practice of using cowpox for this purpose, with a paper on his own inoculation experiments in England). In 1783, Drennan moved to Newry, and in 1789 to Dublin where he quickly became involved in the patriotic and democratic politics of the capital agitated by news of the Revolution in France. Radical democrat Volunteer and the Letters of Orellana Sharing the sympathies of many Ulster Presbyterians (few without kindred in the colonies), Drennan greeted news of Britain's first defeat in the American War of independence (Burgoyne's surrender at Saratoga in 1777) as cause to "congratulate the people of Belfast and all mankind". He joined the Volunteers. Ostensibly formed to secure Ireland against a French invasion, the Volunteer companies were soon arming and parading in support of the "inalienable rights" of Irishmen. In 1782 the convergence of Volunteers upon Dublin helped Henry Grattan secure London's recognition of Ireland's legislative independence. Drennan came to national attention with the publication in 1784 and 1785 of his Letters of Orellana, an Irish Helot in the Belfast News Letter Addressed to his "fellow slaves", they were the earliest expressions of his support for radical constitutional reform. Although still, with most in the Volunteer movement, cautious about "a complete extension of civil franchise" to Catholics, Drennan could not be reconciled to an Irish parliament that remained an almost exclusively an Anglican (Church of Ireland) assembly in the pocket of the Kingdom's largest landowners. Neither would he accept an unaccountable executive—the Dublin Castle administration—still appointed from London. His Letters described the (Anglican) Ascendancy as "rooted moral and national evil ... the peculiar curse of this country" and the land system as "at best a mitigated feudality and at worst, the connection of planter and slave". United Irishman In May 1791, as news of revolution in France, and its spirited defence by Thomas Paine, revived the spirit of Volunteerism in Belfast and its Presbyterian hinterland, Drennan proposed to his friend Samuel McTier a benevolent conspiracy—a plot for the people—no Whig club—no party title—the Brotherhood its name—the Rights of Man and [employing the phrase coined by Hutcheson] the Greatest Happiness of the Greater Number its end—its general end Real Independence to Ireland, and Republicanism its particular purpose.In June, Drennan circulated in Dublin, and forwarded to McTier in Belfast a further document, outlining in greater detail the same proposition: an "Irish Brotherhood" that would overcome "the distinctions of rank, of property,