William X. O'Brien (ITGWU) and William O'Brien (Home Rule/IPP) were contemporaries in Irish politics early in the 20th century, but should not be confused. Image of a bearded politician known as William O'Brien.ballarat irish, o'brien, william o'brien, home rule

Image of a bearded man known as Miles M. O'Brien.ballarat irish, o'brien, miles o'brien

Daniel O’Connell was born near Cahirciveen, Co. Kerry, on 6 August 1775. His wealthy childless uncle adopted him at an early age and brought him up at Derrynane. He spoke Irish and was interested in the traditional culture of song and story still strong in Kerry at the time. He also understood how the rural mind worked which served him well in later years. In 1791 he was sent to school at St. Omer and Douai and what he saw there of the French Revolution left him with a life-long hatred of violence. He read law at Lincoln’s Inn (1794 -96) and continued his studies in Dublin where he was called to bar in 1798. He had soon built up an enormous practice. The 1798 rising and the terrible butchery that followed it confirmed his horror of violence. While he approved of the principles of the United Irishmen, their call for reform and for Catholic Emancipation, he disagreed with their methods. In 1815 O’Connell criticised harshly the Dublin corporation. O’Connell was challenged to a duel by one member D’Esterre. In the exchange of shots D’Esterre was killed and O’Connell vowed never to fight again. O’Connell was soon drawn into political action. Hopes of Catholic emancipation had been raised by promises given while the act of union was being passed. In 1823, O’Connell founded the Catholic Association. The aim of the organisation was to use all the legal means available to secure emancipation. It turned into a mass crusade with the support of the Catholic clergy. All members of the association paid a membership of a penny a month (the Catholic rent). This helped to raise a large fund. The Clare election in 1828 was a turning point. O’Connell, with the support of the forty-shilling freeholders, managed a huge victory against the government candidate. He was well supported by the clergy whose influence on the poor uneducated peasant class was enormous. The polling took place in Ennis at the old courthouse where the O’Connell monument now stands. At the final count, O’Connell was elected by a majority of about eleven hundred votes. The ascendancy party had suffered its first big knock since 1798. The whole country was aflame. The British Government feared a rising and granted Catholic emancipation in April 1829. The franchise was, however, raised to 10 pounds which excluded the forty-shilling freeholders. O’Connell was now the undisputed leader in Ireland and he gave up his practice at the bar to devote his time entirely to politics. At the King’s insistence, O’Connell was not allowed to take his seat until he had been re-elected for Clare. In February 1830, O’Connell became the first Catholic in modern history to sit in the House of Commons. For the rest of his life, he was supported by “The O’Connell Tribute”, a public collection out of which O’Connell paid all his expenses. O’Connell now decided to concentrate on winning repeal of the act of union and getting an Irish parliament for the Irish people. British political leaders feared repeal as they did not fear emancipation. They saw repeal of the Act of Union as the first step in the break-up of the act of union, as the spirit of the repeal movement was revived when the young Ireland writers wrote about it in the Nation. In 1841, O’Connell was elected Lord Mayor of Dublin and in 1843 the subscriptions to his Repeal Association, the Repeal “Rent” came to 48,400 pounds. He now began to organise monster meetings throughout the country. It is thought that three-quarters of a million people gathered on the hill of Tara to hear the man they called the “Liberator”. The government became alarmed at the strength of the Repeal Movement and a meeting which O’Connell had planned for 8 October 1843 in Clontarf, Dublin was banned. Huge crowds were already on their way when O’Connell called off the meeting to avoid the risk of violence and bloodshed. He was charged with conspiracy, arrested and sentenced to a year in jail and a fine of 2,000 pounds. The sentence was set aside after O’Connell had been three months in prison. When he was released he continued with his campaign for repeal. However, a turning point had been reached. The tactics that had won emancipation had failed. O’Connell was now almost seventy, his health failing and he had no clear plan for future action. There was discontent within the Repeal Association and the Young Irelanders withdrew. There was also some failure in the potato crop in the 1840’s, a sign of things to come in the Great Famine of 1845-1847. Aware of the fact that he had failed with his great goal, (the Repeal Movement), O’Connell left Ireland for the last time in January 1847. He made a touching speech in the House of Commons in which he appealed for aid for his country. In March, acting on the advice of his doctor, he set out to Italy. Following his death in Genoa on 15 May 1847, his body was returned to Ireland and buried in Glasnevin Cemetery. [http://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclare/people/daniel.htm, accessed 13/12/2013]Portrait of a man known as Daniel O'Connell.ballarat irish, daniel o'connell, o'connell

