Mallow

A small inland town pleasantly situated in ‘good wheat country’ on the fertile northern bank of the river Blackwater, Mallow, by the late eighteenth century, was ‘probably the most famous spa town in Ireland.’ Once much resorted to for its clear spring, it had since become unfashionable, having lost out to domestic and English competition.1E. Johnston-Liik, History of the Irish Parliament 1692-1800, ii (2002), 211; H. Heany, A Scottish Whig in Ireland 1835-1838. The Irish Journals of Robert Graham of Redgorton (1999), 129-30. Even so, the waters were thought comparable to those of Clifton. Nevertheless, the spa, which was refurbished in 1828, distinguished Mallow from other towns in the region, elevating its social importance and providing seasonal employment. An important market town, being ‘very considerable’ both in wealth and population, during the early nineteenth century had been a period of development and saw the establishment of tobacco processing, rope-making, brewing, salt, and lime works, as well as tanneries and flourmills. The town also established a ‘lucrative trade’ in the manufacture of candles, soap, blankets and flannel, and high-grade limestone was quarried nearby. Yet, by 1833, Mallow was no longer ‘remarkable for trade or manufactures’, with a little more than half of its families being supported in these occupations.2I. d’Alton, Protestant Society and Politics in Cork 1812-1844 (1980), 3, 29; PP 1835 [23] [24] [25] [27] [28] xxvii. 1, 51, 79, 199, xxviii. 1 [283-6]; E. Bolster, A History of Mallow, 62-3; HP Commons, 1820-32, iii. 715; J. Gorton, A Comprehensive Topographical Dictionary of Great Britain and Ireland, (1833), ii. 746. Nevertheless, the town was ‘greatly enlarged and much improved’, and by the 1840s was regarded as ‘much superior in comfort, wealth, and respectability’ to most other towns in the south of Ireland.3S. Lewis, A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland, ii (1837) 339; Parliamentary Gazetteer of Ireland (1846), 2 (2), 729. From 1838 the town lobbied for improved communications and it was eventually connected to the Great Southern and Western Railway, and, as the main junction on the lines linking Limerick, Waterford, and Cork, became known as ‘crossroads of Munster’.4Morning Post, 11 Dec. 1838; Freeman’s Journal, 26 Dec. 1844.

Electoral history

Mallow was ‘one of the largest country towns in Ireland without a corporation’, there being scant evidence that such a body existed after a charter was granted in 1612.5It was to have consisted of a provost, 12 burgesses and a commonality. The manor, granted to the Jephson family in the same year, was governed by a seneschal and the parliamentary representation was determined by its freeholders (who could vote for both the borough and county). As principal proprietors and lords of the manor, the Jephsons of Mallow Castle dominated the representation in the early years of the Union.6PP 1835 [23] [24] [25] [27] [28] xxvii. 1, 51, 79, 199, xxviii. 1 [283-6]; HP Commons, 1780-1820, ii. 639. Though the gradual diminution of the 40 shilling freehold voters after 1832 (only 78 survived by 1842) tended to curtail this whig proprietorial interest, it remained strong enough to deter a Conservative challenge until 1841. There was, however, a relatively high concentration of Protestants in the town. The town’s Presbyterians, who had formed a congregation at Mallow in 1815, and its Methodists, who established a school there in 1834, each shared an identity of commercial and social interests with the Anglican mercantile elite. The Protestant clergy of the parish were, however, moderately disposed, being in favour of ‘self-imposed’ reform, and the Protestant party were reluctant to upset the sitting Liberal member, Sir Charles Jephson, ‘lest he might lean too far towards the O’Connellites’.7d’Alton, Protestant Society and Politics, 13, 28, 29, 74, 77, 164, 171, 172. The large concentration of gentry residing in the neighbourhood (there were 50 gentleman’s seats within five miles of the town) also tended to dilute the influence of lower-middle-class Toryism. Although a short-lived Brunswick Club was formed in the town in 1829, no Orange lodge was ever founded and the Conservative interest remained relatively weak.8Lewis, Topographical Dictionary, ii. 340-1; HP Commons, 1820-32, iii. 717; d’Alton, Protestant Society and Politics, 111, 141, 206.

