Speeches from the Dock Part 1

Speeches from the Dock.

by Various.

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

Little more than a year ago we commenced an undertaking never previously attempted, yet long called for--the collection and publication, in a complete form and at a low price, of the Speeches of Irish Patriots, spoken from the dock or the scaffold.

The extraordinary success which attended upon our effort was the best proof that we had correctly appreciated the universal desire of the Irish people to possess themselves of such a memorial of National Protest--protest unbroken through generations of martyrs.

The work was issued in weekly numbers, and reached a sale previously unheard of in Irish literature. In a few months the whole issue was exhausted, and for a long time past the demand for a Second Edition has been pressed upon us from all sides. With that demand we now comply.

The present issue of "Speeches from the Dock" has been carefully revised and considerably improved. With it, as Part I. of a series, we have bound, as its sequels, Parts II. and III.--each Part, however, complete in itself--bringing the list of convict patriot orators down to the latest sentenced in 1868. It may be that even here the sad array is not to close, and that even yet another sequel may have to be issued, ere the National Protest of which these Voices from the Dock are the utterances, shall be terminated for ever. Even so, our faith will be all unshaken in the inevitable triumph of the cause for which so many martyrs have thus suffered; and we shall still await in Faith and Hope the first strains of that Hymn of Deliverance which shall yet resound through the valleys of Emanc.i.p.ated Ireland.

90 MIDDLE ABBEY STREET,

_November_, 1868.

INTRODUCTORY.

To the lovers of Ireland--to those who sympathize with her sufferings and resent her wrongs, there can be few things more interesting than the history of the struggles which sprang from devotion to her cause, and were consecrated by the blood of her patriots. The efforts of the Irish race to burst the fetters that foreign force and native dissensions imposed on them, and elevate their country from bondage and degradation to a place amongst free nations, fill a page in the world's history which no lover of freedom can read without emotion, and which must excite wonder, admiration, and regret in the mind of every man with whom patriotism is not a reproach, and who can sympathize with a cause enn.o.bled by fidelity and sacrifice, and sanctified by the blood and tears of a nation. "How hands so vile could conquer hearts so brave," is the question which our National Poet supposes to arise in the mind of the stranger, as he looks on the spectacle of Ireland in her decay; but another question will suggest itself to those who study the history of our country: it is, how a feeling so deeply rooted as the love of independence is in the hearts of the Irish people--an aspiration so warmly and so widely entertained--which has been clung to with so much persistency--which has survived through centuries of persecution--for which generations have arisen, and fought, and bled, and dashed themselves against the power of England with a succession as unbroken as that of the waves upon our sh.o.r.es--a cause so universally loved, so deeply reverenced, and so unflinchingly supported by a brave and intrepid race, should never have attained the blessing of success. A more signal instance than that which Ireland can supply of the baffling of a nation's hope, the prolonged frustration of a people's will, is not on record; and few even of those who most condemn the errors and weakness by which Irishmen themselves have r.e.t.a.r.ded the national object, will hesitate to say that they have given to mankind the n.o.blest proof they possess of the vitality of the principles of freedom, and the indestructibility of national sentiment.

