James Stephens and John O'Mahony had gone…

James Stephens and John O'Mahony had gone to the Continent to avoid arrest after the collapse of the Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848.

In Paris, they had supported themselves by teaching and translation work and have planned the next stage of "the fight to overthrow British rule in Ireland."

O'Mahony had come to America in 1856, and founded the Fenian Brotherhood two years later.

Stephens had returned to Ireland and in Dublin on St. Patrick's Day 1858, following an organizing tour through the length and breadth of the country, had founded the Irish counterpart of the American Fenians, the Irish Republican Brotherhood.

The object of the association is to secure the freedom of Ireland.

The name was probably derived from O'Mahony's Gaelic studies, the Fenians having been a military body in pagan Ireland, celebrated in the songs of Ossian.

The early portion of Keating's History is occupied with the exploits of the ancient Fenians.

The organization of the new society had been completed at conventions held in Chicago in 1864, and in Cincinnati in January, 1865.

In the United States, O'Mahony's presidency over the Fenian Brotherhood is being increasingly challenged by William R. Roberts.

Both Fenian factions raise money by the issue of bonds in the name of the "Irish Republic," which are bought by the faithful in the expectation of their being honored when Ireland should be "a nation once again".

These bonds are to be redeemed "six months after the recognition of the independence of Ireland."

Hundreds of thousands of Irish immigrants subscribe.

Large quantities of arms have been purchased, and preparations openly made by the Roberts faction for a coordinated series of raids into Canada, which the United States government takes no major steps to prevent.

Many in the U.S. administration are not indisposed to the movement because of Britain's failure to support the Union during the civil war.

Roberts' "Secretary for War" is General T. W. Sweeny, who has been struck off the American army list from January 1866 to November 1866 to allow him to organize the raids.

The purpose of these raids is to seize the transportation network of Canada, with the idea that this will force the British to exchange Ireland's freedom for possession of their Province of Canada.

Before the invasion, the Fenians had received some intelligence from like-minded supporters within Canada but had not received support from all Irish Catholics there, who see the invasions as threatening the emerging Canadian sovereignty.

The command of the expedition in Buffalo, New York, has been entrusted by Roberts to Colonel John O'Neill, who crosses the Niagara River (the Niagara is the international border) at the head of at least eight hundred (O'Neill's figure; usually reported as up to fifteen hundred in Canadian sources) men on the night and morning of 31 May/1 June 1866, and briefly captures Fort Erie, defeating a Canadian force at Ridgeway.

Many of these men, including O'Neill, are battle-hardened veterans of the American Civil War.

In the end, the invasion is broken by the U.S. authorities’ subsequent interruption of Fenian supply lines across the Niagara River and the arrests of Fenian reinforcements attempting to cross the river into Canada.

It is unlikely that with such a small force that they would have ever achieved their goal.