Life [ top ] Works [ top ] Criticism See also Peter Linebaugh, Is This the Place?: On the Bicentennial of the Hanging of Thomas Russell, in Counterpunch, ed. Alexander Cockburn & Jeffrey St. Clair (21 Oct. 2003) [online & infra]. [ top ] Commentary Rosamund Jacob, The Rise of the United Irishmen 1791-94 (1927), dock speech, advising those gentlemen who have all the wealth and all the power of the country in their hands to attend to the grievances of their tenants; From the time I could observe and reflect I perceived that there were two kinds of laws - the laws of the State and the laws of God - frequently clashing with each other; by the latter kind I have always endeavoured to regulate my conduct. The author adds, it was true of him in a greater degree than almost any other Irishman of his time. (p.256 [END]) [ top ] C. J. Woods, ed., Journals and Memoirs of Thomas Russell, 1791-95, with a foreword by Marianne Elliott (Dublin: IAP 1991) 199pp., index; FOREWORD, He was one of those favoured individuals, recalled Mary Ann McCracken, whom one cannot pass in the street without being guilty of the rudeness of staring in the face while passing, and turning round to look at the receding figure. (Quoted from Mary McNeill, the Life of Mary Ann McCracken 1770-1866 (Dublin 1960) [7]; Elliott says no biography has been written but perhaps overlooks the adulatory picture of him in A Prisoner of His Word, by Louis Bennett; His hand-writing is wellnigh illegible. Marianne Elliott has called in dyslexic [see p.22, n.17, infra.]; ... the sense of helplessness progressively relieved by the recognition that sectors of the lower orders had already been revolutionised [9]; entered popular balladry in Florence Wilsons The man from God-knows-where (Florence M. Wilson, The coming of the earls and other poems, Dublin 1918, pp.9-12). EDITORS PREFACE: Journals little used on account of disordered and illegible state; only modern biography Séamus N Mac Giolla Easpaig [Rev Br. James Norbert Glespen], viz, Tomás Ruiséil (Cló Morainn 1958); Bibl., Charlemont MSS, The manuscripts and correspondence of James, first earl of Charlemont, 2 vols, Historical Manuscripts Commission, London, 1891-4; McDowell, RB, The Personnel of the Dublin society of United Irishmen; in Irish Historical Studies, ii, no.5 (Mar. 1940), pp.12-53; R. R. Madden, The United Irishmen, their lives and times, 1st series in 2 vols (London 1842); 2nd series in 2 vols. (London 1843); 3rd series in 3 vols. (Dublin 1846); revised ed. in 4 vols. (Dublin 1857-60). Introduction: b. 21 Nov. in townland of Drommahane in parish of Kilshannig, Co. Cork; son of John Russell, a lieutenant in the 83rd Foot, and a Catholic mother, née OKennedy, from Tipperary; one of five children; soon moved to Durrow, Co.Kilkenny, and to Dublin where his father held an office as caption of invalids in the Royal Kilmainham Hosp.; joined the 100th Foot in Indian, and attached to 52nd Foot, serving on the Malabar coast; met Tone in the public gallery of the Irish house of commons, 2 July 1790; commissioned to 64th foot, garrisoned in Belfast, in August 1790; sold his ensigncy in July 1791 as a result of debts incurred when Thomas Attwood Digges, his enthusiastic informant on American democracy, defaulted on the bail that Russell provided for him; frequently travelled to Dublin during 1790-91l; probably assited Tone with his pamphlet, An argument on behalf of the Catholics (Aug. 1791); seneschal of the manor court of Dungannon, through patronage of the Knoxes of Dungannon; stayed with McDonnell in Belfast during 1793, following his fathers death; appointed librarian of Belfast Society for Promoting Knowledge (Linen Hall Library), Jan. 1794; in June 1795, planned armed uprising with French assistance; Tone departing to France in June 1796, he issued on 12 Sept. 1796 his pamphlet, A letter to the people of Ireland on the present situation in the country; surrendered to a warrant for arrest 16 Sept., and refused to give sureties of good behaviour; detained in Newgate Prison, Dublin, until March 1799, when he was transferred to Fort George in north Scotland; released in 1802 on condition of exile; reunited with Hamilton and met Emmet on the continent; rebel commander in Ulster, 1803; arrested at the house of Daniel Muley, gunsmith, in Parliament St., Dublin, 9th Sept. 1803; tried, convicted, and and hanged for high treason, 21 Oct. 1803. Bibl., Sketch of the life of Thomas Russell, in Ulster Magazine, i (1830), unfinished; Thomas Crofton Croker and Samuel McSkimins deprecatory, anonymous and spurious Secret history of the Irish insurrection of 1803 in Frasers Magazine, xiv (July-Dec. 1836), pp.546-67; R. R. Maddens memoir in The United Irishmen (3rd ser. London 1846), ii,137-283; Robert Dunlops account in Dictionary of National Biography (1st imp. vol. xlix, 1897; corr. imp. vol. xvii 1909); John Gray, “Millenial vision, Thomas Russell reassessed, in Linen Hall Review, vi. no. 1 (spring 1989); Brendan Clifford, Thomas