The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-14 00:00:00

DIABOLICAL FENIAN OUTRAGE.

Yesterday London was made the scene of a Fenian
outrage exceeding in enormity anything even they have
yet attempted. It had for its object the liberation of the
prisoners Burke and Casey, who have been for some time
confined in the Clerkenwell House of Detention. With
a reckless disregard for life, a gang of conspirators
attempted to accomplish this purpose by blowing in a wall
of the prison. Happily the attempt was frustrated. It
could hardly by any possibility have succeeded, but in its
failure it involved immediately the Eves of three persons
and injuries to forty or fifty others, some of which are
almost certain to prove fatal, and in addition to this loss
of life a destruction of a large number of houses and their
contents.

The scene of the explosion is Corporation-lane, which
runs parallel with the prison wall on its northern side,
and consisted of houses three stories high—some of them
let out in tenements and others used for various manufac-
turing purposes. The prison is surrounded on the northern
side by Corporation-lane, on the east by Woodbridge-
street, and on the west by Rosoman-street. Corporation-
lane is a narrow street, having the prison wall on one side
and a row of eight or ten three-storey tenements on the
other. Opposite the centre of the wall is a narrow court,
called St. James's-passage, running into a street called
St. James's-place, which is parallel to Corporation-lane.
St. James's-place runs into Rosoman-street. Rosoman-
street is the best of the streets referred to. It is composed
almost solely of private houses, inhabited chiefly by
working jewellers and lapidaries, who carry on their
trade, which is indigenous to Clerkenwell, with pretty
fair success.

The explosion, which sounded like a discharge of artil-
lery, occurred at exactly a quarter to four o'clock in the
afternoon, when there is still daylight oven in these short
days, and it was heard for miles round. In the immediate
neighbourhood it produced the greatest consternation, for
it blew down houses and shattered the windows of others
in all directions. The windows of the prison itself, of
coarse glass more than a quarter of an inch thick, were to
a large extent broken, and the side of the building imme-
diately facing the outer wall in which the breach was
made, and about 150 feet from it, bears the marks of the
bricks which were hurled against it by the explosion.
The wall surrounding the prison is about 25ft. high, 2ft.
3in. thick at the bottom, and about 14in. thick at the
top.
In order to understand the events in the order in which
they occurred, we must go back a little. The police,
warned of the desperate character of the Fenians by the
outrage at Manchester, appear to have suspected that
some such attempt might be made, and therefore, ever
since Burke and Casey were first remanded, the exterior
of the House of Detention has been watched by detective
police. A house close to the north-western boundary
of the prison has been suspected of being a
Fenian rendezvous. There have never been less
than three detectives on the watch ; but up to
yesterday they failed to discover anything positively
suspicious. Yesterday morning three officers, named
Sutton, Ranger, and Knowles, went on duty, and about
twelve o'clock they noticed three men and a woman of
suspicious appearance and still more suspicious behaviour.
For some time the officers watched them unobserved, and
saw that they appeared to be reconnoitring the prison
walls and the surrounding streets and courts. The
close scrutiny of the constables made the Fenians, for
such they were, suspect that they were under surveil-
lance, and there then followed a series of ma-
noeuvres on both sides, one party being anxious to
throw the other off the scent, and the other just as
determined to keep their game in view. The Fenians
separated and went different ways, an example which was
promptly followed by the officers. Then they harked
back, and again congregated in the vicinity of the prison,
where, being again alarmed, one of the men, who is
known, and who has for some time past been sus-
pected, though no positive proof could be obtained
against him, drove off in a cab, while the others
again separated, each dogged by an officer. At
about half-past three o'clock, immediately before the
explosion, the detectives had watched the party of Fenians
into St. James's-place, and saw them turn into St. James's-
pas:age. The officers were then in Rosoman-street, and,
of course, all that was necessary to prevent the Fenians
getting out of sight, was to watch the end of St. James's-
place and Corporation-lane. After a brief parley to
arrange the plan of operations, Ranger and Knowles went
up St. James's-place to reach the end of St. James's-
passage, and Sutton went down Rosoman-street to guard
the end of Corporation-lane. Just as Ranker -and
Knowlcs reached the end of the passage they met two of
the men and the woman running at full speed up the
passage, in a direction away from the prison wall, with
such an expression of anxiety and alarm that the officers
were satisfied that something had been done, and at once
stopped and arrested them. Scarcely had they seized
their prisoners when a tremendous explosion took place,
which almost prostrated the struggling group, followed by
a shower of dust, the crash of falling houses, and, after a
moment's deathly silence, the shrieks and wails of wounded
men, women, and children. Sutton had just reached the
corner of Corporation-lane, when he saw one of the
Fenians—a man of the true Irish-Yankee type, with red
hair, and that peculiarly American hirsute ornament on
the chin, known as a " goatee "—running close alongside
the prison wall and just turning the corner into
Rosoman-street, to go in the direction of Cler-
kenwell-green. Sutton, having the same suspicion as his
brother officers, at once started in pursuit, but just as ho
reached the middle of Corporation-lane the explosion took
place, and he was prostrated and partially stunned.
Rising as rapidly as possible, he saw the Fenian, who had
been protected by the south-west wall of the prison, turn-
ing the corner of a street in the distance, whence he was
lost to view and effected his escape. There is some satis-
faction in knowing that this scoundrel, who seems to have
been the most active agent in the outrage, is the man who
was known as a suspicious character to the police, and
whose appearance with his companions yesterday first
excited the grave suspicions of the detectives. It is to be
hoped, therefore, that very few hours will elapse before he
is in custody.

