Pre-Famine Ireland: Social Structure: Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged

By Desmond Keenan

This book describes the social and economic conditions in Ireland during the first half of the nineteenth century—that is up to and including the Great Famine. It is concerned about particular issues like the Catholic emancipation or the famine but looks at Irish society as a whole. Central and local government are described: the economy (agricultural and industrial), the churches, the educational system, the medicine, the arts, the music, and the sports. It aims at presenting, as complete a picture as possible, Ireland at the time.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 20, 2018
• ISBN: 9781984569547

Desmond Keenan

The author was born in Ireland, studied economics and sociology at The Queen’s University of Belfast, Northern Ireland. He completed a doctoral thesis on the Catholic Church in Ireland in the early nineteenth century. Afterwards, he continued his research in the British Library and British Newspaper Library, London (UK).

Book preview

Copyright © 2019 by Desmond Keenan.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2018914206

ISBN:            Hardcover                              978-1-9845-6956-1

                      Softcover                                978-1-9845-6955-4

                      eBook                                     978-1-9845-6954-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 12/18/2018

Xlibris

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

789079

Dedication

Memento Domine, famulorum, famularumque tuarum. qui nos praecesserunt cum signo fidei et dormiunt in somno pacis. Ipsis, Domine, et omnibus in Christo quiescentibus, locum refrigerii, lucis et pacis, ut indulgeas, deprecamur. (Canon of the Roman mass, 5th century).

Remember, Lord, those who have died and have gone before us marked with the sign of faith, and who sleep in the sleep of peace. We ask that through your mercy these, Lord, and all who rest in Christ, find in your presence light, happiness, and peace.

To Annie, Maggie, Lizzie, Bridget, Katie, and Angela, my aunts, John my Uncle, and Frank my cousin, who brightened my childhood and are fondly remembered.

CONTENTS

PREFACE TO THE 2ND EDITION

INTRODUCTION

Chapter 1     STRUCTURE AND VALUES OF IRISH

SOCIETY

Chapter 2     SYNOPSIS OF IRISH HISTORY 1800-1850

Chapter 3     THE IRISH ECONOMY

Chapter 4     ROADS AND RAILWAYS

Chapter 5     WATER TRANSPORT

Chapter 6     TRADE

Chapter 7     FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS

Chapter 8     THE PRIMARY SECTOR I: AGRICULTURE

Chapter 9     THE PRIMARY SECTOR II

Chapter 10   SECONDARY SECTOR: FACTORS OF

PRODUCTION

Chapter 11   SECONDARY SECTOR: PROCESSING AND

MANUFACTURING

Chapter 12   LOCAL ADMINISTRATIONS I

Chapter 13   LOCAL ADMINISTRATIONS II

Chapter 14   CRIME AND POLICE

Chapter 15   CROWN AND PARLIAMENT

Chapter 16   THE IRISH GOVERNMENT I

Chapter 17   THE IRISH GOVERNMENT II

Chapter 18   THE ARMED FORCES

Chapter 19   THE COURTS OF LAW

Chapter 20   RELIGIOUS DIVISIONS

Chapter 21   THE PROTESTANTS I: THE CHURCHES

Chapter 22   THE PROTESTANTS II: THE LAYMEN

Chapter 23   THE CATHOLICS

Chapter 24   EDUCATION I

Chapter 25   EDUCATION II

Chapter 26   MEDICINE AND PUBLIC HEALTH

Chapter 27   THE PRESS

Chapter 28   SCIENCE AND INVENTION

Chapter 29   LEISURE ACTIVITIES

Chapter 30   THE CONDITION OF WOMEN AND

FEMINISM

REFERENCES AND SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

PREFACE TO THE 2ND EDITION

When at university I studied sociology and economics. I became interested in historical sociology, a branch of the science not so well developed as political history and economic history. It is over 25 years since I first commenced the study of social and economic conditions in pre-Famine Ireland. Since then a large amount of new material has become available on the Internet, and I have been able to expand many of the sections. I have also been able to make a deeper study of Irish history in general, and in many cases my conclusions differed from the standard, politically-inspired, nationalist version. The aim of this book is to present a complete picture of Pre-Famine Ireland as it was seen by the people who lived then.

People at the time could not foresee that in the future Catholic voters would out-number Catholics and could elect a Catholic parliament. They did not think that Ireland was ruled by ‘the British Government’. They knew who ruled Ireland. They had seen what republics were like in France and were against the idea of Ireland being a republic. They had the traditional respect for the aristocracy and for the monarchy. Yet as in England, they were wary that royal influence could be abused, but felt protected by the Constitution. The settlement of the ‘Glorious Revolution’ in 1688 was accepted by all. The Catholics had long accepted the legitimacy of the House of Hanover. They had an active Parliament which was always ready to remedy real abuses. They had an Irish Government, one of whose jobs was to propose legislation for Ireland. They were not socialists, though the term was being invented, and did not believe in equalising wealth. God had placed everyone in their own rank in society.

Most Protestants still believed their own propaganda about the evils of popery and the Spanish Inquisition as did other English-speaking Protestants. At the back of the minds of Irish Protestants were the massacres of Protestants in 1641. Though this had happened in only a few places, they believed that they had occurred all over Ireland. The cold-blooded massacre of Protestants in Wexford was an isolated incident, but it revived fears of 1641. They also knew their local Catholic priests and knew they were no threat, and that they had no political ambitions. But the activities of many Catholic priests in the Twenties and Thirties revived and strengthened their fears. That was why involvement of the Catholic clergy in O’Connell’s campaigns was so ill-advised

They did not look through the distorting prisms of later political, and self-justifying political propaganda. They could not see, or imagine, the campaign against ‘landlordism’. They could not foresee the arise of ‘Nationalism’, still less Catholic nationalism or the theory of ‘races’. It is their view of Ireland I wish to present.

