbled the facts and distorted their evidence. Into all this it is not necessary now to go, but it may be observed that, while everything inconvenient was left out, an innuendo was made that the betrayal of Dr. Macnevin's memoir may have been due to Reinhard, the French Minister. [Pg 66] This—apart from M. Mignet's testimony to the incorruptibility of Reinhard—serves to exculpate him, and narrows the spot on which suspicion now rests. Reinhard, in his letter to De la Croix, thinks it strange that Turner had never spoken to him about certain revelations made by 'the Secret Committee of the Parliament of Ireland;'[180] but the reason now seems intelligible enough.

Macnevin published his 'Pieces of Irish History'[181] at New York in 1807, and notices the betrayal of the memorial which he had addressed to the French Government. Up to that time, and until his death in 1840, he does not seem to suspect Turner. Had any such doubt occurred to him, he would have been the first to avow it. At p. 146 of his book Macnevin inveighs against a 'profligate informer,' 'a ruffian of the name of Reynolds;' but Reynolds' treachery was confined to the arrests at Bond's in Dublin, and did not take place until March 1798. Ten pages further on Macnevin speaks of the 'unparalleled fidelity of the United Irish Body.' Dr. Macnevin was struck by the knowledge the Government had acquired of the 'negotiations of the United Irishmen with foreign States,' and, he adds, 'at this time one of the deputies [i.e. himself] had personal evidence of its extent and accuracy. That knowledge was obtained from some person in the pay of England and in the confidence of France.' And Dr. Macnevin then proceeds to point to Reinhard by name!

This is just what the officials of the Home Office wished for all along. Wickham, referring to the publication of Macnevin's memorial by the Secret Committee of the House of Lords, writes: 'It may fairly be presumed that the copy has been obtained at [the Foreign Office] Paris, or from R.'s [Reinhard's] secretary at Hamburg. This conjecture will be at least as probable as the real one.'[182]

One circumstance struck Macnevin as 'confirmation [Pg 67]strong' of his dark suspicion. Reinhard, as he tells us, made difficulties about giving him a passport to Paris. A most important despatch from Reinhard to De la Croix thus concludes:—

This letter—possibly written at Lady Edward Fitzgerald's house at Hamburg, and put into her post-bag—was treacherously betrayed to Pitt. When De la Croix remained ominously silent in response to the above appeal, is it surprising that Reinhard should have made difficulties and delays in giving Macnevin a passport?[184]

Macnevin's groundless distrust of Reinhard naturally influenced the views of a most painstaking investigator. Dr. Madden, who, when he at last saw, in the 'Castlereagh Papers,' Reinhard's letters to De la Croix, regarded the circumstance as damning proof of his treachery.[185] Subsequently Mignet, the great French historian and keeper of the ministerial archives at Paris, who had ample official means of knowing the character and acts of both Reinhard and De la Croix, assured Madden in writing that both men were incorruptible. This may be taken as conclusive, for, unlike Turner, there is not a line in any English State Paper tending to compromise Reinhard or De la Croix.[186]

For the act of betrayal we must therefore look to Samuel Turner, agent at Hamburg of the United Irish Brotherhood; [Pg 68]the man who had access to the most secret papers in Lady Fitzgerald's house, and who, we learn, 'was admitted to close and secret conversations upon the prospect of French interference in Ireland with Reinhard.' This, in fact, was the grand proof submitted by Downshire's visitor to show that he was in a position to spy to advantage—a fact sufficient in itself to demonstrate that Reinhard was himself no spy.

Dr. Madden's suspicion of Reinhard was doubtless strengthened by a passage which for a long time puzzled myself, and occurs in Wickham's letter to Castlereagh of June 8, 1798. Wickham speaks of 'information confirmed by a person at Hamburg, who must necessarily have derived his intelligence from a very different source, and who could not but be ignorant of that from which R. had procured all that he has communicated to us.' The name thus masked is not Reinhard, but Richardson—an alias for Turner, as proved at p. 48 ante.

One thing greatly complicated this puzzle as regards 'R.' Wickham, in a subsequent letter, dated July 25, 1798, speaks of 'R.'—meaning not Richardson, but Reinhard, as the context shows.[187] But these blanks are due to the noble editor of the 'Castlereagh Papers,' the late Lord Londonderry; and in cloaking the name Richardson—it inadvertently peeps out in one place, like 'Capel' instead of 'Catesby' in 'Lothair'—he doubtless thought that it was a real name.

On February 18, 1798, Lord Moira addressed the House of Lords in favour of Catholic Emancipation, which, he declared, must be granted, as well as Parliamentary Reform. 'The greatest evil to be feared from it sinks to nothing compared to the mischief which is raging at present. The expression of a conciliatory desire on your part would suspend immediately the agitation of the public mind.'

Mr. Froude says that the members of Council knew more than Lord Moira—'if he really believed his words;' and he adds that they must have found it hard 'to sit patient under his flatulent declamation.' How much Turner's tattle[Pg 69] had excited the Cabinet, and aroused lasting prejudice against a statesman not less able than estimable, appears from the historian's words: 'At that moment the Council were weighing intelligence from the friend at Hamburg, so serious that they had all but resolved on an immediate arrest of the entire Revolutionary Committee.'

Reinhard tells De la Croix, on July 12, 1797, that while 'Lord Edward Fitzgerald and Macnevin[188] were of the moderate party, Turner was for a speedy explosion.'[189] Turner was co-operating in a very base policy, one which unscrupulous statesmen are said to have planned. During the examination of Macnevin before the Secret Committee, Lord Castlereagh confessed that 'means were taken to make the United Irish system explode.' The policy of exciting a premature explosion before Ireland had been organised peeps forth in the Report of the Secret Committee of the Irish Parliament: 'The rebellion [we are told] would not have broken out so soon as it did, had it not been for the well-timed measures adopted by Government.'

Turner's policy changed according as the policy of his employers changed. In March 1798 the rebel Directory at Dublin were seized as they sat in council at Oliver Bond's. Soon after, three out of thirty-two counties rose; and to crush that partial revolt cost England twenty-two millions of pounds and twenty thousand men.

CHAPTER VIII
GENERAL NAPPER TANDY

An old and very influential French newspaper, 'Le Journal des Débats,' published, on February 29, 1884, an article descriptive of the pleasure with which its writer had heard sung a touching but simple Irish lyric, 'La Cocarde Verte,' commemorative of the career of General Napper Tandy. It had been sung, he said, at Paris, by an English girl, who threw into its simple lines a power most entrancing. The melody and the words continued to haunt him at all hours,[190] and, some months later, we learn, found him in London, seeking information, but in vain, regarding Napper Tandy and the song. During a subsequent tour to the 'Giant's Causeway,' his inquiries were not much more successful. 'J'avouai que nos histoires de France ne nous parlent pas de Napper Tandy, et je quittai Portrush sans être absolument satisfait.'

When French history is silent as regards Tandy, and remote inquirers appear so much interested about him, the present chapter may not have been written in vain.

The arrest by British agencies of Tandy and others within the neutral territory of Hamburg and contrary to the law of nations was baldly denied for some time.[191] A similar tone [Pg 71]was taken by official authority as regards the subsequent surrender of Tandy to England; but how true was the story, and with what striking circumstances fraught, will presently appear.

Soon after the departure of Humbert's expedition for Ireland, Tandy, now a general in the French service, accompanied by a large staff, including Corbet and Blackwell, sailed from Dunkirk in the French ship 'Anacreon,' having on board a store of ordnance, arms, ammunition, saddles, and accoutrements. He effected a landing on the coast of Donegal, but, learning that Humbert, after having beaten Lake at Castlebar, had met with reverses and surrendered to Cornwallis, he abandoned the enterprise and re-embarked. It is told in the 'Castlereagh Papers' that the 'Anacreon,' when attacked by an English cruiser, gave battle near the Orkneys, and that 'Tandy had put two twelve-pound shot in his pockets, previous to leaping overboard in the event of striking to the English ship.'[192]

An interesting memoir of Colonel Blackwell, who died in 1809, appears in Walter Cox's 'Irish Magazine' for that year. William Murphy, an old '98 man, and afterwards the well-known millionaire, said that Cox played fast and loose, betraying his own party and the Government alternately. Cox begins by saying that 'few occurrences excited a stronger or more universal sensation than the treacherous arrest at Hamburg, in 1798, of Blackwell, Morres, Tandy and Corbet.' Cox describes Blackwell's perilous descent with Tandy on the Irish coast, and states that, when passing through Hamburg going back to France, the secret of his arrival and that of his comrades 'was betrayed to the British envoy, Crawford, by two pensioned spies of England, Turner and Duckett.'[193]

Cox was a shrewd man; but when suspicion is once raised [Pg 72]it is apt to extend beyond due limits. He was right as regards Turner; he wronged Duckett. His impression of at least the first was probably derived from Blackwell himself, for Cox acknowledges that some of the facts 'the writer of this sketch received from the mouth of Colonel Blackwell.'

General Corbet privately printed at Paris, in 1807, strictures on the conduct of the Senate of Hamburg for having handed him over to the British minister. Appended to this brochure is a letter written by Tandy some days before his death, giving an account of his arrest. 'The original,' writes Corbet, 'is in my possession.'

Cox jumped at the conclusion that the names thus cautiously initialled by Corbet, are Turner and Duckett.[194] A coming chapter will vindicate Duckett; and I am bound to conclude that this man, if he really joined the supper party, had been duped by the plausibility of Turner. Turner and Duckett have been previously shown as on friendly terms.[195]

The accuracy of the information by which Crawford, the British minister at Hamburg, was able to effect his coup excited general surprise. According to the 'Castlereagh Papers' tidings reached him that Tandy and others were lodged at an [Pg 73]inn in Hamburg called the 'American Arms,' and on November 24, 1798, soon after five o'clock A.M., this minister, accompanied by a guard, entered the house. Early as it was, Napper Tandy was found writing. The officer demanded his passport. Thereupon Tandy, with composure, said he would produce it, and going to his trunk he took out a pistol, which presenting, he said: 'This is my passport.' The officer grappled with him, and the guard rushing in secured Tandy. 'He and his associates were put in irons, and confined by order of Sir James Crawford.'[196]

And now for a short digression ere finishing the story of Tandy's woes.

People were puzzled to know how the complicated intrigue which achieved his capture—contrary to the law of nations—could have been completed in a few hours. There can be little doubt that Turner—whom Cox broadly charges with the betrayal, by furnishing information to Crawford had ample notice of their coming.[197] Besides Turner's personal acquaintance with Tandy, official ties of brotherhood had arisen between them, and nothing was more natural than the invitation to sup.

A letter headed 'Secret Information from Hamburg,' and bearing date August 16, 1798, has found its way into Lord Castlereagh's correspondence.[198] The writer, clearly Turner, is found back at Hamburg after one of his periodic visits to Paris, where, with his usual audace, he claimed to be an [Pg 74]accredited envoy of the United Irishmen, and sought to discredit the mission of Lewins.

Before Tandy had left Paris for Dunkirk, where the 'Anacreon' was being equipped for Ireland, he had some unpleasant differences with Lewins and Wolfe Tone.[199] This afforded prospect of a golden harvest for our spy. Tone had long avoided Turner; Lewins repudiated his pretensions. Our spy now 'sided' with Tandy's party, and intrigued to such purpose that he seems to have got himself appointed locum tenens of the general. In this affair Muir and Madgett, with honest motives, bore a part. Muir, a distinguished Scotch advocate, had attached himself to the republican interest, and was tried for sedition.[200] Madgett—an old Irish refugee—held a post in the Foreign Office in Paris, and will be remembered by readers of Tone's Diary as in constant communication with him. It is needless to quote in full the anonymous letter of our spy. It will be found in the 'Castlereagh Papers,' vol. i. pp. 306-9. The men noticed in it, McMahon and O'Coigly, McCann and Lowry, had been old allies of Turner's; and 'Casey, brother to the priest,' Tone, Tandy, Lewins, Teeling, Orr of Derry, McCormack, all figure in the original information conveyed to Lord Downshire.

The letter begins by saying that 'Tandy, having quarrelled [Pg 75]with Lewins and Tone, called a meeting of United Irishmen, at which a division took place; the numbers pretty equal.' Tandy's rupture with Lewins was quite enough to make Turner take Tandy's side. Dating from Hamburg, and believing that the real 'minister of the interior' was a good cook, he writes:—

He then proceeds to describe his visit to the Hague, and the information he acquired there. It may be asked if any evidence exists that Samuel Turner left his usual quarters at Hamburg and was in Paris at this time, and afterwards at the Hague. On p. 409 of the same volume of Castlereagh, Turner is described by name as in Paris on business connected with the United Irishmen, and that from thence he repaired to the Hague. Here he was consulted, as he stated, by General Joubert on various points, including the 'safest places for debarkation.' The West coast, he tells Wickham, 'seemed to be the most eligible, from Derry to Galway.' In the letter to Talleyrand[201] the West coast is also suggested as the best point to invade.[202] The spy, after alluding to the 'contrivances of Lewins,' who 'strives to prevent any person doing anything with the (French) Government but himself,' reports Duckett as a most active [Pg 76]rebel. He makes this statement in a paper meant for the private perusal of Portland[203] and Wickham. Thus it would appear that Blackwell and Cox wronged Duckett in accusing him of informing against Tandy. To Duckett, a man hitherto maligned, it is necessary in justice to return.

Lord Edward had died in Newgate June 4, 1798. The departure of his widow from Dublin and return to Hamburg are announced in the 'Evening Post' of August 16, ensuing. Our spy, as the 'friend' of the dead Geraldine, welcoming Pamela back and tendering sympathy and consolation, would be a good subject for a picture. Mr. Froude tells us that the great power wielded by this seeming exile of Erin lay in his intimacy with Lady Edward Fitzgerald at Hamburg. Morres had been sojourning here previous to Tandy's arrival, and, like Turner, received hospitality at her hands. 'Lord Downshire's friend,' who we are told had access to her house and post-bag, could not fail to know Morres well. It will be remembered that Dr. Madden blows hot and cold on Reinhard, the French minister at Hamburg, and suggests that he may have betrayed to Pitt his correspondence with De la Croix; but Reinhard had now been succeeded by a new man; and if further exculpation[204] of Reinhard were needed after the testimony of Mignet, it is found in the fact that the correspondence of his successor was also tampered with. The letter of 'Lord Downshire's friend,' in which he proposes to become a spy, mentions, as a striking proof of his power, that he had full access to the bureau of the French resident at Hamburg: M. Maragan now filled this post. A letter addressed by him to Talleyrand may be found in the 'Castlereagh Papers.'

[Pg 77]

This was Tandy, as a succeeding letter explains. Tandy and Morres were seized at the same moment, and doubtless on the same whisper. Hamburg encouraged an impression that Russia prompted this arrest; but, unless on the hypothesis that Pitt had the Senate of Hamburg in his pay, it is hard to understand how orders were sent to effect arrests there, just as if it were on British territory. Mr. Secretary Elliot was a member of the family which some months previously received the peerage of Minto in acknowledgment of diplomatic service. This official, writing to Lord Castlereagh, says: 'I learn from Mr. Hammond, Canning's colleague [in the Foreign Office], that Napper Tandy is suspected to be at Hamburg, and instructions have been sent to our resident there to apprehend him.'[207] Thus Crawford must have heard in advance of Tandy's coming, and taken his steps accordingly. Of course he at once acquainted the head of his department; and hence the remark of Mr. Elliot.[208] Some historians convey that [Pg 78]Tandy, after his ill-fated expedition to Ireland, returned direct from Donegal to Hamburg, en route for France. The words of the editor of the 'Cornwallis Papers' are that 'he returned immediately to France.' But these accounts are most misleading. Tandy did not get back to France until after his liberation in 1802, and instead of the few days which might be supposed to intervene between the departure from Donegal and arrival at Hamburg, it was nearer to two months. Dreading renewed trouble with the English cruisers, Tandy gave orders to steer for Norway. All landed at Bergen, and after suffering many vicissitudes sought to reach France by land. The cold became so intense that, as Corbet notes, people were found frozen to death at the gate of Hamburg. Weary and footsore, Tandy arrived here at twilight on November 22, 1798. Hungry for Irish news, he readily embraced Turner's invitation to sup.[209]

This meeting between Tandy and the man whose 'wearing of the Green'[210] had forced to fly his native land may have been in the thoughts of the rebel bard when writing the rude ballad which, a century later, so excited the querist in the 'Journal des Débats:—'[211]

[Pg 79]

It was no isolated secret that Turner had acquired and disclosed. General Corbet, speaking of Morres, Tandy and Blackwall, gives an interesting account of their subsequent imprisonment at Hamburg, and how successive plans to effect their escape became marvellously foiled. 'I lost myself in vain conjectures,' he writes. 'It was not until a long time after that I learned the infamous treason of which I was the victim. I was very far from suspecting the author.' And then, in a foot-note, he indicates him with great caution, dreading the penalty of an action for libel.

It is strange that Corbet was able to anticipate by half a century the revelation made in the 'Cornwallis Papers,' that a secret pension had been given to Turner for information in Ninety-eight. But his privately printed brochure may indeed be styled a sealed book.

Some hours after the arrest Maragan, the French resident, wrote to the Senate at Hamburg claiming Tandy and his colleagues as French citizens, and threatening to leave the Hague unless they were released. Crawford opposed the demand in terms equally strong, and, needless to say, carried [Pg 80]his point. The French chargé d'affaires, observing Tandy's critical state of health, offered a large sum to the officer of the guard to permit his escape, but the superior influence of Crawford overrode all obstacles.

The letter of Tandy, from which an extract has already been made, states that after his arrest one hundred louis d'or were taken from him and never returned. His sufferings in prison he describes as so severe that life became well nigh insupportable, and more than once he prayed to be led out on the ramparts and shot.

John Philpot Curran gives us some idea of what these sufferings were:—

The details given by Corbet of their detention are hardly less painful. At last he and Morres were removed to a new prison.

[Pg 81]

These incidents occurred at a time when wagers had been laid that the days of French power were numbered. England, Austria and Russia prepared to form an alliance. Suvarov, repulsing the French arms in Italy, had entered on French territory; the Archduke Charles advanced on the Rhine, and the Duke of York was in full march on Amsterdam. Hamburg felt that the time had come when England might be truckled to, and France slighted. At midnight on September 29, 1799, after ten months' detention, Tandy and his companions were torn from the sanctuary they had sought and put on board an English frigate which had cast anchor at Cuxhaven.

Their departure was marked by a curious incident, which General Corbet thus notices in describing his arrest and extradition:—

Corbet, describing his arrest in the first instance, says that he asked the soldiers by what authority they acted. 'They appeared not to be ignorant that we were French officers; they answered that they should fulfil the orders of the minister of England.'[215]

For a time France sought to stifle its wrath; but at last it was resolved that the conduct of Hamburg should be denounced to all States, allied and neutral; that all French consular officers quit the offending territory; and that every agent of Hamburg residing in France should leave in twenty-four hours. The Senate of Hamburg now became penitential, and wrote to say so. 'Your letter, gentlemen,' replied [Pg 82]Napoleon, 'does not justify you. You have violated the laws of hospitality, a thing which never happened among the most savage hordes of the desert.'

A deputation from the Senate arrived at the Tuileries to make public apology to Napoleon. He again testified his indignation, and when the envoys pleaded national weakness he said: 'Well, and had you not the resource of weak states: was it not in your power to let them escape?' In reply it was urged that such negligence would have irritated rather than appeased the Powers. Napoleon laid a fine of four millions and a half on Hamburg. This sum, it is naïvely remarked by Bourrienne, his secretary, mollified him considerably, and helped to pay Josephine's debts.

An interesting account of the arrival in England of Tandy and his companions appears in the 'Courier,' a leading London paper, of October 31, 1799.[216] A military cortège accompanied them from Sittingbourne to Rochester, and thence over Blackfriars Bridge, up Ludgate Hill, to Newgate.

Morres had not accompanied Tandy in his expedition to Ireland; and it may be asked on what grounds he was placed in irons, and made to share with the ill-starred general all the rigours of a tedious imprisonment. While Morres indignantly protested against this persecution, he little thought that a document, seriously compromising him, and penned by his own hand, had been given up to the Crown officials. This was a memorial which, on his arrival at Hamburg as an Irish refugee, he had written, in Lady Edward's house most probably, and addressed to the French Minister at Paris. It was intercepted as usual, and may now be consulted in the 'Castlereagh Papers.' Colonel Hervey Montmorency Morres tells Bruix how he had been intrusted by Lord Edward with the direction of the intended attack upon Dublin, and especially as regarded the magazine and batteries in the Phœnix Park; how after the death of Lord Edward he escaped from Dublin, and remained concealed until the arrival of Humbert at Killala, when he assembled the men of West Meath to aid the invading army; but upon the surrender of Humbert he disbanded his followers, and, being pursued by the King's troops, made his way to England, and thence to Hamburg on October 7, 1798. In conclusion he implored the protection of France for himself and his family.[217]

After Tandy and Morres had been removed to Ireland, they were placed at the bar of the King's Bench, when the Attorney General prayed that sentence of death should be passed upon them. Historians curtly tell that the prosecution broke down on a point of law; but this explanation does not quite satisfy. The prisoners pleaded that they were arrested abroad by the King's command, and were thereby prevented from surrendering themselves for trial before the day limited by the Act of Attainder for doing so. The case was argued for[Pg 84] days. Tandy's legal position was shown to be this: 'Why did you not surrender and become amenable to justice? Because I was in chains. Why did you not come over to Ireland? Because I was a prisoner in Hamburg. Why did you not do something tantamount to a surrender? Because I was unpractised in the language of the strangers, who could not be my protectors, inasmuch as they were also my fellow-sufferers.' Counsel argued that when the Crown seized Tandy at Hamburg it thereby made him amenable, and so satisfied the law. Lord Kilwarden, a most humane judge, ruled that Tandy should be discharged.[218] But their triumph was short-lived. Tandy was transferred to Lifford, Donegal, previous to being tried in the district where two years before he had made a hostile descent from France. In Lifford gaol Tandy lay for seven months, during which time great efforts were made to ensure the conviction of so formidable a character; and April 7, 1801, was at last fixed for his trial. Several applications to postpone it were refused by the court, and divers law arguments and objections overruled.

The compact with Turner that he should never be asked to brave public odium by appearing as an approver, was of course respected; but it would seem that he was now brought over to Ireland for the purpose of assisting the law officers in their difficult and delicate task. That the quondam spy at Hamburg was in Ireland at this very time, though soon after he is back again in Hamburg, can be shown. The Registry of Deeds Office, Dublin, records that on February 25, 1801, Samuel Turner, vaguely described as 'of the United Kingdom of Great Britain,' executed to George Lysaght a conveyance of lands in Clare. In society he was well trusted, unless by a few who kept their thoughts to themselves; and at this same time also he became the trustee of the marriage settlement of John Wolcot[219] and Dorothy Mary Lyons. One can hardly realise this man, whose more fitting post would be a funeral [Pg 85]feast, presiding at a bridal breakfast and wishing joy and long life to his friends. His trip to Ireland 'killed two birds with one stone,' for the Book of Secret Service Money expenditure reveals that on July 8, 1801, 71l. 13s. 3d. is paid 'per Mr. Turner to Chapman in Cork for one year and eleven weeks, at one guinea.' Chapman I suspect to have been a minor agent employed by Turner to ferret out evidence against Morres and the Corbets (both Cork men), and in connection with the prosecution of Tandy.[220] The 'one year and eleven weeks' would cover the time that Tandy and his companions, after their removal from Hamburg, lay in an Irish gaol awaiting their trial.

Tandy, finding the evidence against him overwhelming, admitted the accuracy of the indictment, and was sentenced to die on the fourth of the ensuing May. In this course he was doubtless influenced by his son, with whom, as will be seen, McNally, the debauched legal adviser of the rebels, could do what he liked.[221] Meanwhile Napoleon, on his return from Egypt, claimed him as a French general, and held an English prisoner of equal rank a hostage for his safety. It was now not so clear that Pitt had a legal claim to the life of a man who wore the uniform of a French officer, and had come into his hands under circumstances the most peculiar.

As regards Blackwell, the fellow-prisoner of Tandy, Portland, writing to Cornwallis, speaks of having been importuned by Mrs. Blackwell's family, whom he describes as 'of considerable influence in Somersetshire,' and imagines that 'there is no intention of inflicting any punishment on Mr. Blackwell.'[222] Soon after we find Blackwell[223] discharged, but, unlike Morres, he proudly refused to give bail. Morres after [Pg 86]an imprisonment of more than three years regained his liberty on December 10, 1801. Tandy, less fortunate, was removed to Wicklow gaol, and his son asserts that while there the French minister in London signified that Buonaparte had sent directions to his brother Joseph not to sign the treaty of peace 'at Amiens' till Tandy was restored. M. Otto had in fact, as Bourrienne states,[224] previously negotiated with Lord Hawkesbury for his release. Mr. Froude says that 'Tandy was spared as too contemptible to be worth punishing.'[225] This hardly conveys a true idea of the facts. A pardon was at last made out for him on condition of banishment to Botany Bay. To this proviso his son demurred; but, as Mr. Marsden, the Under Secretary at Dublin Castle, assured him, 'all that was required was merely the name of transportation, in order to strike terror into others; and that he would pledge his honour, if he acquiesced, that his father should be landed wherever he pleased, that it might appear to the world as if he made his escape at sea.'[226]

Tandy arrived at Bordeaux on March 14, 1802. Bonaparte's treaty with England was signed on the 27th of the same month. Military honours hailed Tandy. Bordeaux was illuminated, and he was promoted to the rank of a general of division. But in the midst of this jubilee the old rebel read with horror a speech of Pelham's in Parliament stating that 'Tandy owed his life to the useful information and discoveries he had given to the British Government.' He addressed a letter to Pelham, now a peer, branding the statement as mean, audacious, and false. 'This may appear uncouth language to a courtly ear,' he added; 'but it is the voice of truth. I never had any connection or correspondence with your Government, and if I had, they knew my character too well to attempt to tamper with me. Had you contented yourself with saying, "there were particular circumstances in my case," you would have adhered to the truth, [Pg 87]for you know the whole, though you have let out only a part!' Tandy thus concluded: 'I am, my Lord, with the same sentiments which I have uniformly cherished and supported, a friend to universal benevolence, and an enemy to those only who raise their fortunes on their country's ruin!'

Pelham probably confounded Napper Tandy with James Tandy, from whom information had been given to his confidant, McNally, and by 'Mac' conveyed to Dublin Castle. Napper told his son all, not thinking it would transpire. His feelings had been roused by the imputation, and in a letter to the 'Argus' he gave them fuller vent. 'Had discoveries been proposed to me, I should have rejected, with scorn and indignation, a baseness which my soul abhorred.... I had made up my mind for death in a cause which no mode of execution could stamp disgrace upon. It would have been death in the cause of freedom and of my country—a cause which would have converted the scaffold into an altar, the sufferer into a victim!'

Mr. Elliot, who, I think, afterwards succeeded his brother as Lord St. Germans, echoed in Parliament the taunt cast by Pelham, and spoke of 'Tandy's ignorance and insignificant birth.'[227] Tandy, addressing Elliot, said:—

Eight weeks elapsed. Elliot failed to reply, and Tandy, in accordance with the fashion of the day, proclaimed him 'a calumniator, a liar, and a poltroon!' This fierce climax was preceded by a more temperate tone.

Ignorant of the source to which his betrayal was due, it did not occur to Tandy that the speeches of Elliot and others may have aimed at diverting suspicion from their real informant. Tandy, in reply, advanced merely the suspicion that the charge of being an informer was fulminated to excite the jealousy and disgust of his adopted country France, which, unlike America, had opened her arms to afford him protection.[228]

[Pg 89]

The wearing worry of Tandy's later life had sapped his strength, and left him sensitively open to hostile shafts, which his conduct provoked. His vanity was commensurate with his patriotism, and in his stoutest day was easily wounded. He gradually sank, and died at Bordeaux in 1803. 'His private character,' writes Barrington, 'furnished no ground to doubt the integrity of his public one.' He died, as he had lived, a staunch Protestant.[229]

Much has been written of the wonderful escape from Kilmainham Gaol of Corbet, afterwards a general in the French service, and one of the prisoners captured with Tandy at Hamburg, and thence removed to Dublin. Miss Edgeworth was so much struck by this romantic escape, that she made it the leading incident of her best novel. But, considering the subtle international difficulties that had arisen, and with the suggestion of Under-Secretary Marsden before us, it is a question how far Corbet's escape may not have been connived at by Castlereagh.

The sermon which Napoleon preached to the Hamburg deputies on their infringement of the law of nations was in the mouths of his admirers for years after; but it lost in impressiveness by his own violation of the neutral territory of Baden, when, on the night of March 17, 1804, he sent a strong guard[Pg 90] to seize and carry off to France the Duc d'Enghien. After a hasty trial by court-martial, and on unproven charges of conspiracy, he was cruelly put to death in the Castle of Vincennes. In the heated discussions to which this outrage gave rise, Buonaparte more than once quoted the case of Tandy, and feebly sought to find in the past conduct of Hamburg a precedent and justification.

Thomas Addis Emmet accused him of coldness and indecision as regards the long threatened invasion of Ireland, because, instead of steering for Erin in 1798, he changed his plan and went to Egypt. The arrest of Tandy in Hamburg rekindled Napoleon's hostile feeling, and shortly after the death of that general he resolved to carry out comprehensively his oft-mooted design.

The 'Correspondence of Napoleon'[230] contains a letter to Berthier, dated September 27, 1804. He says that an expedition to Ireland had been decided upon; that 18,000 men for that purpose were ready at Brest; that a simultaneous landing was to be attempted in Kent; while in Ireland the French army would march straight on Dublin. Meanwhile 200,000 men were encamped at Boulogne; but hostile plans collapsed with the smash of the French fleet at Trafalgar. A few weeks later the so-called 'Army of England' traversed the banks of the blue Danube instead of the Thames. General Mack capitulated at Ulm; Francis of Austria fled, and Napoleon's legions entered Vienna.

CHAPTER IX
ARREST OF JÄGERHORN IN LONDON—THE PLOT THICKENS—TURNER SHOT THROUGH THE HEAD

In 1799, Turner's stealthy steps can be traced once more in London. It will be remembered that Lord Edward Fitzgerald had met, by appointment near Whitechapel, M. Jägerhorn, a secret envoy of France, and gave him, in full detail, information regarding every point on which that agent had been charged to inquire. Jägerhorn was 'the estimable Swede' named by Reinhard, the French minister at Hamburg, when writing the intercepted letter. This document, dated July 12, the editor of the 'Castlereagh Papers' assigns to the year 1798;[231] but as Lord Edward was dead at that time,[232] it must belong to the previous year. Other secret missives were sent to Dublin at the same time by the Home Office, in order to guide the course of the Irish Government. These papers, filling forty pages of the book,[233] were the result of a successful stroke of espionage at Hamburg.

M. Jägerhorn is of course the person alluded to by Mr. Froude when describing the nocturnal visit to Lord Downshire. 'He [Lord Edward] had been watched in London, and had been traced to the lodgings of a suspected agent of the French Directory, and among other papers which had been forwarded by spies to the Government, there was one in French containing an allusion to some female friend of Lady Edward, through whom a correspondence was maintained between Ireland and Paris.'

[Pg 92]

Hamburg was Turner's usual residence, and Jägerhorn had an estate near that place.[234]

Although the case of M. Jägerhorn is opened in the first volume of the 'Castlereagh Papers,' and misplaced among the incidents of another year, we do not find until far in the second the letters addressed to him in 1797 by General Valence and Lord Edward. In 1799 Jägerhorn had sought to renew his perilous enterprise. The same keen scent which traced Lord Edward, in 1797, to the lodgings of the confidential envoy in London, was once more on his track. Wickham, writing from the Home Office on March 28, 1799, has news for Castlereagh in Dublin: 'I have the satisfaction to inform your lordship that we have secured M. Jägerhorn, who was coming over here on a mission similar to that which he undertook some two years since, when he met Lord Edward Fitzgerald in London.'

A full report is given of Jägerhorn's examination, in which he is asked: 'Were you not charged to deliver to Lord Edward Fitzgerald a letter from somebody?' and he replied, 'Madame Matthiessen.' This was the lady, nearly connected with Lady Edward, and alluded to by Mr. Froude as a name found in secret papers. He is further questioned about Lord Edward, Lady Lucy, General Valence, and a number of other persons whose names had cropped up in the interview between Turner and Downshire; but, though the queries were searching, and Jägerhorn now seemed completely in Pitt's power, nothing material was wrung from him. England and Russia were at this time allied, and Jägerhorn, pretending that he had a pension of 2,000 roubles as a spy of Russia, rather dumb-foundered his examiners, and he at last regained his liberty. All this is to be found, with full details, in the 'Correspondence of Lord Castlereagh.'

The paltry sum which Turner received for his services now comes to be considered. This man, who had every facility of access to Lady Edward's house at Hamburg and its rebel entourage, held the key of a position so incalculably important[Pg 93] that he never himself discerned its marketable value. Thousands would doubtless just as readily have been paid to him as 'the cool 500l.' that he modestly asked. 'To get the information had cost him,' he said, 'three times that sum, and to keep up the acquaintances and connections he had at Hamburg he could not live on less.' 'Small profits and quick returns' seems to have been his motto.

'Fresh evidence of the person's power to be useful,' writes Froude, 'made Pitt extremely anxious to secure his permanent help.' The Cornwallis papers record, but without any attempt to identify him, that the pension Samuel Turner received—dating from 1800—was but 300l. a year. Wellington when Irish Secretary addressed to Portland a letter in which a present payment of 5,000l., and 'not more than 20,000l. within the year,' appears guaranteed to one nameless informer.[235]

Another case may be cited. A document placed in my hands by Sir W. Cope, Bart., records that his grandfather was told by Under-Secretary Cooke to stop at no sum, not even 100,000l., in urging Reynolds to turn approver. Reynolds, not realising the importance of his evidence, consented to take 5,000l. and 1,000l. a year, with the post of British consul. The tergiversation of Reynolds did not take place until 1798, long after Turner had sold the pass.

