When the law had consummated its crime, and the doom of the felon was
pronounced against John Mitchel, there stood in the group that pressed
round him in the dock and echoed back the assurances which he flung as a
last defiance at his foes, a thoughtful, delicate looking, but resolute
young Irishman, whose voice perhaps was not the loudest of those that
spoke there, but whose heart throbbed responsively to his words, and for
whom the final message of the unconquerable rebel possessed a meaning
and significance that gave it the force of a special revelation.
"Promise for me, Mitchel," they cried out, but he had no need to join in
that request; he had no need to intimate to Mr. Mitchel his willingness
to follow out the enterprise which that fearless patriot had so boldly
commenced. On the previous day, sitting with the prisoner in his gloomy
cell, John Martin of Loughorne had decided on the course which he would
take in the event of the suppression of the _United Irishman_ and the
transportation of its editor. He would start a successor to that
journal, and take the place of his dear friend at the post of danger. It
was a noble resolve, deliberately taken, and resolutely and faithfully
was it carried out. None can read the history of that act of daring, and
of the life of sacrifice by which it has been followed, and not agree
with us that while the memories of Tone, of Emmet, and of Russell, are
cherished in Ireland, the name of John Martin ought not be forgotten.
A few days subsequent to that memorable scene in Greenstreet
court-house, John Martin quitted his comfortable home and the green
slopes of Loughorne, separated himself from the friends he loved and
the relatives who idolized him, and entered on the stormy career of a
national leader and journalist, at a time when to advocate the
principles of nationality was to incur the ferocious hostility of a
government whose thirst for vengeance was only whetted by the
transportation of John Mitchel. He knew the danger he was braving; he
knew that the path on which he entered led down to suffering and ruin;
he stood in the gap from which Mitchel had been hurled, with a full
consciousness of the perils of the situation; but unflinchingly and
unhesitatingly as the martyr goes to his death, he threw himself into
the thinning ranks of the patriot leaders; and when the event that he
anticipated arrived, and the prison gates opened to receive him--then,
too, in the midst of indignities and privations--he displayed an
imperturbable firmness and contempt for physical suffering, that showed
how powerless persecution is to subdue the spirit that self-conscious
righteousness sustains.
His history previous to the conviction of his friend and school-fellow,
John Mitchel, if it includes no events of public importance, possesses
for us all the interest that attaches to the early life of a good and
remarkable man. John Martin was born at Loughorne, in the lordship of
Newry, Co. Down, on the 8th of September, 1812; being the eldest son of
Samuel Martin and Jane Harshaw, both natives of that neighbourhood, and
members of Presbyterian families settled there for many generations.
About the time of his birth, his father purchased the fee-simple of the
large farm which he had previously rented, and two of his uncles having
made similar investments, the family became proprietors of the townland
on which they lived. Mr. Samuel Martin, who died in 1831, divided his
attention between the management of the linen business--a branch of
industry in which the family had partly occupied themselves for some
generations--and the care of his land. His family consisted of nine
children, of whom John Martin--the subject of our sketch--was the second
born. The principles of his family, if they could not be said to possess
the hue of nationality, were at least liberal and tolerant. In '98, the
Martins of Loughorne, were stern opponents of the United Irishmen; but
in '82, his father and uncles were enrolled amongst the volunteers, and
the Act of Union was opposed by them as a national calamity. It was from
his good mother, however, a lady of refined taste and remarkable mental
culture, that young John derived his inclination for literary pursuits,
and learned the maxims of justice and equality that swayed him through
life. He speedily discarded the prejudices against Catholic
Emancipation, which were not altogether unknown amongst his family, and
which even found some favour with himself in the unreflecting days of
boyhood. The natural tendency of his mind, however, was as true to the
principles of justice as the needle to the pole, and the quiet rebuke
that one day fell from his uncle--"What! John, would you not give your
Catholic fellow-countrymen the same rights that you enjoy yourself?"
having set him a thinking for the first time on the subject, he soon
formed opinions more in consonance with liberality and fair play.
