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Local History

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Abstract

Local history is the history of place, but, though place is central to its meaning, it is much more than this. Local historical research, in the first place, teases out the interplay of landscape, economy, culture and population to explain the shaping of the local community over time. Secondly, by asking ‘big questions about small places’, it prompts the reassessment of assumptions about developments over a wider spatial canvas.1 Thus, local history is about both people and place, and it provides a lens through which one can view the evolution of both the micro world of the locality and the wider world composed of many such localities. Modern Irish local history has been in the making since the mid-eighteenth century, the first significant landmark in its development being the work of the Physico-Historical Society. Established to investigate the roots of contemporary economic development and to combat Ireland’s image as a barbaric country, this society initiated a series of county studies, only four of which were published.2 Though primarily economic in focus, these surveys into ‘the ancient and present state’ of the counties in question effectively linked past with present, and prefigured the interdisciplinary approach of two centuries later by combining elements of geographical, economic, historical and political enquiry.3
Chapter 7
Local History
Maura Cronin
Local history is the history of place, but, though place is central to its
meaning, it is much more than this. Local historical research, in the first place,
teases out the interplay of landscape, economy, culture and population to
explain the shaping of the local community over time. Secondly, by asking ‘big
questions about small places’, it prompts the reassessment of assumptions
about developments over a wider spatial canvas.1 Thus, local history is about
both people and place, and it provides a lens through which to view the
evolution of both the micro world of the locality and the wider world composed
of many such localities.
Modern Irish local history has been in the making since the mid-
eighteenth century, the first significant landmark in its development being the
work of the Physico-Historical Society. Established to investigate the roots of
contemporary economic development and to combat Ireland’s image as a
barbaric country, this society initiated a series of county studies, only four of
which were published.2 Though primarily economic in focus, these surveys
into ‘the ancient and present state’ of the counties in question effectively linked
past with present, and prefigured the interdisciplinary approach of two
centuries later by combining elements of geographical, economic, historical
and political enquiry.3 Similar researches were continued by the nineteenth
century’s dedicated amateur historian-antiquarians, and from the 1850s
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onwards Kilkenny, Wexford, and Limerick saw the publication of local studies
all primarily genealogical, historical, scenic and antiquarian in focus.4 It was
during this period, too, that there came into existence a number of long-lived
periodical publications: the Ulster Journal of Archaeology, established in 1853,
was one of the first, with the Ossory Archaeological Journal following in the
mid-1870s, and the Kildare Archaeological Journal, the Journal of the
Waterford and South East of Ireland Archaeological Society and the Journal of
the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society in the1890s.5 While most of
these works focussed on the county or a wider region, other contemporary
studies like Lenihan’s Limerick: its history and antiquities or Gibson’s History
of the County and City of Cork celebrated the history of a particular urban
centre in its broader regional setting.6
For Lenihan, Gibson and the other dedicated men of letters in the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, there was little difficulty in defining ‘local’
and in deciding the spatial unit on which to base their studies. Their primary
unit of investigation and celebration was the county, diocese and/or city, and
the focus of attention was on ‘great men’ and ‘great events’, and the stress
was on gathering and listing information rather than on posing and answering
questions regarding the nature and dynamics of local communities. Gibson’s
work was dedicated to Lord Fermoy and Lenihan’s to the Earl of Dunraven,
while their chapters concentrated on leading figures of the past like the Earl of
Desmond, Florence McCarthy and Daniel O’Connell, and on chronological
‘landmarks’ like the Battle of Kinsale, the 1798 rebellion and Catholic
Emancipation.7 This pattern continued into the twentieth century, virtually
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Local History
untouched by the Annales school of the 1920s, which emphasised the need to
explore historical themes through the multiple lens of a wide range of
disciplines. Rev. John Begley’s monumental Diocese of Limerick is
characteristic of the ‘old style’. This work was complied over a thirty-year
period but the approach remained essentially antiquarian, the third volume
(published in 1938), just like the first, being divided into chapters determined
by century, and dedicated to the bishop and the diocese.8
The real turning point in the approach to Irish local history can be dated to
the 1970s, and it was influenced by three parallel developments. The first
such development was the increasing popular interest in local history,
culminating in the founding in 1981 of the Federation of Local History Societies
whose purpose was to encourage research in history, archaeology and
folklore and to provide a forum for those so involved.9 During this period, too,
there was an awakening consciousness of the potential of local history to act
as an influence of reconciliation in divided communities. The Ulster Scots
Historical Foundation, originally set up in 1956, changed its title in 1975 to the
Ulster Historical Foundation, still stressing its unique regional identity but in a
less exclusive manner than heretofore. Two decades later, parallel to
attempted solutions to Northern Ireland’s complex political situation, the
Border Counties Historical Collective was set up to ‘reconcile identities, create
relationship and celebrate unique ways of life and cultural tradition’.10 The
second formative influence on the development of local history in late
twentieth century Ireland was that of the University of Leicester’s Local History
Department, founded in 1948 and, by the 1970s making its mark on the work
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of Irish local historians. The Leicester school stressed an analytical and
quantitative approach, emphasising the broader contextualisation of regional
experience, and shifting the focus from elites to the broader local community.
The third influence was the emerging revisionist trend within both geographical
and historical scholarship, and the parallel increase in emphasis on Irish
social, economic and labour history.11 Though the main emphasis remained
more on re-examining the grand narrative through concentration on local
variations and aberrations than on analysing the local community per se, these
three influences accelerated the growth-rate of locally based studies on issues
including urban growth, popular politicisation and regional agrarian change,
using the regional experience to cast new light on broader historical
developments in the island as a whole.12
In the 1980s the approach to local historical research was further
sharpened and refined by the increasing prominence of historical geographers
in the area, a development prompting among historians a more open attitude
to the interdisciplinary nature of local history and a greater awareness of the
importance of examing the locale in its own right. This was reflected in
Geography Publications’ launching of the ground-breaking History and Society
series, interdisciplinary studies which sought to ‘explore at county level the
dynamics of economic, cultural and social change.’13 The emerging pre-
eminence of the ‘new’ local history was also made manifest in the
establishment in the 1990s of local history degree and certificate courses at
the National University of Ireland Maynooth, the University of Limerick, and
University College Cork.14 Stressing the interdisciplinary nature of local
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history, and influenced especially by the Leicester school, these courses
fostered co-operation between university-based and ‘amateur’ local historians,
posed questions regarding the interpretation of terms like ‘local’ and
‘community’, and promoted research at micro-level, concentrating on smaller
communities and territorial divisions than those of county, diocese or city.
From the 1970s onwards, therefore, Irish local history has been opened up
to explore a broad range of issues which both elucidate the local and regional
experience, and prompt reassessment of island-wide developments: the
evolution of the local landscape; the process of landscape change and shifting
boundaries; the contact between the local and the wider world; and the
dynamics of intergenerational conflict, all traceable through topography, the
evolution of settlement patterns and the development of the local cultivated
and built environment. The study of this ‘living landscape’, shaped by the
confluence of environmental conditions and economic processes, has been
possible only through the interdisciplinary approach, the contribution of
geographers, anthropologists, sociologists and archaeologists being equal in
importance to that of economic and social historians.15
Archaeological research, in particular, has greatly advanced the
understanding of early Irish urban and settlement in its regional and wider
setting. New questions have been posed regarding pre-Viking agricultural and
exchange systems by excavations on Ulster ring-forts by McCormick, while
work by Bradley, Hurley and others, has been used in conjunction with
documentary sources ranging from Giraldus CambrensisExpugnatio
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Hibernica to The Song of Dermot and the Earl to reconsider the pre-Viking,
Viking and Norman genesis of centres like Waterford, Cork, and Dublin.16
Archaeological research, especially that by Orser in the context of Co.