The services of 'Downshire's friend' were more timely and, perhaps, more valuable. He told what he knew in 1797: the names he gave of the Executive Committee (p. 7, ante) proved more important than might appear at first sight. Reynolds, it is true, gave the hint that a Committee would be found sitting at Bond's on March 12, 1798, but he does not seem to have disclosed names; his son says that the names were inserted in the warrant purely 'on speculation.'[236]

As regards the more distinct whisper of Turner, the betrayal of the Belfast Directory, at the very hour that Tone [Pg 94]was leaving Brest with a French fleet, proved in itself a paralysing blow, and one worth its weight in gold. But the arm that dealt it struck from behind unseen. However, as most of the information that Downshire's friend gave concerned the Northern organisation, he may, perhaps, be credited with this exploit. The loss of Ulster was the loss of the right arm of the rebellion. Turner made his disclosures on October 8, 1797. Besides the list of the Executive Directory, there can be no doubt that in the information which followed he named, with others, John Hughes of Belfast, the date and place of whose arrest tally with the presumption that to Turner it was due. The 'History of Belfast' records: 'October 20, 1797—John Hughes, bookseller, having been apprehended in Newry[237] on a charge of high treason, was brought in here escorted by a party of light dragoons.'[238] Mr. Froude says that 'Downshire's friend' kept him informed of everything.[239]

How well Turner knew Hughes is proved by the sworn testimony of the latter,[240] in which he describes a breakfast in June 1797, with Samuel Turner, Teeling, Macnevin, etc., when the fitness of the country for an immediate rising was debated. Hughes had been a great patriot previously, but now to save himself became a mercenary informer, and even sought to criminate Grattan, who thereupon was dismissed from the Privy Council, though, as Stanhope[241] admits, without just cause. There had been no more zealous propagandist of the rebellion than Hughes, and he names a long list of men whom he himself had sworn in on a prayer-book. In 1802 John Hughes retired to the United States and became a slave-owner.

Wickham's letter of June 8, 1798, enumerated, for the [Pg 95]information of Lord Castlereagh, a number of men whose arrests in England seem consequent on the information furnished by Downshire's visitor. These names include McGuckin, the attorney, who had been concerned for O'Coigly at Maidstone. The subsequent career of this once determined rebel, but who soon after his arrest in 1798 became a spy for the Crown, enhances the importance of Turner's information at a great crisis. The first recorded payment to McGuckin of secret service money is March 5, 1799.[242] His son migrated to France, and was created a baron by Louis Philippe.

The peril of assassination which shadowed every step made by Turner was not adequately weighed by Pitt when estimating the value of his services. The risk he ran was not confined to Ireland. The life of an English spy abroad was deemed equally unsafe, and there is much reason to fear that more than one met with short shrift. Even a successful diplomat, if his subtlety touched French interests, could not regard his life as safe. The disappearance of Benjamin Bathurst, a kinsman of Earl Bathurst, has never been explained. Bathurst was sent on a secret mission to Vienna, at the time that England before opening the Peninsular campaign sought to persuade Austria to declare, by way of a distraction, war against France. Austria soon after crossed the French frontier, and Bathurst received hints of threatened personal doom. Hoping to avoid assassination, he took a northerly route in returning to England, and on reaching Perleberg in Brandenburg, he visited, in his agitation, the commandant of cuirassiers, requesting that sentries might mount guard at the inn where he stopped. These were supplied, and Bathurst spent the day in writing and destroying letters. Shortly before his carriage came to the door in the dark of a November evening, he told some troopers who escorted him that they might withdraw. While all the household was on the alert to see him off, he walked beyond the circle of the lantern glare, and was lost to sight at the heads[Pg 96] of the horses. This occurred on November 25, 1809, and Bathurst was never seen or heard of more, notwithstanding that, as we are reminded by Baring Gould, England offered 2,000l. reward, and Prussia 100 Friedrichs d'or, for the discovery even of his remains.

To trace the spy with whom these chapters mainly deal seemed, at the outset, almost as hopeless as to find Bathurst's bones. Of all the Government informers not one has been more ingeniously guarded from discovery. Wellington, with all his astuteness, supposed that the fact of a man's name appearing in the Banishment Act was conclusive evidence against him of having been a rebel,[243] and therefore disqualified from claiming any favour from the Crown. But had he known the secret history of Turner's case, it would have opened his eyes. A Fugitive Bill was passed in July 1798, enumerating the rebel leaders who had fled from justice. In this bill we find Samuel Turner named. During the following year Parliament was asked to lend itself to the fraud of branding as a traitor the same Samuel Turner, by passing against him an Act of Attainder. From 1797 he lived abroad, posing as an 'exile of Erin.'[244]

The sealed chest in Dublin Castle which was opened a few years ago contained the only letter I ever saw signed with Turner's name. It related to his pension, and it was necessary [Pg 97]to lay the mask aside for once. We have already seen him styled Furnes, Richardson, and especially 'Lord Downshire's friend.'[245] A new name is now adopted to puzzle posterity. He directs that 500l. be lodged to the account of 'J. Destinger,' and this sum he was to draw through a third party. Turner's letter is addressed, not to Dublin Castle, but to Cooke in London, that gentleman having been succeeded, as Under-Secretary for Ireland, by Mr. Marsden.

Turner spent money freely, and often when he could ill afford it. He had a social status to maintain: he was the son of a county magistrate; had distinguished himself in college; [Pg 98]belonged to an honourable profession. He was the trustee of marriage settlements. He was 'Lord Downshire's friend!' If he continued to wear his mask well, why might he not aspire to attain, in America at least, the high official rank of his late colleague and fellow-prisoner, Thomas Addis Emmet, whom she at last honoured by a public funeral and a monument raised by national subscription?

The 'Dublin Directory' for 1804 describes Samuel Turner's address as 58 St. Stephen's Green, in that city. The volume must have been compiled during the previous year, and it may be that the Irish Government, in 1808, removed him to Dublin, with the object of picking the brains of those who had been concerned in Emmet's rebellion of that year. Until the very night of its outburst, in July 1808, the existence of a slumbering volcano had not been suspected. After the vain attempts to convict and hang Tandy, Turner had returned to his old quarters.[248]

The Irish Government were wholly unprepared for Emmet's revolt. No wonder that Wickham, with the experience he had acquired, confessed amazement that the secret should have been kept so well.

Turner was at once set in motion: but how? We find him put into the same gaol with a swarm of State prisoners, many of whom had been active in 1798. All daily met for exercise in the yard of Kilmainham Gaol, and had every opportunity for converse. Here Robert Emmet himself had been confined until the very day of his execution.

The execution was followed by that of several of his confederates. Let us look back. Martial law is proclaimed; a dead calm prevails. Turner is now traced stealthily making his way to the Secretary of State's Office, Dublin Castle. Anxious to avoid committing himself in writing, especially with a true signature, he seeks the safer medium of oral communication. Mr. Marsden cannot be seen; he is engaged just then in conference with the chief law officer of the Crown. Turner scribbles the following and sends it in; no signature is attached, but the paper and enclosure are endorsed, by Marsden, 'Mr. Samuel Turner':—

Sergeant Ball's letter is dated

[Pg 100]

How Marsden and the Attorney-General settled the difficulty, no correspondence exists to show; but the London 'Courier' of December 5, 1803, most lucidly reveals the facts:—

The 'Dublin Evening Post' of the day states that Turner's arrest was due simply to his indiscretion in visiting Ireland on business arising from the death of his father.[251] But as the 'Post' in 1803 had been subsidised by the Crown, this account was probably meant to mislead. The Castle archives bulge with the brimful letters of its editor, H. B. Code. Turner's committal to Kilmainham was only another act in the great drama, one scene of which Mr. Froude has so powerfully put before us. 'Samuel Turner, Esquire,' of imposing presence and indomitable mien, a veteran in 'the cause,' the man who had challenged the Commander-in-Chief, the envoy to France, the exile of Erin, the friend of Lord Edward and Pamela, the disinherited by his father, the victim of State persecution, now stood before his fellow-prisoners the 'Ecce Homo' of martyrdom, commanding irresistibly their confidence.

Of his detention in Kilmainham Dr. Madden knows no[Pg 101]thing; but he mentions that Turner accompanied the State prisoners—nineteen in number—to Fort George in Scotland, the final scene of their captivity. Here Turner's work was so adroitly performed that we find a man of incorruptible integrity suspected instead. Arthur O'Connor told John Patten that Thomas Addis Emmet 'gave information of a letter which O'Connor was writing, through which means Government became acquainted with the circumstance.' A long correspondence on the subject has been published by Madden. Emmet at last challenged O'Connor. Patten,[252] the brother-in-law of Emmet, was told to bring a certain pair of duelling pistols to Fort George; but, thanks to the efforts of Robert Emmet to allay the dispute, the weapons were not used. It was Patten's impression that Turner's machinations had set the two friends by the ears. Although O'Connor apologised, and both parties shook hands, it is painful to add that half a century after, when the upright Emmet had been more than twenty years dead, O'Connor, in his book 'Monopoly,' stigmatised him as a man of bad faith. A suspicion more baseless was never uttered. In this book the name of his fellow-prisoner, Turner, is not once mentioned. Indeed, the inference is that he thought well of Turner; for O'Connor, after criticising the Catholic members of the Directory, declares that he had much greater reliance on the Northern chiefs. O'Connor, Emmet, Neilson and others were detained at Fort George until the Peace of Amiens, and then enlarged on condition that they should expatriate themselves for ever.[253]

In 1807 Sir Arthur Wellesley, afterwards Duke of Wellington, entered on his duties as Irish Secretary. A letter, dated Dublin Castle, December 5, 1807, and addressed to the Admiralty, recommends a midshipman in the navy, Francis Turner, for promotion. 'He is the son of a Mr. Turner in this country, who has strong claims to the favour of the Government [Pg 102]for the loyalty and zeal with which he conducted himself during the rebellion in Ireland.'[254] Doubtless the new hand merely wrote in this letter what the permanent officials prompted.[255]

Downshire, although a staunch Tory of the old school, uniformly supported the Catholic claims. This example probably influenced his protégé. O'Connell, while inculcating moral force in his struggle for civil and religious liberty, was fond of enlisting in his bodyguard men who in more troubled times had staked their lives and fortunes for Ireland. He had himself been a 'United Irishman,' as will be shown. The rebel General Clony presided as chairman at the Catholic Association. Rowan, Teeling and 'Con' McLoughlin sat at the Council board, or stood on the National platform. What confidence must not O'Connell have reposed in the man who, as will appear, avowed himself ready to die for his chief!

An aged gentleman, Patrick O'Byrne, who was born at Newry, almost under the shadow of Turner's patrimonial gable, but who never once doubted his fidelity to the cause in which O'Byrne himself has been no silent ally, supplies a fact of sufficiently curious import:—

All this time it cannot be said that, although undiscovered, Turner was still a happy man. The dread spectre of assassination ceased not to haunt him. 'After long experience of the world,' says Junius, 'I affirm before God I never knew a rogue who was not unhappy.' Nor was Turner's presentiment surprising. McSkimmin's History of Carrickfergus, 103-73, in his 'History of Carrickfergus,' states that the pistol and the dagger were no uncommon means of dealing with informers; and he supplies a list of men who thus suffered.

Books which treat of 'Ninety-eight' often mention Byrne of Dundalk. In 1869 the late Mr. John Mathews of that town gathered from Byrne's representative, Mr. P. J. Byrne, Clerk of the Crown, several facts, and, in enclosing them to me, styled his informant 'the highest authority on the unpublished history of the County.' Two days later Mr. Byrne was no more. The inquiries I then made had no reference to Samuel Turner, but some passing notices of this man which occur in the manuscript are useful in now supplying missing links. Mr. Mathews was an ardent patriot, and he described, not without emotion, how Turner died. Regarding him as a rebel true to the end, he writes:—

[Pg 104]

Was the vengeance wreaked by Boyce meant as a tardy retribution? Was the John Boyce, who with five other prisoners was consigned in 1797 to Carrickfergus Gaol, connected with the Boyce who shot Turner? What Boyce had against Turner was a secret which died with both. No proceedings seem to have been taken against the man by whose hand he fell. And possibly this forbearance was not uninfluenced by the fact that the Crown had need no longer for their informer's services, but, on the contrary, gained by his death. Turner was a clever man, troublesome to deal with, haughty, touchy, and resentful; and, like Maguan,[258] Bird and Newell, he might at any moment publicly turn upon his employers and betray them with as little compunction as he had already sold his comrades.

A word as regards Lord Downshire, through whom Turner's disclosures were at first conveyed. This peer, who at one time had wielded potential influence at Whitehall, and had the ear of Pitt, lived to fall into deep disfavour with Government. He steadily opposed the Legislative Union, and helped to form a joint-stock purse with the object of out-bribing Dublin Castle. In chastisement he was dismissed from the Lord Lieutenancy of Down, deprived of his rank as colonel, expelled from the Privy Council, and threatened with a parliamentary inquiry into his conduct. These blows told, and on September 7, 1801, he breathed his last.

CHAPTER X
EFFORTS TO EXCITE MUTINY IN THE ENGLISH FLEET

Of Duckett, an amateur rebel envoy, mentioned in connection with the arrest of Napper Tandy,[259] something remains to be said. He was a man of very active habits, and if less impulsive would have had more friends. Tone, already the victim of misplaced confidence, viewed many men with suspicion, and let them see it. In 1796 he was passing as a French officer, and mentions in his diary that, when waiting to see De la Croix, the minister of war at Paris, Duckett, who chanced to be also in the ante-room, sought to enter into conversation with Tone by handing him an English newspaper. Advances of this sort, though natural in an exiled Irishman meeting another, were not without effect in making Tone distrust and avoid him.[260] Duckett no doubt had projects connected with the enterprise in hand to which the chivalrous Tone would not stoop; but of these Tone knew little, and his prejudice was formed on quite different grounds. These suspicions were shared by Madgett, an official in the French War Office. Duckett, it appears, told Madgett that two expeditions were to proceed to Ireland. 'Madgett said that he had endeavoured to put Duckett off the scent by saying he did not believe one word of the story, but that Duckett continued positive.' Tone adds that the information was probably true; but that it was terribly provoking it should be known to [Pg 106]Duckett, 'to whom, by the by, De la Croix revealed in confidence all that he knew, for which he ought to be damned.' Tone later on admits that he knows nothing against Duckett unless by report.[261]

Tone's unhealthy impression Dr. Madden caught contagiously. In the first edition of his book, published forty years ago, he conveys that Duckett was a spy subsidised by England.[262] Innuendo grew at last into accusation, and a more recent edition records that Duckett, 'there is good reason to believe, was not employed by the Irish Directory, but by the British Minister, Mr. Pitt.'[263] Again, we are told that Duckett was 'assuming the character of an agent of the United Irishmen at Paris, and continually dodged Tone in all his movements.'[264]

I cannot endorse this imputation. In no pension list, or account of secret service money, is the name of Duckett to be traced; nor is there one line to criminate him in the archives of the Home Office. Nay more. Open the 'Castlereagh Papers,' and there Duckett is found denounced as a sworn enemy to England. These valuable State papers were published ten years previous to the issue of Dr. Madden's revised edition; but, uninfluenced by their revelations, he renews the charges against Duckett.

Guillon, who has had access to the Government archives in France, says that Truguet, Minister of Marine, had thrown himself heart and soul into the projected invasion, and proposed to land 30,000 men in Ireland, under Hoche; and 60,000 later on in England; but the Directory deemed the plan too daring, and threw it aside; until Tone's memorials made their thoughts recur to invasion, and they then adopted a portion of the rejected scheme of Truguet.[265] An interesting letter from Duckett to Truguet, Minister of Marine, turns up among the intercepted despatches. This functionary had just been succeeded by a new hand.

[Pg 107]

Is the Government still resolved to prosecute the same plans and the same projects [Duckett asks]. Can my country rely on its promises? Let me know, I beseech you in the name of Liberty, what is to be done? Shall I go home to accelerate the period for the arrival of which we are all solicitous? Consider that it is only patriots and enemies of England who risk anything—it is their blood that will flow.

The fears I had lest I should not be able to convert your bill into money are unfortunately realised. I have presented it to Citizen Reinhard, explained to him who I was, and what I was going to do. I showed him how necessary it was that I should leave Hamburg. He replied that his personal means did not permit him to comply with my application, adding that he could not act, because I had not a particular letter for him.

A mysterious task and goal are glanced at.

It will be remembered that the betrayer whom Mr. Froude dramatically pictures as unbosoming himself to Downshire was the confidant of Reinhard at Hamburg, had access to his house, and used that fact to prove that his services, as an informer,[Pg 108] were worth purchase by Pitt. I have elsewhere shown that the letters headed 'Secret Information from Hamburg,' which have crept into the 'Castlereagh Papers' to puzzle the world,[267] can only have been written by 'Lord Downshire's friend'—i.e. Turner. One appears at page 306 of the first volume of that work. There the objects vaguely broached by Duckett are revealed as plainly as though Reinhard himself had whispered the word. The spy, having furnished other items of news, writes:—

Obstinately hostile winds, as in 1796, once more saved England. Tone, whose untiring energy had accomplished the organisation of the invading forces, soliloquises in his diary of 1 August, 1797:—

Much that Tone privately penned is found confirmed by a secret committee which sat while Parker's[271] corpse hung in chains at Sheppey. It appeared that the crews were largely sworn to espouse the Irish cause; 'to be faithful to their brethren who were fighting against tyranny;' to carry a portion of the fleet into Irish ports, hoisting, instead of the Union Jack, a green flag emblazoned with Erin-go-bragh.[272]

Dr. Madden's suggestion that Duckett was a spy of Pitt's is reiterated with cruel consistency. Part of the grounds of his suspicion was Duckett's intimate relations with Reinhard, also suspected by Madden, but who is now shown conclusively to have been true. Madden frequently quotes from the 'Castlereagh Papers,' but overlooks the following letter from Sir J. Crawford to Lord Grenville, one wholly inconsistent with his hypothesis that Duckett, like Turner, was a spy for Pitt. Crawford was, of course, the British representative at Hamburg.

This letter explains the more ambiguous despatch written two months before. Wickham transmits, by direction of Portland, for the information of the Irish Viceroy, a copy of a secret note,

Tone's prejudice against Duckett influenced Macnevin. 'Mr. Duckett is still here,' writes Reinhard to De la Croix in another intercepted letter. 'I proposed to Mr. Macnevin to reconcile himself with Mr. Duckett. He has refused to do so.'

It is remarkable that while the usually clear-sighted physician suspects Duckett of being an English spy, he praises 'the zeal and talents of Turner.'[280] Nor is there one line in Tone's Diary to indicate distrust of Turner; but the wrong man, in true dramatic style, incurs suspicion and blows. On September 21, 1797, Tone called on General Hoche at Rennes. Hoche spoke of Duckett, and Tone destroyed him with an expressive shrug, adding that he had boasted at Paris of his acquaintance and influence with General Clarke, and even with Hoche himself. Two days later Colonel Shee, the uncle of Clarke, and who accompanied the expedition to Bantry Bay, also inquires if Tone knew Duckett. 'I answered that Duckett was a scoundrel. I besought him to put Hoche on his guard.' It appeared that Duckett had made two or three advances to Shee, who, however, had consistently avoided him. Tone's gorge is raised, and he ends some remarks of asperity with 'I'll Duckett him, the scoundrel, if I can catch him fairly in my grip.'[281]

Duckett, according to the Hamburg spy, now shown to be Turner, was employed by the French Government to excite mutiny in the British fleet. Its first outburst was at Portsmouth; it was renewed at the Nore. As historians, who might be expected to treat largely of such incidents, barely [Pg 112]notice that mutiny, a few remarks here are perhaps admissible; the more so as it will be necessary to recur again to Parker, who led the revolt. It assumed so formidable a front that Truguet thought it might prove the death-blow to England's greatness. Parker, who possessed wonderful powers of persuasion, was soon joined by a large portion of Lord Duncan's squadron, and became the soi-disant admiral of the fleet. He blockaded the Thames, and threatened to starve London. His mutinous force now consisted of twenty-four sail of the line. Each ship was governed by a committee of twelve, together with two delegates and a secretary, and all assembled by beat of drum. The pulse of public feeling was shown in three per cent. Consols falling to forty-five. The Board of Admiralty visited the scene of the mutiny, but failed to effect an arrangement. Lord Northesk, R.N., waited on Parker to hear his terms. These were so exacting that Northesk hesitated. The following is culled from the (London) 'Courier' of June 8, 1797, and it will be seen how much Parker's letter differs from the mild version of it given in Campbell's 'Lives of the Admirals':—

Northesk, furnished with a passport from Parker, returned to town, while Pitt and Dundas were hanged in effigy at the yard-arm. It was even debated to surrender the fleet to the French. Thereupon Sheridan suggested that all the buoys and beacons should be removed. A paper of the day states[Pg 113] that the troops, ordered to fire on the fleet from the batteries at Gravesend, broke out into mutiny themselves, declaring that fratricide formed no part of their duty. The biographical dictionaries say that the popularity of Northesk and the firmness of Lord Howe caused the utter collapse of this great mutiny; but such history is misleading. The 'Repulse' was the first ship to abandon the cause, and becoming stranded was mercilessly cannonaded by the fleet. Its foremast and rigging were shot away; its decks were red with blood. Two more deserters, the 'Agamemnon' and 'Vestal,' escaped better. In slipping their cables and entering the Thames it was supposed that they were carrying into effect an already debated plan of bombarding Gravesend. The rest of the fleet followed and found themselves snared into the hands of the Government. When this fact became apparent, the mutineers were filled with fury. The ships separated, turned the great guns on each other, and fought furiously for hours, until at last Parker succumbed. In reading the trials of the delegates one is struck by such Celtic names as Sullivan, Donovan, Walsh, Hughes, Brady, MacCarthy, Maginnis, Coffey, and Branon. Strange reports were current.[282] The 'Courier' of June 6, 1797, records that

However, he made no distinct revelation. He was subjected to a number of interrogatories, 'dans lesquels,' observes a French authority, 'on chercha vainement à découvrir les secrets moteurs de l'insurrection.'

Duckett's letter to Truguet, minister of marine, and the information of the Hamburg spy, help to throw light on this stirring episode. The mutiny is commonly ascribed to the harsh regulations of the Admiralty. A deeper design underlay it. Parker was at first committed to stand his trial before a civil court; but a court-martial was suddenly substituted. This deprived him of the forensic services of Erskine, whose powerful eloquence had successfully defended Horne Tooke against the Cabinet of Pitt. It was desirable that so dangerous a man should be got rid of without delay. His application for an adjournment was refused; and on June 30, 1797, he suffered death.

These mutinies were largely the work of Duckett, acting under the instructions of La Croix, the French minister of war. Tone, as we have seen, hated Duckett, whom he constantly snubs and denounces. Had there been a co-operation, the event would doubtless have been different. However all moderate men rejoiced at the issue. The mutiny formed part of a scheme to sever England's right arm; but the chivalry of Tone recoiled from a manœuvre of which he finally saw the importance while hesitating to approve of it. Dutch and French fleets for the invasion of Great Britain and Ireland had been nearly ready to start at the time of the mutinies.

Pitt used a powerful engine in subduing the mutiny. He [Pg 115]despatched to the Nore a Roman Catholic priest, who impressively preached the doctrine of submission.[283] This was probably the same priest of whom Father O'Coigly complains as worrying him in the condemned cell in the hope of persuading him to inform.

CHAPTER XI
THE BETRAYER OF LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD[284]

Another man there was of the same type as Turner, who posed in impenetrable disguise, but unlike Reynolds and Armstrong, spied in secrecy and on the express condition that he should not be asked to give public evidence and thus damage his social status.

An historian often quoted in these pages is not safe in suggesting that we may find behind the mask of Lord Downshire's visitor the betrayer of Lord Edward Fitzgerald. The utterly distinct quarter to which the Geraldine's arrest is due will presently appear. Lord Edward had the command of Leinster. Turner had mainly to do with Ulster. Guiltless he was of Lord Edward's betrayal in Dublin, for the simple reason, no doubt, that living abroad himself he knew nothing of his hiding-places. All other sensational incidents of that stirring time paled before the sorrow by which Lord Edward's arrest and death oppressed the people. A Dublin ballad expressed the fierce anxiety felt to discover and destroy the veiled betrayer—

Whilst, on the other hand, ballads inspired by loyal ardour did not hesitate to regard as a holy work the annihilation of Lord Edward Fitzgerald.[285]

[Pg 117]

In 1830, when continental thrones trembled and others fell, Moore published his interesting 'Life of Lord Edward'—a work which, however popular and opportune, will not bear a critical scrutiny as regards historic exactness. 'From my mention of these particulars respecting Neilson,' writes Moore, 'it cannot fail to have struck the reader that some share of the suspicion of having betrayed Lord Edward attaches to this man.' Moore's book attained a wide circulation, and the descendants of Neilson naturally felt the wounding words. A letter of his daughter strongly protests against them, and expresses a hope that allowance will be made 'for the indignant feelings of a child who has always been proud of her father's character.' Colonel Miles Byrne, a shrewd head which narrowly escaped the axe in '98, failed to endorse the imputation on Neilson, but hesitated not to declare that Lord Edward had been 'betrayed, and discovered by Reynolds, a United Irishman, to the agents of Government.'[286] In this random shot the Colonel missed his mark. The flaming patriot, Walter Cox, often states in his magazine that Laurence Tighe had shadowed to death the Geraldine chief. Thereupon Dr. Brennan, in the 'Milesian Magazine,' broadly charged Cox with the perfidy. Murphy, an honest, simple man, in whose house Lord Edward was taken, has not been exempted from suspicion. 'Lord Edward's concealment,' observes Patrick Brophy, 'became known through a soldier who was courting Murphy's servant girl;' forgetting that Thomas Moore, in his account of the arrest, incidentally remarks: 'an old maidservant was the only person in Murphy's house besides themselves.' Maxwell, in his 'History of the Rebellion,' said of Neilson, 'Thou art the man.' Mark O'Callaghan, in his 'Life of O'Connell,' brands John Hughes as having received 1,000l. for Lord Edward's blood, thus endorsing the indictment previously framed by Dr. Madden.[287] The son and biographer of [Pg 118]Reynolds flings suspicion on Murphy; while Murphy, in his own account, says: 'I heard in prison that one of Lord Edward's bodyguard had given some information.' Again, Felix Rourke was suspected, and narrowly escaped death at the hands of his comrades. Suspicion also attached to Mr. Ogilvie, who, as a near connection, visited Lord Edward in Thomas Street a few days before the arrest, and transacted business with him. Interesting as it is, after near a century's speculation, to know the name of the real informer, it is still more satisfactory that those unjustly suspected should now be finally acquitted.

'On the 18th of May' [1798], writes Mr. Froude, 'Major Sirr received communications from a quarter unhinted at in the most secret letters of the Viceroy, telling him where Lord Edward could be found.'[288] I proceed to point out 'the quarter.'

In 1841 Dr. Madden obtained access to a book in which Mr. Cooke, formerly Under-Secretary at Dublin Castle, had made secret entries of various payments to informers. Amongst these items is: 'June 20, 1798, F. H. discovery of L. E. F. 1,000l.' Although Cooke disclosed merely the initials 'F. H.,' he gave the name in full when recommending the informer for a pension. Writing to Lord Castlereagh in 1799, Mr. Cooke says: 'Francis Higgins,[289] proprietor of the "Freeman's Journal," was the person who procured for me all the intelligence respecting Lord Edward Fitzgerald, and got —— to set him, and has given me much information, 300l.' This 300l. was an annual stipend.

[Pg 119]

The 'Freeman's Journal' at this time was the organ of Dublin Castle, and it is stated in a memoir of Secretary Cooke that he had written for that paper. Hence a frequent intercourse subsisted between Cooke and Higgins; and the evidence is conclusive as to Higgins having received the Government reward. But the person of whose good name Cooke is so careful that in writing to Castlereagh he considerately puts a blank for it, was not so easily traced when first I took up this inquiry. Mr. Ross, editor of the 'Cornwallis Papers,' who was allowed to ransack the archives at Dublin Castle, writes: 'The man who gave the information which led to his [Lord Edward's] arrest, received 1,000l., but his name has never transpired.'

The point is now to prove that Francis Magan, M.A., barrister-at-law, a man traditionally described as one of the most unsociable of men, was the private friend and political ally of Higgins.

Thomas Magan, of High Street, Dublin, was the father of Francis. The leading journal of that city, in its issue of June 30, 1787, records how, on the previous evening, 'Mr. Magan, of High Street, entertained Mr. Francis Higgins' and others. 'The glass circulated freely, and the evening was spent with the utmost festivity and sociality.' The editor concludes by styling him 'Honest Tom Magan.' On November 5, 1789, he returns to the charge:—

From an old Directory it appears that Tom Magan's loyal zeal was acknowledged about this time by his appointment as 'Woollen Draper and Mercer to His Majesty'[292]—one of the few paltry boons to which, in penal days, a slavish Catholic trader dare aspire. In 1793 a Catholic Relief Bill passed, and the bar was opened to Papists—a concession due to the menacing attitude of the United Irishmen and the boom of the French Revolution. Tom Magan's son, Francis, entered Trinity College, Dublin; graduated in 1794; and became a member of the bar—probably on the suggestion of Higgins, who was an attorney. In 1795 Francis Magan left the parental roof-tree in High Street and took house for himself at 20 Usher's Island, where he continued to live until his death in 1843. This house having been the residence of the Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, Dr. Carpenter, who died there a few years previously, was regarded reverentially by the survivors of his flock.

'Will no one urge Lord Edward to fly—I pledge myself that every port in the kingdom shall be left open to him'—said Lord Chancellor Clare. But money was to be made of his blood; and vampire instincts must needs be sated. The arrest was not effected until Saturday, May 19, although a proclamation promising 1,000l. as its price had been out since March.

[Pg 121]

Higgins, who constantly transmitted the result of his espionage to Dublin Castle, was now more than ordinarily on the qui vive. At Moira House, Usher's Island, Pamela, wife of Lord Edward, sometimes stayed. In March, Leinster House, Kildare Street, was searched by soldiers—on which occasion Major Swan said to Lady Edward: 'This is an unpleasant duty for any gentleman to perform.'—'It is a task which no gentleman would perform,' was the reply.[293] She little dreamed that men whose friendship she valued were playing a part still more ungentlemanly. On this occasion Lord Edward narrowly escaped; thenceforth he avoided both Leinster House and Moira House, unless for stealthy visits, and for weeks he remained hidden at Portobello near Dublin.

Thomas Moore, when engaged on the 'Life of Lord Edward,' had an interview with Major Sirr, and learned from him that on May 17,[294] 1798, 'he received information that a party of persons, supposed to be Lord Edward Fitzgerald's bodyguard, would be on their way from Thomas Street to Usher's Island that night.' Their destination, Moore adds, he had failed to discover. I am in a position to show, however, that the party were on their way to the house of Francis Magan and his sister, in Usher's Island. Mr. James Moore, of 119 Thomas Street, had given Lord Edward shelter when 1,000l. lay on his head; but a carpenter named Tuite—who worked in Dublin Castle, and knew Moore—having overheard Cooke say that Moore's house should be searched, gave a timely hint to Moore, who therefore fled to Meath, previously telling his daughter to provide for Lord Edward's safety. Francis Magan and his sister were well known and respected by Miss Moore. She conferred with Magan on the subject, and an arrangement was made that Lord Edward should move that night from Moore's in Thomas Street to Usher's [Pg 122]Island and occupy a bedroom in Magan's house.[295] But it was suggested that, as two or three people knocking at his hall door on Usher's Island might attract attention, it would be safer to admit them by his stable in Island Street, which lay immediately at the rear. The biographer of Lord Edward knew nothing of Miss Moore's arrangement with Magan; but he casually mentions that the Government received information of his lordship's intended visit to Usher's Island. Major Sirr, attended by a guard, proceeded to the quarter pointed out; a conflict between the parties took place; 'and,' adds the biographer, 'Sirr in defending himself lost his footing and fell; and had not those with whom he was engaged been much more occupied with their noble charge than with him, he could hardly have escaped. But their chief object being Lord Edward's safety, after snapping a pistol or two at Sirr they hurried away.'[296]

Several volumes containing the original correspondence of Major Sirr are now preserved in the library of Trinity College, Dublin. Amongst them is the following letter:—

[Pg 123]

Cooke, with due consideration for the feelings of Magan and Higgins, does not tell Sirr from whom the information came; but the plot now thickens, and will be soon made clear.

Miss Moore—afterwards Mrs. Macready—died in 1844. To her son, she said:—'The Government got timely information that we were going to Usher's Island. Now this intention was known only to Magan and me; even Lord Edward did not know our destination until just before starting. If Magan is innocent, then I am the informer.'

On the day after Magan's apparently humane arrangement with Miss Moore he called at her house, anxiously inquiring if aught had happened, as he had waited up until the small hours, and yet Lord Edward did not come! Miss Moore, not suspecting Magan, replied: 'We were stopped in Watling Street; we hurried back to Thomas Street, where we providentially succeeded in getting Lord Edward a room at Murphy's.' Mr. Magan, satisfied by the explanation, leisurely withdrew, but, no doubt, quickened his gait on reaching the street. That evening, at four o'clock, Murphy's house was surrounded by soldiers, and Lord Edward, after a desperate resistance, was secured, and conveyed in a sedan-chair to the Castle.

Higgins claimed, and received, 1,000l. as the price. How much was given by him to the 'setter,' or what precise agreement subsisted between them, I have no document to show. A pension was bestowed upon Magan, and I find in the Secret Service account the following entry: 'September 11, 1800—Magan, per Mr. Higgins, 300l.'

