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The Dublin Evening Mail and pro-landlord conservatism in the age of Gladstone and Parnell1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 February 2015

Patrick Maume*
Affiliation:
Dictionary of Irish Biography

Extract

The historiography of nineteenth-century Irish newspapers centres on the development of a nationalist press nationally and locally, with expansion of readership and titles connected to the great waves of politicisation under O’Connell and Parnell. Studies of unionist newspapers tend to focus on Ulster or the Irish Times, whose institutional continuity maintains interest in its earlier incarnations, and whose relatively liberal nineteenth-century unionism was directed at the Dublin Protestant middle classes. There was, however, another type of nineteenth-century Southern unionist newspaper addressing a conservative audience of landlords, professionals and Church of Ireland clerics. Such diehard newspapers often clung to older business models involving limited readership, and underpinned their activities by second jobs and patronage from local elites, though the Dublin Tory press developed a somewhat wider audience.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Irish Historical Studies Publications Ltd 2011

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Footnotes

1

All citations from weekly edition (Warder until 1880, thereafter Warder and Weekly Mail ); citations from the daily edition, the Evening Mail, are referenced as such.

References

2 Legg, Marie-Louise, Newspapers and nationalism: the Irish provincial press, 1850– 1892 (Dublin, 1999).Google Scholar

3 Petre, M. D., Autobiography and life of Father Tyrrell (2 vols, London, 1912), i, 4, 7Google Scholar.

4 Irish Daily Independent, 19 Mar. 1898; Healy, T. M., Letters and leaders of my day (2 vols, London, 1928), i, 60Google Scholar.

5 Curtis, L. Perry jnr., ‘Landlord responses to the Irish Land War’ in Éire-Ireland, xxxviii, 3–4 (fall/winter 2003), pp 134–88CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 Watt, Francis, ‘Halpin, Nicholas John (1790–1850)’, rev. Huddleston, David, in Oxford D.N.BGoogle Scholar.; Boase, G. C., ‘Halpine, Charles Graham (1829–1868)’, rev. Nilanjana Banerji, in Oxford D.N.BGoogle Scholar.

7 Fitzpatrick, W. J., History of the Dublin Catholic cemeteries (Dublin, 1900), p. 155Google Scholar; for Remigius cf. MacDonagh, Oliver, O’Connell: the life of Daniel O’Connell, 1775–1847 (2 vols, London, 1988–9; 1991 ed.), pp 352, 371, 674Google Scholar.

8 4 Oct. 1879; Dunn, P. M., ‘Perinatal lessons from the past: Drs Richard Evanson (1800–71) and Henry Maunsell (1806–79) of Dublin and their paediatric text’ in Archives of Disease in Childhood: Fetal and Neonatal Edition, xci (2006), pp F460–F462Google Scholar; Blaney, Roger, ‘Henry Maunsell (1806–1879): an early community physician’ in Irish Journal of Medical Science, cliii, no. 1 (9 Jan. 1894), p. 42Google Scholar. Maunsell’s firtations with ‘Tory nationalism’ caused retrospective controversy. A. M. Sullivan exaggerated his initial support for Butt’s home rule (14, 21 Feb. 1880). Charles Gavan Duffy’s memoirs erroneously attribute to him views of Thomas Davis’s mentor, Thomas Wallis (10 Mar. 1883).

9 McCormack, W. J., Sheridan Le Fanu and Victorian Ireland (Oxford, 1980).Google Scholar

10 Cullen, L.M., Eason and son: a history (Dublin, 1989), p. 52Google Scholar.

11 Ibid., p. 45.

12 Ibid., p. 53.

13 Ibid., pp 45–6.

14 15 Apr. 1876; for Casey see Maume, Mairead, Maume, Patrick and Casey, Mary (eds), The Galtee boy: a Fenian prison memoir (Dublin, 2004).Google Scholar

15 Daily Express, 5 Apr. 1876.

16 Irish Times, 3, 8 Apr. 1876.

17 26 Nov. 1881.

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20 23 Feb., 26 Apr. 1873.

21 1 Mar. 1873.

22 8 Mar. 1873.

23 4, 18 Jan. 1873.

24 12 Apr. 1873, 3 Jan. 1874.

25 11 Jan. 1873, 3 Jan. 1874.

26 8 Feb. 1873.

27 22 Feb. 1873.

28 12 Jan. 1874.

29 4 Jan. 1873.

30 31 May 1873.

31 3 Jan. 1874.

32 1 Jan. 1876.

33 11 Nov. 1876.

34 16 Sept. 1876.

35 19 May 1876.

36 25 Nov. 1876.

37 5 May 1880.

38 Barr, Colin, ‘An Irish dimension to a British Kulturkampf?’ in Jn. Eccles. Hist., lvi, no. 3 (July 2005), pp 473–95.Google Scholar

39 18 Jan., 15 Feb., 8 Mar. 1873, 21 Feb. 1874, 26 Feb., 1 Apr., 19 Aug. 1876.

