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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 July 2016
It is of the nature of a revolutionary conspiracy that it tends to leave as little trace as possible of its internal history; and it is not surprising that documentarv evidence of the activity of the supreme council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood is scanty. The documents printed below are for this reason of peculiar interest and importance.
1 Presumably James Stephens’s refusal to fulfil his promise to lead a rising in 1865, when the ending of the American civil war seemed to offer favourable conditions to the fenians.
1a We have not succeeded in tracing this document, and it seems highly improbable that any such declaration would have taken shape in a fenian context in 1860. Mr R. V Comerford, to whom we are indebted, suggests that the date in the address is a misprint for 29 October 1867, at which time the emerging supreme council seems to have been centred on London and suggestions were being made of support from English radical elements (Irishman, 9, 23 Nov. 1867).
1b ‘our lives . . homes’ is borrowed from the concluding words of the American declaration of independence (4 July 1776), with the substitution of ‘homes’ for ‘honor’ Presumably the change, ruinous to the verbal perfection of the phrase, was deliberate; or it may be due to a printer’s error or to a faulty recollection.
1c By-laws were made in accordance with this section, and with the corresponding section in the constitution of 1873 (below, document (E), pt I, § 12). Two sets of such by-laws have come to light, (a) Laws, rules and regulations for the government of the I.R.B., promulgated by the divisional executive of the North of England, ‘ which will be held binding upon every member of the I.R.B, resident in the said division, in addition to the constitution of the I.R.B., which is binding upon every member in Ireland and England and Scotland ’ (S.P.O., Land League papers, carton 10). This is a printed booklet of 12 pages comprising 49 sections. It was seized by the police in Liverpool from a fenian centre in October 1869 (S.P.O., Fenian papers, 4854 R, 4871 R). A copy was also found by the police among papers of John Walsh (see below, note 4) seized at Rochdale on 28 February 1883 (Special, comm. 1888 proc, iv, 394, 405); and this was produced in evidence before the Times-Parnell commission (ibid., pp 405–10). The same document is also printed, without the preamble and lacking sections 22–4, in Pollard, , Secret societies, pp 279–89).Google Scholar (b) A corresponding book of rules for the Leinster division of the I.R.B., consisting of 8 printed pages and 27 sections, was found by the police on a drunken prisoner at Robertstown, County Kildare, on 17 December 1875. A minute by the assistant inspector-general, R.I.C., notes that a similar printed document had on a previous occasion been forwarded to the government. (S.P.O., R.P. 1875/7583, 14249.)
2 A memorandum on this report, dated 21 May, by Samuel Lee Anderson, describes the address as ‘a reprint of the address, copies of which were found some time ago with J. Famony in Cork and John Martin at Carrickmacross. It is not nearly so well printed or on such good paper as the original issue, but the fact of a “second edition” of it being distributed tends to show that the conspiracy is still alive.’
3 As already mentioned, Doran’s notes begin with a meeting already in progress, the earlier part of whose proceedings, together with its date, are missing. On the pattern of the dated meetings—13 June and 8 August 1875, 28 May and 20–21 August 1876—we might suppose that the biannual meetings (Special comm. 1888 proc, viii, 371–2) were normally held in May or June and in August. But we have to consider (a) that the meeting of June 1875 was a special occasion, and (b) that the meeting of May 1876 was abnormally late (see above, p. 320, below, note 9); and this suggests that the normal first meeting of the year was in March or April. The first meeting of 1877 was on 5 March (above, p. 295), and there appears to have been a meeting in March 1878 (below, p. 332, note 33). This would indicate March 1875 as the date of the first meeting of our series. But it had been decided that for 1875 the spring meeting should be combined with the August meeting, because so many I.R.B, members would be in Dublin then for the O’Gonnell centenary (see above, p. 318; below, note 9). Thus we assume August 1874 as the most likely date of the meeting with which Doran’s summary notes open.
