Patrick J. Whelan
Encyclopedia
Patrick James Whelan was a tailor
and alleged Fenian
sympathizer executed following the 1868 assassination
of Canadian
journalist
and politician
Thomas D'Arcy McGee.
He maintained his innocence throughout the proceedings, but the government needed somebody to blame, and although the evidence against Whelan was entirely circumstantial
, he was "the perfect candidate". Questions about his guilt continue to be voiced, as his trial was "marred" by political interference, dubious legal procedures, allegations of bribing witnesses and easily discredited testimony.
against a police station in Tallaght
. Whelan then led a "wandering life" traveling around England, before moving to Canada in approximately 1865.
In Quebec City he worked as a tailor. There he joined the Volunteer Cavalry against the Fenians; however, some of his actions led to a military review on suspicions his sympathies lay with the Irish raiders. He was arrested, but eventually released without charge.
He is believed to have moved between Buffalo, New York
and Hamilton, Ontario
and finally Montreal, Quebec for a year before marrying Bridget Boyle in 1867. Boyle, who was thirty years older than Whelan, was an upper class
woman and later the couple settled down with Whelan working as a merchant tailor in Ottawa
.
On December 31, 1867, two men including one identifying himself as "Smith, of the Grand Trunk
" went to the home of McGee where they were welcomed into the library of the house by McGee's brother. One of the visitors, commonly believed to be Whelan, told McGee that he had come to warn the family that renegades were plotting to burn down the house at 4am the following morning. He was thanked for the information, which seemed credible given the animosity against McGee, and given a note to take to the police station relating the known information about the alleged arson attempt and requesting two officers be sent to the house for protection. However, Whelan did not deliver the note to police until 4:45am the following morning, after the supposed arsonist had failed to arrive.
On March 17, 1868, Whelan acted as the Assistant Marshal of the St. Patrick's Day Parade in Ottawa.
on Sparks Street
in the early morning hours of April 7, 1868. Smoking a cigar and fumbling with his key in the lock, he was greeted as the owner Mary Ann Trotter opened the door for him. At that moment, a muzzle flash
erupted, and as a .32 calibre bullet tore through McGee's neck and through his jaw, knocking his dentures
out, the politician fell back into the street.
By the next nightfall, more than 40 Canadians, predominantly Irish immigrants suspected of Fenian allegiance, had been arrested; most prominent of these was Patrick Buckley, who served as the stable hand to Prime Minister John A. Macdonald
, and who gave police the name of Whelan.
Whelan, who had just left the house of Richard Quinn where he had mentioned that his boss Mr. Eagleson had been arrested for the murder, was found in a tavern belonging to Michael Starr at 9:30pm. He was searched. A Sgt. Davis produced from Whelan's front right pocket a .32 Smith and Wesson pistol, serial #50847, with all six rounds still loaded. The other officers present took from his pocket a box of cartridges, some papers, the Irish American newspaper from a month earlier, a green silk badge of the Toronto Hibernian Benevolent Society, a membership card for the St. Patrick's Benevolence Society, a photograph of a lady, a ticket from the St. Patrick's Literary Society, two tickets the shamrock Quadrille Club inviting Whelan and a lady friend. By April 9, the 28-year old Whelan was considered the prime suspect and charged with the murder.
while hearing evidence. Ironically, Whelan was defended by Protestant Orangeman John Hillyard Cameron, while the prosecutor was Irish-Catholic James O'Reilly. The jurors at the trial were William Purdy, Matthew Heron, William Morgan, William Gamble, Thomas Weatherley, John Fecles, Benjamin Hodgins, John Wilson, Samuell Conn, Robert McDaniel, Robert W. Brown and George Cavanagh.
