Through lack of numbers they failed to make a significant impact on the vastly superior forces arrayed against them.

[2] After this Daly had to flee the country by stowing away first on a boat the Hollywood, to England, and from London then on board the Cornelius Grenfel to the United States of America.

[2][3] Life in America for working class immigrants was particularly tough and his first job on leaving the ship was digging a cellar.

Though the organisers of the meeting attempted to hold some form of gathering, Daly and the IRB refused to relent.

In 1876 Daly was again arrested for disturbing another home rule gathering, though on being brought before the court he was acquitted.

[6] During the Land War Daly was a member of the Supreme Council of the IRB and became organiser for Connacht and Ulster.

In the summer of 1883, Daly moved to Birmingham, England, and settled in the home of James Egan, an old friend from Limerick and a generally inactive IRB man.

E.G. Jenkinson, head of Special Branch, was informed that John Daly was on his way to Britain from America; Daly had been asked by the Supreme Council to deliver the graveside oration at the funeral of Charles J. Kickham while in the United States.

As a result of this, Special Branch were alerted to the importance of John Torley in Glasgow, Robert Johnston[7] in Belfast and Mark Ryan in London of the IRB.

[9] In Chatham prison he became friends with Tom Clarke, who would later marry his niece Kathleen and who was a leader of the 1916 Easter Rising.