When about twelve years of age, young Martin was sent to the school of
Dr. Henderson at Newry, where he first became acquainted with John
Mitchel, then attending the same seminary as a day scholar. We next find
John Martin an extern student of Trinity College, and a year after the
death of his father he took out his degree in Arts. He was now twenty
years old, and up to this time had suffered much from a constitutional
affection, being subject from infancy to fits of spasmodic asthma.
Strange to say, the disease which troubled him at frequently recurring
intervals at home, seldom attacked him when away from Loughorne, and
partly for the purpose of escaping it, he took up his residence in
Dublin in 1833, and devoted himself to the study of medicine. He never
meditated earning his living by the profession, but he longed for the
opportunity of assuaging the sufferings of the afflicted poor. The air
of the dissecting-room, however, was too much for Martin's delicate
nervous organization; the kindly encouragement of his fellow-students
failed to induce him to breathe its fetid atmosphere a second time, and
he was forced to content himself with a theoretical knowledge of the
profession. By diligent study and with the assistance of lectures,
anatomical plates, &c., he managed to conquer the difficulty; and he had
obtained nearly all the certificates necessary for taking out a medical
degree, when he was recalled in 1835 to Loughorne, by the death of his
uncle John, whose house and lands he inherited.
During the four years following he lived at Loughorne, discharging the
duties of a resident country gentleman as they are seldom performed in
Ireland, and endearing himself to all classes, but particularly to the
poor, by his gentle disposition, purity of mind, and benevolence of
heart. In him the afflicted and the poverty-stricken ever found a
sympathising friend, and if none of the rewards which the ruling faction
were ready to shower on the Irishman of his position who looked to the
Castle for inspiration, fell to his share, he enjoyed a recompense more
precious in the prayers and the blessings of the poor. The steps of his
door were crowded with the patients who flocked to him for advice, and
for whom he prescribed gratuitously--not without some reluctance,
however, arising from distrust of his own abilities and an unwillingness
to interfere with the practice of the regular profession. But the
diffidence with which he regarded his own efforts was not shared by the
people of the district. Their faith in his professional skill was
unbounded, and perhaps the confidence which they felt in his power,
contributed in some measure to the success that attended his practice.
In 1839 Mr. Martin sailed from Bristol to New York, and travelled thence
to the extreme west of Upper Canada to visit a relative who had settled
there. On that occasion he was absent from Ireland nearly twelve months,
and during his stay in America he made some tours in Canada and the
Northern States, visiting the Falls, Toronto, Montreal, Philadelphia,
New York, Washington, Pittsburg, and Cleveland. In 1841 he made a brief
continental tour, and visited the chief points of attraction along the
Rhine. During this time Mr. Martin's political ideas became developed
and expanded, and though like Smith O'Brien, he at first withheld his
sympathies from the Repeal agitation, in a short time he became
impressed with the justice of the national demand for independence. His
retiring disposition kept him from appearing very prominently before the
public; but the value of his adhesion to the Repeal Association was felt
to be great by those who knew his uprightness, his disinterestedness,
and his ability.
When the suicidal policy of O'Connell drove the Confederates from
Conciliation Hall, John Martin was not a silent spectator of the crisis,
and in consequence of the manly sentiments he expressed with reference
to the treatment to which the Young Ireland party had been subjected, he
ceased to be a member of the Association. There was another cause too
for his secession. A standing taunt in the mouth of the English press
was that O'Connell pocketed the peoples' money and took care to let
nobody know what he did with it. To put an end to this reproach Mr.
Martin asked that the accounts of the Association should be published.
"Publish the accounts!" shrieked the well-paid gang that marred the
influence and traded in the politics of O'Connell: "Monstrous!" and they
silenced the troublesome purist by suppressing his letters and expelling
him from the Association. In the ranks of the Confederates, however,
Martin found more congenial society; amongst them he found men as
earnest, as sincere, and as single-minded as himself, and by them the
full worth of his character was soon appreciated. He frequently attended
their meetings, and he it was who filled the chair during the prolonged
debates that ended with the temporary withdrawal of Mitchel from the
Confederation. When the _United Irishman_ was started he became a
contributor to its columns, and he continued to write in its pages up to
the date of its suppression, and the conviction of its editor and
proprietor.
