[Edgware]

Originally Posted by all_names_gone

I just ask that as someone previously said they didn't see the point of my posts, so if there no requirements to engage with someone who doesn't see the point of my posts, I don't really see what the issue is

I thought your post was very interesting. Having recently visited the Famne Museum in Strokestown I was able to realise waht happened in the mid 1800s and how it impacted on land clearance, emigration sponsored by landlords etc. The treatment endured by the native Irish from their landlords created the situation where Irish Americans never forgot and would support Clan na Gael etc

[bobbyss]

Originally Posted by Edgware

I thought your post was very interesting. Having recently visited the Famne Museum in Strokestown I was able to realise waht happened in the mid 1800s and how it impacted on land clearance, emigration sponsored by landlords etc. The treatment endured by the native Irish from their landlords created the situation where Irish Americans never forgot and would support Clan na Gael etc

Is the Museum worth a visit?

[Del.Monte]

Originally Posted by bobbyss

Is the Museum worth a visit?

Apparently it is, and there's a fine restaurant there too where you can stuff yourself while thinking of all those who starved to death.

https://www.strokestownpark.ie/

[pinkypinky]

Originally Posted by Del.Monte

Apparently it is, and there's a fine restaurant there too where you can stuff yourself while thinking of all those who starved to death.

https://www.strokestownpark.ie/

I absolutely don't mean to make light of famine deaths, but I always like to think that those people would have eaten their fill if they could have and wouldn't want to deprive others.

[bobbyss]

Originally Posted by Del.Monte

Apparently it is, and there's a fine restaurant there too where you can stuff yourself while thinking of all those who starved to death.

OK. Might be worth a go. Bit of a low profile. Should be pushed more. Thanks.

[pedroeibar1]

Originally Posted by bobbyss

OK. Might be worth a go. Bit of a low profile. Should be pushed more. Thanks.

Low profile? It's been highlighted in the media for years, a stop-off point on the main tourist trails, a place to bring many visiting dignitaries and it has been on the school tour circuit since it opened.
However, it has absolutely zero relevance to this thread; the Vandeleur evictions were decades after the Famine and were for political reasons not simply crop failure/inability to pay the rent. A bit like talking about Arnhem in a discussion of the Somme.

[bobbyss]

Originally Posted by pedroeibar1

Low profile? It's been highlighted in the media for years, a stop-off point on the main tourist trails, a place to bring many visiting dignitaries and it has been on the school tour circuit since it opened. However, it has absolutely zero relevance to this thread; the Vandeleur evictions were decades after the Famine and were for political reasons not simply crop failure/inability to pay the rent. A bit like talking about Arnhem in a discussion of the Somme.

Low profile for me certainly. I can't remember the last time I saw on TV, radio or the press in general any mention of it at all. There may very well have been some publicity campaign at some stage or other but I must have missed it. I can't recall seeing much coverage of visiting dignitaries' visits. Again however I may have missed those.

But a digression. Back to thread topic.

[KWAG2019]

Originally Posted by pedroeibar1

If something is posted on this (or any) forum it is open to be challenged. That is what this forum is for and it is a requirement when a post – such as yours - is grossly inaccurate, unrepresentative and misleading. Unchallenged posts turn the forum into a blog, which is not what we are here for. If you don’t want to be challenged go stick with your blog.

Critically, your post fails to quantify the number of the 1888 evictions (about 20 families if I recall correctly), a drop in the ocean of evictions in West Clare since 1845. Plus you ignore the reasons why these happened.


The photograph you use is not by an American tourist – it, and most of the photos of that event, were taken by a photographer named French who worked for the Lawrence brothers of Dublin. (It also is in copyright, NLI, do you have their permission to publish it here?)


Wrong. The cost of the rent was determined by the local demand, with prospective tenants bidding against each other for land. There also were other controls including a review system and judicial review.

In addition to ignoring the Gladstone Land Act of 1881, you fail to mention the key and critical influences that directly led to these evictions– the ‘Plan of Campaign’, the Land League and the very important role of Catholic Church, up to and including the Pope. Nor do you detail why the tenants were evicted – they were ordered to withhold their rent. Furthermore, you have ignored the state of local finances. Vandeleur, for example, owned a row of houses in Kilrush which had an annual rental income of £11 – all in arrears – yet his Rates bill under the Poor Law was £22 annually on that property.

