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Life
| b. 3 Sept., Kill [var. Johnstown], Co. Kildare; republican organiser, spanning 1867 and 1916; son of smallholder; moved to Dublin by Famine; ed. evening classes and Catholic Univ.; joined French Foreign Legion for military experience, seeing service in Algeria, 1861-2; returned to Ireland, 1862; orgainised IRB in Naas; asked by James Stephens to recruit for Fenianism in British army; chief organiser of IRB, organiing escape of Stephens from Richmond Prison; arrested 22 Feb. 1866; 15 years sentence; 5 years served in Millbank, Portland and Chatham; |
realised 1871; travelled to New York among ‘Cuba Five’; journalist in Chicagoand New York; joined Clan na Gael; organised escape of Fenians from Fremantle, Australia, on board the whaler Catalpa, 1876; combined with Michael Davitt to propose deal between Clann na Gael and Parnell, known as ‘New Departure’, 1879; fnd. Irish Nation, 1882; supported Harrington’s Plan of Campaign, 1886; opposed the ‘Triangle’ (terrorist wing); fnd. Gaelic American, 1903; drove wedge between England and America; supported Pearse in America; |
main figure behind Irish-American funding of republicanism up to breakdown of relations with de Valera in 1919, breaking over tactics; supported Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1921 as first step; visited Ireland in 1924 for Tailteann Games; The Land of Éire (1822), also The Irish Land League (1882); Recollections of an Irish Rebel (1929). Letters published as John Devoy’s Post Bag, ed. William O’Brien and Desmond Ryan (Dublin 1948); d. 29 Sept., Atlanta city, buried Glasnevin; letters edited by William O’Brien and Desmond Ryan as Devoy’s Post Bag (1948). DIW DIB DIH FDA |
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Works
The Irish Land League, Its Origin, Progress and Consequences (NY: Patterson & Neilson 1882); Recollections of an Irish Rebel, The Fenian Movement ... Personalities and Organisation (NY: Young 1929), and Do. [rep. edn.], ed. S. Ó Luing (Dublin: IUP 1969).
Correspondence, William O’Brien & Desmond Ryan, eds., Devoy’s Post Bag, 2 vols. (London 1948-53) [incls. corr. with Eamon de Valera, et mult. al.].
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Criticism| Biographical studies |
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| General studies |
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See also ‘Devoy’s Post-Bag 1871-1928 / A Broadcast Talk by Cathal O’Shannon’ [pamph. rep. from Liberty, June 1953] - chiefly a commentary on P. S. O’Hegarty’s book; held in William O’Brien Collection, National Library of Ireland [album], PO 115, Item 55.] |
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Commentary
Malcolm Brown, Politics of Irish Literature: From Thomas Davis to W. B. Yeats (London: George Allen & Unwin 1972), calls him ‘a humorless Irish Cato’ who believed that Irish nationalism should make use of every weapon ‘not even excluding the legal’ (p.7).
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References
Seamus Deane, gen. ed., The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing (Derry: Field Day 1991), Vol. 2, selects Recollections of an Irish Rebel [265-75]; 368, BIOG, b. Johnston, Co. Kildare; joined Fenians; enlisted Foreign Legion and spent a year in Algeria, returning to Ireland in 1862; organiser for IRB; recruited British soldiers; chief organiser, 1865; arranged escape of James Stephens from Richmond Prison; sentences to 15 years in 1866; released 1871 on condition of departure for America; journalist; joned Clann na Gael, organised Fenian escapes from Australia; ran anti-British propaganada in support of Davitt and Prnell in his papers Irish Nation and The Gaelic-American; raised funds to Irish Volunteers, 1914; arranged Casement’s contact with German embassy in Washington; supported Treaty, broke with de Valera; d. Atlantic City. [WORKS as supra.]
Roy Foster, Modern Ireland (London: Allen Lane 1988), p.393, bio-note calls him the chief organiser of funding for ‘nationalist projects’ up to split with de Valera.
Doherty & Hickey, A Chronology of Irish History since 1500 (Dublin: Gill & Macmillan 1989), records that those rescued on the Catalpa were Thomas Darragh, Martin Hogan, Michael Harrington, Thomas Hasset, Robert Cranston, and James Wilson; exploit planned by John Devoy and John J. Breslin of Clann na Gael; whaling vessel bought for $5,250, with $13,760 spent equipping it; 202 tons, 90 ft. x 25 ft.; Capt. George S Anthony; sailed from Fremantle, 17 April 1876; resisted attempted boarding by British navy vessel, The Georgette; rescued Fenians landed NY, 19 Aug. 1876; a simultaneous plan to rescue the Fenians hatched by Denis Florence McCarthy and John Walsh, members of the IRB, was abandoned in favour of the Catalpa exploit. (See Seán Ó Luing, Freemantle Mission (Tralee: Anvil Bks. 1965).
Hyland Books (Cat. 219) lists Joseph Clarke, The Story of the Catalpa and the Rescue of the Fenian Prisoners (?1950); also The Rescue of the Military Fenian Prisoners from Australia, with a memoir of John Devoy [n.d.] (Dublin 1929), 16pp.
Books Ireland (Sept. 2003) lists Terence Dooley, The Greatest of the Fenians [... &c.] (Wolfhound Press), previously listed in same source as [prev. listed as Dooley, The Rebel Returns: John Devoy in Ireland (Dublin: Wolfhound Press 2003). 176pp.
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Notes
John Hume refers to ‘John Devoy, editor of The Gaelic-American’ in his Foreign Affairs article (Winter 1979/80), 1980 [FDA3 786].
Donal O’Kelly, Catalpa, Washington Post, first play at Kennedy Centre’s Island: Arts from Ireland’; writer-actor Donal O’Kelly, product of Andrew’s Lane, Dublin; cast as screen-writer who fails to sell a script, which he then enacts solo’; dr. Bairbre Ní Choaimh; stage design by Ben Hennessy; light Nicholas Acton; costumes, Mona Monaghan; score, Trevor Knight; concerns Captain George Antony, who takes the whaler Catalpa to Australia to rescue six Fenians; has promised dying mother of his yng wife never to go to sea again (‘If you break her heart … I’ll haunt you’); similar threats from his wife, should he go to sea (‘You’ll never sail these seas again’). See Washington Post, 19 May 2000, C2.
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