40 2 Dec. 1876.

41 26 Feb. 1876.

42 19 Aug. 1876.

43 28 Feb. 1874.

44 7, 14 Feb. 1874.

45 14, 21 Mar. 1874.

46 22 July 1876.

47 26 Aug. 1876.

48 12 May 1877.

49 1 Jan., 12 Feb., 11 Nov. 1876.

50 19 Feb., 3 June 1876.

51 11 Mar. 1876.

52 2, 9 Sept. 1876.

53 1 Jan. 1876.

54 Bew, Paul, Land and the national question (Dublin, 1978).Google Scholar During the Land War, the landlord-run Property Defence Association received financial support from English sympathisers on these grounds (Curtis, ‘Landlord responses’, pp 176–7).

55 26 Aug. 1876.

56 4, 18 March 1876. The Mail recalled Butt’s bill scornfully in 1880: government would never practise rent fxing as this would be too controversial (8 May 1880).

57 6 May 1876.

58 13 May 1876.

59 13 May, 2 Sept. 1876.

60 15 June 1876.

61 8 Jan. 1876.

62 8 Jan. 1874, 15 Jan. 1876.

63 Evening Mail, 18 Dec. 1880.

64 9 Sept. 1876.

65 22 Apr., 20 May, 2, 9, 30 Sept. 1876.

66 8 July 1876.

67 2 Sept. 1876.

68 Hollander, Joel A., Coloured political lithographs as propaganda: warrior artists and the battle for home rule, 1879–1886 (Lewiston, NY, 2007), pp 735Google Scholar, 165. Hollander notes the 1890–2 Christy–Barney columns, but overlooks their earlier appearances.

69 10 Apr. 1880.

70 22 May, 17 July 1880; 9 Apr. 1881. The paper summed up its complaint by protesting that ‘the empire is swayed by Birmingham radicals and Liberal cowards’ (25 Dec. 1880).

71 25 Sept. 1880.

72 Evening Mail, 11 Nov. 1880.

73 27 Nov. 1880.

74 10 Dec. 1881.

75 20 Nov. 1880; Evening Mail, 27 Sept. 1880.

76 14, 21 Aug. 1880.

77 21 May 1881; Tickell and Andrew J. Kettle clashed at North Dublin Poor Law Board of Guardians’ meetings, 2 July 1882.

78 27 Mar. 1880.

79 5 Feb. 1881.

80 4 Sept. 1880.

81 26 Mar. 1881.

82 9 Oct. 1881.

83 15 Apr. 1882, 18 Oct. 1890.

84 21 Jan. 1881.

85 15 Apr. 1882.

86 16 July 1881 (Parnell compared to ‘Herr Stocker [Adolf Stoecker (1835–1909)] the German Titus Oates’).

87 13 Nov. 1880.

88 26 June, 10 July 1880.

89 31 July 1880; see also 10 July, 7 Aug. (Gibson’s speech).

90 6 Nov. 1880.

91 7 Aug. 1880.

92 16, 23 Apr. 1881.

93 27 Aug. 1881.

94 21 May 1881.

95 26 Nov. 1881.

96 6 Aug. 1881.

97 27 Nov., 4 Dec. 1880.

98 Evening Mail, 17 Nov. 1880.

99 11 Dec. 1880.

100 Evening Mail, 18, 20, 29 Dec. 1880.

101 15 Apr. 1882.

102 Evening Mail, 16, 30 Dec. 1881.

103 22 Oct. 1881.

104 9 June 1883.

105 9 Sept. 1876.

106 31 Jan., 6 Mar., 28 Aug., 18 Dec. 1880; 30 Apr. 1881 (compared to astrology); 3 Sept., 13 Dec. 1881; 1 July 1882.

107 19 Feb. 1881.

108 Evening Mail, 22 Nov. 1881.

109 4 Feb. 1882. The paper claimed the R.U.I. would produce university-educated revolutionaries resembling American Clan leaders (13 Aug. 1881); it would have been better to affliate the Queen’s Colleges to Trinity.

110 ‘A Catholic who has suffered for his religion’, Evening Mail, 15 Dec. 1880.

111 Hynes, Eugene, Knock: the Virgin’s apparition in nineteenth-century Ireland (Cork, 2008), p. 258Google Scholar.

112 Ibid., pp 251, 265.

113 22 Oct. 1881.

114 15 Oct. 1881.

115 9 July, 24 Sept. 1881 (Garfield was shot on 2 July but did not die until 19 September, so the first quote describes the reaction to the shooting, and the second to his death).

116 22 Oct. 1881.

117 8 Oct. 1881.

118 3 Dec. 1881.

119 8 Apr. 1882.

120 15 Apr. 1882.

121 3, 24 Dec. 1881.

122 25 Feb. 1882.

123 6 May 1882.

124 13 May 1882.

