Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846Various
History
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
Mr Clarke is shot in Tipperary, because he came to reside on his land;
and his murder was plotted and executed, not because he did harm or
injustice to any one, but because he ventured to do what Lord Grey and
others, who "pick their teeth" in safety here, insist that Irish
gentlemen should do--he dared to live on his own land. The approver--in
whose house the assassination was planned, and in which the assassins
resided while waiting an opportunity to destroy their victim--declared,
in his examination on their trial, "that he was a good friend to him,"
and that he never knew him to distrain any man for rent, and yet he gave
him no notice; and the intended murder was openly spoken of before a
numerous family of children--ay, _girls_ of fifteen years of age were
privy to it; and yet no compunctious feelings touched their hearts. One
of them, in giving her testimony, admitted that she knew what the men
meant to do when they were leaving the house; and that, when she heard
the shot, she was convinced that her landlord had been murdered.
In passing sentence on two of the persons convicted of this dreadful
outrage at Nenagh, on the 3d, Judge Ball said--"With regard to you,
Patrick Rice, I have searched in vain through the evidence for something
that might suggest a motive for joining in the conspiracy. There was no
evidence that you had any dealing or transaction with the unfortunate
murdered man. There was no connexion between you in any way, and not the
slightest ground for resentment or provocation that could be traced. As
for you, Hayes, (the other prisoner,) your case is much the same. You
were a tenant of Mr Clarke's; there is evidence that he expressed some
wish that you or your mother should give up a house; and he offered you
every facility to build a house elsewhere, and to supply you with
materials, and the means of removing them, with his own horses and
drags. It has been said that this desire of his might have suggested a
motive for the murder; but when the evidence comes to be given, I find
that you and your mother, instead of expressing displeasure, expressed a
readiness to give up the house after harvest." Here is a man murdered
for merely proposing change of locality, which must be accompanied, as a
matter of course, by better accommodation. This is his only crime, and
yet it is sufficient to secure his destruction. What a grateful people
are the Irish!--how patiently they endure wrong!--and what a picture of
their morality do the details of this horrid assassination afford!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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