Landlord responses to the Irish land war, 1879-1882
Citation:
Adam D. Pole, 'Landlord responses to the Irish land war, 1879-1882', [thesis], Trinity College (Dublin, Ireland). Department of History, 2006, pp 391Download Item:
Abstract:
This dissertation examines rural class conflict in Victorian Ireland at a critical point when the simmering antagonism of tenant farmers over access to and possession of the land became fused with a nationalist movement and exploded into agrarian agitation during the agricultural depression of the late 1870s. The starting point of this project was that previous accounts of the land war had fixated aknost entirely on the agrarian agitation of tenant farmers led by the Land League, but largely neglected to examine the responses of the landowners to this grave challenge. This study approaches the responses of landlords to the land agitation in two ways: by examining how landlords as individuals responded on their own estates and how landlords responded collectively in forming defence organisations to protect their class interests. It is argued that while landlords increasingly used legal strategies to enforce the payment of rent and thereby combat the land agitation, they increasingly did so by the use of sheriffs sales of livestock and the interest of farms. Too much focus has traditionally been given to evictions during the land war, and generally in the nineteenth century, and this thesis illustrates that while there were thousands of evictions during this period, there were many more sheriff's sales to enforce the payment of rent.
Author: Pole, Adam D.
Advisor:
Fitzpatrick, DavidQualification name:
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)Publisher:
Trinity College (Dublin, Ireland). Department of HistoryNote:
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