The way in which the explosion was brought about is
pretty fully known. The wretches placed a barrel of
gunpowder against the prison wall, lighted a fuse, and
then ran—like cowards as they were.

It is stated with confidence that more than one person
witnessed the two men carrying the keg of powder
from the corner of St. James's-passage to the opposite
side of Corporation-lane, and place it there against the
wall, and that another man was seen to place the
lighted fuse at the top of it. The effect of such
an explosion would be threefold. First, there would be
the outward explosion, carrying everything away before
it. In fact, it carried away a street and a half. Next
would be the lateral explosion—the expansive destruction
from side to side. The result of this was shewn in havoc
and ruin for many hundreds of yards to the right
and the left hand. Thirdly would come the recoil. It
was this recoil which knocked a hole in the wall.
The entire roadway in Corporation-lane was covered with
bricks. It was all bricks. It seemed as though some mon-
strous volcano had suddenly emitted a shower of bricks.
The house immediately facing the place where the barrel
had been fired was blown clean out ; that is to
say, where twenty-four hours ago stood a human
habitation there was only now a hole. The
report of the explosion was like the simultaneous roar
of field-pieces and the rattle of musketry. In the midst
of the smoke, now a sickly blue, partially cleared away, a
perfect shower of glass could be seen, and floating—as if
glass had lost its specific gravity—in such a fashion as
paper torn into little atoms by children, and thrown from
a window, is wont to do. But it, was when the
smoke was lifted from the street that the worst result
of the catastrophe could be realised., Out of sashless win-
dows were women suspended, supporting themselves by
clinging to the window sills. From every window came
screams for help ; and fine, strong mothers, who in the
impulse of the moment appeared about to leap to the
pavement, disappeared only to return with the child or the
children they had in the love of life but momentarily for-
gotten. Tho dense smoke had been driven into the rooms, and
half-stifled girls, boys, men, and women tried to make
themselves heard by the few who were in the lane, for
fear of danger had driven almost every one out of it.
From a second floor a little girl screamed out, " Oh !
mother's killed mother's killed ;" and in the
top window of the next house a strong man im-
plored some one to go up and help him " to save
the children." Help was not long in coming, and
dead, dying, maimed, and disfigured people were being
carried from the houses. In most cases the poor little
children appeared to be the greatest sufferers. Their
mothers carried them bleeding through the streets, rushing
frantically to wherever they thought a surgeon could be
found. Other women fainted and lay upon the heaps of
dirt until restored by the attentions of those around them.
The report and coneu:sion of the air alarmed every one
half a mile round, and within a radius of half that dis-

