THE FENIAN MOVEMENT AT HOME.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 7, Issue 381, 31 May 1866, Page 1

THE FENIAN MOVEMENT AT HOME.

(Prom the Home News, 26th March.) The arrests for Fenianism still continue, but on a diminished scale. In Limerick, Mr Stephen B. Walsh, aged 34, a very respectable young man, was brought in from Kilmallock by the constabulary and lodged in the country gaol. The master of the Rathkeale workhouse is also a prisoner in the same gaol. In addition to these there have been committed —Thomas M‘Donell, slater, Ballingarry; Mr Richard Loane, weighmaster, Newcastle West; and John Sheehan, publican, Newcastle West. This man had been previonsly arrested, but was out on bail. The total number of Fenians now in the county of Limerick prison is 33. Thomas O’Connell, of Abbeyfeale, recently arrested, was stated to have been a captain in the Federal army, and an associate of Geary, who shot Head-constable O’Sullivan in Newcastle. Ilis friends assert that he did not occupy the rank of captain, and deny that he had any acquaintance whatever with Geary. For three weeks previous to his arrest, O’Connell was confined to his own house, under medical treatment. The calendar for the county contains tho names of Darby O’Grady, John Lysaght, Edward Dillane, David Quade, John Sheehan, and Thomas Browne, who are to be tried under tho Treason Felony Act. They stand charged with being members of the Fenian Brotherhood, and soliciting others to join the confederacy; also, for having treasonable documents in their possession.

la Cork, a young man named John O’Calligban, holding a very respectable post in that city, has been arrested. Soon after his arrest the police proceeded to his residence. Fair-hill, and there instituted a vigorous search for arms and documents, and they succeed in gaining possession of several suspicious papers which it is said will very deeply implicate him in the present treasonable movement. It is also said that he holds as important a post as a “ Centre ” for the city. Four men were arrested in Waterford and five in Sligo on February 27. There are 24 Fenians confined in the gaol at Mullingar and 14 in that of Rosscommoa. An important arrest has been made in the County Carlow. The Dublin Express correspondent says:— “After several months’ searching, by night and day, John Morris, the famous Head Centre for Carlow, has been arrested at the house of his uncle, Ned Nolan, a farmer residing at Kilmaglash, near Myshal. By the arrest of this outlaw the Fenian cause the country has got a very serious check, as there is reason to suppose that he was one of the most active agents engaged in the treasonable conspiracy.” £IOO reward had been offered for his apprehension. The arrest was very cleverly effected.

Among the later arrests in the provinces are the cases of three drapers’ assistants in Bantry; seven young men, all strangers in in Gorcy; an English-Irish emissary in Athy; three publicans in Sligo; and a tailor and his wife in Portstewart, the female for having, and attempting to conceal, two small leather cases of documents ; 11 militiamen of the Mayo regiment, and also two constabulary policemen in the county of Cork. The muskets, fowling-pieces, and all sorts of fire-arms pawned in Dublin have been transferred to the stores in the Castle, which now contains a more extraordinary collection of miscellaneous weapons than has ever before been brought together in one place. A Fenian proclamation posted in Tuam is remarkably different from former compositions of the sort. It is headed, “ God save the Green/’ and runs —

“ Whereas in the year of the Irish Re--1866 certain persons (enemies of said Republic) styling themselves the Parliament of Great Britain, and who pretend or imagine they have authority over this Oppressed Nation. have ordered the arrest of all the loyal subjects of said Republic by the suspension

of an Act which they call the Habeas Corpus, Now in order to let the usurpers see that the Irish Nation will have their independence, and in case the myrmidons of the so-sailed British law make any attempt on their liberty, it is ordered that they do not allow it if possible. By order of the Executive Committe, Irish Eepublic. February 21,1866. Goi> save the Green!” ESCAPE OP STEPHENS. The report that Stephens had succeeded in making his escape from Ireland has received what appears to be reliable confirmation. A Dublin paper publishes the following circumstantial account of the affair which it states was furnished by a gentleman of the highest respectability in Paris, who is in a position to obtain accurate information, and to whom it is justified in placing full confidence-

“ I write to give you positive information of Stephens, which I think will be the first authentic account of him since his escape from gaol. He embarked from Galway in a small sailing vessel, and after being out for some time was driven into Belfast, where he was detained by stress of weather for two or three days. From Belfast he sailed for Scotland, and from thence by public conveyance to Dover, and on to Paris, where ho arrived on Sunday, the 18th of March.” As a confirmation of the foregoing, the Daily Telegraph publishes the following telegram from its Paris correspondent, dated March 23 :

“ Stephens, the Fenian Head Centre, is now in Paris. Mrs Stephens, arrived here last night. Stephens gives out that he shall soon return from America to Ireland. Since his escape from the Richmond Bridewell ho has remained constantly in Dublin, under the protection of a Fenian police, acting counter to the force employed by the authorities.

The trial of a man named Maher at the Kildare assizes for singing and circulating seditious songs has shown in a remarkable manner one of the ways in which tha attempt w r as made to corrupt the soldiery. Coporal Leechman, of the 107th Regiment, was on one occasion in a hut at the Curragh, with about a dozen soldiers, when Maher came in and distributed his songs, as he had previously done in other huts. He had a box in which were a number of lottery tickets, and the songs were given as a prize to the Tucky drawer, along with other small articles, such as paper, pens, and pomatums.