September 16, 1867 -- Five Fenian revolutionaries arrested in 
     Manchester for involvement in the killing of a Sergeant Brett 
     during an attempt to rescue fellow Fenians from a police van.  They 
     are condemned to death -- though none fired the shot that killed 
     Brett.  Public protest was considerable.  In the end, three of the 
     five "Manchester Martyrs" would he hanged on November 23, 1867; 
     another was sentenced to life in prison; the fifth, Maguire, was 
     set free.  
 
     The Fenian movement was born in 1858 -- in New York and Dublin.  It 
     was more officially known as the Irish Republican Brotherhood.  
 
                                                                    -kkc 
 
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                 ON THE FENIAN PRISONERS IN MANCHESTER 
 
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                   Memorial of the General Council of  
              the International Working Men's Association 
                           November 20, 1867 
 
 
To the Right Hon. Gathorne-Hardy,  
Her Majesty's Secretary of State: 
 
The memorial of the undersigned, representing workingmen's associations 
in all parts of Europe, showeth: 
 
That the execution of the Irish prisoners condemned to death at 
Manchester will greatly impair the moral influence of England upon the 
European continent.  The execution of the four prisoners resting upon 
the same evidence and the same verdict which, by the free pardon of 
Maguire, have been officially declared, the one false, the other 
erroneous, will bear the stamp not of a judicial act, but of political 
revenge.  But even if the verdict of the Manchester jury and the 
evidence it rests upon had not been tainted by the British Government 
itself, the latter would now have to choose between the bloody-handed 
practices of old Europe and the magnanimous humanity of the young 
Transatlantic Republic.  
 
The commutation of the sentence for which we pray will be an act not 
only of justice, but of political wisdom.  
 
 
 JOHN WESTON, Chairman                ROBERT SHAW, secretary for America 
 EUGENE DUPONT, secretary for France  KARL MARX, secretary for Germany 
 HERMANN JUNG, secretary for          PAUL LAFARGUE, secretary for Spain 
      Switzerland                       
 ANTON ZABICKI, secretary for Poland  DERKINDEREN, secretary for Holland 
 ALEXANDRE BESSON, secretary for      J. GEORGE ECCARIUS, general  
      Belgium                              secretary 
 
 
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