Redemption - Leon Uris [293]
“Save your clever Irish tongue. We can do what we wish to do.”
“Does that not imply that you have always had in mind a separate standard of justice for the Irish?”
Brodhead slammed both hands on the sides of his leather chair. “Let me tell you why you are here, Fitzpatrick. Our fifteen hundred Fenians in custody are hostages to assure us that Ireland remains passive. If you go on ranting, you shall be responsible for minimum sentences doled out to these men of twenty years in penal colonies.”
He rose from his seat, leaned over his desk, his face reddening. “As for those death sentences, they shall be carried out at my pleasure. The louder you protest, and the more trouble you stir up, the more people we will execute. I suggest you and your mother keep your big mouths shut or you shall become directly responsible for the executions of those condemned. You may go, Fitzpatrick.”
“Haven’t you learned anything in your entire experience in Ireland? Your loathing of us as inferiors is so inbred you see nothing wrong in what you are doing.”
“Neither does the American press and public. Our ambassador in Washington reports outrage at you in editorials across the entire country.”
I dimly heard him say…“Don’t bother to attempt to contact us again. Dublin Castle is closed to you.”
I got back to my office as quickly as I could, locked myself in, and tried to find reason. There was no doubt now why Llewelyn Brodhead had been sent to bless us.
Why should England have reacted in such a manner? The Rising posed no threat to their rule in Ireland. It was not carried out by trained soldiers. It was done and over within a week and punishment should have been meted out to fit the crime.
In their stampede to keep us silent, had they entirely lost sight of their own glorious history of democracy and justice? Not when it came to the Irish. The lengths that England would go to in Ireland had already been established in the great famine.
Down through the ages they knew but one way to rule us…by intimidation. When trouble stirred they’d overpower us with their armed forces, impose martial law, suspend justice, spy, murder…BULLY.
Bullying had always put the Irish in their place. Why not bully now? In the sordid British experience here, what did the execution of another ninety-six Irishmen matter?
They lost focus that these were ordinary citizens in their own country protesting for their freedom. The men they intended to kill were dreamers and intellectuals. Dear Lord, when do you line up poets against a firing wall and shoot them down?
May 3, 1916
I was folded up in three halves so I could fit on my office couch and avoid the springs when a distant crackle made me unglue my eyes. Maybe my hearing was playing tricks on me.
My old partner, Robert Emmet McAloon, likewise bedded down in his office, flung open my door.
“Did you hear it?” he cried.
“Aye, are you sure it was rifle shots?”
We spent the next hours frantic until our fears were confirmed: we finally found Kathleen Clarke, just after being advised to come to Kilmainham Prison and remove Tom’s body.
It was she, God love her, who kept me together. I had to wait outside the gates while she went in and fetched him in the funeral wagon. Kathleen had married Tom after he had served fifteen years hard labor for Fenian activities. Old Tom, the tobacconist, led the Brotherhood. His lady was pregnant with their fourth child. He was dead now, gunned down by a firing squad.
and
As he was leaving Kilmainham, another funeral wagon passed us. I went from one to the other. Damned, it was Tom MacDonagh. No place for him to be shot dead. He was Brotherhood, sure enough, but he was an educator, a poet, a critic, a founder of the Irish Theatre, the editor of a periodical. I loved the nights at his cottage, which was the intellectual