With the Irish Reform Act came a new boundary for the borough. Prior to this, the constituency encompassed the 10 ½ sq. miles of the manor and contained 7,588 inhabitants, of whom 524 were electors (416 of them 40s freeholders). The parliamentary commission recommended that a boundary of a ‘rather wide margin’ be drawn around the town to include the small suburb of Ballydaheen situated on the southern bank of the river. In spite of a petition to have the boundary extended to encompass the entire parish (which would have secured a population of around 10,000), the select committee inquiry saw no grounds for altering the limit suggested by the boundary commissioners. The registered electorate in 1832 numbered 458, considerably less than the 650 estimated by the commission and, according to Jephson, excluded ‘many most respectable electors’.9PP 1831-32 (519) xliii. 1 [147-51]; CJ, lxxxvii. 436; PP 1831-32 (631) (635) v. 3, 5 [1, 9-12, 16-8]; HP Commons, 1820-32, iii. 717-8; Freeman’s Journal, 13 Apr. 1859. Formerly a freeholder borough, Mallow retained 250 40s. freeholders, whose right to vote expired with their lives, and only 161 electors qualified as £10 householders. In spite of the general prosperity of the town, it was estimated that three-quarters of working people, which included some of the electors, were not in constant employment. In 1837 a significant proportion (29%) of voters were marksmen (i.e. illiterate), and were characterised by Conservatives as ‘mendicants’ and ‘paupers’ who would deliver the constituency into ‘the hands of the priests’.10Dod’s Electoral Facts, 203; Parliamentary Gazetteer, 730; K.T. Hoppen, Elections, Politics, and Society in Ireland 1832-1885 (1984), 30. Twenty-six were registered as £50 freeholders, 13 as £20 freeholders, and eight as occupiers: HP Commons, 1820-32, iii. 717-8.

Since 1826 the constituency had been represented by Sir Charles Jephson, who took the additional name of Norreys in 1838. Born in Surrey in 1799, he was the descendant of ‘a very ancient Hampshire family’ which had settled in Ireland in the seventeenth century and had since represented Mallow without the interruption of a single generation.11Morning Chronicle, 31 Jan. 1835; Johnston-Liik, History of the Irish Parliament, ii. 211, iv. 477-82, 485-6; HP Commons, 1820-32, v. 857-62. He resided at Mallow Castle, a medieval ruin to the east of the town, where he built an Elizabethan-style residence ‘appropriate to the extensive and beautiful demesne’ in which it was situated. As lord of the manor he had inherited almost all the houses in the town, with the exception of a few which belonged to the Longfields, who usually gave no trouble. He effectively controlled local government, and held the exclusive right to levy tolls at fairs and markets.12The Patrician, iii. 554-6; Lewis, Topographical Dictionary, ii. 340; Parliamentary Gazetteer, 728; Freeman’s Journal, 21 Sept. 1833. A reformer and supporter of Catholic claims, he had stood consistently on popular principles but would not pledge himself to repeal.13Stenton, Who’s Who of British MPs, i. 102. This entrenched Whig interest was challenged at the 1832 general election by William O’Neill Daunt, a younger son of a minor landowning family who, after converting to Catholicism, had become a repealer and protégé of Daniel O’Connell. The contest was undertaken reluctantly. The Freeman’s Journal expressed regret that an attempt was being made to dislodge the sitting member, given his previous support for emancipation and tithe reform, and O’Connell himself regarded the contest as unwelcome. The government predicted that Jephson would retain his seat if he spent ‘a few hundred pounds’, something he was, however, ‘disinclined to do’.14Freeman’s Journal, 18 Sept., 23 Nov. 1832; Derby MS 920 Der (14) 125/4, Barrington to Smith Stanley, 16 Nov. 1832. Daunt therefore, with the assistance of his kinsman, Feargus O’Connor, was able to secure a surprise victory, heading the poll by ten votes. A petition was, however, lodged on behalf of Jephson by five electors, all tradesmen, who complained that votes had been accepted from persons whose right to vote derived from property situated outside the boundary of the borough or, as Catholics, had not taken the oaths and declarations required of them by the Reform Act. Daunt, stung by further charges of bribery and corruption and finding himself unsuited to parliamentary life, agreed not to contest the petition and, with O’Connell’s advice and assistance, Jephson was reseated, 24 Apr. 1833.15D. O’Connell to C.D.O. Jephson, 16 Apr. 1833, O’Connell Correspondence, ed. M.R. O’Connell, v. 24; The Times, 25 Apr. 1833. The committee struck off 11 of the sitting member’s votes for his non-attendance and removed 18 votes in all: CJ, lxxxviii, 76-7, 300-1, 304.