It is for us, however, Irish of the Irish, that the history of the struggle for Ireland's rights possesses most attractions. We live amidst the scenes where the battles against the stranger were fought, and where the men who waged them lived and died. The bones of the patriots who laboured for Ireland, and of those who died for her, repose in the graveyards around us; and we have still amongst us the inheritors of their blood, their name, and their spirit. It was to make us free--to render independent and prosperous the nation to, which we belong--that the pike was lifted and the green flag raised; and it was in furtherance of this object, on which the hearts of Irishmen are still set, that the men whose names shine through the pages on which the story of Ireland's struggles for national existence is written, suffered and died. To follow out that mournful but absorbing story is not, however, the object aimed at in the following pages. The history of Ireland is no longer a sealed volume to the people; more than one author has told it truthfully and well, and the list of books devoted to it is every day receiving valuable accessions. Nor has it even been attempted, in this little work, though trenching more closely on its subject, to trace the career and sketch the lives of the men who fill the foremost places in the ranks of Ireland's political martyrs. In the subjoined pages little more will be found than a correct report of the addresses delivered, under certain peculiar circ.u.mstances, by the group of Irishmen whose names are given on the t.i.tlepage. A single public utterance from the lips of each of these gentlemen is all that we have printed, though it would be easy to supplement them in nearly every case by writings and speeches owning a similar authorship, equally eloquent and equally patriotic. But the speeches given here are a.s.sociated with facts which give them peculiar value and significance, and were spoken under circ.u.mstances which lend to them a solemn interest and impressiveness which could not otherwise be obtained. They reach us--these dock speeches, in which n.o.bility of purpose and chivalrous spirit is expressed--like voices from the tomb, like messages from beyond the grave, brimful of lessons of dignity and patriotism. We can see the men who spoke them standing before the representatives of the government whose oppression had driven them to revolt, when the solemn farce of trying them for a crime which posterity will account a virtue had terminated, and when the verdict of "guilty"

had gladdened the hearts of their accusers. The circ.u.mstances under which they spoke might well cause a bold man to falter. They were about parting for ever from all that makes life dear to man; and, for some of them, the sentence; which was to cut short the thread of their existence, to consign them to a b.l.o.o.d.y and ignominious death, to leave their bodies mutilated corpses, from which the rights of Christian burial were to be withheld--which was to a.s.sign them the death of a dog, and to follow them with persecuting hand into the valley of death--was about to fall from the lips of the judges whom they addressed. Against others a fate less repulsive, perhaps, to the feelings of humanity, but certainly not more merciful, and hardly less painful and appalling, was about to be decreed. Recent revelations have thrown some light on the horrors endured by the Irish political prisoners who languish within the prison pens of England; but it needs far more than a stray letter, a half-stifled cry from the dungeon depths, to enable the public to realize the misery, the wretchedness, and the degradation attached to the condition to which England reduces her political convicts. Condemned to a.s.sociate with the vilest of the scoundrels bred by the immorality and G.o.dlessness of England--exposed, without possibility of redress, to the persecutions of brutal, coa.r.s.e-minded men, accustomed to deal only with ruffians than whom beasts are less ferocious and unreclaimable--restricted to a course of discipline which blasts the vigour of the body, and under whose influence reason herself totters upon her throne--the Irish rebel against whom the doom of penal servitude has been p.r.o.nounced is condemned to the most hideous and agonizing punishments to which men of their cla.s.s could be exposed. It was with such terrors staring them in the face that the men whose words are recorded in this little work delivered their speeches from the dock.

It is surely something for us, their countrymen, to boast of, that neither in their bearing nor in their words was there manifested the slightest trace of weakness, the faintest exhibition of any feeling which could show that their hearts were accessible to the terror which their situation was so well calculated to inspire. No cheek grew pale, no eyes lost their light--their tones were unbroken, and their manner undaunted as ever, as these men uttered the words we purpose recording.

Their language tells of minds which persecution could not subdue, and for which death itself possessed no sting; and the manner in which it was expressed showed that, in their case, elevation of sentiment was allied with unconquerable firmness and resolution. Never were lessons so n.o.ble more boldly preached. It is in courts of justice, after all, declares a great English authority, that the lessons of morality are best taught; and in Ireland the truthfulness of the a.s.sertion is established. But it is not from the bench or the jury-box that the words have fallen in which the cause of morality and justice has been vindicated; venality, pa.s.sion, and prejudice have but too often swayed the decisions of both; and it is to the dock we must turn when we seek for honour, integrity, and patriotism.