4 The phrase ‘Meeting of the D.Cs.’ might appear to be a description of the council itself, but in fact it signposts the subject matter of the three succeeding entries, all of which relate to business arising out of a meeting of centres of the North of England division of the I.R.B. For district centres in Britain see constitution of 1873, above, document (E), Pt 1 § 9. The meeting here referred to is described in Doran’s next entry is ‘that meeting in Manchester’ There is a printed document among his papers that can only be an official report of this Manchester meeting. It is entitled ‘Report of the annual conference of Cs and D.C.s of the A.O.O.I.R.B. Friendly Society held in O district, July 8th and 9th 1865’, but internal evidence shows that both the identity of the organisation and the date of the conference have been deliberately falsified. The organisation was the I.R.B, in the North of England, and much of the business of the conference was concerned with complaints of unsatisfactory relations with the supreme council in Ireland. There is an unmistakable connection between a decision recorded in the conference report not to transmit the ‘20 per cent money’ to the council but to return it to the centres that had contributed it, and the dissatisfaction expressed at the council ‘ at the conduct of those who retained the funds’ This provides the context in which Walsh, at the same meeting of the council, promised that ‘ the money will be revoted in May next’ It is evident from the notes for 8 August 1875 (see above, p. 319) that the council continued to pursue the matter. As to the date of the Manchester conference, 1865 is out of the question the supreme council was not then in existence, and the report cites the amended constitution of the I.R.B., which was adopted in 1873. If what is said in note 3 on the dating of the first council meeting of Doran’s notes is correct, the true date of the Manchester conference is 8–9 July 1874.
5 John Walsh, of Middlesborough also known in fenian circles as ‘ Hanrahan ’, representative of the North of England division of the I.R.B, on the council. In response to an appeal dated 3 August 1875, smuggled out of prison by the seven fenians held at Fremantle, Western Australia, to M. F. Murphy, of Cork, funds were collected for a rescue effort, and Walsh, accompanied by Denis Florence McCarthy, went to Australia for that purpose early in April 1876. They offered their services to the Catalpa expedition sent for the same purpose in April 1875 by Clan na Gael from Boston, Mass., and played a part in the successful rescue operation at Fremantle on 17 April 1876. The letter from the Fremantle prisoners to M. F Murphy, and a report by Walsh and McCarthy are among Doran’s papers. Walsh later earned notoriety as a Land League organiser. A true bill for the murder of T. H. Burke in the Phoenix Park was brought against him by the Dublin grand jury in May 1883, but by that time he had fled to France. He died in New York. (Devoy’s s post bag, i, 105, 172–82, 219–23; Devoy, , Recollections of an Irish rebel (New York, 1929), 251–6Google Scholar; Special comm. 1888 proc., iv, 394–405, 410–20, vi, 150)
6 The United Brotherhood, or Clan na Gael.
7 Charles James Kickham (1828–82), president of the council, journalist, poet, novelist and one of the founders of fenianism. Co-editor, with John O’Leary and Thomas Clarke Luby, of the Irish People, 1863–5. Convicted of treason-felony, and sentenced to fourteen years penal servitude, 1865; in English prisons, 1865–9. Released, March 1869, and returned to Ireland, to live in his native village of Mullinahone, Co. Tipperary, where his most famous book, Knocknagow, was written in 1870. Though almost blind and extremely deaf he lived an active intellectual life, and remained the most high-minded and undeviating exponent of apostolic fenianism to the end of his life. He was a leading spirit in the I.R.B, supreme council as constituted in 1869. (D.N.B.; Devoy’s post bag; Doran papers; Comerford, R.V., ‘Charles J Kickham (1828–82)’, M.A. thesis, N.U.I., 1972)Google Scholar
8 Patrick Egan (1841–1919), treasurer of the council, was managing director of the North City Milling Co. Highly intelligent, shrewd and discreet, with great executive ability, controlled energy and charm of manner, he quickly rose to the top of the business he had entered as a boy of fourteen. A deeply committed fenian, he was one of the founders of the amnesty movement in 1868, and one of the most important advocates of fenian support for the home-rule movement. He later helped to found the Land League, which he served as treasurer (1879— 82). Suspected of being involved in the Phoenix Park murders, he emigrated in 1883 to the U.S., where he had a second and distinguished career. (D.A.B. ; O’Brien, William, Recollections, pp 135–7Google Scholar; and other memoirs by contemporaries, passim)
9 The centenary of the birth of Daniel O’Gonnell (6 Aug. 1775) was celebrated in Dublin on 5–7 August 1875. The demonstration in Sackville Street on 6 August was the occasion of a fracas between the middle-class, catholic, whiggish organisers, who wanted to give the occasion a distinctively catholic character, and a combination of home-rulers and fenians, who were determined to emphasise O’Connel’s achievement as a nationalist ( O’Brien, R.B., Parnell, 1, 147–9Google Scholar; Thornley, , Isaac Butt, PP 265–9).Google Scholar A.M. Sullivan, Parnell, O’Connor Power, Barry, John Daly and Doran himself were at one in rallying round Butt as the symbol of this attitude. But Power and Doran subsequently had an altercation about the behaviour of nationalists at the platform (on the site now occupied by the O’Connell statue) from which the lord mayor, Peter Paul McSwiney, attempted to read an oration. McSwiney’s voice was drowned by roars of ‘Down with whiggery’ ‘No whig placemen’, and ‘Butt, Butt’; he eventually had to withdraw, to be replaced as speaker by Butt himself. Butt was followed by Power and Sullivan, who protested vigorously against the choice of O’Hagan, lord chancellor (1868–74) in Gladstone’s first administration, to deliver the memorial oration, which, O’Hagan having decided not to attend, McSwiney had attempted to read. Power, however, publicly expressed the view that the heckling was unworthy of nationalists, and in reply to criticism from Doran (Doran to Power, 11 Aug. 1875, in Doran papers), reminded him that ‘even whigs are men and therefore entitled to freedom of speech’ (Power to Doran, 12 Aug. 1875).