There were many noble and excellent qualities which the friends of John
Martin knew him to possess. Rectitude of principle, abhorrence of
injustice and intolerance, deep love of country, the purity and
earnestness of a saint, allied with the kindliness and inoffensiveness
of childhood; amiability and disinterestedness, together with a perfect
abnegation of self, and total freedom from the vanity which affected a
few of his compatriots--these they gave him credit for, but they were
totally unprepared for the lion-like courage, the boldness, and the
promptitude displayed by him, when the government, by the conviction of
Mitchel, flung down the gauntlet to the people of Ireland. Hastily
settling up his worldly accounts in the North, he returned to Dublin to
stake his fortune and his life in the cause which he had promised to
serve. The _United Irishman_ was gone, but Martin had undertaken that
its place in Irish Journalism should not be vacant; and a few weeks
after the office in Trinity-street was sacked he reoccupied the violated
and empty rooms, and issued there-from the first number of the _Irish
Felon_. There was no halting place in Irish Journalism then. The
_Nation_ had already flung peace and conciliation and "balmy
forgiveness" to the winds, and advocated the creed of the sword. The
scandalous means used to procure a verdict of guilty against Mitchel
tore to tatters the last rag of the constitution in Ireland. It was idle
to dictate observance of the law which the government themselves were
engaged in violating, and the _Nation_ was not the journal to brook the
tyranny of the authorities. With a spirit that cannot be too highly
praised, it called for the overthrow of the government that had sent
Mitchel in chains into banishment, and summoned the people of Ireland to
prepare to assert their rights by the only means now left them--the
bullet and the pike. And the eyes of men whose hearts were "weary
waiting for the fray," began to glisten as they read the burning words
of poetry and prose in which the _Nation_ preached the gospel of
liberty. It was to take its side by that journal, and to rival it in the
boldness of its language and the spirit of its arguments, that the
_Irish Felon_ was established; and it executed its mission well. "I do
not love political agitation for its own sake," exclaimed Martin, in
his opening address in the first number. "At best I regard it as a
necessary evil; and if I were not convinced that my countrymen are
determined on vindicating their rights, and that they really intend to
free themselves, I would at once withdraw from the struggle and leave my
native land for ever. I could not live in Ireland and derive my means of
life as a member of the Irish community, without feeling a citizen's
responsibilities in Irish public affairs. Those responsibilities involve
the guilt of national robbery and murder--of a system which arrays the
classes of our people against each other's prosperity and very lives,
like beasts of prey, or rather like famishing sailors on a wreck--of the
debasement and moral ruin of a people endowed by God with surpassing
resources for the attainment of human happiness and human dignity. I
cannot be loyal to a system of meanness, terror, and corruption,
although it usurp the title and assume the form of a 'government.' So
long as such a 'government' presumes to injure and insult me, and those
in whose prosperity I am involved, I must offer to it all the resistance
in my power. But if I despaired of successful resistance, I would
certainly remove myself from under such a 'government's' actual
authority; that I do not exile myself is a proof that I hope to witness
the overthrow, and assist in the overthrow, of the most abominable
tyranny the world now groans under--the British Imperial system. To gain
permission for the Irish people to care for their own lives, their own
happiness and dignity--to abolish the political conditions which compel
the classes of our people to hate and to murder each other, and which
compel the Irish people to hate the very name of the English--to end the
reign of fraud, perjury, corruption, and 'government' butchery, and to
make, law, order, and peace possible in Ireland, the _Irish Felon_ takes
its place amongst the combatants in the holy war now waging in this
island against foreign tyranny. In conducting it my weapons shall
be--_the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me
God_!" Such "open and avowed treason" as this could not long continue
to be published. Before the third number the _Felon_ saw the light, a
warrant for Mr. Martin's arrest was in the hands of the detectives, and
its fifth was its last. On Saturday, July 8th, Mr. Martin surrendered
himself into custody, having kept out of the way for a few days to
prevent his being tried, under the "gagging act," at the Commission
sitting when the warrant was issued, and which adjourned until
August--the time fixed for the insurrection--in the interim. On the same
day, Duffy, Williams, and O'Doherty were arrested. Martin was imprisoned
in Newgate, but he continued to write from within his cell for the
_Felon_, and its last number, published on July 22nd, contains a
spirited letter signed with his initials, which formed portion of the
indictment against him on his trial. In this letter, Martin calls on his
countrymen in impassioned words to "stand to their arms!" "Let them
menace you," he writes from his dungeon, "with the hulks or the gibbet
for daring to speak or write your love to Ireland. Let them threaten to
mow you down with grape shot, as they massacred your kindred with famine
and plague. Spurn their brutal 'Acts of Parliament'--trample upon their
lying proclamations--fear them not!"
