John O'Connor Power
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John O'Connor Power (1846 – 21 February 1919) was an Irish Nationalist politician and Member of Parliament in the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Mayo from June 1, 1874 to 1885.
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[edit] Early radical years
He was born into poverty, the third son of Patrick Power (mother's name O'Connor?) [Register... Middle Temple, ii, 609], during the Potato Famine years, and was raised partly in the workhouse in Ballinasloe, County Galway, where he contacted smallpox, which left him facially scarred [1]. Later in life he wore a thick beard to cover the scars. He joined relatives in Lancashire when aged about fifteen, where he took up a trade in house painting. It was here that he first met Michael Davitt.[2]
He embraced Fenianism, and became known to the police under alias names 'John Fleming', 'John Webster', 'Charles Ferguson'[2]. After being involved in the abortive raid on Chester Castle in February 1867, he evaded capture and was sent to the United States later that year at the age of 21 to discuss reorganization of the Fenians. After his return he was arrested in Dublin on February 17 1868 and spent five months in Kilmainham and Mountjoy jails.[2]
He was a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) Supreme Council and was believed to be involved in gun-running (a matter on which in later life he threatened legal action), but he also promoted cooperation with constitutional politicians e.g. with George Henry Moore in 1868-69.[3]
From 1871 to 1874 he obtained an education at St. Jarlath's College, Tuam, with his fees and expenses paid by a combination of teaching and lectures in Britain and America.
[edit] Moderate parliamentary years
While still at St. Jarleth's, Power signalled his intention in January 1874 to stand for Parliament; and to take the oath of allegiance to the Queen and his seat if elected. Although there was clerical opposition, led by Archbishop McHale of Tuam, he was successful at the by-election in May that year. [2][4]
In the 1874 Parliament, dominated by Disraeli's Conservatives, Isaac Butt's policy of attempting to achieve Irish Nationalist objectives by working with the Liberals and Conservatives and respecting House traditions, failed - the Irish minority was simply ignored.
O'Connor Power and J.G. Biggar therefore pioneered[5] the new policy of obstructing the House of Commons business by making long speeches and manipulating its procedures. They were joined in this more successful policy by Charles Stewart Parnell on his election in April 1875.
O'Connor Power spoke strongly and repeatedly in parliament from 1874 to 1877 for amnesty for Michael Davitt, imprisoned in Dartmoor, and other fenian prisoners, and brought to notice perceived unfairness of their treatment as common criminals rather than as political prisoners. Examples are July 13 1874, March 1875, August 1 1876, June 1877, July 20 1877. This led to Gladstone lending his support to amnesty. Davitt was released early on December 19 1877 and fenians Thomas Chambers, Charles McCarthy and John Patrick O'Brien in January 1878.[2]
In 1876 John O'Connor Power and Parnell were sent to the United States by the Irish Nationalist Party to congratulate the President Ulysses Grant on the American centennial. At an informal meeting with the President they asked that Ireland's bid for independence be given recognition.
O'Connor Power is perhaps best known for his work in the radical wing of the Home Rule League and support for tenant farmers' rights, in conjunction with Parnell, Michael Davitt, Matt Harris and James Daly.
He was generally considered by the Fenians to have sold-out to constitutionalism during his career. Along with J. G. Biggar he was expelled from the IRB Supreme Council in 1876.[3] Fenians of the "New Departure" refused to work with him and it was Parnell who become the man to bridge the gap between Fenians and constitutionalists.
T. D. Sullivan presents an anecdote from 1876 that illustrates the distance that grew between O'Connor Power in his Home Rule days and his former radical nationalist colleagues:[6]
An immense mass of people assembled in the Free Trade Hall [Manchester] on the 16 September 1876, to hear a lecture from Mr. John O'Connor Power, MP, on a non-political subject. The chair was taken by Mr. J. G. Biggar, MP. On rising to introduce the lecturer, he soon discerned that trouble was impending, that there was, so to say, "a storm in the offing." An "Advanced" person, a Mr. Flesh of Ramsbottom, came on the Platform and informed him that at a meeting of Nationalists held on the previous evening, it was decided that the lecture might be allowed to proceed only on the condition that the lecturer should first answer satisfactorily a series of questions which had been drawn up for him. The main purpose of those interrogatories was to ascertain whether he held and was prepared to support the principles of Wolfe Tone, Lord Edward Fitzgerald, and Robert Emmet. The chairman said those questions were not in order, as the lecture was to be on a non-political subject; however, he would leave it to the lecturer to deal with the queries as he thought fit, Mr. O'Connor Power then came to the front and said, amidst much noise, that with regard to the questions that had been read, his view was identical with that of the chairman. He begged leave to point out - He could say no more: the platform was rushed; there was a smashing of chairs and tables, a noise of heavy blows, and of fierce exclamations from men engaged in close combat, mingled with the shouts and screams of women, while blood flowed freely from many wounded persons... The subject of Mr. O'Connor Power's intended lecture was "Irish Wit and Humour".
