 Cavendish was elected to Parliament in 1865 and was murdered by Irish republicans in the Phoenix Park Murders on 6 May 1882, the same day he took the oath of office of Chief Secretary for Ireland.Although devastated by the assassination, on the day before the ringleader was hanged she sent him the small gold crucifix she had long worn, as a token of her forgiveness.Gladstone was greatly moved when she told him that she could bear the loss of her beloved husband "if his death were to work good to his fellow-men, which indeed was the whole object of his life."