Mr. Adams to Mr.
Seward.
No. 1369.]
Legation of the United States,
London,
May 18, 1867.
Sir: I have to acknowledge the reception of a
telegram in cipher, of the 16th instant, which reached me at half-past
10 o’clock the same evening. It gives me instructions to act in certain
contingencies in behalf of citizens of the United States now under trial
or sentence for offences committed in Ireland.
I have not been an inattentive observer of the proceedings in that
country, reports of which have been steadily and promptly transmitted to
me by Mr. West, the consul at Dublin. But I must candidly admit that as
yet I have seen no reasonable ground of objection to them. The trials
have thus far been conducted with liberality and fairness, and great
latitude has been granted to the able lawyers who have disinterestedly
enlisted in the defence of the prisoners. No evidence has yet been
furnished to this legation that either Burke or Doran is a citizen of
the United States. The former does not appear to be the same person who
was arrested last season and liberated on condition of return to
America. The penalty of death inflicted upon the latter by the court has
already been commuted to imprisonment, and it is generally understood
that the former will not be executed. I transmit a copy of the London
Times of the 15th instant, containing an article on the subject, which
is here considered as written under official suggestion. With regard to
the barbarous terms of the sentence as pronounced by the court, they
form one of the relics of the habits of a past age which still adhere to
the judicial forms of the United Kingdom, without implying any
consequent action in that sense at the present day. It is quite half a
century since any similar sentence has been carried into execution. The
practice is for the government to remit all the superfluous
brutality.
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McCaffrey’s case still hangs upon a decision of the court on points of
law reserved during his trial. There is no danger of his being treated
with excessive harshness, if I may judge by the compliment paid to him
in the court for his “gallant” service as an insurgent during the
rebellion in America. He is undoubtedly a native citizen of the United
States, but great difficulty has been experienced by me in aiding him,
from the fact that he attempted to pass himself off and get interference
on his behalf under a different name. I presume he felt conscious of the
effect of the not dissimilar deception he undertook last year. He
appears to have little sense of the value of truth.
There is another case of a young man by the name of John McClure, who
headed an attack upon a police station at Knockadoon, and fought with
great fierceness until finally taken, which may terminate in a capital
conviction. I shall endeavor to urge an alleviation of the sentence on
the ground of his extreme youth.
There have been a few eases of arrest and detention of persons claiming
to be citizens of the United States, all of which have been promptly
attended to by Mr. West, and in several their liberation procured. James
Smith, of Cincinnati, was one of the number, in spite of the fact that
he was found here again after having been liberated last year on
condition not to return. I believe his is the only instance of that
sort. But before he succeeded in getting away he was arrested a second
time on new grounds of complaint, and still remains in prison.
I presume that Mr. West makes such full reports of his correspondence to
the department that most of this information is already in your
possession. I can only add that I shall continue to do all in my power
to carry out what I understand to be your wishes, as they are my own, by
sustaining the just claims to protection of citizens of the United
States within this realm.
I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward,
Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.
[Untitled]
[From the
London Times, May 15,
1867.]
The gallant behavior of the Irish constabulary during the late Fenian
attempt at insurrection has just been chronicled in an unpretending
little report, which ought to make their prowess as celebrated as if
it had been sung by a sacred bard. On a dark and cold morning of
early March a number of the police stations in various parts of the
country, occupied only by the usual small detachments, Were attacked
by bands of armed Fenians, brought together in pursuance of no less
an object than the dethronement of Queen Victoria, the establishment
of an Irish republic, and the division of the lands of the gentry
among the victorious soldiers of the revolution. For this purpose
long and extensive preparations had been made. A complete republican
government—nay, two governments—had been established in New York,
with president, secretaries of finance, war, and even marine, with a
military organization comprising generals and major generals,
colonels, and majors, some of these being actually men of military
experience who had served in the late war. They had plenty of money;
they had the great body of the Irish population of the United States
to back them, and no small number of enthusiastic and credulous
people in Ireland to believe in them. They chose their time; they
smuggled in and secreted their arms; their chiefs and messengers
came and went pretty much as they pleased, exhibiting, we are bound
to say, much enterprise and some degree of skill. When all was ready
they began their campaign. Their generals were prudent, if not
audacious. They did not attack the regular troops of the hostile
power which they desired to drive from Ireland; they cared not for
the glory of any gallant exploit against Saxon redcoats; their
design was at the outset to win an easy victory over the scattered
constabulary—almost to a man Irishmen like themselves—and they
hoped, by the alarm which they would spread, to rouse an excitable
population. The result is well known, but the details will be better
understood by looking at the return which has been published. It
will there be seen how miserable and how ludicrous were the attempts
of these conspirators, and how completely they were thwarted by the
steadiness of a few brave men who knew how to do their duty. The
Fenian outbreak has even less of dignity than Mr.