After gaining independence in 1921 the victorious Sinn Féin and IRA rewrote Irish history to their own satisfaction. To justify their rebellion against the crown a version of Irish history had to be fabricated. In 1916 there were no objective justifications for a just war, and the IRA were just common criminals, until they won. This version depicted 800 years of British oppression and 800 years of Irish struggles to recover their independence. To this was added a racial element in accordance with the racial theories of the time, a perennial struggle of Celts against Anglo-Saxons. The Catholics were identified with the Celts and the Protestants with the Anglo-Saxons. All Protestants were classified as the Protestant Ascendancy forming an alien ruling class, and all Catholics as the long-oppressed Celts. Of course, like most ideological versions of history was total nonsense and perversion of the truth.

Those who studied Ireland in the early 19th century should look to the facts as they were at the time, not as later revolutionaries depicted them. The Sinn Féin IRA version is no truer than the Nazi version of German history or the Bolshevik version of Russian history. Catholic and Protestants were together solidly against the French during the War, and only a handful supported the United Irishmen. The splendid Nelson’s Pillar showed that solidarity. Ireland was not at war with Britain. On the contrary Ireland supported Britain. It was not until Daniel O’Connell held out the mirage to the Catholics that in an independent Ireland all the public jobs and corruption would be controlled by the Catholics that the polarization of Ireland on sectarian lines commenced. Neither the United Irishmen nor O’Connell envisaged the bulk of Catholics being given the franchise. The United Irishmen still expected the Protestants to be in control. Neither in France nor in the United States was universal suffrage envisioned. We must never read the present into the past.

When I commenced my head was full of the ideas I had been taught in school about the miserable conditions Ireland, and the oppression of the Catholics. Of the oppressions of the ‘British Government’, of the continuing struggle of the Catholics down the centuries against that oppression, and that the Irish Catholics were only held in bondage by a series of Coercion Acts which suspended the rule of law. That the ruling Protestant class, called the Ascendancy, were a rich tiny minority of foreigners, who had confiscated all the lands of ‘the Irish’. That the Penal Laws against the Catholic religion were in full force, until 1829, when Daniel O’Connell, single-handedly, but backed by heroic forty-shilling freeholders, forced the ‘British Government’ to repeal them. That there was no government by Irishmen, and that Britain ruled Ireland from Dublin Castle, where the officials just carried out the instructions of London. I was not alone in my misapprehensions, and one can find similar views echoed on the internet to this day. (I often place inverted commas around certain words of phrases like ‘British Government’ or ‘Protestant Ascendancy’ to signal that nationalist historians often distorted the meanings of these phrases. The ‘Government of the United Kingdom’ and ‘British Government’ can have different meanings. In 19th century Ireland, only the first is correct, though the phrase is unwieldy.

But during my studies I found many things that made me question my assumptions. One of the first things that raised doubts was a minor one, a visit round the Catholic parish churches and pro-cathedral, which I found quite costly buildings, in no way reflecting an impoverished and down-trodden people. Many of the Catholics of Dublin were rich and cultured people, and the so-called ‘Ascendancy’ was not oppressing them.

The greatest source of information lay in the newspapers, daily, tri-weekly, and weekly, which just reported things as they happened. They dealt with the ordinary interests of the people of Dublin at the time. They were the interest of an ordinary people going about their affairs. They were the same interests as the people of England, or the United States. They were not the interests of a people whose sole interest was in keeping a rebellious people in subjection.

One Irish historian, a friend of mine, quoted another historian, about the ‘traditional views’ of events in Irish history. He maintained that whenever you searched for the origin of the ‘traditional view’ you found in in the 19th century. In fact, the whole theory of a racial struggle between ‘Celt’ and ‘Saxon’ lasting several hundred years is an invention of the late 19th century. It was to become a founding myth of the Irish Republic. But it never happened. Without it, the insurrectionists in Dublin in 1916 were common criminals, who would have to make full restitution for the damage they had done before receiving absolution. With it they were heroes and martyrs. As a London writer observed about the men of Young Ireland: they wrote very sonorous verse and invented history with entertaining facility.

This does not mean that the historians were deliberately distorting evidence. It just meant they were selecting pieces of the evidence that suited their argument. For example, to refer to an earlier period, did Norman knights conquer and seize lands from Gaelic chiefs, or did the Gaelic chiefs offer them lands, and the hands of their daughters to get their military expertise? A lot depends on the way you look at it. Another question derived from the sociology of science is what gets published. A book gets published only if the publisher sees a market for it. Will people buy the book? The fact is that most Catholic Irishmen in Europe and America will only buy books on Irish history that makes them feel good. Tell the facts and you get subjected to a torrent of abuse (Crede experto; believe one who was there.)

In the past 20 years research is helped by the posting of information on the internet. This has enabled me to expand some sections, like that on the police, and qualify some expressions, e.g. writing many in place of most, but the book remains essentially unchanged.

It is dispiriting however when one searches the internet to find the fictitious nationalist version of Irish history, and alleged British Rule almost universally accepted. To find, for example that a lighthouse in Co. Cork was built by the British. It was of course designed by an Irish engineer and built with Irish labour. New laws are attributed to the British Government which were drawn up by Irish officials in Dublin. Officials in England, Ireland and Scotland were faced with similar problems, and designed their own solutions to them. Sheriffs in Scotland remained important judges, while in England and Ireland they lost almost all judicial functions. Local government in Ireland was entrusted to local Grand Juries while in England it was entrusted to a bench of magistrates who were royal appointees. Legislation regarding Ireland was left largely to the Irish Government and the Irish MPs. Few Englishmen, other than those who had served in Ireland, had any interest in or knowledge of conditions in Ireland. There was no such a thing as British Rule in Ireland.

INTRODUCTION

This book grew out of a project I undertook to read, after completing my doctoral thesis, a copy of one or more Irish newspapers for every day between 1800 and 1850. This not only gave me contemporary perspectives on the period but also provided a wealth of information not otherwise readily available. Documents now found in archives first appeared in print in the public newspapers. Information, for example, on the courts, on the duties and responsibilities of officers, like mayors and sheriffs, how they were appointed, to whom they were responsible, and who was responsible for seeing they conducted themselves well; who conducted schools, what was taught in them, who managed schools for girls; long-forgotten religious disputes, and so on. In fact, the newspapers presented a rounded view of Irish society in stark contrast the us versus them view of nationalist writers. In this revision, I could draw on the great number of official documents now available on the internet, though what gets published there seems largely a matter of chance.