We owe it to the men who suffered so unflinchingly in the cause of our country, and who have left us so precious a heritage in the speeches in which they hurled a last defiance at their oppressors, that their names should not be forgotten, or the recollection of their acts suffered to grow cold. The n.o.blest incentive to patriotism, as it is the highest reward which this world can offer those who dare and suffer for fatherland, is the grat.i.tude, the sympathy, and the applause of the people for whom they laboured. We owe it to the brave men whose patriotism is attested in the addresses comprised in this volume, that the memory of their n.o.ble deeds shall not pa.s.s away, and that their names shall remain enshrined in the hearts of their countrymen. They failed, it is true, to accomplish what they attempted, and the battle to which they devoted themselves has yet to be won; but we know that they, at least, did their part courageously and well; and, looking back now upon the stormy scenes of their labours, and contrasting the effects of their sacrifices with the cost at which they were made, the people of Ireland are still prepared to accept the maxim that--

"Tis better to have fought and lost, Than never to have fought at all."

While such men can be found to suffer as they have suffered for Ireland, the ultimate triumph of her aspirations cannot be doubted, nor can the national faith be despaired of while it has martyrs so numerous and so heroic. It is by example that the great lessons of patriotism can best be conveyed; and if the national spirit burn brightly to-day in Ireland--if the spirit of her children be still defiant and unsubdued--if, at home and in the far West, the hearts of the Irish people still throb with the emotions that prompted Emmet and Wolfe Tone--if their eyes are still hot to see the independence of their country, their arms still ready to strike, and their spirit ready to sacrifice for the accomplishment of that object, we owe the result largely to the men whose names are inscribed in this little work, and whose memory it is intended to perpetuate.

We have commenced our series with the speech of Theobald Wolfe Tone, and our record stretches no further back than the memorable insurrection of 1798. If our object were to group together the Irishmen who are known to have struggled for the independence of their country, and who suffered for their attachment to her cause, we might go much farther back into history, and indefinitely increase the bulk of this publication. We fix the insurrection of '98 as the limit of our collection, chiefly because it was at that time trials for high treason in Ireland a.s.sumed the precise meaning and significance which they now possess, and there is consequently, in the speeches which follow, such a unity of purpose and sentiment as renders them especially suitable for presentation in a single volume. Only seventy years have elapsed since Wolfe Tone spoke to the question why sentence should not be p.r.o.nounced on him--only two-thirds of a century since Emmet vindicated the cause of his country from the Green street dock, and already what a host of imitators and disciples have they had! There is not a country in Europe, there is not a nationality in the world, can produce such another collection as that which we to-day lay before the people of Ireland. We live under a government which claims to be just, liberal, and const.i.tutional, yet against no other government in Christendom have the same number of protests been made within the same s.p.a.ce of time. Not Poland, not Hungary, not Venetia, can point to such an unbroken succession of political martyrs. The pages of history contain nothing to compare with the little volume we to-day place in the hands of our countrymen; and we know of no more powerful and eloquent condemnation of the system on which Ireland is governed, than that contained in the simple fact that all those speeches were spoken, all those trials carried-out, all those sentences decreed, within the lifetime of a single generation. It is idle to think of subduing a people who make so many sacrifices, and who are undaunted still; it is vain to think of crushing a spirit which survives so much persecution. The executioner and the gaoler, the gibbet, the block, and the dungeon, have done their work in the crusade against Irish Nationality, and we know what the result is to-day. The words of the last political convict whose name appears in these pages are as uncompromising and as bold as those of the first of his predecessors; and, studying the spirit which they have exhibited, and marking the effect of their conduct on the bulk of their countrymen, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion, that so much persistent resolution and heroism must one day eventuate in success, and that Ireland, the country for which so many brave men have suffered with such unfaltering courage, is not destined to disprove the rule that--

"Freedom's battle once begun,-- Bequeath'd from bleeding sire to son-- Though baffled oft, is ever won."

THEOBALD WOLFE TONE.

