Test of the Society of United Irishmen facts for kids

The test was a pledge taken by members of a democratic political society in the Kingdom of Ireland, the United Irishmen, who in 1798 organised a republican insurrection. As the Society, despairing of reform, began to arm and drill, it amended the original wording to accommodate greater militancy and the need for secrecy. Under the Insurrection Act of 1796, the administration of the test became a capital offense. There were local variants, and societies formed by United Irish exiles, convicts and sympathisers overseas, framed their own tests.

Drennan's original wording, 1791

The original Test taken by members of the Society of United Irishmen was written by the Belfast physician William Drennan.

At the meeting, Theobald Wolfe Tone and Thomas Russell objected that the wording was too vague, and that the pledge might dissuade potential members. Although Tone and Russell were prime movers in the formation of the society, and were later joined in their opinion of the test by Whitely Stokes, their reservations were overruled by the broader membership.

Less elaborate, local variants of the test were administered.

Militant revision, 1795

As government repression increased following the French declaration of war on Britain in February 1793, and as a move, beginning in Belfast, was made toward a more militant, potentially insurrectionary, organisation, the test was revised. Delegates from seventy-two societies meeting in Belfast on 10 May 1795 approved amendments to Drennan's original test inserting the words "full representation of the people" and omitting reference to the Irish parliament. Emphasis was also placed on the need for secrecy. In the words of William James MacNeven (McNevin) who had taken the oath in Dublin from Mary Moore, "the substance was so altered as to correspond with the progress of opinion, embracing both republicans and reformers".

Under the Insurrection Act of 1796 any person convicted of administering the test was to "suffer death without benefit of clergy" and anybody taking the oath was to be "transported for life". An early and celebrated victim of the Act was William Orr who, in October 1797 was hanged in Carrickfergus, County Antrim, for administering the United Irish test to two soldiers.

Pledge of the American Society of United Irishmen, 1797

In August 1797, MacNeven, James Reynolds, Archibald Hamilton Rowan and other movement exiles in the United States published the constitution of the American Society of United Irishmen, an association that had been active for some months.

United Irish oath-taking in Newfoundland and New South Wales

In 1800, Catholic mutineers in Newfoundland, reportedly took "the oaths of the United Irishmen". United Irish convicts in New South Wales may have done the same in preparing for their rebellion in 1804. Wording is not recorded.