Clan na Gael
Encyclopedia
The Clan na Gael was an Irish republican
organization in the United States
in the late 19th and 20th centuries, successor to the Fenian Brotherhood
and a sister organization to the Irish Republican Brotherhood
. It is shrunken to a shadow of its former self in the 21st century.
in 1771, and the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick also formed in New York in 1784.
In the later part of the 1780s, a strong Irish patriot
(rather than Catholic
) character began to grow in these organisations and amongst recently arrived Irish immigrants. The usage of Celt
ic symbolism helped solidify this sense of nationalism and was most noticeably found in the use of the name "Hibernian." (Hibernia is the Latin
name for Ireland.)
In 1858, the Irish Republican Brotherhood
(IRB) had been founded in Dublin by James Stephens
. The initial decision to create this organisation came about after Stephens consulted, through special emissary Joseph Denieffe, with John O'Mahony
and Michael Doheny
, members of a precursor group called the Emmet Monument Association
.
In response to the establishment of the IRB in Dublin, a sister organization was founded in New York
, the Fenian Brotherhood
, led by O'Mahony. This arm of Fenian
activity in America produced a surge in radicalism among groups of Irish immigrants, many of whom had recently emigrated from Ireland during and after the Great Hunger. In October, 1865, the Fenian Philadelphia Congress met and appointed the Irish Republican Government in the U.S. But in 1865, in Ireland, the IRB newspaper The Irish People
had been raided by the police
and the IRB leadership was imprisoned. Another abortive uprising would occur in 1867, but the British remained in control.
After the 1865 crackdown in Ireland, the American organization began to fracture over what to do next. Made up of veterans of the American Civil War, a Fenian army had been formed. While O'Mahony and his supporters wanted to remain focused on supporting rebellions in Ireland
a competing faction, called the Roberts, or senate wing, wanted this Fenian Army to attack British bases in Canada
. The resulting Fenian Raids
strained U.S.-British relations. The level of American support for the Fenian cause began to diminish as the Fenians were seen as a threat to stability in the region.
The Irish were still seen as a foreign people within the borders of the American state by anti-Catholic Americans such as members of the Know-Nothing Party; their existence within America was seen primarily as temporary camps of immigrants who planned to stay in America only as long as the British stayed in Ireland. Upon the British withdrawal from Irish soil, it was believed, the Irish immigrants would return to their native land. The Fenian Raids were seen as an astonishing example of immigrant activity in U.S. history and Irish nationalism has itself become something of an exception among the American melting pot. Very few U.S. immigrants concerned themselves with their mother country as did the Irish; in March 1868, 100,000 Fenian supporters held an anti-British demonstration in New York.
chose to support neither of the existing feuding factions, but instead promoted a renewed Irish republican organization in America, to be named Clan na Gael.
According to John Devoy
in 1924, Jerome James Collins founded what was then called the Napper Tandy Club in New York on June 20, 1867, Wolfe Tone's birthday, this club expanded into others and at one point at a picnic in 1870 was named the Clan na Gael by Sam Cavanagh. This was the same Cavanagh who killed the informer George Clark (Gaelic American January 7, 1905) who had exposed a Fenian pike making operation in Dublin to the police.
Collins, who died in 1881 on the disastrous Jeannette Expedition to the North Pole, was a science editor on the New York Herald, who had left England in 1866 when a plot he was involved in to free the Fenian prisoners at Pentonville Prison
was uncovered by the police. Collins believed at the time of the founding in 1867 that the two feuding Fenians branches should patch things up. (Much of the preceding is found in the Gaelic American, 29 Dec 1906, in an article entitled "The Inside Story of the Jeanette Horror". Both John O'Mahony and William R Roberts, opposing leaders of fighting branches of the Fenians, belonged to the Napper Tandy Club, according to Devoy in the aforementioned article.)
and the outfitting of this ship as a whaler. The Clan engaged an American Captain George S Anthony as its Captain with New Bedford whaling crew. John received considerable help in running the Clan from Dr. William Carroll who was elected Executive Board Chairman in 1875 and between them they controlled Clan activity until 1882. Carroll was of Ulster Protestant stock and brought in others to the Clan from the upper middle class such as Simon Barclay Conover, Senator from Florida
. Devoy's nemesis during the fund raising for the enterprise was John Goff, an aspiring Clan member who later became a New York Supreme Court Judge and who, perhaps, resented the influence of Bourke and Devoy in the Clan. Devoy did in fact take a strong hand and began tossing out Clan members for malfeasance in office and violation of Clan rules as is shown in "General Circular No. 2" dated January 15, 1875 [NLI MS. 18,015(1): John Devoy Papers. For more on the Catalpa rescue see Sean O'Lung "Fremantle Mission", Philip Fennell and Marie King (Eds.) "John Devoy's Catalpa Expedition", a transcription of John Devoy's Catalpa Story in the Gaelic American, and ZW Pease's "The Catalpa Expedition" the latter published by George Anthony the Captain aboard the ship. The success of the rescue in 1876 resulted in the Clan na Gael replacing for all practical purposes the Fenian Brotherhood as the spokesman of Irish-American nationalism.