On Tuesday, August 15th, John Martin's trial commenced in Green-street
court-house, the indictment being for treason-felony. "Several of his
tenantry," writes the Special Correspondent of the London _Morning
Herald,_ "came up to town to be present at his trial, and, as they
hoped, at his escape, for they could not bring themselves to believe
that a man so amiable, so gentle, and so pious, as they had long known
him, could be"--this is the Englishman's way of putting it--"an inciter
to bloodshed. It is really melancholy," added the writer, "to hear the
poor people of the neighbourhood of Loughorne speak of their benefactor.
He was ever ready to administer medicine and advice gratuitously to his
poor neighbours and all who sought his assistance; and according to the
reports I have received, he did an incalculable amount of good in his
way. As a landlord he was beloved by his tenantry for his kindness and
liberality, while from his suavity of manner and excellent qualities, he
was a great favourite with the gentry around him."
At eight o'clock, p.m., on Thursday, August 17th, the jury came into
court with a verdict of guilty against the prisoner, recommending him to
mercy on the grounds that the letter on which he was convicted was
written from the prison, and penned under exciting circumstances. On the
following day, Mr. Martin was brought up to receive sentence, and
asked--after the usual form--whether he had anything to say against the
sentence being pronounced? The papers of the time state that he appeared
perfectly unmoved by the painful position in which he was placed--that
he looked round the courthouse in a calm, composed, dignified manner,
and then spoke the following reply in clear unfaltering tones:--
"My lords--I have no imputation to cast upon the bench, neither have
I anything to charge the jury with, of unfairness towards me. I think
the judges desired to do their duty honestly as upright judges and
men; and that the twelve men who were put into the box, as I believe,
not to try, but to convict me, voted honestly, according to their
prejudices. I have no personal enmity against the sheriff,
sub-sheriff, or any of the gentlemen connected with the arrangement
of the jury-panel--nor against the Attorney-General, nor any other
person engaged in the proceedings called my trial; _but, my lords, I
consider that I have not been yet tried_. There have been certain
formalities carried on here for three days regarding me, ending in a
verdict of guilty: _but I have not been put upon my country_, as the
constitution said to exist in Ireland requires. Twelve of my
countrymen, 'indifferently chosen,' have not been put into that
jury-box to try me, but twelve men who, I believe, have been selected
by the parties who represent the crown, for the purpose of convicting
and not of trying me. I believe they were put into that box because
the parties conducting the prosecution knew their political
sentiments were hostile to mine, and because the matter at issue here
is a political question--a matter of opinion, and not a matter of
fact. I have nothing more to say as to the trial, except to repeat
that, having watched the conduct of the judges, I consider them
upright and honest men. I have this to add, that as to the charge I
make with respect to the constitution of the panel and the selection
of the jury, I have no legal evidence of the truth of my statement,
but there is no one who has a moral doubt of it. Every person knows
that what I have stated is the fact; and I would represent to the
judges, most respectfully, that they, as upright and honourable men
and judges, and as citizens, ought to see that the administration of
justice in this country is above suspicion. I have nothing more to
say with regard to the trial; but I would be thankful to the court
for permission to say a few words in vindication of my character and
motives after sentence is passed."
Baron Pennefather--"No; we will not hear anything from you after
sentence."
Chief Baron--"We cannot hear anything from you after sentence has
been pronounced."