The plan of this book is not based on an historical framework but a sociological one. A society must have an economic basis; a set of beliefs, values, and instruction; systems of legitimisation and control. There are multiple gradations in society (lords, gentlemen, common people, women) for example. Other things flow from the desires and capabilities of individuals (pursuits of culture or recreation). Some things (technical developments like the printing press and the railway, or religious beliefs) lead to the development of vast subsystems. Growth and development must also be considered. The framework too is neutral and ‘value free’ no judgement being passed on whether any group was right or wrong; any action good or bad.

The period 1800 to 1850 in Irish history has not been particularly well researched. Distortions too were caused by the political objectives of the various writers. Facts were selected, omitted, or twisted to suit political objectives. Catholic or nationalist writers wrote with their own religious and political objectives in mind, and Protestants or loyalists likewise. Historians concentrated on the political struggles and conflicts, omitting investigation of other aspects of society, particularly the social and economic conditions and practices of the time. Some of these have long since vanished. Others are still with us but very much altered. Local government for example was drastically altered in the second half of the century. Some people too, know institutions and customs only in their British or American forms. Nowadays, for the most part, historians take a much more objective approach, and the study of social and economic history has been developed.

It is essential to banish from one’s mind the nineteenth-century nationalist version of Irish history which portrayed the ‘Irish’ people as a ‘Celtic race’. Long-down-trodden and always fighting for freedom from an oppressive ‘Anglo-Saxon’ race. A ‘colonial Government’, like in India, with a foreign ruling elite, the ‘Protestant Ascendancy’ keeping the ‘Irish’ in subjection, and suppressing uprisings with a succession of Coercion Acts, never happened. That never happened. The way the Reformation developed in Ireland meant that all the most powerful and richest people in Ireland were Protestants, while the poor people remained Catholics. These poorer people, like the poorer people in the British Isles and America, lacked political power and influence. But for the most part they accepted that as the natural order of things. The was no religious persecution of Catholics, and as the Penal Laws against Catholics were directed at rich land-owners, they were scarcely affected by them.

After the success of Sinn Fein and the IRA in achieving independence in 1921 the largely fictitious history of the alleged struggle of Irish republicans from 1798 onwards became the founding mythology of the new state. (Every new state in the 20th century developed its own mythology regarded the ‘struggle for freedom.) This version had to be accepted as facts for otherwise the revered leaders in 1916 would be common criminals. However, that does not mean it should be accepted as fact any more than the Bolshevik version of Russian history, or the Nazi version of German history would also have to be accepted as facts. They are the propaganda of factions, not histories of peoples.

Countries in Europe and America had been growing steadily for hundreds of years. The Irish economy was better in the nineteenth century than in the eighteenth century. It was perhaps more developed than that of France or the United States at the time. We need to have some idea of orders of magnitude and of trends. So, I have copied statistics, for example to show the growth of trade in various ports. All the figures given should be regarded as approximations. We really have no idea how accurately or honestly the figures were recorded. We can only hope that in each case they were recorded consistently. I am always rather sceptical, but we must use what we have. For more complete calculations specialist books and articles should be consulted.

Social and economic institutions were well developed in Ireland in the early nineteenth century. It was not a primitive country, or yet one where a native population was ground down by colonial oppressors. It was not a country sharply divided between rich Protestant gentlemen called landlords living on their estates and rack-renting a multitude of impoverished Catholics, living in mud-walled hovels, and eking out a living on tiny holdings. In many ways Ireland in 1800 was larger and more developed than the infant United States. The people, Catholics and Protestants, regarded themselves as living in a free and democratic country. There might be more freedom and democracy in America, but they considered that what they had was more suitable for their country and congratulated themselves on having escaped the excesses of the French Revolution. Very few after 1800 looked for a republic. There was a free press, and letters to the editor were particularly illuminating. There were great political struggles between Catholics and Protestants, but these were very like those between Republicans and Democrats in the United States later in the century, violence and all. Catholics in the nationalist party in Ireland and Catholics in Tammany Hall in the United States came from the same families. It was not an anti-colonial war.

European society and that of America were going through a period of great economic and social change. New ideas like democracy, equality under the law, abolition of slavery, the rooting out of corruption, holding office-holders to account, went hand in hand with the great developments in the industrial and agricultural spheres. Standards were improving in policing, in providing lighting, clean water, sewage and paving to the towns. Standards in medical care, the treatment of lunatics, the management of gaols and prison, especially the segregation of the sexes. As usual changes came first to the east coast urban areas. The country areas were more conservative, and more tolerant with how things were done in the past. Religion no longer held the dominant position it had held up to and during the Reformation. At the same time, there was a religious revival in all the churches. Lax standards had been tolerated in the recent past. Regarding the education of the clergy the Established Church led the way, but for historical treasons the Catholic Church was better placed about residence of clergy and bishops.

Between 1800 and 1830 the Tories had a majority in Ireland. Though called Tories, they really were a coalition of Pittite and Portland Whigs joined with an aim to prosecute the war against Napoleon. By 1830 the more liberal Whigs whose great aim was to extend the franchise and democratic control of government came to the fore. But the Tories were not in general reactionaries, though some were. In many ways they were forward looking and passed many Acts for the improvement of Ireland.

For the most part too, the people were forward looking, and could see that many things could be improved. The great economic improvement of the age was the application of steam power to transport on the land and on sea. But education was also improved, and the franchise extended. A comprehensive system of provision for the very poor was provided. Every effort was made to repair defects in religion and the Churches. All the time the population and the economy were expanding.

There were troubles and disturbances without doubt. Society was very unequal, and many rewards went to those already rich. But there was equality before the law, and equality in business. Attempts were always made to remedy real grievances and numerous commissions of enquiry were appointed. Reliance was normally placed on the ordinary processes of the law. Extraordinary measures to deal with outbreaks of violence were limited as far as possible in their scope and their duration. There was a strong feeling among all classes against harsh or arbitrary measures by the crown and Parliament always tried to limit the scope of extraordinary measures.

