Introduction to The Sham Squire.

**The Sham Squire

**and

The Informers of 1798

**with a view of their contemporaries.

To which are added, in the form of an Appendix,

Jottings about Ireland Seventy Years Ago.

By William J. Fitz-patrick

Biographer of Bishop Doyle, Lord Cloncurry, Lady Morgan, etc.

Third Edition.

Completely Re-cast, with New Matter,

Valuable Documents hitherto unpublished, and Illustrations from Contemporary Prints.**

**

**“Truth is stranger than fiction.”

Dublin:

W. B. Kelly, 8 Grafton Street.

London: Simpkin, Marshall & Co.

fiatjustitia.gif (43657 bytes) **

Preface To The Second Edition**

The object which originally led me to commence researches in reference to Francis Higgins, “the Sham Squire,” was to remove a misapprehension which pervaded almost the entire press of Great Britain and Ireland.

For 61 years the name of the person who received the reward of £1,000 for the betrayal of Lord Edward Fitzgerald remained an impenetrable mystery, although historians have devoted much time and labour in seeking to discover it. Among other revelations, recently published in the “Cornwallis Papers,” we find that “Francis Higgins, proprietor of the *Freeman’s Journal, *was the person who gave all the information which led to the arrest and death of the Patriot Chief.”

In the following pages, however, it will appear that Higgins was not the actual betrayer, but the employer of the betrayer, a much respected “gentleman,” who, although in receipt for 45 years of a pension-the price of Lord Edward’s blood - was not suspected of the treachery.

‘The *Athenoeum, *after justly reprobating some of the duplicity practised in 1798, observed:-

“The Freeman’s Journal was a patriotic print, and advocated the popular cause, and its proprietor earned blood-money by hunting down the unfortunate Lord Ed ward Fitzgerald!”

“Truth is stranger than fiction,” however; and the *Freeman’s Journal, *when owned by Higgins, was not only the openly and notoriously subsidised organ of the then corrupt Government, but the most violent assailant of the popular party in Ireland.

The *Times, *noticing the United Irishmen, said - “They believed themselves to be embarked in a noble cause, and were cheered on the path that led to martyrdom by the spirit-stirring effusions of a press which felt their wrongs, shared their sentiments, and deplored their misfortunes. Alas! the press that encouraged was no more free from the influence of Government than the advocate who defended them. Francis Higgins, proprietor of the *Freeman’s Journal, *was the person who procured all the intelligence about Lord Edward Fitzgerald. When we reflect that the *Freeman’s Journal *was a favourite organ of the United Irishmen, (The organ of the United Irishmen was the Press) that in that capacity it must have received much secret and dangerous information, and that all this information was already bargained for and sold to the Irish Government before it was given, we can appreciate at once the refinement of its policy, and the snares and pitfalls among which the path of an Irish conspirator is laid.”

The misapprehension under which the paragraphs of the *Times *and Athenoeum were written, found a prompt echo in the *Mail, Post, *and other influential Irish journals. The *Nation *gave it to be understood that Higgins, having become a secret traitor to his party, published “next morning thundering articles against the scoundrel who betrayed the illustrious patriot;” and in a subsequent number added: “What fouler treachery was ever practised than the subornation of the journals and the writers in whom the people placed a mistaken confidence, whereby the unsuspecting victims were made to cram a mine for their own destruction!”

These statements excited a considerable sensation. The Irish provincial press reiterated them, and locally fanned the flame. The *Meath People, *after alluding to Higgins, said: “Shame, shame for ever on the recreant who had patriotism on his pen point, and treason to the country in his heart !” I felt that this statement if unrefuted, would soon find its way into the permanent page of history. A short letter from me, explanatory of the real facts, was gladly accepted by the conductor of the *Freeman’s Journal, *who introduced it in the following words, less by one too flattering observation:-

“We publish to-day a most interesting letter from William John Fitzpatrick. The sad fate of the gallant Lord Edward excited peculiar and permanent interest in the minds of all who prized chivalry and patriotism; and when the ‘Cornwallis Papers’ disclosed the name of the Government agent who had tracked the noble chief to his doom, a host of reviewers, ignorant of the history of the time, and anxious only to cast a slur on the patriots of a bygone century, wrote beautiful romances about the betrayer of Lord Edward. The reviewers, without exception, have represented Higgins as the confidant of the United Irishmen - as a ‘patriotic’ journalist, who sustained the popular party with his pen, and told them for Castle gold.

Mr Fitzpatrick dissipates the romance by showing who and what Higgins was - that he was the public and undisguised agent of the English Government; that his journal, instead of being ‘patriotic,’ or even friendly to the United Irishmen, was the constant vehicle of the most virulent assaults upon their character and motives; that he was the ally and friend of the notorious John Scott; that, as a journalist, he was the panegyrist of Sirr, and his colleague, Swan ; and that he never mentioned the name of an Irish patriot-of Lord Edward, O’Connor, Teeling, or their friends - without some such prefix as ‘traitor,’ ‘wretch,’ ‘conspirator,’ ‘incendiary,’ while the Government that stimulated the revolt, in order to carry the Union, is lauded as ‘able,’ ‘wise,” humane,’ and ‘lenient!’ These events are now more than half a century old; but, though nearly two generations have passed away since Higgins received his blood-money, it is, as justly remarked by Mr Fitzpatrick, gratifying to have direct evidence that the many high-minded and honourable men who were, from time to time, suspected for treachery to their chief, were innocent of his blood.”