Mr. Martin--"Then, my lords, permit me to say that, admitting the
narrow and confined constitutional doctrines which I have heard
preached in this court to be right, _I am not guilty of the charge
according to this act_. I did not intend to devise or levy war
against the Queen or to depose the Queen. In the article of mine on
which the jury framed their verdict of guilty, which was written in
prison, and published in the last number of my paper, what I desired
to do was this--to advise and encourage my countrymen to keep their
arms, because that is their inalienable right, which no act of
parliament, no proclamation, can take away from them. It is, I
repeat, their inalienable right. I advised them to keep their arms;
and further, I advised them to use their arms in their own defence,
against all assailants--even assailants that might come to attack
them, unconstitutionally and improperly using the Queen's name as
their sanction. My object in all my proceedings has been simply to
assist in establishing the national independence of Ireland, for the
benefit of all the people of Ireland--noblemen, clergymen, judges,
professional men--in fact, all Irishmen. I have sought that object:
first, because I thought it was our right--because I think national
independence is the right of the people of this country; and
secondly, I admit that, being a man who loved retirement, I never
would have engaged in politics did I not think it was necessary to do
all in my power to make an end of the horrible scenes that this
country presents--the pauperism, starvation, and crime, and vice, and
hatred of all classes against each other. I thought there should be
an end to that horrible system, which, while it lasted, gave me no
peace of mind; for I could not enjoy anything in my native country so
long as I saw my countrymen forced to be vicious--forced to hate each
other--and degraded to the level of paupers and brutes. That is the
reason I engaged in politics. I acknowledge, as the Solicitor-General
has said, that I was but a weak assailant of the English power. I am
not a good writer, and I am no orator. I had only two weeks'
experience in conducting a newspaper until I was put into jail; but I
am satisfied to direct the attention of my countrymen to everything I
have written and said, and to rest my character on a fair and candid
examination of what I have put forward as my opinions. I shall say
nothing in vindication of my motives but this--that every fair and
honest man, no matter how prejudiced he may be, if he calmly
considers what I have written and said, will be satisfied that my
motives were pure and honourable. I have nothing more to say."
Then the judge proceeded to pass sentence. In the course of his remarks
he referred to the recommendation to mercy which came from the jury,
whereupon Mr. Martin broke in. "I beg your lordship's pardon," he said,
"I cannot condescend to accept 'mercy,' where I believe I have been
morally right; I want justice--not mercy." But he looked for it in vain.
"Transportation for ten years beyond the seas" is spoken by the lips of
the judge, and the burlesque of justice is at an end. Mr. Martin heard
the sentence with perfect composure and self-possession, though the
faces of his brothers and friends standing by, showe signs of the
deepest emotion. "Remove the prisoner," were the next words uttered, and
then John Martin, the pure-minded, the high-souled, and the good, was
borne off to the convict's cell in Newgate.
Amongst the friends who clustered round the dock in which the patriot
leader stood, and watched the progress of his trial with beating hearts,
was Mr. James Martin, one of the prisoner's brothers. During the three
long weary days occupied by the trial, his post had been by his
brother's side listening to the proceedings with the anxiety and
solicitude which a brother alone can feel, and revealing by every line
of his countenance the absorbing interest with which he regarded the
issue. The verdict of the jury fell upon him with the bewildering shock
of an avalanche. He was stunned, stupified, amazed; he could hardly
believe that he had heard the fatal words aright, and that "guilty" had
been the verdict returned. _He_ guilty! he whose life was studded by
good deeds as stars stud the wintry sky; _he_ guilty, whose kindly heart
had always a throb for the suffering and the unfortunate, whose hand was
ever extended to shield the oppressed, to succour the friendless, and to
shelter the homeless and the needy; _he_ "inspired by the devil," whose
career had been devoted to an attempt to redress the sufferings of his
fellow-countrymen, and whose sole object in life seemed to be to
abridge the sufferings of the Irish people, to plant the doctrines of
peace and good-will in every heart, and to make Ireland the home of
harmony and concord, by rendering her prosperous and free. It was a lie,
a calumny, a brutal fabrication! It was more than his sense of justice
could endure, it was more than his hot Northern blood could tolerate.