No name is more intimately a.s.sociated with the national movement of 1798 than that of Theobald Wolfe Tone. He was its main-spring, its leading spirit. Many men connected with it possessed, as he did, brilliant talents, unfailing courage and determination, and an intense devotion to the cause; but the order of his genius raised him above them all, and marked him out from the first as the head and front of the patriot party. He was one of the original founders of the Society of United Irishmen, which was formed in Belfast in the year 1791. In its early days this society was simply a sort of reform a.s.sociation, a legal and const.i.tutional body, having for its chief object the removal of the frightful oppressions by which the Catholic people of Ireland were tortured and disgraced; but in the troubled and portentous condition of home and foreign politics, the society could not long retain this character. The futility of seeking a redress of the national grievances by parliamentary means was becoming apparent to every understanding. The system of outrage and injustice towards the Catholics, unabating in its severity, continued to exasperate the actual sufferers and to offend all men of humane feelings and enlightened principles; and, at the same time, the electric influence of the American War of Independence and the French Revolution was operating powerfully in every heart, evoking there the aspiration for Irish freedom, and inspiring a belief in its possible attainment. In the midst of such exciting circ.u.mstances the society could not continue to stand on its original basis. In the year 1794, after a debate among the members, followed by the withdrawal of the more moderate or timid among them from its ranks, it a.s.sumed the form and character of a secret revolutionary organization; and Tone, Thomas Addis Emmet, Samuel Neilson, Thomas Russell, James Napper Tandy, with a number of other patriotic gentlemen in Belfast, Dublin, and other parts of the country, soon found themselves in the full swing of an insurrectionary movement, plotting and planning for the complete overthrow of British power in Ireland. Thenceforward, for some time, the organization went on rapidly extending through the province of Ulster, in the first instance, and subsequently over most of the midland and southern counties.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THEOBALD WOLFE TONE. _From a Portrait by his Daughter-in-law, Mrs. Sampson Tone._]

Such was the state of affairs when, in the early part of 1794, an emissary from the French government arrived in Ireland, to ascertain to what extent the Irish people were likely to co-operate with France in a war against England. This individual was the Rev. William Jackson, an Irish Protestant clergyman, who had for some years been resident in France, and had become thoroughly imbued with Democratic and Republican principles. Unfortunately, he was not one of the most prudent of envoys.

He revealed his mission to an acquaintance of his, an English attorney, named c.o.c.kayne, who repaid his confidence by betraying his secrets to the government. c.o.c.kayne was immediately employed as a spy upon Jackson's further proceedings, in which capacity he accompanied his unsuspecting victim to Ireland, and acquired cognizance of most of his negotiations. On the 28th of April; 1794, Jackson was arrested on a charge of high treason. He was brought to speedy trial, was found guilty, but was not sentenced, for, on the day on which the law's award was to have been announced to him, he contrived, before entering the court, to swallow a dose of poison, from the effects of which he expired in the dock. Tone, with whom Jackson was known to have been in confidential communication, was placed by those events in a very critical position; owing, however, to some influence which had been made with the government on his behalf, he was permitted to exile himself to America. As he had entered into no engagement with the government regarding his future line of conduct, he made his expatriation the means of forwarding, in the most effective manner, the designs he had at heart. He left Dublin for Philadelphia on the 20th of May, 1795. One of his first acts, after arriving, was to present to the French Minister there resident a memorial on the state of Ireland. During the remaining months of the year letters from his old friends came pouring in on him, describing the brightening prospects of the cause at home, and urging him to proceed to the French capital and impress upon the Directory the policy of despatching at once an expedition to ensure the success of the Irish revolutionary movement.

