When Drennan had first returned from Dublin in 1807, William Bruce attempted a reconciliation. He proposed Drennan to his Belfast Literary Society, but Drennan declined. His friend John Templeton (the "father of Irish botany") had already withdrawn from the Society rather than accept the presence of Dr. James MacDonnell. In the wake of Robert Emmet's abortive rising, in 1803 MacDonnell made a public subscription for the capture of Thomas Russell, who had been their mutual friend and was subsequently hanged. Instead, with Templeton and the dissident Quaker John Hancock, Drennan began publication of the "Belfast Monthly Magazine."