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Daniel O'connell, Marquess Wellesley and the Politics of Dublin Castle in the 1820S

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Daniel O'connell, Marquess Wellesley and the Politics of Dublin Castle in the 1820S Daniel O’Connell, Marquess Wellesley and the politics of Dublin Castle in the 1820s Dr Síle McGuckian In 1829 Daniel O’Connell stood at the pinnacle of his career. He was one of the most powerful men in Ireland, having achieved his life time goal of Catholic Emancipation as well as his election as a member of parliament. However, only nine years earlier in 1820 O’Connell had had virtually nothing to show for more than a decade of political sacrifice and agitation. The 1820s were to prove to be the crucial decade of O’Connell’s career. He pursued every possible means of achieving his goals, and although his success when it came appeared to have been achieved far from the corridors of power in Dublin Castle, his interactions with the members of the Irish Administration were an integral part of his successful campaign. The years following the Act of Union in 1801 had been very barren ground for the Irish Catholic movement with successive British governments taking a hard line on any Catholic claims. In 1820 the Irish movement was split. In London the prime minister, Lord Liverpool, and the majority of his cabinet was strongly opposed to Emancipation, while in Dublin an uncompromising Protestant administration remained in charge in the Castle. The independent Irish parliament had been abolished in 1801, and replaced by a separate Irish administration in Dublin Castle that was overseen by London. The lord lieutenant, or viceroy, remained the head of the Irish administration and the Crown’s representative in Ireland. He dealt directly with the prime minister and the home secretary. Both of whom dealt with parliament and the King. The Chief Secretary was the cabinet member who was specifically responsible for Ireland. He divided his time between Dublin where he acted as chief administrator of Irish domestic affairs, and London where he was a member of the cabinet. For most of the period 1810-20, the conservative Tory MP Robert Peel had been chief secretary. Under his tenure the members of the Irish administration had been united in their goal of protecting the interests of the Protestant ascendancy and opposing Catholic advances. The attorney general, William Saurin, the lord chancellor, Lord Manners, and the under-secretary William Gregory were all staunchly anti-Catholic. Indeed, all three were members of the Orange party. From O’Connell’s point of view there had been little to be gained from any dealings with the Irish administration. In 1820 O’Connell had determined to try a new approach, that of conciliation. George IV had finally succeeded his father as king, and while the early indications that he might have been sympathetic to the Catholic cause had taken a knock when he became regent, O’Connell was optimistic that he might yet prove less intransigent on the issue than his father. The announcement of the King’s proposed visit to Ireland in the summer of 1821 provided O’Connell with a direct opportunity to put his new plan into effect. Somewhat 1 unexpectedly, George IV was very warmly received throughout Ireland and O’Connell had been at the fore front of those welcoming him. Although O’Connell was criticised for his actions, he responded that he had always been, and remained, loyal to the crown as King or Queen of Ireland. He argued that Irish Protestants should have no monopoly on loyalism; Irish Catholics should also be viewed as full loyal subjects, and not under a cloud of constant suspicion. In the autumn of 1821 the prime minister announced that he intended to make a ‘clean sweep’ of the Irish administration. He announced that he was appointing the pro-Catholic politicians Marquess Wellesley as lord lieutenant and William Plunket as attorney general. However, their influence was greatly limited by the appointment of two pro- Protestant politicians, Henry Goulburn as chief secretary, and Peel in the role of home secretary. Richard, Marquess Wellesley was aged 62 at the time of his appointment and had been a highly successful Governor General in India, foreign secretary of Britain and had come tantalisingly close to becoming prime minister a decade earlier. Not only was he the first Irish born lord lieutenant to be appointed in over a century, he was also proud of his Irish birth and had taken a keen interest in Irish affairs throughout his life. Wellesley, like O’Connell, had consistently espoused many liberal views and although these beliefs had proved no impediment to his highly successful career as an imperialist in India, his life- long support for Catholic emancipation had proved extremely costly when in 1812 it had been one of the chief reasons that he had failed to become prime minister. Wellesley was sympathetic to the situation of the Irish