The same eye-witness describes as follows the last act of the tragedy, with a brief general sketch of which we commenced this narrative:—
"At a quarter to eight o'clock the interior court of the gaol presented a strange and striking spectacle. Behind the wall in New Bailey-street was erected the long staircase leading to the scaffold, and by its side were platforms for the use of the military. The fog was so dense, that objects could be but faintly distinguished at a distance of thirty yards. Suddenly the words of military command were heard, and a company of the 72nd Highlanders marched round the Roundhouse, and took up a position in line at the foot of the staircase. Simultaneously, small detachments of the same regiment ascended to the platform, and crouched there, with their loaded rifles slightly projecting over the prison wall. At almost the same moment the heads of a line of soldiers arose above the parapet of the railway viaduct. A line of warders was formed in the gaol court. The sentries on duty ceased their walk; magistrates and reporters stood aside, and a dead silence prevailed for a few moments, as a signal was given from the corner of the Roundhouse. At three minutes past eight o'clock the solemn voice of a minister repeating the litany of the Catholic Church was heard, and the head of the procession became visible through a thick fog, about thirty yards from the foot of the staircase. The Rev. Canon Cantwell walked first by the side of Allen. The convict was deadly pale; his eyes wandered alternately from the priest to the individuals standing round, and then he uplifted his gaze, in a vain endeavour to pierce the dense canopy which hung above him. He walked with a tolerably steady step, and uttered the response, 'Lord, have mercy upon us,' in a firm voice."
Next to him came Larkin, in whose appearance confinement and anxiety of mind had wrought a striking change. His physical strength seemed shaken, and he required to be assisted by one of the warders in ascending the long wooden stair that led to the scaffold. Last of all came O'Brien, whose noble, firm, and dignified bearing won the approbation of everyone who beheld him. A partition running in the line of the wall divided the scaffold into an outer and an inner platform, a small door opening between them. Allen and O'Brien, and their attendants, having reached the top of the stair, waited on the inner platform until Larkin and the rest of the attendant warders and officials came up. Then, all being ready, the door was flung open, and the boy-martyr was first led out upon the drop. His face, which was deathly pale, appeared working with the effects of strong mental agony. The high priest of English rule over Irishmen, Calcraft, came forward, placed the treacherous noose around Allen's neck, pulled a thin white cap over his ashen face, and then stooped, and securely tied his feet together. The pinioning of the arms, which had been done in the cell, allowed his hands, from the elbows downward, sufficient freedom to clasp on his breast a crucifix, which ever and anon, as he spoke aloud the responses of the litany, the poor young fellow seemed to press closer and closer to his heart.
Next O'Brien was led forth. On his fine manly face the closest scrutiny could not detect a trace of weakness. He looked calmly and sadly around; then, stepping up to where Allen stood capped and pinioned, he clasped him by the hand, and kissed him affectionately on the cheek, speaking to him a word or two not overheard. Then O'Brien himself was placed by Calcraft on the drop, the rope was fixed upon his neck, the cap was drawn on his face, and his feet were securely bound.
Larkin was now brought out, and led directly to his place on the left hand of O'Brien, who was in the middle. The sight of his two brother-martyrs capped and pinioned, and with the fatal cord around each neck, seemed to unman the poor fellow utterly. He stumbled on touching an uneven plank on the scaffold, so that many thought he had fainted; but it was not so, though he unquestionably was labouring under intense agony of mind. O'Brien, firm and unshrinking to the last, turned and looked at him encouragingly, and to him also spoke a few words in a low tone.
Calcraft now disappeared from view, and the three men stood for a moment before the multitude, their voices ringing out clearly in the still morning air, "Lord Jesus, have mercy on us." Suddenly the click of the bolts was heard; the three bodies sunk through the traps; England's three halters strained, and tugged, and twitched convulsively for a few moments, and the deed was done—her vengeance was accomplished.
That afternoon, her functionaries bore to three grave-pits in the prison-yard three lumps of lifeless clay, that a few short hours before had been three of God's noblest creatures. Like carrion, they were flung into those unconsecrated pits, and strewed with quicklime. For this was British law. The wolf and the tiger leave some vestiges of their victims; but a special ordinance of English law required even the corpses of those martyred Irishmen to be calcined.
They had purposed addressing the crowd from the scaffold, but were prevented from so doing by order of the government! They had each one, however, committed to writing, as already mentioned, a last solemn message to the world. These declarations of the dying men were entrusted to the care of their confessor, who eventually gave them up for publication. They created the most intense and painful sensation in Ireland. They made more and more clear the, dreadful fact that the hapless men had been cruelly sacrificed. Standing, as it might be said, in the presence of their God and Judge, they one and all protested their innocence, and declared the falseness of the evidence on which they had been convicted. But not in querulous repining or denunciation were these truths proclaimed, but in language and with sentiments worthy of men who professed the faith preached by the Crucified on Calvary. Every line breathed the purest humility, the most perfect resignation, and the most intense devotion to God, mingled with the most fervent love of country. Those men were all of humble circumstances in life, and, with the exception of O'Brien, had but slight literary advantages; yet the simple pathos, beauty, and eloquence of their dying messages moved every heart. Poor Larkin was, of all three, the least endowed with education, yet his letter has been aptly described as "a perfect poem in prose." here append those memorable documents:—