The name of Thomas Magan, the father of the betrayer, disappears from the Directory in 1797—from which I, at first, inferred that his death occurred about that time. But it now appears that he subsided into bankruptcy. On May 2, 1798, the assignees of Thomas Magan, woollen-draper, a bankrupt, grant to John Corballis, for the consideration of 690l., some house property belonging to Magan.[301] This date is worthy of [Pg 124]attention; it is one fortnight before the arrest of Lord Edward Fitzgerald. The difficulties of the Magan family had been gathering for some years. They commenced in 1793, when Higgins lent Thomas Magan 1,000l.; and three years later, as will be seen, another thousand. 'The borrower is servant to the lender,' saith the proverb. Further search in the Registry of Deeds Office, Dublin, discloses two additional mortgages from Thomas Magan, senior, to Francis Higgins—one for 2,341l., another for 1,000l. The 'witness is Francis Magan.'[302] Their date is July 7, 1796, when very serious embarrassments threatened the family. How closely Shamado's toils[303] grasped father and son is now clear; and let us hope that when Francis Magan was persuaded by his tempter to sell Lord Edward's blood, he muttered, not without emotion, 'My poverty, and not my will, consents.'[304]

The name 'James Dixon' appears in the private list, supplied by Mr. Froude, of those who constituted the executive Committee of the United Irishmen in 1795, and 'by whom the whole organisation was managed.' Dr. Madden does not seem to know this, and says merely[305] that 'James Dickson hospitably treated and succoured on all occasions the families of the State prisoners.' The late Mathias O'Kelly told me that one of the few persons with whom Magan lived, in early life, on [Pg 125]terms of intimacy was 'James Dickson, of Kilmainham,' and that he had repeatedly met Magan at Dixon's house. 'Dixon was deeper in the confidence of the rebel party than many more prominent leaders,' adds O'Kelly. 'He took the chair at the meeting of United Irishmen which had been convened to thank Napper Tandy for challenging Attorney-General Toler, afterwards Lord Norbury; and he was twice imprisoned for alleged complicity in the rebellion.' But the Government treated him with a consideration extended to few others; and, on the grounds of ill-health, he was permitted to leave Kilmainham Gaol daily on short riding excursions.[306]

Undemonstrative in his habits, it is not easy to trace him in the scanty reports of contemporary newspapers. On May 17, 1797, a meeting of barristers was held urging the Government to 'yield to the moderate wishes of the people, and thereby defeat the designs of any party dangerous to the country;' and amongst the seventy-three signatories, with Francis Magan, were T. A. Emmet, H. Sheares (afterwards hanged), Robert Orr, B. B. Harvey (commander at Vinegar Hill in '98, and also hanged), W. Sampson, Robert Holmes, J. Philpot Curran, L. McNally, and many other popular men, some recognised as members of the United Irish Society, such as Joseph Huband, and W. Newton Bennett, afterwards a chief justice.[307] The subsequent Baron, Smith, is there too with Robert Johnson, dismissed from the bench in 1806, and George Ponsonby, afterwards Lord Chancellor. In 1797 they stood upon a pitfall, but by a miracle escaped.

Francis Magan posed through life as the pink of propriety. Before the last century closed he had strong claims for secret service; but I cannot doubt, knowing his quiet and somewhat nervous nature, that whatever information he gave must have been communicated through Higgins. The latter owned a newspaper, which was the openly subsidised organ of the Government. He constantly assailed the popular party with [Pg 126]invective; so that, unless through Magan, he could have had no opportunity of approaching the patriots, much less sucking their brains.

My contention as regards Magan was first expressed in a 'Note on the Cornwallis Papers' printed thirty years ago,[308] and it is with no small interest that I now find all my suspicions confirmed by Magan's own letters. The letters of Higgins to Cooke claiming blood-money for Magan form the crowning proof of that which at first was mere theory. Magan was an informer of the most mercenary type—constantly tendering his services, and withholding information when coin ceased to clink.

The earliest mention of Magan by name is in 1797; the reports of Higgins are specially full at that date, no doubt the fruit of intercourse with Magan, who was completely his creature. One, undated, says: 'On Wednesday last, Jackson, Dixon, Magan, and a large party dined at McKinley's, opposite Kilmainham Gaol. The two first went into the prison, and distributed money which the prisoners had wrote for.'

Many letters follow. Higgins told enough to show how important a spy Magan could become if betrayal were made[Pg 127] worth his while. On December 29, 1797, he writes: 'You have not, dear Sir, determined as to M. At such a momentous and critical period ... every intelligence should be obtained for Government.'[309]

But is the proof certain that 'M.' means Magan? Higgins four days later returns to the charge, adding: 'You have said nothing about Magan, and will let his information slip through your hands, as he is about to go down to Belfast, and thence to England.'[310]

Higgins and Magan, strange to say, did not know that the democratic barrister, McNally, was already in pay as a spy. Part of the information furnished concerns McNally's movements, which may have made Cooke indifferent as regards some of the letters. Higgins, on January 3, 1798, reports that at the pillorying of Finnerty, Lord Edward, O'Connor, Bond, Sheares and McNally attended the rebel as a mark of sympathy. Magan was hungry for Lord Edward's blood; and Cooke must needs be brought at once to business. On January 5, 1798, Higgins says he will 'fix Magan to meet Cooke at dinner,' and 'shall in the course of to-day or to-morrow give you a hint of his terms.'

The dinner did its work. The ill-fated priest O'Coigly—or Quigly—was now 'wanted,' but meanwhile other wants must needs be satisfied.

Four days later he writes:—

A bundle of letters covering six weeks follows. Magan feigned to be the attached friend of his victims, and was so entirely trusted that they resolved to give him higher office in the rebel executive.

A letter dated March 7, 1798, contains a long account from Magan, through Higgins, regarding persons from Belfast and Wexford, recently forming deputations from their committees. 'He is to be with me at 12 o'clock to-morrow. I request you will be so good as to recollect sending to me for him as promised.' Magan was duly pumped, and Higgins, on March 15, writes: 'M. was with me this day, and seemed as if I had received a second 100l. for him. For God's sake send it, and don't let me appear in so awkward a situation.' And on March 23, 1798, Higgins writes:

The money was sent, and Magan's tattle was resumed.

Raised to a post of trust and authority in the organisation, Magan's power of betrayal became, of course, largely increased. He had hitherto communicated solely through Higgins. [Pg 129] Stimulated by reward, he now addressed Cooke direct, but anonymously. Cooke, however, has endorsed the letter 'Mag.' It is dated not from Usher's Island, where he lived, but from Higgins' house in Stephen's Green, and the handwriting is the same as that in a later document with an acknowledged signature.

On May Day 1798, when boys and girls were rejoicing, and the May-pole at Finglas was the scene of a festivity in glad welcome of the coming flowers, Higgins writes in great fuss to Cooke that a more formidable rising was at hand, adding: 'If you can see M. this night, you can bring out where Lord Edward is concealed.' 'What hour shall I bring M. this night, if your leisure will permit? Remember to bring him to a point—I mean about Lord Edward.' But his lordship's [Pg 130]frequent change of abode baulked the projected capture. Mr. Lecky considers that the search must have been made with singular languor to produce such little fruit. It should be remembered, however, that no police force deserving the name existed in Dublin; and that arrests were usually made, as eventually in Lord Edward's case, by detachments of military.

On May 15 Higgins wrote to Cooke:—

Magan is shown to have met Lord Edward at council at this time, but it was not easy to seize the chief on such occasions. Higgins was the Castle journalist, and could throw off letters with ease. Mr. Lecky says that his missives to Cooke would be found most useful material in illustrating the history of his time; and, no doubt, they are destined some day to see the light. Higgins uniformly writes of Lord Edward as a monster of evil, but it is due to the ill-fated Geraldine to say that men whose testimony ranks far higher record a different estimate.[321] Lord Holland, a Cabinet minister, thus writes of him:—

[Pg 131]

If he had personal ambition to gratify, the powerful influence of his family could easily have fed it to repletion. His life was one of sacrifice and attests the sincerity of his soul.

Higgins thought that Cooke was not sufficiently alive to the importance of Magan's hints. He now tells Cooke that an attack on Dublin Castle had been proposed and adopted, but this information may have been embellished to rouse the Irish Government. 'M. thinks it is on the ensuing Tuesday or Wednesday, but will be certain for your information,' he writes. 'He says the 300l. promised should have been given at once.... However, I have given him leave to draw upon me, and fully satisfied him of the honourable intentions of Government where service was actually performed, and of your kind attention if he would go forward among the meetings, communicate what is transacting, and, if found necessary, point out the spot where they may be seized, etc. This he has at length agreed to do.'[323]

The reader will remember Magan's arrangement with Miss Moore that, for Lord Edward's greater safety, the noble fugitive was to shift his quarters from James Moore's house to Magan's. The latter, to screen himself from suspicion, felt anxious that Lord Edward's capture should be made in the street.

[Pg 132]

The 'armed banditti' consisted merely of Mrs. and Miss Moore, Gallagher, a clerk in Moore's employ, and a man named Palmer.[325] This is the account furnished to me in a most circumstantial statement by the late Mr. Macready, the son of Miss Moore. She had been educated in Tours; Lord Edward always conversed with her in French, and he usually passed as her French tutor. The hour was 8.30 in a lovely May evening. Palmer and Gallagher walked some yards in advance, and were the first to come in contact with Sirr's party at the corner of Island Street. Sirr gave Gallagher an ugly wound which afterwards favoured identification. The latter, a powerful man, made two or three stabs at Sirr, who fell in the struggle, but, as he wore a coat of mail, he was able, after a few moments, to regain his feet. Lord Edward was also in handigrips with one of Sirr's guard; both came to the ground, but with no more ill result to his lordship than some unsightly daubs of mud on his coat. In the confusion the ladies hurried back with their noble charge to Thomas Street, leaving Palmer and Gallagher to hold Sirr at bay. The party abandoned their design of going to Magan's, though not from any distrust of his fidelity, and obtained shelter for Lord Edward in the house of a faithful adherent named Murphy with whom he had previously stayed. Miss Moore told Magan next day the whole adventure, and how the retreat had been safely effected. Lord Edward was lying on his bed in Murphy's attic, after having drunk some whey to relieve a bad cold, when Major Swan and Captain Ryan peeped in at the door, exclaiming that resistance would be vain. At once Fitzgerald started up like a lion from his lair and rushed at Swan. Revolvers were as yet unknown and his pistol missed fire; he then drew a dagger. The account furnished by Swan to a Government print states:—

Captain Ryan then came upon the scene, but his flint lock missed fire; and thereupon he lurched at Lord Edward with a sword-cane, which bent on his ribs. Sirr had been engaged in placing pickets round the house, when the report of Swan's pistol brought him upstairs.

Lord Edward, in fact, had completely ripped him open. Although Sirr had lodged several slugs in his lordship's right shoulder, he continued to fight furiously until the soldiers, of whom more than 200 were present, overwhelmed him by pressing their heavy firelocks across his person. They had brought him as far as the hall, when he made another desperate effort to escape, and a drummer from behind stabbed him in the neck.[327] Previous to this scene Higgins plied Cooke with gossip from Magan, as the case about to be cited will show.

The nickname applied to Pamela in the following extract was due to a popular rumour that her parents were Madame de Genlis and Philippe Egalité, Duke of Orleans: 'Lady Egality complains dreadfully about Lord Castlereagh ordering [Pg 134]a short passport. She will have letters sewed or quilted in her clothes, and goes to Hamburg. I shall send you particulars.'[328]

Lady Fitzgerald was at this time at Moira House, within a few doors of Magan; and the concluding words go to show that he had access to the house, and was entirely conversant with its domestic doings; the status, politics and attainments of so near a neighbour would facilitate access to its gilded salons.[329] Lord Edward probably sent, through Magan, messages to Pamela. Magan acted his part so plausibly that on the very night Lord Edward lay a bleeding captive in Newgate, he was raised by the votes of United Irishmen to a still higher post in the organisation.

Lord Edward had been arrested in Murphy's house; and Mr. Lecky remarks[330] that there is no mention of the place in the letters of Higgins. The latter, to save time, may have given the hint orally. Higgins resided within twelve minutes' walk of Cooke's office. Mr. Lecky states:[331] 'He [Higgins] was accustomed to go openly and frequently to the Castle.' Cooke told Sirr that if he would go on the following day, between five and six P.M., to the house of Murphy in Thomas Street, he would find Lord Edward there.[332]

On May 20, when Lord Edward was dying of his wounds in Newgate, Magan furnishes through Higgins fresh hints, and promises further information 'to-morrow.' 'He was elected last night of the committee,' adds Higgins. 'I had a great deal of exertion to go through to keep him steady, and was obliged last week to advance him money.' On June 8 Higgins writes: 'I cannot get from M. a single sentence of who assumes a Directory. I have so frequently put him off about [Pg 135]the payment of the 1,000l. that he thinks I am humbugging him.'[333]

It will be remembered that, according to a secret entry of Cooke's, 1,000l. was paid on June 20 to 'F. H.' for the discovery of 'L. E. F.,' and he observed the compact that Magan's name should not appear. Magan thought that there was an effort to 'humbug' him as regards the blood-money which he earned, but he knew how to 'humbug' a little himself. Higgins, setting forth his own claims, tells Cooke, later on: 'By your interference Mr. M. obtained 300l. for expenses; give me leave solemnly to assure you that I paid every possible expense he was at, and more than I can mention.'[334]

Magan was one of the first Catholic barristers called after the Relief Bill of 1793, and wore an aspect highly demure and proper. He was a trump card in the hands of Higgins, which, if adroitly played, could not fail to clear the board. But with what a small share of the winnings Magan was content is consistent with all we know of his crawling career.[335] Arthur O'Connor, writing to Dr. Madden in 1842, says: 'So far as I could learn, no one betrayed Lord Edward'—a striking testimony to the secrecy with which the thing was done.[336]

Magan, the better to cloak his treachery, and to command that confidence the fruit of which was distilled into dainty drops for Cooke's ear, continued to manifest popular sympathies. [Pg 136]He went further, and on December 9, 1798, is found taking part against the Government in a debate and division, where his feeble voice could carry no influence, unless to deceive democratic friends. It was on the occasion of the bar meeting, in Dublin, convened to discuss and oppose the Legislative Union. Francis Magan's name may be found on the patriotic side, in company with Bushe, Burton, Barrington, Burrowes, Curran, Fletcher, Plunket, Ponsonby, and Leonard McNally.

Passing on to 1802, we find a round sum of 500l. slipped into the hands of Francis Magan on December 15 in that year, as appears by 'an account of Secret Service money applied in the detection of treasonable conspiracies.' This is the same amount which was given in 1848 for the discovery of Smith O'Brien, and again in September 1865 for Stephens, the Fenian head centre; while in 1798 only 300l. was offered for Neilson and General Lawless. The discovery which earned the reward of 500l. in December 1803 must have been esteemed of importance. What that discovery was has been hitherto involved in mystery; but the succeeding chapter, devoted to William Todd Jones, may help to make it clear. The 500l. is given to Magan direct, nearly eleven months after the death of Higgins, through whom Magan's information had been previously conveyed to Dublin Castle. He was now thrown on his own resources, and seems to have been less squeamish than of yore. Were Higgins then living the refresher might have been less, for 'Shamado' had no objection to a lion's share. And one is not surprised to read in Plowden that Higgins, originally a pauper, died worth 40,000l.[337]

Magan continued successfully to preserve his mask. A great aggregate meeting was held on December 18, 1812, to protest against acts of the Irish Government, and among the signatures convening it are those of Daniel O'Connell and Francis Magan. This fact is brought out in a memoir of the Liberator by his son, who, however, does not suspect Magan.

[Pg 137]

It was a national crisis. Meetings in aid of Catholic Emancipation had just been forcibly dispersed. Lords Fingall, Netterville, and Ffrench were dragged from the seats in which, as chairmen, they presided. Other signatories who, with Magan, convened this meeting, were the three Catholic peers just mentioned, Dr. T. Dromgoole, Bernard Coyle, Sylvester Costigan, Con McLoughlin, and Fitzgerald of Geraldine—the latter five having been, as well as O'Connell, United Irishmen.

I was not surprised to hear from Mathias O'Kelly,[338] an old member of the Catholic Board and at one time secretary to the Catholic Association, that Magan possessed the respect and confidence of those bodies. He seemed to prove the sincerity of his sympathy in the most practical way, and rarely gave less than ten pounds as a subscription to their funds. It is, no doubt, to Magan that Wellington refers in his letter to Dublin Castle, dated London, November 17, 1808: 'I think that, as there are some interesting Catholic questions afloat now, you might feed —— with another 100l.'[339]

Dr. Dirham, who from his boyhood had resided on Usher's Island, heard it rumoured, he told me, that Magan during the troubled times kept frequently open the door of his stable in Island Street to facilitate espionage.[340] Moira House, now the 'Mendicity Institution,' is situated within a few doors of No. 20, Usher's Island, the residence for half a century of Francis Magan. As already mentioned, Pamela, the beautiful wife of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, received in the stormy period of '98 hospitable shelter from Lady Moira. To my surprise I find, in a manuscript life of Dwyer the outlaw, by the late Luke Cullen, a Carmelite friar, that two of Emmet's most active emissaries, Wylde and Mahon, lay concealed in Moira House [Pg 138]while a proclamation offering 500l.[341] for their capture was being widely circulated. Before this curious fact came to my knowledge, it will be seen, from a former work of mine dealing with informers, that on utterly distinct circumstantial evidence I sought to trace Magan as on the track of Wylde and Mahon at Philipstown during the same eventful year.

Major Sirr made a private note, which remains duly on record[342] that the retreat of Wylde and Mahon 'is sometimes at the gaoler's in Philipstown, who is married to Wylde's sister.' The following entry appears in the 'account of secret service money employed in detecting treasonable conspiracies per affidavit of Mr. Cooke': 'April 2, 1803. Francis Magan, by post to Philipstown—100l.'[343]

In the State Papers of the time I can find no letters bearing on this transaction, and therefore I must seek to trace it on circumstantial evidence.

Who can doubt that Magan, when a refresher reached him at Philipstown, was in hot scent after Wylde and Mahon? Later on, during the same year, we find Captain Caulfield and a party of military laying siege to the house at Philipstown in which Wylde and Mahon were suspected to be concealed. An account of a skirmish is supplied by Captain Caulfield in a letter, dated December 17, 1803, also preserved in the Sirr papers: 'Captain Dodgson was killed, and,' adds Caulfield, 'we were obliged to retire, while the villains made their escape.'[344]

Luke Cullen, the Carmelite already referred to, spent his later life gathering from the peasantry their recollections of the [Pg 139]troubled times. His manuscript life of Dwyer has been placed in my hands by the superior of Clondalkin monastery. Folios 595 to 597 describe Wylde and Mahon's refuge at Philipstown, the abortive efforts to catch them there, and afterwards their concealment at Moira House, Dublin. The governor of Philipstown Gaol, we learn, was a near connection of both. They are stated by Cullen to have at last effected their escape from Moira House, Usher's Island, in a boat which rapidly passed out of the bay. Having reached the United States, Wylde and Mahon joined the army, and found speedy promotion. The statement that two proscribed men, most active propagandists of Emmet's plans, lay under Lord Moira's ægis seems startling; but this statesman and his countess had very popular sympathies, and liked to succour rebels. The late Mr. Thomas Geoghegan, solicitor, informed me that two uncles of his named Clements, who were United Irishmen, obtained refuge at Moira House while warrants were out for their arrest, and finally succeeded in escaping all pains and penalties owing to the precautions taken by Lady Moira.

It is not a little singular that General Lord Moira, who, later on, was offered the Viceroyalties of Ireland and of India, and who in 1812, on the death of Percival, sought to form an administration, should have performed the perilous task of harbouring men who loved Ireland 'not wisely, but too well.' Portland, in a letter to Camden, dated 11 March, 1798, classes with 'the disaffected,' 'Lord Moira and his adherents.' This impression was partly due to his indignant protest in Parliament against that policy of torture by which the people had been daily goaded to rebel.

Magan's life involved some strange contradictions. Proud, and even haughty, he yet hesitated not to commit base acts; with the wages of dishonour he paid his just debts. An interesting letter, in reply to a query, was addressed to the present writer by the late John Fetherstonhaugh, of Griffinstown, Kinnegad. His grandfather, Thomas Fetherston, of Bracket Castle, was, he states, in the habit for years of lodging in High Street, Dublin, at the house of Thomas Magan, a draper,[Pg 140] 'and departed this life in his house.'[345] Fetherston's son, on inspecting his papers, found a joint bond from the draper and his son, Francis Magan, for 1,000l., and on speaking to the former respecting its payment, he declared that he was insolvent.

James Dickson of Kilmainham has been more than once mentioned in these pages. As soon as he had been discharged from gaol, in the absence of evidence to convict him in a court of law, he opened his house for the entertainment and solace of the families of the State prisoners. But his guests were not confined wholly to the United Brotherhood. My informant, the late Mathias O'Kelly, often met there William Todd Jones, of whose arrest in 1803, on suspicion of complicity in Emmet's treason, volumes were published; Lord Kingsland, famous for a career of marvellous vicissitude; Mrs. Neilson, [Pg 141]wife of the rebel leader, then imprisoned at Fort George; and Plowden, the popular historian, who gathered at Dickson's table much valuable information. The house was quite a centre of liberal opinion in Dublin, and no man shared Dickson's confidence more fully than Magan. Mathias O'Kelly greatly respected Magan, and thirty years ago, when I first started my suspicion, he laboured hard to convince me that I was entirely wrong. Magan told O'Kelly that he had been a member of the Society of United Irishmen, but withdrew from it when he saw it drifting into dangerous courses. The reverse is the fact. He played his part so well that at the time of his betrayals he was promoted to a high post in the rebel executive.[347]

In 1832 a brochure was 'printed for the author by William Shaw, Dublin,' which must have quickened the sluggish pulse of Mr. and Miss Magan. It was 'An Impartial Enquiry respecting the Betrayal of Lord Edward Fitzgerald,' by Joseph Hamilton. No charge was preferred against the Magans in this pamphlet. But conscience makes cowards; the probing given to a sore spot, and Hamilton's mention of 'Mr. Magan and his sister,' with others who knew of Lord Edward's movements previous to the arrest, proved distasteful at 20 Usher's Island.

Hamilton's labour was undertaken with the avowed object of clearing Neilson from a suspicion which Moore, in his Memoir[Pg 142] of Lord Edward, ventured to start. Whether Moore, in gathering facts for his book, had been referred to the Magans, I know not, but he certainly returned to England strongly prejudiced against the incorruptible Neilson, and straightway framed an indictment bristling with innuendos.[348] Hamilton prints, with other vindicatory papers, letters from Hamilton Rowan and Dr. McNevin, also a touching protest from the daughter of Neilson. Hamilton knew Lord Edward well.

Mr. Hamilton proved Neilson guiltless, but he fell into the error, which a man blindfolded at play commits, in very often making a grasp in the wrong quarter. He suspects Reynolds; Captain Armstrong, who betrayed Sheares; 'a Mr. Hatton, one of the rebel Executive, who unaccountably escaped.'[349] Even Sir Jonah Barrington; nay, the estimable philanthropist, Mathias O'Kelly, who lived with his father at Galway's Walk, near the scene of Lord Edward's tussle with Sirr, was also mentioned in a suggestive way. 'On the 17th May,' writes Hamilton, 'Armstrong met both the Sheares, and on that evening Major Sirr was seen looking towards the rear of Miss [Pg 143]Magan's house from Mr. O'Kelly's stable door in Galway's Walk. I know five different places where Lord Edward was concealed,' he adds. The secret which, like the sword of Damocles, had long hung over the heads of Francis Magan and his sister, now seemed on the point of falling; but their names were not used in this pamphlet more freely than those of Miss Moore, Murphy, and a few other persons amongst whose haunts the Geraldine flitted during his last days in this world. Hamilton thus closes the first stage of his inquiry:—

A promised second part never appeared; but it were almost better for the feelings of Magan and his sister had the dreaded charge been boldly fulminated, than the agony of suspense to which they were doomed. I had not seen this scarce pamphlet when I first expressed my suspicions of Magan.

When the present century was in its teens, the aristocratic section of Irish Catholics sought to give the Crown a 'veto' in the appointment of their bishops, and started in opposition to O'Connell, who had been demanding unfettered emancipation. In the ranks of this troublesome schism, the records of which would fill a library, I find Francis Magan, Lords Fingall,[351] Trimleston, Kenmare, Gormanstown, and Southwell, [Pg 144]Wolfe,[352] Shiel,[353] Bellew, Lynch, Donellan,[354] Wyse,[355] Ball[356] and others anxious to reach by a short cut the good things of the State.

The gentleman into whose hands Magan's papers passed tells me that he found a letter addressed to him in 1834 by Sir W. Gossett, Assistant Secretary of State at Dublin Castle, asking under what circumstances he claimed a pension from the Crown, and requesting information as to a small office he held. A copy of Magan's reply was appended, saying that the Viceroy of the day had promised him a county chairmanship—or, as it would now be called, a county court judgeship; but, owing to the disabilities then affecting Catholics, he was found to be not eligible for appointment, and the emoluments in question were given as compensation.[357] Gossett had succeeded Gregory in 1831, and having come in with the Whigs sought to administer a more liberal form of government. Cornwallis, Castlereagh, Cooke and Marsden had been long gone to their account, and dead men tell no tales. Whether Gossett viewed Magan's reply as quite satisfactory does not appear. In 1835 Earl Mulgrave deprived Watty Cox of his pension, but I cannot say whether the same high-handed course was extended to Magan.

[Pg 145]

Magan was said to have filled some small legal office long since abolished, though of its precise character even his relatives could afford no information. A gossiping missive is subjoined, the less reluctantly because Magan, having often stood in misanthropic isolation, it is pleasant to find any person who came in frequent contact with him. Moreover it is one of the last letters of a not undistinguished man. Sir W. Gossett, who wrote to Magan for information as regards the sinecure he held, might have been glad of the dates which are now supplied. The late Huband Smith, M.R.I.A., served with Magan as a Commissioner for Enclosing Commons. This was rather an unpopular appointment. The disturbances of 1766, ending in the execution of Father Sheehy, all originated in the resistance offered to a similar measure. From 1821 to 1827 Mr. Goulburn filled the office of Chief Secretary for Ireland, and he was a very likely man to have recognised the claims of any person who had rendered secret service in '98. The same remark applies to the Premier, Lord Liverpool, who provided so munificently for the family of Reynolds the informer. On the death of that peer in 1827 his successor, Mr. Canning, earned popularity by refusing to employ in his departments any of the spies of '98, or even to ratify the appointments of Lord Castlereagh or Lord Liverpool.

Huband Smith's letter runs:—

Mr. Magan was socially described as a person who 'held his head high,' and with a nice sense of honour. In later years he seemed unduly sensitive and, at times, retiring. Possessing few friends through life, he continued staunch to these few, beginning with Francis Higgins and ending with 'Master' Clancy. 'I hold Magan in such esteem,' the latter said, 'that only for his advanced age I should like to appoint him my executor.' Some other men who remembered '98, its horrors, and its gossip, rather recoiled from Magan without knowing well why. There was something of a 'Dr. Fell' about him. He occasionally went the home circuit, but got no briefs. When hailed by juniors with a deference which put to flight all misgivings on his part as to whether acquaintanceship was likely to be valued, his hauteur softened into a dignified affability, and this relaxation was often taken as a gracious condescension. His white locks made him venerable, and by some he was regarded as a father of the Bar.[359]

Another man who viewed him with respect was the late Judge Corballis, who in reply to a letter wrote:—

Mr. Corballis lived in the country and knew not what Magan's neighbours said. In their eyes a black cloud seemed to hover over his house.

But in personal appearance he was neat enough, and might be daily seen, in the stiff high cravat of the Regency, emerging from its precincts. Dr. Atkinson and Charles Kernan say that, though Magan was a familiar object to them all the year round, they never saw him accompanied by mortal in his walks. He never married, would sit in solitude, or stalk from room to room like Marlay's ghost. Perhaps the voice of conscience muttered, 'You are said to have sought the confidence of men in order to betray it; show the world by your frigid attitude that such is not likely to be true.' He was reported to have wealth: how he acquired it seemed a mystery.

In 1842, Dr. Madden, when engaged on his 'Lives of the United Irishmen,' had interviews, as he tells us, with Mrs. Macready, who, as Miss Moore, had been with Lord Edward the day before his arrest;[361] but her son informed me that as Magan was then alive and residing near at hand, she did not mention his name to Dr. Madden. Magan, however, cannot fail to have heard of the inquiries being instituted around him by Madden, and his nervous temperament was not calmed by that knowledge. He died in 1843, during a period of great popular excitement and when fears prevailed that the events of '98 were about to be renewed.

'Magan's remains lie in our vaults' writes a local priest.[362]

[Pg 149]

'By his will he requires a perpetual yearly mass to be celebrated by all priests of this church for the repose of his soul, so that I have been praying for him once each year since I became attached to this parish, without knowing anything of his antecedents.'

Dr. Dirham had been residing within a few doors of Magan's house, and on the death of that gentleman it occurred to him to move to the more ample accommodation it afforded. His account, though wholly unimportant, is curious in its way. For years Miss Magan kept constantly promising to vacate in his favour, stating that some small cottage in some rural spot would be much more suitable to her lonely life; but an irresistible fascination bound her to the dingy rooms in which she had vegetated since the dark days of '98. Francis Magan, by a will of ten lines, had left all his property to Elizabeth, his sister, and directed that his funeral might be private. The rooms were now all shut up, and Miss Magan herself ate, drank, and slept upon the landing. For twenty years the drawing-room had not been opened, owing to the fact that a younger sister had died there; and the other apartments of the house were locked up for reasons equally odd. A strange indisposition to permit the humblest visitor to enter the place, was shown in various ways. A quarter of a century seemed to have elapsed since the dust-pit had been emptied, and boards were erected round it which enabled the Magans to add daily débris, until at last they became dust themselves. When Dr. Dirham came into possession of the place[363] he found the garden covered from end to end with some feet deep of cinders, through which rank nettles struggled like the stings of the self-consciousness that made life with Magan the reverse of roseate. In a retired nook stood a bottle drainer, the wooden bars of which had fallen in from decay, smashing in its descent the emblems of conviviality it once enshrined, and through the [Pg 150]aid of which profitable secrets may erst have been gained. The sewers and gratings had become choked; and the deep area at the rear of the house was filled with eight feet of stagnant water. A subterranean cell, adjoining this fosse, and by courtesy styled the 'coal-vault,' opened on another dark chamber; and a feeling of awe crept over the Doctor when, impelled by curiosity to gauge its depth, he cast a stone into the pit, and listened until its descent terminated in the sound of splashing water below. The hinges of the hall door were so stiff during Miss Magan's tenancy, that Dr. Fleming, who as a cousin once ventured to visit the moneyed recluse, had to call at a neighbouring chemist's for sweet oil ere he felt safe in crying 'Open Sesame.' Seated on the cold landing, in the midst of chests of mysterious treasure, this 'unprotected female,' trembling in every nerve lest friends should wrest it from her grasp, gloomily passed the closing years of a hidden life. Once, on a false alarm of fire, her anguish was pitiable, and, to the surprise of everybody, she relinquished the custody of some chests to a neighbour,[364] Mr. Cotton, who, however, detained them only a few hours. At another neighbour's, Miss Flanagan's, who kept an old established bakery, Miss Magan always got her bank-notes changed; but, fearful of being waylaid between the covered car she occupied, and the door at which it stopped, Miss Flanagan was always obliged to get into the vehicle and place in the hands of its shrinking occupant the metallic equivalent for the crisp new note. Some arrears of rent had accumulated at the time of Miss Magan's death, and a term of years in the lease remained unexpired; but her property was so left that the landlord's claim could not be satisfied. The house was in such a ruined state that the landlord, Colonel King, was glad to accept half the former rent. Although an extremely old house, only one tenant, Archbishop Carpenter,[365] occupied it before Magan. In [Pg 151]its back parlour had been ordained Dean Lube and many other old priests well known in Dublin during the struggle for Catholic Emancipation; and so searchingly severe was the operation of penal law, that students for ordination had to be smuggled into the Archbishop's house by the stable in Island Street, afterwards turned to ignoble purposes. An altar stood in a recess of this parlour, which the Magans changed into a cupboard.

