The Garden of MartyrsTwo Irish Catholic immigrants, Dominic Daley and James Halligan, were traveling west on the Boston Post Road, headed for New York. A man named Marcus Lyon was robbed and killed along the same road. Though the two Irishmen denied any knowledge of the crime, they were arrested and accused of the murder. They spent five months in jail. Only two days before their trial they were allowed to consult with a lawyer. The trial, a mockery of justice, lasted only one day. The two were sentenced to be hanged by the neck and, as the presiding judge said, "their bodies dissected and anatomized." Father Cheverus, an émigré priest from France and one of only two Roman Catholic priests in all of New England at the time, is asked by Daley's wife and mother to go to the cell to comfort them, listen to their confessions, offer them communion. Father Cheverus, who escaped the Terror of the French Revolution, is a man plagued by his own past. Daley, a simple family man with a young son, and Halligan, a slick type with a checkered past and a lost love, face their deaths bravely, only to be exonerated in 1984. Michael White has used his considerable talent to capture the political, social and cultural aspects of New England. In this heartbreaking story, he shows that the anti-Catholic and anti-foreign sentiments of that period in some ways reflect ongoing prejudice today. |
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Contents
Section 1 | 1 |
Section 2 | 3 |
Section 3 | 30 |
Section 4 | 61 |
Section 5 | 85 |
Section 6 | 87 |
Section 7 | 113 |
Section 8 | 134 |
Section 12 | 215 |
Section 13 | 232 |
Section 14 | 249 |
Section 15 | 271 |
Section 16 | 289 |
Section 17 | 310 |
Section 18 | 329 |
Section 19 | 348 |
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Common terms and phrases
Archbishop of Arles attorney bay horse Bishop of Dol Blake bloody Boston breath Bridie bunk Caleb Strong cassock Catholic cell Cheverus asked Cheverus's child Church confession cried crowd Daley asked Daley's dark death Dominic Daley Dowd eyes face Father Cheverus Father Matignon Federalists feel felt finally Finola Daley forgive gaze glanced guards Halligan asked Halligan thought hand he'd head heard heart horse Irish Irishmen Jacobins jail James Halligan Jamy boy Jean Judge Sedgwick knew Laertes looked Máirtin manacles Marcus Lyon Mattoon Mayenne River mother mouth murder neck never night nodded Northampton papist Perhaps pistol post rider pray prisoners replied Rose seemed September Massacres sheriff shoulder smell smile someone soul stared stood street Sullivan surplice talk tell Thank Theodore Sedgwick thing told took trial turned voice waiting walked wanted woman yellow fever