The major event, and great mystery, was the Great Irish Famine. Why did it occur? Agriculture was prosperous, and exports were booming, great developments in railways and steamships were taking place. The possibility of such a famine caused by crop-failure had been foreseen for many years, and every effort had been made to be ready for it. A nation-wide system of poor relief had just been completed. Corn Laws had been passed to develop Irish agriculture and were so successful that they were no longer needed. But despite all the steps taken a major disaster occurred. Despite the claims of some nationalists both the Tory and Whig Governments made every effort to relieve distress. The ability of the Government of the United Kingdom to borrow money when faced with an unprecedented challenge proved crucial to the success of their efforts. Even a century earlier people just died in a Famine because there was a limit to what anyone could do.

CHAPTER ONE

STRUCTURE AND VALUES OF IRISH

SOCIETY

(i) Social Structure

Ireland was a very modern country by 1800. Beginning with the policy of Surrender and Regrant of Henry VIII when the involvement of the crown in Ireland’s affairs may be said to have commenced, most of the medieval structures were swept away. The huge grants of land made to the great Gaelic chiefs in fee simple established land-owning on a modern basis, where Common Law universally applied. All tenancies and leases were under Common Law even when a lease was held by a group of men. There were no restrictions on movement. Common lands and feudal rights appertaining to them disappeared except on Church lands. The last of the medieval Liberties ended in 1715 when the Liberty of Ormonde was forfeited. Every man, woman and child came under Common Law and were free of all the courts in the land, i.e. free to attend them and plead. Any restrictions on religious grounds could easily be avoided by taking the Sacrament in any church of the Established Church. Anyone could set up a business anywhere, so restrictions on trade could not be enforced by trade guilds. Brehon Law was never formally abolished, but the courts of the chiefs were never summoned.

Survivals from the Middle Ages were the Established Church whose medieval structure remained intact until 1833 and the system of law courts which survived until 1888. The medieval charters of some cities and corporate town survived until 1840. The charters of must towns dated from the reign of James I as did the manor courts attached to them. Manor courts were passing out of fashion in favour of petty sessions courts and ceased to exist. (It would seem that ancient feudal dues or sheriff’s proffers, payable by the county to the king were abolished in 1835, probably because it cost more to collect them than they were worth. They were still mentioned in an Act in 1793.)

Irish society at the beginning of the nineteenth century was in many ways homogeneous with a common acceptance of values. It was also largely homogeneous regarding population. As in other parts of Europe later arrivals of all ranks of society intermarried with those already there. The landed gentry were not (before the rise of nationalism) regarded as aliens. Most Irish landowners were resident and both they and their tenants disliked ‘absentee landlords’ whom they considered failing in their duties towards country and tenants. It was a perfectly normal, Western European type of society ruled by an aristocratic class. Despite later nationalist propaganda, it was not like India, with a foreign ruling class (the Protestant Ascendancy) ruling over an impoverished native race with a total barrier between them. Nor was there a struggle by the natives to achieve independence, despite later republican attempts to show a continuous struggle for freedom after 1798. It did not exist. There were of course, as in Britain and America, things to be improved, but this could be achieved, and was achieved through legislation, usually formulated in Dublin

Later in the century there was a long campaign by the Catholic middle classes to get a separate parliament, for this would give them control over the political rackets. Every job paid from the public purse would be taken from a Protestant and given to a Catholic. It was a zero-sum game, which is why it was almost totally opposed by Protestants. There was no misrule, bad Government, or the later favourite expression colonial exploitation (The mythology of a native Celtic race ruled by an alien class, often absentee, will be dealt with under beliefs.)

The people, for the most part, were not backward. Ireland was not quite as rich and developed as England then was, but no other country was either. By-and-large, the beliefs and practices of the English were rapidly diffused in Ireland, as was the English language which was seen as being of more practical use. Irish society was much like that in most of Western Europe and North America at the time. There was the usual mix of wealthy landowners, prosperous farmers and merchants, an educated middle class, and many small tenant farmers, the latter usually illiterate. But that was the usual condition at the time

It was largely a rural, but not a peasant society; it was a hierarchical aristocratic society with various grades from noblemen to landless cottiers and hired servants. The traditional picture of a wealthy aristocracy ruling an undifferentiated mass of impoverished peasants was far from accurate. There was a certain division regarding religion, but there was no rigid exclusion of people born Catholics because there was no bar on joining the Protestant Church.

A person’s position in the society was determined partly by his family origins and titles, partly by the amount of land he owned, and partly by his income. In general, noblemen had the most land and consequently the largest incomes, but many landed families were deeply in debt, a situation that was not peculiar to Ireland. At the other end of the scale the holding of a lease of a small piece of land established the tenant as a ‘farmer’ and so higher in the social scale than the landless labourer.

There were two main points of division on the social scale. The first was between those who were counted as ‘gentlemen’ and those who were not. (The aristocracy for these purposes were gentlemen with a patent of nobility). The second was between those who had a holding or tenancy of land and those who had not.

Noblemen had the same origins, ranks, and rules of precedence as English lords and on official occasions in England took their precedence in their appropriate rank. All ranks of nobility (all of which were hereditary) were conferred exclusively by the crown. Irish peers had equal access to the king as English peers. A knighthood was a personal rank of honour conferred by the crown. There were however three hereditary knighthoods in Ireland. There were a few titles of honour derived from Gaelic chiefdoms, like O’Connor Don, the recognized head of a branch of the O’Connors, but they counted only as gentlemen. To the nobility and their families were given the greater offices of state. Catholic noblemen supported the Whigs, and after Emancipation, took office with them. The Catholic bishops up to Emancipation for the most part followed the Catholic nobles. After that they tended increasingly to support O’Connell.

The Irish peerage was considerably distorted by the number of those who were given their peerages in the 18th century. In the Irish House of Commons, the crown, to get the Bills of Supply (taxes) passed had to promise offices and/or honours to various Members of Parliament. Every man had his price, and the crown had to get the Act passed. Nevertheless, there was still many ancient peerages.

