The letters of Martha McTier and Mary Ann McCracken testify to the role of women as confidantes, sources of advice and bearers of intelligence. R.R. Madden, one of the earliest historians of the United Irishmen, describes various of their activities in the person of an appropriately named Mrs. Risk. By 1797 the Castle informer Francis Higgins was reporting that "women are equally sworn with men" suggesting that some of the women assuming risks for the United Irish cause (possibly including McCracken) were taking places beside men in an increasingly clandestine organisation. Middle-class women were reportedly active in the Dublin United Irishmen. William James MacNeven was sworn into the society by a woman.