Russell and Belfast (Belfast 1988); The place of Thomas Russell in the United Irish movement, in Hugh Gough and David Dickson, eds., Ireland and the French Revolution (Dublin 1990), pp.83-100; and see also studies of the United Irish movement by Charles Dickson, Mary McNeill, R. B. McDowell, and Marianne Elliott; The Sirr Collection of papers at TCD were presented by his elder son, Rev. Joseph DArcy Sirr, at some time between Jan. 1841 (when he died) and Feb. 1843. His pocket books were first used by McDowell in an Hermethena article of May 1939, and more extensively in his Irish Public Opinion, 1750-1800 (1944); while his transcription was used by McDermott in Wolfe Tone; .. his avocation was peripatetic prophet of revolution ... (p.30; see text, infra). Sean Kearney, review of James Quinn, Thomas Russell: Soul on Fire, in Fortnight (April 2003): I believed until now that Russell like Tone had a broader, wiser vision of an Ireland tha cold overcome ignorance, poverty, sectarianism, and a thousand other evils. Alas, the man who emerges from these pages is a confused[,] religious fundamentalism, who was probably a manic-depressive or possibly a meglomaniac. All this it seems, arose from a belief in the doctrine of the millenium, which accrdoing to Scripture, predicts a thousand years of justice and harmony to precede the end of the world. (p.28.) [ top ] Quotations [ top ] Journals and Memoirs of Thomas Russell, 1791-95, ed C. J. Woods, with a foreword by Marianne Elliott (Dublin: IAP 1991), index; THE NOTEBOOK, 1. is a kind of Querist, re. the superannuated [i.e., elderly], .. whether small praemiums to those wo educate such a number of would not more efficiently prevent the murder of infants than any such instittion as the foundli[ng]; whether the badging [of] the paupers in each county, city and parish would not effectually prevenet their becoming a nuisance in any place. [36] 2. Religion, It was not supported by Tyranny but Tyranny endeavourd to support itself by perverting it from its purposes and debasing its purity. [37] 3. Pearse, the disappointed inventor. [March1791] Burke contends for the states not having any right whatsoever over the property of individuals. The French seem to hold otherwise. ... Private property is above power [in England]. In France absolute power is supposed in the nation. That must be exercised by some small body. An individual may be obnoxious to them and what is his security? 4. On tanning bark. Reports speaking to Grattan about the issue, and Grattans saying, he was fully possessed with the great advantages of it [scheme to inport bark as ballast] and told me he had spoken of it to Sir John Parnel [sic], who sayd our offering a bounty might or would offend the people of England and therefore it would not be done. There is a good government and a precious rascal for Chancellor of the Exchequer. March 1791 [46]; MORE, Sit til 2, then go to all the [w]hores in town ... We sit till near 3. then ramble through the town as the night before. [April 1791] [50] In the evening Hall and I walk in quest of game. Meet a girl of Coates the hairdresser. She introduces me into the house of her master. Stay till near eleven. Near being detected. In my return to the barack fall over a heap of dirt. Find a party after supper. Sit with them till late. [51] NOTE, Russells arguments in defence of Catholics include a)that the descendents of those dispossessed are extinct or too abject to claim, and b) that many Catholics have Protestants in their power already by money lending and would not overturn the mortgages (insuperable bar to any revolution in property] [54]; the laws relating to popery were enacted form experiencing the political evils incident to that beliefe [Catholicism]. Those evils were perhaps temporary and from the extinction of the Stuart family are not now to be apprehended. Yet a state should rather be cautious than confident and without being well assured of the contrary will not give power to the Roman Cathlics to begin fresh disturbances. If they wish to participate [in] the benefits of the constitution they should give some security that they will not endeavour to subvert it. ... I would not be understood to have myself the smallest doubt of the loyalty of the Catholicks. I have none. Their loyalty has been established too well to need any panegyrick ... [55] ... I know no good results from these laws, either political or religious, but many evils. [56]; Notes on Lelands history, Note the people of Wicklow troublesome from their vicinity to the capital and strength of their country (Leland, Vol. 2, p.16); Russell notes details about the balance of Catholics and Protestants in the Irish parliament during the viceroyalty of Strafford, remarking, Strafford ballances the partys and by introducing officers, etc., could make [57] either party preponderate. It does not appear that the Catholicks made any attempt to change the establishd religion. [58] 11. Discusses dreams of his