Catholic population. He had supported the Union because he believed that it was likely to prove the best form of government for the Catholic majority. In Wellesley’s view equality and prosperity held the key to solving Ireland’s problems. Although on first appearances, O’Connell seemed to have little in common with the new viceroy, in fact the two shared a surprising number of similarities. Both were eighteenth century Enlightenment liberals and, certainly in 1821, both believed that under fair circumstances, Irish Catholics could be loyal subjects to the King and equal members of society. However, their commonalities were closer than their political outlook. Both were the eldest sons of precarious Irish families who had bet on their talents to safeguard their families’ futures. Wellesley’s Irish peerage was fairly recent, and his father had died when Wellesley was only 21 leaving no money, a mountain of debts and five younger siblings to look after. His family had made the financial sacrifice to send Wellesley to boarding school at Eton in England and the gamble had paid off. Wellesley had made close friendships among influential families and this allied with his sharp intelligence had allowed him to rise far in British politics. At the same time, he had closely supported his younger siblings. Although four of the Wellesley brothers eventually managed to win peerages in their own right (and his middle brother Arthur had become the Duke of Wellington) many members of the British establishment continued to regard the Wellesleys as Irish parvenus, and Marquess Wellesley, in particular, as very difficult to deal with. To O’Connell however, it appeared that he was someone with whom he could work. He wrote optimistically that 2 ‘Lord Wellesley is, I conceive the harbinger of Emancipation and is determined to put down the Orange faction.’ As far as the new attorney general, William Plunket was concerned, O’Connell was more ambivalent. Plunket had replaced the hard-line Orange supporter, William Saurin whom O’Connell had described as his ‘mortal foe’. However, Plunket was essentially a political rival of O’Connell’s. The previous year, on the death of Henry Grattan, and much to O’Connell’s disappointment, Plunket had been appointed spokesman for the Irish delegation to parliament, beating O’Connell’s friend, Maurice Fitzgerald, the Knight of Kerry to the position. O’Connell had also been strongly opposed to the Catholic Relief Bill that Plunket had brought to parliament earlier in 1821. His initial comments to his uncle Hunting Cap on Plunket’s appointment reflect his misgivings: ‘Mr. Plunket and I have had many meetings’ … I have got him to give up much of his obnoxious securities and I strongly hope that he will completely accede to our wishes’. As far as the rest of the administration was concerned, O’Connell disliked them all, both politically and personally. Robert Peel had been appointed home secretary in early 1822. O’Connell and Peel loathed each other. Throughout Peel’s tenure as chief secretary they had been strong and vocal opponents. O’Connell is credited with fixing Peel with his soubriquet ‘Orange Peel’ and in 1813 described him in a speech to the Catholic Board as a raw youth squeezed out of the workings of I know not what factory in England, and sent over to Ireland before he had got rid of the foppery of perfumed handkerchiefs and thin shoes, upon the simple ground that, having vindicated the murderous Walcherin expedition, he was thought to be a lad ready to vindicate anything and everything. O’Connell’s invective against Peel was as inventive as it was heartfelt. It was also highly effective. As a result of some incendiary comments O’Connell made about Peel in 1815 they had chased each other across Britain attempting to fight a duel. They were essentially rescued by O’Connell’s wife Mary, who horrified on learning of their plans, had alerted the authorities who called a halt to the affair. However, surprisingly, they appear to have had a degree of mutual respect. Peel recognised O’Connell’s exceptional ability as a politician and a lawyer. When O’Connell was described to Peel as a ‘low, broguing fellow’, Peel had responded that there was no one whom he would prefer as a counsel in a case in which he had a heavy interest. Correspondingly, in 1825 when O’Connell had made an apology to Peel for the events that had almost led to a duel, one of the reasons that he gave was that he had come to respect Peel for the reforms he had made as home secretary. As far as the chief secretary Henry Goulburn was concerned, O’Connell had no time for him or his policies. He described him as ‘as rancorous a supporter of all the abuses in the Church and in the Corporations and above all, in the Orange Lodges,’ concluding ‘He is a man of miserable intellect and only the more virulent on that account.’ Goulburn, in return, despised O’Connell considering him to be underhand and craven.
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