William Allingham would seem to have had the house in his eye when, some years later, he wrote:—

On consulting the records of the Probate Court early in this inquiry, I was puzzled to find that the sum which Miss Magan appeared to have died worth was quite nominal. This discovery disturbed, and for some time retarded, the completion of the chain of evidence. On inquiry, however, it was stated that, in order to save the legacy duty, she transferred,[Pg 152] when almost in extremis, a considerable sum to the late Very Rev. Dr. Taylor and a respected physician[367] still living; and she made a will ratifying that act. Orally, she expressed a wish as to its bestowal for some useful purpose, but leaving details entirely to their discretion. With the bulk of this money a refuge for penitent females and an asylum for the insane were built.[368] Miss Magan died worth 14,000l., not to speak of a fee-farm property known as Hartstown, held under Lord Carhampton, and not far from the Devil's Mills, near Dublin, which, local tradition states, his lordship built in one night by demoniac aid.[369]

[Pg 153]

It seems strange that Magan, who was insolvent before the rebellion, could amass so much money. His secret pension was merely for 200l. a year[370] (a sum insufficient to pay the rent of his house), give good donations to the Catholic Board, pay off Fetherston's bond, and support himself, his sisters and his horse—for in early life Mr. Magan did indulge in that luxury. His pension, there is reason to think, from the letter of Sir William Gossett in 1834, ceased to be paid about that time. His fees as a Commissioner for enclosing commons were enjoyed by him for a few years only; and as the 'S.S. Money Book' records but three payments to him—namely, on September 11, 1800, April 2, 1802, and December 15, 1802—it is evident that he must have derived income from other sources. There are payments of secret service money to the informers of '98 and their representatives which obtain no record in the book ostensibly devoted to that purpose. Captain Armstrong, who betrayed the Sheares's, is known to have received, throughout sixty years, about 29,000l. in recognition of that act; and yet no trace of his name appears in the book of Secret Service Money expenditure. Money was also obtainable under a clause in the Act of 39 George III. cap. 65, by which a sum of 2,910l. was allocated to the Under-Secretary in the Civil department (Dublin Castle) for the time being, in trust for payment of secret annuities. A letter from Dr. Ferris suggests another source. He states, on the authority of a clerk in Gleadowe Newcomen's Bank, then dead, that an annuity had been paid from that house to Francis Magan, and that the clerk had seen Magan's receipts. Dr. Ferris suggests that [Pg 154]the books of the bank might be still accessible for examination.[371]

An Act of Parliament provided that the Secret Service Money placed at the Viceroy's disposal should pass confidentially through the hands of the Chief Secretary; but this arrangement has not always been adhered to, as is evident from the fact that the 1,000l. reward for the discovery of Emmet was lodged to the credit of the informer in Finlay's bank. The hint of Dr. Ferris is not uninteresting, but the books of Newcomen's bank do not seem to have been preserved. Barrington states that Sir W. Gleadowe Newcomen, who voted for the Union, received a reward of 20,000l. with a peerage, and the patronage of his county. It is a strange irony of fate that Lord Newcomen died poor. For years he lived alone in the bank, gloating, it was wildly whispered, over ingots of treasure, with no lamp to guide him but the luminous diamonds which had been left for safe keeping in his hands. Moore would have compared him to 'the gloomy gnome that dwells in the dark gold mine.' Wrapped in a sullen misanthropy, he was sometimes seen emerging at twilight from his iron clamped abode. La Touche's bank stood on the opposite side of Castle Street, and Dublin wags compared the street to a river because it ran between two banks. Jokes soon gave way to sobs. One day Newcomen's bank broke,[372] and prosperous men perished in the collapse. Lord Newcomen had previously retired to Killester, where he died by his own hand. No claimant appeared for his coronet, and the line became extinct. This was the twenty-seventh Irish peerage which had failed since the Union. Gleadowe had been M.P. for Longford when he voted for the extinction of the Irish Parliament. Richard Lovel Edgeworth, a betrayed [Pg 155]constituent, regarded this vote as an act of treason, and in anger shot forth the following bolt:—

What was a pointless sarcasm in 1800 became a stubborn fact in 1825—Newcomen's notes were waste paper. The Hibernian Banking Company soon after began business within the walls.

FOOTNOTES:

[284] I leave unchanged some of the circumstantial evidence which had convinced me of Magan's guilt, adding in brackets the criminatory letters subsequently found (January 1891).

[285] Thus, in 'Croppies lie down,' to the tune of which, as Moore says, 'more blood had been shed than often falls to the lot of lyrical ballads'—

'The ruthless Fitzgerald stept forward to rule,
His principles formed in the Orleans school.'

[286] Memoirs of Miles Byrne, iii. 247. (Paris: Bossange, 1863.)

[287] 'Dr. Madden,' writes the Rev. James Wills, 'mentions a train of circumstances which seems to fasten the imputation on Hughes.'—Lives of Illustrious Irishmen, vi. 51. Years after, in his new edition, Madden suggests suspicion against one Joel Hulbert (i. 85; ii. 443). Eventually, however, Dr. Madden wrote: 'And now, at the conclusion of my researches on this subject of the betrayal of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, I have to confess they have not been successful. The betrayer still preserves his incognito; his treachery, up to the present time (January 1858), remains to be connected with his name, and once discovered, to make it odious for evermore.... Nine-and-fifty years the secret of the sly, skulking villain has been kept by his employers, with no common care for his character or his memory.'—See Lives of the United Irishmen, by R. R. Madden, ii. 446, 2nd ed.

[288] Froude, iii. 342.

[289] Cornwallis Correspondence, iii. 320.

[290] The Viceroy, whose carriage Magan and Higgins hired a mob to draw triumphantly through the streets, was Lord Temple, afterwards Marquis of Buckingham, twice Chief Governor of Ireland, and of whom Mr. Grattan writes: 'He opposed many good measures, promoted many bad men, increased the expenses of Ireland in a manner wanton and profligate, and vented his wrath upon the country.'

[291] Dublin Evening Post, No. 1767. The same journal adds:—'It was in Mr. Magan's house in High Street that the creditable certificate of the clergy of Rosemary Lane Chapel was written and obtained.' It may be explained that when the moralist, Magee, denounced Higgins as one who had defied the laws of God and man, an advertisement, purporting to come from the priests of Rosemary Lane Chapel, said that they had no official or other knowledge of an imposture alleged to have been committed twenty-three years previously by Mr. Francis Higgins, and adding that, during his residence in Smock Alley, his conduct had been marked by benevolence. 'This sprig of Rosemary,' commented the Post, 'may serve to revive the fainting innocence of the immaculate convert of Saint Francis!' Magan, as a leading Catholic parishioner, had much weight with the clergy.

[292] Dublin Directory, 1790.

[293] It was during this anxious period that Lord Edward, venturing out at night, had an interview with Pamela in Denzille Street, when their little child was taken from its cot to see its father, and a servant suddenly entering the room found the parents in tears.

[294] It should be Friday, May 18, as appears from Sirr's original memorandum.

[295] Statement of Mr. William Macready, the grandson of Moore, furnished exclusively to the present writer.

[296] Life and Death of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, by Thomas Moore. Paris ed. p. 160.

[297] May 18, 1798.

[298] Lest he should arrive at the hall door.

[299] Dirty Lane, now Bridgefoot Street, was another route by which Lord Edward could come from Moore's. The Queen's Bridge is at the foot of Dirty Lane. Island Street runs parallel with Usher's Island, a suburban quay; and Magan's is the second stable from Watling Street.

[300] Major Swan was the assistant town major. Atkinson will be remembered as the chief constable of Belfast. See ante, p. 8.

[301] The premises were on Wood Quay (then known as 'Pudding Row'), Wine Tavern Street, and Fisher's Alley; they also included the 'Dog and Duck' inn, north side of Thomas Street, with a rear extending to Marshalsea Lane.—Registry of Deeds Office. Traces of other property held by Thomas Magan crop up in unlooked-for places. By the settlement of Philip Whitfield Harvey with Miss Frances Tracy, dated September 16, 1802, it is recited that Thomas Magan, having become a bankrupt, his properties at Blackstaheny and in Britain Street were sold by auction to Samuel Dick and a Mr. Halpin for the sum of 4,830l. Higgins had property of his own at Blackstaheny, for I find a conveyance of lands there in 1806 from the Harveys and Tracys to Andrew Rorke of Clonsilla; consideration, 1,084l. 12s. 6d.

[302] Magan's seal displays a boar's head, with the motto 'Virtute et probitate!'

[303] A nickname by which the popular journalist, John Magee, satirised Higgins.

[304] It was whispered that Francis Magan may have been the godson of Francis Higgins, and baptised Francis in compliment to him. The Catholic baptismal registries of the parish do not go back sufficiently far to throw light; but, inasmuch as Thomas Magan married, in October 1770, the daughter of Francis Kiernan, merchant, their son would be very naturally called after the grandfather.

[305] United Irishmen, iv. 25.

[306] This would give Magan an opportunity of meeting and discoursing with his old friend.

[307] Dublin Evening Post, Tuesday, May 23, 1797.

[308] Dublin: W. B. Kelly. Long out of print. The Rev. Dr. Stokes, Professor of Ecclesiastical History, Trinity College, Dublin, in the Mail of October 14, 1885, stated that this pamphlet 'may be found in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, Gallery H. 10, vol 92.' The brochure had been printed mainly for the purpose of correcting a mis-statement made by the Athenæum, when reviewing the Cornwallis Papers. The Athenæum, then edited by W. Hepworth Dixon, far from resenting my correction, reviewed the book in terms which stimulated further efforts, and, if any excuse for them were needed, it is supplied in that too favourable judgment. See No. 1649 p. 744. 'This biography reads like so many pages out of Mr. Lever's Con Cregan, or the Irish Gil Blas; but Mr. Fitzpatrick quotes several legal and literary documents to authenticate his text. Facts in abundance are produced. As illustrative of the state of Irish political society in those days, this tract is extremely curious. With extraordinary power of social research, an intimacy is established between the hateful Higgins and Magan; ... most curious circumstantial evidence, to criminate Magan. This tract merits preservation. The mass of social and personal knowledge accumulated by Mr. Fitzpatrick is very striking. He writes like an ex post facto Boswell, and the research with which he amasses minute particulars is a speciality with him. It is for want, heretofore, of detailed and accurate domestic knowledge, that Irish history is so crude and colourless; and works like those of Mr. Fitzpatrick have value.'

[309] Higgins to Cooke, December 29, 1797.

[310] Idem, January 2, 1798.

[311] O'Coigly left for London on his luckless mission, and Magan lost sight of him.

[312] Higgins to Cooke, January 12, 1798.

[313] Henry Jackson, a very active member of the Rebel Directory, and father-in-law of Oliver Bond.

[314] John Fallon, Esq., J.P. and D.L., born April 6, 1767. Higgins to Cooke, January 16, 1798.

[315] Higgins to Cooke, February 26, 1798.

[316] Lawless was Professor of Physiology in the College of Surgeons; but, on finding that a warrant was out for his arrest, got safely to France, where he rose to the rank of General, and lost a leg at Leipzig.

[317] Higgins to Cooke, March 28, 1798.

[318] Moore mentions that Lord Edward and Neilson were stopped, at midnight, by the patrol at Palmerstown; but the former having personated a doctor hurrying to the relief of a patient, both were suffered to resume their journey.

[319] The accurate information on other points which daily reached Cooke convinced not a few United Irishmen that treachery was at work.

[320] Magan to Cooke, April 22, 1798.

[321] It is also due to Lord Edward's memory to remind the reader that Higgins was a man of leprosied reputation. Nearly thirty years ago, I gave some account of him in Ireland before the Union. Meanwhile, the reader might see what an English historian, Mr. Plowden, says of him, vide chap. xiv. 'Father Arthur O'Leary,' et seq. p. 213. I printed in the Sham Squire the original informations against Higgins for the basest fraud, the true bills found against him by the Grand Jury in 1766, and the records of his committals to Newgate.

[322] Memoirs of the Whig Party.

[323] Higgins to Under-Secretary Cooke, May 18, 1798.

[324] Idem.

[325] Afterwards known to Turner at Hamburg, p. 14 ante.

[326] The Express, May 26, 1798.

[327] Mr. Froude says that 'Lord Edward was naturally a powerful man' (iii. 343). This impression is not accurate. Jasper Joly, LL.D., son of Lord Edward's godson, tells me that 'he was a small, wiry man.'

[328] Francis Higgins to Under Secretary Cooke, May 18, 1798.

[329] John Wesley visited Moira House in 1775, and has described the splendour of its rooms, one of which was inlaid throughout with 'mother-of-pearl.' The spiritualised philosopher adds, 'and must this pass away like a dream?' But he did not live to see, as Magan did, Moira House the refugium of hunger, rags, and dirt—a 'Mendicity Institution.'

[330] Lecky, viii. 44.

[331] Ibid. vii. 211.

[332] Life of Reynolds, by his Son.

[333] Francis Higgins to Cooke, Stephen's Green, June 8, 1798. Quoted by Lecky. For curious facts about Higgins, see chapter xiv.: 'Father O'Leary.'

[334] Higgins to Cooke, June 13, 1801.

[335] The writer will be excused if he seems to linger on this theme; but from childhood 'Magan' has been to him a familiar household word. His grandfather, John Brett, lived next door to Magan's house at Usher's Island. Voices, long since hushed, often described their strange, silent neighbour, of whom it might be said, 'still waters run deep.' Brett, though not a rebel, had popular sympathies, and several patriots, including James Tandy, visited at his house. One day Major Sirr created a great scare at Brett's by instituting a search for pikes and papers. The hysterics of the young ladies and the protests of their brothers served only to stimulate his ardour. No nook was left unexplored, no stone unturned. The intruders even uprooted the flower-beds in the garden, hoping to make a discovery, but all in vain; and Sirr, with drooping plumage, at last withdrew.—See James Tandy's arrest, Appendix, infra.

[336] United Irishmen, ii. 234.

[337] Historical Review, ii. 256.

[338] O'Kelly held, from a close personal knowledge of the man, that he would be incapable of treachery.

[339] Correspondence of the Duke of Wellington (Ireland), pp. 485-6.

[340] Two gardens belonged to Moira House: one in front of Island Street, the other at its opposite side. These gardens are separated by Island Street, which runs parallel with Usher's Island. A subterranean passage under the street communicates with both pleasure grounds. Usher's Island was formerly called Usher's Garden.

[341] The monk names this figure, but I think overstates it.

[342] The Sirr MSS., Trin. Coll. Dublin.

[343] In library of the Royal Irish Academy, Dublin.

[344] The Sirr MSS. This letter is quoted by Dr. Madden, who thinks that the information on which Dodgson and Caulfield acted came from Kildare; but it appears by the letter he himself prints (i. 522) that it came from Dublin. Caulfield's letter, addressed to Major Sirr, says, 'In consequence of your information, I reached Philipstown.' On the two previous occasions when Major Sirr had laid hands on Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the information as we see came from Magan. Dr. Madden, in printing the letter referred to above, erroneously assigns to it the date 1798; but the original MS. displays 'December 17, 1803.'

[345] How Mr. Fetherston came to patronise Thomas Magan's lodgings, and otherwise to befriend him, was partly due to the fact that Magan had descended from a once opulent race in West Meath. Vide wills, in Irish Record Office, of Thomas Magan, Togherstown, co. W. Meath, dated 1710; and another, probably of his son, dated 1750. By a deed, dated May 2, 1798, it appears that James and John Fetherston had been trustees of the will of Mary Magan, the grandmother of Francis. The property of Papists in penal times was liable to discovery and forfeiture, and the help of friendly Protestants as trustees sometimes became a necessity. The first mention of the Magans, and of the Fetherstons as their trustees, is in 1763.

[346] Mr. Lecky has been kind enough to say (History of England, viii. 45) that I have 'thrown more light than any other writer on the career of Magan;' and he quotes the above as 'a very curious fact,' adding that it would be interesting to know if 'the transaction took place shortly after the death of Lord Edward.' As satisfaction of the bond might possibly have been 'entered,' I searched the records of the Four Law Courts, term after term, from 1798 to 1808, but no trace can be found.

[347] The deliberate and mercenary way in which the respected 'counsellor' set himself to spy could be shown by fifty letters. Father Quigley, or O'Coigly, who, it will be remembered, was arrested at Margate in February on Turner's information (see chap. iii. ante), and suffered death soon after, escaped by a hair's breadth the net which Magan had been weaving for his capture in Dublin. A letter from Higgins to Under-Secretary Cooke, dated 'Stephen's Green, 12th January, 1798,' goes on to say: 'When I saw M—— this day and just mentioned Quigly's name, he gave me instantly a description of him. Met him before he went abroad often, and was sheltered in Dixon's house. Will, he is convinced, find him out. But I beg to recommend a strict watch on Dixon's and you will instantly discover him.' Four days later, i.e. January 16, 1798, Higgins tells Cooke, 'M—— went several times to Dixon's, but found no trace of Quigly at his former residence. Neither has he been at Dr. McNevin's. The only place that he can be sheltered among the party is at Bond's, and which will be known by Thursday.' Two previous letters, dated October 17, and October 30, 1797, report very fully Dickson's conversations with Magan.

[348] Magan, to divert suspicion from himself, may have been the first to set the story going that Neilson was a base informer. Thomas Moore, after making inquiries in Dublin, returned home strong in suspicion that Neilson had betrayed Lord Edward. Magan, in his secret letters of 1798, sometimes seeks to convey that Neilson was giving information at Dublin Castle. One letter, dated April 22, 1798, says: 'I sometimes imagine he (Neilson) is the person who communicated with Government; however, suspicion has not pointed at him.' Higgins writes (May 15): 'M. says Neilson is playing a double game.' So faithful did Neilson prove, that Major Sirr discovered him organising a plot to rescue Lord Edward.

[349] P. 19. The italics are Hamilton's. Hatton was one of the rebel executive at Wexford.

[350] James Dickson, at whose house Magan had been a constant guest, died a few years previously, and was buried beside the Round Tower at Lusk.

[351] Fingall before his death expressed deep regret for this policy. See Fagan's Life of O'Connell.

[352] Afterwards Chief Baron.

[353] Afterwards Master of the Mint and British minister at Florence.

[354] Bellew, Lynch, and Donnellan had pensions; not for secret service, but to restrain them from clanking their chains.

[355] Afterwards a Privy Councillor, and British minister at Athens.

[356] Afterwards Mr. Justice Ball.

[357] The papers which set forth Magan's real claims to his pension were not then accessible, even to the Irish Government. One of the many letters addressed by Higgins to Cooke, dated June 30, 1798, refers to the original intent of the United leaders to rise on May 14. 'Lord Edward was then with Magan, who found means to prevail on him to postpone his purpose.' The postponement would give time for the capture of Lord Edward Fitzgerald and others. This letter was written after the death of the chief, and informs Cooke that 'the plan was to rise Garretstown, Naul, &c., and circuitously round the metropolis to Dunleary, &c. Lord Edward insisted on his Kildare men and those of Carlow being brought in, and he would take the field at Finglas, and march into the city, which was his great object to carry.' The above is curious as showing how much Lord Edward's views had changed since Reinhard described him as one 'of the moderate party.'

[358] Some said of Smith that he was 'cracked with larnin',' and his chat deserved that Irish compliment. 'Your phrase "Still waters run deep" seems happy in its application to Magan. There is also an Irish proverb of which it reminds me:—

Well rendered by the Latin, seemingly a mediæval rhyme—

"Audi, vide, tace:
Si vis vivere in pace."

and almost literally translated by the French—

"Oys, vois, et te taise,
Si tu veux vivre en paix."

Magan was not dumb, but he knew well probably when to hold his tongue.'—Letter of the late J. Huband Smith, M.R.I.A., June 5, 1866.

[359] The only sense of humour that he is recorded to have evinced was in reference to Con Leyne, a wit often named in Moore's Diary. The late Rickard O'Connell, of the Munster Bar, and satellite of the Liberator, wrote, in reply to some questions, that he had been introduced to Magan at the Four Courts in 1831 by Maurice King, who said: 'Our young friend can tell you some good ones as to how Con got on at Darrynane' (Dan's seat); and from time to time after, as I met Magan in the 'Hall,' there was generally some allusion to Con, and a chuckle if any fresh story or point against the renowned gastronome turned up. 'The only members of the Munster Bar I ever saw speaking to Magan were King, O'Loghlen (Sir M.), Con Leyne, and Howley—all men of high honour, who would shun him as a black sheep if they had even a strong suspicion that he was the character you assume him to be. Usually, he was rather starched and formal in manner.'

[360] William Allingham.

[361] See Lives and Times of the United Irishmen, 2nd ed. ii. 408.

[362] Canon O'Hanlon, author of The Lives of the Irish Saints, then attached to the church of SS. Michael and John. The vaults referred to were once the pit of Smock Alley Theatre. The coffin, inscribed 'Francis Magan,' reposes close to that of the venerable Father Betagh.

[363] This was written in 1866, though not published until now.

[364] Secretary to the Mendicity Institution.

[365] Dr. Carpenter preceded Dr. Troy in the see, and by great prudence guided the suffering Church through the quicksands which in penal days encompassed it. He deprecated public agitation on the part of his flock, lest the very clanking of the chains should arouse their keepers to renewed activity and vigilance.

[366] The brother of Mathias O'Kelly was betrothed to Miss Magan; but he broke away. Whether the bridal feast had been absolutely spread, is not stated.

[367] The late Dr. Fleming of Merrion Square, one of the next-of-kin, sought by legal proceedings to foil this arrangement, but failed. Mr. H. Fetherston, his attorney after the case had been decided against his client, said to the gentleman who partly represented Miss Magan: 'According to Canon Law you are now free to keep this money, and none but a fool would reject it.' Mr. Fetherston was right; but the other replied that there was also a law of honour and of conscience.

[368] Hartstown being a freehold, it could not go towards the endowment of the institution, and the executor says that this fee-farm has cost him more trouble than all the worry attendant on her complicated affairs.

[369] By a deed, dated December 10, 1797, Lord Carhampton, commander-in-chief, a leading terrorist of his time, grants to Francis Higgins part of his estate of Hartstown and Barnageath; but without mention of trusts or considerations of any kind. During a law suit which took place in 1802, as Mr. James Curran, great-grandnephew of Higgins, informs me, it transpired that Higgins, in this transaction, had been merely trustee for Magan. The freehold conveyed by Carhampton to Higgins is now in the hands of Magan's legal representative. I long suspected, but, on full inquiry, have failed to satisfy myself, that Carhampton's grant to Higgins, in trust for Magan, was part of an arrangement cunningly devised to baffle suspicion, and meant as an acknowledgment of private information regarding rebel doings, which Magan, it is certain, was giving to Higgins; but at least, it proves Carhampton's friendly wish to promote the interwoven interests of both. On pursuing the labyrinths of the Registry of Deeds Office, Dublin, I find that the Magans had connection with the property so far back as 1780. On February 20, 1793, 1000l. was lent by Higgins to Thomas Magan, the father of Lord Edward's betrayer, charged on Blackstaheny and Clonsilla, the adjoining lands. Three years later Higgins tightens his toils, and, as already stated, seeks to further secure this 1000l. charged on the same property. 'Shamado,' doubtless, well knew how to make his creature work. The consent to harbour Lord Edward, and the whispered information as to place and hour would be an easy way of wiping out the debt for 1000l., and of currying favour with the lender. I may add that the foregoing note was written long before I had found the criminatory letters of Higgins and Magan.

[370] Some of Magan's receipts have been preserved. On these receipts the letters 'S. A.' are marked, a cipher implying that he belonged to a class of informers who, by special agreement, were never to be called upon to give public evidence. His pension was paid quarterly, and here is one of his receipts:—

'Received from Wm. Gregory, Esq., by Wm. Taylor, Esq., fifty pounds sterling, for the quarter to December 24 last.

'Dublin, January 22, 1816.

F. Magan.'

[371] Letter of Edward Ferris, M.D., Athy, June 21, 1867. He died, March 25, 1877.

[372] A run had been made on La Touche's Bank, and great fears were expressed lest it should break. At last Lord Limerick, who as Sexten Pery had been popular, took his stand at the counter, and when people saw him paying out the gold, confidence became restored.—His kinsman, Aubrey de Vere, to the Writer.

[Pg 156]

CHAPTER XII
WILLIAM TODD JONES. EMMET'S REBELLION

Todd Jones, Wolfe Tone, and Hon. Simon Butler were three Protestants to whom, Mr. Froude says, the Catholic Committee voted 1,500l. each, as a reward for their cordially rendered aid. This was in 1793, and we hear no more of Todd Jones from Froude. His subsequent history is not without interest, and seems interwoven with that of Francis Magan.

John Philpot Curran's writing-desk remains exactly as he left it when quitting Ireland in 1817 to die. A long and cautiously written letter,[373] without signature, dated August 13, 1803, but known to be from Lady Moira, reposes in this desk. It was written three weeks after Emmet's rebellion, and a month prior to his execution. The letter begins mysteriously, 'Read, reflect, but do not answer. Time will unfold the intentions.' She complains of information which had been sent to the Government, regarding a trunk, assumed to be full of papers, reaching Moira House, Usher's Island, and presumably from Todd Jones. She declares that her rooms were ransacked, under a warrant from the Secretary of State, and how letters addressed to Todd Jones at Moira House had been carried to Dublin Castle. In writing to Curran, whom she wishes to be her counsel if the matter should come to trial, she makes light of these letters, and prudentially describes her correspondence with Jones as mainly of an antiquarian and picturesque interest.

Magan, who resided within a few doors of Moira House,[Pg 157] possessed peculiar facilities for 'setting'[374] the movements of its habitués.[375] It must have been in 1802 when he was found by Mathias O'Kelly[376] associating with Todd Jones, and that date merits attention. 'I had been absent from Ireland for ten years, from the year 1792,' writes Jones in his petition to the king, 'during the whole of which period I was uninterruptedly a resident in England, and in May 1802 I was indispensably compelled to return to Dublin, by an affair of honour.'[377] Soon after he proceeded to Munster, 'which I had never beheld, and had long entertained an inclination to see.'[378]

At what date can we trace the first arrival of Jones on his mysterious mission to Clonakilty, where with several of his friends he was arrested on a charge of high treason in July 1803? To that question the answer is, December 1802. The 'Account of Secret Service Money, applied in detecting Treasonable Conspiracies,' contains the following entry:—'1802, December 15th, Francis Magan, by direction of Mr. Orpen, 500l.'

There is but one family named 'Orpen' in Ireland; and the only Orpen who could possibly be authorised to direct the payment of 500l. to Magan at this time was the High Sheriff of Cork, in whose bailiwick Jones was tracked and caught.[379]

Emmet, in his speech from the dock, denied that he was the life and soul of the conspiracy, as alleged by Mr. Solicitor-General Plunket; declared that men of greater mark than he were deep in it; that on his return to Ireland he found the organisation formed; he was asked to join it; he requested time to consider; they invited him again, and he embarked in [Pg 158]the enterprise. And yet, so carefully was the secret kept, that nothing transpired to show that he had any colleagues of good position. Lord Norbury, who tried the case, and the Attorney-General stigmatised the plan as contemptible from the fact that Emmet's allies were of no higher rank than 'ostlers, bakers, carpenters, and old clothes men,' and, notwithstanding the solemnity of Emmet's dying words, history has since given him the exclusive credit, or discredit, of the rising of 1803.

Among others to whom suspicion attaches, although there is no absolute evidence to show his guilt, may be mentioned William Todd Jones, a Protestant of good family and some means, a barrister and writer, and a member of the late Irish Parliament. The Viceregal organ, the 'Dublin Journal,' in its issue of August 6, 1803, after noticing the arrest of Jones, adds: 'This gentleman has been many months on a tour through the provinces of Leinster and Munster, making speculations on the state of the country through which he passed.' He remained eight months in Cork, and it is a question whether, during that prolonged stay, he may not have sought to foment revolution. All memoirs of Emmet have hitherto been silent as regards the complicity of Cork in his designs. Kildare is the county of which mention is chiefly made. The following from the 'Courier' (London) of August 5, 1803, furnishes a glimpse into the then state of Cork:—

The same journal, of August 16, 1803, contains a letter 'written by a gentleman of distinction in the county of Cork,' possibly Mr. Orpen himself, who commanded a corps of Yeomanry. The writer, after stating that he had spread yeomen in all directions to prevent the embarkation of persons charged with treason, goes on to say:—

[Pg 159]

It appears from this letter, dated August, 1803, that Jones had been then eight months at Clonakilty in the county Cork: therefore his arrival would have been in December 1802—the very date of the payment of 500l. to Magan by direction of Mr. Orpen, high sheriff for the county. Meanwhile the locality in which Jones pitched his camp became, from some cause, decidedly heated. A letter in the London 'Courier,' dated 'Cork, August 21,' after recording the arrest of Todd Jones, Donovan, and Dr. Callanan, states, 'The peasantry in the neighbourhood of Ross, near Clonakilty, go armed to their chapels, and mount a regular guard over their arms while they perform their devotions.'

We have seen that Magan—traditionally described as an unsociable person, possessing few friends—maintained most intimate relations with James Dickson of Kilmainham, in whose house Jones was also a constant guest. About the same time as the arrest of Jones in Cork, the 'Courier' of August 30, 1803, announces in its Dublin news: 'Yesterday Mr. James Dickson, of Kilmainham, was arrested at his house by Messrs. Atkinson[381] and Carleton, chief peace-officers, and his papers searched. The superintendent magistrate had him conveyed to the Castle, where he underwent examination, and was afterwards committed to Kilmainham Gaol.'[382]

[Pg 160]

Todd Jones, writing at the time, warmly details the circumstances of his arrest (the italics are his own):—

He then goes on to request that all concerned in his detainer, including the Sheriff of Cork, may be summoned to the Bar of Parliament. An account of his shattered health is sent to the Secretary of State—'It is my liberty which I pray for—a trial—liberation—or death! I have been a close prisoner for eleven weeks, without even having been shown my indictment, or been told the names of my accusers.'[383]

These complaints were made in October, 1803, but entirely failed to obtain redress. His petition to the king, dated 1808, resumes the story: 'Within this prison I continued confined from 23rd July, 1803, until the latter end of October 1805, when I was unconditionally discharged by the High Sheriff of the County of Cork—untried—unbailed—unexamined and unredressed.'[384]

[Pg 161]

When the High Sheriff of Cork liberated Jones it may be assumed that the same authority was instrumental in his committal. Formerly, high sheriffs took much more active part in such proceedings than now. No organised system of police then existed, and the high sheriffs seem to have been duly impressed with the responsibility of their position. On March 18, 1800, we find in the Secret Service Money Book, 100l. handed to Mr. Archer, High Sheriff of Wicklow, for the detection of treason, and on April 27, 1801, a further sum. But these exertions were dignified in comparison with the acts of Sir Judkin Fitzgerald, High Sheriff of Tipperary, who, with his own hands, flogged the peasantry to extort confession.

Emmet's insurrection burst forth in Dublin on the night of July 23, 1803; that same morning, and at a distance of 150 miles, Jones is arrested.

The connection of Todd Jones with Irish politics was apparently of a graver and more subtle sort than might be inferred from Lady Moira's letter to Curran, or even Plowden's account of him in his History. Plowden, a Catholic—the guest, with Jones and Magan, of James Dickson—says that the persecution which Jones underwent at the hands of the Government was due solely to his powerful advocacy of Catholic Emancipation and Parliamentary Reform. He defends Jones with all the warmth of friendship; his 'History of Ireland' enters most largely into the case, and quotes various orators who sought to vindicate Jones in Parliament.[385] But the reply of the ex-Secretary of State, Mr. Wickham, finds no place, contrary to Plowden's usual honesty and fulness in that work. Wickham, as appears from Hansard, rose from the bed of sickness to reply to Fox, who had taken up the case of Jones, and addressed the House sitting. He said:—

Of how Jones's alleged guilt was hushed up, and why the vengeance of the Attorney-General preferred to fall on 'ostlers, bakers, carpenters, and old clothes men,' as he said, an idea may be perhaps formed from a letter addressed by the Right Hon. William Saurin to Jones, proposing that he should secretly, and as if of his own accord, exile himself from Ireland. This letter was enclosed by Wickham to Jones on October 11, 1803. Saurin, Jones states, had been his schoolfellow.[387]

Dr. Madden professes to supply a list of all persons of substance connected with Emmet in his attempt; also of persons who were cognisant of his plans, and were supposed to be favourably disposed towards them; but Todd Jones obtains no place,[388] and therefore the less excuse is needed for this effort to embrace a long neglected figure, and one not uninteresting for 'Auld lang syne.'[389]

CHAPTER XIII
THOMAS COLLINS. PHILLIPS THE SACERDOTAL SPY

A recent letter from the ex-Crown and Treasury Solicitor for Ireland quotes the following from Mr. Lecky's notice of an unnamed spy, and asks me 'Who is he?'[390] 'He was a Dublin silk merchant,' writes Lecky, 'and can be identified by a letter from Cooke to Nepean, May 26, 1794, in the Record Office, London.'[391]

I may now state that his name was Collins. Cooke's letter mentions that 200l. a year had been settled on the informer of 1794, and that he was recommended for office in the West Indies—his future residence in Ireland, after Rowan's arrest, being unsafe.

Mr. Joynt's query comes not amiss, for John Keogh, also a silk merchant, was broadly branded by Walter Cox as an informer, and the plausible indictment is transcribed by Dr. Madden and enshrined in his magnum opus.[392] The charge against Keogh, who, by the way, preceded O'Connell as leader of the Irish Catholics, is, however, baseless.

Mr. Cooke does not give the Christian name of this Collins, but later official records describe it as Thomas. Collins was the first of the systematic informers. Some sheaves of his letters are still preserved at Dublin Castle, addressed to 'J. G.,' and heretofore supposed to imply 'Gregory,' a highly distinguished [Pg 164]secretary to the Lord Lieutenant. But Gregory's name was William, and 'J. G.' stands for 'Jack Giffard,' whom Curran and Grattan, in often-quoted philippics, denounced. The reports furnished to Giffard were regularly passed on to Cooke, and two letters[393] from Collins to the latter speak of his confidant 'Mr. G—— d.'

The daily reports extend almost unbroken from 1792 to 1795. All are without a signature, while the official endorsement usual on such letters is confined, in this case, to 'U. I. M.,' meaning, of course, the rebel brotherhood. On December 15, 1792, he writes to Cooke: 'Implicitly depend upon my being totally unknown to mankind in this business, save and except to you and J. G.'[394]

Collins—at each conclave—feigned to be an advanced republican, and was regularly invited to attend. New members, on being admitted, repeated 'a test.' In an early letter to Giffard he writes:—

In advance of every meeting a list was sent to Collins of the new candidates for election. Scores of his secret letters enclose these lists, and announce the results of the ballot, with the names of the rejected, and it is curiously illustrative of the precautions taken to ensure secrecy, and as showing how little Collins was himself suspected, that men much superior to him were refused admission. Carefully prepared reports of the proceedings, with the names of the speakers and of the number present, exist in endless evidence. In one [Pg 165]letter he encloses, for the Viceroy's satisfaction, the receipt given to him for his annual subscription to the Society, signed by Oliver Bond, but the part which names Collins is first blotted out, and finally cut clean away.[396]

In August 1792, Cooke deputed Collins to extend his secret inquiries to a wider area than the Hall in Back Lane where the United Irishmen met; and the result is found in the subjoined letter. Its stealthy style contrasts with the boldness of later missives.

[Pg 166]

Collins had the same liking for dramatic mystery as Turner; many of the letters to 'G.' ask him to call at night to hear things that could not be put on paper, to tap at a certain door in a dark passage, and 'no one would be the wiser.' In the graphic sketch he daily furnished, special attention is paid to the chief 'sitter,' Hamilton Rowan, who presided as chairman until his arrest; while Tone, Tandy, Emmet, Drennan, Bond, Lewins, the Sheares, and B. B. Harvey (the last three afterwards hanged) stand forth in bold outline from a crowd of minor faces grouped in the background. Sometimes they all dined together. 'When Paine's health was given his picture was introduced and received a general embrace. Several French songs were sung by Mr. Sheares, with proper explanations for those ignorant of the language.'[401] Glimpses of further feasts are caught, revealing the same familiar faces: men who had not yet begun to realise the gruesome fact that the handwriting was on the wall.

