The Land League in Clare

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matthewmacnamara
Posts: 139
Joined: Mon Mar 28, 2011 6:38 pm

Re: The Land League in Clare

Post by matthewmacnamara » Sun Jul 24, 2022 11:28 am

This relates to my previous item.

A convention of skilled and unskilled Labour delegates of the Land League branches and sympathisers of the labourers’ cause in the province of Munster was held today in the Town Hall Limerick.
Mr Mac Coy, P.L.G. said : The Irish labourers had to fly to other lands simply because the Irish people were too selfish to allow them a little means to live on the land which gave them birth (applause). Nothing less than an acre of land with a proper house, would be sufficient for a labourer.
Rev Mr Casey, C.C., Abbeyfeale, said he was prepared, and he hoped they would be prepared, never to lay down the question and never lay down the arms of the Constitution until they had defaced and blotted once for ever the stain upon their national history – namely the position of the Irish labourer (applause). He knew many strong, active labouring men who would be glad to work 12 or 14 hours to get in the evening one sixpence (shame), and no farmer would put his cow or horse into the houses where some labourers slept. He agreed that some of the farmers had acted very bad, but what could the poor farmers do when very many of them were worse than paupers themselves! ... Mr Hastings, Shanagolden... said he would not let it go forth from this meeting that the labourers should be placed in the hands of the farmer, for if they were they would be badly treated. [Freeman’s Journal, May 20, 1881]

Sduddy
Posts: 1826
Joined: Sun Sep 26, 2010 10:07 am

Re: The Land League in Clare

Post by Sduddy » Mon Jul 25, 2022 6:02 pm

Hi Matthew

Thank you for that. I wrote quite a bit on the Agricultural Labourers on this forum – see “Agricultural Labourers in Clare in the 19th Century”: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=7077. I was interested, at the time, to see that one of the outcomes of the Land War was the Labourers’ Act of 1883, which established in law the provision of Labourers’ cottages. But I did not realise, at the time that I was writing, that the labourers themselves had organised meetings in order to bring attention to their situation. If they had not done this, they probably would have gained nothing from the Land War.

Sheila

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