note: Maria Island prison was a British operated internment camp in Tasmania.
William Smith O'Brien was a 'Young Irelander', an Irish Nationalist.

THE MURDER OF SMITH O'BRIEN

Anglo-Celt, Published in Cavan on June 7, 1850
(From 'The Nation' Newspaper)

If there be tenderness in the women, and range in the men left in Ireland, there is news to-day to flood the land with tears; to fill the air with curses.

They are killing Smith O'Brien by slow murder in Maria Island.

We have been silent for three weeks, believing that his aristocratic and parliamentary friends would interpose effectively on his behalf, as they promised to do. But they have paltered with his interest, ruining it with faint, hesitating help, and quenching hope among those who were manlier and more devoted. Meantime, a voice of remonstrance is again heard across the ocean, demanding, is O'Brien to be murdered?

Cruelties the most terrible - cruelties which it maddens to think of, and shames to mention - are inflicted on this defenceless man by the Executioner of British vengeance.

He is caged in the closest solitary confinement. His food is scanty, and loathsome. He has no comforts, no attendance. He never sees the face or hears the voice, of a friend. He is denied the common requisites of decency. For months he has not been allowed a change of raiment, or permitted to cleanse his dress.

This will be questioned, disputed, disbelieved. No wonder; for it is monstrous and incredible. But we write every syllable of it on the authority of one as incapable of falsehood or exaggeration as of murder. It is the literal truth.

In solitude, in privation, in filth, in rags lives this Irish gentleman; this noble man who lost liberty, home, family - ALL - for Ireland.

Nor is this the whole. In the foul den where is thrust, like a chained reptile, one generous girl of the age of ten years, daughter of the governor, sought, with the instinctive charity of her sex, to solace the captive's care, and lighten his suffering by kindly offices; and forthwith, on pain of new privation, O'Brien was forbidden ever to speak to her again. He lost this innocent familiar, whose childish beauty and guilessness perhaps, spoke to his father's heart of the orphaned darlings who weep for him at home.

What multitudes have melted into tears over this very incident in the prison revelations of Silvio Pellico; and here we have it re-enacted in the life of a man from whom no human creature ever suffered a wrong.

These atrocities are inflicted by the Governor of Maria Island; an official, whose brutality has earned for him in the colony, the title of "The Black Serpent;" a tyrant, whose name is a terror, and whose presence is despair to the hapless victims of his infernal cruelty.

In this monster's power; tortured, outraged, maddened, lives your countryman; the son of your kingliest house; the generous patriot who fought and fell for you and us all.

Is this law? Is this justice? Who is so brutal here as to defend such barbarity? What partisan of British rule - what representative of British authority dare stand up in these islands and vindicate this dark, cowardly, and hellish persecution?

Does the law of God justify it? Does the law of man ordain it? Will the people of England sanction it? Will the peeple (sic) of Ireland endure it?

It is a crime horrible enough to provoke the indignation of humanity. What wonder if the burning manhood of Ireland arose in arms against the government that thus sins against justice and our race; that thus murders by slow death our dear brother; the stainless, heroic champion of our liberty.

Men of Ireland - and let God and men, the time and the eternity, witness the solemnity and truth of our invocation! - whether you be Protestants or Catholics - whether you are arranged beneath the Green Flag of our Fathers, or under the crimson banner of St. George - whether you desire Irish independence or cherish a Union with England, your sacred duty is identical. You must interfere, and save this man's reeson. (sic) You must interfere and save this man's life; for, we tell you, both are threatened.

We say this advisedly. No human constancy can long withstand the torturing cruelty O'Brien suffers. No bodily strength can triumph over the privations O'Brien endures.

If you will not be accomplices in the murder, which is designed; if you would not have O'Brien's blood red in judgment on your souls - we say to you, interfere. Denounce this iniquity. Terminate this dread agony. Expostulate with this cruel, malignant, assassin government. Save him from death, or worse than death. These tidings have produced a profound impression in Dublin. They have excited intensest indignation. A committee is being formed, of men of all parties; and, if we have not mistaken Irish hearts, there will be a denunciation that shall ring through the land like the judgment-peal - a remonstrance which it will not be prudent for any government to despise, or safe for any government to disobey.

We hear, indeed, that the Queen of England comes to Ireland again this summer - comes for the ovation that monarchs love from petted slaves. But we warn her and her ministers that surely as she sets foot on Irish soil, while O'Brien is thus tortured and degraded, so surely, wherever she turns, shall his name be thundered in her ears as a malediction - so purely shall his blood be flouted in her face. This promise we will see fulfilled.