Roscommon, has also begun to contribute to our understanding of the material
culture of pre-famine clachan settlements, while industrial archaeology has
added immeasurably to our understanding of the development of the
eighteenth and nineteenth century city.17
A similar interdisciplinarity, this time between history and geography, is
evident in recent research into settlement patterns over time. Geographers’
and historian’s exploration of the history of the names of fields, townlands and
streets has facilitated the tandem tracing of socio-economic and
landscape/streetscape change from the seventeenth to the nineteenth
century.18 Similarly, history and geography combined have helped to trace the
ebb and flow of settlement from the seventeenth century onwards, not only in
the more intensively planted Ulster region, but through the island generally.19
Smyth’s examination of ‘property, patronage and population’ in mid-
seventeenth century Tipperary traces the long-term effects of the Cromwellian
conquest and the growth of a new landowning elite, while O’Dowd’s study of
Sligo in the same period reveals the complexities of Gaelic society, the
progress of settlement in an area outside the main locus of government-
sponsored plantation, and the effects of such plantation on the subsequent
character of the county.20 The nature of plantation and its effects are
analysed in David Dickson’s monumental work on Cork as ‘Old World Colony’
which, like Jacqueline Hill’s study of Dublin Protestantism, reaches forward
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into the early nineteenth century to trace the undermining of ‘ascendancy’ and
the parallel acceleration of social and demographic research which would
have been impossible without the local and regional focus, again owes much
to the geographers who by mapping population clusters and surname
distribution, tracing the rise and decline of high- and medium-status families,
and examining the distribution and shape of villages and the nature of
parochial structures, have traced patterns of population expansion and
contraction, land reclamation and abandonment over a span of some four
centuries.21 Parallel to this, historical and anthropological researches into the
means of production, such as Bell’s study of farming methods in nineteenth
century County Derry and Cohen’s examination of linen production in Down,
allow the examination of contemporary social gradations and entrepreneurial
attitudes through the lens of ‘improved’ and ‘traditional’ farming.22
Fundamental to place-centred research is an ever-growing awareness of
the centrality of mapping no surprise to geographers, admittedly, but
underplayed by most Irish historians before the 1980s. This stress on the
spatial aspect of local history, epitomised in the ongoing Irish Historic Towns
Atlas project23, has resulted in the emergence of two types of map-related
research over the past two decades: (1) studies identifying and discussing
contemporary motives for surveying and mapping and (2) those using maps as
the primary lens through which to examine local and regional developments.
J. H. Andrew’s study of map-making in Wexford, for instance, highlights the
role of the 1798 rebellion as a major incentive to mapping, while Patrick
Power’s examination of Wicklow maps in the early modern period throws light
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not only on the development of surveying, but also on parallel changes in both
the landscape and in the complex political structures of the time.24 Two
invaluable map-centred works examining both rural an Durban evolution over
time have been published in the recent past. The Atlas of the Irish Rural
Landscape,(1997) though not a local study, uses local and regional case
studies to explore issues of settlement, production and communication, while
the Atlas of Cork City (2006) takes a more deliberately local vantage point.25
Perhaps the most assiduous recent use (and deconstruction) of maps in
researching local socio-economic change is by Jacinta Prunty, whose Dublin
Slums 1800-1925 (1998) discusses and maps living conditions, industrial
location and the relationship between property valuation and social position.26
Other studies fit, like Prunty’s, into the rapidly developing area of Irish urban
history. Particularly revealing are Clarkson’s examination of late eighteenth
century Armagh and King’s study of Carlow in its transition from manor to town
over the course of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.27
Anngret Simms’ Irish Country Towns and More Irish Country Towns (1995)
and Howard Hughes’ Irish Cities, by bringing together studies on thirty-seven
individual urban centres ranging in size from Downpatrick to Dublin, and from
Carrickmacross to Cork, have provided both an overview of, and an agenda
for Irish urban history.28 Originally broadcast in the Thomas Davis Lectures on
Radio Teilifís Eireann between 1991 and 1995, these particularly accessible
urban studies explore not only the spatial and socio-economic development of
the centres in question, but also the more elusive matter of the local character
and sense of place.
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Local History
The precise delineation of ‘place’ remains the primary question facing
every potential researcher in the field of local history. The administrative unit of
the county, so beloved of the earlier antiquarians, still continues to provide a
vital focus for local studies. Now, however, its study moves far beyond the
recording-listing function to that of re-assessing the grand narrative. Dickson’s
work on Cork and O’Dowd’s on Sligo, for instance, explore not only the forces
defining ‘region’, but also the nature and impact of colonisation and settlement
over a broader geographical canvas, while Jordan’s Land and Popular Politics
in Ireland (1994) traces the economic transition from subsistence to agrarian
capitalism from the vantage point of County Mayo, discussing the varieties of
economic region and experience initially masked by arbitrary county divisions
a theme also captured in the aptly named Various country: essays in Mayo
history (1987) edited by Gillespie and Moran.29 The county-centred study has
also contributed hugely to our understanding of the background to, and
dynamics of, nationalist politics and militancy in the period 1910-1923,
beginning with David Fitzpatrick’s ground-breaking study of Clare, and now
extending to the various, yet linked, experiences of the War of Independence
in several parts of the island, especially Tipperary, Cork, Derry and
Longford.30 While taking the county as their primary focus, these works
continue, like those centred on earlier land-related themes, to highlight the
varieties of experience within each county, Derry’s nationalism, for instance,
being more radical in the city and the eastern portion of the county than in the
more westerly areas.31 The History and Society series, too, stresses the
parallel cohesion and diversity within counties by combining the county focus
with that on smaller spatial units, each of the sixteen county volumes so far
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published comprising a number of thematic chapters which together build up
not only a profile of the dynamics of long-term economic, cultural and social
change but also stress the combined cohesion and diversity of county
experience.
The smaller spatial units upon which the more recent studies are
focussed range downwards in size from the Poor Law Union to the townland.
