THE INDIAN MUTINY MEDAL TO THE LIVERPOOL “MOLLY MAGUIRE”, PRIVATE JOHN CLARNEY (SURNAME ALSO SOMETIMES SPELT KILLARNEY), 84TH (YORK AND LANCASTER) REGIMENT (THE POST 1880 2ND BATTALION YORK AND LANCASTER REGIMENT)., LATE 51ST (2ND YORKSHIRE WEST

THE INDIAN MUTINY MEDAL TO THE LIVERPOOL “MOLLY MAGUIRE”, PRIVATE JOHN CLARNEY (SURNAME ALSO SOMETIMES SPELT KILLARNEY), 84TH (YORK AND LANCASTER) REGIMENT (THE POST 1880 2ND BATTALION YORK AND LANCASTER REGIMENT)., LATE 51ST (2ND YORKSHIRE WEST RIDING LIGHT INFANTRY, THE POST 1880 THE KING’S OWN YORKSHIRE LIGHT INFANTRY) WHO EMIGRATED TO ENGLAND WITH HIS FAMILY CIRCA 1844, IMMEDIATELY PRIOR TO OUTBREAK THE GREAT IRISH FAMINE OF 1845-52 AND WHO IS RECORDED IN THE 1851 CENSUS AS BEING RESIDENT IN SAWNEY POPE STREET, LIVERPOOL, THE LOCATION OF AN ALEHOUSE THAT WAS THE THEN HEADQUARTERS OF THE LIVERPOOL BRANCH OF THE MOLLY MAGUIRES, AN IRISH IMMIGRANT SECRET SOCIETY THAT ADVERTISED ITSELF AS A SUPPORT GROUP FOR IRISH IMMIGRANTS BUT IN FACT HAD MORE TO DO WITH CRIMINALITY AND GANGSTERISM THAN WITH WELFARE OF THE IRISH IMMIGRANTS IN THE SAWNEY POPE STREET AND THE SURROUNDING AREA OF LIVERPOOL, THE IRISH IMMIGRANT RESIDENTS OF SAWNEY POPE STREET, WHEN TAKING PART IN FACTION FIGHTS WITH OTHER GROUPS OF IRISH IMMIGRANTS, IDENTIFYING THEMSELVES AS “MOLLY MAGUIRES”.

JOHN CLARNEY’S EARLY LIFE AS A “MOLLY MAGUIRE” FROM SAWNEY POPE STREET IN LIVERPOOL ULTIMATELY LED TO HIM COMBINING HIS MILITARY CAREER WITH A LIFE OF CRIMINALITY, HIS BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ON ANCESTRY RECORDING A PERIOD OF IMPRISONMENT FOR LARCENY IN 1854, CLARNEY BEING JAILED FOR HOUSE BREAKING AND THEFT WHILE STILL SERVING WITH THE 51ST FOOT AND NEWSPAPERS OF THE PERIOD LATER RECORD CLARNEY AS BEING INVOLVED IN THE MURDER OF A MAN IN HUDDERSFIELD IN 1861, WHILE SERVING WITH THE 84TH FOOT.

Indian Mutiny Medal, no clasp (officially named, impressed in plain block capitals: JOHN CLARHEY, 84th. REGt.). Good Very Fine.

Note incorrect spelling of surname in naming, no doubt due to a manuscript correction to Clarney’s surname in the original medal roll, as a result of which the “N” in Clarney on the medal roll looks like a letter “H”.

Medal accompanied by biographical details, extracts 1851, 1861, and 1891 census returns, copied service papers for Clarney’s two periods of enlistment, 51st Foot 1853-55 (Attestation and Service Papers) and 84th Foot, 1857-1868 (Attestation and Service Papers), extract 1856 criminal register, and copied extract medal roll, confirming no clasp Indian Mutiny Medal for service “with Brigadier Douglas at Bullah”, along with extract from T. Rice Holmes “A History of the Indian Mutiny” giving details of Brigadier Douglas’s campaign in the Shahabad and Kashmir Hills, Western Behar, including the Pursuit of Kunwar Singh, and extract from Michael Macilwee’s “The Liverpool Underworld. Crime in the City 1750-1900” (Liverpool University Press, 2011).