Tone was not the man to disregard such representations. He had at the time a fair prospect of securing a comfortable independence in America, but with the full concurrence of his heroic wife, who had accompanied him across the Atlantic, he sacrificed those chances and resumed the perilous duties of an Irish patriot. On the 1st of January, 1796, he left New York for Paris to try what he could do as a diplomatist for the cause of Ireland. Arrived at the French capital, he had his business communicated to the Directory through the medium of an Irish gentleman, named Madgett, and also by memorial, representing always that the landing of a force of 20,000 men in Ireland, with a supply of arms for the peasantry, would ensure the separation of Ireland from England. Not satisfied with the slow progress he was thus achieving, he went on the 24th of February direct to the Luxemburg Palace, and sought and obtained an interview with the War Minister, the celebrated Carnot, the "organizer of victory." The Minister received him well, listened attentively to his statements, discussed his project with him, and appeared much impressed with the prospects it presented. The result was that on the 16th of December in the same year, a splendid expedition sailed from Brest for Ireland. It consisted of seventeen sail of the line, thirteen frigates and fifteen transports, with some smaller craft, and had on board 15,000 troops, with a large supply of arms for the Irish patriots. Tone himself, who had received the rank of Adjutant-General in the French service, was on board one of the vessels.

Had this force been disembarked on the sh.o.r.es of Ireland, it is hardly possible to doubt that the separation of this country from England would have been effected. But the expedition was unfortunate from the outset.

It was scattered on the voyage during a gale of wind, and the Admiral's vessel, with Hoche, the Commander, on board, was separated from the others. A portion of the expedition entered the magnificent Bay of Bantry and waited there several days in expectation of being rejoined by the vessel containing the Admiral and Commander; but they waited in vain. Tone vehemently urged that a landing should be effected with the forces then at hand--some 6,500 men--but the officers procrastinated, time was lost, the wind which had been blowing from the east (that is out the harbour) rose to a perfect hurricane, and on the 27th and 28th of the month the vessels cut their cables and made the best of their way for France.

This was a terrible blow to the hopes of the Irish organizer. Rage and sadness filled his heart by turns as the fierce storm blew his vessel out of the bay and across the sea to the land which he had left under such favourable auspices. But yet he did not resign himself to despair.

As the patient spider renews her web again and again after it has been torn asunder, so did this indefatigable patriot set to work to repair the misfortune that had occurred, and to build up another project of a.s.sistance for his unfortunate country. His perseverance was not unproductive of results. The Batavian or Dutch Republic, then in alliance with France, took up the project that had failed in the Bay of Bantry. In the month of July, 1797, they had a.s.sembled in the Texel an expedition for the invasion of Ireland, nearly, if not quite, as formidable in men and ships as that which had left Brest in the previous year. Tone was on board the flag ship, even more joyous and hopeful than he had been on the preceding occasion. But again, as if by some extraordinary fatality, the weather interposed an obstacle to the realization of the design. The vessels were ready for sea, the troops were on board, nothing was wanted but a slant of wind to enable the fleet to get out. But for five weeks it continued to blow steadily in the adverse direction. The supplies ran low; the patience of the officers, and of the government, became exhausted--the troops were disembarked and the project abandoned! The second failure in a matter of such weight and importance was a heavy blow to the heart of the brave Tone. Elaborate and costly efforts like those which had ended so poorly, he felt could not often be repeated; the drift of the war was cutting out other work for the fleets and armies of France and her allies, and the unwelcome conviction began to settle darkly on his mind that never again would he see such a vision of hope for dear Ireland as that which had shone before him on those two occasions, and vanished in doubt and gloom.

Yet there was no need to despair. a.s.surances reached Tone every day that the defeat and humiliation of England was a settled resolve of the French Government, one which they would never abandon. And for a time everything seemed to favour the notion that a direct stroke at the heart of England was intended. In the latter part of 1797 the Directory ordered the formation of "The Army of England," the command of which was given to General Buonaparte. Tone's heart again beat high with hope, for now matters looked more promising than ever. He was in constant communication with some of the chief officers of the expedition, and in the month of December he had several interviews with Buonaparte himself, which however he could hardly consider of a satisfactory nature. On the 20th of May, 1798, General Buonaparte embarked on board the fleet at Toulon and sailed off--not for Ireland or England, but for Egypt.