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Smith O’Brien’s one day’s campaign in
1848. Were it not that it was actually attended with loss of life,
and that its instigators, though contemptible as rebel leaders, have
shown themselves dangerous agitators, we should hardly think it
worthy to be treated seriously. It appears from the return that at
Castlemartyr, in the county of Cork, the police station was defended
successfully by six men, while the “supposed number of insurgents”
was four hundred; at Kilmallock, where the attack lasted for several
hours, and the Fenians used every effort to subdue their enemy,
there were from first to last only fifteen policemen engaged against
three hundred. At Emly six were opposed to two hundred or three
hundred; but the most extraordinary case is that of Palmerstown,
where the “number of constables engaged” was one. In this memorable defence sub-constable John Blair by
himself repulsed a number of Fenians “not known, the night being
dark, but it must have been considerable.” Afterwards follows a list
of the stations to which parties of police belonged who met and
successfully engaged the insurgents in places other than the police
stations. The most notable of the adventures here reported occurred
at Mallow. Three constables are described as encountering three
hundred rebels. It is explained that they accompanied a detachment
of the 71st regiment “to represent the civil power when in pursuit
of the insurgents.” “The military, having their knapsacks on, were
unable to proceed as quickly as the constabulary, who arrested three
men in advance of the military (about two miles) and brought them
prisoners to Bottle Hill, on the 6th of March, 1867.” After this we
are not surprised to learn that in the neighborhood of Dublin
sixteen policemen successfully encountered six hundred rebels, and
that at Westgate, in Drogheda, twenty-seven discomfited one
thousand.
The conclusion we would draw from these facts is that the Fenian
conspiracy has been shown, by its abortive outbreak, and by the
indifference with which its suppression is regarded, to be beneath
the extreme severity of a wise government. The excuses made for it
by a certain class of radicals here and in Ireland will, indeed,
find approval with very few men of sense. These Fenian leaders are
morally as bad as any traitors that ever suffered death. They have
come to this country intent upon murder and pillage; they have
infected the most ignorant part of the Irish people with ideas
subversive of government, property, and national prosperity; they
have in several cases returned to their enterprise after being
released by the Irish executive; they have cost Ireland millions by
the check to its prosperity they have inflicted. They have actually
“levied war,” and murder has been committed by one at least of the
bands which they called into activity. If it were necessary to give
such a warning to future marauders as the infliction on one or more
of them of the punishment of death, the government would be fully
justified in allowing the law to take its course. But there is
reason to believe that the danger is past, the strength of the
British government understood even by the most reckless, and the
imbecility of the Fenian leaders appreciated by nearly all their
dupes. To send these men to penal servitude will be a wiser course
than to give their memory the dignity of death in a political cause.
A factitious importance attends such a fate which has often lifted
into posthumous honor men very commonplace and not very upright.
There is enough of sympathy with the Fenian cause among the
multitude for them to make a martyr of any one who may die with
decent courage, but not enough to gild the unromantic and obscure
fate of an ordinary convict. We may urge also that if in Canada,
where the whole province was kept in alarm for months, and where
there was a real invasion and loss of life, the British government
directed the commutation of the sentence, it can hardly be necessary
to execute them here. If danger from the conspiracy is to be
apprehended, and severity is excusable, it is rather across the
Atlantic, where armed Fenians are said to be reckoned by hundreds of
thousands, than with us, where they may be troublesome, but can
never be formidable.
The Americans, when they interceded with our government for the lives
of the Fenians convicted in Canada, did certainly not preach where
they were unprepared to practice. Since the conclusion of the war,
the North, though severe on the southern community, has given way to
no animosities against individuals. No one has been put to death in
America for what the North has declared to be treason; very few have
been molested if they chose to acquiesce in the restored rule and to
take no part in politics. The leniency of the government has,
however, been carried to its furthest point by the release on bail
of Mr. Jefferson Davis after a captivity of two years. Whether he
will ever be brought to trial seems to be still uncertain; but we
may almost predict that in any case the punishment inflicted on him
will not be extreme. We can see that in the case of America this is
the wisest policy, and that it is best not to give renewed rancor to
the animosities of the South by any act of severity. A similar
forbearance would have its good effects on Ireland also.