The meeting of the council usually held in the spring had been put off (probably because of Doran’s preoccupation with John Mitchel’s visit to Ireland (Feb.-Mar. 1875) for tne Tipperary by-election) to the weekend of the centenary celebrations, as most members would in any case be in Dublin then; but this decision was subsequently modified by the convening of a special meeting on 13 June to deal with urgent business from Clan na Gael relating to ‘the compact’ (see below, note 13).
10 John O’Connor Power (1846–1919), the representative of Connacht on the council, was the most dynamic and ambitious of the ‘old fenians’ who, after taking a leading part in establishing the supreme council, pioneered the policy of cooperation with the home-rule movement. A dominating figure in the amnesty agitation (1868–78); home-rule M.P for Mayo, 1874–80, 1880–85. Of working-class origin and largely self-educated, he became one of the ablest orators and publicists of the Irish parliamentary party and scarcely less formidable as an obstructionist in the 70s than Parnell himself. But of all the opportunist fenians he was the most obnoxious to the orthodox, including such different personalities as John O’Leary and John Daly of Limerick. He twice visited the U.S. in 1875–7 as I.R.B. envoy (Aug. 1875–Mar. 1876, Oct. 1876–Mar 1877).
On the former occasion he was involved in discussions with American fenians about the creation of a joint revolutionary directory; on the latter he accompanied Parnell with an address of congratulations from the people of Ireland on the centenary of American independence. Very active in the beginnings of the Land League. ( MacDonagh, Michael, The home rule movement (Dublin, 1920)Google Scholar; O’Donnell, F H., A history of the Irish parliamentary party (2 vols, London, 1910),Google Scholar Healy, T M., Letters and leaders of my day (2 vols, London, (1928])Google Scholar; Devoy’s post bag; Thornley, D.A., Isaac Butt and home rule (London, 1964),Google Scholar S.P.O., Fenian papers; Doran papers)
11 John Levy, or Leavy, representative of Leinster on the council. Employed by Messrs Kelly and Dunn, hide, skin, leather and oil merchants, of Watling Street and Cooke’s Lane, Dublin. He told the Times-Parnell commission that he remained on the council till 1880, but his evidence about its membership from 1877 is confused and self-contra dictory. He was arrested on 7 May 1881 under Forster’s coercion act and held in Kilmainham. On his release after three months he was prosecuted for embezzlement by Kelly and Dunn, and sentenced to twelve months hard labour. He is described by Ryan, Desmond (Devoy’s post bag, 1, 90)Google Scholar as an informer, apparently because he gave evidence for the accusers before the Times-Famell commission. (Special comm. 1888 proc, vi, 370–80, Doran papers)
12 John Barry (1845– ), born in Wexford, the son of a coastguard. Went to Newcastle-upon-Tyne as a boy, did well in business, and rose to be chief traveller for Shepherd and Beveridge, floor-cloth manufacturers of Kirkcaldy, Fife, operating from Manchester. ‘The ablest man of Irish blood in Britain’ ( Healy, , Letters and leaders, 1, 30)Google Scholar; an opportunist fenian, he was foremost in organising the Irish parliamentary vote in Great Britain. Secretary of the Manchester Home Rule Association; founder of the Home Rule Confederation of Great Britain, at Manchester, in February 1873. A strong supporter of Parnell, and largely responsible for getting him elected president of the Home Rule Confederation in Butt’s place on 27 August 1877 Later involved in Land League, especially in organising support for it in Britain. Home rule M.P. for County Wexford, 1880–95. (Healy, Letters and leaders; O’Donnell, Irish parliamentary party, i; Davitt, , Fall of feudalism, pp 226–7Google Scholar; Doran papers; Barry is the ‘X’ frequently quoted by R. B. O’Brien, Parnell, i)
13 Doran reported the matter to John Devoy, of Clan na Gael, on 30 June 1875 (Devoy’s post bag, i, 114–15), enclosing a copy of the resolution referred to above, as follows.