Beckoning a friend, he rushed with him into the street, and drove direct
to the residence of Mr. Waterhouse, the foreman of the jury. The latter
had barely returned from court, when he was waited upon by Mr. Martin,
who indignantly charged him with having bullied the jury into recording
a verdict of guilty--an accusation which current report made against
him--and challenged the astonished juryman to mortal combat. Mr.
Waterhouse was horror-struck by the proposal, to which he gasped out in
response, a threat to call in the police. He never heard of anything so
terribly audacious. He, a loyal Castle tradesman, who had "well and
truly" tried the case according to the recognised acceptance of the
words, and who had "true deliverance made" after the fashion in favour
with the crown; he whose "perspicuity, wisdom, impartiality," &c., had
been appealed to and belauded so often by the Attorney-General, to be
challenged to a hostile meeting, which might end, by leaving a bullet
lodged in his invaluable body. The bare idea of it fairly took his
breath away, and with the terrible vision of pistols and bloodshed
before his mind, he rushed to the police office and had his indignant
visitor arrested. On entering the Green-street courthouse next day, Mr.
Waterhouse told his woeful story to the judge. The judge was appalled by
the disclosure; Mr. Martin was brought before him and sentenced to a
month's imprisonment, besides being bound over to keep the peace towards
Mr. Waterhouse and everyone else for a period of seven years.
A short time after Mr. John Martin's conviction, he and Kevin Izod
O'Doherty were shipped off to Van Diemen's Land on board the
"Elphinstone," where they arrived in the month of November, 1849.
O'Brien, Meagher, MacManus, and O'Donoghue had arrived at the same
destination a few days before. Mr. Martin resided in the district
assigned to him until the year 1854, when a pardon, on the condition of
their not returning to Ireland or Great Britain was granted to himself,
O'Brien, and O'Doherty, the only political prisoners in the country at
that time--MacManus, Meagher, O'Donoghue, and Mitchel having previously
escaped. Mr. O'Brien and Mr. Martin sailed together in the "Norna" from
Melbourne for Ceylon, at which port they parted, Mr. O'Brien turning
northward to Madras, while Mr. Martin came on _via_ Aden, Cairo,
Alexandria, Malta, and Marseilles to Paris, where he arrived about the
end of October, 1854. In June, 1856, the government made the pardon of
Messrs. Martin, O'Brien, and O'Doherty, unconditional, and Mr. Martin
then hastened to pay a visit to his family from whom he had been
separated during eight years. After a stay of a few months he went back
to Paris, intending to reside abroad during the remainder of his life,
because he could not voluntarily live under English rule in Ireland. But
the death of a near and dear member of his family, in October, 1858,
imposed on him duties which he could only discharge by residence in his
own home, and compelled him to terminate his exile. Living since then in
his own land he has taken care to renew and continue his protest against
the domination of England in Ireland. In January, 1864, acting on the
suggestion of many well-known nationalists, he established in Dublin a
Repeal Association called "The National League." The peculiar condition
of Irish politics at the time was unfavourable to any large extension of
the society; but notwithstanding this circumstance the League by its
meetings and its publications rendered good service to the cause of
Irish freedom. Mr. Martin has seen many who once were loud and earnest
in their professions of patriotism lose heart and grow cold in the
service of their country, but he does not weary of the good work.
Patiently and zealously he still continues to labour in the national
cause; his mission is not ended yet; and with a constancy which lapse of
years and change of scene have not affected, he still clings to the
hope of Ireland's regeneration, and with voice and pen supports the
principles of patriotism for which he suffered. The debt that Ireland
owes to him will not easily be acquitted, and if the bulk of his
co-religionists are no longer to be found within the national camp, we
can almost forgive them their shortcomings, when we remember that,
within our own generation, the Presbyterians of Ulster have given to
Ireland two such men as John Martin and John Mitchel.
Mr. Martin's name will re-appear farther on in another portion of this
work, for the occasion of which we have here treated was not the only
one on which his patriotic words and actions brought upon him the
attention of "the authorities," and subjected him to the troubles of a
state prosecution.
* * * * *