John Keogh is not often mentioned as present; and never after 1793. In October '92 Collins furnishes an abstract of a spirited speech delivered by Keogh. This led to queries, and in reply Collins tells Cooke: 'The leaders are Hamilton Rowan, Tandy, Jackson, Bond, Dowling, McCormick, Warren, and some others. But Keogh and Drennan are the grand movers;'[402] and on the following day he writes: 'Keogh is the principal performer behind the scenes—as the fellow's art is such he does not appear amongst us, but has a set of fellows to constantly attend and broach his sentiments.'[403] Keogh, a man of rare sagacity—whose life has yet to be written—took the course described in consequence of having recognised in his audience a person whom he did not fully trust. Turning to Richard McCormick, in the hearing of 'Billy Murphy,' the subsequent millionaire, he said, 'Dick, men's lives are not safe here,' and glided quietly away. John Keogh is the only man of mark who passed unscathed through the crisis of '98; [Pg 167]and Cox, mistakenly believing that this immunity was due to treachery towards his colleagues, sought to brand him as a spy.

In 1793, John Keogh, Sir Charles Ffrench and several other Catholic delegates,[404] waited on George III. at St. James's and presented a petition craving relief from the disabilities by which their order was oppressed. The loss of America had preached the wisdom of concession; and the tempest of the French Revolution roared within measurable distance. While Pitt and Dundas were not indisposed to grant a full emancipation to the Irish Catholics, they were constantly opposed in this policy by Dublin Castle. The often sensational reports of Collins seem to have had due effect. A long letter to Cooke regarding the Catholics begins by saying that

A small measure of Catholic Relief was at length offered by Pitt. Collins, a month later, courageously writes: 'If you think it prudent to have me examined by the Secret Committee, I may give some useful information previous to the Catholick Bill going to the Upper House.'[409]

It is not surprising that, from the regularity and general accuracy of the spy's reports, Giffard in his conversations more than once revealed a knowledge that fluttered the Inner Circle. On February 15, 1794, Collins reports, in the précis of proceedings that had taken place that night:—

Three months elapsed: they met and deliberated; the reports went regularly to Dublin Castle; arrests were made; the Society wondered; but Collins, though a loaded mine lay beneath his feet, stood his ground. On Saturday, May 10, 1794, he announces:—

Collins, no coward like Turner, maintained his character as one of the most regular attendants at the meetings, played his part, opposed some minor propositions,[410] and continued his carefully framed reports.[411] These reports perturbed Dublin Castle quite as much as the United Irishmen had been scared by the leakage of their plans. On April 28, 1794, Marcus Beresford writes to his father, who had long been regarded as the virtual governor of Ireland:—

Judging from Cooke's letter to Nepean, Collins' chief enterprise was in bringing Hamilton Rowan within the meshes of the law. In 1792, as we learn from his Autobiography, Rowan was arrested on a charge of distributing a seditious paper. Informations were filed against Rowan, difficulties supervened, and he was not brought to trial until January 1794. Rowan offered proof that two of his jurors had declared 'Ireland would never be quiet until Rowan and Napper Tandy were hanged.'[413] The challenge, however, was not allowed. Curran acted as his counsel, and delivered a speech reminding one of Cicero's defence of Milo. Rowan was found guilty, fined, and committed to Newgate, but, by bribing his jailer, escaped; and, after various romantic [Pg 170]adventures, reached France in a boat manned by two fishermen of Howth.[414]

A proclamation offering 1,000l.[415] reward for his capture was read by the men, but they told him not to fear. This remarkable escape took place on May 4, 1794. Cooke's letter, saying that Collins' further residence in Ireland would be unsafe, is dated May 26 following. An amusing proof of the general distrust which then prevailed is shown in the fact, recorded by Rowan, that on reaching France he was arrested as a British spy, sent under a strong guard to Brest, and lodged with galley-slaves.[416] Judging from Beresford's letter, written two days before the escape, however, it cannot be said that he got out of the frying-pan into the fire, as Rowan seems to have thought.

Some few letters from Mr. Douglas, who filled a Government post in London, are intermingled with the Collins MSS. The Right Hon. John Beresford, in a letter dated May 13, 1794, writes: 'Douglas called upon me this day; we had a great deal of conversation about Rowan. He told me that, as Rowan had escaped, Tone was the next guilty person, and ought to be hanged.' This, however, it was not so easy to do. Neither Turner nor Collins would prosecute openly. Meanwhile some friends of Tone entered into negotiations with Government, and he was at last allowed to expatriate himself beyond the seas.[417]

[Pg 171]

Mr. Collins[418] did not get the post for which he was recommended until the year 1800. It was Dominica, one of the West Indian Islands, as we learn from the 'S. S. Money Book.' The first entry of his name is on November 23, 1797: 'Mr. Collins.—Sent to him, in London, 108l.'[419] Here he remains for two years—no doubt one of the gentlemen 'recommended by Mr. Cooke,' and mentioned in the 'Castlereagh Correspondence' as qualified to 'set' the movements of Lord Cloncurry in London.

In more than one of the secret letters sent by Collins to Cooke, he offers his services for fields in other countries, where he thinks he could be even more useful than at home. A large sheaf of papers regarding troubles in the West Indies is preserved at Dublin Castle. Dominica—the site of his first appointment—had been captured by the British in 1756, but in 1771 the French, after a hard fight, once more became its masters. In 1783 the island was again restored to the English, but its executive felt far from secure. Intrigue was at work; French emissaries were not few; and the presence of Collins, a practised spy, came not amiss. The French, however, again effected a landing in 1805; Roseau, the chief town, was obliged to capitulate, and pay the enemy 12,000l. to quit. In 1890, after the cession of Heligoland to Germany, there was talk of surrendering Dominica to France.

What was Collins' later history I have been unable to discover. 'Sylvanus Urban' tells of a Thomas Collins who was hanged; but this is a mere coincidence of name. It is within the possibilities that our spy may have posed as Governor Collins, and even received at his levees Hamilton Rowan, who, [Pg 172]during the travels by which his exile was beguiled, would pay his devoirs, as he says, to the British resident.[420]

An informer of a novel type was a priest named Phillips. Describing the events of the year 1795, Mr. Froude writes:—

Among Mr. Froude's startling passages, none created in Ireland a more painful sensation than this. That an Irish priest—the Soggarth Aroon[424] of the people—should be selling the lives of his friends, flock, and penitents, was indeed a novel incident. Interest in the episode has quite recently been revived by Mr. Lecky, who describes Father Phillips as having given the Government some really valuable assistance in detecting Rebel Leaders.[425] For all we know to the contrary, this Ecclesiastic might have gone on to the end undiscovered, posing and pontificating as a solemn Hierarch. But, in point of fact, Phillips, though in orders, had been degraded and suspended by his Ordinary. Dr. Madden, long before the publication of Froude or Lecky, casually notices Phillips[426] as an 'excommunicated priest from French Park, co. Roscommon.'

[Pg 173]

His end was involved in some mystery which it may be well to penetrate. McSkimmins' 'History of Carrickfeargus' records, under date January 5, 1796: 'The body of a stranger, said to have been an informer, of the surname of Phillips, was found in a dam, near the paper mills, Belfast.' How he came there we learn from James Hope, a Protestant rebel of Ulster. After the excommunicated priest, Phillips, had betrayed a number of the Defenders in Connaught, he proceeded to Belfast, only to find, however, that his character had cast its shadow before him. A party of Defenders seized Phillips, tried him on the spot, and sentenced him to death. 'They gave him time to pray,' adds Hope, 'then put leaden weights into his pockets, and drowned him.'

Punishment of informers by death was not of the frequency that McSkimmin supposed and Turner feared. Hope, who is always truthful, adds, that at a meeting of the Craigarogan Branch, 'they came to a resolution: "That any man who recommended or practised assassination of any person whomsoever, or however hostile to the Society, should be expelled."'

There is another informer whose name Mr. Froude undertakes to disclose. In April 1797 Camden sends Portland 'A statement which had been secretly made to him by a member of the Military Committee of the United Irishmen,'—and we learn that the informer in this instance was a miniature painter named Neville. Due inquiry has failed to find any man named Neville in the Society of United Irishmen, though a respectable wine merchant, Brent Neville, appears as the uncle of Henry Sheares's wife; 'Neville' has been reprinted in every succeeding edition of Mr. Froude's book. But it is now quite certain that Neville is a misprint for Newell. The 'Life and Confessions of Newell (a Spy),' written by himself, and undoubtedly genuine, was published in London in 1798; and in it (pp. 13-15) he describes his calling as that of a miniature painter.

CHAPTER XIV
LEONARD MCNALLY

Thirty years ago I published in 'Notes and Queries'[427] an exposé of McNally, so far as it could then be done on circumstantial evidence. His secret letters to the Irish Government were not accessible when I first touched the subject, but these have become very familiar to me of late, and it will be seen that all I sought to show is proved by the revelation of McNally's own testimony. Before I come to these letters, some of the remarks with which I had long previously prefaced my doubts may perhaps be allowed to stand.

It is an object with Mr. Froude to show—and evidently as pointing a moral—that men who posed as the greatest patriots were secretly betraying the plans of their colleagues. But although Mr. Froude mentions McNally more than once, it does not appear that he was an informer. When describing the arrest and death of the Rev. Wm. Jackson in 1794, he mentions McNally as 'a popular barrister,' and further on his name is given with that of Curran, Ponsonby, Emmet, and Guinness, as constituting 'the legal strength of Irish Liberalism.' This remark is made in connection with an episode told with such dramatic effect by Mr. Froude that it remains merely for a minor pen to unmask 'the popular barrister.'

Charles Phillips, although he had made the lives of famous Irish barristers his study, as shown in 'Curran and his Contemporaries,' refused to believe any tale to the prejudice[Pg 175] of McNally. In the last edition of his popular book Phillips declares that

In this impression he was supported by W. H. Curran, afterwards judge—a man who, unlike his illustrious father, was of the hardest and coldest nature. He travelled out of his path, in writing that father's life, to pronounce a panegyric which is quite a curiosity to exhume:—

These remarks were elicited by a scene which occurred in Finney's trial[430] in '98. John Philpot Curran, embracing [Pg 176]McNally, said, 'My old and excellent friend, I have long known and respected the honesty of your heart, but never until this occasion was I acquainted with the extent of your abilities. I am not in the habit of paying compliments where they are undeserved.' Tears fell from Mr. Curran as he hung over his friend.[431] Emotion spread to the Bench, and Judge Chamberlain, and Baron Smith warmly complimented McNally. Poor Curran! He

In 1817, when Curran died in England, Burton—afterwards judge—singled out McNally, as the attached friend of the illustrious dead, to tell him the sad news.[433]

It does not surprise one that Phillips should have expressed the scepticism he puts on record. No man was more deeply versed in Bar traditions. He loved to question its oldest members about their contemporaries; and amongst all their ana he never heard, as regards McNally, a dark doubt started. 'Dr. Madden in his "Life of Robert Emmet,"' writes Phillips, 'broadly states the fact [that he was in Government pay], but does not give, as he usually does, his grounds for so stating it.'[434] Madden, replying to Phillips, said, 'I acknowledge I am ignorant of the time when the pension of 300l. was conferred.'

We now know not only the date, but the nature of the service by which the pension was earned.

Under-Secretary Cooke, in the year 1800, drew up for Castlereagh's information a confidential memorandum respecting 'Secret Service Pensions' for those who had given important assistance during the Rebellion. 'Mac,' for a [Pg 177]pension of 300l. a year, is the first name recommended.[435] On the following page, Mr. Cooke—obliged to be explicit—writes the name Leonard MacAnally in full, with the amount 300l. as his annual wages.

Major Sirr was chief of the police system in Dublin. His papers contain no letters from McNally; but Thomas O'Hara, writing to Sirr on November 11, 1800, proffers his services as a spy, and requests Sirr to address his answer to 'Leonard McNally, Esq., 20 Harcourt Street, Dublin.'[436] McNally, irrespective of the knowledge he possessed as counsel for the rebels, was himself a 'United Irishman.' An organ of that body, the 'Northern Star,' on March 3, 1797, proudly describes him as such in connection with the fact that, some days previously, he challenged and fought Sir Jonah Barrington for having used disparaging language towards the United Irishmen. In this combat he lost his thumb. The two Sheareses and Bagenal Harvey—all hanged the following year—escorted McNally to the ground.

A number of receipts for quarterly payments of Secret Service money were stolen from Dublin Castle during the thirties, and came to the hammer at a literary sale-room. Among them is the following:—

McNally seems to have been the only recipient who was permitted to use false initials. The handwriting in the above is identical with some acknowledged autograph lines of Leonard McNally; but 'trifles light as air' at first encouraged my suspicions. For instance: there appears in the 'Cornwallis Papers,' some five hundred pages away from the part which mentions him, a letter signed 'J. W.'[438] The able editor, Mr. Ross, cannot guess the writer; but the information given deals [Pg 178]with matters arising out of legal proceedings, and thereby points to a barrister as the spy.

In the same letter,[439] 'J. W.' states that a man named Bird is determined to 'let the cat out of the bag.' Here it may be observed in passing, that a pamphlet of the day is entitled 'The Cat let out of the Bag,' and, though published anonymously, the copy now before me displays his well known autograph, 'By Leonard McNally, Barrister-at-law.'[440]

John Pollock was Clerk of the Crown for the Leinster Circuit in 1798. The Book of Secret Service Money[441] records frequent payments, through his hands, to 'J. W.' These entries appear from February 16, 1799, to June 16, 1801, when the words 'repaid from pension' are added. McNally, it will be remembered, received his pension the previous year. Cooke, in a confidential memorandum for Castlereagh, writes:—

Thus we see how weak was the attempt made by McNally's friends to explain away his secret pension. It was plausibly alleged that McNally, having been refused a silk gown in 1808, the pension was then conferred to compensate for his disappointment. So popular was this barrister, that the refusal of the Crown to give him silk was voted a grievance. Indeed, so far as outward appearance went, he uniformly took the popular side on all questions. The Bar meeting, to denounce the proposed Legislative Union, held on December [Pg 179]9, 1798, includes, among the patriotic orators, Leonard McNally.

Some of the reasons given by Phillips for refusing to doubt McNally's patriotism were, that he declined to join the lawyers' corps of yeomanry in 1798, and that his was the last hand Curran grasped when leaving Ireland! These waifs and strays only prove how well McNally played his part. As a successful dramatic author, and one who had been himself upon the stage, theatrical effect was at all times easy to him.

It is now time to appeal to direct evidence, not until recently accessible. Mr. Lecky, in examining the archives of the Home Office, has found record of McNally's fall, and the virtuous historian describes it as a 'peculiarly shocking one.'[444] It will be remembered that the Rev. Wm. Jackson, a parson, came to Ireland in 1794 on a secret mission from France. He was arrested, tried, and sentenced to death. McNally now found, it is said, that if he did not become an informer the halter would soon encircle a neck previously dignified by forensic bands.

Jackson, finding no chance of acquittal, took poison and died, just as Lord Clonmell was about to sentence him to be hanged. Shortly before his death in the dock, seeing McNally pass, he grasped his hand and is said to have whispered, 'We have deceived the Senate!' This was true of McNally, but Jackson did not suspect him; nor did Curran, or the many other shrewd scribes who have chronicled the touching incident.

Mr. Lecky thinks that McNally's fall dates only from 1794: my belief is that he had previously evinced some frailty. In 1790, when counsel for Lord Sherborne, Beresford Burston accused him of 'doing dirty work,'[446] and McNally thereupon challenged Burston. Dr. Madden says that, in 1792, at the time of Napper Tandy's action against the Viceroy, some of Tandy's legal advisers were suspected of having disclosed their ingenious case to the Crown. McNally was certainly counsel in this cause. St. John Mason, brother-in-law of Addis Emmet, broadly charges McNally with perfidy committed in[Pg 181] 1792.[447] Previous to this date Collins the spy calls McNally 'one of us,' in a secret letter to the Government agent, Jack Gifford.[448] Who Gifford was is shown by Curran, who complains to the Chief Secretary for Ireland, that 'Gifford, a note-taker for your Government, had the daring to come up to me in the street and shake his stick at me.'[449]

Mr. Lecky says that McNally often betrayed to the Crown the line of defence contemplated by his clients, and other information which he could only have received in professional confidence, and the Government archives contain several of his briefs annotated in his own hand. Mr. Lecky finds that

Among the earlier victims to the severe legislation of that time was Laurence Conner, a poor schoolmaster of Naas, charged with Defenderism, whose case has been invested with interest by Sir Jonah Barrington, Dr. Madden, and others. A moving speech from the dock failed to avert his doom, and his head, for years after, grinned from a stake at the top of the gaol. McNally, who had defended him, stated in his secret report to Pelham that a provision had been offered for Conner's family if he would make discoveries; but his reply [Pg 182]was, 'He who feeds the young ravens in the valley will provide for them!'[452] It is strange that McNally should report to his employers this chivalrous speech, which places in marked contrast his own frailty and disgraceful fall. But corrupt as his heart had now become, he could not help admiring magnanimity wherever he met it. The man who sought to make Conner inform was, doubtless, McNally himself, at the instance of Crown Solicitor Pollock, who, as the 'Cornwallis Papers' record (iii. 120), 'managed Mac.'

This is the man whose name Earl Russell erased from Moore's Diary of February 27, 1835, leaving merely the initials 'L. McN.,' because some doubts of his honesty had been expressed postprandially by Plunket, a man more clear-sighted, it appears, than Charles Phillips. Succeeding chapters will show Plunket associated with McNally during the State trials of '98.

'Your profession should have taught you principles of honour,' McNally writes in the piece which first roused the muse of Moore. With such fine sentiments it must have caused him a struggle to betray. All will rejoice that he who sang

escaped the blight of McNally's breath. Moore was the bosom friend of Emmet, sympathised with the 'cause,' and wrote for the organ of the United Irishmen. Shortly after '98, however, he entered at the Middle Temple, London, and saw McNally no more. Plunket told Moore that it was in a duel McNally received the wound in the hip that lamed him, and on a subsequent occasion, when he was again going[Pg 183] out to fight, a friend said, 'I'd advise you, Mac, to turn the other hip to him, and who knows but he may shoot you straight.'[453]

McNally was indeed a brave man. If anyone seemed to doubt him, he would be called out and probably shot. In early life he practised at the English Bar. It is recorded in the 'Cyclopædian Magazine,' for 1808, that during the Gordon Riots, when the mob had smashed down the Bishop of Lincoln's coach, had dragged him out, and were beating him with bludgeons, McNally, at the risk of his life, rescued Dr. Thurlow, on whose forehead, he heard them say, they meant to cut the sign of the cross. This prelate, who somewhat favoured Catholic Relief, was the brother of Lord Chancellor Thurlow; and the young barrister may have had an ulterior object in thus exposing himself to danger. McNally himself evidently supplied the account, of which but a few details are here borrowed, and we learn that 'the Bishop required, and received, the address of his protector, but never after acknowledged the obligation.'[454] Some pamphlets on the Regency struggle, and the 'Claims of Ireland' vindicated on the principles of the English Whigs, introduced him to Fox, for whom he acted as counsel at an election for Westminster. 'By whatever right England possesses Liberty,' he said, 'by the same right Ireland may claim it!'

McNally as an orator was declamatory, and at times theatrical. His outward man has been often caricatured, but John O'Keefe tells us that he had 'a handsome, expressive countenance, and fine sparkling dark eyes.'[455] Sir Jonah Barrington recognises the same features. Contemporary memoirs of him supply a long list of his dramas, farces, comic operas, touching lyrics, prologues and masques, all produced at Covent Garden. But when in England he was [Pg 184]a genuine, thoroughgoing Irishman very unlike the sham which he afterwards became; and why he resigned a dramatic for a forensic career is curiously shown by 'Sylvanus Urban.' The opening of Covent Garden Theatre, on September 23, 1782, was commemorated by a prelude from McNally's pen.

No name seems to have been more popular with the pit and galleries, and the admiration of his countrymen for him showed itself in odd ways. Kemble somewhere describes an Irishman at Drury Lane indignantly claiming one of Shakespeare's plays for McNally: and when a spectator, duly challenged, replied that he did not want to dispute the point with him, his tormentor said, still trying to foster a quarrel, 'but perhaps you don't believe me?' Again the man received a polite assurance which seemed quite satisfactory; but five minutes later 'Pat,' observing Kemble whispering to a companion, came over in an attitude still more menacing—'Maybe your friend doesn't believe that the play is written by Leonard McNally?' and to avoid a scene both were glad to decamp. Those were the days when the voice of national predilection made itself heard and felt in dramatic criticism. Home scored a success with 'Douglas:' 'and where be your Wully Shakespeare noo?' was shrieked by some clannish Scots that night. McNally's friends regretted more than once that he ever left London. A book called 'Five Hundred Celebrated Authors of Great Britain now living' was published here in 1788,[456] and it is amusing to find McNally's name included with those of Burke, Gibbon, Walpole, Crabbe, Burns, Cowper, De Lolme [Pg 185]and Mackenzie, who at the close of a century were helping to educate the minds which were to adorn its successor.

One day Lord Loughborough, finding McNally ill prepared in a case which came before the Court, advised him to abandon the Muses and study Blackstone; but the cacoëthes scribendi burned too strongly within him to relinquish more cultured pursuits. His 'Sentimental Excursions to Windsor' appeared, and on rejoining the Irish Bar he produced 'The Irish Justice of the Peace,' for which 2,500l. was paid by Hugh Fitzpatrick, the Catholic publisher; 'but it contained so much bad law,' writes Charles Phillips, 'that it proved a treasure not to the J. P's., but to the country attorneys.' Sadly soon the former had practical experience of a writ; and Michael Staunton told me, that if McNally's law points often served culprits, they hanged as many more.[457] 'In Dublin,' records a contemporary scribe,[458] 'he has now very considerable law business.'

'He had a shrill, full, good bar voice,' writes Barrington, in bestowing other praise. Sir Jonah occupied the judgment seat, and was famous for his power of discerning character; but, although he impugns the good name of many men, he does not distrust McNally. According to Barrington, 'Mac' was 'good-natured, hospitable, and talented.'[459] It is to be feared that hospitality with the popular barrister was but a means to an end. 'Will you walk into my parlour?' said the spider to the fly. McNally, in some of his letters to the Government when requesting money, urges as an extra reason the necessity of entertaining friends in order to get at new information.

[Pg 186]

McNally knew human nature quite as well as Bishop South, who says of the bacchanal that his 'heart floats upon his lips, and his inmost thoughts proclaim and write themselves upon his forehead;' and he adds that, just 'as a liar ought to have a good memory, so a person of guilt ought to be also a person of great sobriety.'[461] McNally's dinner in honour of unfortunate 'Parson Jackson' and of the man who shadowed him to the grave, suggests that it was not the only occasion when death sat at the table.

In midsummer 1798 the clangour of battle filled the air. 'Fear prevails, and all jovial intercourse has ceased, so far as my experience goes,'[462] he writes; but when hostilities ceased, amenities were renewed.

After he had ceased to produce 'masques' at Covent Garden, and entered on his new career of a barrister and a spy, one great effort of his energetic life was to divert suspicion and puzzle posterity. He saw the wisdom of the proverb, 'Show me your company,' and thus he had a double object to gain by cultivating touch with patriotic men. In 1790 he was admitted a Freeman for—as the address to him said—his services to his country. In 1802 he published 'The Rules of Evidence, or Pleas of the Crown.' It is dedicated to John Philpot Curran, 'from an affectionate attachment,' writes McNally,

[Pg 187]

The 'authorised' memoir of McNally in the 'Cyclopædian Magazine' quotes the above, adding, 'The relatives of Mr. Curran may extract from this dedication an epitaph worthy of his memory.' The whole object of the memoir, one evidently inspired by McNally himself, is to foster a feeling of respect for and confidence in his own pretensions. No wonder that, in the eyes of Young Ireland one hundred years ago, a halo encircled McNally's head. Some of the spirited efforts which roused the Muse of Moore and Drennan are found in the organ of the United Irishmen. The 'Northern Star' of November 10, 1792, contains rebellious verses signed L. M. N.

Mr. Lecky has not examined McNally's secret reports after the year 1800, and his impression is that he 'did not wish to implicate "persons."'[463] It would appear, however, on Mr. Lecky's own showing, that McNally was not squeamish—even during the reign of terror—in pointing to men by name.

On February 5, 1797, McNally warns the Government that O'Coigly (hanged the following year) was in Ireland on a political mission, and reports the pith of his conversation.[465] 'O'Connor, Macnevin and Lord Edward Fitzgerald,' he whispers, 'are the advocates of assassination,'[466] which, indeed, there is great reason to doubt.[467] On November 19 Grattan is [Pg 188]put in jeopardy.[468] Next month 'a most circumstantial and alarming story,' writes Lecky, had come from McNally. 'It was, that Lord Edward received, some days since, orders from Paris to urge an insurrection here with all speed, in order to draw troops from England. In consequence of it, there was a meeting of the head committee, where he and O'Connor urged immediate measures of vigour;' and thereupon their plans are laid bare: but how Emmet, Chambers, etc., opposed. McNally lived in Dominic Street, near the Dominican Fathers. In letters to Cooke he points to MacMahon and other of his reverend colleagues; and I learn from the present custodian of the 'Dominican Records' that Fathers MacMahon, Bushe, and Mulhall were arrested in '98, but at last suffered to leave Ireland for America. On May 24, 1798, J. W. mentions that MacMahon had called on him the previous day. But so early as June 14, 1797 the falcon eye of McNally had become fixed on this friar. He and other priests, he states, meet weekly at Herbert's tavern, Clontarf. 'Reilly, an officer who served in Germany, is often with them. Individually, no doubt, they are all concerned in the politics of the day, and they act when together with a caution certainly suspicious. Vernon, of Clontarf, offered the waiter 100l. to make discoveries, which he refused.'

'Troy may be up,'[469] McNally reports, meaning that the Catholic archbishop had been probably enrolled a United Irishman. Henceforth his Grace's letters were regularly opened at the Post Office.[470] Minor names are often breathed, and who can doubt that, with the Habeas Corpus Act suspended, advanced men stood upon the brink of an abyss? Carhampton, Commander-in-Chief, sent numbers of untried men out of the country,[471] and threatened to do the same with the Rev. Edward Berwick,[472] and others. Hundreds were seized on bare suspicion and expatriated without even knowing their accusers, or hearing the charge for which they suffered.[473]

[Pg 189]

The acts of no member of the Directory are more regularly reported than those of Arthur O'Connor. McNally seems to have been in his confidence as political ally and legal adviser. In turning over his letters I met one much more voluminous than the rest, furnishing a complete list of all the witnesses to appear at Maidstone for O'Connor's defence, and the facts to which they were prepared to testify.[474] These witnesses included Erskine, Fox, Grattan, Sheridan, Whitbread, Lords Moira, Suffolk, Thanet, and Oxford.

Throughout the State Trials men stalked who, as Curran said, measured their value by the coffins of their victims, and gloom was relieved by forensic persiflage. The duel already described left McNally lame, and another limping barrister one day asked Parsons in 'the Hall' of the Court, 'Did you see McNally go this way?' 'I never saw him go any other way,' was the reply.

Ned Lysaght had his skit, too:—

He had been urged to join a Volunteer corps; but Curran told him that serious trouble might result, for, when ordered to 'march,' he would certainly 'halt.'[475] When writing to [Pg 190]Cooke on the subject of the Lawyers' Corps, J. W., in a secret letter of June 12, 1798, introduces his real name, no doubt to puzzle outsiders into whose hands it might fall: 'It would be well perhaps if some of the judges would institute a Corps of Invalids. McNally might lead blind Moore to battle.'

Mr. Lecky thinks that McNally after his fall 'retained all the good nature and native kindness of his disposition.'[476] I fear that this redeeming virtue cannot be safely assigned to him. A careful sketch of the man appears in a local publication of the year 1806; and we learn that among his characteristics are—

This, as we now see, was done quite as much in the privacy of his study as in the forensic arena.

Curran's great speech in Hevey v. Sirr contains a passage which has often been quoted:—

This 'learned and respected barrister' was none other than McNally himself. I have read his secret letter to Cooke on the subject, endorsed 'June 2, 1798,' and it makes him less a hero than he would publicly convey. He complains of the seizure of his cup, notwithstanding that, as he assured his military visitor, he had already erased the offending inscription. 'Mac,' [Pg 191]in conclusion, says that the cup was value for 22l. 10s., 'hardly earned,' and encloses a separate paper distinctly naming that sum as his due. Four days later he writes to Cooke: 'Major Sandys returned a sterling answer to my friend's note,' which means a full money remittance for the amount claimed.[478]

Below we have McNally's version of this transaction, as supplied to Curran's son for historic and popular purposes:—

Arthur Wolfe, Lord Kilwarden, was the Chief Justice of the King's Bench, and his alleged intimacy with McNally is probably exaggerated. The biographer says that Curran repeatedly told this episode of '98, and quotes a touching peroration regarding Kilwarden's alleged interposition: that, [Pg 192]in fact, great was the odour of its memory and precious the balm of its consolation!

McNally's account of the robbery of his silver cup was part of his stock-in-trade, and I am sure that for twenty times the price he would not have been without it.

William Henry Curran knew not very much of his father, whose biographer he became. John Philpot Curran had excluded him from his domestic circle, and the letters to his son which appear in the book were addressed to Richard. Who can doubt that much detail which lends interest to the ever popular 'Life, by his Son,' was supplied to the youth by the practised old scribe Leonard McNally? Curran's gratitude to him for help afforded is freely expressed. McNally wrote a style clear as rock water and full of classic strength. Nothing can be finer than his secret letters to Pelham and Cooke—three of which he often despatched in one day. The wonderful anecdotes which made Curran's Life, by his son, almost a classic have been quoted over and over, including the dinner scene at McNally's, when the ill-fated Rev. Mr. Jackson was entertained. Curran's son tells how the talk had been getting imprudent, when the butler, beckoning his master to the door, warned him to be careful; 'for, sir, the strange gentleman who seems to be asleep is not so, but listening to everything said: I see his eye glistening through the fingers with which he is covering his face.'

Cockayne was, of course, a spy of Pitt's; but some of the sensational anecdotes which McNally told of him, as also of Reynolds and Armstrong, may have been overcharged to divert suspicion from himself. These are not the only instances in which the embellishments of the professional advocate seem traceable. As regards Jackson's death in the dock, we are told that he made an effort with his cold and nerveless hand to squeeze McNally's, muttering a quotation from Addison's 'Cato'; but the lines and the adjuncts would be more likely to occur at such a moment to an old playwright like McNally than to the dying clergyman.

Emmet's revolt took place on July 23, 1803, but was soon[Pg 193] quelled. He remained in concealment at Harold's Cross, and chose that position in order that he might see Sarah Curran, with her father, pass daily to Dublin. On August 25 he was arrested by Major Sirr. Popular confidence in McNally had now reached its height. A special commission for trying the insurgent leaders began on August 24, 1803. 'Most of the prisoners chose Mr. McNally as their counsel, and Mr. L. McNally, junior, as their agent,' records the 'Evening Post' of the day.

McNally had long had his eye on the gifted young orator Robert Emmet: 'Emmet, junior, gone on business to France—probably to supersede Lewins,'[481] he writes to Cooke three years previous to the insurrection of 1803. On September 3, in the latter year, McNally sends one of his secret letters to Cooke, saying that he is authorised to treat on behalf of a person privy to the whole conspiracy.[482]

The remainder of McNally's letters during these troubles of 1803 are yet wanting. No doubt they remain among Wickham's papers of the period which are still a sealed book.[483] Among the sensational incidents of the hour was the outrage of searching Curran's house, and the capture of Emmet's love-letters to Sarah Curran—to whom the youth had been secretly engaged. Curran himself, we are told, though aware of Emmet's visits, was ignorant of the attachment. But there was a seemingly dear old friend, having access to Curran's domestic circle, whose eagle eye could penetrate still deeper secrets. In the absence of McNally's private reports of that month there is, however, no absolute proof against him on this point.

Mount Jerome,[484] the seat of John Keogh, the great Catholic leader, was also searched, and his papers seized. Dr. Madden [Pg 194]mentions that, in 1802, Emmet had dined at Keogh's in the company of John Philpot Curran, when the probability of success in the event of a second rebellion was debated with great animation.[485] Whose was the whisper which betrayed this information never transpired. But Curran, the great depository of popular secrets, maintained, as will be shown, no reserve with McNally. So far back as 1797 McNally writes:—

A quantity of information follows, and the letter ends with these pregnant words:—

This is the man whom William Henry Curran describes as having been 'from his youth to his latest hour the most affectionate, unshaken and disinterested friend' of his father.[487]

Before and after the conviction and death of Robert Emmet, the initials 'L. M.' peep from the 'Secret Service Money Book.' On August 25, 1803 (the very day on which Emmet was captured), we read: 'Mr. Pollock for L. M., 100l.' Pollock, Clerk of the Crown for Leinster, is the same man through whom the bribes for 'J. W.' (McNally) are paid.[488] The 100l. cannot have been for the actual capture of Emmet, for I know that in November following a bulk sum was paid for that service. The douceur to L. M. was in acknowledgment of useful information.[489]

McNally appears as counsel for Emmet in the State trial [Pg 195]on September 19, 1803. Four days previously, namely, on September 14, 100l. is set down to 'L. M.' On the morning of Emmet's execution an affecting scene took place between the rebel chief and McNally, the only friend allowed to see him. Emmet's mother had just died, but he did not know it, and desire to see her filled him—'Then, Robert, you shall meet her this day,' replied McNally, pointing to Heaven in his accustomed dramatic style. A long account of the interview, doubtless supplied by 'Mac' himself with his usual itch for writing, and evidently designed to promote Lord Hardwicke's popularity as Viceroy, appears in a Ministerial journal, the London 'Chronicle,' on September 24, 1803.