On the Irish leaders at home these repeated disappointments fell with terrible effect. The condition of the country was daily growing more critical. The government, now thoroughly roused and alarmed, and persuaded that the time for "vigorous measures" had arrived, was grappling with the conspiracy in all directions. Still those men would, if they could, have got the people to possess their souls in patience and wait for aid from abroad before unfurling the banner of insurrection; for they were constant in their belief that without the presence of a disciplined army on Irish soil to consolidate their strength and direct it, a revolutionary effort of the Irish people could end only in disaster. But the government had reasons of their own for wishing to set an Irish rebellion afoot at this time, and they took measures to precipitate the rising. The arrest of the delegates at the house of Oliver Bond in Dublin, and the capture of Lord Edward Fitzgerald contributed to this end; but these things the country might have peacably endured if no more dreadful trial had been put upon it.

What could not be endured was the system of riot and outrage, and murder, to which the unfortunate peasantry were then given over. Words fail to describe its cruelty and its horrors. It was too much for human nature to bear. On the 23rd of May, three days after Buonaparte had sailed from Toulon for Alexandria, the Irish insurrection broke out. The news of the occurrence created the most intense excitement among the Irish refugees then in Paris. Tone rushed to and fro to the Directory and to the generals, pleading for the despatch of some a.s.sistance to his struggling countrymen. Various plans were suggested and taken into consideration, but while time was being wasted in this way, the military forces of the British Government were rapidly suppressing the insurrection of the unarmed and undisciplined Irish peasantry. In this condition of affairs a gallant but rash and indiscreet French officer, General Humbert, resolved that he would commit the Directory to action, by starting at once with a small force for the coast of Ireland. Towards the middle of August, calling together the merchants and magistrates of Roch.e.l.le, "he forced them to advance a small sum of money, and all that he wanted, on military requisition; and embarking on board a few frigates and transports with 1,000 men, 1,000 spare muskets, 1,000 guineas, and a few pieces of artillery, he compelled the captains to set sail for the most desperate attempt which is, perhaps, recorded in history." Three Irishmen were on board the fleet--Matthew Tone, brother to Theobald, Bartholomew Teeling, and Sullivan, an officer in the French service, who was enthusiastically devoted to the Irish cause, and had rendered much aid to his patriotic countrymen in France. Humbert landed at Killala, routed with his little handful of men a large force of the royal troops, and held his ground until General Lake, with 20,000 men marched against him. After a resistance sufficient to maintain the honour of the French arms, Humbert's little force surrendered as prisoners of war. The Irish who had joined his standard were shown no mercy. The peasantry were cruelly butchered. Of those who had accompanied him from France, Sullivan, who was able to pa.s.s as a Frenchman, escaped; Teeling and Matthew Tone were brought in irons to Dublin, tried, and executed. The news of Humbert's expedition and the temporary success that had attended it created much excitement in France, and stirred up the Directory to attempt something for Ireland more worthy of the fame and power of the French nation, and more in keeping with their repeated promises to the leaders of the Irish movement. But their fleet was at the time greatly reduced, and their resources were in a state of disorganization. They mustered for the expedition only one sail of the line and eight small frigates, commanded by Commodore Bompart, conveying 5,000 men under the leadership of General Hardy. On board the Admiral's vessel, which was named the Hoche, was the heroic Theobald Wolfe Tone. He knew this expedition had no chance of success, but he had all along declared, "that if the government sent only a corporal's guard, he felt it his duty to go along with them." The vessels sailed on the 20th of September, 1798; it was not till the 11th October that they arrived off Lough Sw.i.l.l.y--simultaneously with an English squadron that had been on the look out for them. The English ships were about equal in number to the French, but were of a larger cla.s.s, and carried a much heavier armament.