Of the ancient Gaelic families, only the O’Briens (Inchiquin and Thomond) and the O’Neills, through a female branch (Baron O’Neill), retained titles of nobility. The earls of Upper Ossory (Fitzpatrick, Mac Giolla Phádraig, survived until 1818, when the title became extinct. Other ancient families like the O’Connors, MacMurrough Kavanaghs, and the various MacCarthys remained as wealthy gentlemen. The MacMurrough were among the wealthiest families in Leinster, though they had no titles in the peerage. The O’Connors of Connaught were represented by the O’Connor Dons, chiefs of the name but untitled. O’Connor Sligo likewise survived. Also, the MacDermotts, Princes of Coolavin. Descendants of the MacCarthys were widespread in the south of Ireland, but untitled.

Title survivors from the Middle Ages were more numerous. Chief of these were the Fitzgeralds, Earls of Kildare (Duke of Leinster). The earldom of Ormonde died out in the 18th century, but the Butler family were represented by the Viscounts Mountgarret. The Earldom of Desmond no longer existed but the family was represented by the Knight of Kerry, and the Knight of Glin. The estates of the White Knight passed by marriage to the Earls of Kingston. Also surviving were the two branches of the de Burgh family, the Earl of Mayo (Bourke) and the Marquess of Clanrickarde (Burke). Of the Plunketts, one branch(Dunsany) conformed, and the branch (Fingal) did not. Of the great lords of the Pale there were the Prestons (Barons Gormanston), the St Lawrences (Barons Howth), the Fitzeustaces, the Plunketts (Barons Killeen and Earls of Fingal), the Talbots of Malahide (not Shrewsbury), the Barnewalls (Barons Trimleston), the Nettervilles (Viscounts), the Bellews (baronets and later barons), and the Cusacks. The Nugents became earls of Westmeath. The Wellesley family of Dangan Castle, Co. Meath, arrived in the 12th century, were undistinguished, and were not ennobled until the 18th century. Almost all the property-owning families conformed to the Established Church in the centuries after the Reformation to save their lands. Sometimes they hedged their bets, by having one son conform and the other not.

After the Reformation, and the confiscations of land, many people came from England in the service of the Government and obtained estates by fair means or foul. Notable were the Boyles, Earls of Cork, and the Chichesters, Marquesses of Donegall, and owners of Belfast. The Needhams (Earls of Kilmorey,) got a grant of land in the Plantation of Ulster and came to own the town of Newry. The Stewart family were landowners in Co. Down, Co. Londonderry, and Co. Donegal who became rich in the linen trade. Robert Stewart was given a peerage in 1789 and was made Marquess of Londonderry in 1816. The Ponsonbys (Earls of Bessborough, were descended from Sir John Ponsonby, a colonel of horse in the Commonwealth army, who received a grant of the forfeited lands of the Dalton family in Co. Kilkenny. The Ponsonbys came to the fore in the 18th century Irish Parliament.

These were the gentlemen who since the Restoration in 1660 had built up the Irish economy, to make one of the best in Europe. And who had advanced science to make Ireland to make a world leader. The ‘Georgian’ art and architecture was likewise world standard. The 150 years of peace, marred only by the short Jacobite wars enabled Ireland to prosper as never before.

There was no such a thing as a ‘Protestant Ascendancy’ class ruling Ireland ‘alien by race and religion. Since the time of the Vikings, most of the foreigners who came to Ireland were men. Most those who arrived in Ireland from overseas were single men who invariably took Irish wives and joined the local nobility. All through the Middle Ages there was one ruling class, of mixed Norman and Gaelic blood. After the Reformation the English settlers took local wives and joined the ruling class. The Penal Laws against property ensured that almost all the leading families in Ireland became Protestant, and they formed the Irish upper class or ruling class. Ireland was no different from that in England. Most of the great Catholic landowners became Protestants. From Viking times onward, there was only one ruling class in Ireland. They were not foreigners living in Ireland. Ireland was not India, where those of mixed blood were ruthlessly excluded after it became safe for English women to go to India. Many of these families were in Ireland longer than most white families in North America. Only late 19th century nationalists declared them foreigners.

There was no exact definition of a gentleman. A gentleman originally belonged to a family with the hereditary right to bear arms, and which held land from the king under the obligation of supporting the king in battle. A gentleman did no manual work, nor did he engage in trade. He should have an independent income from land to the value of at least £200 a year. The younger sons of noblemen might be virtually penniless but were undoubtedly gentlemen.

Professional people like barristers, doctors, and ships’ surgeons were definitely gentlemen, but then those with a university education mostly came from gentle families. Clergymen of the Established Church were gentlemen, but there was some doubt about the clergy of other denominations. But by the middle of the nineteenth century the Catholic clergy were accepted as gentlemen because they could read Latin, i.e. they were in a gentle profession. One was a gentleman only if accepted as such by other gentlemen. A crucial test was whether a challenge to fight a duel would be accepted. Those engaged in trade, even if they were rich and had extensive holdings of land, were not gentlemen. Apothecaries could read Latin but were in trade.

(The gentlemen in Ireland were often referred to as ‘landlords’ but this term has acquired misleading overtones from long political controversies. In place of landlord I use the term landowner or proprietor.)

These gentlemen were the rulers of the country. They were elected to Parliament and formed the committees of canvassers who decided who might be a candidate. They formed the Grand Juries of counties and from their ranks came the county officers, the sheriffs, magistrates, military and revenue officers, civil servants, indeed anyone in a position of authority. As most government was local, membership of a Grand Jury was for most gentlemen more important than being a lowly MP. They formed the ‘gentle’ or ruling class. They filled the middle offices of state. Their children formed the bulk of the pupils in the grammar schools and undergraduates in the university. They filled the gentle professions, medicine, the law, the Established Church, and the press. Catholic gentlemen up to 1829 supported the Whigs, and for the most part after Emancipation supported the Whigs in Parliament and accepted public offices.

