What Happened? Flashcards
Grattan and Plunket
> Grattan and Plunket were members of the Patriot Party that existed in the Irish Parliament before the Act of Union; in fact Grattan was hailed as a hero of Nationalism of the 18th Century. In total, both men had 5 attempts at granting Emancipation in Parliament; however the only real successes came with Plunket in 1821 and 1825 when his bills gained a majority of support in the House of Commons but were defeated by the House of Lords.
O’Connell 1823 to 1829
> Daniel O’Connell and his Catholic Association campaigned for the Emancipation of Catholics (equal political rights).
The Campaign had 2 major breakthroughs; the first being the 1826 General Election in which 4 seats were won by Liberal Protestants who backed Emancipation thanks to the mobilisation of the 40 shilling freeholders (“footsoldiers of emancipation” Jackson).
The second was O’Connell running for the 1828 Clare by-election against incumbent Vesey Fitzgerald, which he won.
While O’Connell was Catholic and could not take his seat, he had won democratically, and this was major challenge to the government. Now Emancipation had to be considered, otherwise Wellington would actively be behaving anti-democratically.
In 1829 The Catholic Relief Act was passed, which granted Emancipation. The campaign can be considered a major success, as it achieved its primary aim.
O’Connell 1829-1843
> At the end of the Emancipation Campaign O’Connell felt that because the Union had been promised with Emancipation (which was never granted as part of the 1800 Act), it was appropriate to remove the act and give the newly emancipated Catholic population the real chance to make their own decisions.
> In 1830, O’Connell began seeking the “Repeal” of the Union Act-although what would replace Repeal was purposely ambiguous.
> Ultimately O’Connell failed, trying for 15 years to achieve Repeal; he was jailed in 1844 which put an end to the campaign momentum, began faltering with the Great Famine in 1845 and ultimately the movement died with O’Connell in 1847.
Gavan Duffy and the Tenant Rights League
After the famine, politics in Ireland were dead. Ireland had just come out of the worst famine in its history, with 1 million dead and 1 million emigrating; a quarter of the population was gone in 5 years. In 1850 Charles Gavan Duffy introduced the Tenant Right League which had the purpose of passing the “3 Fs: Fair rent, fixity of tenure and free sale”. The League failed ultimately to achieve this goal, but did have the success in legacy. The message was adopted by future nationalists, notably The Land League.
Gavan Duffy and the IIP
> In 1852 40 MPs in favour of the Tenant Rights movement were elected; this was the first independent Irish party in Parliament.
> However this was its only real success; by 1856 only 12 members remained. The IIP was nicknamed the “Pope’s Brass Band”- this was because they were all Catholic, and while attractive and loud politically as a Brass Band is musically, completely useless.
> The IIP succumbed to in fighting the same year they were elected; a complete failure.
Parnell and the Land League
> 1879-1882, Charles Stewart Parnell led the National Land League of Ireland with the aim of “The Land for the People” (“the land question was the key to the national question” Bartlett)
> The movement itself was split into 3 clear factions who all envisaged a different meaning to this message, with different outcomes.
> There were 2 clear victories for the Land League as it “fought” the Land War; the first was the 1881 Land Act which Rees considers a “substantial concession” which granted the 3Fs of Duffy’s Tenant Rights League.
> The second victory was the 1882 Kilmainham Treaty which granted the Arrears Act (1882); cleared the arrears of all tenant farmers, and meant the 1881 Land Act was fully accessible.
> The Land League’s campaign could be considered the most successful Irish Nationalist organisation in history; the League achieved its aim within 3 years, brilliantly balanced 3 otherwise unconnected Nationalist factions and meant that the social revolution of Ireland was carried out to its maximum potential.
Parnell and Home Rule
The Land League had achieved its aims and the League itself had been outlawed in 1881, by 1882 Parnell was ready to pursue Home Rule; that which had been the long term aim of his support and involvement in the Land League.
> Like with O’Connell’s Repeal movement from 1830 to 1845, Parnell was purposefully unprecise about exactly what Home Rule would entail, other than it would mean the Act of Union would be repealed.
> Ultimately Home Rule failed under Parnell’s leadership; personal scandal divided the party and he fell from grace within a year.
Emmet’s Rebellion of 1803
> In July 1803, a young man named Robert Emmet set a plan to rebel in Dublin; he would start an uprising in Dublin and seize Dublin Castle, and when news of his rebellion spread, his connection to the United Irishmen rebels would rally the spirits of all United Irishmen supporters across Ireland and England, who would then rise up and overthrow English rule from Ireland.
> However, when push came to shove in 1803 Emmet led only 300 men to Dublin Castle, but they were faced down by crown forces. In end, Emmet’s rebellion descended into a general Dublin riot after he hesitated to give clear instructions of attack, and when he tried to call it off he was ignored.
> A major outcome was that Lord Kilwarden-Chief Justice of Ireland-was pulled from his carriage and viciously murdered by the rebels. The rebellion ended, and Emmet was captured, tried and executed.
The Irish Confederation 1848
> In 1848, inspired by the wave of revolutions occurring across Europe (France, Germany, Austria) and threat of arrest under the Treason Felony Act, the Irish Confederation’s (“the official organisation of Young Ireland” according to Moody) leaders John Blake Dillon and Francis Meagher convinced William Smith O’Brien (one of the Irish Confederation MPs) to lead a rebellion in County Tipperary.
> He did so reluctantly, but managed to gather 6,000 men.
> Several factors led to this number being reduced to a mere 100 men armed with pikes and rifles.
> The uprising was started in the town of Ballingarry, resulting in the local police being forced inside the house of a one Widow McCormack (who was absent).
> The house was surrounded and a “tense” standoff began (only 2 men died).
> When police reinforcements arrived the Irish Confederates merely drifted off into the countryside.
The Fenians 1867
> 5th of March 1867, across Ireland, members of Irish Republican Brotherhood began an uprising initiated with a proclamation issued to The Times newspaper.
> Dublin, Cork City and Limerick City all saw uprisings, as did Ballingarry (the site of the 1848 rebellion) and other smaller Irish settlements across the Island.
> The largest interface between the Constabulary and the IRB men was at Tallaght in Dublin, when several hundred IRB men armed with an assortment of pikes, muskets and fists were attacked by a small police force that dispersed them.
> The Uprising was over on the same day; only 12 men had died across Ireland, and bad weather conditions had perturbed some IRB units from rising up in their areas.
Young Ireland
> In 1842, three young men called Thomas Davis, John Blake Dillon and Charles Gavan Duffy (who were members of the Repeal Movement) set up a newspaper called “The Nation” which was interlaced with poetry and stories proclaiming an Irish Cultural Nationalism.
> It was here that these younger men of the Repeal Movement wrote about the subjects of the time relating to history, politics, economics as well as producing literature and poetry.
> Their significance lies in the works they produced that influenced the Nationalists of the future.
New Nationalism and the Cultural Revival
> From the mid-1880s onwards, there were a number of cultural movements that demonstrated together a clear change in Nationalist expression.
> After the collapse of Parnellism (which “caused an identity crisis within Irish Nationalism” according to Rees and caused politics to appear ineffectual), the fact that the land question had been in large part satisfied by Constructive Unionism and Gladstonian Reforms, and the cronyism of the IPP excluding newly educated and urbanised Catholics meant that Nationalism had been left with nowhere to channel itself, except with culture.
> Irish cultural exploration had always been a feature of the Nationalist movement; The United Irishmen with the ideals of a non-religious Irish nationality, Thomas Davis with Gael language and culture returning to the fore, and Charles Kickham with the ideas of a Republic gained by violence.