On his first day of trial, Whelan was noted as wearing an "irreproachable" black silk hat, black frock coat, white vest with narrow gold chain and back pants, and exhibiting a "jaunty" demeanor. He sat with folded arms, listening intently to the trial proceedings and eating apples. He was entranced by the flies walking on the ceiling of the courthouse, and laughed audibly when a constable lost his footing and slipped while trying to bring him out of the defendant's box. Agnes Macdonald wrote in her journal that he was a "small, mean-looking" man, who stroked his mustache nervously.
Eliza Tierney, a 14-year old servant at Starr's tavern, was called as a witness and testified that she had known Whelan for six weeks as a boarder who lived in a room on the first floor of the tavern, and that he had owned a pistol for as long as she had known him. However, she discredited the police evidence suggesting that a shot had been recently fired from Whelan's gun, by offering that one of the other servant girls had handled the pistol clumsily only a week before and shot herself in the arm. This was also confirmed by bookkeeper William Goulden in his testimony, who added that Whelan had offered to sell his pistol just six weeks before McGee was killed. Other evidence suggested that Whelan owned the pistol as he was fond of sport shooting.
The prosecutor called Joseph Faulkner, a tailor who knew Whelan in Montreal, hoping that he would testify about Whelan's Fenian connections; while he said he recollected Whelan being angered by McGee during the election season, which was contradicted by other witnesses who claimed Whelan showed no interest in politics, he said there was no known Fenian connection. Another witness identified as Turner testified that he had heard a Member of Parliament
mention that the government had offered Doyle $16,000 and passage to anywhere in the world to re-start his life, if he would make a sworn statement against Whelan. However Susan Wheatley later testified that she had heard Turner say he would swear his grandfather's life away for $10,000 or $20,000 and no mention was made of Doyle. Later witnesses were actually directly asked to swear whether they had received any money for their testimony.
There was much laughter in the courtroom when Cameron began questioning a witness demanding to know why "John Downey" had just answered that he had never known Whelan, nor lived in Montreal as it was widely known was true. The witness whispered to the judge, who informed counsel that the man called to the witness stand was named John O'Donnell, causing Cameron to mutter "Oh...then you may go down" and excusing him from the court while the actual John Downey was found and sworn in.
In his closing address, which lasted nearly three hours, Cameron noted that he did not believe any man had ever before been given a trial "under circumstances so unfairly arrayed in prejudice against him", and gave the example of several prominent legal cases where the defendant had been found guilty and executed, only to be exonerated later when the real culprit was found. When he resumed his seat, there was applause in the courtroom. When O'Reilly gave his closing address, he ended advising the jury "don't stretch your imaginations...don't trifle with your concsciences or seek for doubts where there are none. Society looks to you for justice."
Whelan appealed to the Court of Queen’s Bench of Ontario; but Richards had just been named to that court, and thus cast the deciding vote not to overturn his own judgment. In January 1869, Whelan appealed to the Ontario Court of Appeal
only to find Richards again sitting on the deliberating body and casting his vote to not overturn his conviction of Whelan. Whelan sent a letter to the Irish priest Dr. O'Connor on February 1, 1869 advising that it seemed his execution was imminent and he would request the priest's service and extreme unction on the scaffold.
He was publicly hanged in front of 5,000 spectators on February 11, 1869 at the Carleton County Gaol. He met his death "with manliness and faith", and told the gathered crowd that he was innocent, although he did know who had killed McGee. His last words were "God save Ireland and God save my soul".
Shortly after the debacle, the revolver Whelan was alleged to have used to murder McGee was lost. It surfaced as a family heirloom in the family of Scott Renwick in 1973, and 32 years later was offered at auction for $55,000.
In August 2002, a Catholic ceremony exhumed
his remains from their grave in the former prison cemetery, and repatriated them alongside his wife's Montreal plot in Côtes des Neiges cemetery.
Whelan's case is dramatized in the Canadian play, Blood On The Moon.
