The Fenian bombings of the 1880's were a terror campaign perpetrated by the Irish Republican Brotherhood that mostly targeted infrastructure and military installations. I was thinking, what would be the repercussions if one of the attacks (deliberately or accidentally) killed HM the Queen? How would the government and King Edward-VII-twenty-years-early deal with the Irish after this?
WI Queen Victoria dies in the Fenian bombings?
- Thread starter New Cleo Genesis
- Start date
The Irish wont know what hit them.
Seriously...Irish republicans killing Victoria?....Goodbye any support for devolution and liklyhood of mass reprisals and thats just if their lucky
Yes, the Irish would certainly become quite familiar with the pale horse after that, but for how long?
Until every republican's rounded up and shot most likely. Killing the Monarch of any country at the time was kinda...frowned upon. And this is nigh the height of the British Empire....having the Queen killed by a bunch of upstart and radical Irishmen?.....Yea....good luck ever getting their country back on track, for at least a few decades, and doubt there'd be a Irish republic today.
A titular event like that could go either way I think. Either Irish republicanism is wiped out and Irelend as a whole remains within the Kingdom
or, the British could over react too hard for too long and International opinion turns against them and the hatred they engender leads to a seperate virulent Ireland
How much further to the Reactionary end of the spectrum does Britain turn due to this?
Another what if contigency just popped into my head
Fenian raids in Canada post civil war are more deadly due to British reaction in Ireland due to the assassination
British reaction to the Fenian raids is then also cranked up
Britain blames US for aiding terrorists and having Canadien conquest dreams
US counters with the St. Alban Raid
"They Killed our beloved Queen!" one side screams waving its fist
"What exactly was John Wilkes Booth doing in Montreal in 1864?" the other side retorts with anger
Tempers flare and reason loses out to national egos
Anglo-American war 1866?
What do Napoleon III and Maxmilian do?
Resurgent Confederacy?
or, the British could over react too hard for too long and International opinion turns against them and the hatred they engender leads to a seperate virulent Ireland
How much further to the Reactionary end of the spectrum does Britain turn due to this?
Another what if contigency just popped into my head
Fenian raids in Canada post civil war are more deadly due to British reaction in Ireland due to the assassination
British reaction to the Fenian raids is then also cranked up
Britain blames US for aiding terrorists and having Canadien conquest dreams
US counters with the St. Alban Raid
"They Killed our beloved Queen!" one side screams waving its fist
"What exactly was John Wilkes Booth doing in Montreal in 1864?" the other side retorts with anger
Tempers flare and reason loses out to national egos
Anglo-American war 1866?
What do Napoleon III and Maxmilian do?
Resurgent Confederacy?
deathscompanion1
Banned
Its not like we don't have plenty of OTL precedent for British crackdowns on Irish nationalists in pre-independent Ireland. Executions followed by popular outrage followed by a swell of support that over time fades but provides the ingredients for the next generation of nationalists.
Chances are the only change is that the agitation for home rule comes early and the British arent in the mood to compromise leading to another rising or some such, easily put down and either temporarily bringing some stability or just sparking of a chain of events leading to independence.
At some point the scales will shift towards the insurgent and the British will become less willing to wage dirty wars and quite likely as OTL factors will converge on some sort of acceptance of some need to partition Ireland administratively in two with one side indivisible with Britain and the other on the path to ever greater separation.
Chances are the only change is that the agitation for home rule comes early and the British arent in the mood to compromise leading to another rising or some such, easily put down and either temporarily bringing some stability or just sparking of a chain of events leading to independence.
At some point the scales will shift towards the insurgent and the British will become less willing to wage dirty wars and quite likely as OTL factors will converge on some sort of acceptance of some need to partition Ireland administratively in two with one side indivisible with Britain and the other on the path to ever greater separation.
Or the Fenians conduct the campaign in the 1860's...
Spring 1862
Queen Victoria in murdered by a Fenian bomb.
Summer 1862
British investigations uncover a New York trail for the bomb (easy, NY was the largest irish diaspora colony in the US).
Autumn 1862
Diplomatic tensions escalate, the US receives a request for extradition of irish citizens which is almost an ultimatum. Lincoln would cave in, Seward leaks the thing to the press. The northern population shifts into millions-for-defence-not-a-cent-for-tribute mode and Lincoln has to show the british ambassador his (Lincoln's, not the ambassador's
) middle finger. Declaration of war ensues (and nobody in Britain gives a shit about the confederate being slave owners). France follows the trend. Union (plus maybe Russia) vs. Confederacy, British and French Empires. The dogs of war howl.considering the british already tried to genocide the irish in the 200 odd years prior to this (just read up on how they enslaved the irish and deported them, and most of the time treated them even worse than black slaves), and also remember what the british did in the concentration camps in the boer war?
so the fenians killing the queen will lead to either a lot of slaughtering the iriish or a large amount of them getting deport to some far away colony (aus/nz??)
also what will also count is that the fenians are american irish, so it might have consequences for the us also.