Under the leadership of John Devoy
, Clan na Gael would eventually be successful in educating Americans about the movement.
" in Irish republican thinking, by which the "physical force party" allied itself with the Irish Parliamentary Party
under the political leadership of Charles Stewart Parnell
, MP; the political plans of the Fenians were thus combined with the agrarian revolution inaugurated by the Irish National Land League
. The arrangement was cemented at the first Irish Race Convention
held in Chicago
in 1881.
By 1880 more aggressive men within the Clan na Gael were chaffing at the slow pace of Devoy and Carroll and these men were able to take control of the organization in 1882 when two "action men", Alexander Sullivan and Michael Boland took over the reins and ran the clan as a dictatorship along with an inactive Mr. Feeley. The new leadership ignored the Revolutionary Council set up by Carroll to coordinate between the IRB and the Clan and began to operate in total secrecy from even the membership of the Clan. These three men called themselves the "Triangle" and began making bombing runs into England in what was called the "Dynamite War". This infuriated the IRB in Ireland which cut ties with the Irish-Americans. Michael Boland was later pointed out as a British spy which might have explained why the majority of the bombers were caught and jailed before they could strike.
The 1880s saw the solidification, at least within America, of Irish ideological orientations, with most nationalist sentiment finding its home within Clan na Gael, rather than sectarian anti-Protestant organisations such as the Ancient Order of Hibernians
. The more agrarian-minded found their ideological brethren within the Irish Federation of America. The third ideological strand was connected to the union and socialist movement and found support with the Knights of Labor
. In the late 1880s a financial scandal in the Chicago branch of the Clan led to a successful conspiracy to murder whistle-blower Dr. Patrick Henry Cronin. John Devoy, who worked with Cronin, also began carrying a gun and expected to be assassinated by Alexander Sullivan's henchmen. The Cronin case, prosecuted by State's Attorney Joel Minnick Longenecker
achieved international attention. Neither the prosecution or the defense were concerned with the Clan's ties to the Fenians, trying the case simply as a conspiracy to commit murder. The Clan na Gael had split into pro and anti Sullivan/Boland branches, but was re-united by John Devoy around 1900.
In Ireland the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) achieved electoral success in the 1880s, and was supported by the British Prime Minister William Gladstone who introduced the unsuccessful Government of Ireland Bill 1886. Gladstone's party then divided over home rule, and the IPP also divided for a decade over Parnell's marriage to Mrs. O'Shea.
In 1891, a moderate offshoot of the Clan na Gael broke away and formed an organization under the name of Irish National Federation of America with T. Emmet as president. The federation supported the National Party in Ireland, a splinter group of Parnell's Home Rule
Party. Rising to prominence within the Clan from the 1890s were Daniel Cohalan
(later to be a Judge of the New York Supreme Court
) and Joseph McGarrity
.
and his aide Franz von Papen
in 1914. This was followed by an emissary John Kenny
, sent on a mission to Berlin to discuss how the German war effort and Irish Nationalism could cooperate. Devoy, along with Roger Casement
and Joseph McGarrity
, was able to bring together both Irish-American and German
support in the years prior to the Easter Rising
. However the German munitions never reached Ireland as the ship The Aud carrying them was scuttled in Cork Harbour after being intercepted by the Royal Navy
.
Clan na Gael became the largest single financier of both the Easter Rising and the Irish War of Independence
. Imperial Germany aided Clan na Gael by selling those guns and munitions to be used in the uprising of 1916. Germany had hoped that by distracting Britain with an Irish uprising they would be able to garner the upper hand in the war and affect a German victory on the Western Front
. However, they failed to follow through with more support. Clan na Gael was also involved via McGarrity and Casement in the abortive attempt to raise an "Irish Brigade" to fight against the British.
Some Sikh
s held talks with Clan Na Gael, which led to authorities in Great Britain
and India
fearing Irish-Americans and Sikh
s uniting against the British Empire
. Clan Na Gael supported the primarily Sikh Ghadar Party
, and played a supportive role in the Hindu German Conspiracy in the United States
during World War I
, which led to the Hindu German Conspiracy Trial
in San Francisco in 1917-18.
Clan Na Gael largely controlled the Irish Race Conventions
from 1916, and its affiliated group the Friends of Irish Freedom
. The Irish War of Independence
led to a split in Clan na Gael which was precipated in June 1920 by Éamon de Valera
, as President of the Irish Republic became involved in a dispute with Devoy and Judge Cohalan
over lobbying US Presidential candidates on the issue of American recognition for the Irish Republic
. To punish Woodrow Wilson
for his apparent lack of support, the Clan backed Harding in the United States presidential election, 1920
. In October, 1920, Harry Boland
stated that the IRB
in Ireland had terminated connections between the Clan and the parent body in Ireland until the will of Dáil Éireann
was mirrored in Clan na Gael. Devoy & Cohalan refused to accept this but McGarrity disagreed believing that without IRB support, the Clan was not legitimate, which led to a split. McGarrity, whose faction went by the name Reorganized Clan na Gael, supported the Anti-Treaty forces during the Civil War while Devoy and Cohalan supported the Free State. After 1924, when the IRB and the Devoy-Cohalan Clan na Gael both voted to disband, McGarrity's faction became the sole Clan na Gael. In 1926, the Clan na Gael formally associated with the reorganized Irish Republican Army in the same fashion as it had with the IRB.