Resolved that the compact of agreement between the E.U.B. (executive of the United Brotherhood, or Clan na Gael) and the S.C., proposed by the former body and dated 25 June 1874, be accepted by the S.C., and that the Efxecutive] of the S.C. do affix thereto the official stamp of the I[rish] R[epublic], and that the secretary of the S.C. do at once communicate the foregoing resolution to the secretary of the U.B. and tender to that body the assurance of the hearty affection of the I.R.B.
14 M. W Stackpool, a member of Clan na Gael, who was in Europe in 1874–5 as envoy to the supreme council (Devoy’s post bag, i, 69–70, 86–8, 93–4, 98, 131, 200). He favoured the compact between the I.R.B, and Clan na Gael, ‘both for its moral effect here [in the U.S.] and because the S.C. are the only legitimate representatives of the party of action’, though he considered that ‘Butt and [A.M.] Sullivan are entirely too clever for the present S.C.’ (Carroll to Devoy, 24 Jan. 1876, ibid., p. 131).
15 This was a ‘rough pencil draft’ (ibid., p. 114), cf. above, note 13.
16 The shorthand reads ‘MS’, which can only mean ‘McGuinness’, for McGuinness ‘of Preston’ ( Ryan, , Fenian memories, p. 64)Google Scholar is stated by Levy to have been a member of the council for the North of England along with John Walsh (Special comm. 1888 proc., vi, 370, 378, ‘for president’ on p. 370, no. 57,254, is a printer’s error for ‘of Preston’ and ‘Mclnnes’, on p. 378, no. 57,496, for ‘McGuinness’). The anomaly of two members for one division appears inexplicable, but was ended with M S’s resignation on 20 August 1876 (see p. 321).
17 Joseph Gillis Biggar (1828–90), a well-to-do provision merchant, of Belfast. A presbyterian who joined the catholic church, and home-rule M.P. for County Cavan (1874–90) when he joined the I.R.B. A hunch-back of enormous courage, bluntness of speech and kindness of heart. Father of the obstructionist tactics in the house of commons perfected by Parnell. Became deeply involved in the Land League. Gave evidence for the defence before the Times-Parnell commission in 1889. (D.N.B.; Healy, , Letters and leaders, 1, 39–44 Google Scholar; O’Donnell, , Irish parliamentary party; Special comm. 1888 proc., 5, 365–415, x, 419–21)Google Scholar
18 John Ryan, a Tipperary man living in London, who represented the South of England division of the I.R.B, on the council. He was one of two John Ryans in the LR.B. in London, both shoemakers. ( Devoy, John in Gaelic American, 18 August 1906 Google Scholar; Ryan, M.F, Fenian memories, p. 61).Google Scholar
19 He sailed from Queenstown on 26 August 1875 an arrived at Liverpool on the return journey on 14 March 1876 (Doran papers).
20 See above, note 4.
21 Cf., above, documents C and D.
22 John Torley, manager of a large chemical works at Duntocher, in Dumbartonshire. He represented the Scotland division of the I.R.B. on the council. (Doran papers; N.L.I., MS 15337; Devoy, John in Gaelic American, 18 August 1906)Google Scholar
23 From early April onwards Egan, Barry, Biggar and Power repeatedly urged Doran to summon the council. Doran, who was taking the waters at Bath in March, had not responded to their expostulations by early May, when Biggar and others themselves called the meeting that took place as recorded above. While in England Doran had passed through London, but did not make contact with Biggar or Power, both being then engaged in attending parliament. One of Egan’s letters to Doran, of 3 April, says that the anxiety felt by himself, Barry, Biggar and Power to have an early meeting of the council is ‘in reference to the understanding’—presumably the ‘pledge’ claimed to have been given by Butt in 1873 (Doran papers).