125 1 July 1882; comparisons to Arabi, 24 June, 20, 29 July 1882; comparisons to Boers 17, 24 Mar. 1883.

126 13 May 1882. The letter restrained a Fenian hothead, Arthur Forrester, from shooting a man on suspicion; Davitt pretended to acquiesce while referring Forrester to senior Fenians who would forbid it. Davitt explained this at the Parnell Commission in 1889 and in private memoranda and correspondence with those who knew the truth (including Forrester): Moody, T. W., ‘Michael Davitt and the “pen” letter’ in I.H.S., iv, no. 15 (Mar. 1945), pp 224–53Google Scholar. Moody’s statement that the only Irish commentator using the letter at this time was Richard Pigott (pp 232–3) overlooks its Evening Mail appearance.

127 27 May 1882.

128 19 Aug. 1882.

129 30 Dec. 1882, 14 Apr., 7 July 1883.

130 27 Jan., 14 Apr. 1883.

131 3 Feb. 1883.

132 2 June 1883.

133 17 June 1882; cf. 7 Apr. 1883 (denounces proposal for appeal court); 10 June 1882 (Justin MacCarthy accused of wishing ninety-nine innocents die rather than one moonlighter be executed); 23 Dec. 1882 (Biggar compared to Marat).

134 Waldron, Jarlath, Maamtrasna: the murders and the mystery (Blackrock, Co. Dublin, 1992).Google Scholar

135 26 Aug., 2 Dec. 1882 (Maamtrasna shows Connemara peasantry worse than subjects of King Theebaw of Burma).

136 24 Feb., 19 May 1883.

137 3, 10 Mar., 28 Apr. 1883.

138 21 Apr. 1883.

139 26 Feb. 1881.

140 14 Jan. 1882. Glenveagh, County Donegal, was cleared in 1861 by its landlord John George Adair who blamed its inhabitants for murdering one of his Scottish shepherds. This invocation is noteworthy because the case outraged most sections of opinion at the time: Vaughan, W. E., Sin, sheep and Scotsmen: John George Adair and the Derryveagh evictions, 1861 (Belfast, 1983).Google Scholar

141 17 July 1880, 11 Feb., 1 July, 12 Aug. 1882, 31 Mar. 1883.

142 11 Nov. 1882.

143 10 Apr. 1880, 25 Mar. 1882.

144 21 Feb. 1880.

145 29 Oct. 1881, 18 Feb., 22 Apr. 1882; 31 Mar. 1883.

146 29 Mar., 5 Apr. 1890 (Balfour’s land-purchase bill discussed as proof of unionist benevolence); 30 Aug. 1890 (on unionist government’s establishment of Congested Districts Board); 28 June 1890 (Balfour fulfils Thomas Davis’s advocacy of peasant proprietorship).

147 24 May 1890.

148 8 Feb., 22 Mar. 1890.

149 31 May 1890.

150 22 Nov. 1890.

151 23 June 1883.

152 22 Nov. 1890.

153 29 Nov., 6 Dec. 1890.

154 20 Dec. 1890.

155 Maunsell, J.P.obituary, 16, 23 Jan. 1897Google Scholar.

156 ‘Lord Burghley and his contemporaries’, 15, 22, 29 Apr. 1893. Cf. Maume, Patrick, ‘Standish James O’Grady: between imperial romance and Irish revival’ in Éire-Ireland, xxxix, nos. 1–2 (spring/summer 2004), pp 11–35CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

157 Plunket, B. J., ‘Guinness, Arthur Edward, Baron Ardilaun (1840–1915)’, rev. Gray, Peter, in Oxford D.N.B.Google Scholar; Shaw, R.J.H., ‘Healy, John Edward (1872–1934)’, rev. Brodie, Marc, in Oxford D.N.BGoogle Scholar; Jackson, Alvin, ‘The failure of unionism in Dublin’ in I.H.S., xxv, no. 104 (Nov. 1989), pp 377–95Google Scholar.

158 Cullen, , Eason & son, p. 71.Google Scholar

159 Evening Mail, 29 Oct. 1960.

160 For Doig (1874–1931), including Irish Times obituary (6 Apr. 1931), see http://doig.net/THOM1752.html (accessed 19 May 2009).

161 Gageby, Douglas, The last secretary general: Ireland and the League of Nations (Dublin, 1999), pp 912Google Scholar.

162 Maguire, Cf. Martin, ‘The organisation and activism of Dublin’s Protestant working class, 1883–1935’ in I.H.S., xxix, no. 113 (May 1994), pp 65–87Google Scholar for the Express ’s working-class appeal.

163 Dillon, Eilis, The head of the family (Dublin, 1960; 1982 ed.), p. 103Google Scholar.

164 Horgan, John, Noël Browne: passionate outsider (Dublin, 1999), p. 200Google Scholar.

165 Evening Mail, 29 Oct. 1960.

166 James, , From the margins to the centre, pp 158–9Google Scholar.