The French Admiral directed some of his smaller craft to endeavour to escape by means of their light draught of water, and he counselled Tone to transfer himself to that one of them which had the best chance of getting away. The Frenchmen, he observed, would be made prisoners of war, but for the Irish rebel a worse fate was reserved if he should fall into the hand of his enemies. But to this suggestion the n.o.ble-hearted Tone declined to accede. "Shall it be said," he replied, "that I fled while the French were fighting the battles of my country." In a little time the Hoche was surrounded by four sail of the line and one frigate, who poured their shot into her upon all sides. During six hours she maintained the unequal combat, fighting "till her masts and rigging were cut away, her scuppers flowed with blood, her wounded filled the c.o.c.kpit, her shattered ribs yawned at each new stroke, and let in five feet of water in the hold, her rudder was carried off, and she floated a dismantled wreck on the water; her sails and cordage hung in shreds, nor could she reply with a single gun from her dismounted batteries to the unabating cannonade of the enemy." During the action Tone commanded one of the batteries "and fought with the utmost desperation, as if he was courting death." But, as often has happened in similiar cases, death seemed to shun him, and he was reserved for a more tragic fate.

The French officers who survived the action, and had been made prisoners of war, were, some days subsequently, invited to breakfast with the Earl of Cavan, who commanded in the district in which they had been landed.

Tone, who up to that time, had escaped recognition, was one of the party, and sat undistinguished among them, until Sir George Hill, who had been a fellow-student of his in Trinity College, entered the room and accosted him by his name. This was done, not inadvertently, but with the intention of betraying him. In a moment he was in the hands of a party of military and police who were in waiting for him in the next room. Seeing that they were about to put him in fetters, he complained indignantly of the offering of such an insult to the uniform which he wore, and the rank--that of Chef de Brigade--which he bore in the French army. He cast off his regimentals, protesting that they should not be so sullied, and then, offering his limbs to the irons, exclaimed--"For the cause which I have embraced, I feel prouder to wear these chains, than if I were decorated with the Star and Garter of England." He was hurried off to Dublin, and though the ordinary tribunals were sitting at the time, and the military tribunals could have no claim on him, as he had never belonged to the English army, he was put on his trial before a court-martial. This was absolutely an illegal proceeding, but his enemies were impatient for his blood, and would not brook the chances and the delays of the ordinary procedure of law. On the 10th of November, 1798, his trial, if such it might be called, took place in one of the Dublin barracks. He appeared before the Court "dressed," says the _Dublin Magazine_ for November, 1798, "in the French uniform: a large c.o.c.ked hat, with broad gold lace and the tri-coloured c.o.c.kade; a blue uniform coat, with gold-embroidered collar and two large gold epaulets; blue pantaloons, with gold-laced garters at the knees; and short boots, bound at the tops with gold lace." In his bearing there was no trace of excitement. "The firmness and cool serenity of his whole deportment,"

writes his son, "gave to the awestruck a.s.sembly the measure of his soul," The proceedings of the Court are detailed in the following report, which we copy from the "Life of Tone," by his son, published at Washington, U.S., in 1826:--

The members of the Court having been sworn, the Judge Advocate called on the prisoner to plead guilty or not guilty to the charge of having acted traitorously and hostilely against the King. Tone replied:--

"I mean not to give the court any useless trouble, and wish to spare them the idle task of examining witnesses. I admit all the facts alleged, and only request leave to read an address which I have prepared for this occasion."

Colonel DALY--"I must warn the prisoner that, in acknowledging those _facts_, he admits, to his prejudice, that he has acted _traitorously_ against his Majesty. Is such his intention?"

TONE--"Stripping this charge of the technicality of its terms, it means, I presume, by the word traitorously, that I have been found in arms against the soldiers of the King in my native country. I admit this accusation in its most extended sense, and request again to explain to the court the reasons and motives of my conduct."

The court then observed they would hear his address, provided he kept himself within the bounds of moderation.

Tone rose, and began in these words--"Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Court-Martial, I mean not to give you the trouble of bringing judicial proof to convict me legally of having acted in hostility to the government of his Britannic Majesty in Ireland. I admit the fact.