McGarrity continued to provide support and aid to the IRA
after it was outlawed in Ireland by de Valera in 1936 but became less active in the 1940s and 50s following McGarrity's death in 1940. However the organization grew in the 70's. The organization played a key part in NORAID
and was a prominent source of finance and weapons for the Provisional IRA during "The Troubles
" in Northern Ireland
in 1969-1998.
The Clan-na-Gael still exists today, much changed from the days of the Catalpa rescue and as recently as 1997 another internal split occurred as a result of the IRA shift away from using physical force as a result of the 1998 Good Friday peace accords
, and before that over the abandonment of the policy of abstentionism in 1987. The two factions are known to insiders as Provisional Clan na Gael (allied to Provisional Sinn Féin/IRA) and Republican Clan na Gael (associated with both Republican Sinn Féin/Continuity IRA and 32 County Sovereignty Movement/Real IRA, though primarily the former). These have been listed as terrorist organizations unilaterally at various times by the UK Government.
The first Chairman perhaps should be Jerome Collins as the man who founded the first Club [D1] of what would later be called the Clan na Gael [these clubs later were called "Camps"] The club was named Napper Tandy after an Irish Patriot. From the beginning, according to John Devoy in the Gaelic American, the secretary of Napper Tandy and later of the Clan na Gael was William James Nicholson. He was secretary from 1867 to 1874 when he was dismissed for loaning Camp Funds which were not repaid. According to a descendant of the John Haltigan the foreman printer of the Irish People, James Haltigan son of John Haltigan was Executive Board Chairman in 1871.
In 1873 James Ryan Was Executive Board Chairman (Devoys PostbagBP Vol. I p. 87–88) was he from Lawrence, Mass? [Devoy in the Gaelic American said the man who preceded him was from there and was a nonentity]
In 1874 John Devoy was chosen Executive Board Chairman at the Baltimore Convention/
From 1875 until he resigned in 1879, John Devoy's trusted friend and ardent nationalist Dr. William Carroll of Philadelphia was Executive Board Chairman. James Reynolds of Connecticut temporarily held the post from Carroll's resignation until 1881 [there was no convention in 1880] when the Triangle Sullivan,Feeley,Boland assumed command although Devoy supporters Reynolds and Treacy remained on the Executive Board, they were left out of the decision-making process by the Triangle. The Triangle's bombing campaign split the organization into two factions in the mid 1880s. After the murder of Cronin, the Clan na Gael united once again under John Devoy in 1900. John Kenny
served as president of the Napper Tandy branch in 1883 and again in 1914.
Irish Republicanism
Irish republicanism is an ideology based on the belief that all of Ireland should be an independent republic.In 1801, under the Act of Union, the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland merged to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland...
organization in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
in the late 19th and 20th centuries, successor to the Fenian Brotherhood
Fenian Brotherhood
The Fenian Brotherhood was an Irish republican organization founded in the United States in 1858 by John O'Mahony and Michael Doheny. It was a precursor to Clan na Gael, a sister organization to the Irish Republican Brotherhood. Members were commonly known as "Fenians"...
and a sister organization to the Irish Republican Brotherhood
Irish Republican Brotherhood
The Irish Republican Brotherhood was a secret oath-bound fraternal organisation dedicated to the establishment of an "independent democratic republic" in Ireland during the second half of the 19th century and the start of the 20th century...
. It is shrunken to a shadow of its former self in the 21st century.
Background
As Irish immigration to the United States of America began to increase in the 18th century many Irish organizations were formed. One of the earliest was formed under the name of the Irish Charitable Society and was founded in Boston, Massachusetts in 1737. These new organisations went by varying names, most notably the Ancient and Most Benevolent Order of the Friendly Brothers of Saint Patrick, founded in New York in 1767, the Society of the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick for the Relief of Emigrants in PhiladelphiaPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...
in 1771, and the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick also formed in New York in 1784.
In the later part of the 1780s, a strong Irish patriot
Irish Patriot Party
The Irish Patriot Party was the name of a number of different political groupings in Ireland throughout the 18th century. They were primarily supportive of Whig concepts of personal liberty combined with an Irish identity that rejected full independence, but advocated strong self-government within...
(rather than Catholic
Catholic
The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...
) character began to grow in these organisations and amongst recently arrived Irish immigrants. The usage of Celt
Celt
The Celts were a diverse group of tribal societies in Iron Age and Roman-era Europe who spoke Celtic languages.The earliest archaeological culture commonly accepted as Celtic, or rather Proto-Celtic, was the central European Hallstatt culture , named for the rich grave finds in Hallstatt, Austria....
ic symbolism helped solidify this sense of nationalism and was most noticeably found in the use of the name "Hibernian." (Hibernia is the Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
name for Ireland.)
In 1858, the Irish Republican Brotherhood
Irish Republican Brotherhood
The Irish Republican Brotherhood was a secret oath-bound fraternal organisation dedicated to the establishment of an "independent democratic republic" in Ireland during the second half of the 19th century and the start of the 20th century...