The Poor Law Union, in existence since the late 1830s and early 1840s, was
an important public administrative unit over a span of more than eighty years,
and the survival of impressive (if incomplete) runs of minute books and
registers ensures that the unions provide a useful lens through which to study
the regional experience.32 Landed estates, too, for which a variety of records
survive in both private hands and in public repositories, have provided a focus
for the historian of local social and community networks. Donnelly’s seminal
study of Cork landed estates has been followed by another on the Kerry
Kenmare estates, by Lyne’s examination of the Lansdowne Estate in the same
county, and by Connell’s examination of agrarian changes in Meath in the
century preceding the famine.33 Similarly, the diocese and parish widely
used as the unit of investigation by clerical local historians in the nineteenth
century still provide a useful focus, while at micro-level, village and townland
open windows into the locale.34 Though the townland (the smallest territorial
division in the Irish context) can prove difficult to research, lying as it does
beyond the reach of many sources, it has been successfully unearthed by the
interdisciplinary approach, with the emphasis not only on topography and
archaeology, but also, like Scally’s work on the county Roscommon townland
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of Ballykilcline and Carr’s study of Portavo in county Down, on tracing the
inward and outward movement of influences and families over time.35 Villages
too, have proved a useful keyhole into the broader society: the last ten years
have seen published O’Flanagan’s work on Co. Cork villages, those by Hunt
on the Co. Waterford industrial village of Portlaw and Lawlor on Dunlavin, and
two collections of seminal essays exploring individual villages shaped by
forces ranging from topography and monastic and manorial settlement, to the
economics of fairs, markets and fishing.36 The parish, too, as ‘a place of
neighbours, kin, marriage alliances and community solidarity’, has provided a
useful lens through which to view the dynamics of local communities. 37 Work
on Catholic parishes in Counties Dublin, Longford and Leitrim considers the
interlinked issues of religious observance, parish loyalty and attitudes to
economic change, while Eoin Devereux’s piece on ‘negotiating community’ in
the Limerick urban parish of St. Mary’s explores the role of local development
groups and parish-based activists in the later twentieth century.38 Moffit’s and
Crawford’s studies of Church of Ireland Parishes in Connaught and Dublin
respectively explore the experience of communities within broader
communities a theme also explored at city and county level by D’Alton in
relation to Cork and Tunney in reference to Donegal.39
This focus on the local experience has also enabled a deeper exploration
of the issue of place beyond place i.e. the complex interdependence
between family and locality on the one hand, and Ireland abroad on the other.
Studies by Edward T. McCarron and John Mannion on prosperous Offaly and
Wexford farming and milling families’ move to New England and
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Newfoundland in the eighteenth century explore their relations with their peers
at home, their marriage-cemented status, and their upward thrust in
economically liberating but politically constrained colonial societies.40 Further
down the social scale, and echoing David Fitzpatrick’s Oceans of Consolation
(1994) in a more local context, O’Mahony and Thompson’s appropriately
named Poverty to Promise (1994) documents the experiences and emotions
of the assisted emigrants from the county Limerick Monteagle estate in the
immediate pre- and post-famine years.41
It is at micro-level that the examination of the mechanisms of social and
economic control can best be carried out, and the internal competition for
power within local communities informs several recent studies, challenging
any simplistic view of individual or group power as entirely dependent on, or
proportionate to, social status. As indicated by several such studies from as far
apart as Waterford and Monaghan, landlords were not always in control, nor
were tenants without power. While improving landlords had a major role in
shaping the local landscape and economy through house-building, hedge
planting and clearing stones from fields, absentee landlords lost out on the
chance to improve and modernise their estates. In the proprietor’s absence,
consolidation and the elimination of the prevailing clachan and rundale system
were prevented, or at least inordinately delayed, as tenants seized ‘control of
the landscape’.42 Local studies also enable the tracing of a social hierarchy
stretching from the strong farmer down to the labourer, Burtchael and Stout
making particularly astute use of Griffith’s Valuation to confirm the occupancy
of prime land and site by the strongest farmers, with smaller holders and
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cottiers relegated to the margins.43 Status exploration at local level has also
been painstakingly and convincingly analysed over the past two decades by
the work of anthropologists. Gulliver and Silverman’s studies on the
Thomastown neighbourhood of Co. Kilkenny, spanning a century and a half,
explore the complex issues of respectability and status through the lens of the
local labouring and shopkeeping classes, while Cohen’s work on the linen-
producing County Down parish of Tullylish casts much light on the varieties of
class formation, paternalism, neighbourliness, interdependence and gender
over a two-century span.44
The study of powerful families and prominent individuals, part of local
history since the eighteenth century, maintains its attraction into the twenty-
first century. However, while the celebratory and adulatory emphasis
continues to dominate popular history, more serious studies effectively use the
family or individual focus to open a window on the local and wider society.45
Land ownership and lordship changes some sweeping, some faltering
continue to be examined most effectively through the varied experiences of
powerful regional septs and families in Gaelic and Norman Ireland, as locally
based power was challenged first by ambitious families who set their sights on
a more centralised power, and later by the evolving administrative apparatus
accompanying Plantagenet and Tudor state building.46
Centenaries and anniversaries have contributed their fair share of local
studies, the best of which have prompted a re-examination of wider issues.
The 1798 rebellion, itself generated by an uneasy mixture of national and
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international forces confused by local rivalries, prompted in its bicentenary
year a multiplicity of regional studies re-examining inter-generational political
transmission and the complexity of regional economic networks. A number of
these works concentrated on families or individuals involved in the disturbed
events of the 1790s, exploring the complexities of personal, family and
regional loyalties, particularly in Wexford and Wicklow.47 The 150th
anniversary of the famine, too, produced its own crop of local studies revisiting
the nature of poverty and the difficulties experienced by both state and local
elite in dealing with the crisis, while the centenary of a very different event
the 1899 reform of Irish local government gave rise to a number of local
studies prompting a re-assessment of both political developments on the
threshold of the twentieth century and the evolution of Irish democracy.48
Some of the most useful individual local histories of the past two decades
have centred on landlords in the context of their estates and wider society, an
area of research which will be greatly helped in the future by NUI Maynooth’s
setting up of the Database of Irish Country Houses and their Related Estates.
The study of the estate, its locale and its impact in the future will be helped
greatly. Robert French of Monivea, Ulick John de Burgh of Portumna, and
John Hamilton of Donegal are among those whose careers highlight the
dilemmas facing Irish landed proprietors in their role as brokers between
locality and metropolis, caught between the conflicting motives of
humanitarianism and economic survival in the eighteenth and nineteenth
century.49 The complex relationships between landlord family, servants,
tenantry and community in a later period are confronted in Terence Dooley’s
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study of the ‘big house’ (concentrating largely on the Leslie estate in Co.
