BATEMAN, John (1792-1863), of Oak Park, Killeen, co. Kerry of Dirreen Lodge, Castleisland, co. Kerry

An Irish Tory squire, who was once described by Daniel O’Connell as ‘an utter incapable, who could not read three words of English’, Bateman provided a brief hiatus in the post-reform domination of the radical borough of Tralee by the Liberator’s family.1Morning Post, 3 Aug. 1837. Having been rapidly unseated, he made continued efforts to rally opposition to the Liberal interest in his neighbourhood until, his fortunes sinking with the Great Famine, he sold off his estates and retired to England.

Bateman was descended from an East Anglian officer of Cromwell’s army, who had settled in Ireland about 1654. Subsequently granted considerable estates in Kerry by Charles II, Rowland Bateman became customs collector at Tralee and high sheriff of the county in 1669, and his family settled at Oak Park in 1697.2Burke’s Landed Gentry (1848), i. 68; M.C. O’Laughlin, Families of County Kerry, Ireland (1994), 5. Bateman’s grandfather, another Rowland Bateman (c. 1737-1803), had sat in the Irish parliament for the close borough of Tralee, 1761-8, and, having married the eldest daughter of the borough’s patron, Sir Thomas Denny, represented County Kerry, 1776-83.3E. Johnston-Liik, History of the Irish Parliament 1692-1800 (2002), iii. 146-7. The family’s close association with Tralee was maintained when Bateman’s father, who had signed the pro-Union county petition, married his first cousin, a daughter of Sir Barry Denny, in 1790.4Burke’s Landed Gentry (1848), i. 68.

Bateman was born in Dublin, but inherited more than 11,000 acres in county Kerry from his father and in the 1820s built a large mansion at Oak Park, just one mile from Tralee. He was an active magistrate and served as high sheriff of Kerry in 1820.5The Times, 8 Dec. 1821. He also became involved in local politics, chairing a meeting of the vestry at Tralee to consider the Tithes Compensation Act in October 1823, and joining Colonel James Crosbie on the platform at the County Kerry election in 1826. Standing himself as a second Conservative candidate alongside Pierce Crosbie at the 1830 general election, he came fourth in the poll.6Morning Post, 8 Oct. 1823; Morning Chronicle, 1 July 1826; HP Commons, 1820-1832, iii. 781-3.

As an extensive local proprietor, Bateman was brought forward for Tralee in the Denny interest at the 1837 general election.7Standard, 13, 14 July 1837; Morning Chronicle, 23 Sept. 1837. His address was ‘silent regarding politics’, and despite being the Protestant corporation’s candidate he was regarded as ‘a moderate Conservative’ and attracted the votes of twenty Catholic electors.8The Times, 14 July 1837; Morning Post, 22 Aug. 1837. He was returned ahead of Maurice O’Connell after a very close contest, a result which Benjamin Disraeli regarded as ‘very welcome’ proof that the Irish boroughs could be ‘rescued from [Daniel] O’Connell’s gripe [sic]’.9Morning Chronicle, 10 Aug. 1837; B. Disraeli to S. Disraeli, 11 Aug. 1837: Benjamin Disraeli Letters, ii. 292. O’Connell, however, was convinced that the outcome had been determined by ‘the most afflicting stupidity’ of the assessor, who had disqualified a number of votes on a technicality. The result was therefore immediately challenged and funds quickly raised for a petition against Bateman’s return.10D. O’Connell to P.V. Fitzgerald, 11 Aug. 1837, O’Connell Correspondence, ed. M.R. O’Connell, vi. 80-1; Standard, 17 Aug. 1837; Freeman’s Journal, 31 July 1841.

Bateman had pronounced Orange sympathies, and in September 1837 was said to have proposed a toast at the County Club to ‘The Battle of the Diamond – hell and damnation to Lord Mulgrave and all Radicals of his feeling’.11Caledonian Mercury, 30 Sept. 1837; The Times, 2 Oct. 1837. He appears to have attended the Commons regularly, voting in 40 divisions during his short time in parliament. Given the dubious circumstances of his own return, he prudently voted against both the second reading of the controverted elections bill, 27 Nov. 1837, and William Smith O’Brien’s motion on Irish election petitions, 6 Dec., and divided against the third reading of the parliamentary electors bill, 19 Feb. 1838. He voted in favour of Sir Robert Peel’s resolution on the civil pensions list, 8 Dec. 1837, backed the Irish poor relief bill, 9 Feb., and divided against the ballot, 15 Feb. He found himself in the unusual position of entering the division lobby alongside Daniel O’Connell in favour of an investigation into certain claims on the French compensation fund, 22 Feb., but then eagerly recorded five votes in favour of reprimanding O’Connell for breach of privilege, 26, 27 Feb. 1838. He appears to have spoken in the Commons only once, during the debate on the civil list in November 1837, when he angered the chancellor of the exchequer by asking whether the pension of the Irish poet Thomas Moore had been ‘granted to him for making ballads for lovesick maidens, or for slandering George the fourth’.12Hansard, 23 Nov. 1837, vol. 39, c. 161. A petition against Bateman’s return was presented that month, and he was unseated when the Tralee assessor’s objection to the validity of electors’ voting certificates was overruled by a committee, 12 Mar. 1838.13CJ xciii. 47-8, 349; The Times, 27 Nov. 1837.

Bateman twice offered briefly for Tralee as the candidate of the County Club at the 1841 and 1847 general elections, but did not appear at the hustings.14The Times, 5, 11 June 1841; Standard, 19 June 1841; Morning Chronicle, 22 June 1847; Daily News, 22, 30 June 1847. In July 1851 he sold off the greater part of his estate in order to pay off £61,000 in encumbrances, Oak Park being purchased by the tea magnate, Thomas Sandes, for more than £20,000.15Freeman’s Journal, 9 July 1851; The Times, 25 July 1851; Irish Jurist, vi (1854), 91; J. Bateman, The Great Landowners of Great Britain (4th edn., 1883), 395. By then Bateman had taken up residence in London, where his wife, a niece of the famed actress Mrs. Jordan (Dorothea Bland), died some time prior to 1861.16Census returns 1851 and 1861; London Magazine, x (1824), 555; R.B. Mosse, The Parliamentary Guide (1837), 135; Examiner, 25 Nov. 1848. Thus Mrs. Bateman’s great-grandfather was grandfather of the children of William IV: The Assembled Commons; or, parliamentary biographer (1838), 26.

Bateman died at his residence in Leslie Park Road, Croydon in October 1863. His personal effects were sworn at under £1,500, and he is thought to have left a daughter.17Morning Post, 7 Oct. 1863; Gent. Mag. (1863), ii. 661; Nat. Probate Calendar, Index of Wills, 1858-1966 (27 Oct. 1863), re-sworn July 1865. His only son, Rowland Bateman (1826-57), a lieutenant in the 64^th Foot, had been killed at the relief of Lucknow in September 1857.18For which his father received £455 16s 10d in compensation: Morning Chronicle, 24 Apr. 1858.