An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business
Seanad Éireann — 2026-03-25
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Conor Murphy (SF), Industrial and Commercial Panel

I wish to raise the issue of the ship, the Catalpa. It may familiar to students of history but for those who are not, the Catalpa facilitated an escape of Fenian prisoners from Freemantle Prison outside Perth in Australia. The 150th anniversary of this escape will take next month. There had been a general amnesty for Fenian prisoners who had been shipped to Australia but these six prisoners had been serving members of the British forces and Fenian revolutionaries at the same time and were therefore excluded from that.
One of the prisoners who had been released prior to that, John Boyle O'Reilly, worked in the United States to try to secure their release. One of the prisoners was from Wicklow, two were from Cork, one was from Tyrone, one from Limerick and there was a guy called James Wilson, whose real name was in fact McNally. He was from Newry, County Down. The Fenian who people will be familiar with, John Devoy, worked in the United States to raise funds to raise funds to try to secure their freedom. I think the equivalent of £1 million in today's money was raised to buy a whaling ship called the Catalpa and send it to Australia to try to secure their release. The prisoners managed to escape out to the Catalpa in small boats but as the ship tried to exit Australian waters it was confronted by a British warship. The captain of the ship, who was a Quaker from the United States, hoisted the American flag and declared if they attacked the ship it would be an act of war on the United States of America and thus secured their freedom.
It is a remarkable story and this week in Freemantle and Perth there is a week-long commemoration of the events. I had the opportunity in October to visit Freemantle Prison and saw the exhibition and the excitement about the anniversary coming up. There are events in Boston and New York because that is where they eventually ended up after three months at sea but there are no events in Ireland. My colleague, Deputy Ó Snodaigh, asked the Minister, Deputy Jim O'Callaghan, and was told there was nothing planned. The flag that was used is kept in the National Museum here yet we have nothing to commemorate this event.
The consular offices in both the United States and in Australia are assisting with the events there. I ask the Leader to ask the Government to again consider hosting some events commemorating this. I ask the Cathaoirleach to ensure that, if there is an exhibition attached to the commemoration, we try to secure it for this place at some stage over the course of the year. This is a remarkable story that is receiving increased attention given the anniversary of the escape and I would like to see us having the opportunity to commemorate the anniversary in Ireland, and not just in Australia and the United States of America as is currently happening.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-03-25/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:46+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-03-25