Tailor
A tailor is a person who makes, repairs, or alters clothing professionally, especially suits and men's clothing.Although the term dates to the thirteenth century, tailor took on its modern sense in the late eighteenth century, and now refers to makers of men's and women's suits, coats, trousers,...
and alleged 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...
sympathizer executed following the 1868 assassination
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
of Canadian
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...
journalist
Journalism
Journalism is the practice of investigation and reporting of events, issues and trends to a broad audience in a timely fashion. Though there are many variations of journalism, the ideal is to inform the intended audience. Along with covering organizations and institutions such as government and...
and politician
Politician
A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...
Thomas D'Arcy McGee.
He maintained his innocence throughout the proceedings, but the government needed somebody to blame, and although the evidence against Whelan was entirely circumstantial
Circumstantial evidence
Circumstantial evidence is evidence in which an inference is required to connect it to a conclusion of fact, like a fingerprint at the scene of a crime...
, he was "the perfect candidate". Questions about his guilt continue to be voiced, as his trial was "marred" by political interference, dubious legal procedures, allegations of bribing witnesses and easily discredited testimony.
Life
Whelan was born near Dublin, and became apprenticed to a tailor at the age of 14. Meanwhile, his brother John was alleged to have committed arsonArson
Arson is the crime of intentionally or maliciously setting fire to structures or wildland areas. It may be distinguished from other causes such as spontaneous combustion and natural wildfires...
against a police station in Tallaght
Tallaght
Tallaght is the largest town, and county town, of South Dublin County, Ireland. The village area, dating from at least the 17th century, held one of the earliest settlements known in the southern part of the island, and one of medieval Ireland's more important monastic centres.Up to the 1960s...
. Whelan then led a "wandering life" traveling around England, before moving to Canada in approximately 1865.
In Quebec City he worked as a tailor. There he joined the Volunteer Cavalry against the Fenians; however, some of his actions led to a military review on suspicions his sympathies lay with the Irish raiders. He was arrested, but eventually released without charge.
He is believed to have moved between Buffalo, New York
Buffalo, New York
Buffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...
and Hamilton, Ontario
Hamilton, Ontario
Hamilton is a port city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Conceived by George Hamilton when he purchased the Durand farm shortly after the War of 1812, Hamilton has become the centre of a densely populated and industrialized region at the west end of Lake Ontario known as the Golden Horseshoe...
and finally Montreal, Quebec for a year before marrying Bridget Boyle in 1867. Boyle, who was thirty years older than Whelan, was an upper class
Upper class
In social science, the "upper class" is the group of people at the top of a social hierarchy. Members of an upper class may have great power over the allocation of resources and governmental policy in their area.- Historical meaning :...
woman and later the couple settled down with Whelan working as a merchant tailor in Ottawa
Ottawa
Ottawa is the capital of Canada, the second largest city in the Province of Ontario, and the fourth largest city in the country. The city is located on the south bank of the Ottawa River in the eastern portion of Southern Ontario...
.
On December 31, 1867, two men including one identifying himself as "Smith, of the Grand Trunk
Grand Trunk
Grand Trunk can refer to:*The Grand Trunk Company in Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels*The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway in Canada*The Grand Trunk Railway in North America*The Grand Trunk Road in South Asia...
" went to the home of McGee where they were welcomed into the library of the house by McGee's brother. One of the visitors, commonly believed to be Whelan, told McGee that he had come to warn the family that renegades were plotting to burn down the house at 4am the following morning. He was thanked for the information, which seemed credible given the animosity against McGee, and given a note to take to the police station relating the known information about the alleged arson attempt and requesting two officers be sent to the house for protection. However, Whelan did not deliver the note to police until 4:45am the following morning, after the supposed arsonist had failed to arrive.
On March 17, 1868, Whelan acted as the Assistant Marshal of the St. Patrick's Day Parade in Ottawa.