(IRB) had been founded in Dublin by James Stephens
James Stephens (Irish nationalist)
James Stephens was an Irish Republican and the founding member of an originally unnamed revolutionary organisation in Dublin on 17 March 1858, later to become known as the Irish Republican Brotherhood , also referred to as the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood by contemporaries.-Early...
. The initial decision to create this organisation came about after Stephens consulted, through special emissary Joseph Denieffe, with John O'Mahony
John O'Mahony
John O'Mahony may refer to:*John O'Mahony , founder of the Irish Republican Brotherhood *John O'Mahony , Irish Fine Gael politician representing Mayo and twice an All-Ireland winner managing the Galway Football Team*Sean Matgamna , also known as John O'Mahony, Trotskyist theorist*Seán O'Mahony ,...
and Michael Doheny
Michael Doheny
Michael Doheny was an Irish writer and member of the Young Ireland movement.-Early life:The third son of Michael Doheny, of Brookhill, he was born at Brookhill, near Fethard, Co. Tipperary, and married a Miss O'Dwyer of that county...
, members of a precursor group called the Emmet Monument Association
Emmet Monument Association
The Emmet Monument Association was a mid-nineteenth century secret military organization with the special purpose of training men to attack England and free Ireland. It was established in the mid 1850s, by John O'Mahony and Michael Doheny refugees from the Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848...
.
In response to the establishment of the IRB in Dublin, a sister organization was founded in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, the Fenian Brotherhood
Fenian Brotherhood
The Fenian Brotherhood was an Irish republican organization founded in the United States in 1858 by John O'Mahony and Michael Doheny. It was a precursor to Clan na Gael, a sister organization to the Irish Republican Brotherhood. Members were commonly known as "Fenians"...
, led by O'Mahony. This arm of Fenian
Fenian
The Fenians , both the Fenian Brotherhood and Irish Republican Brotherhood , were fraternal organisations dedicated to the establishment of an independent Irish Republic in the 19th and early 20th century. The name "Fenians" was first applied by John O'Mahony to the members of the Irish republican...
activity in America produced a surge in radicalism among groups of Irish immigrants, many of whom had recently emigrated from Ireland during and after the Great Hunger. In October, 1865, the Fenian Philadelphia Congress met and appointed the Irish Republican Government in the U.S. But in 1865, in Ireland, the IRB newspaper The Irish People
The Irish People
The Irish People has been a title of a number of mostly political newspapers in Ireland and America.**The Irish People was an Irish nationalist newspaper of the Fenian movement founded in 1863 by James Stephens. Nationalists Charles Kickham, Thomas Clarke Luby and John O’Leary were editors of this...
had been raided by the police
Dublin Metropolitan Police
The Dublin Metropolitan Police was the police force of Dublin, Ireland, from 1836 to 1925, when it amalgamated into the new Garda Síochána.-19th century:...
and the IRB leadership was imprisoned. Another abortive uprising would occur in 1867, but the British remained in control.
After the 1865 crackdown in Ireland, the American organization began to fracture over what to do next. Made up of veterans of the American Civil War, a Fenian army had been formed. While O'Mahony and his supporters wanted to remain focused on supporting rebellions in Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
a competing faction, called the Roberts, or senate wing, wanted this Fenian Army to attack British bases in Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. The resulting Fenian Raids
Fenian raids
Between 1866 and 1871, the Fenian raids of the Fenian Brotherhood who were based in the United States; on British army forts, customs posts and other targets in Canada, were fought to bring pressure on Britain to withdraw from Ireland. They divided many Catholic Irish-Canadians, many of whom were...
strained U.S.-British relations. The level of American support for the Fenian cause began to diminish as the Fenians were seen as a threat to stability in the region.
The Irish were still seen as a foreign people within the borders of the American state by anti-Catholic Americans such as members of the Know-Nothing Party; their existence within America was seen primarily as temporary camps of immigrants who planned to stay in America only as long as the British stayed in Ireland. Upon the British withdrawal from Irish soil, it was believed, the Irish immigrants would return to their native land. The Fenian Raids were seen as an astonishing example of immigrant activity in U.S. history and Irish nationalism has itself become something of an exception among the American melting pot. Very few U.S. immigrants concerned themselves with their mother country as did the Irish; in March 1868, 100,000 Fenian supporters held an anti-British demonstration in New York.
Creation of Clan na Gael
After 1867, the Irish Republican Brotherhood headquarters in ManchesterManchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
chose to support neither of the existing feuding factions, but instead promoted a renewed Irish republican organization in America, to be named Clan na Gael.
According to John Devoy
John Devoy
John Devoy was an Irish rebel leader and exile.-Early life:Devoy was born near Kill, County Kildare. In 1861 he travelled to France with an introduction from T. D. Sullivan to John Mitchel...
in 1924, Jerome James Collins founded what was then called the Napper Tandy Club in New York on June 20, 1867, Wolfe Tone's birthday, this club expanded into others and at one point at a picnic in 1870 was named the Clan na Gael by Sam Cavanagh. This was the same Cavanagh who killed the informer George Clark (Gaelic American January 7, 1905) who had exposed a Fenian pike making operation in Dublin to the police.