O'Connor Power had an uneasy working relationship with Parnell. He thought Parnell "a mediocrity". T. M. Healy narrates an incident from 1878:[7]
... I wrote Maurice:
London,
October, '78.
"Would it be possible to get up a meeting in Lismore, and invite Parnell? The resolution I moved in Dublin at the Confederation of Great Britain was at his request, upon a suggestion of my own. If he could have O'Connor Power at his elbow continually it would be a good thing, as Power understands the necessities of agitation, and Parnell doesn't. I hope he will make a good fist of his answer to Butt, though I have never been persuaded that he shines as a letter-writer. Dan Crilly told me Parnell's first contribution to the Liverpool Argus (mentioned in my London letter) was not worth much, and though he promised to insert it, he has failed me."
O'Connor Power and Parnell were not kindred spirits. Power was an able and eloquent man, "reeking of the common clay", at which Parnell's aristocratic sensitiveness recoiled. "Of their differences I hinted to my brother":
London,
24 November, '78.
"I met O'Connor Power, and he was unaware, until I told him, that his name was down to propose one of the resolutions in Dublin. He expressed disgust, and said he told the Dublin people he would not go over, and that it was only another piece of their cowardice in being afraid to face Butt themselves.
I was aware of the stories told about Power, but what is the use of repeating them? Parnell has been careful to tell me his views about Power (and so has Biggar), but I have defended him to them, and think they should make allowance for his poverty and position. Parnell told Power to his face that he was "a damned scoundrel," and Power made a coarse reply...."
[edit] The Land War
However O'Connor Power retained credibility with small tenant farmers and addressed the Tenant-Right Meeting at Irishtown, Co Mayo on April 20, 1879 which launched the protest movement that led to the Irish National Land League.[4]
After Parnell and Davitt addressed the followup meeting at Westport, County Mayo on June 8 1879 they took control of the growing Land War. T. M. Healy gives his view of how O'Connor Power was frozen out of the Land League:[8]
Stirrings of ambition and resentment may have been ingredients in Parnell's action in joining Davitt and cold-shouldering Power, but what can lessen admiration for the pluck with which he threw himself into a movement which involved him and his relatives in danger and loss? His rents in Co. Wicklow and those of his brothers in Armagh and Carlow were at stake.
Towards the close of the session Power wrote me:
House of Commons,
4 August 1879.
My Dear Healy, -
Finegan told me you would be down to-night, but I have not been so fortunate as to come across you.
If you have seen my article in the Fortnightly, I would feel obliged by your noticing it in your letter this week. The cynical Saturday Review noticed it fairly enough, but I have seen no notice of it in any Irish paper."
Ever sincerely,
J. O'Connor Power.
I complied, but owing to his strained relations with Parnell and Biggar, he went to Dublin to examine the position, and wrote me:
".... Davitt met me on my arrival here - a reception unexpected on my part. He is writing an appeal to the Irish at home and abroad, for funds to carry on the Land agitation, and working hard to abolish the Home Rule League.
I am here just in time for Thursday's meeting, when the Home Rule League will be "tried for life" and perhaps condemned. Parnell's resolutions evidently tend in that direction."
Power's letter was written from the lodgings of Tom Brennan, who three months later, became secretary to the Land League, when Davitt was made its chief organizer, and Parnell (with Dillon) was accredited envoy to the United States.
Power, who started the movement, was left "festering outside-the breastworks," without control or influence in the new organization.
Though originally a friend, Davitt changed his opinion of O'Connor Power, describing him in his 'Jottings In Solitary' of 1881-1882 as a "renegade to former nationalist principles : unscrupulously ambitious and untrustworthy".[2]
[edit] The 1880 Parliament
He was re-elected for the two-member Mayo constituency in 1880. [Power, Home Rule, 1645 votes, Parnell, Home Rule, 1545 votes, Browne, Home Rule 628 votes. Parnell sat for Cork instead. [McCalmont, Parliamentary Elections.]
