He regarded O’Mahony as one of the finest Irishmen that he had the pleasure of meeting, and describing the Fenian leader he claimed that: ‘He made the impression on me that he was a man proud of his name and of his race. And I liked him for that.’4
While O’Mahony was in Ireland, back in America, Terence Bellew MacManus a veteran of the 1848 Rebellion, originally from County Fermanagh, had died in San Francisco. Buried in Calvary Cemetery, San Francisco, it was decided by the Fenian Brotherhood that he should be exhumed and buried in Ireland. This decision was based on a calculation that the MacManus funeral could galvanise the Fenian base in Ireland and prove a means to radicalise and educate the people as to the concept of republicanism as an alternative to British administration of Ireland. It also provided an opportunity to establish a cult of the Dead Rebel, which in turn would provide an opportunity to recruit thousands of Irishmen to the cause of Fenianism, thus revitalising the movement. Arriving in New York City, prior to his departure to Ireland, Bellew MacManus’ remains were greeted by huge crowds of Irish-Americans, and his was one of the largest funeral cortege’s seen in that city’s history. As part of the planning of the Bellew MacManus funeral it had been decided that his remains were to be buried in Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin. James Stephens, in his capacity as Chief Organiser of the Irish Republic, had personally written to O’Donovan Rossa, asking him to meet the body at Cork. Stephens also wanted O’Donovan Rossa to accompany MacManus’s remains to Dublin, and the Cork Fenian eagerly accepted. O’Donovan Rossa took his place in the delegation accompanying MacManus’ remains, and when the body arrived in Cork there were crowds of onlookers to witness the arrival. As the body came in quite a stir was caused when a little boy had been seen climbing up a nearby ships flagpole to remove an overlooking British Union flag. Briefly staying in Cork O’Donovan Rossa helped to put the MacManus’ coffin on a train for Dublin and like the other delegates accompanying the remains, he was armed with a pistol. Each delegate had been given a pistol due to a rumour that some people within the IRB organisation would attempt to commandeer the body and use the seizure as a means to rally the people to a premature insurrection.
With the train moving apace from Cork en route to Dublin, there was a stop of seven minutes at Limerick Junction. Here, the anxiety was palpable for O’Donovan Rossa and the delegates accompanying the body. Knowing that the train was carrying Bellew MacManus, hundreds of onlookers had arrived on the platform and thronged fields surrounding the train station. In anticipation of this stop at Limerick Junction, Stephens had ordered local IRB men to be at the station to protect the body and the delegates in the event of an IRB mutiny. With anxiety growing, and the train due to depart Limerick Junction, Stephens shouted out of the window, calling on those assembled to kneel and pray out of respect to Bellew MacManus. The assembled crowd began to recite the Catholic pater and ave for the dead enmasse. As it was in Cork and Limerick Junction, in Dublin, hundreds of onlookers had turned out to see the remains of Bellew MacManus. O’Donovan Rossa was amazed by a city ‘ablaze with torchlights’, in the Young Irelander’s honour.5
A numerous body of persons, admirers of the deceased were present at the Knightsbridge [sic – Kingsbridge] terminus, and when the train moved toward the platform, the entire assemblage, with uncovered heads, awaited the opening of the van containing the deceased… The van containing the body was then opened, and the coffin, which was encased in a heavy square wooden box, was removed on the shoulders of a number of men to the hearse prepared for it.6
All of this was in defiance to the Roman Catholic Hierarchy, who, led by Archbishop of Dublin Paul Cullen, had condemned the funeral and forbid Catholic clergy from taking part in any funeral service for the Young Irelander. Archbishop Cullen even went so far as to deny the use of Dublin’s main Catholic church, the Pro-Cathedral, and was immovable in his opposition. Archbishop Cullen’s opposition to the funeral was no surprise: he had earlier been a vehement opponent of the ecumenical Young Irelanders and as a member of the Roman Catholic Hierarchy, he was bound to oppose secret societies such as the Fenians. Considering that the archbishop would not allow MacManus’ remains into any Catholic church in Dublin, the funeral committee had secured the lecture theatre of the Mechanics Institute on Lower Abbey Street, the present site of the Abbey Theatre, to house the body before burial. With the remains of Bellew MacManus now in Dublin City, O’Donovan Rossa took his place as one of the Cork delegates accompanying the body to Abbey Street:
