PEMBROKE LODGE, March 31, 1848

The preparations for rebellion in Ireland are most alarming, and John’s usually calm and hopeful spirit more nearly fails him on that subject than any other.  The speeches and writings of the Young Ireland leaders are so extravagantly seditious, and so grossly false as to the behaviour of England generally, and the present Ministry in particular to Ireland, that I cannot but hope they may defeat their own objects....  Poor people, the more deeply one feels for the starving and destitute millions among them and admires their patience and resignation, and the more bitterly one resents the misgovernment under which the whole nation suffered for hundreds of years, the fruits of which we are now reaping, the less one can excuse those reckless ones who are now misleading them, who must and do know that the present Ministers have not looked on with indifference and let famine and fever rage at will; that the subject of Ireland is not one to which the Houses of Parliament never give a day’s or an hour’s thought, but that on the contrary, her interests and happiness are daily and nightly the object of more intense anxiety and earnest endeavours on the part of her rulers than any portion of the Empire.  We have had a week of such real spring with all its enjoyments, and to-day is so much finer and milder than ever, that the notion of streets and smoke and noise is odious.  However, we have enough to go for, private and public.  May God prosper the good cause of peace and freedom all over Europe.

The European revolutionary movement of 1848 did not prove serious in England.  What actually took place was a mild mass meeting on Kennington Common, well kept within the bounds of decorum by an army of citizen police.  In Ireland, a rough-and-tumble fight between Smith O’Brien’s followers and the police was all that came of the dreaded rebellion.  But before these events took place the future looked ominous, especially to those responsible for what might happen.

    Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby

    April 8, 1848

John had a late night in the House, and made two speeches on the unpleasant subjects of the Chartist meeting next Monday and Sir George Grey’s “Security of the Crown” Bill; both of which ought to do good, from their mild and whiggish tone, in spite of the sadly un-whiggish nature of the topics; the very, last to which one would wish a Whig Government to have to turn its attention.  All minds are full of next Monday, and at this moment we have not a manservant in the house, as they are summoned to a meeting to learn their duties as special constables for that day.  I find it difficult to be in the least frightened, and I trust I am right.  The only thing I dread is being long without knowing what John is about, and as he would be equally unwilling to know nothing about me, in case of