In most of Ireland there was a considerable middle class, or as we might prefer, lower middle class, of farmers, to whom were added professional men like attorneys, proctors, land agents, doctors, military officers, clergymen, and such like. Some of these obviously counted as gentlemen (especially if they were younger sons of gentlemen) and some not. The sharp distinctions which existed in England between larger tenant farmers, the yeoman class, and the gentry was blurred in Ireland. A gentleman for example might lease quite a small farm. Merchants in towns, as was usual since the Middle Ages in Europe, normally had an estate in the country as well. The Catholics in this class up to 1829 supported the Whigs, but after that largely supported Daniel O’Connell. The same is true of the bulk of the Catholic priests. It was the great aim of O’Connell’s life to wrench power not only from the Protestants but from the Catholic upper classes as well.

To this group belonged those referred to as shoneens, buckeens, or half-sirs There is little point in trying to establish precise distinctions between these. (Shoneens referred to those who aped English speech, accent, and behaviour rather than that of Irish gentlemen and ladies. (Later it was used as a derogatory term for those who preferred English to the Gaelic language.) The income from their holdings might be between £100 and £500 a year. They did no work and spent most of their time hunting and shooting. Their farms were either sublet or were cultivated by hired workmen. They were famous for taking over the organization of elections and making themselves useful to the Government and the local gentlemen of the Grand Jury. These were expected to reward them with appointments to minor public offices of remuneration, and in general they filled the lowest public offices of the supervisory grade. O’Connell estimated that there were about 10,000 such jobs that were filled through the patronage of those in the higher offices.

The real struggle between O’Connell’s supporters on the one side and the Whigs and Tories on the other concerned these public positions. The aim was to displace the shoneens from these minor positions, for the Catholic lower middle classes were prevented by social position, lack of education, and lack of wealth, and lack of patrons, from aspiring to the higher offices. Repeal meant jobs for O’Connell’s supporters, and it was precisely these jobs they aspired to. The Protestant shoneens, who themselves could not aspire any higher, had no intention of given up this source of income.

In some places, especially in the far west and south, subdivision of holdings among the tenants themselves had proceeded so far that there was a mass of sub-tenants on tiny holdings and few others except the head-tenant, the so-called ‘middleman’. But the use of middlemen (despite the impression given by Maria Edgeworth) had long gone out of fashion, most landowners employing professional land agents or managers.

The vast bulk of the people did not belong to any of these groups and formed what might be described as the working classes. The top rank in this group was held by the small tenant farmers that held land on lease. Among these the first rank was held by those farmers who had free holdings for a number of lives to a value of at least 40/- a year clear of all charges. These were the Forty Shilling freeholders, who, if registered, could vote for members of Parliament. They were expected to vote as their landlord directed but following the revolt of the freeholders at O’Connell’s instigation, landowners tended not to give leases for lives. An equal rank could be assigned to master tradesmen, such as master weavers, master tailors, master carpenters, etc. These might work if they had to, but in general left to most laborious work to labourers or journeymen. A master tailor might measure and cut out a suit, and then take off the rest of the day. Their incomes might not exceed £20 a year, but they were their own masters. If they wished to take a day off to go to the fair or the hunt, they asked permission of no one. For this reason, the rank of tenant farmer was excessively esteemed. From this flowed the intense competition for land. Having a lease on a small farm had another advantage, namely, that it conferred a security that hired labour did not have. The ratio of independent tenant farmers, many with tiny holdings to hired servants was much higher than in England. Hired servants, farm labourers, and journeymen, nevertheless, were very numerous.

Those without a holding of land sufficient for their support, farm labourers, servants, and journeymen had not the liberty of the independent farmers. They could be employed permanently, or for a period of six months, by the day, or until the completion of a particular task. House servants, and outdoor workers were very numerous. They were also likely to have a lease on a small patch of potato ground for additional income and as a safety net. Spinning and weaving were widely practised in the ‘cottage industries’ and probably many of those so engaged outside the towns had never served a formal apprenticeship. It would seem that most of those who used violence to promote their aims, members of the agrarian secret societies, the sectarian societies, the trade combinations, and the United Irishmen (especially in Ulster) belonged to this class. They were strongly opposed not only by the Government but also by the middle classes, the clergy of all denominations, and the O’Connellites. Many in the lower classes were descended from families who were formerly chiefs. Some were from major families like the O’Connors, O’Neills, or O’Briens, but most were from small local septs.

In many parts of the West and South were crofters, or as they were known in Ireland, cottiers. The cottiers had smallholdings, held either individually or by groups. They did not produce a surplus for the market, but were virtually self-sufficient. They may not have had cash to spend, but could have a sufficiency of food, shelter, clothing, and fuel for their simple needs. They mostly paid the rent for their small patches of potato ground by means of days of labour. It was estimated that the rent paid by the cottier to the farmer was three or four times what the farmers was himself paying, but all the same the cottier was more secure than the landless day labourer. They could also purchase milk and other items by means of days of labour, and perhaps keep a pig and some poultry. Sometimes the cottier was paid for his labour by the farmer but at half the wage of the day labourer (IFJ 24 Feb 1821). Conditions of holding varied widely over Ireland. They could also get occasional employment in repairing the roads. The Gaelic language which was fast disappearing from eastern Ireland, survived among these classes.

The condition of cottiers renting small patches directly from a farmer in return for so many days labour was very different from that of the cottier-sized holdings which resulted from excessive sub-letting and sub-division. In the latter case, the entire population of a parish might be cottiers who would have to roam far and wide in search of casual work.

At the very bottom of the social structure was the large class of the destitute for which Ireland was famous all over Europe. Many of these had no capital and rented a small patch of potato ground perhaps in return for so many days labour or a share of the crop. This class does not seem to have been evenly distributed over Ireland, and in many parts, it may have scarcely existed. In those parts where there were many large and intermediate-sized farms, or where there was a cottage industry there were many opportunities for hired labour. But in other areas where the farms were uniformly small, there was little opportunity for casual labour. The women and children seem to have begged, while the men planted the potatoes, and took such casual jobs as they could find. They were miserably housed, clothed and fed. The difference between them and the numerous tribe of full-time beggars was slight.