The hearse, preceded by six torch bearers, was immediately followed by Captain M.C. Smith and other members of the Cork and American committees. Then followed about 300 persons, on either side of whom torch bearers walked. The melancholy cortege proceeded along the Quays with a slow and solemn pace. The appearance of torches and the orderly bearing of those who followed the hearse was very impressive and imposing.7
In contravention to the Roman Catholic Hierarchy, the Fenians had arranged for people to come and pay their respects to MacManus while he lay in rest in the Mechanics Institute, and despite religious opposition, thousands of people visited the coffin.8 Inside the Mechanics Institute, the room had been decked in black and the coffin had been placed on a table in the centre of the room, surrounded by a guard of honour, a standing crucifix at the top of the casket and two candles, providing a ‘sombre and peculiar effect’.9 At one o’clock on the 11 November, MacManus was brought from the Mechanics Institute on Abbey Street in a slow procession to Glasnevin Cemetery. Taking a meandering route, the procession passed by several sites associated with Irish republicans, including St Catherine’s Church, Thomas Street, opposite where Robert Emmet had been executed in 1803. Taking over four hours, the funeral procession, followed by thousands of people, eventually arrived at Glasnevin Cemetery. Defying Archbishop Cullen’s dictate that no Catholic priest was to preside over the funeral of Bellew MacManus, Fr Patrick Lavelle, a radical nationalist and respected priest from County Mayo, known as the Patriot Priest of Partry, delivered the funeral service. Fr Lavelle eulogised all who had attended the procession and had been involved with its organisation. He commented how the procession and the show of support for Bellew MacManus had ‘told more forcibly on our hereditary foes and oppressors than any language which that any Irish Priest or patriot could pronounce’. Lavelle went further, and in a remarkable outburst from a Catholic priest, exclaimed: ‘Yesterday, that sarcophagus was the symbol of Erin’s grave. Tomorrow it will be her resurrection.’10 Attending the funeral in Glasnevin, and listening attentively to Lavelle, O’Donovan Rossa could only agree, and left knowing that the funeral was laying the ground for the emergence of a serious challenge to British rule in Ireland: ‘The MacManus funeral tended very much to increase the strength of the Fenian movement. Men from Leinster, Ulster, Munster, and Connaught met in Dublin who never met each other before. They talked of the old cause, and of the national spirit in their respective provinces, and each went back to his home, strengthened for more vigorous work.’11
In January 1863 there had been a rebellion in Poland against the Russian monarchy, and by March of that year, O’Donovan Rossa, with Morty Moynahan and Jerry Crowley, had set his mind to organising a sympathy rally with Polish insurgents in Skibbereen. Once again, O’Donovan Rossa was at odds with the local police, and alongside comrades within the IRB, he actively prepared republican banners and torchlights.12 Becoming a key organiser of this rally through Skibbereen town centre that would involve marching bands and public speaking, O’Donovan Rossa believed that if a large number of people came out it could be perceived as ‘a meeting of organised hostility against England’, bringing the community together in a display of strength.13 In preparation for the rally it had been decided that the marchers were to be properly stewarded, and handbills were produced calling on the people to show no grievance to any police officer observing the parade on the basis that they were Irishmen in uniform who were forced by circumstance to serve the Crown. While O’Donovan Rossa did not agree with this sentiment, the local IRB had produced the flyers for police dissemination so as to avoid potential problems. Learning of the plan to have a rally through the town, police numbers were consolidated and the marchers were confronted by a large body of police led by Charles O’Connell.
O’Connell immediately instructed the marchers to disperse and met with O’Donovan Rossa and the organising committee, demanding that they call upon their followers to disperse as they were disturbing the peace. Explaining to O’Connell that they were peaceful citizens in support of the Polish struggle against tyranny and had a right to peaceful protest, O’Connell read the Riot