John Clarney (1836-1904) is recorded in his service papers as having been born in the parish of Minlough (Menlough) Galway, in 1836. He was the son of John and Julia Clarney, his mother being 15 at the time of his birth. The Clarney family emigrated to England in 1844, just prior to the great Irish famine of 1845-52. John Clarney is recorded in the 1851 census (surname spelt Killarney) as an 18 year old labourer lodging at House 8, Court 10, in the then notorious Sawney Pope Street, Liverpool, the lodging house being kept by a 32 year old labourer Mathias Monaghan and his 30 year old wife Catherine, other residents including Monaghan’s 50 year old widowed mother-in-law, Margaret Fahey, and three other lodgers, 19 year old Michael Molloy, his 18 year old wife Anne and their 8 month old daughter Mary, all of the six adult residents in the lodging house recorded as having been born in Ireland.

Although Clarney’s age is given as 18 in the 1851 census, his army attestation papers indicate that he was actually 15 years of age in 1851.

John Clarney’s mother, Julia Clarney (surname spelt Carney) is recorded in the 1851 census as living in Manchester with her 34 year old husband John Carney and a 7 year old daughter, Anne Jane Carney, who was born in Manchester (her birth year being circa 1844 indicating that the Carney family emigrated from Ireland to England circa 1844.

Service papers record Clarney as having enlisted enlisted into the 51st Foot at Huddersfield on 4/11/1854. At the time of enlistment he stated that he was 18 years and 6 months old. On enlistment Clarney gave his trade as that of labourer. He was discharged medically unfit on 30/11/1856.

John Clarney (surname spelt Killarney) is recorded in the criminal registers for 1856 as being convicted of larceny on 4/12/1856 at Bradford, the indictment reading that on the fifth day of August 1856 “Killarney” did “with force and arms at the parish of Huddersfield in the said West Riding of the county of York one flute of the Goods and Chattels of one Henry Kilmer Beaumont then and there found did then and there feloniously steal take and carry away and afterwards on the same day and year aforesaid with force and arms at the parish of Huddersfield aforesaid in the Riding aforesaid the same one Flute of the Goods and Chattels of the said Henry Kilmer Beaumont then lately before feloniously stolen taken and carried away then and there feloniously did receive he the said John Killarney then and there well knowing the said last mentioned Goods and Chattels to have been feloniously stolen …” Clarney being sentenced to 4 months imprisonment.

This break-in took place whilst Clarney/Killarney was still serving with the 51st Foot, Clarney being discharged “medically unfit” four days before the arraignment at Bradford in order to allow him to stand trial. Clarney would have been released from prison in April 1857.

John Clarney enlisted for a second time, four months after being released from prison, into the 84th Foot, at Halifax on 4/8/1857, receiving a bounty of £2 on enlistment. At the time of enlistment Clarney stated he was 20 years and 6 months old, gave his trade as labourer, and stated that he had previously seen service for 2 years and 42 days with the 51st Foot and had been discharged medically unfit. Clarney is recorded in the 1861 census as resident in the Infantry Barracks, Regents Road, Salford. Clarney never rose above the rank of Private and was discharged at Netley “unfit for further service” on 22/12/1868, having served 13 years and 182 days with the colours. Discharge papers note Clarney’s conduct as “good” and confirm that he was awarded the Indian Mutiny Medal, his conduct at the time of discharge being stated as “Good”. In addition to service at home, Clarney saw service overseas at Malta for 2 years and 2 month, in the East Indies for 1 year and 5 months and the West Indies for 1 year and 8 months. His medical report on discharge notes that he was “invalided once before and re-enlisted”. At the time of discharge, Clarney gave his intended place of residence initially as Halifax, Yorkshire, but then substituted Sheffield.