[edit] Later years
He registered as a student of the Middle Temple in 1878, four years after his election to Parliament in 1874. He qualified in 1881, and spent his later years as a barrister.
He expressed interest in the Irish language.
He stood as a Liberal in Kennington (a seat with a substantial Irish electorate - The Times 02-12-1885) in the 1885 election, losing to a Conservative candidate; and attempted as a Gladstone Liberal to regain in his old heartland, now the constituency of Mayo, West, in 1892, losing to a Nationalist. He stood as a Liberal (Radical candidate) for Bristol, South in 1895, but again failed to re-enter Parliament. [McCalmont, Parliamentary Elections; The Times.]
In the course of the Bristol South election, he threatened legal action when a Conservative paper accused him of having taken the oath of an illegal organisation [The Times, 13 July 1895].
He had been taken up in London by the philanthropist Lady Jersey, which provided him with escape from poverty and the opportunities, for which he was scorned by political colleagues, to mingle with London society. He married a wealthy widow.[1] He was married for over two decades and his wife was at his bedside when he died peacefully in his own home.
He died in London. The Times. 25/02/1919. Deaths (1) and obit(12). On 21 February 1919... Barrister-at-Law of the Middle Temple, once well-known in the House of Commons as a Nationalist M.P. ..
[edit] Quotes
"The land of Ireland for the people of Ireland". October 26, 1878 at the founding meeting of the Mayo Tenants' Defence Association, Castlebar, as reported in the Connaught Telegraph, November 2 1878.[2]
"The mules of politics: without pride of ancestry, or hope of posterity." Quoted in H H Asquith's Memories and Reflections, i. 123. Oxford Book of Quotations, second edition.
[edit] Publications
- Irish political prisoners: Speeches of John O'Connor Power in the House of Commons on the subject of amnesty, &c., and a statement by Mr. Michael Davitt on prison treatment (Unknown Binding) 1878. London?
- "The Anglo-Irish Quarrel; a Plea for Peace.... a reprint of the recent article in the Manchester Guardian, revised by the author, London: the National Press Agency,1886.
- The Making of an Orator. London: Methuen, 1906.
- Various newspaper articles.
[edit] Notes
- ^ a b T.P. O'Connor. Memoirs of an Old Parliamentarian, vol i. London: Ernest Benn ltd, 1928. esp. p83-7
- ^ a b c d e f g T.W. Moody. Davitt and Irish Revolution 1846-82. Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1981.esp. p47-51.
- ^ a b Alvin Jackson. Home Rule. An Irish History 1800-2000. Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 2003.
- ^ a b Donald Jordan, "John O'Connor Power, Charles Stewart Parnell and the centralisation of popular politics in Ireland". Irish Historical Studies, xxv (1986), 46-66.
- ^ T.W. Moody "Fenianism, Home Rule and the Land War" in The Course of Irish History. Lanham, MD: Roberts Rinehart Publishers, 2001
- ^ T. D. Sullivan, Recollections of Troubled Times in Irish Politics. Dublin: Sealy, Bryers & Walker/M. H. Gill & Son, 1905, p 134.
- ^ T. M. Healy, Letters and Leaders of My Day. Chapter 5
- ^ T. M. Healy, Letters and Leaders of My Day. Chapter 6
[edit] References
- John Cunningham, Another Roar From St Jarlath's (Chapter Six of bicentenary history of St Jarlath’s College, Tuam, 1999, pp. 88-127)
- MacDonagh, Michael. The Home Rule Movement, Dublin/London, 1920.(Based partly on Power's personal papers.)
- McCalmont, Parliamentary Elections. See also Brian Walker.
- Register of Admissions to the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, 5 vols, London, [1950], ii, 609.
[edit] Pictures
- In Moody, Davitt and Irish Revolution 1846-62, Plate V.1867, taken when in custody at Kilmainham Gaol.
- Caricature, 1886, by Sir Leslie Ward. Copyright National Portrait Gallery (London), no. 3293. Original of the 'Spy' Cartoon, published in Vanity Fair, 25 December 1886.
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Thomas Tighe |
MP for County Mayo 1874–1885 |
Succeeded by Constituency abolished |