From my earliest youth I have regarded the connection between Great Britain and Ireland as the curse of the Irish nation, and felt convinced that, whilst it lasted, this country could never be free nor happy. My mind has been confirmed in this opinion by the experience of every succeeding year, and the conclusions which I have drawn from every fact before my eyes. In consequence, I was determined to employ all the powers which my individual efforts could move, in order to separate the two countries. That Ireland was not able of herself to throw off the yoke, I knew; I therefore sought for aid wherever it was to be found. In honourable poverty I rejected offers which, to a man in my circ.u.mstances, might be considered highly advantageous. I remained faithful to what I thought the cause of my country, and sought in the French Republic an ally to rescue three millions of my countrymen from--"

The President here interrupted the prisoner, observing that this language was neither relevant to the charge, nor such as ought to be delivered in a public court.

A Member said it seemed calculated only to inflame the minds of a certain description of people (the United Irishmen), many of whom might be present, and that the court could not suffer it.

The JUDGE ADVOCATE said--"If Mr. Tone meant this paper to be laid before his Excellency in way of _extenuation_, it must have quite a contrary effect, if the foregoing part was suffered to remain." The President wound up by calling on the prisoner to hesitate before proceeding further in the same strain.

TONE then continued--"I believe there is nothing in what remains for me to say which can give any offence; I mean to express my feelings and grat.i.tude towards the Catholic body, in whose cause I was engaged."

PRESIDENT--"That seems to have nothing to say to the charge against you, to which you are only to speak. If you have anything to offer in defence or extenuation of the charge, the court will hear you, but they beg you will confine yourself to that subject."

TONE--"I shall, then, confine myself to some points relative to my connection with the French army. Attached to no party in the French Republic--without interest, without money, without intrigue--the openness and integrity of my views raised me to a high and confidential rank in its armies. I obtained the confidence of the Executive Directory, the approbation of my generals, and I will venture to add, the esteem and affection of my brave comrades. When I review these circ.u.mstances, I feel a secret and internal consolation which no reverse of fortune, no sentence in the power of this court to inflict, can deprive me of, or weaken in any degree. Under the flag of the French Republic I originally engaged with a view to save and liberate my own country. For that purpose I have encountered the chances of war amongst strangers; for that purpose I repeatedly braved the terrors of the ocean, covered, as I knew it to be, with the triumphant fleets of that power which it was my glory and my duty to oppose. I have sacrificed all my views in life; I have courted poverty; I have left a beloved wife unprotected, and children whom I adored fatherless. After such a sacrifice, in a cause which I have always considered--conscientiously considered--as the cause of justice and freedom, it is no great effort, at this day, to add the sacrifice of my life. But I hear it said that this unfortunate country has been a prey to all sorts of horrors. I sincerely lament it. I beg, however, it may be remembered that I have been absent four years from Ireland. To me these sufferings can never be attributed. I designed by fair and open war to procure the separation of the two countries. For open war I was prepared, but instead of that a system of private a.s.sa.s.sination has taken place. I repeat, whilst I deplore it, that it is not chargeable on me. Atrocities, it seems, have been committed on both sides. I do not less deplore them. I detest them from my heart; and to those who know my character and sentiments I may safely appeal for the truth of this a.s.sertion; with them I need no justification. In a case like this success is everything. Success, in the eyes of the vulgar, fixes its merits. Washington succeeded, and Kosciusko failed. After a combat n.o.bly sustained--combat which would have excited the respect and sympathy of a generous enemy--my fate has been to become a prisoner, to the eternal disgrace of those who gave the orders. I was brought here in irons like a felon. I mention this for the sake of others; for me, I am indifferent to it.

I am aware of the fate which awaits me, and scorn equally the tone of complaint and that of supplication. As to the connection between this country and Great Britain, I repeat it--all that has been imputed to me (words, writings, and actions), I here deliberately avow. I have spoken and acted with reflection and on principle, and am ready to meet the consequences. Whatever be the sentence of the court, I am prepared for it. Its members will surely discharge their duty--I shall take care not to be wanting in mine."

The court having asked if he wished to make any further observation,