Killing of Thomas D'Arcy McGee
McGee was returning to his boarding houseBoarding house
A boarding house, is a house in which lodgers rent one or more rooms for one or more nights, and sometimes for extended periods of weeks, months and years. The common parts of the house are maintained, and some services, such as laundry and cleaning, may be supplied. They normally provide "bed...
on Sparks Street
Sparks Street
Sparks Street is a street in downtown Ottawa, Canada that was converted into an outdoor pedestrian street in 1966, making it the earliest such street or mall in North America....
in the early morning hours of April 7, 1868. Smoking a cigar and fumbling with his key in the lock, he was greeted as the owner Mary Ann Trotter opened the door for him. At that moment, a muzzle flash
Muzzle flash
Muzzle blast is the term used to describe the release of high temperature, high pressure gases expelled from the muzzle of a firearm when it is discharged. Muzzle flash is the term used to describe the visible light of the muzzle blast. The blast and flash are caused by the combustion products of...
erupted, and as a .32 calibre bullet tore through McGee's neck and through his jaw, knocking his dentures
Dentures
Dentures are prosthetic devices constructed to replace missing teeth, and which are supported by surrounding soft and hard tissues of the oral cavity. Conventional dentures are removable, however there are many different denture designs, some which rely on bonding or clasping onto teeth or dental...
out, the politician fell back into the street.
By the next nightfall, more than 40 Canadians, predominantly Irish immigrants suspected of Fenian allegiance, had been arrested; most prominent of these was Patrick Buckley, who served as the stable hand to Prime Minister John A. Macdonald
John A. Macdonald
Sir John Alexander Macdonald, GCB, KCMG, PC, PC , QC was the first Prime Minister of Canada. The dominant figure of Canadian Confederation, his political career spanned almost half a century...
, and who gave police the name of Whelan.
Whelan, who had just left the house of Richard Quinn where he had mentioned that his boss Mr. Eagleson had been arrested for the murder, was found in a tavern belonging to Michael Starr at 9:30pm. He was searched. A Sgt. Davis produced from Whelan's front right pocket a .32 Smith and Wesson pistol, serial #50847, with all six rounds still loaded. The other officers present took from his pocket a box of cartridges, some papers, the Irish American newspaper from a month earlier, a green silk badge of the Toronto Hibernian Benevolent Society, a membership card for the St. Patrick's Benevolence Society, a photograph of a lady, a ticket from the St. Patrick's Literary Society, two tickets the shamrock Quadrille Club inviting Whelan and a lady friend. By April 9, the 28-year old Whelan was considered the prime suspect and charged with the murder.
Trial and execution
Whelan found himself in a "bizarre" 8-day trial. The Prime Minister, a personal friend of Mcgee's, had received permission to sit beside judge William Buell RichardsWilliam Buell Richards
Sir William Buell Richards, PC, Kt was the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada.Richards was born in Brockville, Upper Canada to Stephen Richards and Phoebe Buell. He earned law degree at the St. Lawrence Academy in Potsdam, New York and then articled with his uncle Andrew Norton...
while hearing evidence. Ironically, Whelan was defended by Protestant Orangeman John Hillyard Cameron, while the prosecutor was Irish-Catholic James O'Reilly. The jurors at the trial were William Purdy, Matthew Heron, William Morgan, William Gamble, Thomas Weatherley, John Fecles, Benjamin Hodgins, John Wilson, Samuell Conn, Robert McDaniel, Robert W. Brown and George Cavanagh.
On his first day of trial, Whelan was noted as wearing an "irreproachable" black silk hat, black frock coat, white vest with narrow gold chain and back pants, and exhibiting a "jaunty" demeanor. He sat with folded arms, listening intently to the trial proceedings and eating apples. He was entranced by the flies walking on the ceiling of the courthouse, and laughed audibly when a constable lost his footing and slipped while trying to bring him out of the defendant's box. Agnes Macdonald wrote in her journal that he was a "small, mean-looking" man, who stroked his mustache nervously.