Monaghan) and that by Purdue on the MacGeough Bonds of Co. Armagh,
both teasing out the interwoven strands of deference, affection, paternalism
and resentment and the passing in the early twentieth century of a whole world
which had once seemed immutable.50
Place-centred studies concentrating on individual businessmen and public
figures have also facilitated the exploration of the urban social and political
milieu. An analysis of the career of Thomas Synnott, a forgotten but significant
representative of Dublin’s emerging shopocracy in the 1840s, throws
considerable light on the civic, philanthropic and professional role of the
upwardly mobile Catholic middle class in an age of ferment, while further down
the social scale, the world of Cork city radicalism in a slightly earlier period has
been explored through the public life of Thomas Sheehan, newspaper editor
and political activist.51 From a somewhat different but no less revealing
vantage point, Irish middle class social and intellectual life has been unveiled
in Nuala McAllister’s examination of music in nineteenth century Londonderry,
raising questions for further studies on leisure, status and the overlapping of
the public and private spheres.52 Studies on individual singers and regional
musical styles outside the urban setting have also raised questions of local
cultural identity, Dáibhí Ó Cróinín’s study of Elizabeth Cronin and her songs
throwing light not only on musical issues, but also on local norms of humour,
status and hospitality.53 On the politico-religious front, studies of individual
churchmen in their local-cum-national context have opened up the area of
ecclesiastical politics, McGrath’s study of James Doyle (the redoubtable
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J.K.L.), Bolster’s examination of William Delany of Cork, and Bane’s work on
John McEvilly of Galway all explore the higher ranks of the Irish Catholic
Church at diocesan and national levels, while the more populist aspects of
religion are discussed in regionally-based studies on Catholic pilgrimage and
Presbyterian revivalism.54
The evolving ascendancy of the strong farmer in late nineteenth century
Ireland has attracted growing attention among researchers, and a number of
recent family-centred local studies focussing on the farming class have
contributed to our understanding not only of particular regions, but of broader
developments over time. Margaret Urwin’s research into the O’Hanlon-
Walshes discusses not only one Wexford family’s leading role in late
nineteenth century land agitation, but also touches on the issue of women as
agitators and the combined role of the priest as popular leader and as
representative of strong farming society. The private face of status building in
a similar farming milieu is explored in Rosaleen Fallon’s County Roscommon
Wedding 1892, (2004) which gives rare insights into a family’s marriage-
cemented attempts to ensure consolidation, prosperity and status for the next
generation.55 Further down the social scale Kevin O’Neill’s invaluable
Killeshandra study reconstructs family and household structures in South
Cavan, raising questions regarding status, dependence and patronage. Based
on an in-depth analysis of the family census forms of 1841 the only such set
to have survived intact in the Four Courts fire of 1922 this study focuses on
population (both in its size and its socio-economic profile) as product and
shaper of place. The relevance of the study extends far beyond Killeshandra,
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raising questions regarding pre-famine society by challenging the picture of an
uncontrolled demographic explosion among the labouring classes, and
supporting the view of the precedence of market- over consumption-driven
forces in the pre-1840s economy.56
Identification and analysis of power networks is one of the primary quests
of local history, particularly feasible in the area of public administration at local
level. The complexity of such networks is amply illustrated in Windrum’s
analysis of prison reform in County Down from the late eighteenth to the early
twentieth century.57 Similarly, exploration of the experiences of different Poor
Law Unions has facilitated a reassessment of not only local living conditions
and the administration of poor relief, particularly in times of crisis, but also the
interweaving of politico-denominational with welfare issues, as well as the
complex relationships between relief recipients, local elite and central
authorities.58 Such contact and conflict between the regional and the central
have also been successfully explored in several studies of events that, at first
sight, appeared purely local in their impact. Tensions between community
values and beliefs on the one hand and the apparatus of the modern state on
the other underlie Angela Bourke’s study of the burning of Bridget Cleary in
South Tipperary in 1895, an incident sparked off by a combination of inter-
personal tensions and a common, if imprecise, belief in fairies. Similarly, the
murder of Connor Boyle in North-West Donegal in 1898 explores the intrusion
of the state apparatus into a small remote community whose Gaelic culture
was in retreat. 59 Nor are such studies of central-peripheral conflict confined to
the nineteenth century: more recent conflicts such as that concerning the
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status of Magee College in Derry have opened the way for further exploration
of how faulty communication between central powers, civil service and locality
can complicate already smouldering political and sectional rivalries in a divided
society. 60
Conclusion
Irish local historical research has changed considerably since the Physio-
Historical society set about investigating the past-shaped situation of Irish
counties in the late eighteenth century, and since the committed antiquarians
of the nineteenth century framed their county studies to fit the grand narrative
of history. The break with these founding fathers is not, of course, total. The
county still remains a primary focus for local historians in the early twenty-first
century, but the focus stresses ‘micro’ rather than ‘macro’, and the
concentration is less on prominent individuals and families than on those (of
both high and low status) who provide a historical lens through which the
community’s past can be examined. The contribution of Irish universities,
publishers and local historical societies to this maturing of Irish local historical
study is considerable, and pride of place must surely go to NUI Maynooth, the
Institute of Irish Studies and Geography Publications, not only in terms of
published research, but in relation to the production of research guides
compiled by experts in the field, which point the way forward for both
seasoned and apprentice researchers.61
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One suggested way forward, building on all that has been researched and
written since the 1970s, involves a more in-depth exploration of the elusive
nature of local identity which, despite its tangibility, has been given only
cursory attention up to now. There can be no doubting the role of the county
as a prime shaper of regional identity, as borne out by the avowed objectives
of historical societies, the names of local heritage groups, and the incidental
comments of academic historians.62 While the county’s vital role as identity
shaper is generally attributed to the influence of the Gaelic Athletic Association
from the 1880s onwards, there is some evidence, well worth further
investigation, that county-centred loyalties stretch back at least as far as the
1830s when O’Connell’s public speeches took care to play on the perceived
superiority of his audience’s native county.63 And what of that parish and
locality identity which has generated shelves full of popular histories of
sporting clubs, musical bands and in one region, at least Orange lodges?64
Local identity within the urban setting has been subjected to more analysis,
and identifying labels (partly stereotypical, partly well-grounded) have changed
very little over time. A pre-famine visitor described Cork character as ‘rather
sharp. They like to make themselves merry at other people’s expense… and
are merciless in the use of their keen but cutting sarcasms.’65 A century and a
half later, John A. Murphy noted much the same qualities in Corkonians: ‘cute
(in the Irish rather than the American usage) if not wily and cunning,
opinionated, self-satisfied and self-confident, sometimes to the point of hubris’,
even their county brothers being excluded from ‘the plenitude of Corkiness, so
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to speak, being merely “Kerrymen with shoes”, to quote a contemporary Cork
comedian.’66
Researchers and writers outside the ranks of the historians have also
contributed to the discussion on identity. A number of largely literary
anthologies representing the principal urban centres have appeared since the
early 1990s, all evoking landmarks, events, characters and attitudes capturing
the essential ‘character’ of place.67 The celebration of local identity has also
taken the form of a multiplicity of personal memoirs, some literary, some
popular, on life in Dublin, Cork, and Limerick. The most well-known, the
controversial Angela’s Ashes, centred on Limerick City in the 1930s, provoked
reactions underlining just how alive passions are, even in the early twenty-first
century, regarding the portrayal and reputation of localities.68 Oral testimony,
too, now used increasingly in local studies, deserves more considered
analysis. Flynn’s groundbreaking study on Dundalk, combining oral and
documentary evidence, has paved the way for similar work, including
McGrath’s study of social life and identity in the Limerick City parish of St.
Mary’s in the early twentieth century, while Grace’s work on a Tipperary parish
is an exemplar of accessible historical scholarship, combining exhaustive
documentary evidence with local knowledge and personal memory.69
Similar attention might be given to the local sense of community generated on
those landed estates whose world ended sometime between the two world
wars, and the combined fragility and solidity of whose identity is expressed in
two separate but related anecdotes. The first, noted by Dooley in his Decline
of the Big House, (2001) sums up the bewilderment of the ‘big house’
20
Local History
occupants who, following the burning of the house, found all the doors in the
village closed to them: ‘No one would take us in. I knew every one of them,
their fathers and mothers, their grandparents, all their children, and I thought
they were my friends’.70 The second anecdote centres on the recent
experience of an undergraduate student who wished to interview an elderly
friend who had worked as head stable hand in a South Leinster ‘big house’.
The friend was very willing to be interviewed on his memories of working on
the estate, but as the interviewer got his recorder ready, his potential
interviewee faltered, then baulked. ‘I can’t bring myself to do it’, he said, ‘I
can’t let them down. It wouldn’t be right’. His personal loyalties to his former
employer and the world he represented were too strong to discuss with an
outsider a tenacious, yet seldom recognised, sense of local identity which
has transcended the changes wrought by time.71
Notes:
1 Lawrence J. Taylor, Easton, Pennsylvania, in lecture at University College,
Cork, 3 July 1992; Raymond Gillespie and Myrtle Hill (eds.), Doing Local
History, Pursuit and Practice (Belfast, Institute of Irish Studies, Queen’s
University, 1998), p. 16.
