Ugly scenes after Tory defeat in Irish by-election

Violence

has followed the victory of a candidate committed to giving Catholics the right to sit in Parliament in last month’s by-election in County Dublin.

A pro-emancipation Protestant, Colonel Henry White, defeated the hardline anti-Catholic Tory, Sir Compton Domville by 994 votes to 849. Col. White’s success is being attributed to a campaign organised by Daniel O’Connell, widely regarded as the leader of Ireland’s Catholic majority. He mobilised Catholic tenants to vote for Col. White and against the candidate backed by their landlords.

This is being seem as one of the first occasions on which the potential impact of tenant voters has been realised, to the fury of Protestant landowners. It may inspire Mr O’Connell to repeat the exercise, and even organise Catholics across all of Ireland.

Trouble happened in Dublin after the declaration of the result as Col. White’s victory parade went through the streets, accompanied by supporters and a military band. At first, the mood was buoyant, with cheering outside the Guinness brewery when an employee held up a ‘145’ sign, the pro-emancipation majority.

Disturbances started when the procession reached Trinity College. Students are said to have thrown stones at the marchers, who returned them, smashing windows, with some entering the building.

Three people are reported to have been killed and several seriously hurt. Police who tried to arrest people throwing stones at the college were injured, and magistrates were surrounded by a crowd armed with shillelagh clubs as they questioned stone-throwers.

Worse violence erupted after dark when a mob, armed with bludgeons, ran through the city centre, cheering the name of the losing Tory candidate and assaulting anyone who refused to join in the shouting. The crowd broke windows at Col. White’s HQ and demonstrated outside Daniel O’Connell’s home.