The Consulate officials' change in attitude toward the Church was also related to the information they had gathered.
In 1795, Claudius, the son of John Billforth, who had supported Gandon's construction of the Customs House, encountered a mob attack at the Customs House apartments. In self-defense, he fired several shots in the street, possibly killing more than one person. This caused the situation to escalate rapidly, to the point that even mounted police and patrol officers were attacked by the crowd. In the end, troops had to be dispatched... though it could not be called suppression, because the Irish Volunteers tasked with maintaining order also opposed the union of England and Ireland. The attack was supported by the opposition bishop of Peel Lane. After careful planning, it was made to look like drunken disorder.
Peel Lane was a frequent gathering place for exiled Jacobins. This time, they used the misuse of public funds as their pretext, claiming that Dublin City Hall had spent too much of its budget on flashy vanity projects.
St. Patrick's Seminary, led by Bishop Troy, was likewise unpopular with the French, because they feared that France would invade Ireland. They even held a grand thanksgiving ceremony, praying to be delivered from it. During the union of England and Ireland, they actively participated in political mediation. Not long after the Society of United Irishmen was suppressed in 1793, St. Patrick's Seminary moved from Dublin to a village owned by the Duke of Leinster.
The French did not want clergymen involved in politics, nor did they want speculators fishing in troubled waters. The Irish were also building canals and had formed canal companies to raise funds. The governor cut the ribbon at the docks, but the canal company soon collapsed. Its original advocate went bankrupt, and the governor