24 Neither the resolution, as proposed by Doran, nor the amendments, are among Doran’s papers, but presumably this resolution was the same as the one carried on 20 August; see above, p. 294.
25 Power wrote to Doran on 12 September, from the Imperial Hotel, Dublin, complaining that he ‘had not received a copy of the minutes of the late meeting’ which Doran had promised to send him.
I have been anxiously expecting it, because it appears to me that the important resolution reflecting domestic policy is null and void from the fact that it amounts to an alteration of [meaning ‘departure from’], I think, the third clause of the Rules that [the MS reads ‘and that’, but ‘and’ is clearly redundant] no such resolution can be moved without a month’s notice having been given [see above, document (E), pt II, § 3]. If that notice had been given it would have been a serious question with me whether I should not have come over, notwithstanding my severe illness. As three out of seven were against the resolution, it is null and void on the second ground of not having been passed by a two-thirds majority On stating this view to four others they have concurred with me, our returned friend being one of the number. On behalf of myself and the other four I therefore request that the executive] will not publish the resolution referred to, until it has been reconsidered. I leave for America by the Britannic, from Liverpool, on the 21 st inst. or Queenstown on the 22nd
(Doran papers). The first of Power’s objections would seem to fail because the resolution had been moved at the preceding meeting of the council, three months before, when he was present. The second objection had more substance but the clause in the constitution that he invoked related to expulsion from the council, and the resolution did not expel anyone; the explanation probably is that the report of the terms of the resolution that Power had received was inaccurate. The ‘other four’ were doubtless Barry, Biggar, Egan and Walsh (‘our returned friend ’).
26 Cf. above, under 8 August 1875.
27 This entry evidently refers to a letter from Denis Florence McCarthy, in Australia, about the rescuing of the fenian prisoners at Fremantle; see above, note 5.
28 This line of argument was openly voiced by Doran at a crowded and tumultous meeting of the Home Rule League, held in the Antient Concert Rooms in Brunswick (now Pearse) Street, Dublin (on the site of the present Academy Cinema), on the evening of 21 August. The meeting was chaired by Butt, whose opening speech was interrupted by militant fenians with cries of ‘Physical force’, ‘No more home rule humbug’, ‘What about the prisoners?’, ‘Three cheers for ’98 and ’67’ These were met by counter-cries of ‘Put out that Dalyite’ (a reference to the riot that John Daly had headed at Butt’s meeting in Limerick on the previous 17 April), ‘Put out that paid spy’ (expressing a popularview that disturbances at home-rule meetings were organised by government agents), ‘Three cheers for Butt and home rule’ Butt eventually managed to restore order and finish his speech, and it was in the course of the subsequent debate that Doran, amid loud acclamation from his supporters and furious denunciation from home-rulers, succeeded in intervening. He claimed that the home-rule movement had been fairly tested and had failed, and that Ireland should return to the principles of Tone, Emmet, Fitzgerald and O’Donovan Rossa. He made his speech in what the police described as a scene of the wildest uproar, lasting at least twenty-five minutes, and was cuffed and pushed until, thoroughly exhausted, he ended with ‘God save Ireland’ The home-rulers then had things pretty much their own way, and the meeting closed with a resolution, moved by John Ferguson, of Glasgow, supported by John Barry, expressing the adherence of those present to the principles of the Home Rule League as laid down in 1873 until something more acceptable was forthcoming. (Freeman’s Journal, 18 Apr., 22 Aug. 1876; Irish Times, 22 Aug. 1876; Irishman, 22 Apr., 26 Aug. 1876, S.P.O., R.P 1876/ 12453, 13229; MacDonagh, Michael, The home rule movement, pp 112–14).Google Scholar
29 The text of the resolution, as written by Doran on a separate sheet of flimsy paper, is given above, p. 294.
30 The reference is to envoys from Clan na Gael, such as M. W Stackpool (see above, note 14) and Denis Dowling Mulcahy, who visited Ireland during 1875–6. ‘Jane’ may be a code name for Mulcahy or for Dr William Carroll, chairman of the Clan na Gael executive, who had accompanied John Mitchel to Ireland in 1875 and was seriously contemplating a second visit in May 1876 but did not in fact return till January 1878 (Devoy’s post bag, i, 167, 281, 296).