Eliza Tierney, a 14-year old servant at Starr's tavern, was called as a witness and testified that she had known Whelan for six weeks as a boarder who lived in a room on the first floor of the tavern, and that he had owned a pistol for as long as she had known him. However, she discredited the police evidence suggesting that a shot had been recently fired from Whelan's gun, by offering that one of the other servant girls had handled the pistol clumsily only a week before and shot herself in the arm. This was also confirmed by bookkeeper William Goulden in his testimony, who added that Whelan had offered to sell his pistol just six weeks before McGee was killed. Other evidence suggested that Whelan owned the pistol as he was fond of sport shooting.
The prosecutor called Joseph Faulkner, a tailor who knew Whelan in Montreal, hoping that he would testify about Whelan's Fenian connections; while he said he recollected Whelan being angered by McGee during the election season, which was contradicted by other witnesses who claimed Whelan showed no interest in politics, he said there was no known Fenian connection. Another witness identified as Turner testified that he had heard a Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
mention that the government had offered Doyle $16,000 and passage to anywhere in the world to re-start his life, if he would make a sworn statement against Whelan. However Susan Wheatley later testified that she had heard Turner say he would swear his grandfather's life away for $10,000 or $20,000 and no mention was made of Doyle. Later witnesses were actually directly asked to swear whether they had received any money for their testimony.
There was much laughter in the courtroom when Cameron began questioning a witness demanding to know why "John Downey" had just answered that he had never known Whelan, nor lived in Montreal as it was widely known was true. The witness whispered to the judge, who informed counsel that the man called to the witness stand was named John O'Donnell, causing Cameron to mutter "Oh...then you may go down" and excusing him from the court while the actual John Downey was found and sworn in.
In his closing address, which lasted nearly three hours, Cameron noted that he did not believe any man had ever before been given a trial "under circumstances so unfairly arrayed in prejudice against him", and gave the example of several prominent legal cases where the defendant had been found guilty and executed, only to be exonerated later when the real culprit was found. When he resumed his seat, there was applause in the courtroom. When O'Reilly gave his closing address, he ended advising the jury "don't stretch your imaginations...don't trifle with your concsciences or seek for doubts where there are none. Society looks to you for justice."
Verdict, execution
On September 15, Whelan was found guilty and sentenced to hang by Richards. Upon hearing their verdict, Whelan advanced to the jury dock and said "I am held to be a murderer. I am here standing on the brink of my grave, and I wish to declare to you and to my God that I am innocent, that I never committed this deed".Whelan appealed to the Court of Queen’s Bench of Ontario; but Richards had just been named to that court, and thus cast the deciding vote not to overturn his own judgment. In January 1869, Whelan appealed to the Ontario Court of Appeal
Ontario Court of Appeal
The Court of Appeal for Ontario is headquartered in downtown Toronto, in historic Osgoode Hall....
only to find Richards again sitting on the deliberating body and casting his vote to not overturn his conviction of Whelan. Whelan sent a letter to the Irish priest Dr. O'Connor on February 1, 1869 advising that it seemed his execution was imminent and he would request the priest's service and extreme unction on the scaffold.
He was publicly hanged in front of 5,000 spectators on February 11, 1869 at the Carleton County Gaol. He met his death "with manliness and faith", and told the gathered crowd that he was innocent, although he did know who had killed McGee. His last words were "God save Ireland and God save my soul".
Legacy
Whelan's widow Bridget moved back to Montreal and lived as a recluse until her own death.Shortly after the debacle, the revolver Whelan was alleged to have used to murder McGee was lost. It surfaced as a family heirloom in the family of Scott Renwick in 1973, and 32 years later was offered at auction for $55,000.
In August 2002, a Catholic ceremony exhumed
Exhumed
Exhumed may refer to:*Exhumation*Exhumed , a first-person shooter*Exhumed , a deathgrind band* Exhumed Films, a Philadelphia-based "organization* Exhumed river channel, a ridge of sandstone...
his remains from their grave in the former prison cemetery, and repatriated them alongside his wife's Montreal plot in Côtes des Neiges cemetery.
Whelan's case is dramatized in the Canadian play, Blood On The Moon.