Unlike some of the smaller Cork boroughs which were divested of political patrons after the Reform Act, Mallow provided little opportunity for a Conservative revival in the mid-1830s. Jephson drew criticism in parliament from O’Connor for his alleged treatment of tenants who had voted against him in 1832, but was quick to justify his actions.16Mirror of Parliament, 1834, iii. 2237 (18 June); iii. 2650-1 (7 July); Belfast News-letter, 2 Dec. 1834. Although another attempt was made by the repealers to win the seat at the 1835 general election, the challenge quickly dissolved and Jephson was returned unopposed.17Daily News, 29 Oct. 1849. By 1836 popular sentiment in the town was far more well-disposed towards the Whig ministry: an address from the inhabitants to the Viceroy, Lord Normanby, paid tribute to its ‘wise, just, and paternal Government’. Jephson had become an integral part of O’Connell’s Irish Liberal alliance, and was therefore unchallenged at the 1837 general election, ‘the Conservatives not being able to make a fight’.18The Examiner, 24 July 1836; Freeman’s Journal, 4 Aug. 1837. These were, however, the only two occasions when Jephson was not opposed or obliged to make preparations for a contest.

The nature of Jephson Norreys’s sometimes uneasy truce with O’Connell was demonstrated in October 1839 during the Liberator’s visit to the town. At the public dinner given in O’Connell’s honour, Jephson Norrey’s reaffirmed his reformist sympathies but intimated that he would sooner resign than support repeal. O’Connell responded merely by admitting Jephson Norreys’s right ‘to avow his own sentiments’, while paying respect to his ‘honest independence’.19Freeman’s Journal, 13 Apr. 1859, 25 Oct. 1839; Morning Chronicle, 25 Oct. 1839; Caledonian Mercury, 31 Oct. 1839. Six months prior to this, the Mallow poor law union had been formed, after which 273 of the borough’s 1,034 tenements were valued at £10 or above.20Parliamentary Gazetteer, 730. By 1841 the post-reform electorate had shrunk by a quarter, and Jephson faced a challenge from ‘the aristocratic party’. Being unable to count upon the support of local repealers, the Liberals feared that the borough would be ‘fiercely contested’, thus raising fears that, with the ‘Tories in power … Ireland would be governed like a convict-hulk’.21Freeman’s Journal, 17 June 1841. Richard Longfield of Longueville, a former MP for County Cork, came forward, his family having shared the representation of Mallow with the Jephsons in the decades prior to the Union.22E. Johnston-Liik, History of the Irish Parliament 1692-1800, ii (2002), 211. Longfield was described as ‘a bitter Tory’ with ‘a long purse’ which, it was rumoured, he fully intended to use. He was, moreover, a popular landlord, while Jephson Norreys’s reputation, according to the local parish priest, Rev. Denis Collins, still suffered as a result of the ‘oppressions, hardships and cruelties’ inflicted upon electors who had opposed him in 1832. In spite of his personal unpopularity with independent electors, however, they were not indifferent to the stance he had taken on public issues. Jephson Norreys therefore adhered to reform and expressed support for the ballot, a fixed duty on corn, and freedom of trade. Consequently, Collins, acting on O’Connell’s cue, pledged his support for Jephson Norreys at an electors’ meeting on 12 June.23Rev. D.M. Collins to D. O’Connell, 2 June 1841, O’Connell Correspondence, vii. 82-3; A. Macintyre, The Liberator. Daniel O’Connell and the Irish Party 1830-1847 (1965), 68; The Times, 7 June 1841; Northern Star, 19 June 1841. The nominations were the scene of a heated altercation between Collins and Conservative supporters, after which a disturbance involving ‘a rabble of 20,000 or 30,000 ferocious ruffians’ ensued about the courthouse. Though early polling placed the candidates neck and neck, it was confidently predicted that Longfield could poll no more than 60 votes and, accordingly, he conceded defeat.24Ipswich Journal, 17 July 1841; Liverpool Mercury, 9 July 1841; Morning Chronicle, 10 July 1841; Freeman’s Journal, 10 July 1841. Though it was reported that several houses were subsequently attacked, the Liberal victory was nevertheless represented as having been won ‘without the slightest outrage, or the most trifling violence’.25Freeman’s Journal, 8, 10, 13 July 1841; Hoppen, Elections, Politics, and Society, 403.