2 Eoin Magennis, ‘“A land of milk and honey”, the Physico-Historical Society,
improvement and the surveys of mid-eighteenth-century Ireland’, Proceedings
of the Royal Irish Academy 102C (6) 2002, p. 199-217.
3 Walter Harris, The ancient and present state of the county of Down (Dublin,
1744); Charles Smith, The ancient and present state of the county of Cork
(Dublin, 1750), The ancient and present state of the county and city of
21
Maura Cronin
Waterford (Dublin, 1746), The ancient and present state of the county of Kerry
(Dublin, 1756).
4 ‘Printing at Trim’, Irish Book Lover 1, 77; vi, p. 103; Thomas Shannon,
Antiquities and Scenery of the County Kilkenny (Kilkenny, Robertson, 1851);
Revd William Healy, History and Antiquities of Kilkenny (Kilkenny, Egan,
1893); George Griffiths, Chronicles of the County Wexford, being a record of
memorable incidents, disasters, social occurrences and crimes, also
biographies of eminent persons, brought down to the year 1877 (Enniscorthy,
Watchman Office, 1878); Revd James O’Dowd, Round about the County of
Limerick (Limerick, McKern, 1896), Irish Book Lover vi, 194-195; xxi, p.31.
5 Linenhall Library Belfast, on-line catalogue, March 2004, 313124; Irish Book
Lover xviii, p. 25; Transactions of the Ossory Archaeological Society (Kilkenny,
Journal Office, 1879); Journal of the Waterford and South East of Ireland
Archaeological Society (Waterford, Harvey, 1894), Journal of the Cork
Historical and Archaeological Society (Cork, Guy, 1895). The Cork publication
first appeared in 1892, but was discontinued briefly and resumed publication in
1895.
6 Maurice Lenihan, Limerick, its history and antiquities, ecclesiastical, civil and
military (Dublin, Hodges and Smith, 1866); Rev. C. B. Gibson, The History of
the County and City of Cork, 2 Vols. (London, Thomas Newby, 1861); Michael
Comerford, Collection relating to the diocese of Kildare and Leighlin (Dublin, J.
Duffy, 1886); John Davis Whyte, History of the Family of White (Cashel,
Whyte, 1887); Cashel of the Kings (Clonmel, Chronicle Office,1863; Cashel,
Whyte, 1866); Guide to the Rock of Cashel (Cashel, Whyte, 1877, 1888);
Revd James O’Dowd, Limerick and its Sieges (Limerick, McKern, 1890);
22
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7 Gibson, History of Cork, Vol. 1, p. v, vii-viii; Lenihan, Limerick, p. 396-397, p.
481-482.
8 Rev. John Begley, The Diocese of Limerick (3 Vols.) (Dublin, Browne and
Nolan, 1906, 1927, 1938).
9 Federation of Local History Societies, http,//homepage.eircom.net/~localhist
17 October 2005. Other historical societies founded in this period were the
Ormond Historical Society (1977)
10http,//homepage.eircom.net/~historycollective/projectoffice.html, 17 October
2005.
11 The pioneering work of John Andrews in archival map research was
particularly influential. See Kevin Whelan, ‘Beyond a paper landscape, John
Andrews and Irish historical geography’ in F. A. A. Aalen and Kevin Whelan
(eds.) Dublin City and County, from Prehistory to Present (Dublin, Geography
Publications, 1992), p. 181-228.
12 Mary Daly, Dublin, the deposed capital (Cork, Cork University Press, 1984);
Maura Murphy, Repeal and Young Ireland in Cork City and County
(unpublished M.A. thesis, University College Cork, 1975); James S. Donnelly
Jr, The Land and People of Nineteenth Century Cork (London, Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1975)
13 Kevin Whelan, Wexford, History and Society (Dublin, Geography
Publications, 1992), p. v.
14 The History Department and the Department of Adult and Continuing
Education, University College Cork, and the Department of Modern History,
National University of Ireland Maynooth, offer certificate and primary degree
courses as well as taught and research higher degrees in local history and
23
Maura Cronin
regional studies. The University of Limerick and Mary Immaculate College
Limerick run a joint taught MA course and supervise research towards higher
degrees in local history.
15 Frank Mitchell and Michael Ryan, Reading the Irish Landscape (Dublin,
Townhouse, 2001, first published 1986.
16 Finbar McCormick, ‘Early secular settlement in County Fermanagh’ in E. E.
Murphy and w. J. roulston, Fermanagh, History and Society (Dublin,
Geography Publications), p 57-75; ‘Economic and agricultural change in Early
Medieval Ireland’, paper delivered at the Economic and Social History Society
of Ireland Annual Conference, 11 November 2005; Michael Moore and Peter
Woodman, ‘The Prehistory of County Waterford’; Maurice Hurley, ‘Late Viking
Age Settlement in Waterford City’; John Bradley and Andrew Halpin, ‘The
topographical Development of Scandinavian and Anglo-Norman Waterford
City’ in William Nolan and Thomas P. Power, Waterford, History and Society
(Dublin, Geography Publications, 19920, p. 1-26, 49-72, p. 105-130; John
Bradley and Andrew Halpin, ‘The topographical Development of Scandinavian
and Anglo-Norman Cork’, in Patrick O’Flanagan and Cornelius Buttimer, Cork,
History and Society (Dublin, Geography Publications, 1994), p. 15-44; John
Bradley, ‘The Topographical Development of Scandinavian Dublin’ in Aalen
and Whelan, Dublin City and County, p. 43-56.
17 Colin Rynne, The Archaeology of Cork City from the Earliest Times to
Industrialisation (Cork, Collins Press, 1993); John Crowley, Robert Devoy,
Denis Linehan, Patrick O’Flanagan and Michael Murphy, Atlas of Cork City
(Cork, Cork University Press, 2005).
24
Local History
18 Patrick O’Flanagan and S. Ó Catháin The Living Landscape, Kilgalligan, Co.
Mayo (Dublin, Comhairle Béaloideas Éireann,1975); T. Jones Hugues, ‘Town
and Baile in Irish placenames’ in Nicholas Stephens and Robert
Glascock(eds) Irish Geographical Studies (Belfast, Queen’s University,1970),
p. 244-258; F. H. A. Aalen, Kevin Whelan and Matthew Stout (eds) Atlas of the
Irish Rural Landscape (Cork, Cork University Press, 1997). Maura Cronin,
‘From the “flat o’ the city” to the top of the hill’, Cork since 1700’ in Howard
Clarke (ed.) Irish Cities (Cork, Mercier, 1995) p. 55-68.
19 Robert J. Hunter, ‘The Plantation in Donegal’, in William Nolan, Liam
Ronayne, Mairéad Dunleavy (eds.), Donegal, History and Society (Dublin,
Geography Publications, 1995), p 283-324; Monica Brennan, ‘The Changing
Composition of Kilkenny’s Landowners’, in William Nolan and Kevin Whelan
(eds.) Kilkenny, History and Society (Dublin, Geography Publications, 1990),
p. 161-197.