Finally, these was the body of self-sufficient ‘travelling folk’ called gypsies or tinkers. There may have been some genuine Romany among them. Most have common Irish surnames and may be descended from failed branches of chiefly families. They survived by horse-trading, tin-smithing (tinkering), recycling metals and textiles, and begging. The usually travelled from fair to fair, and meetings for horse-racing. They married only among themselves.

(ii) The Effects of the Act of Union

It is not clear how the Act of Union affected the lives of ordinary people for we know little of the relations of ordinary people with Britain before 1800. The people most affected were the merchants engaged in the import and export trade. Now they could trade freely, not only with Britain, but with all British colonies. Ireland was now included in all trade deals, Britain made with any other country. Ships registered in Ireland had the benefit of all British consular services everywhere in the world, and the protection of the British navy. It was some time however until the currencies were equalized, and all Irish protective tariffs were removed. By 1825 all restrictions had been removed. Irish ships traded as far as India, New Orleans for cotton, and Australia.

From time immemorial people moved forwards and backwards across the Irish Sea, with the tide flowing in one direction or another as circumstances dictated. Foreign merchants and other gentlemen were often awarded patents of denization to obtain particular rights, but it is doubtful if this applied to tradesmen and the like. From time to time efforts were made to remove those Irish who were reduced to begging from England. But that was because the relief of the destitute was a charge on their native parish. Irish Catholic historians have tended to research only those who remained Catholics when they went abroad. But it seems that a majority of emigrants just conformed to the religion of the district in which they found themselves.

Ireland by the 18th century was not a country held in subjection by Britain and always struggling to cast off their chains. This was a Romantic Nationalist fallacy. People moved freely between the two kingdoms. Gentlemen, including Catholics, were received in the best circles in England. The poorer sort moved to British cities. Though Ireland had no colonies of its own, the Irish could settle in any British colony. Irish Protestant gentlemen could be promoted to the highest ranks in the army and navy. George Macartney of Co. Antrim joined the British diplomatic service and led a famous embassy to the Emperor of China. Those living in seaports could be pressganged into the navy.

It is not clear what practical difference the Act of Union made. For most Catholics the Relief Act of 1793 gave them all they needed. The so-called ‘Emancipation’ the admission of rich Catholic gentlemen into Parliament, and the higher ranks in the army, judiciary, etc. was largely symbolic and affect only a handful of gentlemen. But afterwards Irish people could move openly and legally to any part of the British Isles and British Empire, use a British passport everywhere in the world, and get the protection of the British Empire.

(iii) Beliefs and Values

In this section I try to decide what people at the time actually thought and felt, not the thoughts and feelings attributed to them later in the century by people writing what I call fake history. Later in the century a version of Irish history was developed which served to justify the recourse to armed rebellion in the early 20th century. The version was that England had conquered Ireland in the 12th century and held her in subjection for 700 years, and that in every generation during that period the ‘Irish’ had sought to overthrow the English yoke. A close examination of the facts shows there was no basis for that version of history. Specifically, regarding pre-Famine Ireland, there is no indication that England was holding Ireland in subjection, oppressing the ‘Irish’ or that the ‘Irish’ were struggling to overthrow that allegedly hated foreign yoke.

It is worth noting the beliefs and values that were predominant 100 years later that were not found. The Gaelic language, though widely spoken in the remoter parts, was not esteemed. It was the language of largely illiterate people, mostly farmers and fishermen. Many of these had a greater interest in learning to speak English with a view of getting work in eastern Ireland, England, the colonies or America. Some antiquarians in Scotland and Ireland felt it would be useful to know to understand ancient documents.

The people were strongly monarchist, and republicanism was scarcely supported. Memories of the atrocities committed by both sides in 1798 remained clearly in people’s minds when often drunken gangs ranged through the countryside plundering and killing as they went. The mythology of 1798 seems to have originated in the United States, for Daniel O’Connell had to disabuse them. Writers of Young Ireland began to paint a romantic picture to contradict O’Connell’s version, even though he was a contemporary witness of the events. The rehabilitation of the known leaders of the United Irishmen began in The Nation in 1843 and deals with the good intentions of the leaders rather than with what happened. Republicans to this day try to do the same.

The people were not opposed to the upper classes: the so-called Ascendancy. Aristocracy was accepted as the natural form of government. Everyone knew his place in society. The aristocracy was not fixed, and it was always possible to join it. Titles were multiplied in the later years of the 18th century. O’Connell’s view of the Ascendancy was no more widely shared than the views of the republicans. There was no idea of a struggle against ‘landlordism’ which in any case was a middle-class idea not a spontaneous revolt of the peasantry.

People were not democrats. They liked the idea of the Forty Shilling freehold even though they had to vote as their landlord instructed them. At elections they became men of importance who had to be ‘treated, i.e. provided with copious amounts of food and beer. But they recognised that the aristocracy and richer gentlemen would control the parliament and the counties. Only when repeatedly prompted by O’Connell did they begin to imagine some of the spoils might come their way. But that was in the future.

Among the weavers in the North of Ireland principles of democracy inspired by the United States and France seem to have been widespread. Among the Protestant industrial workers in Ulster in 1798 there seems to have been a genuine attempt to establish democracy. In the other provinces, the ideals of the United Irish leaders seem to have been subordinated to those of the agrarian secret societies. The United Irish leaders themselves compromised their ideals by adopting the terrorist methods of the agrarian and sectarian societies. They also compromised their ideals by seeking and accepting the assistance of the French Directory. The French were not helping them out of their goodness of heart. During the first half of the century Whiggery and liberalism remained among the Protestants of Ulster. But O’Connell and his supporters, though nominally Whigs, were totally unable to comprehend them. By the 1830s Ulster was strongly conservative.

Socialism and working-class politics and the class struggle lay far in the future. The concepts of racialism had not yet been invented. Nor did the idea arise that the Catholic Church should replace the Established Church in national life. Nationalism had not yet been invented. One owed allegiance to his king. Officers, for example, could move freely between armies, provided that his king was not at war with the other king.

