The character and career of the spy-master Francis Higgins indicate the level to which the Dublin Castle regime sank in its determination to crush the conspiracy of the United Irishmen writes Brendan O' Cathaoir.
As Thomas Bartlett remarks in his latest scholarly work - Revolutionary Dublin, 1795-1801: the Letters of Francis Higgins to Dublin Castle - the routine collection of information had always been a central activity of English government in Ireland. In the 1790s, Britain was in the grip of a decisive war with revolutionary France. Secret intelligence sources whispered about United Irish links with radical groups in Britain.
Prof Bartlett's mastery of the period is distilled into a richly-annotated introduction. Nineteenth-century historians such as R.R. Madden believed the Castle's intelligence network was invincible: that "every important proceeding was known to the government". In suggesting a reappraisal, Bartlett offers the 158 letters of Francis Higgins - "sham squire", pro-Castle newspaper proprietor and handler of a group of informers - as a contribution towards that re-evaluation. Appendices include the letters of Higgins's prize agent, Francis Magan, United Irishman, barrister and betrayer of Lord Edward FitzGerald.
In its desire to control the dissemination of information, Dublin Castle bought up newspapers. Higgins's Freeman's Journal, through direct subsidies and payments for the publication of government proclamations, was entirely in the Castle's pocket, as were three other Dublin journals. In addition, all four editors became government informants.
In its search for information Dublin Castle was assisted by the garrulity of individual United Irishmen, whose longing for conviviality compromised their secretive fraternalism. Bartlett considers that spies gleaned as much information through plying their sources with drink as through greasing their palms with coin.
Furthermore, the openness of the Dublin Society of United Irishmen left it peculiarly vulnerable. Almost from the society's first meeting in late 1791, until its suppression in May 1794, the Castle was in receipt of detailed information, including its relations with sister clubs in Britain.
Moreover, in the years after 1794, when the radical members of the society reconstituted themselves as a secret oath-bound organisation, dedicated to achieving an Irish republic with French assistance, its reliance on oaths was a potentially fatal flaw. There seemed to be a universal law about subversive movements, Madden noted: the more secrecy is sought, the more difficult it is to guard against traitors. In short, Bartlett observes, a mass-based secret society was a contradiction in terms.
The United Irishmen showed no flair for counter-intelligence. Fastidiously, they may have regarded spying as a tool of a corrupt government. Although aware that their organisation had been infiltrated, scarcely any of the major informers were unmasked in their lifetime, and fewer still met untimely ends as a result of their treachery.
Higgins was dubbed a "sham squire" by a judge of the king's bench, and the nickname stuck. As a young charlatan in pursuit of an heiress, he had produced forged documents which showed he held property in Co Down. Completely deceived, a wealthy Catholic merchant ordered his daughter to marry Higgins. Soon after the marriage the truth that he was a penniless fraudster emerged. His bride fled and reportedly died soon after. The hapless father-in-law took an action against him; Higgins was found guilty of assault and lodged in Newgate gaol.
A further spell in prison for an excise fraud followed. Higgins was employed next as a sort of bouncer by Charles Reilly of Smock Alley, who ran a public house and gambling den. Reilly was soon forced out and, it was contended, Higgins took over both the business and Reilly's wife. When she died the premises became a brothel, Higgins being a friend of Dublin's most notorious madam.
Less disreputably, an investment in the clothing trade paid off. Building on contacts, and after a short period of study, Higgins then became an attorney. His career was by no means done, however; he realised that control of a newspaper would hasten his rise in society and bring him to the attention of Dublin Castle. Though semi-literate, he obtained an editorial position on the Freeman's Journal, and in 1783 acquired ownership.
Government business was worth £1,600 to Higgins in 1788 alone. He became a key informant of Dublin Castle, running as many as seven agents in his own private intelligence network. He frequently visited the Castle, often relayed his information in person to Under-Secretary Edward Cooke. In 1801 the unscrupulous Higgins secured a pension of £300 for his work; but he did not live long to enjoy it, dying the following year.
The contest between revolution and counter- revolution became a life-or-death struggle, the outcome of which was not inevitable. While agreeing with the notion of "informers everywhere", Bartlett argues that their effectiveness was assumed rather than demonstrated. The official mindset displayed wilful blindness.
Most notably, the Castle seriously underestimated Wolfe Tone's role in the revolutionary decade. After a French expeditionary force of 14,000 men and 50 ships nearly landed at Bantry Bay, Tone noted ruefully in his diary (on December 26th, 1796): "England has not had such an escape since the Spanish Armada [in 1588\], and that expedition, like ours, was defeated by the weather".
Until the spring of 1798 Dublin Castle understood neither the importance of the information it had, nor the ramifications of the conspiracy in Ireland. The Castle then acted decisively and won the intelligence war; but, as this important assessment of the role of informers in the 1790s concludes, "it had been a close-run thing".