Collins, who died in 1881 on the disastrous Jeannette Expedition to the North Pole, was a science editor on the New York Herald, who had left England in 1866 when a plot he was involved in to free the Fenian prisoners at Pentonville Prison
Pentonville (HM Prison)
HM Prison Pentonville is a Category B/C men's prison, operated by Her Majesty's Prison Service. Pentonville Prison is not actually within Pentonville itself, but is located further north, on the Caledonian Road in the Barnsbury area of the London Borough of Islington, in inner-North London,...
was uncovered by the police. Collins believed at the time of the founding in 1867 that the two feuding Fenians branches should patch things up. (Much of the preceding is found in the Gaelic American, 29 Dec 1906, in an article entitled "The Inside Story of the Jeanette Horror". Both John O'Mahony and William R Roberts, opposing leaders of fighting branches of the Fenians, belonged to the Napper Tandy Club, according to Devoy in the aforementioned article.)
Catalpa rescue
After arriving in America in 1871 John Devoy indicated he joined the Clan na Gael early on and attempted several times at Clan conventions to get the Clan to adopt a plan to free the military prisoners held by the British in Fremantle Australia. In 1874 John Devoy, with some oratorical help from Thomas Francis Bourke, was elected Chairman of the Executive Board of the Clan and was also chosen to execute the rescue of the prisoners. Bourke warned Devoy that there would be "kickers" and he would have to have a heavy hand to control the Clan na Gael and succeed in the project(Proceedings of the United Brotherhood Convention, Cleveland Ohio September 1874 held at the Fenian archives at the Catholic University of America). John Devoy devoted all his time to this project and oversaw the purchase of the bark CatalpaCatalpa
Catalpa, commonly called catalpa or catawba, is a genus of flowering plants in the trumpet vine family, Bignoniaceae, native to warm temperate regions of North America, the Caribbean, and East Asia....
and the outfitting of this ship as a whaler. The Clan engaged an American Captain George S Anthony as its Captain with New Bedford whaling crew. John received considerable help in running the Clan from Dr. William Carroll who was elected Executive Board Chairman in 1875 and between them they controlled Clan activity until 1882. Carroll was of Ulster Protestant stock and brought in others to the Clan from the upper middle class such as Simon Barclay Conover, Senator from Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
. Devoy's nemesis during the fund raising for the enterprise was John Goff, an aspiring Clan member who later became a New York Supreme Court Judge and who, perhaps, resented the influence of Bourke and Devoy in the Clan. Devoy did in fact take a strong hand and began tossing out Clan members for malfeasance in office and violation of Clan rules as is shown in "General Circular No. 2" dated January 15, 1875 [NLI MS. 18,015(1): John Devoy Papers. For more on the Catalpa rescue see Sean O'Lung "Fremantle Mission", Philip Fennell and Marie King (Eds.) "John Devoy's Catalpa Expedition", a transcription of John Devoy's Catalpa Story in the Gaelic American, and ZW Pease's "The Catalpa Expedition" the latter published by George Anthony the Captain aboard the ship. The success of the rescue in 1876 resulted in the Clan na Gael replacing for all practical purposes the Fenian Brotherhood as the spokesman of Irish-American nationalism.
Under the leadership of John Devoy
John Devoy
John Devoy was an Irish rebel leader and exile.-Early life:Devoy was born near Kill, County Kildare. In 1861 he travelled to France with an introduction from T. D. Sullivan to John Mitchel...
, Clan na Gael would eventually be successful in educating Americans about the movement.
New Departure 1879
In 1879, Devoy promoted a "New DepartureNew Departure (Ireland)
The term New Departure has been used to describe several initiatives in the late 19th century where Irish republicans, who were committed to independence from Britain through use of physical force, attempted to find a common ground for cooperation with groups committed to Irish Home Rule through...
" in Irish republican thinking, by which the "physical force party" allied itself with the Irish Parliamentary Party
Irish Parliamentary Party
The Irish Parliamentary Party was formed in 1882 by Charles Stewart Parnell, the leader of the Nationalist Party, replacing the Home Rule League, as official parliamentary party for Irish nationalist Members of Parliament elected to the House of Commons at...
under the political leadership of Charles Stewart Parnell
Charles Stewart Parnell
Charles Stewart Parnell was an Irish landowner, nationalist political leader, land reform agitator, and the founder and leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party...
, MP; the political plans of the Fenians were thus combined with the agrarian revolution inaugurated by the Irish National Land League
Irish National Land League
The Irish Land League was an Irish political organization of the late 19th century which sought to help poor tenant farmers. Its primary aim was to abolish landlordism in Ireland and enable tenant farmers to own the land they worked on...
. The arrangement was cemented at the first Irish Race Convention
Irish Race Conventions
The Irish Race Conventions were a disconnected series of conventions held in Europe and America between 1881 and 1994. None was concerned in defining the Irish as an ethnic race, but they were arranged to discuss some pressing or emerging political issues at the time concerning Irish Nationalism....
held in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
in 1881.
