3-021-511 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Fenian Prisoners at the Bow-Street Police Court: removal of prisoners from the courthouse, 1868. 'The five persons in custody on the charge of wilful murder done by blowing down the wall of the Clerkenwell House of Detention on Dec. 13, were again brought...before Sir Thomas Henry...Their names are Timothy Desmond and William Desmond, brothers; Jeremiah Allen, Nicholas English, and Ann Justice...The prisoners were conveyed from Millbank in an ordinary prison-van, escorted by a strong detachment of mounted police, armed with cutlasses and revolvers, and as the vehicle passed through the streets at a smart trot it attracted much attention'. On 13 December 1867 the exercise yard of the Clerkenwell House of Detention in London was the target of a gunpowder explosion instigated by members of the Fenian Society in an attempt to aid the escape of Ricard O'Sullivan Burke, an arms supplier to the Fenians. From "Illustrated London News", 1868.