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Manchester Martyrs
The Manchester Martyrs (Irish: Mairtirígh Mhanchain) were three Irish Republicans – William Philip Allen, Michael Larkin, and Michael O'Brien – who were hanged in 1867 following their conviction of murder after an attack on a police van in Manchester, England, in which a police officer was accidentally shot dead, an incident that was known at the time as the Manchester Outrages. The three men were members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, also known as the Fenians, an organisation dedicated to ending British rule in Ireland, and were among a group of 30 to 40 Fenians who attacked a horse-drawn police van transporting two arrested leaders of the Brotherhood, Thomas J. Kelly and Timothy Deasy, to Belle Vue Gaol. Police Sergeant Charles Brett, travelling inside with the keys, was shot and killed while looking through the keyhole of the van as the attackers attempted to force the door open by shooting the lock.
Kelly and Deasy were released after another prisoner in the van took the keys from Brett's body and passed them to the group outside through a ventilation grill; the pair were never recaptured, despite an extensive search. Although Allen and Larkin admitted taking part in the attack, none of the defendants was accused of firing the fatal shot, but they were convicted on the basis of "joint enterprise" for taking part in a criminal enterprise that ended in the killing. The trial has nonetheless been described by an eminent Irish historian as "unsatisfactory", and the evidence as "dubious".
Two others were also charged and found guilty of Brett's murder, Thomas Maguire and Edward O'Meagher Condon, but their death sentences were overturned—O'Meagher Condon's through the intercession of the United States government (he was an American citizen), and Maguire's because the evidence given against him was considered unsatisfactory by the court. Allen, Larkin and O'Brien were publicly hanged on a temporary structure built on the wall of Salford Gaol, on 23 November 1867, in front of a crowd of 8,000–10,000.
Ireland reacted with revulsion and anger to the executions, and Allen, Larkin and O'Brien were hailed as political martyrs. Annual commemorations were held throughout Ireland, and monuments were built in many Irish towns. Brett, the first Manchester City Police officer to be killed on duty, is memorialised in a monument in St Ann's Church.
The whole of Ireland had been under British rule since the end of the Nine Years' War in 1603. The Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) was founded on 17 March 1858 by James Stephens, with the aim of establishing an independent democratic republic in Ireland. The IRB was a revolutionary fraternal organisation, rather than an insurrectionary conspiracy; Stephens believed that a "thorough social revolution" was required in Ireland before the people could become republicans. The Fenian Brotherhood was founded in New York in 1858 by John O'Mahony, ostensibly the IRB's American wing. By 1865 the IRB had an estimated 100,000 members, and was carrying out frequent acts of violence in metropolitan Britain. The Irish community in Manchester accounted for more than 10 per cent of the population, and one contemporary estimate put the number of Fenians and Fenian sympathisers living within 50 miles (80 km) of the city at 50,000.
In 1867 the Fenians were preparing to launch an armed uprising against British rule, but their plans became known to the authorities, and several key members of the movement's leadership were arrested and convicted. Two succeeded in evading the police, Thomas J. Kelly and Timothy Deasy, and travelled from Ireland to Britain to reorganise and raise the morale of the Fenian groups there in the wake of the failed uprising. Both were Irish Americans who had fought with distinction in the American Civil War—Kelly achieving the rank of colonel and Deasy that of captain—and both had played important roles in the abortive uprising; Kelly had been declared the chief executive of the Irish Republic at a secret republican convention, and Deasy commanded a Fenian brigade in County Cork.
During the early hours of 11 September 1867, police arrested two men found loitering in Oak Street, Shudehill, suspecting them of planning to rob a shop. Both were charged under the Vagrancy Act and held in custody. The Manchester police were initially unaware of their identities, until their colleagues in the Irish police identified them as Kelly and Deasy.
On 18 September 1867, Kelly and Deasy were being transferred from the courthouse to Belle Vue Gaol on Hyde Road, Gorton. They were handcuffed and locked in two separate compartments inside a police van escorted by a squad of 12 mounted policemen. The van contained six prisoners: a 12-year-old boy who was being taken to a reformatory, three women convicted of misdemeanours, and the two Fenians. As it passed under a railway arch, a man darted into the middle of the road, pointed a pistol at the driver and told him to stop. Simultaneously, a party of about 30–40 men leaped over a wall at the side of the road, surrounded the van and seized the horses, one of which they shot. The unarmed police were described by O'Meagher Condon, who organised the attack on the police van, as "a miscellaneous lot, apparently embracing the long and short and the fat and lean of the Manchester force"; they offered little resistance and soon fled.