Most tenants on the Vandeleur Kilrush estate owed more than two years rent, hundreds owed up to six years arrears. Vandeleur was prepared to write-off two years arrears and reduce rent by one third; the tenants wanted a reduction of about a half. A priest tried to mediate, Vandaleur acquiesced to his proposals but the tenants still refused to pay. Evictions were inevitable.

Now tell me where I’m wrong.

I have no idea if the detail you have supplied on the Vandeleur evictions is accurate or not. I'll take your post at face value. What I question is the generalized description of the situation from 1847 to 1888. OP mentioned that "in the decades after the Famine etc." to which you replied "Wrong. The cost etc." Are you describing a countrywide process that was uniformly applied across the country 1847-1888? OP has made a wide ranging statement and like all such is open to correction by local variations. I am unclear if your description claims an equally general applicability and if so the source for such would be good to see.

My next concern with your post is the absence of a narrative strand on the whole raison d'etre of the Land League which gave rise to the Plan of Campaign i.e. the land of Ireland for the people of Ireland. To my mind your narrative reads as a factual description of the events devoid of context. Being so devoid it, by absence, wittingly or unwittingly, reads as if Vandeleur was a model of rectitude and a reasonable man. In much the same way a kidnapper might be made to seem reasonable by describing the negotiations where he reduces the demand. I know perfectly well there is a school of history that regards facts as its meat and potatoes. There is to my mind a better history which contextualises things: the context is missing from your post.

The OP is posting in History and Heritage. No doubt the definition of "heritage" in the forum is probably quite academic but I think the post was welcome to show how heritage is broader that what might be usually thought so.

A question then on the RIC. Is that one of them in the picture? It might be of benefit to the current Minister for Justice to reflect on their presence at such evictions and the effect of that.

[pedroeibar1]

Originally Posted by bobbyss

Low profile for me certainly. I can't remember the last time I saw on TV, radio or the press in general any mention of it at all. .......

Correct there - it is run by a charitable trust and while it does get some help from the Dept. of Heritage, there's not much available to advertise heavily!

[pedroeibar1]

Originally Posted by KWAG2019

I have no idea if the detail you have supplied on the Vandeleur evictions is accurate or not. I'll take your post at face value. What I question is the generalized description of the situation from 1847 to 1888. OP mentioned that "in the decades after the Famine etc." to which you replied "Wrong. The cost etc." Are you describing a countrywide process that was uniformly applied across the country 1847-1888? OP has made a wide ranging statement and like all such is open to correction by local variations. I am unclear if your description claims an equally general applicability and if so the source for such would be good to see.

My next concern with your post is the absence of a narrative strand on the whole raison d'etre of the Land League which gave rise to the Plan of Campaign i.e. the land of Ireland for the people of Ireland. To my mind your narrative reads as a factual description of the events devoid of context. Being so devoid it, by absence, wittingly or unwittingly, reads as if Vandeleur was a model of rectitude and a reasonable man. In much the same way a kidnapper might be made to seem reasonable by describing the negotiations where he reduces the demand. I know perfectly well there is a school of history that regards facts as its meat and potatoes. There is to my mind a better history which contextualises things: the context is missing from your post.

The OP is posting in History and Heritage. No doubt the definition of "heritage" in the forum is probably quite academic but I think the post was welcome to show how heritage is broader that what might be usually thought so.

A question then on the RIC. Is that one of them in the picture? It might be of benefit to the current Minister for Justice to reflect on their presence at such evictions and the effect of that.

If (by your own admission) you don’t know much about the Vandeleur evictions, and if you have to ask if they were an example of a countrywide process that was uniformly applied across the country 1847-1888, there is little point in a debate with you. Twenty families were evicted on the Vandeleur estate due to a very particular set of circumstances. Those evictions are representative of that corner of Clare at that point in time, nothing else, and certainly cannot be used as a general representation of evictions, least of all of those in the Famine period. I have repeatedly stated in posts made over several years that ‘context’ is critical in assessing history - if you need 'context' please do your own homework. Volumes and PhD theses have been written on evictions, including those on the Vandeleur estate. Read some of them, get up to speed and I’ll be happy to debate.
PS Your comment on the RIC/Minister for Justice does somewhat give your game away.

