The murder of Lord Mountmorres, 1880

The murder of Viscount Mountmorres, William Browne de Montmorency, on 25 September 1880, during the Land War, caused a sensation in Ireland and despite the best efforts of police, no person was ever charged with the crime.  The Land War, which commenced in 1879, pitted struggling tenant farmers against landlords who demanded rents be paid despite the hardships of the time and the depression in Irish agricultural prices. Here the Leinster Express provides details of the murder

MURDER OF LORD MOUNTMORRES.

On Saturday night Lord Mountmorres was murdered in a most brutal manner between the town of Clonbur and his residence, Ebor Hall, County Galway. The relations between the deceased nobleman and his tenants for some time have not been of an amiable character. Reductions of rent were demanded by the tenants, but to these demands bis lordship refuted to accede  and recently he obtained ejectment decrees against some of the occupiers on his property. His lordship then received several threatening letters, and he deemed it advisable to obtain the protection of the police. This protection was afforded his lordship np to four months ago, when the police were withdrawn. Whether this step was taken at the instance of Lord Mountmorres himself or not is not known _. but it is significant that Sub-Inspector Law, when asked at the inquest whether bis lordship had himself dispensed with the protection of the police, refused to reply to the question, on the ground that it had reference to an official matter, and was irrelevant. Lord Mountmorres was in Clonbur on Saturday evening, and left the town by himself on an outside car at about eight o'clock. His lordship never reached home. At a narrow part of the road, where irregular stone walls, such as are peculiar to the west of Ireland, bordered the highway, an assassin, or more likely a band of assassins lay in wait for him, And shot him as he drove by the hiding place. Lord Mountmorres was probably fatally wounded by the first shot he received. At all events he fell from the car, and he appears to have been unable to use a revolver with which he was armed in his defence. Tho loaded pistol was found in his pocket, none of the chambers having been discharged. When his lordship fell, bis murders seem (o have rushed upon him and finished their horrible work with diabolical completeness. Six bullets were fired into their unfortunate victim's body, and one of the shots was discharged so close that the skin surrounding the wound was burned and blackened by the powder. Any one of the wounds found on Lord Mountmorres body would apparently have been sufficient to cause death. One of the bullets had entered the centre of the forehead, and another passed through the neck and made its exit below the ear, a third bullet remained lodged in the soft tissues of the neck, and two bullets were found in the abdomen. Suspicions of the murder were first aroused among the servants of Ebor Hall by the return of the horse without its owner. Information was given to the police. Patrols were despatched, and late at night his lordship's body bearing the wounds we have described, was found about a mile from Clonbur.

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