During the mid-1840s the threat to Jephson Norreys’s political primacy in Mallow steadily increased. During a repeal meeting in the town, 16 Apr. 1843, Jephson Norreys was called upon to absent himself from the imperial parliament to devote his time ‘to working for Ireland at home’. Rev. Collins was by this time strongly in favour of repeal, and a very large public meeting on the issue was addressed by O’Connell, 11 June 1843. The following year it appeared that the borough’s repealers were ready to turn Jephson Norreys out, and, with a change in government appearing likely in December 1845, they resolved to vote only for a candidate who would take the pledge, and denounced Jephson Norreys for keeping the town’s ‘shopkeepers poor, that he may have them under his thumb’.26The Times, 27 Apr., 23 May, 15 June 1843, 25 June 1844; Freeman’s Journal, 17 Dec. 1845.

By this time Mallow had begun to suffer from the growing agricultural crisis and the following year the town became the scene of popular unrest and food riots. With the onset of famine, the distress became ‘deep and universal’ among the labouring classes. With almost half the population ‘in actual destitution’, the number of pauper inmates of the workhouse rose from 199 in 1844 to 2,134 in 1849.27Freeman’s Journal, 17 Dec. 1845, 29 May, 22, 24 Oct. 1846; E. Bolster, A History of Mallow (1971), 72-3. By 1847 the state of the town was described as ‘frightful in the extreme’ with bodies lying unburied in its streets. Just prior to the general election, the town experienced an outbreak of typhoid fever which carried away both Rev. Collins and the chairman of the town commissioners.28Liverpool Mercury, 1 June 1847; Freeman’s Journal, 2 June, 8 July 1847. By this time there were thought to be 385 registered electors in the borough, one fifth of whom were still qualified by ‘ancient rights’, and once again, Jephson Norreys’s position appeared to be threatened.29The Times, 24 Apr. 1847; Freeman’s Journal, 18 June 1847; Hoppen, Elections, Politics, and Society, 3. His relationship with the local Catholic clergy had become increasingly strained and he was called upon by the independent electors to come forward on repeal principles if he wished to avoid a contest. At this point David Robert Ross, who had resigned his seat as Liberal member for Belfast, came to Mallow as an enthusiastic convert to repeal and received warm support from the local priests.30The Times, 5 June 1845. Ross was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Tobago in February 1851: Stenton, Who’s Who of British MPs, i. 334. At the hustings two ‘blinds’, John Dillon Croker, a veteran local ‘Tory’, and Michael Joseph Barry, a Young Irelander, were also nominated. Jephson Norreys voiced his disgust with the government’s inability to meet the ‘present depression’ and, in calling for unity amongst the Irish representatives, urged the primacy of practical reforms to landholding and local government over repeal. Ross attacked both the Union and ‘the rule of political economy’ in what was described as ‘a wild oration’. The show of hands favoured Ross, but after demanding a poll, Jephson Norreys was returned by a margin of 15 votes.31Freeman’s Journal, 28, 31 July 1841, 5 Aug. 1847; Daily News, 6 Aug. 1847.