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Manchester Martyrs
The Manchester Martyrs (Irish: Mairtirígh Mhanchain) were three Irish Republicans – William Philip Allen, Michael Larkin, and Michael O'Brien – who were hanged in 1867 following their conviction of murder after an attack on a police van in Manchester, England, in which a police officer was accidentally shot dead, an incident that was known at the time as the Manchester Outrages. The three men were members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, also known as the Fenians, an organisation dedicated to ending British rule in Ireland, and were among a group of 30 to 40 Fenians who attacked a horse-drawn police van transporting two arrested leaders of the Brotherhood, Thomas J. Kelly and Timothy Deasy, to Belle Vue Gaol. Police Sergeant Charles Brett, travelling inside with the keys, was shot and killed while looking through the keyhole of the van as the attackers attempted to force the door open by shooting the lock.
Kelly and Deasy were released after another prisoner in the van took the keys from Brett's body and passed them to the group outside through a ventilation grill; the pair were never recaptured, despite an extensive search. Although Allen and Larkin admitted taking part in the attack, none of the defendants was accused of firing the fatal shot, but they were convicted on the basis of "joint enterprise" for taking part in a criminal enterprise that ended in the killing. The trial has nonetheless been described by an eminent Irish historian as "unsatisfactory", and the evidence as "dubious".
Two others were also charged and found guilty of Brett's murder, Thomas Maguire and Edward O'Meagher Condon, but their death sentences were overturned—O'Meagher Condon's through the intercession of the United States government (he was an American citizen), and Maguire's because the evidence given against him was considered unsatisfactory by the court. Allen, Larkin and O'Brien were publicly hanged on a temporary structure built on the wall of Salford Gaol, on 23 November 1867, in front of a crowd of 8,000–10,000.
Ireland reacted with revulsion and anger to the executions, and Allen, Larkin and O'Brien were hailed as political martyrs. Annual commemorations were held throughout Ireland, and monuments were built in many Irish towns. Brett, the first Manchester City Police officer to be killed on duty, is memorialised in a monument in St Ann's Church.
The whole of Ireland had been under British rule since the end of the Nine Years' War in 1603. The Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) was founded on 17 March 1858 by James Stephens, with the aim of establishing an independent democratic republic in Ireland. The IRB was a revolutionary fraternal organisation, rather than an insurrectionary conspiracy; Stephens believed that a "thorough social revolution" was required in Ireland before the people could become republicans. The Fenian Brotherhood was founded in New York in 1858 by John O'Mahony, ostensibly the IRB's American wing. By 1865 the IRB had an estimated 100,000 members, and was carrying out frequent acts of violence in metropolitan Britain. The Irish community in Manchester accounted for more than 10 per cent of the population, and one contemporary estimate put the number of Fenians and Fenian sympathisers living within 50 miles (80 km) of the city at 50,000.
In 1867 the Fenians were preparing to launch an armed uprising against British rule, but their plans became known to the authorities, and several key members of the movement's leadership were arrested and convicted. Two succeeded in evading the police, Thomas J. Kelly and Timothy Deasy, and travelled from Ireland to Britain to reorganise and raise the morale of the Fenian groups there in the wake of the failed uprising. Both were Irish Americans who had fought with distinction in the American Civil War—Kelly achieving the rank of colonel and Deasy that of captain—and both had played important roles in the abortive uprising; Kelly had been declared the chief executive of the Irish Republic at a secret republican convention, and Deasy commanded a Fenian brigade in County Cork.
During the early hours of 11 September 1867, police arrested two men found loitering in Oak Street, Shudehill, suspecting them of planning to rob a shop. Both were charged under the Vagrancy Act and held in custody. The Manchester police were initially unaware of their identities, until their colleagues in the Irish police identified them as Kelly and Deasy.
On 18 September 1867, Kelly and Deasy were being transferred from the courthouse to Belle Vue Gaol on Hyde Road, Gorton. They were handcuffed and locked in two separate compartments inside a police van escorted by a squad of 12 mounted policemen. The van contained six prisoners: a 12-year-old boy who was being taken to a reformatory, three women convicted of misdemeanours, and the two Fenians. As it passed under a railway arch, a man darted into the middle of the road, pointed a pistol at the driver and told him to stop. Simultaneously, a party of about 30–40 men leaped over a wall at the side of the road, surrounded the van and seized the horses, one of which they shot. The unarmed police were described by O'Meagher Condon, who organised the attack on the police van, as "a miscellaneous lot, apparently embracing the long and short and the fat and lean of the Manchester force"; they offered little resistance and soon fled.