After Emmet's arrest Curran was examined by the Privy Council, when Chancellor Redesdale sought by a tone of intimidation to extort the truth; but the scowl of contempt he encountered gave his own nerves the shock he designed for another's, and made him sink back into his chair, abashed by the failure of his rash experiment. Curran's son speaks of the wonderful intrepidity of McNally's language in his addresses to the Court; but it is easy to be defiant when one knows he is safe. Contemporary critics record his marvellous power of penetration in cross-examining witnesses on the State trials. A shrewd man, deep in the secrets of both sides, would not find it hard to create this impression.

Lord Cloncurry complains, in his Memoirs, that after his liberation from gaol in 1801, and for many subsequent years, no man suffered more from petty worries at the hands of the Irish Government. McNally was in the coterie of which Cloncurry formed the central figure, and it cannot be doubted that he consistently reported his fervid sentiments. The 'Press' was the Rebel organ, its tone distinguished, as Lord Camden said,[Pg 196] by 'an unheard-of boldness,'[490] and a friendly offer made by Lawless, afterwards Lord Cloncurry, to McNally is thus reported. After mentioning when the private committee of United Irishmen met, McNally[491] announces—the underlining his own:—

A later letter assures Pelham: 'The fellow-travellers of Lawless shall be found out if possible.'[494]

Higgins and Magan knew nothing of Cloncurry's movements, but between Turner and McNally he had a warm time of it. Lord Holland compared his long detention in the Tower, untried and unaccused, to the operation of the lettres de cachet in old France. In 1803, on secret but, he declares, erroneous information, that Emmet's wounded rebels were concealed there, 'a large military force' searched Lord Cloncurry's house in Kildare, and robbed it of a quantity of papers, some fowling-pieces, armour, and even plate.'[495]

No details are forthcoming as regards the intercourse which subsisted between McNally and Cloncurry throughout [Pg 197]the eventful period subsequent to their friendly relations in '98; but the cordiality of that intercourse may be seen from a waif or two. The 'Correspondent,' a Dublin journal, reports on August 27, 1817, a speech of the patriot peer, Cloncurry, in which the epithet 'dear' is applied to his old friend McNally. 'There is no gentleman,' he adds, 'for whom I have a higher respect or esteem, and of whose knowledge, talent and elocution I am more sensible.'

Sometimes McNally travelled as a spy, probably in disguise, through remote rural districts. On August 28, 1805, he announces Tipperary as 'ready to rise.' In September he goes up the Dublin mountains, 'Emmet's line,' and the result of his inquiries was that no rising need be apprehended.[496] I do not find that McNally's secret letters exist at Dublin Castle beyond the year 1805; I must, therefore, seek to trace from other sources the close of his career. Pecuniary need drew its toils tighter round him every day, making him, no doubt, more energetic in his effort to cast them off.[497]

Readers of the 'Wellington Correspondence' from 1807 to 1809 will be able to identify McNally. The subjugator of Tippoo Saib, then Chief Secretary at Dublin Castle, found Catholic Ireland galled by various disabilities. One letter, dated November 21, 1807, encloses a paper headed 'Information received this evening from a very intelligent Priest.'[498] This, on being quoted by the reviewers of the Wellington Papers, excited disgust that a priest should be in secret correspondence with Dublin Castle; but it is quite clear to me that the letter came from McNally, and embodies merely the responses of a gossiping priest to the pumping of a practised [Pg 198]hand—the same, I may venture to add, to whom McNally, upon dying, will be found making his own confession.

The Whig Duke of Bedford took office with Fox, Lansdowne, and Grey in the administration of 'All the Talents,' and ruled Ireland for one year. Curran became Master of the Rolls, and McNally thought that he himself, as the leading popular barrister, had claims for promotion. All the men who will be remembered as voting with him at the bar meeting in 1799 had got snug berths. His appeal to Bedford was referred to Wellesley, whose common sense appears in the following reply:—

Curiously enough, at the time he is himself most active as a spy, Mr. T. Mulock, of Dublin, reports him, with Messrs. Hutton and O'Connell, as persons who 'ought to be watched.'[500] An account of the first meeting for Repeal of the Union, on September 18, 1810, is preserved in the State Papers; and McNally spoke on that day 'with great zeal and patriotism,' as Plowden proudly[501] records. Mr. Mulock had not the knowledge of character shown by his kinswoman Miss Mulock, the novelist.

Reference has been already made to the fact that in 1811 the Irish Secretary of State, Wellesley Pole, with the object of suppressing the Catholic Committee, caused to be arrested, under the Convention Act, Lord Fingall, Lord Netterville, and the other Catholic delegates. Able counsel were retained by [Pg 199]them, and private conferences, attended by Burrowes, Johnson, Perrin, O'Connell, Burton, O'Driscoll, and McNally, were held in order to decide on the lines of defence to be taken. The questions involved were difficult and subtle; and although the courses decided upon were equally novel, it was observed with amazement that the Orange Attorney-General, Saurin, seemed marvellously well prepared for every point, as the delegates daily fought their ground inch by inch.[502]

An aggregate meeting of Catholics was held after the arrests of their delegates. John Mitchel describes the party then in power as a 'No Popery Administration,' and the appearance of a Protestant on the platform was hailed as a happy incident. The following is taken from the 'Correspondent,' a once influential organ of Dublin Castle:—

O'Connell followed, and the clear head of that great lawyer saved the Catholic body from the deeper pitfall in which the[Pg 200] bad law of a false adviser would have placed them. In the course of his speech he declared:—

On October 19, 1811, Wellesley Pole writes from Dublin Castle to the Home Secretary regarding the proceedings of the Catholic Committee, and enclosing 'a report from,' as he says, 'one of our spies.' This document, signed 'J. W.' is still preserved with Pole's letter in the Record Office, London. About the same time Pole announces to the Home Office that 'Young Mr. Curran, son of the Master of the Rolls, has been very active in soliciting from the Catholics subscriptions for Mr. Finnerty, and letters from persons associated in London for promoting that object have been addressed to the Catholics here.'[503] These regular reportings of Curran's domestic circle involve a degree of treachery painful to contemplate.[504]

The reports of 'J. W.' did not tend to make Curran a favourite with 'the powers.' The patriot's son, describing a prior year, records:—

The late Mr. Byrne, an old Petty Sessions clerk, informed me that when walking at this time with his cousin Mr. Phelan, an attorney of Liberal politics, McNally, with a significant [Pg 201]wink, accosted him, saying: 'The people are at last beginning to read; those who cannot yet read have books and papers read to them; after they read they will think, and they won't be long thinking until they act.'

On the trial of Sheridan and Kirwan, two Catholic delegates, he spoke warmly against the sheriff and others tampering with the jury, and was checked by the bench. He excused himself by saying 'that where the heart and the understanding went together it was difficult to keep bounds,' etc. Great excitement prevailed by the effort made to crush the freedom of speech, in the midst of which Percy Bysshe Shelley came to Dublin, and largely helped by voice and pen to make the crisis historic. Mr. Pole declared in Parliament, that 'if gentlemen would read the debates of the Catholic Committee they would find separation openly and distinctly recommended.' O'Connell, on February 29, 1812, replied: 'Why, my lord, this is a direct accusation of high treason, and he who would assert it of me, I would brand with the foulest epithets. I defy the slightest proof to be given of its veracity.' The Duke of Richmond, then Viceroy, writes at great length to the Home Secretary, speaks of his 'secret information,' and flutters the Cabinet.[506]

It was during the same year that Roger O'Connor, of Dangan Castle—father of Feargus, member for Nottingham—headed a band of rude retainers and robbed the Galway mail coach on Cappagh Hill. Though somewhat daft, he had method in his system, and when, five years later, he found himself a prisoner in Newgate, pending the long averted prosecution, he directed his attorney, named Maguire, to draw up a fictitious case, including a false line of defence, and lay it before McNally, taking for granted that he would betray to the Crown the person he supposed to be his client. The prosecution strangely broke down, and O'Connor, although notoriously guilty, was acquitted.[507] This trial took place in 1817: [Pg 202]the death of Curran followed soon. A man named Waring having been indicted for perjury, McNally is found saying: 'Oppressed by the loss of my earliest friend, I have not strength for the task. But I wish to repel the stigma thrown out against my client, though I should die in the trammels.'[508]

The letters of McNally to Curran would be curious to read; 'but,' writes his daughter-in-law, 'they were destroyed by my late husband when he became so disgusted by the knowledge of the double face McNally must have worn for so many years as the friend of his father.'[509]

Although McNally's are destroyed, some characteristic letters from Curran to him were supplied by the spy to Curran's biographer. It was a constant effort of McNally to engraft himself on the fame and name of Curran. A touching document in the romance of real life is the letter addressed by Curran to McNally in 1810. He exhibits a kind solicitude for the improved health of his false friend, and alludes to their future meeting where secrets and sorrow would be no more.

'Mac' stuck to him like a leech to the end. 'As he walked through the grounds of his country seat with Mr. McNally,' writes Curran's son, 'he spoke of the impending event with tranquillity and resignation:—

'"I wish it was all over."'[512]

'Curran's will, which I have in the house,' writes his daughter-in-law, 'is dated September 14th, 1816, and the codicil the 5th September, 1817; it bears the signatures (as witnesses) of Richard Lonergan and Leonard McNally. Lonergan was editor of 'Carrick's Morning Post,' a popular organ. The first of a series of papers on the Dublin Theatre, signed 'L. M. N.,' appears in this journal of December 16, 1817:—

[Pg 204]

The elder Farran began his career in Dublin, and McNally's criticism helped to make it a success. Mrs. Edwin, Miss Walstein, Fullam, Williams, Young, all were cleverly reviewed. It was not necessary, he said, for a tragedian to roar like a lion, or for a comedian to grin as through a horse-collar. Two letters signed 'L. M. N.' espouse the part of Mrs. Edwin, who had met with some unkindness. The concluding sentence is characteristic: 'Allow me, madam, to inform you, that while I continue your Panegyrist, you shall never know me. All old men are more or less eccentric. I have my whims, and one of them is a dislike to being thanked for doing what I think to be my duty.'

Friendly relations were established between the popular journalist and his contributor, but at last they seem a little strained. The paper got into trouble with a very formidable enemy to popular principles, Jack Giffard, known as the 'Dog in Office.' The officiousness of McNally, if he had no deeper design, is shown by Lonergan in a hurried leader of September 17, 1818—the italics are his:—

Some legal proceedings are reported by the Dublin papers of September 18, 1818, as having been instituted by the histrions of Crow Street Theatre for the recovery of their salaries. McNally's swaggering pretensions to pose as an honourable man are amusingly marked. He was counsel for the lessee, Frederick W. Jones.

The last important case in which McNally figured was that of the Wild Goose Lodge murderers at Dundalk. This case, highly tragic in its nature, has been invested with thrilling interest by the powerful pen of Carleton.

'From grave to gay' marked his course on circuit. A[Pg 206] glimpse of the 'chaff' which followed McNally at mess is shown by Charles Phillips.

Phillips also describes 'Mac' as ever varying in his account of how he lost his thumbs, and that one night, tired and perplexed by repeated questioning on the point,[513] he at last exclaimed, 'I don't know how I lost them!' It seems to me that 'Mac' was too cool and cunning to trip. Phillips, as a most distinguished co-operator with the Catholic Board, was a man worth McNally's while to 'draw'; and the hoary-headed 'father,' in encouraging the juniors' chaff, probably feigned features which he did not possess. We have seen how resolutely incredulous Phillips stood when the spy's real character was first impugned. Phillips is remembered by the English bar as a very cunning man. But as regards McNally's treachery he died unconvinced. The man whose seeming simplicity he loved to chaff was of deeper acumen. The 'Metropolis,' a review of the Bar, printed in 1805, indicated among McNally's gifts—

Phillips seemed to pity the awkward simplicity of his venerable friend; but it was clearly McNally's game at times to pose as a 'butt,' and Charles adds no more than the truth in saying, 'his eyes and voice pierced you through like arrows.'

[Pg 207]

'Howell' should be consulted by those who care to trace the forensic career of McNally—

sings 'the Alphabet of the Bar.' But it is McNally's speeches as a democratic orator, delivered on all great national occasions, in which he appears to best dramatic effect.

The mission of General d'Evereux to Ireland, with the object of raising troops for Bolivar—the South American patriot—took place in 1819, and with it is involved McNally's last important acts of espionage. A military passion had seized on the popular mind. For many weeks the streets of Dublin, gay with plumage, reminded one of Paris during the Napoleonic fever. The city swarmed with stalwart, ruddy youths, clad in uniforms of green and gold, their swords clanking at every step. Levées were held by D'Evereux with all the pomp of a court; public banquets sought to do him honour. At first these things caused alarm at Dublin Castle; but, finally, it was decided that the statute which forbade foreign enlistment might be suffered to lie dormant: after all, the opportunity was not a bad one to rid the land of those military spirits whose presence could never conduce to its repose. In this connection Dr. Scallan has something to say:—

During the passage from Dublin to Venezuela dissensions arose among the officers, and some came back complaining that they had been misled in the business. D'Evereux returned to justify his conduct, and a committee, consisting of Lord Cloncurry, with Counsellors Curran, McNally and Phillips, was appointed to inquire and report.

In 1820 Ireland lost her Grattan.[515] The man who had long shadowed him vanished at the same time. Catholics may care to know, though they will hardly attach much importance to the accession, that Leonard McNally, 'after life's fitful fever,' sank into the bosom of Rome. Father Smith, of Townsend Street Chapel, on February 13, 1820, gave him the last rites. This priest, having got word that 'the Counsellor' wished to see him, went to his house in Harcourt Street, [Pg 209]where Mrs. McNally informed him that her husband was then asleep, and must not be disturbed. McNally's son, who happened to be coming down stairs at the moment, reproved his step-mother for the indisposition she evinced to admit the clergyman, adding, 'Can't you let him go to the devil his own way?'[516] He then conducted the priest to the sick man's room. Father Smith put on his stole, and heard muttered from the parched lips of Leonard McNally a general confession, embracing the frailties of his youth and the sins of his manhood. Contrition was manifested, and the priest gave him absolution.[517] Within an hour McNally was dead. In life he had been no coward, but the death-bed was no place to show old instincts. His funeral cortège wended its way to the old graveyard of Donnybrook, where his bones now lie, near those of Dr. Madden, the historian of the 'United Irishmen.'

McNally had married Miss Janson, the heroine of his famous lyric, 'Sweet lass of Richmond Hill;' but it was his second wife, née Edgeworth, who appeared to Father Smith. The son had acquired a rough reputation, and having been once robbed near Rathcoole, his father asked Parsons, 'Did you hear of my son's robbery?' and received for reply, 'No, [Pg 210]whom did he rob?' This son died in 1869, leaving no representative.[518]

An action was brought by old McNally's administrator regarding the house in which he died. 'I was present at the trial,' writes 'Rebellion Smyth,' an aged correspondent. 'Judge Burton gave McNally a high character for legal learning and worldly simplicity. "In the affairs of the world" said Burton, "he was as simple as a child."'[519] The eminent judge for once was mistaken.

Grattan's name has been mentioned by McNally as privy to the plans of 1798. What truth may be in the assertion that Grattan would join in an appeal to arms is a point which may never be fully determined. It is certain that in 1782 he would not have hesitated to employ physical force. His friend Mr.—afterwards Justice—Day records of him that 'Grattan was resolved to assist, even by arms, if driven to it, the liberties of Ireland.'[520]

CHAPTER XV
FATHER ARTHUR O'LEARY

Dr. Madden, in a well-known work of considerable authority, singles out three divines as examples of noble qualities: i.e. 'the Right Rev. Dr. Doyle, the Rev. Arthur O'Leary, and Archbishop Murray.'[522]

Several years ago an influential journalist posted at Melbourne the following letter. He was the mouthpiece of many. It is rather late to answer his question publicly; but, in truth, the subject was not an inviting one to touch, especially as, not having studied it, I felt unable to reply in a way which would be deemed satisfactory by the querist. On the other hand, the application having come from the antipodes, I am encouraged to think that the subject possesses an interest not confined to a hemisphere. 'No one was more generally loved and revered than Father O'Leary,' writes Charles Butler. Yelverton, speaking in the Irish Parliament, said: 'Unattached to this world's affairs, Father O'Leary can have none but the purest motives of rendering service to the cause of morality and his country.' He was the subject of a grand panegyric from the pulpit. Two biographies of him have been written by anointed hands. Idolised while living, his memory was cherished by thousands. His name wore a halo! Now, according to recent commentators, it seems not free from that light which floats over unhealthy places. Let it not be denied that at different times O'Leary did good work for his creed and country. As a religionist he continued true to the end;[Pg 212] but if we accept the high testimony of Froude and Lecky, the same cannot be said of him as a patriot and a gentleman.

I may at once say that, although evidence exists of O'Leary's frailty, it is not sufficient to warrant, in all details, the very sensational picture drawn by Mr. McMahon.

People always knew that O'Leary became entitled to a pension, though how he acquired it was not so clear. Perhaps it is only fair to give him the benefit of the version which his intimate friend, Francis Plowden, placed on record eighty years ago.[525] His information was, doubtless, derived from O'Leary himself; but O'Leary seems to have told him no more than it was convenient to reveal:—

It was, in fact, entirely by Plowden's intervention that the arrear was paid. So we learn on the authority of the Rev. Thomas England, who in 1822 brought out a life of O'Leary. Plowden was a friend of Pitt's, and undertook to write a History of Ireland under the auspices of that statesman. He had previously published in defence of the British Constitution, and received in acknowledgment the D.C.L. of Oxford. When writing eighty years ago of so popular and respected a priest as O'Leary, Plowden—himself a Catholic—made his revelation cautiously. It would now seem that some greater service was rendered than the public service to which Plowden refers. It will be shown on high contemporary authority that the object of the Castle in 1784 was to divide the two great parties. This policy later on was boldly avowed as Divide et impera.[526] The service, therefore, for which O'Leary accepted secret pay cannot have been for promoting cordial co-operation between Catholics and Protestants.

Mr. Lecky, in the sixth volume of his 'History of England,' has brought to light a letter, going far to establish the fact that in 1784 O'Leary 'consented, for money, to discharge an ignominious office for a Government which despised and distrusted him.'[527]

On studying O'Leary's public life there seems no doubt that the secret pension of 100l. a year, which in 1784 he agreed to accept, was merely supplemental to a larger subsidy previously enjoyed. How he earned the first pension is now to be shown.

[Pg 215]

A volume, 'Sketches of Irish Political Characters,' was published in 1799. The writer, Henry McDougall, commanded sources of information which gave his book value. Speaking of O'Leary, he says (p. 264):—

McDougall doubtless refers to a publication of O'Leary's, largely circulated and often reprinted, i.e. 'An Address to the Common People of Ireland on occasion of an apprehended Invasion by the French and Spaniards in July 1779,[528] when the united Fleets of Bourbon appeared in the Channel.' On April 12, 1779, Spain had concluded an alliance with France and America, whereupon Vergennes, the French Premier, divulged to the Spanish minister, Blanca, that an invasion of Ireland was meditated. To promote this design, an American agent was instructed to foster the interests of the allies amongst the Presbyterians of Ulster; while the task of winning over the Irish Catholics was to be entrusted to Spanish agents.

America was all but lost at this time, and England found herself in a position of great difficulty. Ireland was drained of its garrison; the people much discontented; the Catholic middle classes, grown rich by commercial success, had established branches of their houses in France and Spain. A letter of warning, which alarmed the Cabinet, and probably led them to ask O'Leary's help, still exists. At the same time, hurriedly and with a bad grace, they conceded a measure of Catholic Relief. Lord Amherst, writing to Lord North from Geneva on June 19, 1778, says:—

And again:—

O'Leary by his address aroused not only Catholic loyalty, but awakened the apathy of many Protestants on whom the report of invasion had previously made no impression. The Volunteers sprang into vitality, and though they at first numbered merely 8,000, the force swelled ere the year was out to 42,000 armed men, and without the cost of one shilling to the Crown. Years after, the Government dreading, like Frankenstein, the heaving mass it had helped to create, sought to suppress the Irish Volunteers; but in 1778 their feeling was very different, when O'Leary's inspiring address fanned the spirit of volunteering, and conduced to preserve the country. It was then that Lord Buckinghamshire officially declared that Ireland was prepared to offer a determined resistance to invasion.

A link or two of the heavy penal chain had now been struck from Papist limbs. The relaxation, however, was hampered with a new test oath, drawn up in terms even more subtle than that which, when handed to O'Connell fifty years later in Parliament, he withdrew rather than take. Dr. Carpenter[530] ruled the R. C. see of Dublin at this time. His flock embraced a considerable number who, from timidity of conscience, expressed doubts as to the propriety of taking the oath. Dr. Carpenter, though himself no great friend to the temporal [Pg 217]power of the Pope, felt that to deny on oath a power already claimed by some famous theologians would seem rash and arrogant. Bishop de Burgo, author of the 'Hibernia Dominicana,' opposed the oath in terms still stronger; lay orators described as a poisoned cup the proffered measure of Catholic relief. Again O'Leary came to the front. A pamphlet of eighty-six pages was thrown on the country, entitled, 'Loyalty asserted, or a Vindication of the new Test Oath of Allegiance, with an impartial inquiry into the Pope's Temporal Power [a strong attack upon it] and the claims of the Stewarts to the English Throne: proving that both are equally groundless.' O'Leary examined the oath sentence by sentence, and with logical precision showed its conformity to Catholic teaching. 'The work was widely circulated,' writes Father England, the first biographer of O'Leary, and called forth as well the acknowledgments of the friends of the Government as the warm gratitude of his Catholic fellow-countrymen. In November 1778 we read that the Catholic Archbishop Carpenter, at the head of seventy of his clergy, and several hundred Catholic laymen, attended at the Court of King's Bench in Dublin and took the oath prescribed.[531]

The dreaded invasion never took place; but O'Leary's address was scattered broadcast, and during subsequent years it reappeared again and again. It reads more like the argument of a paid advocate than the disinterested appeal of a poor Franciscan.

All this—not to speak of O'Leary's tracts on Toleration, and his exertions, written and oral, to deter the Whiteboys from their conspiracies—furnishes sufficient claim to a pension, without assuming that it must have been earned in the dark field of espionage. However, we now approach the time when overtures to discharge an ignominious task were undoubtedly made to him.

On August 26, 1784, the Viceroy, Rutland, addressed a 'most secret' letter to Pitt's brother-in-law, Lord Sydney:—

[Pg 218]

This is a glowing picture, one more than realising the beautiful vision of Davis:—

The first mention of O'Leary's name in the State Papers is under date September 4, 1784, when Sydney writes to the Lord-Lieutenant:—'O'Leary has been talked to by Mr. Nepean, and he is willing to undertake what is wished for 100l. a year, which has been granted him.'

Thus, as it would seem, O'Leary had already not been slow in claiming from the Government the merit, if not the wages, of allaying the causes of public alarm. Plowden and England admit that O'Leary had a pension of 200l. a year. He must have been in receipt of at least 100l. for his writings at the time that, for an extra hundred, it was proposed to him to undertake a base task. The promptitude and facility with which Sydney, in September 1784, made the proposition shows the close relations that had previously subsisted.

A curious letter from Weymouth, a previous Home Secretary, addressed to Dublin Castle, is printed in Grattan's 'Life' (vol. i. p. 369). In great panic he expresses fear that the Catholic colleges of France and Flanders would despatch their alumni as secret agents to Ireland. These were among the reasons that made the Government anxious to secure O'Leary's aid.

Dr. England—his earliest biographer—lived comparatively near the time, and heard from O'Leary's publisher, Keating, a few interesting incidents which, to some extent, tally with the revelations of the State Papers. The biographer knows of an interview between O'Leary and Nepean on behalf of Sydney and Pitt, but England and his informant are deceived as to the conditions which accompanied the pension. Their memory is also at fault as regards the year. Instead of 1784, they set it down as 'soon after O'Leary had fixed his residence permanently in London,' which, of course, was in 1789. O'Leary had been a good deal in London previously, for, as Froude states, Orde in 1784 asked Sydney to send him over confidential agents, and in September 1784 he writes, 'your experts have arrived safe.'[535]

[Pg 220]

[Pg 221]

It will be seen that the point here made is not consistent with Plowden's account (ante, p. 213). According to him, the pension was 'hush-money:' he was to write no more, and, above all, he was not to write in promotion of good feeling and toleration. England upholds that it was given in the hope that O'Leary would continue to write in the same tone that had already earned Governmental gratitude. Sydney settled terms with O'Leary in London, and, through his secretary, told him what to do.

'Cedars have yielded,' says St. Peter. It was a clever thought to plan the corruption of O'Leary for the performance of a part which his employers describe with gusto. Two years previously, on February 27, 1782, popular confidence in him had reached its height when Yelverton, Grattan, and Sir Lucius O'Brien praised him with enthusiasm.

How he qualified for these praises Mr. Froude may now be allowed to show. After O'Leary arrived in Dublin he saw Orde, and was told what the Government expected him to do. The following letter is dated September 23, 1784:—

Sir Richard Musgrave was one of the alarmists who loved to purvey sensational news for Dublin Castle. His 'History of the Rebellion,' published in 1801, embodies his impressions of events for twenty years before. No wonder that Dublin Castle was fluttered by his reports. Here is clearly one of them, and it serves to show why it was that the Government were so anxious in 1784 to secure O'Leary by a subsidy:—

And again:—

Musgrave's construction of the above, as in many other incidents, is not wholly correct; though in his estimate of [Pg 223]Tandy and Dowling, both Protestants, he was accurate enough.

If O'Leary played the part assigned and attributed to him, never did face more belie internal baseness, or was more exquisitely fashioned to command the confidence of its dupes. The 'Gentleman's Magazine' for February 1802 contains a study of 'Father Arthur' from the pen of Mr. Pratt.

Curran, addressing the Irish House of Commons in 1787, revealed a trait highly honourable to the friar: 'Mr. O'Leary was, to his knowledge, a man of the most innocent and amiable simplicity of manners in private life. The reflection of twenty years in a cloister had severely regulated his passions and deeply informed his understanding.'[541] Curran's knowledge was partly derived from the fact that O'Leary belonged to 'The Monks of the Screw,' often regarded as a convivial club; but 'whose more important object,' writes Hardy, the biographer of Charlemont, 'was a co-operation of men holding a general similarity of political principles resolved to maintain the rights and constitution of their country.' Previously, O'Leary had dedicated his Miscellaneous Tracts 'to the Dignitaries and Brethren of the Monks of St. Patrick,' addressing them, with his wonted humour, as 'Reverend Fathers and illustrious Brethren.'

[Pg 224]

He had already written in denunciation of French designs on Ireland; and what more natural than that he should now be asked to track the movements of certain French emissaries which the Government heard had arrived in Dublin, and were conspiring with the Catholic leaders to throw off the British yoke.[542] This task O'Leary, as a staunch loyalist, may have satisfied his conscience in attempting, especially as he must have known that in 1784 the Catholics, as a body, had no treasonable designs, though, doubtless, some few exceptions might be found. In fact, his friend Edmund Burke, a member of the Ministry in 1783, declared, but later on, that 'the Irish Roman Catholics were everywhere loyal, save at certain points where their loyalty had been impaired by contact with Protestants.' Orde,[543] while using O'Leary, thought him a knave; yet feigned a readiness to believe his reports. The exhaustive correspondence of Count d'Adhémar, the French ambassador in London, with his Government, is now open to inquirers at the French Foreign Office; but, as it makes no allusion to any French agent in Ireland at this period, the story may be little better than one of the sensational myths so often found in the letters of informers to the Irish executive.[544] But, although no documental evidence exists of a French agent having been in Dublin in 1784, it is certain [Pg 225]that five years later, i.e. in 1789, one Bancroft, an American by birth, was sent on a secret mission from France to Ireland.[545]

We hear of no important arrests during the troubled period that O'Leary is said to have been set in motion; but the Habeas Corpus Act had not been suspended since 1779, and was not until 1794 that Pitt renewed the suspension.

In analysing O'Leary's life and judging his conduct, it is not fair to ignore any remark of his tending to exculpate; but, if panegyrics are desired, the reader should consult the memoirs by England, Buckley and some others. Almost O'Leary's last public performance appeared in 1800: 'An Address to the Lords of Parliament, with an account of Sir H. Mildmay's Bill relative to Nuns.'

This is further useful in showing that O'Leary was no admirer of the French king, and now that he was a pensioner of England would hardly object to discover the reported French agents in Dublin, who, with Napper Tandy, are said to have 'drank on their knees' the toast of 'Louis of France.'

The latter story—told by the Viceroy, Rutland, in his [Pg 226]letter to Sydney—bears improbability on its face. It seems strange that Tandy and his party, who not long after were Red Republicans and the allies of Carnot and Hoche, would drink the health of Louis XVI. on their knees.[547] They were principally Protestants; and John O'Connell, in the Life of his father, says that Sheares shocked the future Liberator by exultantly displaying a handkerchief soaked in the French king's blood.

I suspect that when O'Leary returned from making, in September 1784, the inquiries which he is assumed to have done, his report was something in the spirit of Canning's knife-grinder: 'Story! God bless you, I have none to tell, sir;' and that Orde concluded O'Leary himself was in the plot. On October 17, Orde writes to Nepean, alluding to some rumour about our friar which is not stated. 'Del Campo's connection with O'Leary—or rather O'Leary's with him—may have given rise to all the report; but, after all, I think it right to be very watchful over the priest, and wish you to be so over the Minister. They are all of them designing knaves.'

Thus it appears that in little more than a fortnight after O'Leary is supposed to have begun to spy, Orde was far from satisfied with him.

CHAPTER XVI
ARTHUR O'LEARY IN LONDON

It is to be regretted that the State Paper naming 'O'Leary and Del Campo' should be couched in words so brief and cautious. Mr. Lecky offers no explanation of it. Not only are we uninformed as to the nature of the 'Report;' but we are left to guess who Del Campo was. One thing is evident: Dublin Castle and the Home Office put their heads together, shook them mysteriously, and then urged extreme caution in dealing with knaves. Books of biographic reference make no mention of Del Campo's name; but it is quite clear from Cumberland's memoirs that Del Campo was the Spanish minister, next in authority to Florida Blanca.

While the American War still raged, and hostilities from France and Spain continued to threaten, Richard Cumberland, son of a bishop and the secretary of a former viceroy, started on his secret mission to the courts of Lisbon and Madrid,[Pg 228] bearing from England letters of accreditation, quite a boxful of instructions, and accompanied by his wife and daughters 'on the pretence of travelling into Italy upon a passport through the Spanish dominions.' Cumberland's interviews with Del Campo are described, and for a time all went well; but, owing to terrible rumours as regards the 'No Popery' riots in London, which now broke out, led by Lord George Gordon, President of the Protestant Association, the treaty[549] collapsed; Del Campo refused to appear; Cumberland was recalled, and the Government who sent him out withheld the repayment of 5,000l., the amount of expenses he had incurred.

It may be said that Orde's want of confidence in O'Leary arose, not because he had furnished so little secret information, but because of some whisper that the Spanish Minister had had pourparlers with him. It would be strange if O'Leary, who in 1779 wrote powerfully against the hostile designs of Spain, should be suspected, within the next few years, of abetting them. The rumour, which Mr. Lecky says is not stated, may have been merely that O'Leary, the only Catholic writer of intrepidity at that day, had been asked by Del Campo, who soon after became resident Spanish minister in London, and was himself of English extraction,[550] to write an exposure of the 'No Popery Riots' and their leaders—incidents which Spain, now more than ever defiant in its pose, could not fail to turn to political account.

A postscript to O'Leary's 'Miscellaneous Tracts' mentions that he had been requested to give a history of the London riots. 'I promised to undertake the task,' he writes, 'and began to digest my materials; but afterwards reflecting that the duty of the historian bound me to arraign at the impartial tribunal of truth both men and actions—unmask the leading characters,' &c.... he then came to 'consider my own state exposed in consequence of the Penal Laws to the insult of [Pg 229]every ruffian, and, comparing the defenceless situation of the priest with the duty of the historian, I dropped the attempt.'

These tumults of 1780 lit a flame which did not die out even with the expiring century. During their height most of the Roman Catholic chapels of London, especially those of the foreign embassies, were gutted and burnt. Papists' houses were attacked, as well as the houses of all persons known to favour them. For days and nights the mob gained an almost complete mastery of London, which is described as like a city taken by storm. The venerable Bishop Challoner was roused from his sleep and urged to fly; he died soon after of palsy, the effects of the shock. No man's life was safe who did not mount the badge of riot, a blue cockade; windows displayed flags of the same colour; while the watchword 'No Popery' was prudentially inscribed. Broadsides were circulated under the auspices of Lord George Gordon—the unholy high priest of the holocaust—in which Englishmen were exhorted to remember 'the bloody tyranny and persecuting plots exercised on Protestants by Rome'—the Spanish Armada, of course, included. Society seemed falling to pieces. From Tyburn to Whitechapel the highway presented a frontage of mourning. Every shop was closed. Mr. Archer, a priest, deposed in court that he had paid 40l. to be allowed to pass through Fleet Street, and a hackney coachman refused 10l. to drive a papist to Hampstead. The mob, flushed with victory, now sought allies in the prisons. Newgate, then recently rebuilt at a cost of 150,000l., was attacked with fury; its great gates fell before them like frail partitions; 500 felons, including those set free from Clerkenwell, were let loose upon the burning city, leaving behind them in flames, not the gaol only, but the whole street.[551] It seemed a second 1666, and the famous fall of the Bastile, nine years later, was but the mere echo.

[Pg 230]

Storm had not as yet burst over Ireland; but the heavy air was charged with electricity. The following are the words with which Mr. Froude awakened widespread interest, and drew forth that missive from the Antipodes given on a previous page.