31 The only public document that would fit the description of ‘bishops’ letter’ in this context is the ‘Pastoral address of the archbishops and bishops of Ireland’, of 20 September 1875, issued on the completion of the national synod of the catholic church in Ireland held at Maynooth from 30 August to 20 September 1875 (I.E.R., xii, Oct. 1875, pp 1–18). The first meeting of the council at which this address could have been considered was that of 28 May 1876, but this appears to have been fully occupied with discussion of the council’s relations with the home-rule movement. The same topic engrossed the council’s attention during the first day of the next meeting, 20 August 1876, and the ‘bishops’ letter’ was only one of a number of items on the agenda for the second day. There is no evidence that it was actually discussed. The address, signed by the cardinal-archbishop of Dublin, Paul Cullen, and the other catholic archbishops and bishops, ranges widely, but the relevant passage is unmistakable.
Avoid all secret societies, all illegal combinations, so severely condemned by the church. Such associations afford, indeed, a fitting shelter to infidels and revolutionists wherein to hide from the light of day their foul conspiracies against religion and society; but they have never yet formed a true champion of justice or of liberty. Their efforts have been even cursed with sterility The sole result secret organisations have anywhere achieved has been the uprooting of the faith, the degradation of the national spirit, and the establishment of a tyranny, dark, treacherous and irresponsible, that presses on their unhappy members with a weight and a cruelty compared with which the evils they were ostensibly created to remove might be accounted liberty itself. In them is specially verified the words of holy scripture ‘justice exalteth a nation, but sin maketh a nation miserable’ The history of our own beloved land is a proof that to no other form of resistance to wrong, save that which walks openly and honestly as in the day, belongs the inheritance of success (ibid., p. 16).
This, though it does not name the fenians, is more thorough in its condemnation of them than the decree of the holy office of 12 January 1870, which condemned ‘the American or Irish society known as the fenians (Patrick Corish,’Political problems, 1860–78’ in Corish, , Ir. Catholicism, 5, 3, pp 42–4).Google Scholar The decrees of the Maynooth synod, published in 1876 after being confirmed by Pope Pius IX, included one against se societies, and in this the decree of the holy office against the fenian cited (Acta et decreta synodi plenariae episcoporum Hiberniae hab apud Maynutiam an. MDCCCLXXV (Dublin, 1876), p. 142).
32 This memorandum may be connected with the ‘request of M ster for convention’, listed in the order of business for the cou meeting on 21 August 1876. In the table ‘long’ = rifles, ‘short’ revolvers, ‘am.’ = ‘ammunition’. The reading ‘Waterford’, on fifth line from the foot is conjectural. The figures in the next line h not been identified. Between the third and fourth lines from the i the following has been intercalated : ‘take credit for amn from the [ The figures assembled in this table show that the organisation in Mun was in an extremely weak condition, and compared very unfavoura with those for the North of England as recorded in the report of conference held at Manchester in July 1874 (see above, note 2). corresponding totals are :
33 The rest of Doran’s notes (pp 13–17) are undated, except ‘March’ at the head of p. 14; and, apart from the matter on p. 13; on p. 14 down to ‘very much gratified’, are decipherable only patches. They appear all to relate to a meeting of the supreme cou at which Dr William Carroll, of Philadelphia, chairman of the execu board of Clan na Gael, was present and made a speech. Carroll was Europe as Clan na Gael envoy to the I.R.B. from December 1877 May 1878, and was in Dublin in February, March and May I (Devoy’s post bag, i, 277–8, 296, 299–300, 307, 328). It is probable t the meeting in question was held in March 1878 (see note 34).
34 Presumably John O’Connor, who was known to have been secret of the supreme council from 1878 and whose election as secretary probably what Carroll was referring to when, in a letter from Dublir John Devoy on 5 March 1878, he wrote . ‘Mr Garcia [John O’Cont has been placed in charge of the domestic trade of his firm’ (Devi post bag, i, 307). It would follow from this that Doran, despite repeated intention to resign, did not succeed in doing so till March 18.
35 The sense would seem to require ‘Mr O’C.’ [O’Connor], but th is no doubt that the MS reads ‘Mr Carroll’.
36 Carroll was chairman of the Clan na Gael executive from 1875 1880 (Devoy’s post bag, i, 125–6).
37 Presumably refers to the Catalpa rescue (above, notes 5, 27).
38 Carroll, Devoy, Millen and two other Clan na Gael leaders had interview at Washington in November 1876 with the Russian ambassa in which they argued the case that it was to Russia’s interest to h Ireland to win independence (Devoy’s post bag, i, 209–12).