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When Guelph and area was a 'central point' of Fenian activity

Even locally there were Fenians fighting for the cause to rid Ireland of British rule

There was a time in Canadian history when the word “Fenian” was the equivalent of the word “terrorist” today.

The Fenians, named after warriors of ancient Irish mythology, thought they could free Ireland from British rule by attacking Canada. Most of them were Americans of Irish descent who had never set foot in Ireland, but nonetheless saw it as an ancestral home to which they owed loyalty. Many of them fought in the Union Army during the American Civil War, gaining military training and battlefield experience.

The Fenian movement was well-organized, well-funded, and its members had no qualms about using violence – including murder – to achieve their ends. The Fenian threat was one of the reasons John A. Macdonald established the Dominion Police and Canada’s first secret service.

American authorities did next to nothing to discourage Fenian activity on their side of the border, allowing them to assemble at several places for cross-border raids. The largest of these incursions resulted in the Battle of Ridgeway near Fort Erie on June 2, 1866. Inexperienced Canadian militia met a Fenian invasion force largely made up of battle-hardened Civil War veterans. The Canadians put up a brave fight, but were obliged to retreat. However, the Fenians soon withdrew to American soil, fearing the arrival of regular British troops and realizing that the Canadians didn’t want to be “liberated.” 

By Civil War standards the clash at Ridgeway was but a skirmish. However, it was a major event to colonial Canadians and has remained so in Canadian history. It marked the last battle with a foreign invader on Canadian soil and helped to galvanize the movement for Confederation. The Fenian alarm has also been credited with being “the genesis of active militia service in Canada.” 

The Canadian government called for 10,000 volunteers and Guelph men were among the 14,000 who responded. They joined the 30th Wellington Battalion of Rifles, and although they didn’t see action at Ridgeway, they were sent to potential trouble spots along the border. One of them was Captain G.H. Skinner. The Canadian General Service Medal he was awarded for volunteering during the Fenian troubles of 1866 is now the property of the Guelph Civic Museum. Also among the museum’s artifacts from that period is a police baton that was owned by George H. Sayers of Guelph who helped maintain order as a special constable. Both items are currently in storage.

Fear of Fenian activity remained high for months following the fight at Ridgeway. Then on April 7, 1868, an assassin shot and killed Thomas D’Arcy McGee at the front door of his Ottawa boarding house. Irish-born McGee was a Father of Confederation and a personal friend of Prime Minister Macdonald. He opposed British rule in Ireland, but he also denounced the Fenians. For that, they branded him a traitor. A suspected Fenian named Patrick Whelan was accused of McGee’s murder. 

The McGee assassination brought anti-Fenian feelings in Ontario to a fever pitch. Rumours and suspicions had people on edge in communities across the province and Guelph was no exception. In the first week of May, two government detectives named Follis and Lambert arrived in town on the train from Toronto. They gave Chief Constable Jonathan Kelly a warrant for the arrest of Peter Mahon of Aberfoyle, which at the time was nicknamed Little Ireland.

Twenty-eight-year-old Mahon was known to have attended a Fenian convention in Cleveland. The Mahon family didn’t have a good reputation. The father, Patrick, had once been arrested for counterfeiting but had escaped prosecution on a technicality. Peter had a brother serving a term in prison for robbery.

The detectives, Kelly and a Guelph constable travelled out to the Mahon farm. Follis went to the door under the pretext of selling apple trees. Mahon tried to make a break for it, but was apprehended before he could escape out a back window. He was found to be in possession of a receipt for some money he’d collected for an Irish relief fund. The only weapons the police discovered on the property were three rusty muskets and two fowling pieces. 

Mahon said he was “a Fenian at heart,” but did not believe in fighting for them. However, the detectives apprehended another suspected Fenian, a railroad baggageman named John Murphy who had recently moved to Guelph from London, Ontario. He had in his possession correspondence from a man named McManus who evidently intended to connect Fenian sympathizers in Guelph with those in London.

According to the local press, those plans included “the execution of a number of daring designs, neither creditable to their judgement nor honourable to their positions.” It didn’t take the detectives long to figure out that “McManus” was actually Peter Mahon. They concluded that “Guelph and vicinity has been the central point for Fenian operations in Ontario.”

By mid-August the Fenian scare had died down. Mahon, Murphy and other suspects who’d been rounded up were released from jail, after providing sureties of their good behaviour. Patrick Whelan was tried for McGee’s murder, and convicted on largely circumstantial evidence. He was hanged in Ottawa before a crowd of 6,000  people on Feb. 11, 1869.

His last words were, “God save Ireland and God save my soul.” A Guelph newspaper editorial said the execution of Whelan “closes a tragedy.”