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I am aware that discussion of Tumblety’s alleged Fenianism is off topic – after all we are supposed to be looking (in vain) for proof of his misogyny.
However putting to one side the pretentious psycho-babble, wild conjecture about my supposed pet hates, and disbelief that I could have any legitimate reason for posting on this thread I will come to the one substantive point made:
With this kind of evidence connecting Tumblety to the Irish Nationalist cause, Scotland Yard would have been idiots not to investigate, hence a file on him in Special Branch.
What kind of evidence? It has to pre-date 1888 remember.
In 1866 Tumblety said:
‘The chronicles of Ireland will furnish many instances of undue harshness exercised during troubled times, and the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, but I challenge the record to produce such a flagrant abuse of power’.
Is this evidence of Fenian sympathy?
I would suggest that even here Tumblety pulled his punches.
He describes ‘undue harshness’, but gives an excuse – ‘troubled times’.
The ‘flagrant abuse of power’ that Tumblety characterised as being worse than anything seen in Ireland, was his arrest for suspicion of involvement in the Lincoln assassination!
So his arrest was worse than any British oppression in Ireland.
The only other pre-1888 evidence is that in 1871 Tumblety stayed at a New York hotel managed by a Fenian.
What of the other evidence? To recap…
If it is true that Tumblety was asked to stand against D’Arcy McGee in the 1857 legislative election, then it would have been as a Conservative candidate. There was competition for the Irish vote in Montreal. It was a three member seat.
The Conservative candidates were:
John Rose (elected) – Scottish
Henry Starnes – French Canadian (he gave Tumblety a testimonial)
George Etienne Cartier - French Canadian (he was elected for a different seat that he also contested)
The Radical Reform or Rouge candidates were:
Thomas D’Arcy McGee (elected) - Irish
Luther Hamilton Holton – English descent
Antoine-Aimé Dorion (elected) - French Canadian
It seems likely that the Conservatives wanted an Irish candidate to counter the popularity of D’Arcy McGee – and this may have been behind their approach to Tumblety. The parties tried to have ethnically balanced candidates to appeal to the various communities.
Whatever the case, Fenianism or anti-British sentiment played no part in the campaign on either side in this contest.
Then we have Tumblety’s defence lawyers in the abortive abortion case in the autumn of 1857: Bernard Devlin and Lewis Thomas Drummond.
Like Tumblety they were Catholics born in Ireland, who had then migrated across the Atlantic.
Devlin was a radical – he supported D’Arcy McGee in 1857 but later turned against him when D’Arcy McGee became a Conservative.
Drummond was a life-long Conservative.
It seems likely that they acted for Tumblety in 1857 for professional reasons and perhaps out of good fellowship based on their similar backgrounds. Political considerations must have been absent as they were from different political camps!
Certainly it cannot be said that Tumblety was helped by two Fenian lawyers. This simply is not true.
I disagree with Michael’s point, where he kind of suggested that all Irish Americans hate the English.
Certainly some people of Irish descent retain a misty eyed Fenianism which grows the further they live in time and space from Erin’s valleys.
It is not just in Boston or New York. The same thing is seen in County Kilburn.
But I am certain that most just got on with their lives, barely looking backwards.
As we have seen D’Arcy McGee and Drummond became pillars of the Imperial establishment in Canada.
I am reminded of the different attitudes of President Kennedy and President Reagan to their Irish ancestry. The Kennedy’s were very anti British, whereas Reagan tied to pass himself off as a WASP.
I think Tumblety was far too selfish to be genuinely interested in the Irish cause.
The evidence shows that he craved acceptance from the British establishment. His writing dripped with glowing references to Albion and even visited Ireland in company with Lord Headley – an Irish peer, landowner and member of the Protestant Ascendancy.
When it suited him he put on the blarney – to ingratiate himself with any significant Irish local community.
I think that his enforced flight from Britain following his arrested for Gross Indecency angered him.
It also became useful for him to blame the British Police’s interest in him (supposedly as Jack the Ripper) on his Irishness.
Hence for a while after 1889 we see him becoming much more outspoken. This would have also given him popularity with the more advanced branch of the Irish polity.
However, as he grew older and the dust settled, his desire to ingratiate himself with the British establishment reasserted itself
Dec. 27th 1899.
Viscount Galway,
London. England.
I have taken the liberty of enclosing a portion of the New York Herald of Dec. 23rd, which I think indicates the intense interest the people of the United States take in the South African war.
In expressing the hope that the British may soon triumph, and in assuring your Grace of cordial good will in your new career, I voice the sentiment of the vast majority of people in this country, who are heart & soul with their kith and kin across the sea, in this war.