Private John Clarney/Killarney, 84th Foot, is recorded in the Hampshire Telegraph and Sussex Chronicle of 9th February 1861 as having been involved in the murder of a man in Huddersfield.

“On Saturday night a shocking murder was perpetrated at Huddersfield. A few minutes before 12 a man named Joseph Smith, aged 31, was proceeding towards his hime in Upperhead Row. On his way he entered the Black Lion Passage, when three men named John Killarney (a private in the 84th Regiment of Foot), Norton (a dye-house labourer), Iredale (a cloth-dresser, of Linley, near Huddersfield) went to him. Norton lived in that yard, and he and the soldier commenced abusing Smith, who at once remonstrated with them. He ran into the middle of the road, but they followed him. The police, however, parted them from him, and sent Smith down Spring Street, and the others towards Swallow Street, and proceeded on their rounds. It appears that Norton was aware that Smith would have to return up the street to go home, and he and his companions waited for the unfortunate man, and watched him into Swallow Street, when they kicked him, knocked him down and ill-used him in the most brutal manner, leaving him almost dead. The police afterwards found him in the middle of the road and dying. They at once carried him into teh Black Horse beer house nearby but the unfortunate man expired directly afterwards. The wound that caused death was from a tremendous kick under the left ear, which was very much discoloured and swollen. There was also a cut in the scalp about an inch in length and a slight cut on the right cheek bone. When the police found him he was quite insensible and never spoke to anyone. Iredale was aprehended at his house in Lindley, the following morning. The other two were taken into custody in the Black Lion yard, the scene of the first quarrel. The prisoners were at the time intoxicated, Iredale having been drinking with Killarney all the night. Killarney is on furlough from Manchester, where his regiment now is.”

John Clarney is recorded in the 1891 census as 55 year old labourer living at Hoyle Street, Sheffield, with his 49 year old wife Mary (surname on the census return spelt Killarney).

John Clarney was born in Ireland, prior to the Great Famine of 1845-52, during which over one million people died of starvation and disease and another million people emigrated. The famine destroyed the Irish economy and in the following three years, 1852-55, another 1.1 million people emigrated, bringing the total number of emigrants as a result of the famine to 2.1 million, the largest mass migration from a European country in modern history, Muldoon emigrating in 1855 during the closing stages of that mass migration from Ireland.

The Molly Maguires were an Irish 19th century secret society active in Ireland, Liverpool and parts of the eastern United States, best known for their activities among Irish immigrant and Irish-American coal miners in Pennsylvania. After a series of often violent conflicts, twenty suspected members of the Molly Maguires were convicted of murder and other crimes and were executed by hanging in the USA in 1887 and 1888, including ten men hung together on one day, the largest mass hanging in the history of the USA.

The Molly Maguires were one of a number of secret societies that emerged in Ireland during the 18th and 19th centuries, involved in agrarian resistance related to concerns and grievances with regard to land usage and opposition to catholic shopkeepers and merchants who exploited their starving co-religionists (colloquially known as gombeen men). The victims of their violence were also frequently Irish land agents, middle men and other tenants. Molly Maguires often disguised themselves as women begging for food for their children, approaching shopkeepers to demand donations of food. If the storekeeper failed to provide food, the Molly Maguires entered the premises and took what they wanted, threatening the owner with violence if the incident was reported. The Molly Maguires often blackened their faces with burnt cork, in addition to wearing women’s clothing, thereby disguising themselves as mummers (wandering performers), in order to gain easier access to premises, mummers at the time often traveling from door to door demanding food, money or drink in return for performing. One of the earliest published references to the Molly Maguires can be traced to an address from “Molly Maguire” to her “children” containing twelve rules that was published in the Freeman’s Journal of 7/7/1845, the person writing the letter claiming to be “Molly Maguire” of Maguire’s Grove, Cloone, county Leitrim, and to an article published in The Times newspaper of 24/8/1845, which also referred to the activities of the Molly Maguires following the eviction of Lord Longford’s tenants in Ballinamuck, county Longford, in 1845.