[KWAG2019]

Originally Posted by pedroeibar1

If (by your own admission) you don’t know much about the Vandeleur evictions, and if you have to ask if they were an example of a countrywide process that was uniformly applied across the country 1847-1888, there is little point in a debate with you.

It needs to be spelt out. OP made a remark covering decades. You described a process. I asked you, yes you, if you are claiming that was a uniform countrywide process during those decades and if so to supply a source. You ran away from the question. Simple enough to say yes and give a source. But no answer is rather more interesting.

Originally Posted by pedroeibar1

I have repeatedly stated in posts made over several years that ‘context’ is critical in assessing history - if you need 'context' please do your own homework.
PS Your comment on the RIC/Minister for Justice does somewhat give your game away.

It's not about me "needing" context, its about you leaving it out. And admitting you know the importance of it and leaving it out makes your post look even shabbier.

I don't have a game. I'm curious about the figure in uniform. Could be part of the occupying army. Could be part of paramilitary colonial police force that enforced British law in Ireland. The minister considers the killing of these during the War of Independence "murder". Reading the history of evictions alone would give reason to understand why they were killed. You may consider that a "game". I think OP contributed to a forum which didn't prove very gracious.

[pedroeibar1]

Why continue to attack the man, not the ball? You’ve added nothing to this debate, nothing but a whine for ‘context’ – the context is there, in sufficient headline words for anyone to research if unaware of the facts. You have detracted from the debate with your effort to bring it off-topic with remarks on ‘colonial police’ and references to present-day politicians.

In efforts to promote his own blog the OP has initiated yet another thread, again with a post made up of his cut/paste of swathes of text from sites such as the American ‘Irish Central’ (not exactly renowned for its lack of bias!). For example his text - 'landlords showed little mercy on their tenant farmers and their families, who had just defied all odds with their survival. Instead, these landlords, many of them absentee, would hike rents without regard to circumstance or their tenants' ability to pay, and then call upon authorities to have their tenants evicted.' is straight from HERE

Contrary to your assertion, most see this forum as welcoming to those with a knowledge of history & heritage or a genuine interest in it. What is unwelcome, because it is killing this forum are posts by those who use it to troll or to promote an agenda. You, for example, have some audacity to POST in a heritage forum “It galls me to see money found for restoration of the big house” and “Memorialising colonial piles is quite frankly obscene.” Are old Norman castles not ‘colonial piles’? Clearly you have no idea of what constitutes heritage or how it is ‘funded’ by the State and dropped out of that thread rather quickly.

The majority of those interested in the history of Co. Clare are fully aware of the excellent Clare County Library website which has a worthwhile article on the Vandeleur episode HERE. Read it and you will get all the context you require.

[Shawnee Poole]

Originally Posted by pedroeibar1

Low profile? It's been highlighted in the media for years, a stop-off point on the main tourist trails, a place to bring many visiting dignitaries and it has been on the school tour circuit since it opened.
However, it has absolutely zero relevance to this thread; the Vandeleur evictions were decades after the Famine and were for political reasons not simply crop failure/inability to pay the rent. A bit like talking about Arnhem in a discussion of the Somme.

Arnhem where decendants of the Vandeleur family saw action. Lt Col JOE Vandeleur and Lt Col Giles Vandeleur.

[pedroeibar1]

Originally Posted by Shawnee Poole

Arnhem where decendants of the Vandeleur family saw action. Lt Col JOE Vandeleur and Lt Col Giles Vandeleur.

Yes. Giles and Joe were second cousins, their grandfathers were brothers. Michael Caine played one, Michael Byrne the other in ‘A Bridge Too Far’. Like Caine, Byrne has played several military film roles. He is one of those ‘jobbing actors’ that pops up everywhere, from Indiana Jones to Bond to Gangs of New York to Harry Potter. He also played the officer who tried to rape Mel Gibson’s wife in ‘Braveheart’. (Somewhat off-topic, but it is history!)