Sir Jonah Barrington describes Orde as 'a cold, cautious and sententious man.'[556] These letters in some respects support that impression. A few years later he was created Lord Bolton. His letter, announcing O'Leary's arrival at Dublin on secret service, is dated September 23, 1784.[557] Let us look back a little and see what the previous year was doing.

[Pg 232]

The Dungannon Convention, which won great boons for Ireland, was followed by provincial assemblies in Leinster, Munster and Connaught. Resolutions were carried, delegates were appointed, and the nation anxiously awaited the great Volunteer Convention in Dublin, on which the fate of Ireland was declared to depend. Meanwhile one hundred and sixty envoys of the Volunteer army met, electing Lord Charlemont chairman. Red uniforms fringed the streets, and the delegates, two by two, marched through the lines, amid the roll of drums and the waving of national ensigns. The Earl of Bristol and Bishop of Derry rode to the Convention with an escort of dragoons.

'Plowden's remarks, which you enclose, do not meet the specific statements of Froude, that O'Leary was employed as an informer at the period of the Volunteer Convention,' writes Mr. Morgan McMahon, my Australian correspondent.[559] Mr. Froude's words certainly tend to convey that the Convention took place at the time of Orde's application for a spy. The date of the Convention was November 1783: Orde's letter was written in September 1784. Again, it is suggested that O'Leary was despatched in reply to a request for a [Pg 233]trained informer. But it does not appear that though he may have been useful as a diplomatist he was already a spy. On the contrary, Sydney writes (Sept. 4): 'O'Leary has been talked to and he is willing to do what is wished for 100l. a year.' Orde replies (Sept. 8), 'I am very glad that you have settled matters with O'Leary, who can get to the bottom of all secrets in which the Catholics are concerned.' O'Leary had already a pension, ostensibly for his writings; but the pension for espionage must not be confounded with it.

It is certainly admitted by even O'Leary's panegyrists that at the period of the Convention of 1783 delicate overtures, which they assume he rejected, were made to him; but the magnanimous words supposed to have been used by O'Leary when parleying with his tempter rest on no authority whatever, and some will be disposed to suspect that a colour is imparted to the overtures more presentable to general readers than the naked truth, whatever it was. The pension, I repeat, which O'Leary already enjoyed, was, I think, merely for his writings; though, prior to September 1784, he may have accepted douceurs for distinct acts of diplomacy. At all events it is due to O'Leary to give him the full benefit of the exculpatory words of his brother priest. Describing the Volunteer Convention, Father Buckley writes, eighty years later:—

Thus far Buckley, the biographer of 1867. England, O'Leary's biographer of 1822, finishes the interview in less florid words: 'He was then told that a pension of 150l. per annum was to be offered for his acceptance, and that no condition repugnant to his feelings as an Irishman or Catholic was to be annexed to it. A change in the Administration[562] took place shortly afterwards, and the promise remained unfulfilled.'[563]

Father England assumes that O'Leary spurned the overtures at the time of the Convention, though later on his acceptance of a pension is admitted. While guiltless, no doubt, of direct betrayal, he may have been led to connive at a trick by which the Irish Government succeeded in breaking up the Convention.[564]

O'Leary, towards the close of his life, had made copious notes illustrative of the history of Ireland—notes handed by him to Plowden, who was glad to interweave them with his own when compiling 'The Historical Review.' Plowden dismisses with the following note the great incident of the Convention:—

Catholics thus became excluded from the constitutional prerogatives claimed for Protestants. The proceedings of the Convention were at last adjourned sine die. Sir Boyle Roche invented the fatal letter, and Mr. Froude conveys that he was instigated to this course by the Viceroy. Sir Gavan Duffy states—as a common belief in Ireland—that 'had the Convention not been betrayed by its leaders, the Union would never have taken place.'[565]

O'Leary, though his name, and that of Sir Boyle Roche, are not mentioned in the printed abstract of the proceedings, was certainly present when the fictitious letter was read. Dr. England, describing the demonstration by which O'Leary's arrival was hailed at the Rotunda, adds that it 'occurred on the same day on which the message said to be from Lord Kenmare was read at the Convention,'[566] but no fault is found with O'Leary by England, who is his invariable eulogist.

Lord Kenmare was a fast friend of our friar,[567] and is uniformly praised by him.[568] It was when on a visit to this peer that O'Leary, seeing a wounded stag approaching Yelverton, wittily said: 'How naturally instinct leads him to come to you to deliver him by a nolle prosequi.'[569] Kenmare, this leader of the higher class of Catholics, was falsely represented as announcing at the Convention that his co-religionists were satisfied with the concessions they had got. I find that O'Leary had privately expressed, very much to his honour, but a short time before, an opinion diametrically opposite; and urging the Catholics not to cease agitation till every link [Pg 236]in their fetters had been struck off;[570] but he now held his peace, and thus wittingly, or otherwise, aided the base schemes of the Viceroy. O'Leary himself had long been recognised as the most prominent exponent and mouthpiece of the Catholic demand; and, from his intimacy with Lord Kenmare, he could hardly fail to have known his sentiments on a question in which both were naturally most interested; the forged letter, however, claiming authority to speak for the Catholics of Ireland, was allowed to pass unchallenged, to the ruin of the Convention and the exultant triumph of a faction.

O'Leary and Sir Boyle Roche are not persons likely to have been intimate; and yet it can be shown that an intimacy did exist. A letter from O'Leary, written a year before the Convention, and to be found later on, avows that he was the friend and political correspondent of Roche.[571] The forged letter—in which were travestied the opinions and aspirations of the Catholics of Ireland—was read on November 11, 1783.[572] Not until a fortnight after was the fraud exposed by the popular Earl-Bishop of Derry, who read a letter from Lord Kenmare, [Pg 237]dated Killarney, Nov. 20, saying, 'I utterly disavow having given the least authority,'[573] &c., &c. Sir Boyle Roche thereupon addressed to several leading Catholics a remarkable note dated 'Dublin Castle, 14th February, 1784.' This document was, of course, the act of the Administration, Roche having been merely wound up and used as an automaton. His letter, seeking to entrap slavish Catholics and sink them in the mire of unpopularity, began by saying that it would flatter him in the highest degree 'if I should find that my conduct was not disapproved by yourself and friends,' and he holds out the hope that, being once more in Parliament, he would be not unmindful of Catholic interests.

He adds that he was elated to the greatest degree by his success, having 'entirely disconcerted the measures of the leaders of the Convention.'

The Earl-Bishop of Derry was a decided revolutionist and very eager for separation, and is alleged to have said to Lord Charlemont, 'Things are going well, my lord: we shall have blood.' O'Leary, author of 'Loyalty Asserted,' and notoriously a man of peace, would probably have felt little scruple [Pg 238]in seeking to avert by diplomatic means what Orde feared might become a bloody chaos. Burke, writing to a brother priest of O'Leary's, said, 'Do everything in your power to check the growth of Jacobinism on the one hand, and oppression, which is its best friend, on the other.' No wonder that the Irish Government blenched at the outlook. One Dublin paper, called the 'Volunteer Journal,' urged assassination; and some men had been arrested, in the previous spring, on a charge of conspiring to murder seven unpopular members of Parliament. The supineness of magistrates and the absence of any regular police force opened great facilities for crime. Riots raged in the streets owing to trade strikes; men were 'tarred and feathered' and let loose before the infuriated mob; soldiers were houghed and left bleeding on the pavement. New corps of volunteers advertised for recruits, and men of the worst repute rushed into their ranks. Meanwhile the Bishop of Derry was raising a fresh regiment of volunteers in Ulster. 'The Viceroy, at Fitzgibbon's advice,' writes Froude, 'sent down officers in disguise to watch him, with a warrant in their pockets should an arrest be necessary;' and he adds that 'this singular prelate ran a near chance of ending his career on the gallows.' The withdrawal from public life of so remarkable a figure was second only in its effect to the collapse of the Convention, of which he was the animating spirit. When, six years later, Bancroft was sent by France on a secret mission to Ireland, his report, now preserved in the Foreign Office at Paris, states, as we learn from Lecky, that the fall of the Convention had 'thrown a certain ridicule on Irish democracy, and it may be long before it is repaired.'

The Convention belongs to the year 1783. Not until the autumn of 1784 are any letters found compromising O'Leary—letters not revealing any distinct acts of espionage, or even penned by himself, but showing him to have yielded to the voice of the tempter.

In judging a man who is not alive to defend himself, one whose memory has been for a century revered, I am reluctantly led to encumber this narrative with various con[Pg 239]siderations for and against, so that readers may have the result of a conscientious study of the case, and he able to form a judicial conclusion.

The promptitude of O'Leary's arrival in Dublin impressed badly all who read it in Froude; for Orde, according to that historian, asked the English Secretary of State to send him over two trained men from their own staff of informers.[576] The letter containing this request, however, I have not seen in print or manuscript. O'Leary came over at the same time as a detective named Parker; but the alacrity of the priest's arrival, though it looks badly, may not be altogether due to his readiness to play the spy. This man, 'poor in everything save genius and philosophy,' to quote Grattan's words, was informed, according to England, one of his biographers, that his presence in Dublin was necessary in order that some formalities should be gone through ere his name could be placed on the Irish Civil List.[577] England says that a pension which, during the previous year, he was on the point of receiving, fell through because of a change in the Cabinet; and may not this consideration have been in itself enough to expedite the journey?

O'Leary had been interviewed in London by Sir Evan Nepean, a practised diplomatist, and consented, we are told, to come to Dublin to make certain inquiries. But who can tell what wily words were employed to induce him to wait on the Irish Secretary, Orde, at Dublin Castle? Orde posed as a man rather liberal for the time, and was the correspondent of Grattan and Lord Kenmare. Men of the world know that very different language is often used when writing of a person, than when addressing that person direct. On the other hand it should be remembered, assuming that Sydney conveys a correct impression of what passed, that O'Leary seemed willing to accept 100l. for services dealing, not with the special exigencies of the hour, but on condition that he continued, from year to year, and for the same annual fee, to probe to the bottom certain secrets of his party.

[Pg 240]

When he arrived in Dublin the country was rent by great and just discontent. One grievance was that Parliament possessed no adequate representation of the popular voice. In March 1784, Flood brought in a Bill for 'Reform,' and twenty-six counties petitioned in its favour.

It had been decided that the Convention[578] of the previous year should be followed up by a national Congress. This announcement brought dismay to the Castle. The loss of her American Colonies had just taught Pitt a lesson. Contemporary pamphleteers, thinking perhaps of the then fashionable melodrama, 'The Castle Spectre,' saw Dublin Castle scared by mysterious terrors.

'The letters C.O.N.G.R.E.S.S.,' writes Orellana,[579] 'are magic letters, of themselves sufficient to rise an apparition before the eyes of a guilty Minister—an apparition that will seem to draw his curtains in the dead of night, and rouse him from his pillow!'

The Congress was in fact the ghost of the Betrayed Convention.

There was to be a great meeting at the Tholsel in Dublin, on September 27, 1784, preliminary to the coming Congress. The prompt arrival from London, on September 24, of O'Leary and Parker, and Orde's confidential whisper that they were to begin operations at once, lead to the belief that both attended this meeting. Indeed, from O'Leary's prominent attitude at the previous Convention, he is almost certain to have taken part in the deliberations that followed it. No mention, however, is made of O'Leary or Parker in the [Pg 241]Dublin prints of the day.[580] The Congress and its preliminary meeting are, no doubt, constantly referred to, but they sat with closed doors, and no reports appear. What took place must be gleaned from other sources. A letter from Orde, published in Grattan's 'Life,' and dated September 18, 1784, six days before O'Leary's arrival from London, mentions that at the coming meeting opposition would be made to putting a question upon the election of representatives for a National Congress.[581]

As this was a period full of great issues, and yet but little known, perhaps I may be allowed to cull from the local journals of the day a few remarks to show the spirit which animated both sides.

The 'Dublin Evening Post,' the popular organ, 'most earnestly recommends a numerous and respectable meeting at the Tholse on Monday next. The occasion,' it adds, 'is great.'[582] But ere long the Castle journalist gleefully chronicles a collapse.

If O'Leary attended the meeting at the Tholsel, it is easy to know what tone he took. Three years later he published a pamphlet in which he seems very familiar with the incidents of that month.

This tamed tone will not fail to strike on comparing it with his intrepid letter[584] written not two years before.

Meanwhile the National Congress was announced to hold its first meeting. 'Whatever underhand engines may endeavour to effect,' says the popular organ, 'we hope to see these just and constitutional deliberations re-establish the purity of representation.'[585]

One prime object of the Castle is detected and denounced by the same courageous journalist, John Magee. The 'Dublin Evening Post' of November 5, 1784, records:—

These extracts do not criminate O'Leary, but are useful as illustrating the history of the time, and developing secret policy, while, moreover, they correct some strange inaccuracies. For instance: the Viceroy, writing to Sydney, as printed in Mr. Lecky's History, calls Tandy's colleague 'Binney.' Of course it should be Binns, a name frequently found in the dark records of '98.

The Castle scribe, in another paragraph, states of Binns and Tandy, both thoroughly honest men—'Fame is very busy that they have received the all-subduing touch of "aurum mirabile."' This was probably to divert suspicion from the really subsidised quarter. It will be remembered that the date of O'Leary's arrival, and that of Parker, quite tallies with the meeting on the 27th September; and it may be asked what else could have brought the popular orators to Dublin at that juncture? Parker knew Tandy, and, as Orde remarks, might be 'able to dive to the bottom of his secrets.'

While diplomacy sought to work its ends in one quarter, brute force laboured in another to disable the arm which had been upraised. The Sheriff of the County Dublin having convened his bailiwick to meet on the subject of Reform, Fitzgibbon, then Attorney-General, addressed an unconstitutional letter to him threatening to proceed by attachment against those who responded to his call. The sheriff himself was fined and imprisoned.

The subsidised journalist, Francis Higgins, writes on December 24, 1784:—

[Pg 244]

In conclusion, the old charge of venality and perfidy is brought against the incorruptible Tandy. 'Napper,' we are told, 'betrayed them.' But Barrington, and all other historians, admit that Tandy was sound to the core.

Grattan, in the Life of his father, notices as strange that the Bishop of Derry, who the previous year was so active at the Convention, absented himself from the Congress. The explanation probably is that his lordship had heard something of the detectives with a warrant for his arrest in their pocket. How the Congress crumbled, and the organisation melted away, a glimpse is obtained from Plowden, who embodied in his 'Historical Review' a mass of notes made by O'Leary. 'It is well posterity should know,' writes his biographer, 'how much Plowden was indebted to his co-operation.'[588]

Plowden had never been to Ireland until about the year 1800. The following words seem those of a man who knew the inner workings of the governmental policy in 1784.

The Volunteer army became gradually disorganised and disbanded; and the cannon, on which the words 'Free Trade or This' were inscribed, went back to the foundry.

In 1785 things looked a little dark in Dublin, which must have given O'Leary something to do to see through. A storm signal was raised by a few alarmists, and the Attorney-General, Fitzgibbon, though he sought to make light of the outlook, admitted enough to show that the country ought to be prepared for foul weather. Mr. Lecky, in rejecting as without foundation[591] the report confided by Rutland to Sydney in 1784, that a French agent was then in Dublin, makes no reference to a man named Perrin, mentioned in a remarkable speech of the Attorney-General, Fitzgibbon, better known as Lord Clare. On February 14, 1785, he announced in the Irish Parliament that

M. Perrin, the native of France, whose name Fitzgibbon mentions in connection with the resolution to invite the French to invade Ireland, was no doubt the father of the subsequently well-known judge of the Queen's Bench, Louis Perrin. Under what circumstances M. Perrin first came to Dublin is not clear. Sometimes he was styled a Professor of French; usually resided in Dublin; but would sojourn, for months at a time, in the houses of such Irish gentry as wished to acquire a knowledge of that tongue. 'Perrin's French Grammar' was at a later date very familiar in Irish circles.[593]

The tinge of disappointment which peeps forth in the later allusion of Secretary Orde to O'Leary may have been influenced by a circumstance casually noticed by his biographer. We have seen from a well-informed local journal of the day, that venal writers had received instructions to endeavour to sow the seeds of dissension. It will be shown that O'Leary was specially intimate with the proprietor of the Castle organ, [Pg 247]and O'Leary would be one of the first writers on whom Orde's thoughts could not fail to fall. O'Leary's biographers say, but without giving dates, that he recoiled from the proposal to write in the organ of the Irish Government. Indeed, in a pamphlet, previously published, he records his dislike to anonymous compositions.[594] An eloquent divine, the Rev. Morgan d'Arcy, in preaching the funeral panegyric on Father O'Leary, travelled slightly out of his path to touch on this point. He said:—

The preacher's reference here would be to the year 1789, when O'Leary removed permanently to London. It was in '89 that the great struggle on the Regency Question, which will be dealt with later on, raged between the camps of Whig and Tory in Ireland.

Higgins, the subsidised owner of the Castle organ, was called 'Shamado' by John Magee, and painted in colours of [Pg 248]demoniac hue. According to Dr. Morgan d'Arcy, O'Leary did not yield to the tempter, but rejected the proposal with indignation and contempt, and this would naturally incur displeasure. The statement proves too much, for Higgins, by his will dated 1791, speaks of O'Leary as his 'long and faithful friend,' and leaves him a bequest in proof of affection. Further, his journal devoted part of its very limited space to occasional paragraphs laudatory of O'Leary, and not ill-calculated to strengthen popular confidence in his name. Thus, on May 12, 1785—a few months after Orde says he had consented to work secretly for pay—we read in the subsidised organ of the Irish Government:—

[Pg 249]

The organ of the Irish Government does not praise O'Leary for political support. To do so would arouse suspicion whether well founded or not; but Higgins, from friendship or policy, seeks to exalt his prestige and popularity. In the 'Freeman' of November 20, 1784, we have a long account of how he put down Dr. Johnson, who had addressed him with boorishness. 'The literati,' it is added, 'consider themselves as much obliged by Dr. O'Leary's conduct on the occasion, as it has much humbled the imperious and surly behaviour of Johnson.'

The statement of Plowden, that O'Leary was pensioned on condition that he should withhold his pen in support of toleration,[597] will not bear test.[598] In 1784, O'Leary is conclusively shown to be subsidised. His dissuasive address to the common people of Ireland denunciatory of Whiteboyism, a bulky treatise, bears date 1786. It seems more likely that a subsidy would be given for writing in support of the oppressive laws of that day. This letter to the peasantry writes up that [Pg 250]grinding impost—Tithes—in reference to which Bishop Doyle afterwards prayed, 'May our hatred of Tithes be as lasting as our love of justice!'

In this strain O'Leary argued at much length; but the impartial historian of this very time describes 'the system of Tithes as the greatest practical grievance, both of the poorer Catholics and of the Presbyterians.'[600]

Most people have heard of O'Leary's controversy with the Bishop of Cloyne, in which, when the prelate disputed Purgatory, O'Leary retorted that he might 'go farther and fare worse.' The 'Critical Review' examined the controversy with a shrewdly penetrative eye. Lord Kenmare, in a letter dated October 2, 1787, writes: 'I read with the greatest pleasure the 'Critical Review' on the Cloyne controversy. It is the best performance that has yet appeared on the subject. Grattan is violent against the Bishop of Cloyne for his publication, and thinks, with the reviewer, that Government is at the bottom of it.'[601] O'Leary's reply, which runs to 175 pages, contains many excellent truths worthy of commendation; but it is a question whether this elaborate controversy may not have been inspired and encouraged from Dublin Castle. Law and order are, very properly, inculcated throughout by O'Leary, and powerful dissuasives addressed to the 'Whiteboys' are printed at the end.[602] As regards the Bishop of Cloyne, O'Leary assures him, in words somewhat supererogatory:

[Pg 252]

'I was not sent here to sow sedition (p. 119). I returned here, not as a felon from transportation, but as an honourable exile, who returns to his native land after having preferred a voluntary banishment to ignorance and the abjuration of the creed of his fathers.' Some years later, i.e. in 1789, he was falsely reported to have taken the latter step, and, like Drs. Butler and Kirwan, to meditate matrimony. 'Having from my early days,' he wrote, 'accustomed myself to get the mastery over ambition and love, the two passions which in every age have enslaved the greatest heroes, your correspondent may rest assured that I am not of the trio.'

O'Leary was a Franciscan friar who had made vows of voluntary poverty. The fact that he had long been accustomed to rest content with a little may help to explain the modest sum he was satisfied to accept for services which, if cordially rendered, were worth the amount twenty times told. And in judging the man for accepting this money it must be remembered that the bulk of it was spent in alms deeds. Bishop Murphy told Father England that when a youth he was frequently O'Leary's almoner, and that a number of reduced persons were weekly relieved in Cork to the average extent of two or three pounds. 'Charity,' we are told, 'covers a multitude of sins.'

CHAPTER XVII
THE REGENCY—STRUGGLE BETWEEN WHIG AND TORY CAMPS—O'LEARY AND THE PRINCE OF WALES

The State Papers throw no light on what Plowden styles 'the arbitrary withdrawal of O'Leary's pension.' The following historic incident, now forgotten, and curious in its detail, may have led to that act.

In 1789, a great struggle raged between the Parliaments of England and Ireland on the question of creating the Prince of Wales Regent during the insanity of George the Third. The Prince at this time had been bound up, politically and socially, with the Whigs. Pitt, fearing that the Regency might prove fatal to his ambition and his Cabinet, resisted the heir-apparent's right to the prerogative of his father, and declared that 'the Prince had no better right to administer the government during his father's incapacity than any other subject of the realm.' An address to the Prince from the Irish Parliament requested that he would 'take upon himself the government of Ireland during the continuation of the King's indisposition, and no longer; and under the title of Prince Regent of Ireland, in the name, and on behalf of his Majesty, to exercise, according to the laws and constitution of that kingdom, all regal powers, jurisdiction, and prerogatives to the crown and government thereof belonging.'

Pelham, speaking of 'the tricks and intrigues of Mr. Pitt's faction,' adds, 'I have not time to express how strongly the Prince is affected by the confidence and attachment of the Irish Parliament.' Portland takes the same tone. The Buckingham Papers afford rich material for a history of this[Pg 254] struggle. The noble editor admits that 'the Parliament of Ireland preserved the unquestionable right of deciding the Regency in their own way. The position of Lord Buckingham[603] had become peculiarly embarrassing. What course should be taken in the event of such an address being carried? The predicament was so strange, and involved constitutional considerations of such importance, as to give the most serious disquietude to the Administration.'[604]

Hopes were felt that the King might recover. The Viceroy receives instructions to use obstructive tactics, 'to use every possible endeavour, by all means in your power, debating every question, dividing upon every question, moving adjournment upon adjournment, and every other mode that can be suggested, to gain time!'[605] But the Viceroy did more. He openly threatened to make each opponent 'the victim of his vote.' Fitzgibbon was promised the seals and a peerage if he succeeded for Pitt. Lures and threats were alternately held out. The peerages of Kilmaine, Glentworth, and Cloncurry were sold for hard cash, and the proceeds laid out in the purchase of members. Meanwhile the King got well. Thereupon the Master of the Rolls, the Treasurer, the Clerk of Permits, the Postmaster-general, the Secretary of War, the Comptroller of Stamps, and other public servants, were dismissed. The Duke of Leinster, Lord Shannon, the Ponsonbys were cashiered. Employments that had long remained dormant were revived, sinecures created, salaries increased; while such offices as the Board of Stamps and Accounts, hitherto filled by one, became a joint concern. The weigh-mastership of Cork was divided into three parts, the duties of which were discharged by deputies, while the principals, who pocketed the profits, held seats in Parliament. In 1790, one hundred and ten placemen were members of the House. The Viceroy, Buckingham, during his short [Pg 255]régime, added 13,040l. a year to the pension list; the names of the recipients are already on record. On the other hand, some men who had taken the Prince's side in the contest lost their pensions. O'Leary may have been in this batch.[606] Croly, in his 'Life of George IV,' dilates on the intimate relations which subsisted between the Prince and the priest, and adds that O'Leary was no unskilful medium of intercourse between his Church and the Whigs, and contributed in no slight degree to the popularity of the Prince in Ireland. According to Buckley, the Prince patronised O'Leary to such an extent that rumour whispered it was by him the marriage ceremony with Mrs. Fitzherbert had been performed.

Barrington, describing the chastisement applied to those who, in Ireland, favoured the appointment of the Prince as Regent, says: 'Lord Buckingham vented his wrath on the country;' but what proof have we that the alleged agent of the Castle, O'Leary, incurred that Viceroy's displeasure?

In 1789, the year O'Leary removed permanently to London, he settled down, at the Spanish Ambassador's Chapel in London, as an assistant priest to Dr. Hussey, and, apparently, a most unwelcome one. An extraordinary pamphlet, not known to his biographers, was privately issued by O'Leary referring to a feud between himself and Dr. Hussey. At page 11 O'Leary writes:—

[Pg 256]

This serves to explain Dr. England's remark in 1822, when accounting for O'Leary's permanent removal to London, that 'his residence in Ireland had become painful;'[608] but elsewhere in his book he assigns a different reason for the change.

This biographer did not know O'Leary personally; his conjecture, or explanation, is plausible. But few men would remove for their health to the purlieus of St. Giles and Soho, the mission with which O'Leary had most to do. Its fearful squalor at the period described is curiously shown in Clinch's recently published 'Bloomsbury and St. Giles.' It will be remembered that the preacher of his funeral sermon conveys that the migration in 1789 was caused by O'Leary's refusal to write in a venal Dublin print against the party with whom he had long been associated. Snubbed by the Viceroy, Buckingham, his usefulness at Dublin Castle was now a thing of the past; but yet, as he could not afford to give up all State endowment, I suspect that he settled down in London in some undefined diplomatic rôle, where his tact and influence would find a field for exercise. A most careful memoir of O'Leary, ending with the words 'Requiescat in pace'—written probably by his friend and co-religionist Plowden—appears in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' for February 1802. It contains some facts not noticed by his more diffuse biographers. 'This laudable conduct,' we are told, 'did not escape the attention of the Irish Government, and induced them, when he quitted [Pg 257]Ireland, to recommend him to men of power in this country.' I believe that O'Leary's removal to London was made under Government auspices, extended in the hope that, by his diplomatic power, it might lead to useful knowledge and results.

As George, Prince of Wales, held Whig views at this time, Mr. Pitt's great career ran some risk of being cut short. The Prince gathered round him the leading Whig lights, including O'Leary, as we learn from Croly's 'Life of George IV.'[610] A good picture of life in the Pavilion at Brighton is given, and of the brilliant jokes which capped the hits of Sheridan and Curran. But O'Leary's presence had, I think, a deeper significance. With graver men his intercourse was frequent. 'Edmund Burke was very marked in the regard which he manifested to O'Leary,' writes England. 'Fox was not only Pitt's rival, but the leader of a powerful party constantly on the watch to oust Pitt from office.' It may be presumed that the men of power in London to whom O'Leary, on leaving Ireland, had letters from Dublin Castle, occupied a camp hostile to the Whig garrison of the Pavilion.

One proof that O'Leary wished to regain favour with Pitt is afforded by the casual remark of his biographer. 'When O'Leary learned that his friend (Plowden) was engaged at the desire of Pitt in writing the 'Historical Review,' he sent him his invaluable collections, as affording the best and most authentic materials for the recent history of Ireland.'[611]

I do not like that phrase of Plowden in which he says—when speaking of O'Leary's pension—that it was only after giving repeated proofs that the secret condition had been complied with, he received a large arrear.[612] Plowden no doubt thinks that the pension was meant as 'hush money;' but it [Pg 258]is a question whether O'Leary was quite frank with him as to its character.

'An oak of the forest is too old to be transplanted at fifty,' said Grattan, regarding Flood's removal to London in 1784. 'Disgusted with the condition of his country,' writes O'Leary's later biographer, Buckley, 'and hopeless of doing anything by which it could be improved, he resolved on quitting it altogether and living in the free atmosphere of England, so congenial to a bounding and manly temperament like his.... In the year 1789 Arthur O'Leary left Ireland for ever, and took up his residence in London as one of the chaplains to the Spanish Embassy.'[613] It appears, however, from the testimony of Plowden, the attached friend of O'Leary, that it was a condition expressly made by the Crown that O'Leary was 'to reside no more in Ireland.'[614] I suspect that the appointment just described was brought about by Court intrigue. From the time of the Armada the movements of the Spanish minister were viewed with jealousy, often with alarm. In 1779, when the combined fleets of Spain and France rode menacingly in the Channel, O'Leary, as we have seen, denounced them to the Irish people, and his appointment to the Spanish embassy must have been the work of England rather than of Spain. In 1789 strained relations had again arisen between Spain and England; and a few years later war was actually declared by Spain.[615] Sydney states that O'Leary had already consented to furnish secret information.[616] His present position would enable him to acquire knowledge of, not only the designs of Spain, but of Dr. Hussey too; and without saying that O'Leary could be capable of downright treachery, it is probable that Pitt believed he would. It will be remembered that, in 1780, Dr. Hussey, chief chaplain to the Spanish embassy in London, had been sent with Richard Cumberland to effect a treaty with the Court of Spain, a negotiation not entirely successful. What was the precise nature of the [Pg 259]hold which Hussey, originally a Carthusian monk, acquired over the Court of England is destined to remain shrouded. Buckley says it was at the special request of George III. that Dr. Hussey accompanied Mr. Cumberland on a secret mission to Madrid.[617]

What Cumberland himself thought of his colleague is curious to see. We are told that 'the high-sounding titles and dignities showered upon Dr. Hussey by the Court of Spain outweighed in his balance English guineas;' that 'in his heart he was as high a priest as à Becket, and as stiff a Catholic as ever kissed the cross;' but yet 'had left behind him in his coffin at La Trappe no one passion native or ingrafted that belonged to him when he entered it.' So clear-sighted a man as Hussey could not fail to see the secret thoughts of Cumberland, or to have diagnosed, in his turn, the jaundiced retina through which he was viewed; for Cumberland complains of 'his singular, sudden, and capricious conduct to the author and his family, of which he was an inmate.'[618] Hussey had demanded his passports to return to England; but on Cumberland's remonstrance paused, and cancelled a letter he had addressed to the English Secretary of State asking leave to return. Mystery covers much of this mission to Spain, for Cumberland says, 'I will reveal no more than I am in honour and strict conscience warranted to make public. For twenty years I have been silent, making no appeals at any time but to my official employers, who were pledged to do me justice.'[619]

Mr. Froude tells us that Dr. Hussey[620] was in the confidence of Dundas and Portland, and had received favours from them. Both were prominent statesmen in the Cabinet of Pitt, and both eventually turned against Hussey. Dr. Hussey is described as Chaplain to his Catholic Majesty of Spain, and Rector of the Church of the Spanish Embassy in London. [Pg 260] He evidently knew something of O'Leary not revealed to the world.

At this point it may be well to open once more the pamphlet privately printed—'A Narrative of the Misunderstanding between the Rev. Arthur O'Leary and the Rev. Mr. Hussey.' Its purport, O'Leary says, is to remove the bad impressions which a late report, one which impugned his morality, might have made on some Catholic families, and the reader is requested either to burn the brochure, or erase altogether the name of Mr. Hussey. The latter is just the man to have muttered 'qui s'excuse s'accuse' as he read the following; and O'Leary's remark serves to show that Hussey suspected he had deeper motives.

In 1780, the Spanish ambassador to London was, we learn, 'Count Fernan Nunez, who had committed himself to a conversation from which Mr. Hussey drew very promising expectations.'[622] But in 1789 we find him succeeded by no less a person than the Marquis del Campo, whose previous attitude, as sub-Premier of Spain, had filled the British Cabinet with alarm.[623] Orde, writing to Nepean, of the Home Office, five years before, tells him to be very watchful over this minister; and O'Leary's friend, Plowden, whatever he means by it, says that it was only after giving repeated [Pg 261]proofs that the secret conditions had been complied with, that O'Leary received a large arrear of his pension.

'A Narrative of the Misunderstanding' between O'Leary and Hussey shows that the appointment of the former as Hussey's colleague was forced upon the latter, and that Hussey distrusted and despised him, confirming the old adage, two of a trade never agree. O'Leary complains that on Good Friday, in presence of a crowded congregation numbering many Protestants, Hussey sent

And again:—

O'Leary was the lion of the hour; his portrait looked out from the windows of Bond Street and Piccadilly, surrounded by soul-stirring sentiments culled from his published books.[624] There it was that Dr. Hussey sought to reduce his prestige, which he considered overcharged, and to destroy the confidence and respect usually manifested in his regard. It is certain that he felt as uncomfortable in his society as he had ever [Pg 262]done in the hair shirt and enforced reserve of La Trappe. He did not brand O'Leary as a spy; he could not do so without offending the Government; but he raised what lawyers call 'a false issue.' Indeed O'Leary charges the doctor, on strong circumstantial evidence, with having supplied to the newspapers paragraphs in which an unworthy innuendo is advanced, and one by no means calculated to exalt the friar's reputation for asceticism: 'In proportion as the breach widened between us, the paragraphs rose in a climax to a greater degree of asperity.'[625]

Many curious things transpire in this brochure, and amongst them the following: 'I got the very singular information,' writes O'Leary, 'that some years before, in a boarding school at Hampstead, then under his (Hussey's) direction, he took my picture out of a frame, tore it in several pieces, and cast it away with disdain, saying, "One would imagine he is founder of this establishment."'[626] Here again I submit that Dr. Hussey raised a false issue, and his dislike to O'Leary, as evidenced by this strong proceeding, must have had deeper grounds than the paltry plea assigned.

Dr. Hussey, as already stated, was in the secrets of the Crown. In 1784 Sydney tells Orde, rightly or wrongly, that O'Leary had consented to furnish private information. In 1789 O'Leary, as we have seen, removed to London and settled down in alarming proximity not only to Hussey, but to the [Pg 263]minister of Spain. Hussey's attachment to Spanish interests, Cumberland states, outweighed his devotion to his English patrons, and of course it was highly inconvenient that a man who played fast and loose with both should be domesticated with O'Leary. 'They are all of them designing knaves,' writes Orde, and doubtless he and his colleagues, acting on the coarse prejudice thus expressed, urged the arrangement on the principle of 'set a thief to catch a thief.' The more refined Sydney probably calculated that it would be 'diamond cut diamond' between them.

