Emmet, Robert

A United Irishman and the leader of a failed rebellion in 1803, Robert Emmet (1778–1803) was the younger brother of Thomas Addis Emmet, a prominent United Irishman of 1798. Robert joined the United Irishmen in December 1796 and led the society at Trinity College, Dublin, but fled the country in April 1798 and was in France during the rebellion of that summer. In the autumn of 1798 he became involved in a movement to revive the United Irishmen and initiate a second rebellion. He was back in Ireland by the spring of 1799 and worked actively toward this goal. He left Ireland again in August 1800 and traveled around much of Europe over the next two years, arranging for support from United Irish exiles and foreign governments. Emmet returned to Ireland for the final time in October 1802 and, in cooperation with James Hope, William Putnam McCabe, and Thomas Russell, created a formidable revolutionary network embracing as many as nineteen counties. His immediate strategy was based on the idea of a quick seizure of Dublin, followed by rebellion in outlying counties, all coinciding with a French landing. An accidental explosion in one of several arms depots he had established in Dublin, in addition to the work of spies, led both to the government's discovery of Emmet's plot and to his hurried decision to initiate the rebellion on 23 July 1803 rather than in August (when he mistakenly expected a French landing). After a brief struggle in Dublin the rebel mobilization disintegrated and Emmet and more than two dozen other leaders fled, but they were rounded up within a few weeks. Emmet was tried and found guilty. Before his execution in October, he made one of the most famous of all Irish patriotic speeches from the dock. For this reason as well as because he was among the first to conceive of the Irish separatist struggle as one that must be based primarily on Irish efforts rather than foreign assistance (despite his own intense efforts to secure such assistance), he occupies an important place in the story of Irish nationalism.

SEE ALSO United Irish Societies from 1791 to 1803; Primary Documents: Speech from the Dock (19 September 1803)

Bibliography

Elliott, Marianne. Partners in Revolution: The United Irishmen and France. 1988.

Madden, R. R. The Life and Times of Robert Emmet. 1847.

Daniel Gahan