support us in this matter as you have done on former occasions ... It is needless to point out how staunch Wales has stood to the National cause of Ireland.
P.S. Please bear in mind that I travelled 1300 miles to vote for Second Reading of Home Rule Bill in 1893 – G.O. Morgan.9
***
THE AMNESTY CAMPAIGN
Constitutional nationalists, including Redmond’s father, had engaged in amnesty campaigns for imprisoned revolutionaries since the 1860s. Redmond’s efforts on behalf of members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) in British jails played an important role in the maintenance of the credibility of his faction, and of constitutional political action in general, in the eyes of the ‘advanced’ nationalists who had flocked to Parnell’s side in his final days. The letter here from John O’Leary, a founding member of the IRB though opposed to terrorist methods, criticises the tendency of amnesty rhetoric to merge into approval of violence. The two most notable convicts aided by Redmond were John Daly and Henry Wilson (the alias of Thomas Clarke), both IRB men imprisoned since 1883 on charges of plotting to bomb London. Clarke was to be the principal long-term planner of the Easter rebellion of 1916, which did much to destroy the Home Rule project and Redmond’s career.
FROM E. LEIGH PEMBERTON, HOME OFFICE
Whitehall, 16 February 1892:
I am directed by Mr. Secretary Matthews [Secretary to Home Secretary Sir Matthew Ridley] to say, in reply to your letter of the 15th instant asking for permission to visit John Daly on Thursday next and to see James Egan on the same day, that instructions will be sent to allow you as the legal adviser of Daly to have an interview with Daly on Thursday at Portland … on the express condition that the interview is strictly confined to the legal business of Daly, and not made use of for discussing prison treatment or prison discipline. Similar … with regard to Egan on this occasion ...10
FROM HENRY MORONEY
St. Ignatius Rd., Dublin, 22 November 1892:
[I write] to you on behalf of the ‘Dublin Invincibles’ who are at present confined in Maryboro’ Prison. What I want to know… is why these men are excluded from the Amnesty question or why is it that our representatives in Parliament do not think of paying them a visit … I admit it was a terrible conspiracy, but after all what was it compared to the treachery England used against us? ... They are ‘Political Prisoners’ … they must be released …
I wrote to Mr. Harrington and you Mr. Redmond on one former occasion and I am surprised that my letter was not even acknowledged.11
FROM HORACE WEST (SECRETARY TO H.H. ASQUITH, HOME SECRETARY)
Whitehall, 25 February 1893:
I am desired by Mr. Asquith to acknowledge your letter of yesterday’s date, informing him of your desire to visit the prisoners Daly and Wilson at Portland, some time next week, and to say that instructions will be given to the Governor of the Prison to afford you the usual facilities.12
FROM H.H. ASQUITH, HOME SECRETARY
Whitehall, 20 June 1893:
I am informed by the prison authorities that in the course of your recent visit to Daly you gave him pen and paper, that he wrote for some time, and that you took the document away with you.
Probably you were not aware that such a proceeding is entirely contrary to prison rules, but it is obvious that a prisoner cannot be allowed to take advantage of the privilege of seeing a legal adviser to make any written communication which may be used outside, and which has not passed under the eyes of the Governor.13
FROM JOHN O’LEARY
‘Lonsdale’, St. Laurence Rd., Clontarf, Dublin, 25 October 1893:
… [Regarding the content of your speech] and what you were reported to have said … about the Clerkenwell explosions which was undoubtedly a Fenian act, if scarcely (though not of the dynamite nature at all) a Fenian method …
I fear you are likely to burn your fingers over this amnesty business. I think it cannot serve the prisoners, nor any good cause at all, that at the meetings the use of dynamite is often approved of and nearly always in a sense excused.
There are to my mind two unassailable arguments for amnesty; first, that there was no fairness about the trials, and secondly, that, even if (or when) guilty, the men should not be punished more severely than the undoubted Walsall dynamitards.
As to the plea of innocence, I fear that can hold good for few if any, and I know it can’t hold good for most. I know things are not easy for you or your party, but you may make them more difficult. I incline to think the tenants are a better card to play against your adversaries, though here again the question is made very difficult by the part mad action of O’Brien and Dillon …14
FROM KENELM E. DIGBY [PERMANENT UNDER-SECRETARY], HOME OFFICE
Whitehall, 4 December 1895:
With reference to your letter of the 1st inst. respecting the case of the Treason Felony convicts, I am directed by the Secretary of State to inform you that he has the cases of these men under his consideration, and has ordered a special medical inquiry into the health of all the Treason Felony convicts in Portland, which he desires to have before him before coming to a final decision.
An order permitting you to visit Daly, Wilson and Dalton is forwarded herewith.15
Notes in Redmond’s hand on prisoners, undated:
Drs. Maudsley’s and Nicholson’s report about May ’95 on Portland prisoners.
Wilson [Thomas Clarke]: Heart action shows symptoms of valvular disease but condition not attributable to imprisonment. Indigestion ... Sound mind.
Devany: Mentally he is naturally somewhat weak. Good health.
Whitehead: Good bodily health. Though not mentally strong, he is not insane. He seems to have enough cunning in his disposition to make him feign insanity as he is reputed to have done.
Gallagher: Health good. Lost 35 lbs. Says he has no physical ailment. He is not insane. His answers throughout were quiet and rational and his demeanour, tho’ dejected and somewhat sullen, natural and composed. In our opinion his mental condition exhibits nothing more than the natural effects of imprisonment upon a man of his education and temperament 45 years old.
Duff: Insane.
Dalton: Sound in mind and body.
McDermot: Ditto
Flanigan: Ditto
Burton: … General health not affected.
Featherstone: Circulation weak and sluggish.
Daly: Complained in exaggerated fashion of a variety of ailments. Good health and sound mind.
Generally none of prisoners injuriously or unduly affected in mind or body by imprisonment.16
FROM JOHN DALY, TREASON FELONY PRISONER AT PORTLAND
22 June 1896:
(written on back of leaflet outlining regulations regarding communications between prisoners
