Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 05.djvu/350

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Bond
342
Bond

for the reform of parliament. In consequence of these resolutions Butler and Bond were summoned before the House of Lords at Dublin, At the bar there, in March 1793, they avowed the publication of the resolutions.

The lords resolved that the paper was a libel. They decreed that Bond and Butler should be imprisoned for six months in Newgate, that each of them should pay a fine of five hundred pounds, and remain in continement until these sums had been discharged. In Newgate addresses were presented to Butler and Bond by deputations from meetings of the United Irishmen. After the failure of the efforts to obtain emancipation and parliamentary reform for Ireland by peaceable means, an organisation was formed to establish an Irish republic independent of England. Of this movement Bond was regarded as the mainspring. He became a member of its northern executive committee and of the Leinster directorate, the meetings of which were generally held at hh house. Resolutions declaratory of determination to be satisfied with nothing short of the entire and complete regeneration of Ireland were passed at a meeting there in February l798. In the following month Bond and several members of the directory were arrested at his house and imprisoned. Bond was tried in July 1798 on a charge of high treason, and defended by Curran, who impeached the testimony of Thomas Reynolds, an informer, on whose statements the charges against him were mainly based. The attorney-general characterised Bond as 'a man of strong mind and body, and of talents which, if perverted to the purposes of mischief, were formidable indeed.' The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and Bond was sentenced to be hanged. His fellow-prisoners, without stipulating for their own lives, signed a proposal that if the government would spare him they would give every information respecting their organisation, both at home and in France, and consent to voluntary exile. This proposition, although opposed by some members of the government, was accepted by the Marquis Cornwallis, then viceroy, who had reason to consider that there was very little prospect of being able to convict any of these state prisoners. Bond died suddenly in prison in the following September, and was buried in the cemetery of St. Michan's Church, Dublin. The ‘enlightened republican’ principles of Bond, his high intellectual qualities, elevated sentiments, and patriotic views, were eulogised by his political associate and fellow-prisoner, William James MacNevin, M.D., who became a resident in America. Bond's widow removed with her family from Ireland to that country, and died at Baltimore in 1843.

[Proceedings of Society of United Irishmen, Dublin, 1794; Journals of House of Lords, Ireland; Memoire of Origin and Progress of the Irish Union, 1802; MacNevin's Pieces of Irish History, 1807; Howell's State Trials, 1820, vol. xxvii,; W. H. Curran’s Life of J. P. Curran, 1822; Memoirs and Correspondence of Viscount Castlereagh, vol. i. 1850; Correspondence of the Right Hon. John Beresford, 1854; History of Dublin, 1854; Correspondence of Charles, Marquis Cornwallis, 1859; Madden's United Irishmen, 1859–60.]

J. T. G.


BOND, THOMAS (1765–1837), topographical writer, born at Looe, Cornwall, in 1765, was nominally in the profession of the law, but, having a private fortune, never sought practice. In 1789 he was appointed town clerk of East Looe, and also (a separate office) town clerk of West Looe, the same year that a relative and namesake was elected mayor of East Looe. In 1823, while still in office, he published ‘Topographical and Historical Sketches of the Boroughs of East and West Looe, in the County of Cornwall, with an account of the Natural and Artificial Curiosities and Pictorial Scenery of the Neighbourhood,’ eight plates and several woodcuts, London, 1823, 8vo, pp. 308. This work, written as a ‘labour of love,’ describes seaside places near Plymouth, which were popular resorts in summer for health and recreation. The views of Looe are by his relative, Mrs. Davies Gilbert. Bond was a great reader,and his knowledge of the law of tenures was extensive. He died much respected at East Looe 18 Dec. 1837, and., being unmarried, left the greater portion of his property to Davies Gilbert, Esq. F.R.S., one of his nearest relatives.

[Courtney and Boase's Bibl. Cornub. i. 32; Gent. Mag. 1858, p. 667.]

J. W.-G.


BOND, WILLIAM (d. 1735), dramatist, was, according to the ‘London Magazine’ (1735), ‘a near relation to the Lord Viscount age, and an author of several poetical pieces.' The following are known as works of his: 1. A very poor tragedy called ‘The Tuscan Treaty, or Tarquin’s Overthrow’ (Miscellaneous Plays, vol. xlvi.), announced 'as having been ‘Written by a gentleman lately deceased and altered by W. Bond.' It was unsuccessfully acted at Covent Garden in 1733. 2. A translation of G. Buchanan's ‘Impartial Account of the Affairs of Scotland from the Death of James V to the Tragical End of Earl Murray.' Of this work two editions were published in 1722, one with and one without the Latin text. 3. Contributions to the 'Plain Dealer,' conducted in 1724 by Aaron Hill, who also supplied him