Respectfully
Francis Tumblety M.D.
However putting to one side the pretentious psycho-babble, wild conjecture about my supposed pet hates, and disbelief that I could have any legitimate reason for posting on this thread I will come to the one substantive point made:
With this kind of evidence connecting Tumblety to the Irish Nationalist cause, Scotland Yard would have been idiots not to investigate, hence a file on him in Special Branch.
What kind of evidence? It has to pre-date 1888 remember.
In 1866 Tumblety said:
‘The chronicles of Ireland will furnish many instances of undue harshness exercised during troubled times, and the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, but I challenge the record to produce such a flagrant abuse of power’.
Is this evidence of Fenian sympathy?
I would suggest that even here Tumblety pulled his punches.
He describes ‘undue harshness’, but gives an excuse – ‘troubled times’.
The ‘flagrant abuse of power’ that Tumblety characterised as being worse than anything seen in Ireland, was his arrest for suspicion of involvement in the Lincoln assassination!
So his arrest was worse than any British oppression in Ireland.
The only other pre-1888 evidence is that in 1871 Tumblety stayed at a New York hotel managed by a Fenian.
What of the other evidence? To recap…
If it is true that Tumblety was asked to stand against D’Arcy McGee in the 1857 legislative election, then it would have been as a Conservative candidate. There was competition for the Irish vote in Montreal. It was a three member seat.
The Conservative candidates were:
John Rose (elected) – Scottish
Henry Starnes – French Canadian (he gave Tumblety a testimonial)
George Etienne Cartier - French Canadian (he was elected for a different seat that he also contested)
The Radical Reform or Rouge candidates were:
Thomas D’Arcy McGee (elected) - Irish
Luther Hamilton Holton – English descent
Antoine-Aimé Dorion (elected) - French Canadian
It seems likely that the Conservatives wanted an Irish candidate to counter the popularity of D’Arcy McGee – and this may have been behind their approach to Tumblety. The parties tried to have ethnically balanced candidates to appeal to the various communities.
Whatever the case, Fenianism or anti-British sentiment played no part in the campaign on either side in this contest.
Then we have Tumblety’s defence lawyers in the abortive abortion case in the autumn of 1857: Bernard Devlin and Lewis Thomas Drummond.
Like Tumblety they were Catholics born in Ireland, who had then migrated across the Atlantic.
Devlin was a radical – he supported D’Arcy McGee in 1857 but later turned against him when D’Arcy McGee became a Conservative.
Drummond was a life-long Conservative.
It seems likely that they acted for Tumblety in 1857 for professional reasons and perhaps out of good fellowship based on their similar backgrounds. Political considerations must have been absent as they were from different political camps!
Certainly it cannot be said that Tumblety was helped by two Fenian lawyers. This simply is not true.
I disagree with Michael’s point, where he kind of suggested that all Irish Americans hate the English.
Certainly some people of Irish descent retain a misty eyed Fenianism which grows the further they live in time and space from Erin’s valleys.
It is not just in Boston or New York. The same thing is seen in County Kilburn.
But I am certain that most just got on with their lives, barely looking backwards.
As we have seen D’Arcy McGee and Drummond became pillars of the Imperial establishment in Canada.
I am reminded of the different attitudes of President Kennedy and President Reagan to their Irish ancestry. The Kennedy’s were very anti British, whereas Reagan tied to pass himself off as a WASP.
I think Tumblety was far too selfish to be genuinely interested in the Irish cause.
The evidence shows that he craved acceptance from the British establishment. His writing dripped with glowing references to Albion and even visited Ireland in company with Lord Headley – an Irish peer, landowner and member of the Protestant Ascendancy.
When it suited him he put on the blarney – to ingratiate himself with any significant Irish local community.
I think that his enforced flight from Britain following his arrested for Gross Indecency angered him.
It also became useful for him to blame the British Police’s interest in him (supposedly as Jack the Ripper) on his Irishness.
Hence for a while after 1889 we see him becoming much more outspoken. This would have also given him popularity with the more advanced branch of the Irish polity.
However, as he grew older and the dust settled, his desire to ingratiate himself with the British establishment reasserted itself
Dec. 27th 1899.
Viscount Galway,
London. England.
I have taken the liberty of enclosing a portion of the New York Herald of Dec. 23rd, which I think indicates the intense interest the people of the United States take in the South African war.
In expressing the hope that the British may soon triumph, and in assuring your Grace of cordial good will in your new career, I voice the sentiment of the vast majority of people in this country, who are heart & soul with their kith and kin across the sea, in this war.
Respectfully
Francis Tumblety M.D.
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