Parnell was an Irish nationalist and statesman who led the fight for Irish Home Rule in the 1880s. Charles Stewart Parnell was born on 27 June 1846 in County Wicklow into a family of Anglo-Irish Protestant landowners. He studied at Cambridge University and was elected to parliament in 1875 as a member of the Home Rule League (later re-named by Parnell the Irish Parliamentary Party). His abilities soon became evident. In 1878, Parnell became an active opponent of the Irish land laws, believing their reform should be the first step on the road to Home Rule. In 1879, Parnell was elected president of the newly founded National Land League and the following year he visited the United States to gain both funds and support for land reform. In the 1880 election, he supported the Liberal leader William Gladstone, but when Gladstone's Land Act of 1881 fell short of expectations, he joined the opposition. By now he had become the accepted leader of the Irish nationalist movement. Parnell now encouraged boycott as a means of influencing landlords and land agents, and as a result he was sent to jail and the Land League was suppressed. From Kilmainham prison he called on Irish peasants to stop paying rent. In March 1882, he negotiated an agreement with Gladstone - the Kilmainham Treaty - in which he urged his followers to avoid violence. But this peaceful policy was severely challenged by the murder in May 1882 of two senior British officials in Phoenix Park in Dublin by members of an Irish terrorist group. Parnell condemned the murders. In 1886, Parnell joined with the Liberals to defeat Lord Salisbury's Conservative government. Gladstone became prime minister and introduced the first Irish Home Rule Bill. Parnell believed it was flawed but said he was prepared to vote for it. The Bill split the Liberal Party and was defeated in the House of Commons. Gladstone's government fell soon afterwards.(http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/parnell_charles.shtml, accessed 21 January 2014) The Irish National Land League (Irish: Conradh na Talún) was an Irish political organisation of the late 19th century which sought to help poor tenant farmers. Its primary aim was to abolish landlordism in Ireland and enable tenant farmers to own the land they worked on. The period of the Land League's agitation is known as the Land War. Within decades of the league's foundation, through the efforts of William O'Brien and George Wyndham (a descendant of Lord Edward FitzGerald), the 1902 Land Conference produced the Land (Purchase) Act 1903 which allowed Irish tenant farmers buy out their freeholds with UK government loans over 68 years through the Land Commission (an arrangement that has never been possible in Britain itself). For agricultural labourers, D.D. Sheehan and the Irish Land and Labour Association secured their demands from the Liberal government elected in 1905 to pass the Labourers (Ireland) Act 1906, and the Labourers (Ireland) Act 1911, which paid County Councils to build over 40,000 new rural cottages, each on an acre of land. By 1914, 75% of occupiers were buying out their landlords, mostly under the two Acts. In all, under the pre-UK Land Acts over 316,000 tenants purchased their holdings amounting to 15 million acres (61,000 km2) out of a total of 20 million acres (81,000 km2) in the country. Sometimes the holdings were described as "uneconomic", but the overall sense of social justice was undeniable. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_National_Land_League, accessed 21 January 2014) The Irish National Land League was founded at the Imperial Hotel in Castlebar, the County town of Mayo, on 21 October 1879. At that meeting Charles Stewart Parnell was elected president of the league. Andrew Kettle, Michael Davitt, and Thomas Brennan were appointed as honorary secretaries. This united practically all the different strands of land agitation and tenant rights movements under a single organisation. The two aims of the Land League, as stated in the resolutions adopted in the meeting, were: ...first, to bring out a reduction of rack-rents; second, to facilitate the obtaining of the ownership of the soil by the occupiers. That the object of the League can be best attained by promoting organisation among the tenant-farmers; by defending those who may be threatened with eviction for refusing to pay unjust rents; by facilitating the working of the Bright clauses of the Irish Land Act during the winter; and by obtaining such reforms in the laws relating to land as will enable every tenant to become owner of his holding by paying a fair rent for a limited number of years. Charles Stewart Parnell, John Dillon, Michael Davitt, and others including Cal Lynn then went to America to raise funds for the League with spectacular results. Branches were also set up in Scotland, where the Crofters Party imitated the League and secured a reforming Act in 1886. The government had introduced the first ineffective Land Act in 1870, then the equally inadequate Acts of 1880 and 1881 followed. These established a Land Commission that started to reduce some rents. Parnell together with all of his party lieutenants, including Father Eugene Sheehy known as "the Land League priest", went into a bitter verbal offensive and were imprisoned in October 1881 under the Irish Coercion Act in Kilmainham Jail for "sabotaging the Land Act", from where the No-Rent Manifesto was issued, calling for a national tenant farmer rent strike which was partially followed. Although the League discouraged violence, agrarian crimes increased widely. Typically a rent strike would be followed by evictions by the police, or those tenants paying rent would be subject to a local boycott by League members. Where cases went to court, witnesses would change their stories, resulting in an unworkable legal system. This in turn led on to stronger criminal laws being passed that were described by the League as "Coercion Acts". The bitterness that developed helped Parnell later in his Home Rule campaign. Davitt's views were much more extreme, seeking to nationalise all land, as seen in his famous slogan: "The land of Ireland for the people of Ireland". Parnell aimed to harness the emotive element, but he and his party preferred for tenant farmers to become freeholders on the land they rented, instead of land being vested in "the people".(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_National_Land_League, accessed 21 January 2014)Image of bearded man known as Charles Stewart Parnellballarat irish, parnell, charles parnell, home rule