tance thelinhabitants appear as by one impulse to have
rushed frantically into the streets.
The poliOiNwere summoned to the spot by the admirable
telegraph systen: in force between the various stations
and Scotia:id-3mA',
The first effect of the expi,sion was to clear the streets,
the next to fill them. While fr iendly hands were removing
those who had been injured,'.pthers were surveying the
devastation. It soon, became apparent that the injury
done to property was not confined to Corporation-lane,
but extended' to Coburg-street, Rosoman-street, Wood-
bridge-street, Short's-buildings, Seckforde-street, Bt.
James's-walk, Plumber-place, St. James's-buildings. In
all these streets, and in the lanes abutting on them, the
windows were broken, and the houses shaken as if by an
earthquake. St. James's-buildings are a range of houses
immediately behind Corporation-lane, and it suffered
hardly less than the houses in the front.
A vigorous search was now in progress among the ddbris.
A bricklayer's labourer, named Brasney, observed a hand
projecting from the ruins of the fallen house in front of
him. At a great risk to his own life, he extricated in.
succession an old woman, a man, and a young woma'r.
The rooms of the houses had been cleared. Cabs wqre
promptly procured, and the injured persons brougbkin
them to St. Bartholomew's Hospital and the Royal Alree
Hospital, Gray's-inn-road, while the children whose
parents were injured were taken to the Clertenwell
Workhouse.

When every person was removed from the houses the
condition of the latter could be better ascertr,tned. The
sight was deplorable indeed. Not a windo*--was to be
seen in any of the ten or eleven houses, while there was
not a trace of furniture to be found in anyvroi the rooms,
as if it had been all swept clean away, oellad crumbled
into dust. In some cases portions 44 ff.:ay-Aura lad, by
force of the concussion, been shot out of 'slit back windows,
but, generally speaking, it was only t0.:14e found in heaps.
of atoms in corners of the rooms. No. Lt. in
Corporation-lane was occupied 131,,, a Mrs. Harvey,
who supported herself by a . toy shop. All
her stock, furniture, clothes,, and other pro-
perty were destroyed. In No. ,2A Mr. Spiers kept a
lodging-house, and here several children were much
injured ; the house is gutted, And the furniture ruined.
No. 3A was rented by a prison warder (Mr. Tinnock),
and his wife and two children have been severely cut
about the face. All his, property is lost. No. 1
comes next, and this is thk best house in Corporation-
lane. Mr. Jones, a vestryman of Clerkenwell, is
owner, and occupied the premises. Mrs. Jones
received serious injuries, but is stated not to be
in any immediate danger. Seen from the street, the par-
lour of this house presented an extraordinary appearance.
A very fine chimney-glass was shaken by the concussion
off one of the nails which held it, and remained sus-
pended by the other at the side of the mantel-piece. A
chair, which it is supposed had been standing at
a window when tae explosion took place, was forced
across the room and landed on top of a sideboard.
In the kitchen the candles, which were being prepared
for parlour or drawing-room, stood lighted on the kitchen
table, not having been blown out, strange to say, by the
concussion. InNo. 2 Mr. Moseley kept a lodging-house. His
son, Charles Moseley, sustained a bad cut. The lane—St.
James's-place—separates Mr. Jones's house from that of
Mr. Moseley, and the latter house is opposite the spot
where the barrel of gunpowder exploded ; consequently it
suffered the greatest amount of violence,and is accordingly
a complete wreck. The roof, floors, and side walls are
gone. No. 3 is also terribly shattered. It was rented
by a Mr. Thompson, a lodging-house keeper, and
everything in it has been irreparably damaged. Mrs.
Sampson occupied No. 4, which was her own property ;
No. 5 was rented by Mr. Young, a telegraph case maker;
and No. 6 was a lodging-house. The three houses are in
a wrecked condition. Mr. Bennett's house, No. 7, where
he carried on the business of a working jeweller, has not
suffered very seriously ; but opposite to it, in No. 11, Mr.
Waters has had a good deal of his furniture smashed, and
all his windows broken.

