Boland's involvement in the nationalist movement increased and, after the split over Charles Stewart Parnell's leadership of the Irish Parliamentary Party, he became one of the main Parnellite organisers in Dublin.
He was accused of propounding Parnellite principles and denounced by British politicians in Cape Town as a “Fenian” whose "offence is rank", and who "has been fraternising with Mynheer Van Dunk instead of sticking with John Bull".