20 Mary O’Dowd, Power, Politics and Land, Early Modern Sligo 1568-1688
(Belfast, Institute of Irish Studies Queen’s University, 1991)
21 Jack Burtchaell, ‘A Typology of Settlement and Society in County Waterford
c. 1850’ in Nolan and Power, Waterford, History and Society, p 541-578;
William Nolan, ‘Patterns of Living in Tipperary 1750-1850’; T. Hughes Jones,
‘Landholding and Settlement in County Tipperary in the nineteenth century’ in
William Nolan and Thomas G. McGrath, Tipperary, History and Society
(Dublin, Geography Publications, 1985), p. 288-325, p. 339-367; O’Flanagan,
Patrick, ‘Three Hundred Years of Urban Life, Villages and Towns in county
Cork. C. 1600-1901’ in O’Flanagan and Buttimer, Cork, History and Society, p
25
Maura Cronin
391-468; William Nolan, ‘Society and Settlement in the Valley of Glenasmole
c. 1750-1950’ in Allen and Whelan (eds.), Dublin City and County, p 181-228.
22 Jonathon Bell, ‘Changing Farming Methods in County Derry’ in Gerard
O’Brien (ed.), Derry and Londonderry, History and Society (Dublin, Geography
Publications, 1999), p. 405-414; Marilyn Cohen, Linen, Family and Community
in Tullylish, Co. Down 1690-1941 (Dublin, Four Courts, 1997).
23 Anngret Simms, H. B. Clarke, Raymond Gillespie, J. H. Andrews, Sarah
Grearty (eds.) Irish Historic Towns Atlas (Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, 1981-)
This project, part of the wider European scheme of the European Atlases of
Historic Towns, was established in 1981, with the aim of recording the
topographical development of a selection of Irish towns. Fourteen atlases
have been published by 2005, and a number of others are under
consideration.
24 John Andrews, ‘Landmarks in early Wexford cartography’ in Whelan,
Wexford, History and Society (Dublin, Geography Publications, 1992), p 447-
466; Patrick Power, ‘A Survey, some Wicklow maps 1500-1800’ in Ken
Hannigan and William Nolan (eds.) Wicklow, History and Society (Dublin,
Geography Publications, 1994), p. 723-760.
25 Aalen, Whelan and Stout, Atlas of the Irish Rural Landscape; (Cork, Cork
University Press, 1997); Crowley, Devoy et al., Atlas of Cork City.(Cork, Cork
University Press, 2006).
26 Jacinta Prunty Dublin Slums 1800-1925, A Study in Urban Geography
(Dublin, Four Courts Press, 1997)
27 Leslie Clarkson, ‘Portrait of an urban community, Armagh 1770’ in David
Harkness and mary O’Dowd (eds.) The town in Ireland, Historical Studies, xiii
26
Local History
(Belfast, Appletree Press, 1981), p. 81-102; Leslie Clarkson, ‘Doing local
history, Armagh in the late eighteenth century’ in Gillespie and Hill, Doing Irish
Local History, p 81-96; Bob King, Carlow, the Manor and Town, Maynooth
Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 1997).
28 Anngret Simms, Irish Country Towns (Cork, Mercier, 1994); More Irish
Country Towns (Cork, Mercier, 1995); Howard Hughes, Irish Cities (Cork,
Mercier, 1995).
29 David Dickson, Old World Colony; Mary O’Dowd, Power, Politics and Land;
Donald Jordan, Jr, Land and Popular Politics in Ireland, County Mayo from the
Plantation to the Land War (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994);
Raymond Gillespie and Gerard Moran (eds.) A Various County, Essays in
Mayo History1500-1900 (Westport, Foilseacháin Nisiunta Teo Mayo, 1987).
30 David Fitzpatrick, Politics and Irish life, 1913-1921, provincial experience of
war and revolution (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 1996); Joost Augusteijn,
From public defiance to guerrilla warfare, the experience of ordinary
volunteers (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 1006); Peter Hart, The IRA and its
enemies, violence and community in Cork 1916-1923 (Oxford, Clarendon,
1998); Maria Coleman, County Longford and the Irish revolution, 1910-1923
(Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 2003)
31 Ronan Gallagher, Violence and nationalist politics in Derry city, 1920-1923
Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2003); Joost
Auguusteijn, ‘Radical and nationalist activities in County Derry 1900-1921’ in
O’Brien (ed.) Derry and Londonderry, History and Society, p. 573-600.
32 James Grant, ‘The Great Famine in County Down’ in Leslie Proudfoot (ed.)
Down, History and Society (Dublin, Geography Publications, 1997), p 353-382;
27
Maura Cronin
Eva O Catháin, ‘The Poor Law in County Wicklow’, in Hannigan and Whelan
(ed.) Wicklow, History and Society, p. 503-580.
33 Donnelly, Land and People of Nineteenth Century Cork; ‘The Kenmare
Estates during the nineteenth century’ in Kerry Historical and Archaeological
Journal no. 21, 1988, p. 1-41; 22, 1989, p. 96-7; 23, 1990, p. 5-43; Gerard J.
Lyne, The Lansdowne Estate in Kerry under the agency of William Steuart
Trench 1849-72 (Dublin, Geography Publications, 2001); Peter Connell, The
land and people of County Meath, 1750-1850 (Dublin, Four Courts Press,
2004).
34 Donal McCartney, ‘Canon O’Hanlon, Historian of the Queen’s County’ in
Timothy P. O’Neill and William Nolan (eds.), Offaly, History and Society
(Dublin, Geography Publications, 1998), pp…; Henry A Jeffrries and Ciarán
Devlin (eds.) History of the Diocese of Derry from earliest times (Dublin, Four
Courts Press, 2000); James Kelly and Dáire Keogh, History of the Catholic
Diocese of Dublin (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2000).
35 Gabriel O’Connor, ‘Clonfush, county Galway, a self-contained townland
adjacent to the town of Tuam’ in Brian Ó Dálaigh, D. A. Cronin, and P. Connell
(eds.) Irish Townlands (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 1998), Peter Carr, Portavo,
an Irish townland and its peoples, Earliest times to 1844 (Belfast, White Row
Press, 2003).
36 Patrick O’Flanagan, ‘Three Hundred Years of Urban Life, Villages and
Towns in County Cork, c. 1600-1901’ in Flanagan and Buttimer, Cork, History
and Society, p. 391-469; Karina Holton, Liam Clare and Brian Ó Dálaigh (eds.)
Irish Villages, Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2004); D. A.
Cronin, J. Gilligan and K. Holton, Irish Fairs and Markets (Dublin, Four Courts
28
Local History
Press, 2001); Tom Hunt, Portlaw, County Waterford 1825-76, portrait of an
industrial village Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic
Press, 2000); Chris Lawlor, Canon Frederick Donovan’s Dunlavin 1884-1896
Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 2000).
37 P. J. Duffy, ‘Locality and Changing Landscape, Geography and local history’
in Gillespie and Hill, Doing Irish Local History, p. 34.
38 Elizabeth Cronin, Fr Michael Dungan’s Blanchardstown 1836-1868
Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four Courts, 2002); Francis Kelly,
St. Mary’s Parish, Granard, Co. Longford 1933-68 Maynooth Studies in Local
History (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 1996); Liam Kelly, Kiltubrid. County
Leitrim, Snapshots of a parish in the 1890s Maynooth Studies in Local History
(Dublin, Four Courts, 2005); Eoin Devereux, ‘Negotiating Community, the case
of a Limerick community development group’ in Chris Curtin (ed.), Irish Urban
Cultures (Belfast, Institute of Irish Studies, Queen’s University, 1993).
39 John Crawford, St Catherine’s Parish, Dublin, portrait of a Church of Ireland
community Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic Press,
1996); Miriam Moffit, The Church of Ireland community of Killala and Achonry
1870-1940 Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic Press,
1999); Ian D’Alton, ‘Keeping Faith, an evocation of the Cork Protestant
character, 1820-1920’ in O’Flanagan and Buttimer, Cork, History and Society,
p. 755-793; John Tunney, ‘The Marquis, the Reverend. The Grand Master and
the Major, Protestant politics in Donegal 1868-1933’ in Nolan, Ronayne and
Dunleavy, Donegal, History and Society, p. 675-696.