Although the 1850 Franchise Act extended voting rights to £8 rated occupiers, by 1851 Mallow’s registered electorate dwindled to 143, less than a third of its size in 1832. At the 1852 general election the Conservatives calculated on a large gain in the Irish boroughs and Jephson Norreys was quick to criticise Lord Derby’s ministry for failing to declare its position on protection and its commitment to the Maynooth grant. He advocated an extension to the franchise and the introduction of the ballot, and declared himself in favour of legislation to secure compensation for Irish tenants who improved their holdings. In spite of having voted for the measure, he appealed to Catholic voters by describing the Ecclesiastical Titles Act as ‘an unwise measure’ and advocating its repeal.32Daily News, 19 July 1852; Morning Chronicle, 16 Apr. 1852. Sceptical of this volte face, critics of Jephson Norreys claimed that his support for William Sharman Crawford’s tenant-right bill had been prompted less by conviction than by his doubts about retaining his seat. Challenge by a Captain Roche, a relative of the County Cork MP, Edmund Burke Roche, who stood as ‘a Liberal and Protectionist’, the contest was soon joined by Captain Charles Stannard Eustace, a local farmer, who favoured Derby’s policy of ‘modified protection’, leaving Jephson Norreys stood ‘on the edge of a razor’. The Irish Liberal press predicted that his consistent support for the Russell ministry during 1851-2, in the face of fierce Irish opposition, would ‘be brought up in judgment against him’. Nevertheless, Roche, along with James O’Hea and Rev. Charles Barry, who were also nominated, did not go to the poll, and Jephson Norreys’s ‘long-tried liberalism’ once again ‘stood his friend in the hour of sore trial’, as Eustace was beaten by a clear margin.33Freeman’s Journal, 1 May, 13 July 1852; Daily News, 12, 22 Apr. 4, 23 June 1852; Manchester Times, 17 July 1852.

By 1857 some of the borough’s independent electors were eager to open the field and Sir Henry Wrixon-Becher, the son of Jephson Norreys’s predecessor as MP for Mallow, was briefly spoken of as a candidate. Instead, Henry M. Windsor, a wealthy English gentleman residing near Mallow, came forward as a moderate Conservative.34Freeman’s Journal, 11, 16 Mar. 1857; Morning Chronicle, 12 Mar. 1857; Belfast News-letter, 17 Mar. 1857. He advocated a ‘safe measure of reform’, a revision of public expenditure and ‘an upright and independent foreign policy’, such as that recently taken by Palmerston towards China. He also called for the eradication of the existing system of patronage, which he denounced ‘as one of the greatest abuses that has crept into the constitution’, but soon withdrew from the contest, leaving Jephson Norreys to be returned without opposition.35Freeman’s Journal, 18 Mar., 1 Apr. 1857; Morning Chronicle, 20 Mar. 1857; Daily News, 27 Mar. 1857.