Having, in the letter thus referred to by the *Freeman, *glanced rapidly at a few of the more startling incidents in the life of “the Sham Squire,” which elicited expressions of surprise, and even of incredulity, I conceived that I was called upon to give his history more in detail, and with a larger array of authorities than I had previously leisure or space to bring forward. From the original object of this book, I have in the present edition wandered, by pressing in to the mosaic many curious *morceaux *illustrative of the history of the time; while in the Appendix will be found some interesting and important memorabilia, which could not, without injury to artistic effect, appear in the text.

Owing to the recently discovered Fenian conspiracy, and the attention which it has excited, this work possesses, perhaps, more than ordinary interest; but, lest it should be supposed that I was influenced in my choice of the subject by its aptness to existing circumstances, I am bound to add that the book was written, and in great part printed, before the Fenian movement obtained notoriety.

In conclusion, I have only to observe that I feel the less hesitation in publishing these details, from the fact that the two marriages which Mr Higgins contracted produced no issue.

Kilmacud Manor, Stillorgan,

November 23, 1865. **

Preface To The Third Edition**

A second edition of this book having become exhausted in a few weeks, I am called upon to prepare a third for the press. The matter is entirely recast, and sonic curious Addenda, not hitherto used, with valuable original documents, are now welded into the text. Among the latter I beg specially to direct attention to the historic importance of the Cope and Reynolds papers, and which have been kindly placed at my disposal by Sir Wilham H. Cope, Bart.

Since the publication of this book, I found to my surprise that I had got a few readers so illogical as to assume, first - that because I condemn the Government of a bygone century, I am necessarily opposed to the present Government; and secondly, that my sympathies are with the Revolutionists of ‘98.

The policy of the present Government presents a thorough contrast to that of their remote predecessors, and in my opinion merits support. As to the rebellion of ‘98 I merely say, with the reigning premier, Earl Russell, that ” it was wickedly provoked, rashly begun, and cruelly crushed;” nor do I go so far as the cabinet minister, Lord Holland, who, in his “Memoirs of the Whig *Party,” *writes:-” More than 20 years have now passed away. Many of my political opinions are softened - my predilections for some men weakened, my prejudices against others removed; but my approbation of Lord Edward Fitzgerald’s actions remains unaltered and unshaken. His country was bleeding under one of thee hardest tyrannies that our times have witnessed.”

The true moral which I have sought to inculcate has been so accurately perceived by an old and influential journal, *Saunder’s News Letter, *that I am tempted to quote a passage or two for the behoof of the illogical few to whom I have referred:-

“When,” asks this journal, ” will the people learn that secret confederacies can do no good, that informers will always be found to betray them, and that no** **plot which deals in signs and signals, can enlist the sympathy of those whose co-operation would be really valuable? The very interesting work of Mr Fitzpatrick, recently published, ‘The Sham Squire and the Informers of 1798,’ gives sonic striking instances of the impossibility of treasonable associations being secure from the spy and the false companion, and the wider the conspiracy, the greater the certainty of detection …

There never yet was an illegal secret confederacy which had not members ready to betray their associates, either to purchase safety, or to make a profit for themselves.”

But there is another class of readers who, without holding either of the illogical objections just noticed, entertain an opinion of this book equally erroneous. They assume that I have sought to dishonour Ireland by showing it as always abounding in** **spies, betrayers, &C but they can have hardly read the emphatic passages with which the volume closes.

I have been hitherto noted for embalming the memory of some of Ireland’s worthies; (The Caledonian Mercury, in noticing the life of Bishop Doyle said:-” Mr Fitzpatrick has a commendable patriotic desire to do and have justice done to the more eminent of Ireland’s sons. He entertains the belief that Ireland, unlike most other nations, idolises their great men while they live, and neglects their memory when they are dead; he cannot help regretting that neither by ‘storied urn or monumental bust,’ nor in the written pages of the world’s history, have illustrious Celts received that measure of justice and honour to which they are entitled; he has, therefore, in these, as in previous volumes, furnished satisfactory evidence of his own determination, if not to do the whole work required, at least to lay the foundation upon which the temple of Irish worth and genius may be reared, and its niches becomingly filled, For this he is entitled to the gratitude of every true patriot.”) and it is surely quite consistent and patriotic to stigmatise the representatives of a perfectly opposite character. This course, moreover, serves to show my historic impartiality. Contrasts are often agreeable and useful. “Look upon this picture and on this,” says Shakespeare. Plutarch, the prince of biographers and moral philosophers, in his introduction to the life of Demetrius Poliorcites and another person remarkable for his vices, says: ‘We shall behold and imitate the virtuous with greater attention, if we be not unacquainted with the characters of the vicious and the infamous.” Portraits of unscrupulous statesmen and politicians are no doubt introduced for the better illustration of the eventful epoch in **question; but the sketches are by no means confined to Irishmen.

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