40 Edward T. McCarron, ‘In pursuit of the “Maine” chance, the North family of
Offaly and New England 1700-76’ in O’Neill and Nolan (eds.) Offaly, History
29
Maura Cronin
and Society, p. 332-70; John Mannion, ‘A transatlantic merchant fishery,
Richard Welsh of New Ross and the Sweetmans of Newbawn in
Newfoundland 1734-1862’, in Whelan, Wexford, History and Society, p. 373-
421. See also Cyril Byrne, ‘The Waterford Colony in Newfoundland’ in Nolan
and Power, Waterford, History and Society, p. 351-372.
41 Christopher O’Mahony and Valerie Thompson, Poverty to promise, the
Monteagle emigrants 1838-58 (Darlinghurst, New South Wales, Crossing
press, 1994); David Fitzpatrick, Oceans of Consolation (Cork, Cork University
Press, 1994).
42 Matthew Stout, ‘Historical Geography’ in Geary and Kelleher, Nineteenth
Century Ireland, a guide to recent research’, p. 91; Lindsay Proudfoot,
‘Landownership and Improvement ca. 1700 to 1845’ in Proudfoot, Down,
History and Society, p. 203-238.
43 Jack Burtchael, ‘A typology of settlement in County Waterford’, in Nolan and
Power, Waterford, History and Society, p. 541-578; Geraldine Stout,
Newgrange and the Bend of the Boyne (Cork, Cork University Press, 2002); P.
J. Duffy, Landscapes of South Ulster; a parish atlas of the diocese of Clogher
(Belfast, Institute of Irish Studies, Queen’s University, in conjunction with
Clogher Historical Society, 1993).
44 P. H. Gulliver and Marilyn Silverman, Merchants and Shopkeepers, An
historical anthropology of an Irish market town (Toronto, University of Toronto
Press, 1995); Marilyn Silverman, An Irish Working Class, explorations in
political economy and hegemony 1800-1950 (Toronto, University of Toronto
Press, 2001; Cohen, Linen, Family and Community in Tullylish..
30
Local History
45 Articles appearing in the Connaught Telegraph in the recent past include
‘Forgotten Man of History, James Daly, the Telegraph’s most famous editor’;
‘Michael Davitt, Mayo’s most famous son’; ‘Lord Frederick Cavendish,
champion of the oppressed’. http,//www.mayohistory.com/, 14 November
2005.
46 K. W. Nicholls, ‘The Development of Lordship in county Cork 1300-600’ in
O’Flanagan and Buttimer, Cork, History and Society, p. 157-212; Darren
MacEiteagáin, ‘The Renaissance Lordship of Tír Chonaill 1461-1555’ in Nolan,
Ronayne and Dunleavy, Donegal, History and Society, p. 203-228; David
Edwards, ‘The MacGiolla Padraigs of Upper Ossary 1532-1641’ in Padraig G.
Lane and William Nolan (eds.), Laois, History and Society (Dublin, Geography
Publications, 1999), p. 327-375; ‘The Lordship of O’Connor Faly 1520-1570’ in
Timothy P. O’Neill and William Nolan (eds.), Offaly, History and Society
(Dublin, Geography Publications, 1998),
47 L. M. Cullen, ‘The 1798 rebellion in Wexford, United Irishman organisation,
membership, leadership’ in Whelan, Wexford, History and Society, p 248-295;
Sean Cloney, ‘The Cloney families of county Wexford’ in Whelan, Wexford,
History and Society, p. 316-341; Conor O’Brien, ‘The Byrnes of Ballymanus’ in
Hannigan and Nolan (eds.) Wicklow, History and Society, p. 305-340; Ruan
O’Donnell, ‘The Rebellion of 1798 in County Wicklow’, in Hannigan and Nolan,
Wicklow, History and Society, p. 341-378; Thomas Bartlett, ‘“Masters of the
Mountain”, The Insurgent careers of Joseph Holt and Michael Dwyer in County
Wicklow 1798-1803’, in Hannigan and Nolan, Wicklow, History and Society, p.
379-410.
31
Maura Cronin
48 Ciarán Ó Murchadha, Sable Wings over the Land, Ennis, County Clare and
its wider community during the Great Famine (Ennis, CLASP Press, 1998);
Daniel Grace, The great famine in Nenagh poor law union, Co. Tipperary
(Nenagh, Relay Books, 2000); Brian MacDonald, A Time of Desolation,
Clones Poor Law Union 1845-50 (Enniskillen, Clones Historical Society,
20010; James Grant, ‘The Great Famine in County Tyrone’ in Charles Dillon
and H. A. Jeffries (eds.) Tyrone, History and Society (Dublin, Geography
Publications, 2000), p. 587-615; Diarmaid Ferriter, Cuimhnigh ar Luimneach, a
history of Limerick County Council 1898-1998 (Limerick, Limerick County
Council, 1998); Edward J. Marnane, Cork County Council, the first hundred
years (Cork, Cork County Council, 1999).
49 Denis A. Cronin, A Galway gentleman in the age of improvement, Robert
French of Monivea Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic
Press, 1995); John Joe Conwell, A Galway landlord and the Famine Maynooth
Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2003); Dermot James,
John Hamilton of Donegal 1800-1884, This Recklessly Generous Landlord
(Dublin, Woodfield Press, 1998)
50 Terence Dooley, The Decline of the Big House in Ireland. A Study of Irish
Landed Families 1860-1960 (Dublin, Woolfhound Press, 2001); Olwen
Purdue, The MacGeough Bonds of the Argory, An Ulster gentry family, 1880-
1950 Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four Courts, 2005).
51 Bob Cullen, Thomas L. Synnott, The Career of a Dublin Catholic 1830-1870
Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 1997);
Fintan Lane, In Search of Thomas Sheahan, Radical Politics in Cork 1824-
1836, Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 2001)
32
Local History
52 Nuala McAllister, ‘Contradiction and diversity, the musical life of Derry in the
1830s’ in O’Brien (ed.), Derry and Londonderry, History and Society, p. 465-
495.
53 Damhnait Nic Suibhne, ‘Donegal Fiddling, the Donegal Fiddle Tradition’ and
Lillis Ó Laoire ‘An Ceol Dúchais i dTír Conaill’ in Nolan, Ronayne and
Dunleavy, Donegal, History and Society, p 758-838; Dáibhí Ó Cróinín (ed.),
The Songs of Elizabeth Cronin, Irish Traditional Singer (Dublin, Four Courts
Press, 2000).
54 Liam Bane, ‘John McEvilly and the Catholic Church in Galway, 1857-1902’
in Gerard Moran (ed.) Galway, History and Society (Dublin, Geography
Publications, 1996), p. 421-444; Thomas McGrath, Religious Renewal and
reform in the Pastoral Ministry of Bishop James Doyle of Kildare and Leighlin
1786-1834 (Dublin, Four Courts, 1999); Politics, Interdenominational Relations
and Education in the Publich ministry of Bishop James Doyle of Kildare and
Leighlin 1786-1834 (Dublin, Four Courts, 1999); Evelyn Bolster, History of the
Diocese of Cork (Ballincollig, Tower Books, 1993); James S. Donnelly, Jr,
‘Lough Derg, the making of the modern pilgrimage’ in Nolan, Ronayne and
Dunleavy, Donegal, History and Society, p. 491-508; David Hempton and
Myrtle Hill, Evangelical Protestantism in Ulster Society1740-1890 (London,
Routledge, 1992); Stewart J. Brown, ‘Presbyterian Communities, transatlantic
visions, and the Ulster Revival of 1859’ in J. P. Mackey (ed.) The Cultures of
Europe, the Irish contribution (Belfast, Institute of Irish Studies, Queen’s
University Belfast, 1994), p. 103-114.
