The everlasting Irish question had been coming again to the front. During 1867 the Fenians had attempted to get the grievances of Ireland redressed by adopting violent measures. There had been an attempt upon the arsenal at Chester, numerous outrages in Ireland, an attack at Manchester upon the prison van, in which two Fenian leaders were being taken to prison, and a subsequent attempt to blow up Clerkenwell jail. The crisis had been met by suspending the Habeas Corpus Act in Ireland. Lord Russell, when Prime Minister, had replaced Sir Robert Peel, as Chief Secretary, by Mr. Chichester Fortescue, who later received the same office from Mr. Gladstone. In February, 1868, Lord Russell published his letter to Mr. Fortescue advocating Disestablishment in Ireland, but declaring himself in favour of endowing the Catholic Church with part of the revenues of the disestablished Church. In April Gladstone succeeded in carrying three Resolutions against the Government on the Irish Church question, and though Disraeli tendered his resignation, dissolution was postponed until the autumn. The same month Lord Russell presided at a meeting in St. James’s Hall in support of Disestablishment. At the general election in the autumn the Liberals came in with a large majority; Gladstone became Prime Minister, and in the following year carried his Bill for the Disestablishment of the Irish Church. [70] Lady Russell’s views on the question of Church and State are shown in the following letter:
Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline
PEMBROKE LODGE, May 20, 1868
MY DEAREST MARY,—...How can one write letters in such weather as we have had? A fine May is surely the loveliest of lovely things, and the most enjoyable, at least to lucky mortals like ourselves who are not obliged to be “in populous city pent”—and those who have never seen Pemmy Lodge in its May garments of lilac, laburnum, wild hyacinth, hawthorn, and the tender greens of countless shades on trees and shrubs, are not really acquainted with it.... I have been going through the contrary change from you as regards Church and State. I thought I was strongly for the connection (at least of a Church with the State, certainly not the Church of England as it now is), but reflection on what the history of our State Churches has been, the speeches in St. James’s Hall of the Bishops fostered by the State, and Arthur Stanley’s pamphlet, which says the best that can be said for connection, and yet seems to open