The houses in Corporation-lane were occupied chiefly by
artificers and warders of the prison. The top front ro'm
of one of these houses had been unoccupied for some time,
but shortly before the explosion one of the warders of the
prison called the attention of an officer of the prison
named Moore to a circumstance which he considered sus-
picious. The room commanded a full view of the prison-
yard, and from its opened window was leaning a woman
with a jug in her hand, and behind her were four or five
men, all straining to be as near the window as they could,
with the object apparently of seeing something that was
taking place in the street below. It was five minutes
after this circumstance that the explosion occurred.
We have several accounts of the explosion by eye-
witnesses. One of them was anZintelligent little boy
named John Abbott, 13 years of alt. who happened to be
an eye-witness, and who now lies at St. Bartholomew's
Hospital, but, happily, not much injured. The boy lived
with his parents at 5, Corporation-lane, and we cannot,
perhaps, do better than give his statement in his own
words.

About a quarter to four o'clock, he says, he vi as stand-
ing at Mr. Young's door, No. 5, when he saw a large
barrel close to the wall of the prison, and a man leave the
barrel and cross the road. Shortly afterwards the man
returned with a long squib in each hand. One of these he
gave to some boys who were playing in the street, and the
other he thrust into the barrel. One of the boys was
smoking, and he handed the man a light, which the
man applied to the squib. The man stayed a short time
until he saw the squib begin to burn, and then he
ran away. A policeman ran after him, and when the
policeman arrived opposite No. 5 " the thing went off."
The boy saw no more after that, as he himself was covered
with bricks and mortar. The man, he says, was dressed
something like a gentleman. He had on a brown over-
coat and black hat, and had light hair and whiskers. Ho
should know him again if he saw him. There was a
white cloth over the barrel, which was black, and
when the man returned the squib he partly uncovered
the barrel, but did not wholly remove the cloth. There
were several men and women in the street at the time, and
children playing. Three little boys were standing near
the barrel all the time. Some of the people ran after the
man who lighted the squib.

Mrs. Holder, a widow, living at 4, Corporation-lane,
and now in St. Bartholomew's, says, about half-past three
a man knocked at her door, and, upon her son answering,
the man asked to be allowed to go the top storey of the
house to be enabled to see his cousin and speak to him
when -exercising in the yard of the House of Detention.
His application was refused, and he went away. About
ten minutes afterwards the explosion occurred. It is
understood that her son will be able to identify the man.
A little girl, who was an invalid, and had been removed
from her bed to the window in one of the houses over-
looking the prison-yard, says she saw the cask, and
thought it was treacle. She expressed herself to that
effect to some person in the room, who simply said,
" Nonsense." " But lam sure it's treacle, Polly," said
the girl. On that she saw a man who was near the cask
stoop down, and then the explosion occurred.

A boy named Charles Young, who is much injured, and
who is also in the hospital, is said to have been in the
company of the men and woman who are implicated as
the authors of the explosion. One of the residents of the
locality stated that it was well known and talked about in
the neighbourhood, even by some of the warders of the
prison, the night before, that the authorities had an inti-
mation tha tan attack upon the prison was apprehended,
and precautions were taken to have extra officers on night
duty.

One of the men in custody gives the name Timothy
Desmond, and describes himself as 46 years of age,
and a tailor by trade ; the other, Jeremiah Allen,
is 36, and a bootmaker. The woman, whose name
is Ann Justice, is about 30 years of age. Late at night
she made a determined attempt to strangle herself in a
cell in which she was confined is the House of Detention,
but it was frustrated. She has been in the frequent habit
of visiting the prisoner Casey while he has been confined
there. She did so on the morning before the explosion.

At two o'clock, after she had left the prison, one of the
officers on duty outside the prison, inquired of Mr.
Moore, one of the prison officials, her address, and at the
same time made a communication to Mr. Moore, the
effect of which was that he had seen her conversing with
a fellow who had for days been hanging about the
prison. The constable said it was impossible to
get the man away, he persisting in staying about
the place. Mr. Moore immediately spoke to the
goiernor, Captain Codd, on the subject, and two or
three officers were distributed about in order to give an
alarm if anything occurred. Shortly afterwards one of
the warders called Mr. Moore's attention to a man an-
swering the description given of the one who had been seen
by the constable loitering about being on the top of a
house overlooking the prison yard. When Mr. Moore got
to the window at which the warder was watching, the man
had vanished. But shortly afterwards the same man, ac-
cording to the description, was with the woman near the
front gates of the prison, and presently they were joined
by a second man, The_incident we have recorded above