The Fenian Movement
In 1848, a small group of revolutionaries known as
Young Ireland launched an ill-prepared uprising which was quickly quelled.
Among them were James Stephens and John O'Mahony, who both sought refuge in
Paris, a city which harboured plotters exiled from many countries. In 1853,
O'Mahony sailed to America in the hope of encouraging Irish emigrants to
support a new rising. Stephens returned to Ireland in 1856, tramping throughout
the country to assess the people's mood. On 17 March 1858, he formed in Dublin
the secret society which became known as the Irish Republican Brotherhood.
Later in the year he sailed to America, where O'Mahony became leader of a new
organisation called the Fenian Brotherhood. It took its name from band of
warriors led by the legendary Gaelic hero, Finn Mac Cool, and the name Fenians
came to be used for the whole body of revolutionary conspirators.
The Fenian movement, which sought a revolution
"sooner or never", quickly attracted thousands of young supporters. When one of
the 1848 rebels, Terence Bellew McManus, died in America in 1861, his enormous
funeral procession through Cork and Dublin showed how widespread was the
sympathy for the Young Ireland ideas which Fenianism now embodied. However,
Stephens came in conflict with other nationalist organisations which sought to
end the Union by constitutional methods, and the Catholic Church was generally
hostile. In 1863 his decision to found a weekly newspaper, the Irish People,
was criticised by O'Mahony, who preferred secrecy.
Fenianism was strongly supported by Irish emigrants
in America. Many gained military experience in the American Civil War, and when
this ended in April 1865 Stephens promised an Irish rising later in the year.
However, the government had been alerted by its spies, and in September the
Irish People was suppressed. Stephens and his closest associates were arrested,
but he escaped from prison and reached America. The government quickly took the
offensive, arresting suspects and confiscating arms. Some army units, thought
to include Fenian sympathisers, were moved from Ireland.