By 1880 more aggressive men within the Clan na Gael were chaffing at the slow pace of Devoy and Carroll and these men were able to take control of the organization in 1882 when two "action men", Alexander Sullivan and Michael Boland took over the reins and ran the clan as a dictatorship along with an inactive Mr. Feeley. The new leadership ignored the Revolutionary Council set up by Carroll to coordinate between the IRB and the Clan and began to operate in total secrecy from even the membership of the Clan. These three men called themselves the "Triangle" and began making bombing runs into England in what was called the "Dynamite War". This infuriated the IRB in Ireland which cut ties with the Irish-Americans. Michael Boland was later pointed out as a British spy which might have explained why the majority of the bombers were caught and jailed before they could strike.
The 1880s saw the solidification, at least within America, of Irish ideological orientations, with most nationalist sentiment finding its home within Clan na Gael, rather than sectarian anti-Protestant organisations such as the Ancient Order of Hibernians
Ancient Order of Hibernians
The Ancient Order of Hibernians is an Irish Catholic fraternal organization. Members must be Catholic and either Irish born or of Irish descent. Its largest membership is now in the United States, where it was founded in New York City in 1836...
. The more agrarian-minded found their ideological brethren within the Irish Federation of America. The third ideological strand was connected to the union and socialist movement and found support with the Knights of Labor
Knights of Labor
The Knights of Labor was the largest and one of the most important American labor organizations of the 1880s. Its most important leader was Terence Powderly...
. In the late 1880s a financial scandal in the Chicago branch of the Clan led to a successful conspiracy to murder whistle-blower Dr. Patrick Henry Cronin. John Devoy, who worked with Cronin, also began carrying a gun and expected to be assassinated by Alexander Sullivan's henchmen. The Cronin case, prosecuted by State's Attorney Joel Minnick Longenecker
Joel Minnick Longenecker
Joel Minnick Longenecker , American farmer, soldier, lawyer, State's Attorney, Judge, gubernatorial candidate, and Department Commander of the Illinois Grand Army of the Republic. Active in nationally prominent trials involving the Chicago Anarchists, and Irish nationalists.Longenecker had been a...
achieved international attention. Neither the prosecution or the defense were concerned with the Clan's ties to the Fenians, trying the case simply as a conspiracy to commit murder. The Clan na Gael had split into pro and anti Sullivan/Boland branches, but was re-united by John Devoy around 1900.
In Ireland the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) achieved electoral success in the 1880s, and was supported by the British Prime Minister William Gladstone who introduced the unsuccessful Government of Ireland Bill 1886. Gladstone's party then divided over home rule, and the IPP also divided for a decade over Parnell's marriage to Mrs. O'Shea.
In 1891, a moderate offshoot of the Clan na Gael broke away and formed an organization under the name of Irish National Federation of America with T. Emmet as president. The federation supported the National Party in Ireland, a splinter group of Parnell's Home Rule
Home rule
Home rule is the power of a constituent part of a state to exercise such of the state's powers of governance within its own administrative area that have been devolved to it by the central government....
Party. Rising to prominence within the Clan from the 1890s were Daniel Cohalan
Daniel F. Cohalan
Daniel Cohalan was an Irish-American leader and judge of the Supreme Court of New York State .Born in Middletown, New York where he joined and became a prominent member of the Democratic Party and later involved in the leadership of the Tammany Society .In 1912, Cohalan was appointed a Judge of...
(later to be a Judge of the New York Supreme Court
New York Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the State of New York is the trial-level court of general jurisdiction in thestate court system of New York, United States. There is a supreme court in each of New York State's 62 counties, although some smaller counties share judges with neighboring counties...
) and Joseph McGarrity
Joseph McGarrity
Joseph McGarrity was born in Carrickmore, County Tyrone, Ireland. He emigrated to the USA in 1892 at the age of 18 and settled in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. From 1893 until his death he was a leading member of the Clan na Gael organisation. He also was a successful businessman; however, his...
.
Clan na Gael in the 20th Century
The objective of Clan na Gael was to secure an independent Ireland and to assist the Irish Republican Brotherhood in achieving this aim. To this end, the Clan was prepared to enter into alliances with any nation allied against the British; with the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, the Clan found its greatest ally in Imperial Germany. A delegation led by Devoy met with the German Ambassador in the US Count Johann Heinrich von BernstorffJohann Heinrich von Bernstorff
Johann Heinrich Graf von Bernstorff was a German politician and the ambassador to the United States and Mexico from 1908 to 1917.- Early life :...
and his aide Franz von Papen
Franz von Papen
Lieutenant-Colonel Franz Joseph Hermann Michael Maria von Papen zu Köningen was a German nobleman, Roman Catholic monarchist politician, General Staff officer, and diplomat, who served as Chancellor of Germany in 1932 and as Vice-Chancellor under Adolf Hitler in 1933–1934...
in 1914. This was followed by an emissary John Kenny
John Kenny (Clan-na-Gael)
John Kenny long-time member and multi-term president of the Clan-na-Gael in New York, which supplied support to the rebels in Ireland, culminating in the Easter Rising. Under the cover of personal and business trips, he served as liaison between the "Home Office" and the New York Clan-na-Gael...