John Edward Redmond, was a prominent banker and businessman before entering Parliament as a member for Wexford constituency in 1859; his statue stands in Redmond Square, Wexford town.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Redmond, accessed 21/01/2014) His great nephew, John Edward Redmond (1 September 1856 – 6 March 1918) was an Irish nationalist politician, barrister, MP in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party from 1900 to 1918. He was a moderate, constitutional and conciliatory politician who attained the twin dominant objectives of his political life, party unity and finally in September 1914 achieving the promise of Irish Home Rule under an Act which granted an interim form of self-government to Ireland. However, implementation of the Act was suspended by the intervention of World War I, and ultimately made untenable after the Conscription Crisis of 1918. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Redmond, accessed 21/01/2014)Image of moustached politician John E. Redmond.ballarat irish, redmond, john redmond, irish nationalist party, irish home rule

Protection of Person and Property Act 1881 The ''Protection of Person and Property Act 1881'' was one of more than 100 Coercion Acts passed by the Parliament of United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland between 1801 and 1922, in an attempt to establish law and order in Ireland. The 1881 Act was passed by parliament and introduced by Gladstone. It allowed for persons to be imprisoned without trial. On 13 October 1881, the Act was used to arrest Charles Parnell after his newspaper, the ''United Ireland'', had attacked the Land Act. On Gladstone's return to office in 1880, William Edward Forster was made Chief Secretary for Ireland. He carried the Compensation for Disturbance Bill through the Commons, only to see it thrown out in the Lords. On 24 January 1881, he introduced a new Coercion Bill in the House of Commons, to deal with the growth of the Irish National Land League. Despite a 41-hour long fillibuster in the House by the Irish Parliamentary Party, the bill passed, among its provisions being one enabling the British government in Ireland to arrest without trial persons "reasonably suspected" of crime and conspiracy. However those arrested were often not always suspect, only supportive of the Irish National Land League's movements. Over 100 such acts were passed, some of the more notable of which were "An Act for the more effectual Suppression of Local Disturbances and Dangerous Associations in Ireland", "The Protection of Life and Property in Certain Parts of Ireland Act", and the "Protection of Person and Property Act 1881". An Irish Coercion Bill was proposed by Sir Robert Peel to calm the increasing difficult situation in Ireland as a result of the Great Famine 1844–47. The Bill was blocked and this led, in part, to Peel's retirement as Prime Minister. Later attempts to introduce Irish coercion acts were blocked by the filibustering of Joseph Biggar. As a response to the Plan of Campaign of the mid-1880s the new Chief Secretary for Ireland Arthur Balfour secured a tough Perpetual Crimes Act (1887) (or Coercion Act) aimed at the prevention of boycotting, intimidation, unlawful assembly and the organisation of conspiracies against the payment of agreed rents. The Act resulted in the imprisonment of hundreds of people including over twenty MPs. The so-called ''Crimes Act'' (or "Coercion" Act) was condemned by the Catholic hierarchy since it was to become a permanent part of the law and did not have to be renewed annually by parliament, but the Papacy issued the bull Link: "Saepe Nos" in 1888 which was uncritical of the Acts. Trial by jury was abolished. An influential analysis of the pros and cons of the Act was published in 1888 by W. H. Hurlbert, a Catholic Irish-American author. Many hundreds were imprisoned at times under the Acts, including many prominent politicians and agrarian agitators, Joseph Biggar, Alexander Blane, Michael Davitt, John Dillon, James Gilhooly, Patrick Guiney, Matthew Harris, John Hayden, J. E. Kenny, Andrew Kettle, Denis Kilbride, Pat O'Brien, William O'Brien, James O'Kelly, Charles Stewart Parnell, Douglas Pyne, Willie Redmond, Timothy Sullivan. [http://shelf3d.com/i/Irish%20Coercion%20Act, accessed 13/12/2013]A many sits on a table holding the lapels of his Jacket. ballarat irish, cabin, rent, tenants, quill, biggar, davitt

