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Lynch tried for Treason in London
The Australian Parade magazine (July 1958,
pp.48-49) described
what happened next: A hush fell over the British
High Court in
London on January 23, 1903, as a tall, well-built
Australian,
Colonel Arthur Alfred Lynch, M.P., one of
the most brilliant
men this country has produced, rose in the
dock to hear sentence
passed on him for treason. Sternly Mr. Justice
Wills told Lynch
he had deserted England in her darkest hour
to fight for the
Boers in South Africa. "You sought, for
gold, to dethrone Great
Britain and make her name a byword and a raproach.
You shed,
or did your best to shed, your own countrymen's
blood," the
judge continued. Then, donning the traditional
black cap, he
sentenced Lynch to death.
The hangman's rope, it appeared would end
an amazing career
that began on the goldfields of Victoria and
took Lynch around
the world as scholar, novelist, poet, journalist,
engineer,
mathematician, politician, patriot and soldier.
Fortunately, influential friends intervened
between him and the
gallows. Within two days the death sentence
was commuted to
life imprisonment.
A year later Lynch was released on licence.
In 1907 the King
granted him a free pardon.
Two years later Arthur Alfred Lynch took his
seat as Member
of Parliament in the British House of Commons,
a stark
contrast to the death cell he once occupied.
Alfred Alfred Lynch was born on August 10,
1861, in the
goldrush town of Smythesdale, near Ballarat.
His mother
was a descendant of the Highland chief Rob
Roy MacGregor.
His engineer-surveyor father, John Lynch,
was a prominent
Galway Irishman. Both were champions of liberty
against
tyranny.
John Lynch fought as captain to Peter Lalor
in the Ballarat
goldminer's rebellion of Eureka Stockade in
1854.
John Lynch was arrested, but there was insufficient
evidence
to include him in the State Treason trials
that ensued.
Young Arthur Lynch was well educated in Ballarat,
graduating
later at Melbourne University as Master of
Arts and a Civil
Engineer. He later left for overseas, with
stays in Germany,
Ireland and London.
After his adventures in the Boer War (his
2nd Irish Brigade
successfully covered the Boer retreat from
Ladysmith), he
was sent to the United States to win support
from the Irish
population.
He was arrested for treason after the War
ended, the moment
he stepped on British soil.
On July 9, 1907, King Edward granted Lynch
a free pardon. A
leading Australian newspaper clamored for
him to return to his
homeland and enter politics.
Ireland, which had already tried to send him
to Parliament,
had first call. On September 4, 1909, Arthur
Alfred Lynch
was elected unopposed to the seat of West
Clare.
A silent House of Commons greeted the man
who six years
earlier had been elected, banned, branded
a traitor, and
sentenced to death.
Lynch took his full share in the turbulent
sessions that saw
Lloyd George introduce his first social-insurance
measures.
He fought particularly for higher education
and a new deal for
the common people. Always he continued the
fight for Irish
independence.
When war flared in August, 1914, Lynch wired
the Australian
Government volunteering for active service
with the Common-
wealth Forces. Refused by his own country,
he tried to join
Armies. No one would accept the man who was
sill remembered
for joining the enemy in the Boer War.
Lynch spent much of the rest of his life on
his scientific and
literary works. His love for Australia showed
strongly in his
writings.
He died aged 72 on 26 March 1934 after a short
illness brought
on by ptomaine poisoning.
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