, sent on a mission to Berlin to discuss how the German war effort and Irish Nationalism could cooperate. Devoy, along with Roger Casement
Roger Casement
Roger David Casement —Sir Roger Casement CMG between 1911 and shortly before his execution for treason, when he was stripped of his British honours—was an Irish patriot, poet, revolutionary, and nationalist....
and Joseph McGarrity
Joseph McGarrity
Joseph McGarrity was born in Carrickmore, County Tyrone, Ireland. He emigrated to the USA in 1892 at the age of 18 and settled in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. From 1893 until his death he was a leading member of the Clan na Gael organisation. He also was a successful businessman; however, his...
, was able to bring together both Irish-American and German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
support in the years prior to the Easter Rising
Easter Rising
The Easter Rising was an insurrection staged in Ireland during Easter Week, 1916. The Rising was mounted by Irish republicans with the aims of ending British rule in Ireland and establishing the Irish Republic at a time when the British Empire was heavily engaged in the First World War...
. However the German munitions never reached Ireland as the ship The Aud carrying them was scuttled in Cork Harbour after being intercepted by the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
.
Clan na Gael became the largest single financier of both the Easter Rising and the Irish War of Independence
Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence , Anglo-Irish War, Black and Tan War, or Tan War was a guerrilla war mounted by the Irish Republican Army against the British government and its forces in Ireland. It began in January 1919, following the Irish Republic's declaration of independence. Both sides agreed...
. Imperial Germany aided Clan na Gael by selling those guns and munitions to be used in the uprising of 1916. Germany had hoped that by distracting Britain with an Irish uprising they would be able to garner the upper hand in the war and affect a German victory on the Western Front
Western Front (World War I)
Following the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining military control of important industrial regions in France. The tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne...
. However, they failed to follow through with more support. Clan na Gael was also involved via McGarrity and Casement in the abortive attempt to raise an "Irish Brigade" to fight against the British.
Some Sikh
Sikh
A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...
s held talks with Clan Na Gael, which led to authorities in Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
and India
British Raj
British Raj was the British rule in the Indian subcontinent between 1858 and 1947; The term can also refer to the period of dominion...
fearing Irish-Americans and Sikh
Sikh
A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...
s uniting against the British Empire
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
. Clan Na Gael supported the primarily Sikh Ghadar Party
Ghadar Party
The Ghadar Party was an organization founded by Punjabi Indians, in the United States and Canada with the aim to liberate India from British rule...
, and played a supportive role in the Hindu German Conspiracy in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
during World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, which led to the Hindu German Conspiracy Trial
Hindu German Conspiracy Trial
The Hindu–German Conspiracy Trial commenced in the District Court in San Francisco, California on November 12, 1917 following the uncovering of the Indo German plot for initiating a revolt in India...
in San Francisco in 1917-18.
Clan Na Gael largely controlled the Irish Race Conventions
Irish Race Conventions
The Irish Race Conventions were a disconnected series of conventions held in Europe and America between 1881 and 1994. None was concerned in defining the Irish as an ethnic race, but they were arranged to discuss some pressing or emerging political issues at the time concerning Irish Nationalism....
from 1916, and its affiliated group the Friends of Irish Freedom
Friends of Irish Freedom
The Friends of Irish Freedom was an Irish-American Republican organisation founded at the third Irish Race Convention held in New York . Supported by the United Irish League, the Ancient Order of Hibernians and other leading Irish-American organisations...
. The Irish War of Independence
Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence , Anglo-Irish War, Black and Tan War, or Tan War was a guerrilla war mounted by the Irish Republican Army against the British government and its forces in Ireland. It began in January 1919, following the Irish Republic's declaration of independence. Both sides agreed...
led to a split in Clan na Gael which was precipated in June 1920 by Éamon de Valera
Éamon de Valera
Éamon de Valera was one of the dominant political figures in twentieth century Ireland, serving as head of government of the Irish Free State and head of government and head of state of Ireland...
, as President of the Irish Republic became involved in a dispute with Devoy and Judge Cohalan
Daniel F. Cohalan
Daniel Cohalan was an Irish-American leader and judge of the Supreme Court of New York State .Born in Middletown, New York where he joined and became a prominent member of the Democratic Party and later involved in the leadership of the Tammany Society .In 1912, Cohalan was appointed a Judge of...
over lobbying US Presidential candidates on the issue of American recognition for the Irish Republic
Irish Republic
The Irish Republic was a revolutionary state that declared its independence from Great Britain in January 1919. It established a legislature , a government , a court system and a police force...
. To punish Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...
for his apparent lack of support, the Clan backed Harding in the United States presidential election, 1920
United States presidential election, 1920
The United States presidential election of 1920 was dominated by the aftermath of World War I and a hostile response to certain policies of Woodrow Wilson, the Democratic president. The wartime economic boom had collapsed. Politicians were arguing over peace treaties and the question of America's...