mother as an omen of misfortune, suggested by his brothers experience when desperately wounded in Canada, but disproved by his own dream regarding his father, in June 1792, If he had died I should probably be recollecting dreams during my life. [63]; Expatiates on noblemens estates visited in Fermanagh. [57]; [on THE PEOPLE: ] Few republican. Fond of the king. Hate the gover[n]ment. angry at the kings ent[e]ring into the war agains[t] France. Strong for reform. The middle orders of this way of thinking. [69]; Hamilton Rowans pamphlet causes a stir. Ed. ftn., very probably the declaration “Citizen-soldiers, to arms!, issued by the Dublin Society of UI, under the names of Drennan and Rowan, chairman and secretary respectively. Argued for a revival of volunteering as preferable to a militia, and advocated holdin a convention of the Protestant people on 15 Feb, to complement the Catholic convention just ended. (See Dublin Evening Post, 20 Dec. 1792).; Note that Russell follows Tone in writing XX for Catholics, [70 & passim]; United Irishmen Society in Belfast, The day before it was in contemplation to sell the Northern Star to gover[n]ment. I leave tonwn the day they are to debate whether they will declare for reform. Is that carries all will go well. If not, America, ho! [72]; Note that Russell refers to guineas as grogs, after Swift, and Belfast as Belfescu [74]; 16. Russell enquires about the Sermon on the Mount, whether its doctrine is compatible with social organisation; moves to considering if religious faith is less well founded that the original data of sciences; in the next paragraph he is pondering conclusions from reports American Indians sexual abstemiousness; Northern Star, Prosecution of the proprietors and printer of the paper for sedition began in Jan. 1793; notice of trial was served in July. The government postponed the trial, intending that the accused should compromise. When it took place in May 1794, the proprietors were acquitted, although the printer John Rabb was convicted and imprisoned. (See Brian Inglis, Freedom of the press in Ireland 1784-1841, London 1954, pp. 94-5. Drennans Letters, p.165, shows that the Star people were all wishing to give up the paper, if they could dissolve their agreement, that the paper would certainly drop and that Neilson was now quite deprived of his political boldness. [n.6, 80]; “Poor Ireland becomes a refrain [77, 81] poor country! [88]; Investigates potatoes, do the young potatoes nourish the plant? Next he is talking politics with one of the mill men [82]; I think gover[n]ments will be almost totally done away [with] and little more than society remain. I think in proportion as gover[n]ments grow more simple men will be better. His duty to his god and his interest will clashless. As he has less to do with human laws, he will have more inclination to respect divine ones. Is it not obvious? See! [82]; To ascertain this. [82] To consider this [83] To read the exposition of the reign of the four Stuart by a Mr Cook. [43]; Russell interested in perception; [ON WOMENS STATUS: Should women be made learn[e]d? Is their a difference of mind? Why not as of body? has it egery occur[r]ed to anatomists to observe is their any difference in the brains of men and women children [sic]? [86]; Russell gives an account of his family, OClears [or OCleeres] on one side, Bradshaws on the other. The Bradshaws, of Cheshire, were connected with the president of the regicide committee. The OClears were dispossessed in the sequel of 1641; Considers Antoninus and the Stoics [91] ... Russell not a deist [93]; 21. Long, circumstantial, and moving account of the death of his father. [96-107]. Gallows speech: Had I a thousand lives, I would venture them all, and give them all for, not for the sake of Ireland, but for the sake of this people (quoted by Medbh McGuckian, in interview, European English Messenger, Autumn 2004, p.36.) [ top ] References [ top ] Notes Portraits: Thom. Russell, United Irishman, miniature [lent Dr. Ryan]; see Anne Crookshank, Irish Portraits Exhibition (Ulster Mus. 1965). Florence Wilson: Russell is the eponymous hero of the evergreen poem The Man from God Knows Where by Florence Wilson (The coming of the Earls and Other Poems, Dublin 1918, pp.9-12). Aodh de Blacam, Roddy the Rover [q.d. article tipped into Hayes, ed., Irish Ballads, Univ. of Ulster Library], gives the words of The Man from God Knows Where, by Mrs Florence Wilson, and circumstances of its composition. See also under for quotation in OCasey, Story of the Citizen Army. Maurice Craig: Russell is present in a very indifferent poem - according to its author Maurice Craig - in which occurs the line For the poor Irish exile she cheered as he passed, referring to his departure after 1798 (see further under Maurice Craig, supra). Louis Bennett: Russell is the central character of Louis Bennetts romantic-revolutionary novel, A Prisoner of his Word (1908.)
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