5 people sit around a table. Two drink to His Honor's heath. ballarat irish, rent day, coercion

Ryan was an Irish politician. He was elected to the First Dáil at the 1918 general election and, apart from the Third Dáil (1922–1923), held his seat for Wexford until his retirement at the 1965 general election. During his long career he served as Minister for Agriculture (1932–1947), Minister for Health and Social Welfare (1947–1948 and 1951–1954) and Minister for Finance (1957–1965). (Wikipedia) While studying at university in 1913 Ryan became a founder-member of the Irish Volunteers and was sworn into the Irish Republican Brotherhood the following year. During the Easter Rising in 1916 Ryan was the medical officer in the General Post Office (GPO). He was, along with James Connolly, one of the last people to leave the GPO when the evacuation took place. Following the surrender of the patriots Ryan was deported to Stafford Jail in England and subsequently at Frongoch. He was released in August 1916. Ryan rejoined the Volunteers immediately after his release from prison, and in June 1917 he was elected Commandant of the Wexford Battalion. His political career began the following year when he was elected as a Sinn Féin candidate for the constituency of Wexford South in the 1918 general election. Like his fellow Sinn Féin MPs Ryan refused to attend the Westminster Parliament. Instead he attended the proceedings of the First Dáil on 21 January 1919. As the War of Independence went on Ryan became Brigade Commandant of South Wexford and was also elected to Wexford County Council, serving as chairman on one occasion. In September 1919 he was arrested by the British and interned on Spike Island and later Beare Island until he was released after the truce with the other TDs to attend the deliberations of the Dáil concerning the Anglo-Irish Treaty which he voted against. Ryan was later imprisoned again during the subsequent Civil War, however, while interned he won back his Dáil seat as an abstentionist Sinn Féin TD at the 1923 general election. (Wikipedia)Image of a bearded man known as James Ryan.

Michael J. Ryan, of Philadelphia who was president of the United Irish League. (http://www.amazon.com/Photo-Michael-President-United-Representative/dp/B00B5MCPO6)Portrait of M.J. Ryanballarat irish, ryan, michael ryan, united irish league

John Poyntz Spencer, 5th Earl Spencer, KG, PC (27 October 1835 – 13 August 1910), known as Viscount Althorp from 1845 to 1857 (and also known as the Red Earl because of his distinctive long red beard), was a British Liberal Party politician under, and close friend of, British prime minister William Ewart Gladstone. He was twice Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. (Wikipedia) John Poyntz Spencer, 5th Earl Spencer, KG, PC (27 October 1835 – 13 August 1910), known as Viscount Althorp from 1845 to 1857 (and also known as the Red Earl because of his distinctive long red beard), was a British Liberal Party politician under, and close friend of, British prime minister William Ewart Gladstone. He was twice Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. (Wikipedia)Image of a bearded man known as Lord John Poyntz Spencer.ballarat irish, spencer, red earl, john spencer

Image of a bearded man known as John P. Sutton.ballarat irish, sutton, john sutton