. In October, 1920, Harry Boland
Harry Boland
Harry Boland was an Irish Republican politician and member of the First Dáil.-Early life:Boland was born in Phibsboro, Dublin on 27 April 1887. He was active in GAA circles in early life, and ultimately joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood...
stated that the IRB
Irish Republican Brotherhood
The Irish Republican Brotherhood was a secret oath-bound fraternal organisation dedicated to the establishment of an "independent democratic republic" in Ireland during the second half of the 19th century and the start of the 20th century...
in Ireland had terminated connections between the Clan and the parent body in Ireland until the will of Dáil Éireann
Dáil Éireann
Dáil Éireann is the lower house, but principal chamber, of the Oireachtas , which also includes the President of Ireland and Seanad Éireann . It is directly elected at least once in every five years under the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote...
was mirrored in Clan na Gael. Devoy & Cohalan refused to accept this but McGarrity disagreed believing that without IRB support, the Clan was not legitimate, which led to a split. McGarrity, whose faction went by the name Reorganized Clan na Gael, supported the Anti-Treaty forces during the Civil War while Devoy and Cohalan supported the Free State. After 1924, when the IRB and the Devoy-Cohalan Clan na Gael both voted to disband, McGarrity's faction became the sole Clan na Gael. In 1926, the Clan na Gael formally associated with the reorganized Irish Republican Army in the same fashion as it had with the IRB.
McGarrity continued to provide support and aid to the IRA
Irish Republican Army
The Irish Republican Army was an Irish republican revolutionary military organisation. It was descended from the Irish Volunteers, an organisation established on 25 November 1913 that staged the Easter Rising in April 1916...
after it was outlawed in Ireland by de Valera in 1936 but became less active in the 1940s and 50s following McGarrity's death in 1940. However the organization grew in the 70's. The organization played a key part in NORAID
NORAID
Noraid or the Irish Northern Aid Committee is an Irish American fund raising organization founded after the start of the Troubles in Northern Ireland in 1969...
and was a prominent source of finance and weapons for the Provisional IRA during "The Troubles
The Troubles
The Troubles was a period of ethno-political conflict in Northern Ireland which spilled over at various times into England, the Republic of Ireland, and mainland Europe. The duration of the Troubles is conventionally dated from the late 1960s and considered by many to have ended with the Belfast...
" in Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
in 1969-1998.
The Clan-na-Gael still exists today, much changed from the days of the Catalpa rescue and as recently as 1997 another internal split occurred as a result of the IRA shift away from using physical force as a result of the 1998 Good Friday peace accords
Belfast Agreement
The Good Friday Agreement or Belfast Agreement , sometimes called the Stormont Agreement, was a major political development in the Northern Ireland peace process...
, and before that over the abandonment of the policy of abstentionism in 1987. The two factions are known to insiders as Provisional Clan na Gael (allied to Provisional Sinn Féin/IRA) and Republican Clan na Gael (associated with both Republican Sinn Féin/Continuity IRA and 32 County Sovereignty Movement/Real IRA, though primarily the former). These have been listed as terrorist organizations unilaterally at various times by the UK Government.
Presidents of the Clan na Gael
From its founding in 1869, although heavily influenced by founder John Devoy over the years, the organization was nominally under the control of an executive committee headed by a national Executive Board Chairman. This executive committee was elected at yearly, later ever other year, conventions. At the convention held in Chicago during 1881, the committee was reduced to five members making it easier to control. The committee then came under the domination of Michael Boland, D.S. Freely and national executive chairman Alexander Sullivan who together were known as "the Triangle".The first Chairman perhaps should be Jerome Collins as the man who founded the first Club [D1] of what would later be called the Clan na Gael [these clubs later were called "Camps"] The club was named Napper Tandy after an Irish Patriot. From the beginning, according to John Devoy in the Gaelic American, the secretary of Napper Tandy and later of the Clan na Gael was William James Nicholson. He was secretary from 1867 to 1874 when he was dismissed for loaning Camp Funds which were not repaid. According to a descendant of the John Haltigan the foreman printer of the Irish People, James Haltigan son of John Haltigan was Executive Board Chairman in 1871.
In 1873 James Ryan Was Executive Board Chairman (Devoys PostbagBP Vol. I p. 87–88) was he from Lawrence, Mass? [Devoy in the Gaelic American said the man who preceded him was from there and was a nonentity]
In 1874 John Devoy was chosen Executive Board Chairman at the Baltimore Convention/
From 1875 until he resigned in 1879, John Devoy's trusted friend and ardent nationalist Dr. William Carroll of Philadelphia was Executive Board Chairman. James Reynolds of Connecticut temporarily held the post from Carroll's resignation until 1881 [there was no convention in 1880] when the Triangle Sullivan,Feeley,Boland assumed command although Devoy supporters Reynolds and Treacy remained on the Executive Board, they were left out of the decision-making process by the Triangle. The Triangle's bombing campaign split the organization into two factions in the mid 1880s. After the murder of Cronin, the Clan na Gael united once again under John Devoy in 1900. John Kenny
John Kenny (Clan-na-Gael)
John Kenny long-time member and multi-term president of the Clan-na-Gael in New York, which supplied support to the rebels in Ireland, culminating in the Easter Rising. Under the cover of personal and business trips, he served as liaison between the "Home Office" and the New York Clan-na-Gael...
served as president of the Napper Tandy branch in 1883 and again in 1914.