The effort it must have cost so polished a person as Dr. Hussey to pursue the course ascribed to him may be inferred from the words of Charles Butler: 'He was a man of great genius, of enlightened piety, with manners at once imposing and elegant, and of enchanting conversation: he did not come in contact with many whom he did not subdue: the highest rank often sunk before him.' Cumberland, his companion in the secret mission, describes him as wearing 'a smile seductive; his address was smooth, obsequious, studiously obliging and, at times, glowingly heightened into an impassioned show of friendship and affection. He was quick enough,' he adds, 'in finding out the characters of men.'

O'Leary appealed to Bishop Douglas, and a meeting between the parties took place at his house. The result was a written statement, dated June 21, 1791, that Dr. Hussey never had any crime or immoral conduct to allege against O'Leary, and that he had left the Spanish Ambassador's chapel of his own free will. 'Mr. O'Leary and I have come to a full explanation upon all past misunderstandings, and are both satisfied with the explanation,' writes Dr. Hussey. This paper was certified by Bishops Douglas and Berington[628] and by Francis [Pg 264]Plowden to be conformable to Dr. Hussey's verbal declaration. The finale was worthy of an ecclesiastic who wished to avoid disedifying the laity by unseemly wrangles. But, privately, Dr. Hussey took means to prevent a recurrence of an incident which greatly annoyed him. The Castlereagh Papers contain a letter to Lord Hobart from Sir J. Cox Hippisley, in which he mentions as having been reported to Rome, 'a very offensive measure of Hussey's in a way so as to have produced a sort of censure on Bishop Douglas of London.' Dr. Hussey, it is stated, had claimed the right, as chaplain to the Spanish mission, of nominating priests to officiate at the Spanish chapel in London independently of Bishop Douglas.[629]

Frequent reference has been already made to Del Campo. The concluding words of O'Leary's 'Narrative' go on to say:—

Here O'Leary, though so recently attached to the Spanish embassy, declares himself a partisan, if not a sentinel, in the English interest. It appears that, while officiating at Spanish Place, he lodged in Warwick Street, probably acting as assistant chaplain to the Bavarian embassy as well, and where, as Mrs. Bellamy records, he arrived opportunely, in 1783, to adjust angry difficulties that had arisen in that quarter. Seven years later, although ostensibly pastor of St. Patrick's, Soho, from 1790 to his death, he seems still attached in some way to the Bavarian chapel and embassy, for the preface to his sermon in denunciation of French principles is dated from Warwick Street, though the sermon itself had been preached at St. Patrick's.

In March 1797, O'Leary's desire to retain the favour of Pitt is traceable in the sermon to which reference has just been made. It was preached before a congregation mainly Irish, but embracing also the famous Duchess of Devonshire, and many other great personages.[632] Its aim is apparent in the [Pg 266]account given of it by the 'Monthly Review' as 'a discourse well adapted to keep alive a high degree of good, warm, Christian hatred of the French, on whom the preacher is very severe, with now and then a stroke of pleasantry, sarcasm and rough wit.' Ireland had been nearly lost to England the previous year by Hoche's expedition to Bantry Bay, but England's unsubsidised allies, the winds, had come to her aid. O'Leary's discourse, occupying fifty pages, was at once issued in pamphlet shape, and reprinted in Dublin.

As has been already observed, O'Leary maintained cordial relations with some men who bore a bad name. Francis Higgins, originally a Newgate felon, became at last a most influential negotiator. Plowden exhibits fully his unpleasant character in the 'Historical Review,' vol. ii. pp. 256-9. 'This man' he says, 'had the address, by coarse flattery and assumed arrogance, to worm himself into the intimacy of several persons of rank and consequence, who demeaned themselves by their obsequiousness to his art, or sold themselves to him. The fact that he died worth 40,000l. is highly illustrative of the system which generated, fostered, and pampered this species of reptile.' Higgins is shown by the 'Cornwallis Papers' to have been a spy on a great scale. There is reason to know that he wormed himself into the confidence of O'Leary; and reason to fear that he turned it to account. The man who began his career by duping a Jesuit and obtaining his co-operation in making an heiress his wife, is not likely to have failed with the genial Franciscan. Higgins early won the friendship of O'Leary; and his bequest 'to my long and faithful friend, the Rev. Arthur O'Leary,' has been already noticed. Fidelity to Shamado seems like fidelity to Mephistopheles!

Higgins liked to utilise profitably the information he acquired from pliable Catholics like Magan.[633] Magan was a barrister, and held his head high. It will be remembered that Higgins drew from him the secret of Lord Edward Fitzgerald's hiding place, and for this service alone received [Pg 267]1,000l. in hand, and a pension of 300l. a year. The 'Sham Squire' was not the man to leave money, in 1791, 'to his long and faithful friend,' O'Leary, unless he had made more than the amount by the use of him. Higgins claims O'Leary as a dear friend; the habits of the time warrant the assumption that he was his boon companion too. In the unguarded intimacy of social intercourse, that frank and affable nature is likely to have enriched the Squire's stock of gossip. To what extent that confidence was unfolded can be now but darkly surmised.

O'Leary, if called upon to reveal information to the Government, may have acted with reserve. In softer moments[634] much may have leaked out which was not deliberate betrayal.

It is casually stated by Mr. Lecky (vol. vii. p. 211) that Higgins, in enumerating his services to the Government, especially mentions the expense he had incurred in entertaining priests, and other persons of the higher class, for the purpose of obtaining intelligence. In one respect O'Leary's intercourse with Higgins worked for good. The newspaper of the latter, though an organ of Orangeism, advocated the Catholic claims.

In 1796 Dr. Hussey, afterwards Bishop of Waterford, seems to have accepted the post of secret agent,—probably not widely dissimilar from that which the statesmen of 1784 thought O'Leary would not object to discharge. Higgins, writing to Dublin Castle in October 1796, expresses regret that the Government had not been very judicious in their selection of '[Pg 268]an agent for acting on the Catholics.[635] 'The Roman Catholic body hold a superficial opinion of Dr. Hussey as a courtly priest. If anything was to be effected or wished to be done in the Roman Catholic body, Dr. O'Leary would do more with them in one hour than Hussey in seven years. Of this I am perfectly assured; and O'Leary not ten days since wrote me word he would shortly claim a bed at my house.'

O'Leary had a nephew for whom in a recently published letter he hopes to provide a berth when some friends of his would regain their power. The allusion no doubt is to Fox and the Whigs. This is the nephew noticed by Francis Higgins, in a secret letter to Under-Secretary Cooke eight months before the rebellion. 'At a meeting at Bond's, which Lord Edward Fitzgerald and O'Connor attended, O'Connor read a letter from Fox which had been delivered to him (O'C.) by O'Leary, nephew of Dr. O'Leary, who had arrived from London with despatches from Mr. Fox, and set off in the mail for Cork the same night.' These despatches concurred with the United Irishmen as to the necessity of enforcing a parliamentary reform.[636]

The bequest of Higgins to O'Leary is noticed as strange by the priest's biographer. Was it meant by way of restitution, seeing that the compact to pay O'Leary had been broken? As in the case of the betrayal of Lord Edward Fitzgerald by Magan, 'Shamado' no doubt pocketed the lion's share.

The will of Francis Higgins goes on to say: 'To Andrew D. O'Kelly, of Piccadilly, London, I leave 300l.: declaring that if I did not know that he, my friend, was in great affluence, I would have freely bequeathed him any property I might be possessed of.' This was the man sometimes known [Pg 269]as Count O'Kelly, but more generally as Colonel O'Kelly. An Irish judge who once acted as advising counsel for the legatees of O'Kelly, informs me that the latter was originally a jockey, afterwards a successful blackleg, and was made colonel of a regiment that never existed, simply by the Prince Regent addressing him under that title. This explains a remark made by the 'St. James's Gazette,' that 'his military rank, whatever right he may have had to it, as well as to his Countship, could never obtain for him an entrance to the clubs of his fellow sportsmen.'[637] He owned the racehorse 'Eclipse,' and by its aid netted 124,000l.

There has been much discussion by O'Leary's biographers upon Plowden's statement as to the stoppage of the pension, and they vainly try to account for so harsh a step. 'What the reason for this withholding was, it is not easy to ascertain,' writes Father Buckley; but, from an observation in the 'Life of Grattan,' by his son, we surmise that it must have been because O'Leary refused to comply with a request made by the minister, that he would write in the support of the Union.[638] Plowden takes care to say that the pension was 'hush money.' Buckley's argument demands, however, a fuller reply.

The agitation against the Union took place chiefly in 1799. O'Leary died in January 1802, soon after the Union became law. Plowden, through whom he got the arrears paid, says that it was 'after a lapse of many years, by importunity and solicitation, and repeated proofs of his having complied with the secret conditions, he received a large arrear.' Therefore there could not have been time for all this in the interval between the Union and O'Leary's death.

[Pg 270]

But, in point of fact, O'Leary did express himself publicly in favour of the Union. His 'Address to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal,' dated from O'Kelly's house, and published in June 1800, mentions that he is 'a great friend to the Union, and reconciled many to it;' and then follows much clever argument in support of the measure. This rather spoils the statement in Grattan's 'Life,' quoted by the biographer of O'Leary as proof that he spurned Pitt's proposal to support the Union.

The newspapers recording O'Leary's death, in January 1802, say that he died at his lodgings in Great Portland Street, London. When the Union was carried, he probably got his congé from O'Kelly. This man, of bad odour, became a Crœsus in wealth, and eventually a sort of Brummagem Brummell, deep in the confidence of George, Prince of Wales.[639] O'Leary is found living with O'Kelly in Mayfair, London, and some of his pamphlets are dated from 46 Half-Moon Street, Piccadilly, the 'Colonel's' house.[640] Father Buckley is puzzled 'how our worthy friar contracted so close an intimacy with a man of tastes and habits apparently so little congenial to his own.'[641] Perhaps O'Kelly[642] was the trustee in whose name O'Leary got a pension on secret conditions. Plowden is the only writer who alludes to the intervention of a trustee. He was very intimate with O'Kelly, and witnessed his will in 1820. The [Pg 271]Prince of Wales had already made O'Kelly the medium for paying a secret pension of 300l. a year to Chifney the jockey, in consideration of having designedly lost a race at Epsom.[643]

I now come to a startling piece of evidence, calculated, almost, to make one exclaim with Luke (xix. 22), 'Out of thy own mouth I judge thee.' The testimony of no less a witness than O'Leary himself claims to be heard.

More than sixty years after the death of O'Leary, Father Buckley was informed in writing, by a relative of the deceased, that O'Leary, when dying, often exclaimed, 'Alas! I have betrayed my poor country.'[644] The informant's impression is that O'Leary's remorse was due to having, at the request of Pitt, acquiesced in the Union, notwithstanding that we have 'Colonel' O'Kelly's testimony that 'O'Leary withstood Pitt's solicitations to support that measure.' The Catholic bishops of Ireland cordially encouraged the Union, as the Castlereagh Papers show—and we do not hear that Dr. Troy and his confrères felt much remorse—although, in addition to their support of the Union, they signed resolutions in favour of giving to a Protestant king a veto in the appointment of Catholic prelates.

But the letter of O'Leary's kinsman must not be dismissed without quoting its context. 'Pitt,' he writes, 'promised the emancipation of Catholics and repeal of the Penal Laws, if he (O'Leary) would acquiesce, &c. He did; and so silence was deemed consent. Pitt obtained the Union; then resigned his office; and tricky enough,' adds O'Leary's kinsman, 'said he could not keep his promise.'

This is slightly misleading. Pitt had given a pledge, through Cornwallis, to Archbishop Troy that he would not accept office except on condition that the Catholic claims were to be met. In 1801, owing to the fixed resolve of the King against Emancipation, Pitt went out. His conduct, therefore, was so far straight. When he returned to power in 1804, in [Pg 272]complete violation of that compact, O'Leary had been two years dead.

Among O'Leary's admirers there was none more ardent than the late Lord Chancellor O'Hagan, in whose now deserted study still hangs a fine portrait of the friar, inscribed with soul-stirring sentiments on which O'Hagan had long sought to shape his own course. This gentleman could not bring himself to believe Mr. Froude's charge branding O'Leary as a spy, and was unable to rest until he read with his own eyes at the State Paper Office the original correspondence. He returned to Dublin declaring that the imputation was but too well founded. This view, coming from a man of judicial mind, might be taken as conclusive; but yet, one is unwilling to see a great reputation wrecked, without wishing to throw out a hope or a plank by which there is a chance of saving it. This plank is, indeed, a poor one; but, just as a sinking man will grasp even at a straw, humanity suggests that no effort should be left untried to keep the struggler afloat.

The two letters which led Lord O'Hagan to his reluctant conclusion are now before the reader. In neither is the Christian name of O'Leary given; but no other priest of the name obtained contemporary notice. The most damaging bit of evidence is Sydney's letter to Rutland announcing that O'Leary, having been talked to by Nepean, was willing to do what was wished for 100l. a year.[645] These letters bear date 1784, eighteen years before O'Leary's death. No letters of his in any way compromising him have been found. The voluminous papers of Pelham, the Irish Secretary, from 1795 to 1798 do not once mention his name. 'I have certainly never seen any reports from O'Leary to the Government,' writes Mr. Lecky in reply to an inquiry; 'and I have quoted in my History every passage I have come across in which he is ever mentioned.'[646] These passages are few.

O'Leary was a decided humourist: no one conversing with him felt quite sure when he meant to be serious. In the [Pg 273]'talk' that passed he may have played the diplomat. We have seen how Orde distrusted him. To a request blandly urged in personal converse by a statesman who had already pensioned him, this friar, existing merely by connivance, could not afford to assume attitudes of offended dignity. A glimpse of his precarious position is caught from a speech of Grattan's:—

Nepean and Orde suggested certain inquiries which O'Leary was to make; but who can tell at what point of these inquiries the practised casuist may have meant to draw the line? A hundred pounds a year, which Nepean says he named, seems marvellously small for the magnitude and risk of the service expected. Orde writes on September 8, 1784, expressing satisfaction that Nepean, in London, had 'settled matters with O'Leary, who can get to the bottom of all secrets in which the Catholics are concerned, and they are certainly the chief promoters of our present disquietude.' A fortnight later, after an interview with the priest at Dublin Castle, he adds, (September 24, 1784): 'O'Leary has it in his power, if we can depend upon him, to discover to us the real designs of the Catholics, from which quarter, after all, the real mischief is to spring.' O'Leary must have known that, in 1784, no treasonable designs were harboured by the Catholics, and probably felt that he would be safe in making the inquiries prescribed. Mr. Lecky, a most patient historic investigator, a man who has searched more secret sources of sound information than any other writer of Irish history, while he considers that the[Pg 274] letters just quoted prove O'Leary a spy (p. 369), yet, in describing this very time, doubts

I do not like repetitions; but they are sometimes a necessity, as in judicial summing-up. Twelve days after O'Leary had been set to work, the Chief Secretary at Dublin Castle seems quite dissatisfied with him. The tone in which our humourist's reports were pitched may be guessed from the following passage in a later pamphlet from his pen[649]:—

Lord Chesterfield, on his return from his Viceroyship, informed George II. that he had met in Ireland but two dangerous Papists, of whom His Majesty should be aware—two [comely] ladies named Devereux, who had danced at the Castle on the King's birth-night. All the viceroys of Ireland, from Lord Chesterfield to Earl Camden, could have made a much similar answer, if interrogated, concerning what is called the danger of Popery.[650]

[Pg 275]

Whether from this tone, or from other causes, the Government became quite disappointed with their man; for, as Plowden states, they withheld his pension, and 'an arbitrary refusal for many years threw the reverend pensioner on his friends for subsistence.' 'The unexplained cause,' noticed by Dr. England,[651] may, perhaps, here be guessed. O'Leary, as Sydney states, consented, in 1784, to make the secret inquiries which Orde wished, and probably to offer such advice as his experience should suggest; but the idea thrown out at an early stage of this study seems likely enough,—that, after he had made due efforts to find out the truth, he pleasantly assured the Government that no French emissaries had been to Dublin at all; that the Catholics were loyal subjects; and, instead of a slumbering volcano, that Rutland had found a mare's nest! This Viceroy's letter will be remembered in which he drew a highly sensational picture of alleged secret doings in Dublin. It was he who first urged on Sydney the wisdom of securing O'Leary as a spy, and Sydney soon after reports the negotiation as successful. But we have no testimony from Nepean with whom the interview took place. When Rutland spoke, Orde spoke; the act of one was the act of the other. Both were equally fluent as correspondents; but during the three subsequent years that they held office at Dublin Castle, we find no letters from either announcing any discoveries made by O'Leary, and which, no doubt, they would have been only too glad to do as confirming their own forecast, and building up a reputation for subtle statesmanship.

More troublesome times came within the next ten years: the Society of United Irishmen spread with alarming rapidity; and if O'Leary had any wish to play the spy, he had now a grand opportunity by simulating ardent patriotism like McNally and others. His great sermon in 1797 was a declaration of war against French principles, and against all who adopted the policy of revolution. Again, when it became necessary for him to preach the panegyric of Pius VI., who died at this time, he went out of his way to run full tilt[Pg 276] against democracy. The 'Courier,' a popular organ, thus describes it:—

O'Leary's friends will hope that it was by this tone, rather than by playing the ignominious rôle of a spy, that he sought to regain governmental favour.

The sole remaining letter in the carefully preserved records of the informers of '98 which names O'Leary must not be excluded here. Things had quite changed since 1784. Higgins, in a secret letter to Dublin Castle, dated January 2, 1798, says:—

Higgins does not say that O'Leary authorised him to make this proposition; and even had he done so, it cannot be deemed base.

Orde's letters to the Home Office in 1784, though urging extreme caution lest he and his colleagues should be themselves betrayed, show him to be impulsive in statement, and prone to jump to conclusions. These letters, blemished by an occasional expletive, are printed by Mr. Lecky. Orde is quite[Pg 277] sanguine as regards wonderful Catholic secrets that O'Leary would unearth, but this is not the only case in which he exhibits rashness of assumption.

These notes must now end. If their freedom and fulness need justification, it is found, perhaps, in O'Leary's own words. He had meditated a history of the political events of 1780.

A word remains to be said respecting Parker, the second agent named in Orde's letter of 1784. He is not so easily identified as Father O'Leary. The Irish books which treat of the period may be vainly searched for the name of Parker. It has been said that the adventurous spirit, who thirteen years later aroused by his eloquence the British navy to mutiny, was identical or connected with Orde's agent. I do not bind myself to the truth of this theory; nor am I able to prove a negative; but certainly some circumstances support it worthy of consideration; and having promised in a former chapter to recur to Parker of the Nore, I am afforded an opportunity for doing so by Mr. Froude's account of the secret mission to Dublin. Orde's agent arrived there in September 1784, to overreach and, as we are told, outmouth noisy patriots. It is true that Parker the mutineer was finally executed by the English authorities; but Jemmy O'Brien, the spy, also swung at the same hands. The former had received a classical education, and had served in the navy during the American War. His character was bad. His irrepressible oratory and power of influencing minds got him into scrapes. He married a woman with some property, which he dissipated, and was then imprisoned for debt. Released at length, he was sent on board the royal fleet as a [Pg 278]'supernumerary seaman,' to quote Portland's proclamation offering 500l. for his arrest. 'The address, ready eloquence, but, above all,' says Rose, 'the deep dissimulation he possessed, gave him vast influence over his comrades.' If true that Parker was sent on board the fleet to counteract mutiny, the result only shows that it is possible for an extinguisher to take fire. In his written defence, read on the fourth day of his trial, he 'solemnly declared that his only object of entering into the mutiny was that of checking a most dangerous spirit of revolt which had prevailed in the different ships, the bad effects of which he had done all in his power to prevent.' How he fanned the flame of mutiny, and on its outburst was appointed 'President,' we have already seen. This was in 1797. Who is the Parker, with persuasive oratorical powers, that is sent on a questionable mission to Ireland in 1784? It may be said that this cannot be Parker who afterwards figured at the Nore, because at the time of the secret mission to Dublin he was serving in the navy at a far distant place. The following words of Gorton make it hard to prove an 'alibi' for Richard Parker.[654] After describing his service during the American War, Gorton writes: 'On peace taking place he retired from his professional duties.' American independence had been won in 1778; but the articles of peace were not signed by England until November 30, 1782. Therefore Parker could be easily in Dublin in 1784. Mr. Froude's remarks about him are meagre, but it may be gleaned that the Parker of '84 was a man qualified and ready to keep a dark diary of what he observed. Parker of the Nore had the same habit. When he was searched, an elaborate diary of the proceedings which had taken place on [Pg 279]shipboard was found. Parker's wife testified to the fact that he was rhapsodical and eccentric, but the plea failed to save his life. Orde, in announcing the arrival of Parker of '84, speaks of his 'rhapsodies,' and avows a misgiving that he might not act discreetly. The written defence of Parker of the Nore was highly rhapsodical, and the reverse of discreet. But he had abundant talent. Parker of '84 is described as an accomplished orator, and a good hand at sedition. So was Richard Parker. The former was an expert in dissimulation. The same character is given of Richard Parker by Rose. It may be also noteworthy that Orde's agent hailed from London. Mr. Froude assumes that Parker was an Irishman; the name is certainly English.

The 'Courier' of October 14, 1797, records some conversations with Richard Parker which afford a sample of the rhapsodical eloquence which had so often entranced his audience. An officer on board the ship that held him prisoner expressed impatience at not getting ahead, as the winds were contrary. 'What!' said Parker, 'are you not satisfied with having an admiral of the British fleet in chains, but you must also usurp the command of the elements? Or, because you have the honour to be my executioner, are you likewise as mad as the Persian tyrant who ordered his minions to lash the waves?' Much more of his talk is given. The 'Courier' states that 'from peculiar energy of intellect, his diction, even in common conversation, was bold and original.'

CHAPTER XVIII
BISHOP HUSSEY

The subsequent career of Dr. Hussey—of whom a glimpse is obtained on a previous page—affords features sufficiently curious to claim a fuller view.

A second mission of secrecy to Spain proved more successful than his first. In 1786 London swarmed with freed negroes, made wicked by idleness, and four hundred of them, with sixty white women in bad health and worse repute, were shipped by the Government to Sierra Leone to form a colony. Eight years afterwards this settlement was attacked by the French; Spain sided against England; Dr. Hussey again repaired to Madrid, healed the rupture, and Sierra Leone is now a bishopric. For these and other services Hussey enjoyed a pension from Pitt.[655]

The 'Wickham Papers'—published in 1870—reveal the successful efforts of Pitt to sap Napoleon's power, by paying Pichegru and other French generals on condition that they would do their best to be beaten in battle. Wickham had been sent on more than one secret mission to the Continent, and acquired a shrewd knowledge of the intrigues of men.[656] He was afterwards appointed Under-Secretary at the Home Office, in which capacity he addressed to Lord Castlereagh at Dublin Castle, many letters in 1798, but hundreds of their allusions as printed have been, hitherto, unintelligible. One, [Pg 281]referring to the statement drawn up by Arthur O'Connor and the other State prisoners, says:—

'D.C.' must be Del Campo,[659] the Spanish Minister already mentioned in Sydney's letter about O'Leary; and 'Dr. H.' can only mean Dr. Hussey, chaplain to the Spanish embassy in London. As such, he was the servant of Spain, and when a conclave of English Catholics named him as envoy to Rome, there to lay before Pius VI. a document of much importance, Del Campo refused him leave of absence. The latter had now ceased to be Spanish minister, and Lord Camden had become the Viceroy of Ireland. Mr. Froude, with warmth, writes: 'Lord Camden had brought into Ireland, as he supposed, a serpent of healing, but it turned on him and stung him.'[660] This allusion is to Dr. Hussey who, in 1797, became Bishop of Waterford, and at once issued a pastoral charge so ultramontane [Pg 282]that it gave quite a shock at Whitehall. He lived in a style of brilliant pretension hitherto unattempted by his brother bishops,—men who, as Shiel states, were wont to pick their steps stealthily, as among penal traps. Dr. Hussey's elevation to the See of Waterford was due to the British Crown, but may have been influenced by a desire to shelve him in a remote place where he could do scant harm by intrigue.

'It was as mischievous a performance as ever I read,' quoth Sir John Coxe Hippesley à propos of Dr. Hussey's pastoral, 'and ministers here took care he should know their sentiments on that subject. He was in dudgeon thereat, and the Duke of Portland told me he demanded his passport "to return to Spain;" it was made out, but the doctor thought better of it, and he remains to lend his hand to the tranquillity of Ireland.'[661]

It appears, however, from the Vatican archives that Hussey, in March 1798, did petition the Pope for leave of absence from his diocese, and for a coadjutor, 'as he could not obtain the consent of the Court of Spain to leave its service.' He adds that for thirty years he was head of the Spanish Ambassador's Chapel, London.[662] His amour propre, no doubt, revolted from accepting at Portland's hands the passport to return to Spain—if, indeed, he could desert his diocese without leave from the Pope. A coadjutor bishop was not granted, but, in reply to the request for leave of absence, it was stipulated by Rome that Hussey should appoint efficient vicars to govern the see while away.[663] Was it of this arrangement that, as Hippesley says, he 'thought better'? Between the two accounts the diplomat stands confessed. He certainly passed the year 1799 in London, where, true to his instincts, we find him busy as a bee. Writing to J. Bernard Clinch, the influential occupant of a chair at Maynooth, he says of the then mooted Legislative Union:—

Whatever my reason may tell me upon a cool inquiry, my

[Pg 283]

Dr. Hussey had been so long condemned to observe the Carthusian rule of silence that he seemed, when freed from restraint, like an opened flask of 'Mumm.'

It has been said that only in the confessional, or in chaunting, is this Trappist vow wholly dispensed with. The desire for shrift is implied by pointing to the mouth and beating the breast. To a man orally gifted like Hussey this restraint must, indeed, have proved painful, and accounts for the wonderful reaction in which he now revelled.

[Pg 284]

As a preacher, he made a sensation in the West End second only to that subsequently awakened by Irving's sermons at Hatton Garden. Charles Butler was present at one preached by Dr. Hussey on the small number of the elect. He asked whether, if the arch of Heaven were to open and the Son of Man, bursting from the mercy in which He is now enveloped, should stand in that church and judge his hearers, 'it were certain that three or even two—nay, trembling for myself as well as for you, is it quite certain that even one of us,' thundered Dr. Hussey, 'would be saved?' 'During this apostrophe,' writes Butler, 'the audience was agonised—at the interrogation there was a general shriek—some fell on the ground—the greatest triumph of eloquence I ever witnessed.'[666]

'Dr. Hussey was no favourite at Rome—possibly through lay intrigue, to which Gonsalvi was but too open,' observes an octogenarian priest of Waterford. The Holy See, however, quite recognised Hussey's powers as a diplomatist, for one of his last acts was to draw up the Concordat between Pius VII. and Napoleon—in which delicate mission he obtained the thanks of both. A long account of Hussey's interview at the Tuileries is given by England; and how struck Napoleon was with his arguments and expression.

The 'Burke Correspondence' describes Dr. Hussey's resolute attitude in requiring that the rights of Catholic soldiers should be recognised. The 'O'Renehan Papers' supply further details. At Clonmel Gaol he demanded the release of a Catholic soldier who had refused to receive religious instruction from the parson. The officer in command insulted Dr. Hussey, adding that he would flog him but for his coat. 'You wear the coat of a brave man,' said the bishop, 'and no one but a coward ever uttered such a threat; I dare you to touch me.' 'You shall not remain here, sir,' cried the officer, sulkily. 'Nor the soldier either,' replied Hussey, 'for I shall report your conduct this day, and obtain his release.' He did write to the Duke of Portland, and the soldier was discharged from prison.[667]

[Pg 285]

People were puzzled as to how Hussey managed, in penal days, to have influence with the Home Secretary. The most secret doings of the executive were known to Hussey. Lord Cloncurry mentions in his 'Memoirs' (p. 64), that all his motions in London in 1798 were carefully watched by a spy, and he adds: 'My kind informant was Dr. Hussey, who had been private secretary to the Duke of Portland.'

How he first came in touch with the King's ministers, and even with the King himself, happened in this way. When Spain joined France in assisting America to throw off the English yoke, the Spanish minister quitted London, giving to Hussey authority to complete certain diplomatic negotiations.

Some erroneous impressions prevailed to the prejudice of this singular man. Cumberland blows hot and cold: speaks of the honours Hussey received from Spain, and that he had clearly no repugnance to those that his Church could give. 'He had no wish to stir up insurrection; but'—adds Cumberland—'to head a revolution that should overturn the Church established, and enthrone himself primate in Armagh, would have been his glory and felicity—and, in truth, he was a man, by talents, nerve, ambition, and intrepidity, fitted for the boldest enterprise.' This impression seems partly due to a Good Friday sermon, in which Dr. Hussey announced the speedy emancipation of the Catholics, and the downfall of sectarianism in Ireland. He established new schools, hospitals, and convents in Waterford, and endowed them with gold.

The widespread feeling of distrust in public men which certain incidents of the time aroused is curiously shown by the remark of Sylvanus Urban, when announcing Hussey's death. 'The enemies of administration said he was employed by Government to sow the seeds of dissension with a view to [Pg 286]bring about the Union. Others considered him an agent of France.'[668] We have seen, on the authority of Froude, that he turned on his former friends in the Cabinet, and stung them; while Edmund Burke, writing to Hussey on his famous pastoral, says:—

This was almost the last letter written by Burke.

The Pelham MSS. contain the following curious letter addressed by Hussey to Pelham, afterwards Lord Chichester, and a most influential member of the Government. Hussey's informant was, no doubt, Edmund Burke:—

An account of Maynooth College by one of its professors appears in the 'Irish Magazine' for February 1808; and it is mentioned as a fact not generally known that Burke was 'attended spiritually in his last illness by Dr. Hussey.' In the accounts of Burke's funeral Dr. Hussey's presence is recorded; and it is told by Dr. England that when Hussey approached his old friend Portland in the graveyard, the duke turned abruptly away. 'Crosses' continued to come. [Pg 287] Pelham, replying to Dr. Duigenan on February 22, 1799, declared that the Board of Maynooth had displaced their president for non-residence.

Hussey with all his friendship for Burke was no friend to his son. A letter from John Keogh to Hussey, dated October 2, 1792, and seemingly communicated by the latter to Dundas, then Home Secretary, is preserved among the Secret Irish State Papers in London. It repudiates Burke's son who had been sent to Ireland by his father as an agent on behalf of the Catholics, and tells Dundas that he was wholly unauthorised to speak for that body. According to Tone's journal of September 1792, Keogh regarded young Burke as a spy sent by Dundas. He was wrong, for Hobart, writing to Nepean, on October 4, 1792, states that Dundas took credit with Westmoreland for having given Burke a chilling reception on his return to England. This was the youth of whom Buckle says, 'Never can there be forgotten those touching allusions to the death of that only son, who was the joy of his soul and the pride of his heart, and to whom he fondly hoped to bequeath the inheritance of his imperishable fame.'

Hussey was succeeded as an intermediary between the Irish Catholics and the Crown by Dr. Moylan, Bishop of Cork. This prelate—who had denounced the French when their fleet lay in Bantry Bay, for which he would have lost his head had they been able to land—became a great favourite with Pitt and Portland.

The duke in a letter dated Bulstrode, July 27, 1800, states:—

Dr. Hussey, as the first President of Maynooth, regarded it with paternal anxiety; and as he was now in deep disfavour with the Government, he asked Dr. Moylan to plead for it,[Pg 288] and probably draughted the words. The lay seminary of Maynooth, in which Judge Corballis and other able men received their education, was threatened with suppression at this time.

Dr. Moylan adds:—

Pelham usually endorses his letters with a memorandum of his reply—but in this instance none seems to have been given. Dr. Hussey regarded uneasily the threatened downfall of the house which he had raised. The estrangement of old friends, and prolonged anxiety, preyed upon him, and in the following year he dropped down dead. This event occurred at Tramore, near Waterford. He had

The Bishop outlived O'Leary by eighteen months, and attended the funeral of his rival. His own was marked by a painful incident. Polemic and party spirit ran so high that some militia and soldiers attempted to throw the coffin into the river Suir; a disgraceful riot took place, and several lives[Pg 289] were lost.[670] My correspondent was puzzled to account for an occurrence so painful, but it is clearly traceable to the friction which had arisen between Dr. Hussey and certain military officers. He was fortunate in not living to see the extinction of the Lay College at Maynooth which had known his fostering care.

CHAPTER XIX
PRESBYTERIAN MINISTERS DEEP IN TREASON—PLOT AND COUNTER-PLOT

Twelve Presbyterian clergymen were concerned in the rebellion: the Rev. W. Steel Dickson, D.D., who wrote an interesting 'Narrative' of his 'Confinement and Exile,' Rev. Samuel Barbar, Rev. William Porter, Rev. Sinclair Kelburne, Rev. Arthur McMahon, and the Rev. Messrs. Stevelly, Simpson, MacNeil, Sinclair, Glardy, Birch, and Warwick. Of these men three were executed: Porter, Stevelly, and Warwick. It is to be feared that one of the twelve became a Judas.

There are two informers, McMahon and Durnin, who have never been noticed by Madden or other historians of the time. I now quote from Bourrienne, formerly the private secretary of Napoleon, and afterwards ambassador to Hamburg. Berthier will be remembered as the Minister of War and Prince of Wagram, who met a violent death during the Hundred Days.

'Previous to my arrival in Hamburg in 1804,' writes Bourrienne, Marshal 'Berthier had recommended to Bernadotte two Irishmen as spies. Bernadotte employed them, but I learned that McMahon, one of the two, rendered himself more serviceable to England than to us. I communicated this fact to Bernadotte, who ascertained that my information was accurate.' The future King replied:—