A British statesman and author. In a ministerial career stretching almost 30 years, he was twice Secretary of State for Scotland under William Ewart Gladstone and the Earl of Rosebery. He broke with Gladstone over the 1886 Irish Home Rule Bill, but after modifications were made to the bill he re-joined the Liberal Party shortly afterwards. Also a writer and historian, Trevelyan published The Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay, his maternal uncle, in 1876. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_George_Trevelyan,_2nd_Baronet)Image of George Otto Tavelyon.ballarat irish, tavelyon, george tavelyon, macauey, irish home rule

Image of a bearded man known as Thomas H. Walsh.ballarat irish, walsh, thomas walsh, tom walsh

Image of a moustached man known as Maurice F. Wilhere.ballarat irish, wilhere, maurice wilhere

Winter was Treasurer of the Irish National League. "AUSTRALIAN AID TO IRELAND. - GRATEFUL ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. The following letters have been received:— "The Irish National League, "43 O'Connell-street Upper, "Dublin, 14th Oct., 1886. "My Dear Mr. 'Winter, — I beg to acknowledge receipt of your favour of the 16th August, enclosing; draft for £250 from the Irish National League of Australasia towards the Irish Parliamentary Fund. The treasurers of the fund, to whom I have handed the draft, are transmitting by this mail a formal receipt for the amount of your generous contribution. ' I am very happy to learn from reports which have appeared in our newspapers here within the past few days that the vacancy in Melbourne has been accepted by our worthy, able, and patriotic prelate, the Most. Rev. Dr. Carr, Bishop of Galway. While the Catholic people of the diocese of Melbourne will find in Dr. Carr an able, zealous, and dignified prelate; of whom they will haye every rea son to be proud, the Irish Catholics of the diocese will, in an especial sense, find in him one who knows the wants of their country, who is deeply in sympathy with .the just feelings and aspirations of her people, and who is second to none in his desire to see his native land happy and prosperous I thought our friends in the Federal Council of the League would be anxious to know what man ner of man the new prelate is, and, therefore, writing to you so soon after his appointment I think it my duty to say so much. "Assuring our friends of our warm gratitude for the generous assistance they are continually giving us in the struggle in which we are en gaged — I remain, my dear Mr. Winter, yours sincerely, T. Harrington. "Joseph Winter, Esq., Advocate office, Melbourne," ''The Irish National League, 43 O'Connell-street Upper, " Dublin; 12th October, 1886. 'My Dear Sir, — I beg to acknowledge with thanks receipt of your letter of 16th August, with 'draft for' £250 from the Federal Council of the Irish National League of Australasia to the Parli mentary Fund. Joseph G. Biggar. ' 'J. Winter, Esq.' ' ; IRISH PARLIAMENTARY ELECTION FUND. The following acknowledgment has been received by the Rev. J. H. O'Connell, Victoria : — " The Irish National League, 45 O'Connell-street Upper, Dublin, 12th October, 1886. '"Rev. Dear Sir, — I beg to acknowledge with best thanks receipt of your letter of 24th August, with draft for £1000 towards the Irish Parliamentary Fund from the Executive Committee of the Irish Parliamentary Fund of Melbourne.— Yours faithfully, "Joseph G. Biggar. "Rev. J. H. O'Connell, St. George's Presbytery, Carlton, Melbourne." (Sydney Freeman's Journey, 4 December 1886) MR JOSEPH WINTER AND THE IRISH NATIONAL LEAGUE - Mr Joseph Winter, of Melbourne, has received a courteous letter from Mr. Harrington, M.P., enclosing the following official document : — ' On the motion of the Right Hon. the Lord Mayor, T. Sexton, M.P., seconded by Dr. B. J. Kenny, M.P., the following resolution was unani mously adopted by the Organizing Committee of the Irish National League :— 'That we have heard with regret of the proposed retirement from the treasurership of the Irish National League of Australia of Mr. Joseph Winter, manager of the Melbourne Advocate, and we seize this opportunity of placing on record our appreciation of tbe signal services which he has rendered to the Irish people by his unselfish and devoted advocacy of their cause, especially during the past eight years, during which time the sum of £27,487 has reached the home move ment through his hands. We desire to assure Mr. Winter that his services will not be forgotten by his countrymen in Ireland, and we venture to express the hope that the Irishmen of Australasia may still be permitted to command them.'(Sydney Freeman's Journal, 6 April 1889) Image of a moustached man known as Joseph Winter.ballarat irish, winter, bishop carr, carr, joseph winter, irish national league