Séamus McElwaine judge describing him as a "dangerous killer" and recommending he spend at least 30 years in prison. On 25 September 1983, McElwaine was involved in the Maze Prison escape, the largest break-out of prisoners in Europe since World War II and in British prison history. 38 republican prisoners, armed with 6 handguns, hijacked a prison meals lorry and smashed their way out of the Maze prison. After the escape he joined an IRA Active Service Unit operating in the area of the border between Counties Monaghan and Fermanagh. The unit targeted police and military patrols with gun and bomb attacks,
Fremantle Prison A few days before the second anniversary of his escape, Moondyne Joe was recaptured, returned to prison, and sentenced to an additional four years in irons. Eventually, Governor Frederick Weld heard of his predecessor Hampton's promise, and decided that further punishment would be unfair. Moondyne Joe was given a ticket of leave in May 1871. From 1865 to 1867, British authorities rounded up supporters of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, or Fenians, an Irish independence movement, and transported sixty-two of them to Western Australia. In 1869, John Boyle O'Reilly escaped on the American whaling ship "Gazelle" and settled in Boston. Later