At the 1859 general election, there was a widespread feeling that Jephson Norreys was no longer sufficiently supportive of Liberal causes. His last vote in the House prior to the election had been in favour of what the Freeman’s Journal dubbed ‘the obstructive Reform Bill of the Tories’, and it was thought that the only support he could count upon was that of the ‘petty bodyguard’ of his tenantry.36Freeman’s Journal, 14 May 1859; Belfast News-letter, 27 Apr. 1859. Jephson Norreys himself acknowledged the independent disposition of his electors who, he confessed, had not infrequently reminded him that he was ‘only permitted to represent them “during good behaviour”’.37Freeman’s Journal, 13 Apr. 1859. It seemed that the Conservative and ‘independent’ Catholic electors had ‘decided upon making a united and decisive effort… to rescue the borough’ from Norrey’s grasp38Belfast News-letter, 27 Apr. 1859.. Edward Sullivan, the distinguished barrister, was spoken of as a rival Liberal candidate but, having ‘“felt” his way’ there, did not offer.39Morning Chronicle, 13 Apr. 1859; Freeman’s Journal, 19 Apr. 1859. Shortly afterwards the electors were called upon to reserve their votes as it was rumoured that an English gentleman of ‘independent principles and fortune’ would soon seek their support.40Daily News, 26 Apr. 1859; Freeman’s Journal, 22 Apr. 1859. Although this challenge failed to materialise, another arose after the Central Conservative Society of Ireland reported impressive registration activity in Mallow. The borough duly joined the government’s list of possible gains, and £300 was dispensed from central funds by the Irish chief secretary, Lord Naas, for election purposes.41Hoppen, Elections, Politics, and Society, 291; idem., ‘Tories, Catholics, and the General Election of 1859’, HJ, 13:1 (1970), 48-67 [64, 66]. Crucially, the Catholic clergy turned decisively against Jephson Norreys who, though a Protestant, had hitherto been deemed preferable to a Conservative. The widespread belief that Lord Derby would give fair consideration to the Catholic church and the rights of Irish tenants enabled Robert Longfield, a distinguished Protestant Conservative barrister, to come forward with some prospect of success. A branch of Longfield’s family resided in the neighbourhood and owned about ‘one-third of the town’. He arrived in Mallow to an enthusiastic reception. The parish priest, Rev. Justin McCarthy, having declared himself an ‘ardent supporter’, half the constituency (including three Catholic and three Protestant clergymen) were reported to have signed a declaration of ‘cordial support’.42Belfast News-letter, 27 Apr. 1859; Freeman’s Journal, 28 Apr. 1859. There were at this time 151 registered electors in the borough of whom 142 were expected to vote. The show of hands was in Longfield’s favour, and a poll was demanded. There was a tumultuous atmosphere in the town during the contest, which witnessed an unusual occurrence of mob violence. Jephson Norreys was defeated by a clear margin ‘and never recovered his influence’.43Freeman’s Journal, 9, 28 Apr. 1859; Daily News, 4 May 1859; Hoppen, Elections, Politics, and Society, 395-6, 404; Hoppen, ‘General Election of 1859’, 55.

The seat did not, however, remain long in Conservative hands. After years of being spoken of as a prospective candidate, and having been promised a large degree of popular support, Edward Sullivan finally addressed the electors of his native town as ‘a firm and sincere adherent’ of the Liberal party in 1865.44Morning Post, 31 Jan. 1862, 27 Mar. 1862, 13 Mar. 1865; Freeman’s Journal, 10 Jan. 1865. Married to a Catholic, Sullivan was committed to ‘complete equality in matters of religion and education’ and favoured the compensation of agricultural tenants who made improvements at their own expense. He arrived in the town on 3 July to an enthusiastic reception, and immediately canvassed the electors.45Freeman’s Journal, 1, 4, 5 July 1865; Belfast News-letter, 6, 7 July 1865. Although Longfield retained the support of the parish priest, popular opinion had turned against him for his defence of the Derryveagh evictions and his perceived lack of support for Catholic causes and, ‘finding it useless to continue his canvass’, he withdrew. Sullivan was returned unopposed and his carriage drawn in triumph through the town, thus inaugurating a second period of Liberal hegemony in the borough.46Freeman’s Journal, 12 July 1865; Birmingham Daily Post, 18 July 1865.

Under the Liberals’ abortive Irish reform bill of May 1866, Mallow was to have been united with the boroughs of Charleville and Fermoy to form a single constituency.47PP 1866 (142) v. 103. Under the Conservatives’ 1867 Act, however, it remained unscathed until 1885. In spite of his role in suppressing Fenianism, a movement which acquired many adherents in the town, Edward Sullivan was returned again in 1868 but resigned in 1870 on being elevated to the bench.48Bolster, A History of Mallow, 83. The town had been the birthplace of the Young Irelander and renowned literary nationalist, Thomas Davis (1814-45). A Liberal, Henry Munster, was returned in his place but was unseated on petition, whereupon the borough was secured by another Liberal, George Waters. In 1874 the seat went to a Home Rule candidate, John George McCarthy, but in 1880, the Irish solicitor-general, William Moore Johnson, was returned for the Liberals after a stiff challenge from the Conservatives.49Hoppen, Elections, Politics, and Society, 59. When Johnson became a judge in 1883 the seat was won by William O’Brien, a native of Mallow and a senior lieutenant of Charles Stewart Parnell. In 1885, the borough was incorporated into the constituency of North Cork, an Irish Nationalist stronghold.