55 Margaret Urwin, A county Wexford family in the land war, the O’Hanlon-
Walshs of Knocktartan Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four
33
Maura Cronin
Courts, 2002); Rosaleen Fallon, A County Roscommon 1892, the marriage of
John Hughes and Mary Gavin Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin,
Four Courts, 2004).
56 Kevin O’Neill, Family and Farm in Pre-Famine Ireland (Wisconsin,
University of Wisconsin Press, 1984, republished 2003).
57 Caroline Windrum, ‘The provision and practice of Prison Reform in County
Down 1745-1894’ in Proudfoot, Down, History and Society, p. 327-352.
58 Patrick Durnan, ‘Aspects of Poor Law Administration and the Workhouse in
Derry 1838-1948’ in O’Brien, Derry and Londonderry, History and Society, p.
537-573; Sinéad Collins, Balrothery Poor Law Union, County Dublin, 1839-
1851 Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2005);
Christine Kenealy, ‘The Workhouse System in County Waterford 1838-1923’ in
Nolan and Power, Waterford, History and Society, p. 579-596.
59 Angela Bourke, The Burning of Bridget Cleary, A True Story (London,
Pimlico, 1999); Frank Sweeney, The murder of Connell Boyle, county
Donegal, 1898 Maynooth Studies in Local History (Dublin, Four Courts Press,
2002)
60 Gerard O’Brien, ‘Our Magee Problem, Stormont and the Second University
in O’Brien, Derry and Londonderry, History and Society, p. 647-679.
61 William Nolan, Tracing the Past (Dublin, Geography Publications, 1982);
William Nolan and Anngret Simms (eds.) Irish Towns, a Guide to Sources
(Dublin, Geography Publications, 1998); Peter Collins, Pathways to Ulster’s
Past (Belfast, Institute of Irish Studies, Queen’s University, 1998); Gillespie
and Hill, Doing Irish Local History; Terence Dooley, Sources for the history of
landed estates in Ireland (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 2000); Raymond
34
Local History
Refaussé, Church of Ireland records (Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 2000);
Patrick J. Corish and David C. Sheehy, Records of the Irish Catholic Church
(Dublin, Irish Academic Press, 2001); Philomena Connolly, Medieval record
sources (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 20020; Brian Gurrin, Pre-census sources
for Irish demography (Dublin, four Courts Press, 2002); E. Margaret Crawford,
Counting the people, a survey of the Irish censuses, 1813-1911(Dublin, Four
Courts Press, 2003); Brian Hanley, a guide to Irish military heritage, 1813-
1911 (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2004); Jacinta Prunty, Maps and map-
making in local history (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 20050; Brian Griffin,
Sources for the study of crime in Ireland (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2005);
Toby Barnard, A guide to the sources for Irish material culture, 1500-2000
(Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2005)
62 The objectives of the Offaly Historical Society include ‘preserving, protecting
the history of our families, workplaces and communities’
(www.offalyhistory.com/), while the combination of past- and place-centred
identity is clear in the title chosen by the West Limerick Heritage Group based
in Newcastlewest - ‘As Dúchas Dóchas’ (Out of heritage [come] hope), and
Kevin Whelan’s sense of pride in County Wexford is unashamed in his
reference to ‘my native county’ in Wexford, History and Society, p. v.
63 Maura Cronin, ‘Of One Mind’? O’Connellite Crowds in the 1830s and 1840s’
in Peter Jupp and Eoin Magennis (eds.), Crowds in Ireland c. 1720-1920
(Basingstoke, Macmillan, 2000)
64 See, for example, John O’Connor, On Shannon’s Shore, a History of
Mungret Parish (Limerick, Pubblebrien Historical Society, 2003); Jack Mahon,
For Love of Town and Village (Dublin, Blackwater Press, 1997); Cathy
35
Maura Cronin
Birmingham, The Cork Butter Exchange Band, a living tradition (Cork, Cork
Butter Exchange Band, 1996); Richard T Cooke, Cork’s Barrack Street silver
and Reed Band, Ireland’s oldest amateur musical institution (Cork, Cork
Barrack Street Band, 19920; ‘When brethren are met in their Order so grand’,
a brief history of Orangeism and Orange Lodges in Larne District (Larne,
Larne 1996 Committee, 1995).
65 J. G. Kohl, Travels in Ireland (London, Bruce and Wyld,1844), p. 95.
66 John A. Murphy, ‘Cork, Anatomy and Essence’ in O’Flanagan and Buttimer,
Cork, History and Society, p. 3
67 Sean Dunne (ed.) The Cork Anthology (Cork, Cork University Press, 1993);
Jim Kemmy (ed.) The Limerick Anthology (Dublin, Gill and Macmillan, 1996);
Patricia Craig (ed.) The Belfast Anthology (Belfast, Blackstaff, 1999).
68 Frank McCourt, Angela’s Ashes, a Memoir (London, Harper Collins, 1996);
Other Limerick memoirs include Cristóir Ó Floinn, There is an isle (Cork,
Mercier Press, 1998); Denis O’Shaughnessy, A Spot So Fair, Tales from St.
Mary’s (Limerick, Margo Press, 1998); Patrick Galvin, Song for a Poor Boy, a
Cork Childhood (Dublin, Raven Arts, 1990).
69 Charles Flynn, Dundalk 1900-1960, an oral history, unpublished Ph.D
Thesis, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, 2000; John McGrath, Social
and Economic Identity in St Mary’s Parish, Limerick, 1890-1960 (Unpublished
M.A. thesis, Mary Immaculate College , University of Limerick, 2006); Daniel
Grace, Portrait of a Parish, Monsea and Killodernan, Co. Tipperary (Nenagh,
Relay Books, 1996); Maura Cronin’s Country, Class or Craft, the politicisation
of the skilled artisan in nineteenth century Cork (Cork, Cork University Press,
36
Local History
1994) explores Cork artisans’ multiple identity as Irishmen, craftsmen and
Corkonians.
70 Dooley, The Decline of the Big House in Ireland, p. 256.
71 Related to me by an undergraduate history student at Mary Immaculate
College, September 2005, regarding his attempted interview in March-April
2005.
37
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Daniel O’Connell’s campaigns for reform and repeal during the 1830s and 1840s were characterized by the assembling of large crowds, particularly during the so-called ‘Repeal Year’ of 1843. Such crowd occasions have been given some well-deserved and overdue attention by historians in recent years, the latest example being Gary Owens’s groundbreaking work aptly entitled ‘Nationalism without words’.1 The present study examines the same general area but from a somewhat different vantage point, concentrating particularly on the ways in which the crowds at those meetings were formed and controlled. A number of key questions are posed. Were O’Connellite meetings manifestations of spontaneous political excitement or the result of careful manipulation? How was social order and decorum preserved at such huge gatherings? What windows are opened by these meetings into popular politicization in pre-famine Ireland?
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