The Molly Maguires were particularly active in Liverpool, England, where many Irish people settled in the 19th century, or passed through the city on their way to the United States or Canada. The first mention of the Mollies being active in Liverpool appeared in an article in The Liverpool Mercury newspaper on 10 May 1853, the newspaper reporting that, “a regular faction fight took place in Marybone amongst the Irish residents in that district. About 200 men and women assembled, who were divided into four parties—the ‘Molly Maguires’, the ‘Kellys’, the ‘Fitzpatricks’ and the ‘Murphys’—the greater number of whom were armed with sticks and stones. The three latter sections were opposed to the ‘Molly Maguires’ and the belligerents were engaged in hot conflict for about half an hour, when the guardians of the peace interfered.”

Subsequent Liverpool newspaper articles from the same period refer to assaults by Mollies against other Irish Liverpudlians. The “Molly Maguire Club” or “Molly’s Club” was described as a “mutual defence association” that had been “formed for the mutual assistance of the members when they got into ‘trouble’, each member subscribing to the funds”. Patrick Flynn was the secretary of the Liverpool Molly Maguire Clubs in the 1850s, and their headquarters was in an alehouse in Alexander Pope Street also known as Sawney Pope Street, the same street that John Clarney was living in during the early 1850s, residents of the street collectively being known as “Molly Maguires” when engaged in faction fights in Liverpool with other gangs of Irish immigrants.

The activities of the Molly Maguires, particularly those of the Liverpool Molly Maguires, rather than being politically and economically motivated, had more in common with, and as such were a continuation of the Faction Fighting that was commonplace in 18th and 19th century Ireland, when large groups of people, related by ties of kinship and/or location, and armed with shillelaghs (large wooden clubs) engaged in pitched battles. Those events eventually gave rise to the Irish nickname for a pitched battle, a “donnybrook”, after an event known as the Donnybrook Fair in Dublin, which ran from the 13th century to the 1850s, until a Committee for the Abolition of Donnybrook Fair purchased the licence to run the fair in order to close it down and put an end to the annual outbreak of mass violence.

For further information about the Molly Maguires, see online entry on Wikipedia.

Michael McIlwee, in his “The Liverpool Underworld” describes the Liverpool Molly Maguires as follows:

“The Molly Maguires derived from an organisation of peasants who wore women’s dress and other disguises to attack rent collectors in rural Ireland. The group also had origins in the anthracite coal region of Northern Pensyllvania, where they had a reputation for violent industrial action. The mysterious organisation was first mentioned in Liverpool in 1853. The had their headquarters in an alehouse in Sawney Pope Street, kept by Pat Flynn, the secretary of the “Molly Maguire Club”. Members swore an oath to give mutual help, “an insult or injury to one being taken as an insult to all, for which all sought satisfaction”. They therefore benefited if prosecuted for assaulting policemen or getting into rows, the fines imposed by the court being paid out of a communal fund. In 1858, Flynn was charged with beating up a Pat Nolan, but when the court case drew near, Flynn gave Nolan £2 and 15 shillings not to turn up. Nolan took the money but then decided to press on with the case. Flynn, understandably assaulted him again. Around this time Anthony Fay assaulted Catherine Finnegan, after he accused her of attacking his daughter. In court the victim explained “he is in Molly’s Club” and his wife told me that he could beat anyone he liked and that any fine would be paid for him”. The arrangement proved useless as he was sent to prison for two months instead. Fights between the Irish became part and parcel of everyday Liverpool life. In 1864 a magistrate declared “the other day when I sat here there were 45 cases of assault, 43 of which were connected with Irish squabbles or Irish “faction fights””.