They cared little either way for the Act of Union for it did not affect them. In the meantime, the wars improved the lot of most of the people. The chief losers by the Act of Union were some of the rich merchants in Dublin who supplied the carriage trade when Parliament sat in Dublin. But their dissatisfaction proved short-lived.

There was a distinct sense of identity of the Irish people. This was not the same as the fake Gaelic racial identity manufactured at the end of the 19th century. People living in Ireland felt their separate identity in the same way the Scots and the Welsh did. There had been an influx of Normans, English, Welsh, and Flemings since the 12th century. But as was usual at the time the clear majority of them would have been men, who promptly married local women. The fortunes of the French, English and Gaelic languages waxed and waned over the centuries. French disappeared towards the end of the Middle Ages, and gradually the English language spread. At first bi-lingualism was common. But by 1800 Gaelic was commonly spoken only by illiterate peasants.

There were distinctive Irish accents, just as there were Scottish, Welsh, and regional English accents. The coming of radio and cinema in the 20th century promoted an evening out of accents, but Gladstone and Lloyd George retained their regional accents. In the 18th century, Shoneenism was a term used in Ireland to describe an ostensible Irishman who was viewed as adhering to Anglophile snobbery. The pronunciation of English was changing more rapidly in England than in Ireland, and shoneens affected the latest English upper-class pronunciation. Still a man with a strong Kerry accent, modified in Dublin, was intelligible in Westminster. This strong Protestant sense of a special Irish identity, as a sub-set of the British national identity, persisted even after the Act of Union. Protestants fostered the study of the Gaelic language. It was only when the Irish republican movement hi-jacked the Gaelic language (and the shamrock) as their badges of identity did Protestants drop out.

Regarding the concept of ‘Irishness’ the theorising of Charles Vallencey and his fellow antiquarians seem to have been widely followed. These theories connected the origins of the Irish people with various famous peoples of antiquity such as the Phoenicians and Egyptians. Geoffrey Keating’s story of the successive invasions by Partholonians, Nemedians, Fir Bolg, Tuatha Dé Danaan and finally, Milesians were accepted as historical fact. The Irish were therefore descendants of the Milesians. The general idea behind them seems to have been to rebut English prejudices that the Irish were an uncultured people from the woods by giving them a respectable origin. The Young Ireland writers took these opinions seriously.

One thing we do not find are references to the ancient tales regarding Cúchulainn and the Knights of the Red Branch, and the Fenian cycle which figured so strongly in the synthetic nationalism of later in the century. These only came to light when experts in the Gaelic language examined medieval manuscripts. The scholars at the time believed the tales were factual, referring to real people, and that they originated in Ireland, and represented the ‘spirit (esprit) of the Celtic race. The fact that there is no archaeological confirmation of chariot warfare might indicate the tales originated elsewhere.

There was however one belief which was to prove the strongest and most intractable, and most widespread, and eventually the most dominant. This was the deep-seated traditional anti-Protestant belief among lower-class Catholics. Many of this class may have formerly belonged to higher classes. It was repeated and inculcated as strongly as anti-Popery sentiments were among the Protestant working classes. It was derived from the defeats of the Catholic armies in the civil wars in the seventeenth century and the resulting losses of lands through the various confiscations. After the defeat of the Catholic lords in 1690 and their subsequent acceptance of Protestantism, many who belonged to minor branches of the great families still retained after three generations a sense of grievance at their loss of lands and status. It was on this vague, ill-defined sense of grievance and oppression that O’Connell played, and the Catholic nationalist outlook was built. The idea that the wrongs wrought at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690 could be put right. But the prospect did not seem possible until the electoral reforms in the 1880s gave a realistic chance of success.

For the first thirty years, there were no tensions between British and Irish. The Act of Union was broadly accepted. After the disgraceful proceedings of the United Irishmen in 1798 few people wished to admit connections with them. The name of United Irishmen was tarnished, however well-meaning the Protestant leaders had been. It was admitted the England, Ireland and Scotland, had different histories and traditions, but it was generally felt that the evils of the past had been put into the past. There was no idea of different races, nor of race struggle, a German invention in the nineteenth century. Nor was there an idea of a British ‘occupation’ of Ireland for six hundred years, and a six-hundred-year struggle against the ‘British’. That too was a nineteenth century invention though relied on by the Irish Republican Brotherhood to justify their attempted armed ‘uprising’.

Religious beliefs were the most important. The eighteenth century was not noted for the fervour of its religious practice, but belief in one or other of the versions of Christianity was deep and sincere. By the beginning of the nineteenth century most educated people had some knowledge of the scepticism of the French philosophers, but religious infidelity was virtually unheard of.

The lack of religious fervour was matched by religious tolerance. It was not religious bigotry that kept Catholics out of public office but instead a belief in the need for an Established Church, an official clergy, the recognition that the bishops were proper constitutional advisers of the king, and that all the king’s counsellors should be of the same religion as the king. These beliefs were held as strongly by the Catholics as by the Protestants, and central to McHale’s policy on Repeal was the belief that the Catholic bishops should advise the crown in a Catholic country. (The idea of a non-denominational society originated in the United States and was brought from thence to Ireland in the second half of the nineteenth century. The French revolutionaries believed in an atheistic state.) As the century progressed religious fervour increased, and religious bigotry and intolerance (on both sides) increased pari passu.

Regarding political beliefs, all accepted the ‘Whig Settlement’ of 1688 which established the constitutional relationship between king and people and confirmed the right of the people to the ‘free institutions’ of which they were so proud. These included a free Parliament whose members could not be punished for opposing the king’s wishes. The freedom of the courts meant that judges could not be dismissed for giving verdicts against the king’s officers. There was freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, freedom of worship, and freedom of the press. The people in Ireland, as in England, valued these freedoms which they knew most other countries lacked. Jacobitism had long since died out even among the Catholic swordsmen who were its strongest adherents. When Catholics were allowed to bear arms after the outbreak of the French Revolution the Irish Catholic soldiers in France transferred to George III’s army. Not surprisingly, between 1791 and 1815 there was little support anywhere in the British Isles for the French Revolution and the freedom it was supposed to bring.

Within this consensus there